Transcript
Melanie & Kristen: All right, we're going. Oh,
Kristen: I was about to say hi. I
Melanie & Kristen: I'm sorry. This is the perfect intro for us.
Kristen: i was watching the countdown.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh my gosh. Okay. sorry Okay, sorry.
Kristen: like your coffee cup.
Melanie & Kristen: go
Kristen: I like your coffee cup.
Melanie & Kristen: well Thank you. It says words on the one side. Yeah.
Kristen: Oh. Oh, yeah, look at that. Okay.
Kristen: I just froze for a second. Hold on.
Kristen: I'm just trying to figure out what I'm... Okay. I'm trying to figure out...
Kristen: Happy New Year.
Melanie & Kristen: Happy New Year. Oh, yeah. Happy New Year.
Kristen: Happy New Year. Welcome 2026. You want to stop and restart?
Melanie & Kristen: No, we can edit all that out.
Kristen: The point was for us to, like, limit the editing, though. That was the point. And by us, I mean you. Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, just keep going.
Kristen: All right. All right. Well, welcome, 2026. How's your year going for you?
Melanie & Kristen: I ate a lot of cinnamon rolls yesterday.
Melanie & Kristen: i was feeling left out because you were eating cinnamon rolls and Uncle Jeff was eating cinnamon rolls.
Kristen: Roll. Singular.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. i'm the only one who ate plural.
Melanie & Kristen: We were eating a cinnamon roll and Uncle Jeff may or may not have eaten more than one.
Kristen: To be fair.
Melanie & Kristen: And so I made them. It took all day. um i started at nine. I finished at like four. And i was using the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook.
Melanie & Kristen: And I did not look at the servings that it like gave. It's like it was like 24 of them. of them
Kristen: They're like, to service your small bakery, use this recipe.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, exactly.
Melanie & Kristen: Anyway, had five left by the end and i threw them away.
Kristen: so good job.
Melanie & Kristen: i threw them away.
Kristen: You could have frozen them.
Melanie & Kristen: but just,
Melanie & Kristen: I think it made Eric sad that he ate so many.
Kristen: hello
Melanie & Kristen: ate, I ate like four. Rest for him.
Kristen: well.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, no, there's cat hair in my coffee. It's fine. I got it.
Melanie & Kristen: There's a tablecloth. We're throwing it away.
Kristen: Yum. Okay. Wow. Speaking of all that cinnamon roll goodness. I mean, I will say though, my cinnamon roll was like this big.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh.
Melanie & Kristen: You have a small head.
Kristen: is water
Melanie & Kristen: Like, what does that mean? So more like that?
Kristen: probably like five inches across five inches across i'd say wait is that like one two three i don't have a dollar i don't have cash oh smaller i thought you said go get a dollar smaller than a dollar
Melanie & Kristen: Build up a dollar bill.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. Smaller than a dollar.
Melanie & Kristen: said smaller than a dollar. Six inches, roughly.
Melanie & Kristen: It's a dollar. smaller Smaller than a dollar.
Kristen: I don't know. Maybe should bring the tray over. But like shout out to Whataburger for having a nice cinnamon roll. I mean, the tray of six.
Melanie & Kristen: Did you call it water burger?
Kristen: We call it – we add R's to words that don't have R's.
Melanie & Kristen: Water, water burger.
Kristen: I mean, Whataburger has two R's, but we add an R where there shouldn't be an R. Whataburger?
Melanie & Kristen: But it's literally spelled what a burger, right?
Kristen: It's spelled Whataburger, but no one says Whataburger. If someone says, oh, hello, this is my, we enjoy eating Whataburger.
Melanie & Kristen: mean
Melanie & Kristen: Why did anyone call it that in the first place?
Kristen: We're like, you're not, I don't know, but we're like, you're not from around these here parts.
Melanie & Kristen: I mean, neither are you. You've just acclimatized.
Kristen: But we've been here long enough.
Melanie & Kristen: Acclimatized.
Kristen: We've been, we've been long here long.
Melanie & Kristen: Is that the British way of saying that?
Kristen: Is it what?
Melanie & Kristen: I said, is that the British way of saying that? Acclimatized. No, acclimatized. Or is that just how you say it? Acclimatized. Acclimatized.
Kristen: know if you say acclimatized. I don't know if you can make that a word. I mean, acclimate.
Melanie & Kristen: I was watching this TikTok or, or it was Instagram reels. Anyway.
Kristen: Both good sources here. Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah. It could have been the same thing, honestly. um And I think it was a psychic. There was no, there was no context. It just kind of like appeared. And the guy was the psychic who knows was going, you know,
Melanie & Kristen: yeah 24, Virgo. And then he's like, Jordan? And then someone's like, and in the crowd. He's like, did you just get a pet?
