Speaker 1: I'm gonna say this once and one time only.
Speaker 2: Don't invite me anywhere and say feel free to bring
Speaker 2: the kids unless you plan on paying for all the motherfuckers.
Speaker 3: Dead ass, dead ass, and I'm caught somewhere in between
Speaker 3: wanting to take my kids to see the world and
Speaker 3: leaving it asses at home.
Speaker 1: Dead ass.
Speaker 3: Hey, I'm Kadeen and I'm devoued, and we're the Ellis's.
Speaker 1: You may know us from posting funny videos with our
Speaker 1: boys and reading each other publicly as a form of therapy. Wait,
Speaker 1: I make you need therapy most days. Wow. Oh, and
Speaker 1: one more important thing to mention, we're married, Yes, sir,
Speaker 1: we are.
Speaker 4: We created this podcast to open dialogue about some of
Speaker 4: Li's most taboo topics.
Speaker 1: Things most folks don't want to talk about through the
Speaker 1: lens of a millennial married couple. Dead ass is a
Speaker 1: term that we say every day.
Speaker 4: So when we say dead ass, we're actually saying facts
Speaker 4: one hundred the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but
Speaker 4: the truth.
Speaker 1: Were about to take philotof to our whole new level.
Speaker 3: Dead ass starts right now.
Speaker 2: I got a story to I'm taking you back a
Speaker 2: couple of weeks ago when we was in the Bahamas.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, shout out to the Bahamas. We had an
Speaker 3: amazing time together. That was our first time taking a
Speaker 3: trip as the family of six. Yes, solo, just the six.
Speaker 1: Of us, family of six.
Speaker 2: The last time we all went somewhere, you were pregnant
Speaker 2: with the code.
Speaker 1: We went to Aruba, had a good time at a.
Speaker 3: Great time, family of six. It was like five point five.
Speaker 1: It's five point five. This is our first time is
Speaker 1: family of six.
Speaker 2: So we go to the Bahamas and Kadeen decides, like, yo,
Speaker 2: they got a dope hotel that has a water park
Speaker 2: attached to it. So one thing about Kadeen, Kadeen always
Speaker 2: makes plans, thinking about how the plan is going to
Speaker 2: be executed, how I'm going to feel executing the plan,
Speaker 2: and if the kids going to have fun.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's how she makes small plants.
Speaker 2: She's like, you know what if we're in the hotel,
Speaker 2: DEVI wants to sleep in, but the kids want to
Speaker 2: go to a water park, he don't have to get
Speaker 2: up and drive us. We can go right down there.
Speaker 2: So she had this whole plan set up, which I appreciate. Right,
Speaker 2: So we pull up to the SLS and we're like, Yo,
Speaker 2: we're hungry. Let's go get something to eat. Boom, our
Speaker 2: room ain't ready. We go eat at the what was
Speaker 2: it called the squigly pig.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Somebody swimming pig.
Speaker 2: Swimming pig, the swimming piglet's called the swimming pick. All right,
Speaker 2: So we go into the swimming pig. They got food,
Speaker 2: regular food, chicken fingers. You had some tacos.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, they had this barbecue brisket, nachos.
Speaker 1: Yes, it was good to die for. It's slapped food out.
Speaker 1: There was amazing. I will say that it's slap right.
Speaker 2: Cairo got a burger, cats got chicken fingers, the Coda
Speaker 2: got chicken fings. Everybody got typical stuff. Right, we get
Speaker 2: the bill sixty dollars? How how was it six hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty dollars. I'm gonna explain to you how it's
Speaker 2: six hundred and fifty dollars?
Speaker 1: All right?
Speaker 3: Was that bill six hundred? That was more like four
Speaker 3: or five?
Speaker 1: Nah, that bill was six hundred fifty dos.
Speaker 2: I remember I paid it. I paid it. I'm gonna
Speaker 2: tell you how right. The bill itself was about four
Speaker 2: hundred dollars. The bill itself was four hundred dollars. But
Speaker 2: remember we were drinking too.
Speaker 1: There was you and I.
Speaker 2: You and I started that. We just got there. I
Speaker 2: had two drinks, You had two drinks. So it was
Speaker 2: four hundred and something dollars, right. But then I'm looking
Speaker 2: down because I'm going with I'm like six fifty dollars.
Speaker 2: I'll go down there and I see service charge fifteen percent,
Speaker 2: fifteen percent, four fifty.
Speaker 1: That's another game, about seventy eighty dollars. Then I see vat.
Speaker 1: Not that, but that vat va, that's vat.
Speaker 2: So I'm like, yo, yo, yo yo. I didn't have
Speaker 2: a VAT. I don't know what drink that is. I
Speaker 2: didn't have that. I didn't have that. I had a
Speaker 2: ba tapa, I had a Bahama papa. I didn't have
Speaker 2: a VAT. And he's like, no, no, no, the vat is
Speaker 2: just a tax that we put on as a search
Speaker 2: charge because we do imports and exports. And I was
Speaker 2: just like, so you're going to tax me on top
Speaker 2: of the tax you're already put on my thing and
Speaker 2: the surcharge because y'all had to import stuff and.
Speaker 1: We didn't ask you the import. Yeah.
Speaker 2: But he was just like that's how that's how the
Speaker 2: country makes money off the VAT tax. So it's a
Speaker 2: tax that the government charges the restaurant, which is an
Speaker 2: additional ten percent.
Speaker 3: So it was.
Speaker 2: Twenty five percent on top of already what I had
Speaker 2: already paid.
Speaker 1: So you're looking at four point fifty plus.
Speaker 2: The additional twenty five percent put you at an additional
Speaker 2: one hundred dollars plus.
Speaker 1: They had the nerve to ask for gratuity.
Speaker 2: Me.
Speaker 1: I put my hand and I'm like, yo, yo said,
Speaker 1: we're not in school, you're here. I had to know.
Speaker 1: I had to know.
Speaker 2: I said, so, y'all already have a service charge and
Speaker 2: you have a VAT, right, what are you saying like that?
Speaker 1: Because I was? I was. I was why said, like
Speaker 1: the gratuity? What do you expect me to do for gratuity?
Speaker 1: I asked? She was like, ultypically people do twenty thirty
Speaker 1: percent for gratuity. I was like, y'all got service charge. Well,
Speaker 1: service charge doesn't go to a service charge goes to the.
Speaker 2: Restaurant divided and that goes to the government, right, so
Speaker 2: the gratuity goes to the person who actually like directly
Speaker 2: service suffs. And I was like, and now I feel
Speaker 2: bad because you deserve to get your gratuity yours. But
Speaker 2: but I don't feel very gratuitous right now because y'all
Speaker 2: already vatted me to death and you already service charged
Speaker 2: me to death. So I gave her thirty percent, but
Speaker 2: it came up to six hundred and fifty dollars the
Speaker 2: bill just to have lunch.
Speaker 1: Bro, We're not talking about a dinner in a sit
Speaker 1: down like.
Speaker 3: No, this resort was not all inclusive. No, every every
Speaker 3: meal we paid for. Bro.
Speaker 1: It wasn't that that was the first meal I paid for.
Speaker 1: It wasn't that moment I looked at Caneen and I
Speaker 1: was just like, how long are we here?
Speaker 4: Yo?
Speaker 1: Dead ass? For real? Dead ass?
Speaker 3: Now tell me, are you going to sing the karaoke
Speaker 3: time with the same accent that you said with lots?
Speaker 2: No, I ain't singing. I ain't singing the Russian karaoke
Speaker 2: song right now?
Speaker 3: Right that sidebar VAT stands for value added text in
Speaker 3: case anybody was wondering.
Speaker 2: Oh so they spell it b S because that's really
Speaker 2: what that is. What the fuck is the value added tax?
Speaker 1: Bro?
Speaker 2: They just put anything on the bill, Bro, They put
Speaker 2: anything on the bill in fact, and they gave it
Speaker 2: an acronym like like like, oh, they won't know what
Speaker 2: that is and look up that No, it's fucked up,
Speaker 2: bro funked up.
Speaker 1: Let me get to it. Let me get to karaoke.
Speaker 1: This karaoke shout out to my man Kaz my twin.
Speaker 1: This was his song. Whenever we used to travel, remember
Speaker 1: we did our road trips.
Speaker 2: He'd be in the back of the car screaming his
Speaker 2: head off until we sang this uh.
Speaker 1: Huh b b shot did.
Speaker 3: Baby shock, baby shock, baby.
Speaker 1: Shoe by shot at.
Speaker 2: Baby shop, baby shop, baby shoe.
Speaker 1: And we had to sing it like that. That rendition
Speaker 1: of it was amazing.
Speaker 3: I forget who we came across on social media. It
Speaker 3: was like a comedian. That version of it.
Speaker 1: It was amazing.
Speaker 3: And from then that's the only version of it that
Speaker 3: we singing. He got a kick out of it. And
Speaker 3: then now we get wheels on the bus to death.
Speaker 1: Go around and but it has to start like that,
Speaker 1: if you go right to the wheels and a busy No,
Speaker 1: I love it.
