Speaker 1: Welcome to Parenting Out Loud, the podcast that brought you
Speaker 1: six seven. We're not like every other parenting podcast. We're
Speaker 1: not here to tell you how to parent. We look
Speaker 1: at the trends and the culture and sort of like
Speaker 1: the vibe of parenting and like to kind of pick
Speaker 1: it apart. It's pretty fun. Actually, I'm monque Bowling.
Speaker 2: I'm Amelia Lesta, and I'm Stacey Hicks.
Speaker 1: Coming up on today's show.
Speaker 3: Our viral dilemma this week has sparked a big conversation
Speaker 3: about grandparent boundaries and it's quite spicy.
Speaker 4: Deanna Miller Laura Henshaw two celebrities presenting two very different
Speaker 4: images of what it means and looks like to be
Speaker 4: a new mum.
Speaker 2: So why are people happy with either of them?
Speaker 1: And the Japanese invention that we're obsessed with.
Speaker 3: But first at first, guys, the biggest celebrity mom group
Speaker 3: drama of twenty twenty six has been sparked up again.
Speaker 2: Mandy Moore has entered the chat.
Speaker 4: I was so worried that Mandy Moore would enter the
Speaker 4: parenting chat drama while you were on holiday.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, this has been a story this Sorry, can
Speaker 3: you explain the story to me.
Speaker 1: It's so there are so many prongs. Now, can you
Speaker 1: just give me like a quick praise?
Speaker 5: Yeah, we're up to Yes.
Speaker 3: I can, as the official Celebrity mom Roup correspondent of
Speaker 3: this podcast. So this kicked off back on January one,
Speaker 3: and I love that Mandy Moore has just gone, no,
Speaker 3: I'm not over it yet. It's May and we're talking
Speaker 3: about it again. But it kicked off on me January. Sorry,
Speaker 3: it kicked off on January one because Ashley Tisdale of
Speaker 3: high school musical fame published a pretty scathing article with
Speaker 3: the cart explaining why she left her toxic mum guen.
Speaker 5: She published that on New Year's Day. Yes that's some
Speaker 5: like six. Yes, yes, she's looked at the moon.
Speaker 1: She's gone. You know what I'm doing it. We're changing
Speaker 1: things up this year. I'm going to start the year
Speaker 1: with toxicity.
Speaker 3: Yes. Yeah, she was like twenty twenty six, the year
Speaker 3: of being toxic, and here I go. So she claimed
Speaker 3: that there was mean girl behavior in this mum's group
Speaker 3: that she had to she had to leave. She couldn't
Speaker 3: take it anymore. And it was a celebrity studded mum
Speaker 3: see it was so it was widely known that she
Speaker 3: was in a mum's group with Hillary Duff, Mandy Moore,
Speaker 3: Meghan Trainer, like, they were all posting mom outings together,
Speaker 3: mom holidays all over the place, so it was widely
Speaker 3: known that these were the women she was speaking about,
Speaker 3: despite her never actually saying anything. Now, instead of Hillary
Speaker 3: Duff piping up straight away, Hillary Duff's husband decided to
Speaker 3: clap back on her behalf, which I kind of love
Speaker 3: that she just went, I'm outsourcing this to you, and
Speaker 3: he kind of did this mock cover of her cut
Speaker 3: article and he had the headline, when You're the most
Speaker 3: self obsessed, tone deaf person on Earth. Other moms tend
Speaker 3: to shift their focus to their actual toddlers.
Speaker 5: Burn Oh yes, I.
Speaker 2: Wish all husbands were as good at clapping back as
Speaker 2: as it was iconic.
Speaker 3: He even like dressed and mimicked the position that she
Speaker 3: was in in the photo with the cart. It was
Speaker 3: all it was all very juicy and very petty, but
Speaker 3: it had kind of died down, you know, we'd moved
Speaker 3: on from this. And then Mandy Moore was on Andy
Speaker 3: Cohen's podcast this week and she got asked about it.
Speaker 2: So this is what she had to.
Speaker 6: Say, it's wild to have anybody talk about your life.
Speaker 6: And I know Hillary has sort of mentioned this too.
Speaker 6: It's like we both have grown up in this business
Speaker 6: and had people dissect who we are and the choices
Speaker 6: we make and all of that. But this was something
Speaker 6: altogether different and decidedly like way more upsetting, you know
Speaker 6: what I mean, because it just like cuts to the
Speaker 6: core of I think the most important thing in my
Speaker 6: life is being a kind person and like that legacy
Speaker 6: of kindness, and anyone even insinuating that that might not
Speaker 6: be the case, and with the company that I choose
Speaker 6: to keep is like, is very upsetting.