Melanie & Kristen: And the guy's like, Yeah, seven. He's like, are they chickens? And he's like, sure are. You know it or something like that. And everyone's laughing. And he's like, um are you feeling like oh they're they don't love you as much as you love them? And he was like, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: And he's like, do you feel like they're withholding from you? And he's like, yeah, well, I'm about $1,500 in. I'm like, where the eggs? You know?
Melanie & Kristen: and And that's when he said that they were they need to acclimatize.
Kristen: Are roosters?
Kristen: It is a word, by the way.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, well, I just had to do that whole story for you to just confirm what I asked you in the first place.
Melanie & Kristen: Sisters.
Kristen: I think you didn't have to do the whole story.
Melanie & Kristen: Sisters. Sisters.
Kristen: You could have just said, hey, look it up real quick, which is what I was doing like within the first line of your story. but
Kristen: So, New Year's resolutions.
Kristen: Yay or nay?
Melanie & Kristen: Yay.
Kristen: Nay.
Melanie & Kristen: yay. It's like a, it's like a, it's like a, you know, it's somewhere the middle.
Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Explain.
Melanie & Kristen: Cause I have the same resolution every single year. It's just to lose weight. Yeah. So yes and no. it's just It's just an ongoing goal. I think it's mostly to be healthy all around.
Kristen: Hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: And Eric and I have been um working out a lot. We've been weightlifting in our garage. We have ah a whole setup going on.
Melanie & Kristen: And I am so weak.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm like bench pressing eight.
Kristen: the bar.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. but And he's like doing 50 pounds in each hand.
Kristen: Oh, you're talking about dumbbells.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, we have a we have a bar too but.
Kristen: Well, if you're doing eights, you're not doing the bar.
Melanie & Kristen: what we're doing
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah
Kristen: Emma is very strong. She does a lot of weights with, um they do a lot of weight training with her softball team for school. So that's like, yeah, I don't think we ever did that at school.
Kristen: I think literally the only people that used the weight room were the football players, possibly.
Melanie & Kristen: And like wrestling team, did you have wrestling team?
Kristen: don't know if I had a wrestling team, to be honest. I'm like, We didn't really have the, um, well, I don't know. i was gonna say, I don't know if we had like the, the demographic for wrestling.
Melanie & Kristen: Does anyone?
Kristen: I think so. i think wrestling. Okay. Well now going to look up wrestling demographics.
Melanie & Kristen: eric Eric was on the wrestling team in high school.
Kristen: He looks like he would be a wrestler.
Melanie & Kristen: and And it gives me such joy to tell you this story. um
Melanie & Kristen: He actually made it to the newspaper.
Kristen: Oh, good job!
Melanie & Kristen: but because his opponent
Melanie & Kristen: did some like world record of fastest pin.
Melanie & Kristen: it's been my mission to find it so that we can frame it
Kristen: Hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: and put it on the wall because think it's really funny. um It cracks me up. He's just like on the floor. That's the picture. It's just like being picked.
Melanie & Kristen: One year, I'm going wrap. I'm to find it. i'm gonna frame it.
Kristen: and Frame it.
Melanie & Kristen: and I'm wrap it.
Kristen: I'm sure he's going to love that.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm going to give it to him.
Melanie & Kristen: He's going to think it's hilarious.
Kristen: Okay, so I'm looking at...
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Okay, well, this is race demographics for WWE and then some other... initials that I don't know AEW don't know I don't know but white Americans make up 57.8% of that demographic Latino Americans make up 18.7 black Americans 12.1 on and on and on yes okay now with that background knowledge
Melanie & Kristen: Like wrestlers? Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Let me, ah
Melanie & Kristen: I mean, I've already forgotten everything you just said, but Okay.
Kristen: there was like almost 60% white people um at, I'm looking up our racial demographics at Cleveland High School, Reseda, California.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: All right, so. Grover Cleveland Charter High, because now like all these schools are charters, has a very diverse student body with a total minority enrollment of 84% and 71% identified as economically disadvantaged, indicating a predominantly minority and low-income population, typical for schools in LAUSD areas.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Okay, so, ooh, doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo. Anyway, my point being, oh, here we go. 62.1% Hispanic, 16% white says.
Kristen: There were, i was going to say when I was there, it seemed like, because it's been a hot minute. um It seemed like there was a predominant Hispanic population.
Kristen: And then i feel like there were a lot of black kids, but I know, I feel like nowadays there's a little bit more interracial mixing going on. So I don't know how they look at that andav demographically.