Speaker 3: Oh, I missed my baby cod to come home co
Speaker 3: to sal on vacations, I talk about vacation, best life
Speaker 3: of being lived by an almost two year old. All right,
Speaker 3: let's pay some bills. Let's actually let devour recoup from
Speaker 3: all of the VAT charges. We're gonna pay some bills
Speaker 3: because we need it. All right, thanks, and now we'll
Speaker 3: be back. All righty doaks, we're back. We're back. So yeah,
Speaker 3: back to your story time. That was the first meal
Speaker 3: that we got upon arrival at the resort and going
Speaker 3: into it, I had paid for air fear and I
Speaker 3: had paid for the hotel stay, which with a family
Speaker 3: this big, we have to get either one or two
Speaker 3: bedroom suite at minute, well one bedroom suite at minimum,
Speaker 3: or we get adjoining rooms.
Speaker 1: So we got to get at least a two bedrooms
Speaker 1: at least.
Speaker 3: Well true two bedroom sweet one for me and you
Speaker 3: and then one for the boys. And they didn't have
Speaker 3: that available and we got there. We tried to get
Speaker 3: an upgrade, but they were at capacity, so we ended
Speaker 3: up doing an adjoining room, which worked out really well
Speaker 3: for us also because you know, the kids have access
Speaker 3: to us, but we also have our private time.
Speaker 1: And to not make any more kids.
Speaker 3: That part that part, But then looking at it in
Speaker 3: that moment, I was like, man, should I have booked
Speaker 3: an all inclusive resort versus booking a spot where we
Speaker 3: would have to pay per meal. That's always the debate
Speaker 3: for me, and the issue that I typically run into
Speaker 3: when looking at all inclusive resorts is, you know, reading
Speaker 3: the reviews. I'm a very big like read the reviews,
Speaker 3: get on trip advisors, see how many stars? What are
Speaker 3: people saying about food? And that can kind of be
Speaker 3: hit or miss sometimes because of course, everybody's experience is different,
Speaker 3: and we can kind of compare it to for example,
Speaker 3: us going to the Muhamas versus the week later going
Speaker 3: to Mexico on a trip with your family and what
Speaker 3: the food experienced at the very least was like very too,
Speaker 3: completely different.
Speaker 2: I will say this though, right I was starting to
Speaker 2: get mad at my kids right because I'm like, you know,
Speaker 2: I'm paying six hundred dollars for this food. My nigga,
Speaker 2: you're not going to eat chicken fingers every day, like,
Speaker 2: order something else just because it's so expensive. I need
Speaker 2: need you to try something else. Try a conk Fredda,
Speaker 2: try a Conkforredda. Please just do something. Try try a
Speaker 2: fish taco. But I'm not gonna pay six hundred dollars
Speaker 2: every time we eat for you to have chicken.
Speaker 3: Fingers bro and then we kind of also found a
Speaker 3: way around it because then you realize, too, Okay, what
Speaker 3: are the portions looking like at this resort, right, we
Speaker 3: can essentially have Cairo Kass split a meal, fact and
Speaker 3: then Dakota pretty much eats a little bit from everybody.
Speaker 3: So we got a little smarter as the trip progressed,
Speaker 3: because we're like, do we really even need this? But
Speaker 3: the good thing too, is that we don't really we're
Speaker 3: not big foodies like that, Like we don't have to
Speaker 3: eat slack dinners, but.
Speaker 1: You're gonna take some.
Speaker 2: Let me tell you about Kadeen Kadean not gonna spend
Speaker 2: a bad dollar. No, we order for where did we
Speaker 2: go into Bahamas? And they gave us so much food?
Speaker 2: First of all, if y'all go to the Bahama, eat local.
Speaker 3: Eat local, Well, I'm just saying to eat local.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, no, what's the name of the place.
Speaker 3: Though, Oh oh shoot, we're gonna find Aandrasandrisandris Wandris.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we went first of all, the Bahamas food be slapping.
Speaker 2: It's a mixed for me, it's a mix between Jamaican
Speaker 2: food and Nigerian food. There's an earthiness that Nigerian food
Speaker 2: has and suspiciness that they have, but the colorfulness that
Speaker 2: Jamaican food has was like a perfect mix. And Bahamian
Speaker 2: food is really really good. So every time we ate locally,
Speaker 2: it was, oh my gosh, it was so they still
Speaker 2: have the fat.
Speaker 3: We also went to the poop what was it called again,
Speaker 3: the poop somewhere.
Speaker 1: I know you're talking about on the on the the water.
Speaker 3: Yeah, name for you, But anything local for me, that's
Speaker 3: what I enjoyed. So I don't solely rely on staying
Speaker 3: on the resort. When I go to places, I like
Speaker 3: to go off the resort. She loves, because I want
Speaker 3: the local experience. Like where are y'all going on? Yall
Speaker 3: lunch break?
Speaker 1: That's what I want to know.
Speaker 3: So I always make friends and shout out to Kanesha
Speaker 3: at the resort we went, Tonsha was amazing and she
Speaker 3: was able to give us all the tea and all
Speaker 3: the local spots where to go.
Speaker 1: We're not to go, That's what I was going to say.
Speaker 2: We were at uh Ohandra's, said Andra Laundras, and they
Speaker 2: gave us huge portions, I mean huge huge. So Candien
Speaker 2: is there and I guess people don't typically take food
Speaker 2: home there because when we asked for to go containers
Speaker 2: and stuff, they were just like.
Speaker 1: To go containers.
Speaker 3: It didn't really happen.
Speaker 2: And then it was like yo, yo yo, my men's
Speaker 2: my mens, you're gonna have to find something for me
Speaker 2: to put this in.
Speaker 3: Conk solad in because it was so fresh, it was
Speaker 3: so good and all my father talked about when he
Speaker 3: knew that we were going to the Bahamas, it's like,
Speaker 3: you have to try the conk Bahamas. They're known for
Speaker 3: conk conk. That's just what it is. It was conk salad.
Speaker 3: Everything was just super fresh.
Speaker 1: Love there.
Speaker 2: Fast forward a week and a half, we're in Mexico
Speaker 2: right and we're we had an all inclusive resort. When
Speaker 2: you go to all inclusive resorts, they have restaurants on
Speaker 2: the premises.
Speaker 1: Poo Poop Deck is a place.
Speaker 2: When you're in the Bahamas, you have to go to
Speaker 2: poop Deck. Yes, the food is so good, the service
Speaker 2: was great.
Speaker 1: Everything. The only thing I will say was that it's
Speaker 1: on the water.
Speaker 2: It's humid if you go into summertime because they don't
Speaker 2: have it's the way it's built is you eat right
Speaker 2: on the deck and it's all open, but it's covered
Speaker 2: so the sun doesn't come in, but there's no real ventilation.
Speaker 1: And there's no wind going through. So it was hot.
Speaker 1: So it was hot, but it was worth it.
Speaker 2: Fast forward to Mexico, and when you're at these resorts
Speaker 2: for all inclusive, you can't take food home. Tell me
Speaker 2: while my wife is throwing napkins over the place that's
Speaker 2: not full and putting them underneath the baby carriage.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and were walking out.
Speaker 2: There with plates and plates of food and caves that
Speaker 2: listen to them, kids gonna eat this food later?
Speaker 3: Yeah, because they will be because they're gonna look at
Speaker 3: me at a certain time of the evening. And in Mexico,
Speaker 3: we had like a kitchen itt with a microwave and
Speaker 3: a fridge. So I said, they're gonna eat this later.
Speaker 3: Because the room service was terrible, you know, breakfast was
Speaker 3: hit or miss. Like the food of the all inclusive
Speaker 3: resort was very mediocre. So if you did find something
Speaker 3: that they liked, I'm like, let's just bag this to
Speaker 3: go and I'm gonna put it under the stroller.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we're gonna go back to the room.
Speaker 2: And one thing we noticed too sometimes going to onlyclusive spots.
Speaker 2: When we went to the Rio in the Grill, the
Speaker 2: food there wasn't good either. They have a jerk chicken
Speaker 2: spot that me and k Ate most of the time
Speaker 2: because that's where the local guy comes in to make
Speaker 2: the jerk food. And I mean to us when we
Speaker 2: say the food is terrible. It wasn't like our palates
Speaker 2: have gotten way more different. But also we just want
Speaker 2: to try the food at the actual place we're staying in. Like,
Speaker 2: I don't want to go to a resort and have
Speaker 2: to eat Italian food if I'm staying in Mexico. You know,
Speaker 2: I don't want to go to the Bahamas and eat
Speaker 2: French food. You know, I want to go eat Bahamian food.
Speaker 2: I want to eat some Mexican food.
Speaker 1: Now here's the thing.
Speaker 2: I'm not a big Mexican food eater. So they had
Speaker 2: a Mexican restaurant which was actually really good. I heard
Speaker 2: it was very authentic. But Coleen and I don't like
Speaker 2: Mexican food.