Speaker 2: How's your legacy of christ?
Speaker 1: I don't mean to laugh. I don't mean to laugh.
Speaker 1: But when I saw this, I watched this with no
Speaker 1: sound on, so I didn't hear what she was saying,
Speaker 1: and all I did all I could see was her
Speaker 1: body language in this, And I got to say, I'm
Speaker 1: no body language expert, but I have watched enough Channel
Speaker 1: nine Today show with body language experts to know what
Speaker 1: I'm talking about. It is so it is so charged,
Speaker 1: and it is so defensive, and it does not come
Speaker 1: across well.
Speaker 3: I had a bit of sympathy for her with this,
Speaker 3: because I wondered whether it was one of those things
Speaker 3: where she's held a tongue and she's held a tongue,
Speaker 3: you know, like those people. I'm saying those people and
Speaker 3: I'm this people that can't have someone else thinking ill
Speaker 3: of you even though it doesn't really matter anymore.
Speaker 2: And it's like she just.
Speaker 3: So desperately wanted to fix the narrative and say no,
Speaker 3: but I'm not mean, like I never would have been mean.
Speaker 2: And that's what this felt like, that she was trying
Speaker 2: to be chill.
Speaker 3: And say, you know, yeah, it is upsetting when someone
Speaker 3: says that, and you know that's not who I am.
Speaker 3: But it came across as like, please, don't think I'm
Speaker 3: a mean girl.
Speaker 5: Please. It has no chill.
Speaker 1: It has no chill. And that's interesting because she would
Speaker 1: have known that this was going to come up, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Why hadn't someone prepared her and said, Mandy much chill
Speaker 1: in this situation, like you need to just be so
Speaker 1: level headed and even like channel a CEO, channel Ted
Speaker 1: Lasso and just be like, you know what, it's just
Speaker 1: really disappointing that some people were upset, and I wish
Speaker 1: them well. All it needed to.
Speaker 4: Be gentle parented, Andy Cohen said was very disappointing. I
Speaker 4: think the reason why she wasn't able to rain herself
Speaker 4: in here, despite the fact that I think we can
Speaker 4: agree that Mandy Moore and Hillary Duff won this narrative, Like,
Speaker 4: I don't think anyone thought Ashley Tisdale came out looking
Speaker 4: good from it. Setting that aside, I think that what
Speaker 4: you see happening in this clip is that realization of
Speaker 4: the way you think about yourself is different from the
Speaker 4: way other people think about you. Yeah, that is such
Speaker 4: a confronting moment in anyone's life because you think, well,
Speaker 4: I'm putting out kindness in the world. I'm just trying
Speaker 4: to be kind and clearly it's not coming across that
Speaker 4: way to some people. And you can almost see like
Speaker 4: the cogs in her brain like trying to trying to
Speaker 4: turn over.
Speaker 2: Am I the mean girl?
Speaker 4: Maybe I am the mean girl when I only ever
Speaker 4: tried to be kind?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I do feel I do feel for her.
Speaker 3: I think she's one of those She's had that legacy
Speaker 3: of being one of those very wholesome you know, she
Speaker 3: was famous very early, much like Hillary was, and they
Speaker 3: have both had pretty untarnished reputations as they've as they've
Speaker 3: grown up in this industry.
Speaker 5: Child stars, Yeah, they were child.
Speaker 3: Stars essentially, and so to have someone saying that you're
Speaker 3: you're not a nice person would feel like a big affront.
Speaker 3: But who knows, Maybe Megan Trainer's husband will pipe in
Speaker 3: soon like another update, and this.
Speaker 5: Story will just go all year.
Speaker 1: Like speaking of child stars, it does feel childish to
Speaker 1: an extent, And I think for me, what's interesting about
Speaker 1: it is it's giving high school. It's giving high school
Speaker 1: drama and me and girl drama. And there is this
Speaker 1: maybe there's this myth of when you become a mother
Speaker 1: that you've shared this unique experience with a lot of
Speaker 1: other women. So there's sort of like this kumbayanas that
Speaker 1: might come over you and you suddenly feel like, oh,
Speaker 1: we're a sisterhood, right, I am a mother, you're a
Speaker 1: mother as a mother. But this just shows that is
Speaker 1: not the case at all, Like it is still very
Speaker 1: much high school.
Speaker 5: Two much love.
Speaker 4: Celebrities have lately presented in some ways polar opposite visions
Speaker 4: of what new motherhood actually looks like.
Speaker 5: So let me tell you about the first.