Speaker 3: So well, I like Mexican food, I'm not myself. I
Speaker 3: just don't like cilantro Okay, okay, okay, okay. So yeah,
Speaker 3: so that being said, whenever I do vacation with the
Speaker 3: boys and deval aside from food, because it's just only
Speaker 3: one component of the trip. I'm trying to find something
Speaker 3: that everybody can enjoy, right. So, like we said with
Speaker 3: a Ruba, for example, we had gotten Airbnb and we
Speaker 3: were able to kind of do our own thing. The
Speaker 3: kids can have breakfast at home with us that well
Speaker 3: yet our Airbnb, and then we go out. I found
Speaker 3: the water parks. I found the place that would be
Speaker 3: fun for the kids. But also knowing at that water park,
Speaker 3: let me try to find like a cabana space or
Speaker 3: something that's a little bit private that we can have
Speaker 3: some downtime where now doesn't feel like he's in the
Speaker 3: sun all day chasing the kids. So with the cost
Speaker 3: of airline tickets at an all time high at this point,
Speaker 3: because they're out there trying to recoup every penny, I'm
Speaker 3: thinking since the pandemic, sometimes it's better just to leave
Speaker 3: the kids at home. But if you want to give
Speaker 3: your kids experiences that they'll hopefully never forget and always cherish,
Speaker 3: you better be ready to spend a pretty penny if
Speaker 3: those memories include traveling, and recently we took our little
Speaker 3: small village, our little six of us to the Bahamas
Speaker 3: and we had an amazing, amazing time, but just watching
Speaker 3: the way the bills were racking up, it was wow.
Speaker 3: I just didn't know at any point, whether we did
Speaker 3: all inclusive or not. Was there an inexpensive way to
Speaker 3: vacation with the family this big. I don't know if
Speaker 3: there there's even a way to do that.
Speaker 2: I remember growing up people saying all the time, you know,
Speaker 2: kids are expensive, kids are expensive. And I hadn't reached
Speaker 2: we hadn't reached the point yet where the kids have
Speaker 2: become expensive, you know, because it doesn't matter how much
Speaker 2: money Kadein and I made, we always found ways to
Speaker 2: do things on a budget.
Speaker 1: So he's like, Yo, this isn't that you know, this
Speaker 1: isn't that big deal. This isn't that big a deal.
Speaker 2: But now that we have to pay, and when you
Speaker 2: think about it, before Covid Kaz, we didn't have to
Speaker 2: pay for him to travel. He was still under two
Speaker 2: years old, Kotas and much like Koda, but also Cairo.
Speaker 2: There were times, because Cairo hadn't even become three yet,
Speaker 2: we'd be like, let's see if we can sneak him by.
Speaker 2: You know, Sometimes me and kay gonna try to get
Speaker 2: over one thing about my wife. My wife is a jenile,
Speaker 2: all right, me a teeth, She had a tief Shes gonna.
Speaker 1: Find ways to get by and get over. And I
Speaker 1: love that about hers. It's called reparation. But what is
Speaker 1: wrong with you?
Speaker 3: I'm just saying I had to take it how I
Speaker 3: can get it.
Speaker 2: Listen, I appreciate it because I the benefits of that,
Speaker 2: because them reparations come back in our pockets. But okay,
Speaker 2: we found ways in those early years when we had
Speaker 2: three kids to travel and it wasn't expensive. Now, when
Speaker 2: you have a twelve year old, a six year old,
Speaker 2: a five year old, you have to pay for all
Speaker 2: those tickets. The coda is about to be two. We're
Speaker 2: gonna end up having to pay for his tickets. You're
Speaker 2: talking about six airline tickets. There's no cheap way to
Speaker 2: do that. There is no cheap way to do that.
Speaker 2: And the craziest part is Kadeen and I try to
Speaker 2: get everything together.
Speaker 1: So we try to book a flight where we.
Speaker 2: Can get six seats across the road, either in comfort
Speaker 2: plus or if I like to travel first class, like
Speaker 2: that's just how I like to travel.
Speaker 1: But if we can't.
Speaker 2: Kadeen will be the first, but yo, it ain't no
Speaker 2: first class available and just four thousand a piece.
Speaker 1: We're gonna go Comfort Plus. So we go Comfort a Plus.
Speaker 3: So if you see us in Comfort Plus and the
Speaker 3: kids in main Wave, just say, hi, don't judge us.
Speaker 1: It's just what it is. It is what it is
Speaker 1: because it is what it is.
Speaker 2: I am not going to pay eighteen thousand dollars to
Speaker 2: take a two hour trip to Disney World.
Speaker 1: I'm just not doing it, bro.
Speaker 3: I'm getting the car and drive it and depending on
Speaker 3: where's drivable.
Speaker 1: And that's what we did when we went to Disney
Speaker 1: World to go see Grandma.
Speaker 2: We went to go see Grandma, and we said, you
Speaker 2: know what, Disney World is not really that far six hour,
Speaker 2: six hour.
Speaker 1: She lives close by.
Speaker 3: Might as well make it an experience again going down
Speaker 3: for one thing to spend time.
Speaker 1: But I'll just trying to find ways to keep the
Speaker 1: boys entertained.
Speaker 3: So let's go into some facts and stats so we
Speaker 3: can see what things are looking like on an average
Speaker 3: basis for domestic travel versus international travel and all that
Speaker 3: good stuff. So this is according to a family of four.
Speaker 3: So you guys can kind of do the math based
Speaker 3: on your family size. But according to picasa dot com,
Speaker 3: the average cost for travel for a domestic trip for
Speaker 3: a family of four is nineteen seven.
Speaker 1: You can round that up to two thousand, two thousand.
Speaker 1: This s would be about three thousand for us if
Speaker 1: you added additional two.
Speaker 3: There you go, and that's with four domestic flights for
Speaker 3: thirteen twenty, So that's about thirteen hundred. Airport parking FO
Speaker 3: one hundred and thirty dollars. Rental car two ninety they
Speaker 3: rented for twenty to a bike and gas for two
Speaker 3: eighty eight. Because these rental cars too wild expense, they'll
Speaker 3: show you one price when you start seeing expedia, and
Speaker 3: by the time you know, you go through taxes and
Speaker 3: fees and whatever version of that they got. Then next
Speaker 3: thing you know, you got an eight hundred dollars rental
Speaker 3: car bill. Fact average flight calls for domestic three thirty.
Speaker 3: That's fair depending on where you're going right now and
Speaker 3: how far in advanced you book.
Speaker 1: International eight eighty.
Speaker 2: So international, if we were to just fly coach a
Speaker 2: eighty plus tax, you can round it up to nine
Speaker 2: hundred dollars for six people would be four hundred dollars already,
Speaker 2: that just for flights to go international. And K and
Speaker 2: I talked about wanting our kids to see the world.
Speaker 2: But when you think about every time you have to travel,
Speaker 2: it's going to court you at least six thousand dollars
Speaker 2: just to get on the flight. I don't care how
Speaker 2: much money you make. That's expensive. Absolutely, it's expensive.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, average fortnight lodging costs for a hotel eight ten,
Speaker 3: so that's about two hundred dollars a night roughly where
Speaker 3: you staying at.
Speaker 1: I don't know, yeah, two hundreds a night. I don't
Speaker 1: see that happening.
Speaker 3: I don't know where you're staying at for that, especially
Speaker 3: if you.
Speaker 2: Have kids and them kids got to eat and you
Speaker 2: need plate like you need entertainment, right, Well, the hotel
Speaker 2: is a form of entertainment for the kids.
Speaker 3: That's true. I mean, our kids do enjoy hotels. They
Speaker 3: feel like they're in somewhere so different. Sometimes campsite if
Speaker 3: you're going campaign one sixty vacation rental. Maybe that's if
Speaker 3: you're doing an airbnb or property five forty eight.
Speaker 1: Which is I don't know how accurate this thing is.
Speaker 3: Chill. This might have been from years ago, because if
Speaker 3: you want to even do a fortnight Airbnb, depending on
Speaker 3: where your story it stay, if it's not at a hostel,
Speaker 3: I mean, if you want to just stay in a
Speaker 3: half decent apartment, then it's going to be at least
Speaker 3: three times that our kids can.
Speaker 1: Survive a hostel. I don't think the hostile can survive
Speaker 1: our kids.
Speaker 3: I was about to say we probably run the hostile out.
Speaker 3: We would, We would just take it. Even like them
Speaker 3: kids is too loud, that's a fact. They'd be jumping
Speaker 3: all over everything. Cairo got people waking up in the
Speaker 3: morning and working out. No, like, we're not doing this,
Speaker 3: is gonna ask them questions to death. Carol's colda is
Speaker 3: gonna give him the side eye of the entire time
Speaker 3: and make them really uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Jackson will make friends with everyone, Yeah he would.
Speaker 3: Jackson Jackson would try to find the bright side. Average
Speaker 3: food and drink costs per person for food forty six
Speaker 3: dollars if you're not traveling with my kids, and alcohol
Speaker 3: twenty one dollars. That's like one drink nowadays.
Speaker 1: I don't know about this.
Speaker 2: Very they were very conservative, but they were very conservative.
Speaker 2: But I will say that we do travel expensive like
Speaker 2: you're you you are a hotel.
Speaker 1: Snob, I am, and you're a flight snow. I'm a
Speaker 1: flight stop. So I marriage it is to be broke.
Speaker 1: According to the blog mouse Hacking you, I don't.
Speaker 3: Know what it is.
Speaker 1: It's my element, I guess.
Speaker 3: And the average cost for a family trip to Disney
Speaker 3: World and twenty twenty four will be and they're projecting this,
Speaker 3: I guess, with inslation and everything involved, sixty nine one
Speaker 3: hundred dollars for a family of four to Disney World.
Speaker 2: And you know every fifth birthday, which would be the
Speaker 2: coldest fifth birthday in twenty twenty six. We will all
Speaker 2: be traveling to Disney World in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 3: What's the price gonna look like? At least as the
Speaker 3: last child? And y'all could take me out my misery
Speaker 3: of these trips that we Why do we think this
Speaker 3: was a good idea? A sidebar, here's our mickey and
Speaker 3: see our mom and dad shirts. This was from Kaz's
Speaker 3: fifth birthday last year? Was it right?
Speaker 2: Well, I'm gonna tell you why we decided to do
Speaker 2: this because we had good parents. And your parents gave
Speaker 2: you experiences and my parents gave us good experience.
Speaker 1: But now I see why they stopped at three kids.
Speaker 1: I have right, and I see why we went to.
Speaker 2: Our grandparents every summer and didn't go on the long
Speaker 2: vacations because my parents was like, fuck them kids, we.
Speaker 1: Deserve to go and occasion bosself.
Speaker 3: But now you're traumatized from that whole experience.
Speaker 1: No, actually I'm not traumatized.
Speaker 2: I gained a lot of work ethic having the cut
Speaker 2: grass first thing in the morning.
Speaker 5: Yes, get my ask, what would have flash water? I
Speaker 5: learned discipline, that's a fact. And you're also athletic because
Speaker 5: of it.
Speaker 1: Super athletic, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: At the kids club doing your boys and girls club,
Speaker 3: that's what it was, and you were doing your your
Speaker 3: acting there.
Speaker 2: I think I started early days in the role center
Speaker 2: my arts and craft.
Speaker 3: Sperients, had the foresight to see how it was going
Speaker 3: to positively impact you.
Speaker 1: So it's a scoop and Ma, now I understand you.
Speaker 2: I truthfully understand why we wasn't going on full family
Speaker 2: vacations everything.
Speaker 3: So you know what we should do is return the
Speaker 3: favor and ship all four of our kids to scoop in. Ma.
Speaker 2: Now we on the same give me four. See I
Speaker 2: knew she was on something. You're on fire today, your
Speaker 2: brain braining, listen your brain, you have your cell rejuice
Speaker 2: this morning.
Speaker 1: See I'm not mental clarity. But look at this.
Speaker 2: It says gonna be about set thousand dollars in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four with four family of four. So if that's
Speaker 2: a family of six, two much about it. Three you're
Speaker 2: looking at ten thousand, five hundred dollars for us if
Speaker 2: we were going twenty twenty four, but we're not going
Speaker 2: till twenty twenty six. Yeah, so that ten to five
Speaker 2: will probably be about twelve thousand dollars to go to
Speaker 2: Disney World.
Speaker 1: I know they could.
Speaker 3: I know on Amazon, I could find a Mickey and
Speaker 3: a mini costume and we could just make this house
Speaker 3: look like Disney World.
Speaker 1: So we gonna dre up as Mickey. Many that's a fact,
Speaker 1: and we could use it. At the end of the night.
Speaker 2: The coda will disown you. The Coda's like I watched
Speaker 2: all these videos and my brother's going to Mickey and
Speaker 2: in Disney.
Speaker 1: World, and I got to fly in the backyard and
Speaker 1: I'm still here.
Speaker 3: I know, I know, No, we have to make a
Speaker 3: special for him too. And that's one thing we're very
Speaker 3: very deliberate about. We don't want to drop off at
Speaker 3: the fourth chowel.
Speaker 1: We can't.
Speaker 3: You feel like, damn y'all had me just the skimps.
Speaker 3: So his own actually might then be more elaborate, because
Speaker 3: think about how many years from now that's going to
Speaker 3: be in what position we plan to be.
Speaker 2: In, you know, well, if it's anything like his baby
Speaker 2: shower that you play, and.
Speaker 1: Then he probably gonna boy Disney World when he's five
Speaker 1: years old. That shit was a vibe bro.
Speaker 3: That was such a fun experience and that was the
Speaker 3: first time people were finally back outside after COVID, So
Speaker 3: I think it was the reunion field plus the party.
Speaker 3: Shout out to pep Our event designers, she snapped, she.
Speaker 1: Did snap, that's a whole nother podcast.
Speaker 2: We have to do, Yeah, children's experiences based on what
Speaker 2: position they fall in the family. For example, Jackson's baby
Speaker 2: Shadow was at Aviator right, we had we had over no,
Speaker 2: we had over one hundred people at that baby sit low.
Speaker 3: In terms of like the core and theatric Yeah, but
Speaker 3: we did have agreed.
Speaker 2: We didn't hire a planner. We did everything our own.
Speaker 2: It cost us cost us a grip too, but it
Speaker 2: was at Aviator.
Speaker 3: We got in a discount because you were working there
Speaker 3: running your program out of there.
Speaker 1: But then we did get a lot.
Speaker 3: And every time we have a baby, we get such
Speaker 3: great support and outpour of people with diapers and wipes.
Speaker 3: I don't think we bought diapers for Jackson for like
Speaker 3: a year.
Speaker 1: And a half, we did it.
Speaker 2: Cairo's Baby Shit Hour was at that event space in
Speaker 2: bed in Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: Kaz's baby shower was well.
Speaker 3: Kas probably had small, It was a little It was
Speaker 3: a little dinner that we did.
Speaker 1: Because because we had him right after Kyro.
Speaker 3: He literally came right after Cairo, we didn't need as
Speaker 3: much stuff, but we still felt that we wanted to
Speaker 3: celebrate him in some way, so we had a very
Speaker 3: small We called it a.
Speaker 2: Little push party because we didn't need that much stuff
Speaker 2: because we had Kyro.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: Dakota's baby shower though, was in the city in Manhattan,
Speaker 2: and we had how many people over two hundred people there.
Speaker 2: Of two hundred people, it was it was a full event.
Speaker 2: His first birthday party was the same thing, a full event. Like, yeah,
Speaker 2: so his his Disney World trip is gonna be crazy.
Speaker 3: Another episode on why we chose to do events that big.
Speaker 2: Now, how about we do an episode on starting only
Speaker 2: fans so we can pay for this Disney trip?
Speaker 1: About that, and they practiced my moves enough. That's a fact.
Speaker 1: You've got to get this phone on. Put the phone
Speaker 1: on hit record.
Speaker 3: So the reactions that we've gotten from our kids, I
Speaker 3: think that's what makes it worthwhile for us. Like Jackson
Speaker 3: to this day still can't stop talking about how much
Speaker 3: fun he had on both trips. Yes, and I love
Speaker 3: that we went to the Bahamas right with just the
Speaker 3: six of us. Then we went to Mexico, and of
Speaker 3: course us adults were more critical because we've seen and
Speaker 3: we've yeah, and they one thing with our children, they
Speaker 3: don't complaint. They're grateful, Yes, and I such Jackson at
Speaker 3: the end of it. Actually they had They're pretty grateful.
Speaker 2: Cairo said, the last time we went in first class.
Speaker 2: This first class is trash because they didn't because they
Speaker 2: didn't serve dinner.
Speaker 3: That is true, but it was a flight.
Speaker 1: But at least he knows what to expect. You know,
Speaker 1: it's okay to have.
Speaker 2: Standards, right, but they are grateful, will tell you if
Speaker 2: something is true.
Speaker 3: Carol is super honest and Kaz to kas the same way.
Speaker 3: Jackson is a little more and more diplomatic. It's good,
Speaker 3: you know, I'm just happy to be here. So I
Speaker 3: hit Jackson with you know, like what was your favorite
Speaker 3: part of the vacations or the summer or whatever, and
Speaker 3: he was like, family, Like it got to be with
Speaker 3: you and Daddy and my brothers, and then we got
Speaker 3: to be a daddy's side of family.
Speaker 1: Like family was my favorite.
Speaker 2: This is the first summer in the past six years
Speaker 2: where I've been home the entire summer.
Speaker 3: The entire summer you were in Ottawa, I was in Ottawa.
Speaker 1: Then I had to go to New York to film,
Speaker 1: then we went on tour.
Speaker 3: Yeah, last summer, I enjoyed every freaking second of it.
Speaker 3: As y'all know, I pretty much shut down once May hit.
Speaker 3: I was like, yeah, you was done. I was burnt out.