Speaker 4: Laura Henshaw appeared on the cover of Sunday Life magazine
Speaker 4: for her first Mother's Day with her five month old
Speaker 4: son Atlas.
Speaker 2: Very cool.
Speaker 5: And she looked so.
Speaker 4: Gorgeous and was wearing this kind of beautiful coats with
Speaker 4: her baby nestled under her and you know, relaxing by
Speaker 4: autumn foliage. The photoshoot was gorgeous. Hensher is the co
Speaker 4: founder of wellness platform Kick. She has three hundred and
Speaker 4: forty six thousand followers on Instagram, which is about three
Speaker 4: hundred and forty five thousand and ninety more followers than
Speaker 4: I have. She's been very honest and upfront with her
Speaker 4: community about the challenges of parenting. And this started even
Speaker 4: before she had kids. She had this podcast that she
Speaker 4: hosted called Do I Want Kids? And then on her
Speaker 4: main podcast, she's talked about since having Atlas, for instance,
Speaker 4: her decision to choose an elective cesarean, how hard it
Speaker 4: is to co parent in a fair and equitable way
Speaker 4: with her husband, Dalton. So she is used to controversy,
Speaker 4: but even she must have been taken aback by what
Speaker 4: happened last month when she breastfed Atlas. In a conversation
Speaker 4: on her podcast with Dalton, her husband, here's a bit
Speaker 4: of that podcast. I don't want anyone to listen and
Speaker 4: think we had it all figured out before we went in.
Speaker 5: Because we absolutely didn't.
Speaker 2: And it has been. It has been really hard, and
Speaker 2: it was really interesting.
Speaker 1: Yesterday I had a conversation with someone in my DMS.
Speaker 3: She said, are you really sharing the load or are
Speaker 3: you just telling us that?
Speaker 5: Do you hear Al a.
Speaker 1: Little bit squeaks and then little squeaks of him.
Speaker 4: It sounds adorable, but then he or she is unpacking
Speaker 4: the response with her co host Steph Claire Smith.
Speaker 3: If you can't look at me breastfeeding without sexualizing me.
Speaker 4: You need to do some work on yourself.
Speaker 2: That is not my problem, he said. Imagine a guy
Speaker 2: did this because.
Speaker 4: He was in a rush, in a rush, Yes, he
Speaker 4: just had to film a podcast with his penis. Hat
Speaker 4: was the most rogue comment, because why.
Speaker 3: The could you need to get your penis out in
Speaker 3: a podcast?
Speaker 5: So that was yes.
Speaker 4: One of the criticisms was how gratuitous it was of
Speaker 4: her to take her breast out to breastfeed her son
Speaker 4: while podcasting. So let me pause there before I tell
Speaker 4: you about a s who I think is presenting a
Speaker 4: very different image of New motherhood and ask if you
Speaker 4: saw this moms, did you see that controversy?
Speaker 5: And is this really where we're still.
Speaker 1: At I saw the original clip and not the controversy,
Speaker 1: and I just scrolled on past and was like, cool,
Speaker 1: there's a woman at work doing all the work. The
Speaker 1: baby's hungry, she has to record the podcast like play
Speaker 1: on no worries. I'm not surprised that the response to
Speaker 1: it was so disgusting, and it was because I think
Speaker 1: we know that there's this lurking manisphere. There's these men
Speaker 1: out there that feel that they can have these kind
Speaker 1: of vocal opinions, that they are very aggressive in the
Speaker 1: way that they go after people on social media. So
Speaker 1: I thought the response to it was excellent because them
Speaker 1: laughing at it and ridiculing it almost but then being
Speaker 1: able to take a step back and just laugh their
Speaker 1: heads off at what some of these men were saying
Speaker 1: takes a lot of the power out of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there was a vibe of you're at work, why
Speaker 4: can't you just focus on your work? That was very
Speaker 4: much the message that these commenters were sending Laura. But
Speaker 4: what's interesting is that this week Sienna Miller, who was
Speaker 4: a millennial icon went on Jimmy Fallon's show just three
Speaker 4: weeks after giving birth at the.
Speaker 5: Age of forty four.
Speaker 4: Just pause for a minute and imagine you are three
Speaker 4: weeks after giving birth at the age of forty four,
Speaker 4: and you need to go on Jimmy Fallon's show to
Speaker 4: talk about your Amazon Prime series with John Krasinski. She
Speaker 4: also has a toddler and a teenager at home, by
Speaker 4: the way, and the message.