Speaker 3: I was, but also too, I really was like desperately
Speaker 3: craving reconnecting with you and my boys. I kind of
Speaker 3: felt like the past two years were really a blur
Speaker 3: because we were working so much and around the clock.
Speaker 3: There was really no off time. So I was very
Speaker 3: deliberate this summer about really enjoying it because I knew
Speaker 3: the minute the last day of school hit. This year,
Speaker 3: I'm like, watch, we're gonna blink and they're back in school,
Speaker 3: and here we are.
Speaker 1: They're back in school.
Speaker 3: But I can say that I thoroughly enjoyed the summer
Speaker 3: with the boys and they got all of us and
Speaker 3: shout out to you for even just being.
Speaker 1: Home and getting a little bit of a getting a break.
Speaker 1: You have not stopped. I don't think ever.
Speaker 3: I don't think it was ever a time where you
Speaker 3: just did not have to be out of the house.
Speaker 2: Since we since we've been together, since I've turned eighteen
Speaker 2: and been playing football than in the NFL, I've never
Speaker 2: had a full three weeks straight off.
Speaker 1: Never you always doing something, always doing something.
Speaker 3: But I mean, think about it, even with those weeks off,
Speaker 3: all you've been doing was doing content. Yeah, this summer,
Speaker 3: Deva has been like back to videos again, back to videos.
Speaker 3: I'm like, wait a sday, I thought we stopped doing that.
Speaker 6: Bro. I looked at the VAT and I said, Man,
Speaker 6: if I got to pay this VAT, I'm gonna make
Speaker 6: some money off this video video video after taxes, That's
Speaker 6: what that is.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do a video after I pay these taxes.
Speaker 1: There we go.
Speaker 3: That's that was it, the new definition of vat. I
Speaker 3: love that every time you held the phone like here's
Speaker 3: my video for the dek and I'm like that I
Speaker 3: got PTSD.
Speaker 1: No, we're not doing this again. We're not doing this again.
Speaker 1: I'm not playing we had as.
Speaker 2: I will say this though, as much as we are
Speaker 2: complaining and making jokes how expensive it is, we're making
Speaker 2: jokes because we have to laugh at our pain.
Speaker 1: It is expensive.
Speaker 2: I will not trade the time I spent with you
Speaker 2: and the kids for anything.
Speaker 1: Else, nothing like those.
Speaker 2: This past summer has been my favorite summer so far.
Speaker 1: Kadeen and I have been man, we've traveled.
Speaker 2: When we went to Italy and I was just asked,
Speaker 2: we did our vacation and we're going to do a
Speaker 2: whole other podcast on the purpose of a vacation. But
Speaker 2: now that I know things, I'm just going to say this,
Speaker 2: you should do the vacation after the family vacation facts,
Speaker 2: because we did the vacation.
Speaker 1: Then we went to the Bahamas and we.
Speaker 3: Did back to back family vacations with the kids, so
Speaker 3: that was just a lot.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, we should have kind of flipped it. We
Speaker 1: should have flipped it.
Speaker 3: In my mind, I said, if we did the vacation first,
Speaker 3: that was our way to kind of really get connected. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then we'll have the energy for the kids. Because literally,
Speaker 3: within the time span of doing Bahamas in Mexico, Devo
Speaker 3: was just like I'm in Chuigan. No ready a vacacy No,
Speaker 3: because it's literally me running after the kids all the
Speaker 3: entire time and him.
Speaker 2: You won't spend any time with your significant other if
Speaker 2: you're on vacation with your kids, especially if you have
Speaker 2: a young child, like the Colde is turning too. He
Speaker 2: wanted either me or Kadeen. Most of the time, you
Speaker 2: wanted Kadeen. But withf that comes fatigued, like Kadeen is like, yo,
Speaker 2: I've been trying to get the boys ready all day.
Speaker 1: I've been doing all this other stuff.
Speaker 2: And even if I took them on the slide or
Speaker 2: I took them to do some things, he was climbing
Speaker 2: up Kadeen because it's a different environment for him.
Speaker 1: So his fear that it's a different advice. He just
Speaker 1: wants to be with his mom.
Speaker 2: So we spend all day chasing after the kids, make
Speaker 2: sure they enjoy themselves in that night, Kadeen and I
Speaker 2: would put the kids down to sleep.
Speaker 1: You have a twelve year old.
Speaker 2: The good thing is having a twelve year old and
Speaker 2: he can chill and watch the kids that go to sleep.
Speaker 2: We will go down to the bar for about thirty
Speaker 2: minutes and we're like, yo, let's just sit down and
Speaker 2: talk about the day people watch.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's the best time we had.
Speaker 5: Exactly, and come upstairs it little nightcab and pass out. Yeah,
Speaker 5: because after you after y'all know how d be on me.
Speaker 2: Sometimes I'll be like, you know, I am not a machine,
Speaker 2: don't objective find my body.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, since you vated the balls, now we're easy.
Speaker 3: It's easy for us to just see know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: Since the balls got the vat, you.
Speaker 1: Know, I still didn't have my VAT party. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: that's pretty good. What's coming, baby?
Speaker 3: The anniversary of the VET is almost here, So just
Speaker 3: just stay tuned, Just stay tuned. Okay, stay tuned.
Speaker 1: I love that.
Speaker 3: But as a kid, my mom and dad they also
Speaker 3: were deliberate about showing me different places, and I love that.
Speaker 3: I looked forward to every summer. We went to a
Speaker 3: different place every year, and I love that my parents,
Speaker 3: they worked really hard to provide us that, you know, yeah,
Speaker 3: one or two weeks where we were able to go
Speaker 3: abroad and just learn about a different culture and experience
Speaker 3: different things.
Speaker 1: And had that time.
Speaker 3: So I just knew when I had children, I wanted
Speaker 3: to be able to offer them the same experience. We
Speaker 3: raise little well traveled, cultured global citizens, because it's hard
Speaker 3: sometimes when you can't see past your front step or
Speaker 3: past your environment, and you just want to have a
Speaker 3: greater appreciation for what you have when you can see
Speaker 3: how other people live. Absolutely, And I always in the
Speaker 3: fun and in the water slides and in the experiences
Speaker 3: that we provide them on vacation, I also make sure
Speaker 3: I give them lessons absolutely and show them how other
Speaker 3: people live in different ways of doing things cultures, because
Speaker 3: everybody deserves some sort of respect, regardless of where you
Speaker 3: come from. So there's always a lesson wrapped up in there.
Speaker 3: You know. I'm still a very much wester than in
Speaker 3: a mom and I'm going to find a way to
Speaker 3: make a lesson out of something.
Speaker 2: So everything's a lesson. Everything's a lesson. She had them
Speaker 2: calculating the vets at the end of every year dinner.
Speaker 2: They wanted with Roger their tutoring. But what you're saying
Speaker 2: is actually very true, right, Traveling with your children teaches
Speaker 2: them how to travel, you know, like for example, Jackson,
Speaker 2: if he had to travel on his own now but
Speaker 2: nowhere to go, go to the kiosk print his boarding past,
Speaker 2: how to navigate. The funny thing is watching our kids
Speaker 2: and they've traveled a lot over the past couple of year,
Speaker 2: and we're typically in first class, so people always give
Speaker 2: us compliments and be like, wow, I didn't realize that
Speaker 2: there was a baby and two little kids and a
Speaker 2: preteen in first class. Like they get on there, they
Speaker 2: put their headphones on, they find what they want to
Speaker 2: watch when a lady comes by, so you can have
Speaker 2: a spike please, Like they just know.
Speaker 1: How to properly.
Speaker 2: Properly exists in the space where people just want to relax.
Speaker 1: You know. Kids. Travel etiquette, Yeah, travel etiquette.
Speaker 2: You know, kids oftentimes because they're only in school or
Speaker 2: at home, behave other places like they would behave in
Speaker 2: school or home.
Speaker 1: Kids can be wild. You know, my kids in this house.
Speaker 2: If people were to just come by this house randomly
Speaker 2: on a Tuesday, they would be like, yo, how do
Speaker 2: you Because.
Speaker 1: When they're at home, we let them do what they want.
Speaker 2: They can bounce the ball, they can run around, they
Speaker 2: go to their boy cave, they get in the air matches,
Speaker 2: they flipping on the air matches, they go jump in
Speaker 2: the pool. But I think them traveling and being told like, hey,
Speaker 2: when we travel, there's a certain etiquette. They know how
Speaker 2: to bring it down when they get older, like when
Speaker 2: you travel in middle school or high school for AAU tournaments.
Speaker 2: I don't have to worry about my children going places
Speaker 2: and say, you know how your kids were acting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know how my kids were acting. So if
Speaker 1: something happened, wasn't my kids, you know.
Speaker 2: It ain't them. No, that's a fact. They go to restaurants,
Speaker 2: they order their own food. They know how to speak
Speaker 2: to the waiters or the waitresses.
Speaker 3: I should reading them men, that's reading comprehensions.
Speaker 1: Would you order? Oh you didn't know the burger had
Speaker 1: that on it?
Speaker 2: Sorry, all experiences and these are the same compliments your
Speaker 2: parents used to get. My parents used to get grandparents
Speaker 2: because they did that to us. So it seems like
Speaker 2: it's normal. But everyone doesn't get the same experience. So ultimately,
Speaker 2: we want to implore all you to as expensive as
Speaker 2: it's going to be, put some money aside and find
Speaker 2: ways to travel with your children.
Speaker 3: So many ways to travel, especially if you're on a budget.
Speaker 3: Like there's so many websites and deals and stuff out there,
Speaker 3: So find what is within your means to be able
Speaker 3: to give your family those experiences because they'll thank you later.
Speaker 2: And if flights are too expensive, remember the Kadeena and
Speaker 2: I did the travel show that Elie only vacation. We
Speaker 2: get in our car and we'll drive six to eight
Speaker 2: hours and take them to see places within the country
Speaker 2: that have historical value and make it a lesson, but
Speaker 2: also have fun for sure, you know.
Speaker 1: So you don't have to always get on a plane.
Speaker 2: You can go stay in a whole four hours, four
Speaker 2: hours away from your house and just enjoy that time too.
Speaker 3: That's a fact, all right. I don't think we can
Speaker 3: enjoy any more talk about this until we go pay
Speaker 3: some bills so we can recoup some of that money,
Speaker 3: and we'll be back in listener letter land.
Speaker 1: So stay tuned. All right, we're back. We are back.
Speaker 2: Oh, I haven't said this in a long time. For
Speaker 2: Kadi's favorite part of the show.
Speaker 1: Hey love this for us. You want me to go first?
Speaker 1: All right, go for it? All right? Hey guys, Kadeen,
Speaker 1: I love you real bad. Oh, I love you.
Speaker 3: An all cats, all cats or this is I love
Speaker 3: you back, thank you.
Speaker 2: But I'm writing you guys because I'm kind of desperate.
Speaker 2: I'm a twenty seven year old single mother of two
Speaker 2: ages six and eight. You had them babies young, so
Speaker 2: that's nineteen and twenty one. So and I grew up
Speaker 2: being molested at a very young age. Sorry to hear that, Mama,
Speaker 2: that I would say it started at about seven or
Speaker 2: eight years old, and I thought it was okay, that.
Speaker 1: It was normal.
Speaker 2: Now that I know how wrong it was, it's so
Speaker 2: hard not to blame myself for allowing it to happen.
Speaker 2: You can't blame yourself for that mom when you didn't know,
Speaker 2: like you said you were seven or eight. Blaming my
Speaker 2: mom for not knowing, not teaching me or having conversations
Speaker 2: about my body parts and knowing where a good touch
Speaker 2: is and where a bad touch is. I never had
Speaker 2: any conversation with my mother about it, about any of it,
Speaker 2: So I feel like I'm just learning life at twenty seven.
Speaker 2: But my question is how do I teach my kids
Speaker 2: things that I don't know. I've learned a lot from
Speaker 2: you guys, and I'm in therapy, but I don't feel
Speaker 2: like I'm emotionally intelligent. I have no financial literacy, and
Speaker 2: I feel like a I parent out of fear and anger.
Speaker 2: And I just want to give my kids everything I
Speaker 2: never had. Man, I just want to know how a
Speaker 2: single mom can raise a black man having not been one.
Speaker 2: How to instill confidence, love, respect, compassion, comfort, just all
Speaker 2: the things I feel I lack because I feel like
Speaker 2: such a horrible mother and it hurts that I feel
Speaker 2: like I'm damaging them and just doing them a disservice.
Speaker 1: Please help first and foremost.
Speaker 2: Wrong, But I want to say this though, sorry the
Speaker 2: way you feel, Me and Kadean be feeling the same
Speaker 2: way at times. You know how many times we look
Speaker 2: at each other and be like, do you feel like
Speaker 2: I handled that right? Like? Do you think we don't
Speaker 2: want to damage our own kids? So what we're saying
Speaker 2: to you is this feeling of guilt and feeling lost
Speaker 2: and feeling like you don't have all the answers is normal,
Speaker 2: regardless of what your upbringing is. Because I grew up
Speaker 2: in I would say a fairly privileged, black, upper middle
Speaker 2: class family. I grew with both my mom and my dad.
Speaker 2: My dad always made very good money. My mom worked
Speaker 2: as well. We lived in a private house, they owned cars.
Speaker 2: My father owned land in Virginia. Like I grew up privilege,
Speaker 2: your parents grew up. Your mom and dad owned three properties.
Speaker 2: You grew up with a driveway in a private house.
Speaker 2: All of your brothers and sisters owned cars. We both
Speaker 2: were privileged. Yes, So considering your background and saying you
Speaker 2: don't know because of your background, think about our background.
Speaker 3: And we still didn't know a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: And we still damaged. Doctor, you know, look at Jackson
Speaker 1: and be like, bro, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: We just had this conversation like two days ago about
Speaker 3: how much Jackson still feels the effects of stuff that
Speaker 3: we've done early on where we thought we were doing
Speaker 3: the best that we could as parents. But again, like
Speaker 3: you said, and we can relate to you parenting out
Speaker 3: of fear, parenting out of you know, not knowing anger,
Speaker 3: anger parenting because that's just what our parents did and
Speaker 3: that's the only way that we knew. Like, there were
Speaker 3: so many moments with Jackson that now we're self correcting
Speaker 3: and apologizing, like I feel like you should be speaking
Speaker 3: to your children about moments where you feel like, you
Speaker 3: know what. I may not have handled that right and
Speaker 3: acknowledged the way they feel because I think the emotionally
Speaker 3: intelligent part that we've lacked even as adults, and we
Speaker 3: can see why it's them from that as children, is
Speaker 3: because we weren't acknowledged as children where our feelings were
Speaker 3: validated right, And sometimes our parents did or did not
Speaker 3: take accountability for that, but not because they were coming
Speaker 3: from a place of analysis.
Speaker 1: They just did not know.
Speaker 3: So I think you're doing the right thing first off
Speaker 3: by even writing into us or listening to our podcasts
Speaker 3: or other spaces or other forums where you can learn
Speaker 3: as a mom and as a single mom, taking tidbits
Speaker 3: from places that you say, you know, I never thought
Speaker 3: about that before, but I listened and heard it on
Speaker 3: this platform, and I can maybe implement this in my life.
Speaker 2: One thing I will say having my mentorship program, seventy
Speaker 2: five percent of the young men and women that I
Speaker 2: trained were from single moms. And the one thing I
Speaker 2: knew that was a consistent was that those single moms
Speaker 2: tried to find men that could fill that space of
Speaker 2: not having a fallow Yes, and part of that comes
Speaker 2: from having discernment right, choosing the right person to be
Speaker 2: your child's mentor. I would understand, and I truly understand,
Speaker 2: her fear. If she was molested from seven to eight
Speaker 2: for a long time, it would probably be difficult for
Speaker 2: her to let her children be with other adults. So
Speaker 2: the first thing is you can't parent out a fear
Speaker 2: because you can't protect them all of the time. And
Speaker 2: what you can do is you can put them in
Speaker 2: a bubble, and putting them in a bubble until they
Speaker 2: become adults is not protecting them at all either. So
Speaker 2: you don't want to do that out of fear by
Speaker 2: putting them in a bubble. What I would say is
Speaker 2: continue to go to therapy. Right in therapy, learn a
Speaker 2: lot about yourself, open up to your therapists, but also
Speaker 2: the people in your life and family who've wronged you.
Speaker 2: Right more than likely the people who've molested you or
Speaker 2: we're in your family who may still be there. I
Speaker 2: think that you owe it to yourself to heal, you know,
Speaker 2: to approach them or let them know how you feel
Speaker 2: and how it's hurt you. So that you can let
Speaker 2: it be known that this is not a secret that
Speaker 2: I'm going to keep for everybody. This is something that
Speaker 2: I went through and I experienced it. Showing that strength
Speaker 2: will show your kid's strength. Yes, But then what it
Speaker 2: also do is allow you to at some point let
Speaker 2: it go.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: I'm going to give you an analogy real quick, and
Speaker 2: I hope this analogy helps people. So we and I
Speaker 2: know will take time. I tend to talk a lot.
Speaker 2: But if I hold my phone, right, I hold my phone?
Speaker 2: Is it heavy? Is it heavy?
Speaker 1: I got my phone on my hands? Your phone heavy?
Speaker 1: How much? Is the phone? Way? Less than a pound? No?
Speaker 1: Less than the pound? Right?
Speaker 2: But if I hold it for an hour, start to
Speaker 2: make my arm ache.
Speaker 1: A little bit? Right? Is your arm extended? Yeah, my
Speaker 1: arm extended?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: If I hold it for a day, my arm might
Speaker 2: feel like it's gonna fall off. Right, And now the
Speaker 2: phone feels like a thousand pounds wide because I'm holding
Speaker 2: onto it. Some things you got to learn how to
Speaker 2: let go, because the only person you damaging when you
Speaker 2: hold on to things that you don't have to hold
Speaker 2: on to is yourself.