Speaker 1: Oh no, no, no, Amelia the toddler was on the flight
Speaker 1: with her to the Jimmy Fallon Show. She had to
Speaker 1: take a transatlantic flight with a three week old and
Speaker 1: a toddler to even get to that interview and three
Speaker 1: week's postpartner.
Speaker 4: She put on a marigold yellow spaghetti strap dress and looks,
Speaker 4: I think, more beautiful than I've ever I've seen even
Speaker 4: Sienna Miller look and talks to Jimmy Fallon in a
Speaker 4: completely coherent way.
Speaker 2: Here she is and I can't even believe that you're
Speaker 2: here because you just had a baby three weeks ago.
Speaker 4: It's yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1: It's crazy to be talking words and wearing like a dress.
Speaker 4: So she sounds self deprecating in that clip, but then
Speaker 4: she very quickly does move on to her work project.
Speaker 4: And I'll call this approach to new motherhood the Margo
Speaker 4: because you know who else did this had a baby
Speaker 4: and then went straight back to never talking about babies
Speaker 4: at work was Margot Robbie Stacy. You had quite a
Speaker 4: strong reaction to our friend Sienna's address.
Speaker 3: I don't like this about myself, Like, would I ever
Speaker 3: commented on the internet. No, of course I wouldn't. But internally,
Speaker 3: when I saw that clip of her, I did go, oh,
Speaker 3: you're so annoying, like, how do you look that beautiful?
Speaker 3: And me doing all of this stuff three weeks later?
Speaker 3: It just makes me feel bad And that's so ridiculous.
Speaker 3: And I know that intellectually because this was ten minutes
Speaker 3: of Sienna Miller's day. A person who has access to
Speaker 3: makeup artists, nanny's stylists, it's her job to look like that.
Speaker 3: It's her job to go out and present those things.
Speaker 3: So of course she is going to go and do that.
Speaker 3: But I don't think you can help but kind of
Speaker 3: compare your own experience to that and where you were
Speaker 3: at at that at that point, And even though I
Speaker 3: know that, you know the rest of her night was
Speaker 3: probably a shit show.
Speaker 2: With that baby. It did make me bristle, it did.
Speaker 4: I think that's a completely valid emotional response. What happened
Speaker 4: online is that comment has started criticizing her for leaving
Speaker 4: her baby God and Margot. Robbie has also gotten some
Speaker 4: backclash recently from people saying, where's your baby, Margot? Why
Speaker 4: aren't you talking about your baby? And it suddenly occurred
Speaker 4: to me, maybe this is what patriarchy is. When a
Speaker 4: new mother can literally not do anything right. If she
Speaker 4: feeds her baby, she's told she's not focusing on her work.
Speaker 4: If she focuses on her work, she's told that she
Speaker 4: needs to be at home with her baby.
Speaker 3: And what's the other option, Like we want these women
Speaker 3: to completely vanish, And that's the.
Speaker 4: Thing that's the preferred outcome.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that is so such a bad message to
Speaker 3: send to mothers, that you must be invisible after that point,
Speaker 3: like you must retreat, so we don't see how you
Speaker 3: do it, whether it's right or wrong.
Speaker 2: We just know you're with them. Twenty seven.
Speaker 5: That's a great point, Stacy.
Speaker 4: I actually hadn't put it together that that's why this
Speaker 4: message gets pushed out there, because if both Margo and
Speaker 4: Laura feel like they're they're doing it wrong. The net
Speaker 4: result is every day women who are not celebrities look
Speaker 4: at them and say, there's no right way of doing this.
Speaker 4: So I'm just going to make sure that I take
Speaker 4: myself out of the professional sphere altogether. Mons are we
Speaker 4: overthinking this? Is this just Ciana Milla looking beautiful in
Speaker 4: a spaghetti strut dressed?
Speaker 1: You know what, I don't think they give a fuck
Speaker 1: what we all think. I don't think they give a
Speaker 1: fuck what people on the internet think. I don't think
Speaker 1: they care. I think they are doing what is right
Speaker 1: for them in that moment, and that is their choice
Speaker 1: and more power to them. I think that Ciena Miller
Speaker 1: might not have even wanted to be there. She probably
Speaker 1: signed a contract to promote this movie two years ago
Speaker 1: and the timing didn't line up. You know, Laura Henshaw
Speaker 1: is running her own business. You can't take maternity leave.
Speaker 1: You have to just keep working. And I just think
Speaker 1: we're at the point now where there is so much
Speaker 1: noise towards mothers that it's like become white noise. And
Speaker 1: I just really hope that they just shrug their shoulders
Speaker 1: and get on with it, because who cares is that
Speaker 1: too simplistic.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think so.
Speaker 3: I just think that women in the public eye, they've
Speaker 3: just got an impossible task. But I at least like
Speaker 3: that we're seeing different versions of what motherhood can be
Speaker 3: at that point, because I think, yeah, there is actually
Speaker 3: a lot of movement in that space to women seeing
Speaker 3: different ways of doing things. So at least that's something.
Speaker 3: But it's a shame that they need to take such
Speaker 3: backlash in order for that to happen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. At some point in the journey
Speaker 1: of becoming a mother, you're just too tired to care
Speaker 1: what other people think. You're just too tired, and your
Speaker 1: head is down and you are getting on with it.
Speaker 1: And I hope that that's what these women are doing
Speaker 1: and not even reading the comments. The other point is
Speaker 1: that like women are being asked to make motherhood look
Speaker 1: compatible with everything else. That's the frustrating bit is that
Speaker 1: this is a lie, like Ciam Miller thing is a
Speaker 1: total lie, Like you can't.
Speaker 3: That's so true, that's so true, that's seemlesstncient bold.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and that's that's difficult. But aren't we smart
Speaker 1: enough now to all look at it and go, wow,
Speaker 1: She's amazing. She must have had a whole team of people.
Speaker 1: She probably didn't even want it.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm projecting too much onto her.
Speaker 3: Okay, there is this trend popping up in Japan at
Speaker 3: the moment that I think is one of the most
Speaker 3: brilliant ideas for mothers I've ever seen, and they need
Speaker 3: to have them everywhere.
Speaker 2: They're called nighttime crying cafes.
Speaker 5: I love it already, It's so good.
Speaker 3: So they essent spaces for women where they can take
Speaker 3: their babies late at night or into the early hours
Speaker 3: of the morning, free of charge, and just be with
Speaker 3: other mothers who are also going through the same thing
Speaker 3: while their babies cry it out, essentially. So one woman,
Speaker 3: Medoka Nazawa, she runs one of these crying cafes in
Speaker 3: Hakkaido free of charge, in a space that is actually
Speaker 3: used as a specialty French toast shop during the day,
Speaker 3: which I want to go to quite badly.
Speaker 1: But smell delicious, wouldn't it.
Speaker 3: But this place is then run by volunteers at night
Speaker 3: so that these women can bring their babies. The babies
Speaker 3: can play or sleep, they can breastfeed, change nappies there
Speaker 3: and just be heard these by these volunteers in that space.
Speaker 2: Isn't that so genius?
Speaker 4: I love that I had a baby in Japan, and
Speaker 4: it is true that is of course in many ways,
Speaker 4: the public spaces are really nicely set up for babies.
Speaker 2: I remember there was a cafe near.
Speaker 4: Where I lived which had a broom which was covered
Speaker 4: in those like play mats that you get for kids. Yeah,
Speaker 4: like where they can crawl around. There was just one
Speaker 4: big round table so there were no sharp edges and
Speaker 4: I could just take my baby there and have the
Speaker 4: baby crawl around while I was drinking my delicious coffee.
Speaker 4: That's great and I just wish that more places in
Speaker 4: Australia would do that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I know this is meant to be like a funny
Speaker 1: light segment, but I have such a visceral reaction to
Speaker 1: reading this story and I feel like the pin prick
Speaker 1: of tears behind my eyes because I had two babies
Speaker 1: with colic. I don't know if either of you had
Speaker 1: a baby with KIT and that is the most intense
Speaker 1: and relentless experience in those early early months, and I
Speaker 1: would have loved to, like I remember that feeling of
Speaker 1: four o'clock coming and the feeling of dread in the
Speaker 1: pit of my stomach. The crying was going to start,
Speaker 1: and then it just wouldn't stop until ten o'clock at night.
Speaker 1: And it's that I would love to go to a
Speaker 1: crying cafe where you can just I don't know if
Speaker 1: I would have had the energy for it, but just
Speaker 1: to know that there was a space where other people
Speaker 1: were going through it.
Speaker 3: It's so important, Yeah, because those hours really do feel
Speaker 3: like the loneliest of your entire life, horrendous, they will
Speaker 3: never ever end. And to just think of this like
Speaker 3: going out into the night and literally seeing that light
Speaker 3: at the end of the tunnel, like that light at
Speaker 3: the end of the street that you could go to
Speaker 3: and just be there and know someone else was there,
Speaker 3: would just be the coolest thing.
Speaker 2: So I hope these pop up more and more.