Speaker 1: Let stuff go.
Speaker 2: If you learn to let it go, you won't continues
Speaker 2: to continuously damage yourself. You can heal, but then you
Speaker 2: also won'tamage the people around around you, which right now.
Speaker 1: Are your children.
Speaker 2: Learn to let stuff go, use discernment, find good, positive
Speaker 2: influences around them that you can put them in front
Speaker 2: of that you trust you. You use discernment to meet
Speaker 2: these people first, and if you trust them, allow those
Speaker 2: people to pour into your children. Because that's what we
Speaker 2: were at Prototype Sports Performance Lab. I was a big brother,
Speaker 2: a father figure, uncle, whatever I had to be.
Speaker 5: I mean still to this today. Yes, yes, TJ called
Speaker 5: you pops, called me pops. A lot of y'all think
Speaker 5: that he's really my son because.
Speaker 3: It looks just like just like me when he doesn'tunding
Speaker 3: how much they resemble each other.
Speaker 1: A couple of times I have to be like.
Speaker 3: You sure you know?
Speaker 1: And is my boy? I love them, I love them,
Speaker 1: we love them.
Speaker 2: And there's guys that like TJ, like ramel Uh, Tasia,
Speaker 2: my cousin Kai Roger, they're so ricky DJ.
Speaker 1: And some of these guys have fathers, but that doesn't.
Speaker 2: Mean you can't supplement with another father figure to get
Speaker 2: to give them, you know, a different perspective. So It's
Speaker 2: natural for you to feel fear, mama, but let things
Speaker 2: go heal, don't pass it on to your children. And
Speaker 2: I use that desertment to find some positive influences that
Speaker 2: can help you for.
Speaker 3: Sure and continue to be a student of life because
Speaker 3: you'll just learn so many.
Speaker 1: Things that will absolutely at your kids.
Speaker 3: Alrighty, Hey, Kadina devou first Kadeen, my Jamaican sister.
Speaker 1: From a Nada my dad and mother. Way you see
Speaker 1: how I read it that way?
Speaker 3: Right? I just knew what it was. You're so beautiful.
Speaker 3: Thank you for inspiring me to get my body banking.
Speaker 3: I'm saying love my body and loving my body after
Speaker 3: these kids.
Speaker 1: Oh, thank you for that. Sis.
Speaker 3: Love you guys, and how honest you are about your relationship.
Speaker 3: Listening to your podcast has inspired and forced me to
Speaker 3: get my money slash business right, be a better mom, partner, friend,
Speaker 3: and all around better person. You guys are like the
Speaker 3: mirror I ignored for so many years. I love to
Speaker 3: hear that. Thank you and that's why we do it
Speaker 3: and value You're my favorite sisters. So here's my question.
Speaker 3: I have been in a relationship with my fiance for
Speaker 3: seven years. We have one child together, and I have
Speaker 3: two from before. We have been engaged for three years.
Speaker 3: My fiance keeps saying that he wants everything right financially
Speaker 3: before we get married. We both own businesses that are
Speaker 3: in the beginning stages, so you know how that goes.
Speaker 3: I don't want a big wedding. I'm fine with going
Speaker 3: to the courthouse. My ringe doesn't even have to be
Speaker 3: a diamond, just a simple band, and I love it.
Speaker 3: I spent to spend money on a wedding is foolish
Speaker 3: right now. We have set a date two times and
Speaker 3: he's continuously said I'm not ready yet, not sure when
Speaker 3: we can set a date. This last time, I told
Speaker 3: him we need to live separately unless we get married.
Speaker 3: He set a date to get married. I bought a dress,
Speaker 3: and after I bought it, he told me, I'm not
Speaker 3: ready yet. I need more time. I'm seeing time go
Speaker 3: by with no date in sight, and I don't know
Speaker 3: what to do. I want to leave, but I really
Speaker 3: do feel like, deep down he's the man I am
Speaker 3: to marry. Also, my parents do not like him at all,
Speaker 3: and they make it known, which makes it even harder.
Speaker 1: Please help me.
Speaker 2: She's Jamaican. She's Jamaican too, and she's ja Jamaican parents
Speaker 2: don't be liking people. That's just what it is.
Speaker 1: That's true because you know, listen, mom, Mimi gave me
Speaker 1: a hard way to go.
Speaker 3: Me me almost fumbled the bag for you.
Speaker 1: Like song says, married Donovan not de vow.
Speaker 3: All right, So he keeps putting off the date, putting
Speaker 3: off the date. So it's giving what he doesn't want
Speaker 3: to get married Devau, What do you think.
Speaker 1: I don't think that it's given that to me.
Speaker 2: It's thinking that he said he wants things to be
Speaker 2: together financially, but they're starting a business, so things aren't
Speaker 2: together financially. It could also be that he does not
Speaker 2: want his wife to settle because then he would have
Speaker 2: to hear for the rest of his life how I
Speaker 2: settled for this wedding. A lot of times I understand,
Speaker 2: right when a woman says, and I'm not going to generalize,
Speaker 2: but when a woman says, babe, I don't need this,
Speaker 2: I just want this, and then you give them what
Speaker 2: they say they just want, and then later on you
Speaker 2: got to hear about how they just settle for that.
Speaker 1: Nobody wants to hear that you've done.
Speaker 2: That before, right, and that it doesn't feel good to me.
Speaker 2: It didn't feel good to me, And as a man,
Speaker 2: you don't ever want to feel like your wife or
Speaker 2: your girlfriend had to settle.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: You want her to have everything her heart desires, and
Speaker 2: sometimes as you're planning and trying, things don't go the
Speaker 2: way you wanted them to go financially, and I feel
Speaker 2: I don't know him, I don't know his story. I
Speaker 2: know that she's kind of anty, and she's like, yo,
Speaker 2: it's been time, and she's putting her foot down, like
Speaker 2: we have to live separately, similar to you. Two thousand
Speaker 2: and seven, Kadina and I were living together in Michigan
Speaker 2: and she was like, YEA, I think I'm gonna go
Speaker 2: back to my parents' house if we're not going to
Speaker 2: get married.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be a living girlfriend.
Speaker 2: I understand now your perspective then, but at that time
Speaker 2: I didn't.
Speaker 3: Understand make sense.
Speaker 2: And I was kind of like, yo, like why are
Speaker 2: you forcing me to do something when I can't physically
Speaker 2: give you what I know that you want?
Speaker 3: And it all might also be sis that maybe your
Speaker 3: fiance knowing how your parents feel about him, because they've
Speaker 3: made it known that they don't necessarily care for him,
Speaker 3: he does not want to enter into a marriage with you,
Speaker 3: and then shit flop and then they be like see Metelia,
Speaker 3: and I like him from money, And that's all you're
Speaker 3: going to hear over and over again because they won't
Speaker 3: let you live it down that he's pretty much married
Speaker 3: you or they're marrying you off to this man who
Speaker 3: essentially is not going to be able to sustain your lifestyle.
Speaker 3: And having started two businesses, there probably is a lot
Speaker 3: going on. I when Devala is in his business mindset
Speaker 3: and DeVos trying to grow some business, or he has
Speaker 3: an idea and he's in like work mode, he don't
Speaker 3: want to hear about nothing else in that moment. So
Speaker 3: he could essentially just be putting things off because he
Speaker 3: just mentally might be bogged down from getting these businesses started.
Speaker 3: You know, that's only something we can you can know,
Speaker 3: because we don't know how.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we don't know him like that. We don't really
Speaker 2: know you like that. But this sounds very similar to us.
Speaker 2: And I'll give you the most realist feeling that I
Speaker 2: had one time in your parents' house. I just got
Speaker 2: cut from the lions. We come back we get married,
Speaker 2: we have this big wedding. Right, have this big wedding.
Speaker 2: We have to move back into the apartment. We moved
Speaker 2: back into the apartment you pregnant. I'm like, yo, these walls.
Speaker 2: My wife is not going to live in this old
Speaker 2: apartment like this. So we had to live with your
Speaker 2: parents for about three months while they renovated the whole apartment.
Speaker 2: Do you know how less of a man I felt
Speaker 2: with my pregnant wife staying in Sakari's room because Sakari
Speaker 2: was at boarding school. After I promised your parents that
Speaker 2: I was going to take care of you, like, I know,
Speaker 2: you probably didn't feel like, well, this is my responsibility
Speaker 2: to get us out of here, because you was just like, oh,
Speaker 2: we can stay at my parents' house.
Speaker 1: Be cool.
Speaker 2: I felt like I was feeling as a man, like
Speaker 2: I'm like, yo, Remember I asked your your pop. I said, Pops,
Speaker 2: how did you feel when your daughter was back at home?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 2: With it was me, you Kingston and Achilles. So we
Speaker 2: had two dogs living in their house for three months.
Speaker 2: Like you didn't feel like like like my my daughter's back.
Speaker 2: He was like, nah, you know, it's just this is
Speaker 2: what you guys have to do.