Speaker 4: I feel like I need to interject also, though, and
Speaker 4: say that the flip side to Japan having a lot
Speaker 4: of really lovely spaces for babies is that those spaces
Speaker 4: are very much designed for mothers and babies. It's a
Speaker 4: lot of the expectations and responsibilities around child wearing in
Speaker 4: Japan still very much lie with mothers, and in fact,
Speaker 4: recently in the same newspaper that we read this in,
Speaker 4: which is The Japan Times, there was a headline about
Speaker 4: how Japanese dads are so overwhelmed that they've started Isakaia
Speaker 4: support groups.
Speaker 5: Isakaias are of course bars.
Speaker 4: And the dads going to isakia support groups there are
Speaker 4: not There are no babies in isakiah's, so the mothers
Speaker 4: go to a place with.
Speaker 5: Their babies for emotional support.
Speaker 4: The fathers are heading out to Kiski sour at the
Speaker 4: isakayah And look, I don't think any society is perfect
Speaker 4: on this note. But there was an article in Time
Speaker 4: magazine just a couple of years ago about a government
Speaker 4: flyer that was being distributed in on Amishi, which is
Speaker 4: a city in Hiroshima Prefecture, and it was a pamphlet
Speaker 4: of advice to new mothers. This was twenty twenty three,
Speaker 4: not that long ago, and it included a list of
Speaker 4: behaviors that men didn't like in their wives.
Speaker 5: These include, I want to know if you're guilty of this.
Speaker 4: Being busy taking care of the baby and not doing chores,
Speaker 4: failty of that? And what about this one getting frustrated
Speaker 4: for no reason?
Speaker 2: H Yeah.
Speaker 4: It also recommended that new mothers prepare their husband's lunch
Speaker 4: every day, thank men for doing basic household chores, and
Speaker 4: always have a smile on their faces.
Speaker 5: So look, I don't mean to be a downer.
Speaker 4: I think that we should bring the crying cafes to Australia. Absolutely,
Speaker 4: but also maybe the moms go to the Yezekaiah every
Speaker 4: now and then too.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, So there's a grandmother that went viral this week
Speaker 1: for a small crime of love and maybe overstepping depending
Speaker 1: on how you feel about it.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: The Washington Post has an advice column called life Hacks
Speaker 1: because the columnist is called Carolyn Hacks, and it went like.
Speaker 3: This, After my son's family moved back to the area,
Speaker 3: I told them I joined my grandkid's pta.
Speaker 5: My daughter in law was so upset they stopped speaking
Speaker 5: to me.
Speaker 2: What should I do?
Speaker 1: Okay? How involved is too involved?
Speaker 3: The biggest crime here comes down to one thing that
Speaker 3: she didn't ask before she joined. She mustn't have because
Speaker 3: she told them after the fact, and that is the
Speaker 3: part that's the crime. This is equivalent to saying, oh,
Speaker 3: I took your baby for their first haircut while I
Speaker 3: was looking after them. Hope that's okay?
Speaker 5: It's my god, it is not it is because it's like.
Speaker 3: The parent's probably not going to have a problem with it.
Speaker 3: They're probably happy you're taking them, but like, just run
Speaker 3: it by them first.
Speaker 5: It's a free country, right.
Speaker 3: I just think there's some things that walk that line
Speaker 3: of that's that's for me to do, and I'll tell
Speaker 3: you if I need your help with it, or just
Speaker 3: ask me if it's okay.
Speaker 5: No, Mom's what do you think?
Speaker 1: What is the crime? A succulent PTA? I say, let
Speaker 1: the grandparents at it. Seriously, if my mother in law
Speaker 1: joined the PTA, you know what, I'd think, Great, one
Speaker 1: less job for me to do. I think, you know
Speaker 1: what else can we get them to do? Can they
Speaker 1: do my tax? Can they take the kids to the
Speaker 1: orthodontis appointment?
Speaker 5: Please? Like please?
Speaker 4: I was kind of curious about the context for this,
Speaker 4: and so I went and read the actual letter that
Speaker 4: was sent to Carolyn Hacks, who, by the way, is
Speaker 4: my favorite advice columnist and has been doing it for
Speaker 4: like three decades.
Speaker 5: She's the best.
Speaker 4: The original letter is kind of like a walking red
Speaker 4: flag for a bad mother in law.
Speaker 2: I knew it.
Speaker 5: I'm just this is not her first charge.
Speaker 4: This is not one little, one little paragraph count the
Speaker 4: red flags. She says, I don't understand what's happened. I
Speaker 4: always have had a frosty relationship with my daughter in law.
Speaker 4: She is not my favorite person. I did not approve
Speaker 4: of my son marrying her and found her immature since
Speaker 4: the kids were born. I tried to let by gones
Speaker 4: be by gones.
Speaker 5: He is not letting bygones be by.
Speaker 3: I knew that this woman had a rap sheet, like
Speaker 3: I knew that this was not the first time that
Speaker 3: this mother in law has stock.
Speaker 5: She says.
Speaker 4: She responded with ignoring any advice I've provided and making
Speaker 4: it as difficult as possible for me to visit. She's cordial,
Speaker 4: but not friendly, and I feel she excludes my husband
Speaker 4: and me from some events. I cannot imagine why. I
Speaker 4: cannot imagine.
Speaker 3: Oh damn, as much as we're saying she's a menace,
Speaker 3: like tension is the price you pay for community. Unfortunately,
Speaker 3: like if you want to have family help you, if
Speaker 3: you want to have people around that help you out,
Speaker 3: there's always going to be discrepancies in the best ways.
Speaker 5: It's really profound. Tension is the price you pay for community.
Speaker 4: Did you just make that up.
Speaker 2: Yeah I did.
Speaker 5: That came out of my little tired brain.
Speaker 3: But I just think it's true, like we have differing
Speaker 3: ideals than our parents did or our parents in law do,
Speaker 3: around how we raise children, the decisions around them, and
Speaker 3: so if you want their help, if you want their participation,
Speaker 3: and you want to be around them and your children
Speaker 3: have a relationship with them, you're probably just gonna have
Speaker 3: to deal with like a little bit of that and
Speaker 3: a little bit of just going Okay, you do that
Speaker 3: thing and I'll do this thing.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so true. We say we want the village,
Speaker 1: and then when the village comes, we're like, no, not
Speaker 1: too much village, or.
Speaker 2: Don't do the village that way.
Speaker 3: That's not how I like the village done.
Speaker 1: I do think though, this has sparked an idea, an
Speaker 1: entrepreneurial idea that I have. It's like Air tasker, but
Speaker 1: for grandparents. Grand tasker, so you just like find a
Speaker 1: grandparent and then assign them a job that you don't
Speaker 1: have the time to do in your life, like, oh,
Speaker 1: the school's got an AGM, cool off you go, gramps.
Speaker 2: Yeah that takes some notes.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is a great idea. I would like one
Speaker 3: of those too, that would be great.
Speaker 1: All right, So grandparent air tasker or grand tasker aside,
Speaker 1: what else are we recommending this week?
Speaker 3: I am recommending a show, and you know my taste
Speaker 3: in shows that this is not going to be high
Speaker 3: brow people.
Speaker 5: You were the first person to tell me about here
Speaker 5: did why?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 3: And this show is similar to Heated Rivalry. It is
Speaker 3: the other hockey show. That's what it's been referred to.
Speaker 5: As so boring. It's no, it's great.
Speaker 3: Okay, let me convince you. It is a college romance
Speaker 3: between the sweet natured music student and the star hockeyslayer.
Speaker 3: And it starts with My Loves where they're trying to
Speaker 3: make someone else jealous, but then their chemistry can't be denied.
Speaker 2: Is this a trope you've seen a million times? Yes?
Speaker 5: It is?
Speaker 2: Are these people.
Speaker 5: Beautiful book student?
Speaker 1: Yesh? Does the music student have like nerding glasses and
Speaker 1: oily hair? And do they have the makeover the money?
Speaker 6: No they don't.
Speaker 3: She's absolutely stunning from the get go, absolutely stunning. But
Speaker 3: this show has gone off like everyone and their mother,
Speaker 3: I'm the mother is watching this show and like m
Speaker 3: Vernham mentioned this on Friday in out Loud as well,
Speaker 3: it's cool. See our cool girl m Burnham is watching
Speaker 3: it as well. But also I have friends who are
Speaker 3: around my age texting me and going, oh I checked.
Speaker 3: The lead is actually twenty seven, so it's not that
Speaker 3: bad that I find him.
Speaker 5: So entracted.
Speaker 2: And the main guy.
Speaker 3: Not that this matters, but it is a nice bonus.
Speaker 3: Before he became famous, he donated a kidney to a
Speaker 3: stranger in one of those kidney swaps to like get
Speaker 3: his friend a kidney. He tried to donate to his
Speaker 3: friend and wasn't compatible, so he gave one to someone else.
Speaker 5: And I just think that's very.
Speaker 2: Love, Like, what a nice man.
Speaker 5: It's very nice.
Speaker 3: It's on Amazon Prime. It is nothing but sugar and
Speaker 3: fairy floss. And that is why what's that cold?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 5: Off campus? And is it Canadian American?