Speaker 1: You got to do it.
Speaker 3: You have to do My dad, Loki loves roll together,
Speaker 3: he loves he loves all the family together in one house.
Speaker 1: So many ninety you'd be like, you guys, don't have
Speaker 1: to go back to the apartment.
Speaker 3: You can stay and I'm like, Dad, we gotta go home.
Speaker 1: But I know your mother wasn't liking it.
Speaker 3: She was probably just like she see where this will go.
Speaker 2: Now send its football, Pa this football and is going
Speaker 2: to do this. And then remember I was telling I'm
Speaker 2: starting to start in the business, you know, starting a
Speaker 2: football training program. Jim, he's going to open the gym. Now, okay, okay,
Speaker 2: let's see where this goes. Like, I know what that
Speaker 2: feels like as a man, to have that pressure to
Speaker 2: be able to be everything you want to be for
Speaker 2: your wife. I think more people should understand what that
Speaker 2: looks like before they say here's an ultimatum, We're either
Speaker 2: doing this this way or it's not gonna work, because
Speaker 2: that pressure realistically does not fall on you as a woman.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: If things don't happen financially, people don't ever look at
Speaker 2: me and be like, what is Kadeen doing?
Speaker 1: They look at me like, what is happening?
Speaker 3: You know what I'm that is a fact?
Speaker 1: Think about it.
Speaker 2: Did anybody when we move back to Brooklyn and we
Speaker 2: had to live in the apartment, did anybody ever say
Speaker 2: to you, Kadeen, why aren't you picking yourself up by
Speaker 2: your bootstraps and helping out and doing all this?
Speaker 1: And anybody ever say that to you?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 1: Your mom, your mom.
Speaker 3: That's one thing, mam your my mom might be hard
Speaker 3: on you, but she's equally hard on probably.
Speaker 1: Ten times I will give Mimi that. Mimi was definitely
Speaker 1: on you, like.
Speaker 3: She's just like, and what are you doing to contribute?
Speaker 3: What's next for you? And what is your plan?
Speaker 1: She says that.
Speaker 3: Now still living in this house with us, she looks
Speaker 3: at me some days like, so what are you doing?
Speaker 3: So what's next? I was like, mine, you don't even
Speaker 3: have any clue about what I do?
Speaker 1: Do you? She don't.
Speaker 2: But think about it other than your mom than anybody else,
Speaker 2: look at your no, no, you know, but think about
Speaker 2: Tiff for example, Oh yeah, Tiff.
Speaker 1: Which was friends going to do? Is be life? Say
Speaker 1: it to you? So how long?
Speaker 3: She was like, how long are you about to let
Speaker 3: this acting thing? Right out until it's no more.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, you know what, I love to for
Speaker 1: saying that. You want to know why she was honestly concerned?
Speaker 3: She genuinely was, and I mean tell me about it.
Speaker 3: She was like friends being friends with both of us,
Speaker 3: just like what.
Speaker 2: The she said to me, She said, I've known you
Speaker 2: since college. You've always been good at school, you good
Speaker 2: with business. You expected me to believe at that time
Speaker 2: that acting was going to be the thing that got
Speaker 2: you like she just didn't see it. She was like,
Speaker 2: you've always done business like you've done well. Why was
Speaker 2: it that so?
Speaker 1: And I respect her?
Speaker 2: And this is another thing for you people who have friends,
Speaker 2: When you have friends who tell you the truth, don't
Speaker 2: be mad at your friends, for that's why.
Speaker 1: They're your friends. You would hope they would not.
Speaker 2: Just not just applaud for you in your face and
Speaker 2: in behind your back, be like, I don't know, nah,
Speaker 2: Tiffany applauded and then to k was just like what
Speaker 2: is this? And then to me it was just like
Speaker 2: the val like how long you're gonna have my friend
Speaker 2: working at the mall?
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: But those pressures I felt and I just want her
Speaker 2: to understand that those are the pressures that men feel true,
Speaker 2: and we got to own that pressure the same way
Speaker 2: the pressure for y'all will be well when you're having kids,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, Like, no one ever asks
Speaker 2: a man, it's you know when you have kids, when
Speaker 2: you have a kids, that doesn't happen to us.
Speaker 1: There's certain pressures.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's pressures that society puts on certain genders.
Speaker 1: And that's one of themen.
Speaker 3: I want what your plan inside when you say you
Speaker 3: need to live separately, because living separately, if you're gonna
Speaker 3: be paying a rent, he's gonna be paying a rent
Speaker 3: or two separate sets of bills. That too, is not
Speaker 3: also physically responsible. So financially that might be a lot
Speaker 3: too if you're going to be living separately.
Speaker 2: But I think, but you know what's funny, she's probably
Speaker 2: not even thinking about that because you weren't thinking about
Speaker 2: your plan. You weren't working, and you were living with
Speaker 2: me in Michigan. But she was like, I'm thinking I'm
Speaker 2: gonna go back home to my mom because parents you
Speaker 2: was thinking about fiscal responsibility. You were just like, no,
Speaker 2: I want to be a wife and I'm not going
Speaker 2: to be a living girlfriend in fact, so I understand where.
Speaker 3: She's where she's coming from you. But the good thing
Speaker 3: is that you're writing in right to trying to get
Speaker 3: our little two cents. We don't have all the answers
Speaker 3: to this, and of course we're only working with what
Speaker 3: we got in this paragraph that you wrote us. But Sistern,
Speaker 3: I think it's worth having more conversations to find out
Speaker 3: why exactly he's not ready and why the date is
Speaker 3: not sticking.
Speaker 2: And when he tells you, don't try to make up
Speaker 2: your own narrative as to what's really happening. If he
Speaker 2: tells you believe him, if that's the man you chose
Speaker 2: and you used proper discernment. If he tells you believe him,
Speaker 2: don't try to make up your own story about what
Speaker 2: it is. And do if she wants to get married
Speaker 2: or move in a certain way and she's letting you
Speaker 2: know what it is, don't take that from her and say, well,
Speaker 2: you got to do things on my timeline. Be honest
Speaker 2: and say, baby, I would be more comfortable doing this
Speaker 2: if I had this amount of money in my bank account,
Speaker 2: because then I know we would be fine. Or when
Speaker 2: my business gets to this level, we'll be good. But
Speaker 2: when you're vague as a man and you say, well,
Speaker 2: we're just waiting, we're just waiting.
Speaker 1: Nah, that doesn't work for women either.
Speaker 3: Facts and address your parents. They can't be disrespecting your
Speaker 3: man either. I had to put my foot down at
Speaker 3: one point my parents and be like, listen, this is
Speaker 3: the way it's going to be, and I just need
Speaker 3: your support.
Speaker 1: So there you go, all right. If you like to
Speaker 1: be featured as.
Speaker 3: One of our listener letters, email us at dead ass
Speaker 3: Advice at gmail dot com.
Speaker 2: That's d E A d A S S A D
Speaker 2: V I C E at gmail dot com.
Speaker 3: Love it and we're talking traveling with kids. Moment of truth.
Speaker 3: Leada Ass is home. I'm just kidding. What's your moment
Speaker 3: of truth? Babe?
Speaker 1: My moment of truth is that the travel is worth it.
Speaker 1: It is.
Speaker 2: We made jokes about it being expensive because it is expensive,
Speaker 2: but every single moment we had on vacation with these
Speaker 2: young men was so worth it.
Speaker 3: It was so worth it that was actually gonna be
Speaker 3: my moment of truth. My own truth is actually going
Speaker 3: to be that. In addition to and just be strategic
Speaker 3: with when you're gonna plan the vacation after, because you
Speaker 3: don't need to recoup after the same way we joke
Speaker 3: and say that this house is not really our house
Speaker 3: and we just stay here because it's the kid's house.
Speaker 3: It's the same thing with kids' vacations and stuff. It's
Speaker 3: for them to enjoy, and it's so worth it to
Speaker 3: see the light in their eyes when they're in a
Speaker 3: different space and they're absorbing things for the first time
Speaker 3: and trying things for the first time, snorkeling for the
Speaker 3: first time, jumping off a boat for the first time,
Speaker 3: like those are so many memories that you know they'll
Speaker 3: be able to tell these stories for years to come.
Speaker 3: All right, y'all, be sure to follow us on Patreon
Speaker 3: if you have not yet. Exclusive Deadass podcast video is
Speaker 3: there and you might see some family action. You might
Speaker 3: see some vacation stuff on Patreon as well too. Be
Speaker 3: sure to follow us on social media too if you
Speaker 3: have not yet, dead Ass the podcast on Instagram, I'm Kadene,
Speaker 3: I am and.
Speaker 2: I am Devout, And if you're listening on Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 2: be sure to rate, review, and subscribe.
Speaker 1: Dead Ass, y'all. Dead Ass.
Speaker 4: Dead Ass is a production of iHeartMedia podcast network and
Speaker 4: produced by Donora Pinya and Tribble. Follow the podcast on
Speaker 4: social media at dead ass the Podcast and never miss
Speaker 4: a Thing