Speaker 3: No, it's American, but yeah, off campus. And there's actually
Speaker 3: an Aussie star in it, Josh Houston. He's an Ossie
Speaker 3: actor and he's in it as well. It's just the
Speaker 3: hottest cast you'll ever see, yes see young but you'll
Speaker 3: enjoy it anyway.
Speaker 4: Okay, so what's your show? I have another show. Yeah,
Speaker 4: my show is called The Other Bennett's Sister. I've heard
Speaker 4: about that it's on Binge, and I basically watched the
Speaker 4: whole thing on a glorious Sunday when I was under
Speaker 4: the weather, and it was just the most posey show.
Speaker 4: It's based on the book The Other Bennett's Sister, which
Speaker 4: is a spin off of Pride and Prejudice, and it's
Speaker 4: about im pride and prejudice that the Bennett sisters. There's
Speaker 4: five of them, and there's one who's very very bookish,
Speaker 4: who doesn't get married to anyone, so it's sort of
Speaker 4: left out of the main plot, and the novel imagines
Speaker 4: what her life was like after all her sisters.
Speaker 5: Went and got married.
Speaker 4: And the show is just so well cast, well done.
Speaker 4: It's like little like thirty minute fite sized episodes. It's
Speaker 4: not sort of an epic historical drama. It feels very
Speaker 4: pacy in terms of its plot. But the reason I
Speaker 4: think it's really interesting to recommend on a parenting show
Speaker 4: is because it gets you thinking about how families tell
Speaker 4: certain truths about their dynamic and their relationships. And this
Speaker 4: sister was always told by her family that she was
Speaker 4: not beautiful like this sister, and not like this sister,
Speaker 4: and not popular like this sister, and the show is
Speaker 4: about how she manages to create her own more positive
Speaker 4: self image away from maybe the stories that she got
Speaker 4: told in her family unit. So I think it just
Speaker 4: it's a reminder that your kids are always kind of
Speaker 4: listening to the stories you're telling them about themselves.
Speaker 5: And that's my.
Speaker 4: Very convoluted way of tying it into parenting. It's just
Speaker 4: a great watch.
Speaker 2: Love it. What's yours, Mamsie?
Speaker 5: Great?
Speaker 1: I'm going to recommend another podcast and I know people
Speaker 1: are always looking for the next thing to listen to,
Speaker 1: and it's a MoMA Mere Network podcast that I also
Speaker 1: work on Caveat. It's called Unleashed. And the reason I
Speaker 1: wanted to bring it is because it's a show where
Speaker 1: you don't have to think too much. It's just very
Speaker 1: much light distraction. But in this episode this week, one
Speaker 1: of the hosts, kath Mahoney, talked about long weekends as
Speaker 1: a single parent and how there's this myth of like
Speaker 1: when there's a long weekend coming up, everyone's like, Yay,
Speaker 1: what are you doing for the long weekend? Can't wait
Speaker 1: for the long weekend? But her experience as a single
Speaker 1: parent is very different.
Speaker 7: Take a listen, I actually dread holidays and long weekends,
Speaker 7: Like since I've been divorced and a single parent, I
Speaker 7: really struggle with holidays. Oh I do, like like that'd
Speaker 7: some good ones.
Speaker 5: But yeah, I love you.
Speaker 2: You're talking about care are you talking about like holidays.
Speaker 1: And then just long weekends, like anything that feels like time?
Speaker 7: Yeah, something should be happening, and yeah, if you don't
Speaker 7: set something up, you know, it's also really lonely.
Speaker 2: So it's really yeah, crappy time.
Speaker 6: No, I mean I think that could happen to any
Speaker 6: of us, you know, being a single mom, single.
Speaker 5: Parents, right, so I completely understand.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I've like never really said that out loud, because
Speaker 7: first of all, you put on a happy face, don't
Speaker 7: you for holidays, and you don't want to sound like
Speaker 7: the person you know, Yeah, yeah, miserable. So that's the
Speaker 7: first time I've shared that on a podcast.
Speaker 1: She's just a darling. It's a really great show. It's
Speaker 1: got a lot of humor and a lot of warmth
Speaker 1: and yeah it's called Unleashed, all right. So there you
Speaker 1: have it, something to watch, something to listen to, something
Speaker 1: to do. It's been great spending time with you on
Speaker 1: parenting out loud. We will be back in your ears
Speaker 1: or in your eyeballs if you're watching on Apple Podcasts
Speaker 1: next week. Have a great week. MoMA me acknowledges the
Speaker 1: traditional owners of the land on which we have recorded
Speaker 1: this podcast.