Kristen: Two or more races, I guess is what they would say.
Melanie & Kristen: Nobody wants to identify as white.
Kristen: The point is, is there wasn't a lot.
Kristen: Well, it's interesting here. My kids identify as white Hispanic. Not that they have any Hispanic, um like they're all European. it's you're They're European, but because Eddie's family is from Argentina, it's a cultural thing that they are that they include. So I'm like, yes, yes, check that box.
Kristen: Because, you know, my poor son, you know, white male, that's that's a rough one. We can talk about my whole like, ah what is it?
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: The... ah
Melanie & Kristen: um don't know.
Kristen: When the thoughts...
Melanie & Kristen: What is it?
Kristen: Oh, this is such a bad idea. um
Kristen: I can't think of the name of this.
Kristen: This happens to me all the time. It's so fun. um Because then I look like...
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. I don't know if it's ADHD or cancer. That's like making my brain not remember things.
Kristen: Oh, I thought you meant my astrological sign.
Melanie & Kristen: Literally you said overalls earlier. Literally you said overalls earlier and i was like, oh, this is a, I don't know. It's a pinafore.
Kristen: Yeah, that's how I'm feeling right now. um
Kristen: It's like...
Kristen: They just got rid of it in schools recently. And like across the board, I feel like. But it was Oh my gosh.
Kristen: All right.
Melanie & Kristen: Describe it so I can help you.
Kristen: It's where... People of color, because that's who it usually, you know, help, were given an advantage with, like, school enrollment, work stuff.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: And I, for the life of me, it's like,
Melanie & Kristen: don't know what it's called, but I know what you're talking about, I think.
Kristen: Okay. So I have that story about how that was, how I was affected by that. was very sad.
Melanie & Kristen: oh
Kristen: Going into junior high school and I was ranked like in the 99th percentile across the board. So that's like, you know, I did better than 99% of students in the whole state of California.
Kristen: And I had like straight A's. And and I applied to this magnet junior high school and they were like, we would love to have you. you're like our perfect ideal student.
Kristen: Problem is, is we have too many white kids enrolled, so we can't offer you a spot right now. So i was like, wait, so I can't go because I'm white? Like that, that was the whole thing. I was like, okay.
Melanie & Kristen: You're like, well, I'm not.
Kristen: I'm like, I'm very tan.
Melanie & Kristen: right husband Yeah, I'm very tan.
Kristen: i was very tan in elementary school.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah You look like Mowgli.
Kristen: Thank you.
Melanie & Kristen: You're welcome. We should put that picture of you.
Kristen: no, we shouldn't because where my underwear is.
Melanie & Kristen: one Like this?
Kristen: It was my underwear up, yeah, because mom was like, let me take a photo of you, even though you're sitting here in your Chinese.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: She had just had yeah just cut my hair. That was the context of that. i wasn't just... And I was like eight.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Seven or eight, yeah. But still.
Melanie & Kristen: I think it's because you were just in underwear that you really, it really sold the whole Mowgli thing. You know?
Kristen: The fact that she's like, here, let me take a photo of you. And I'm like...
Melanie & Kristen: Look what I did.
Kristen: Well, and this was like before, obviously before digital cameras. And so I'm like, this is going to be developed by someone and they're going to see me.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. there're if What's crazy to me is some the the pictures that some people would take and then like
Kristen: Creepy.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, the developers just like going through them all. see It's like that movie, One Hour Photo with Robin williams and he starts like collecting photos, making double.
Kristen: Oh yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: how many How many people do you think did that for like questionable photos that people took without even thinking? Like I'm never going to see this person again.
Kristen: ah Yeah, I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: It's not like doctor-patient confidentiality.
Kristen: I...
Melanie & Kristen: Like these people are looking at all your secrets. Exactly.
Kristen: Probably.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh,
Kristen: Okay. So that long segue to say that I don't think we had a wrestling team at my high school.
Melanie & Kristen: um look, we brought it back.
Melanie & Kristen: um Do you have any Year's resolutions?
Melanie & Kristen: Or do you believe in them? Okay.
Kristen: no i't I don't really believe in in New Year's resolutions, but i I think that I have, like, I have things that I aim for, but I have, like, very, I've learned that I have to be very specific with the things that I aim for.
Kristen: Like, I can't just blanket statement say, going to get healthy this year because for me, that leaves it, like, way too open.
Kristen: Like, I need concrete
Melanie & Kristen: Mm-hmm. Something specific.
Kristen: yeah, like I will walk at least, you know, three days a week on the treadmill or something like that where it's a very like, okay, you know, it's, it's tangible.
Melanie & Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Kristen: Like you're like, okay, I know this, it's not something that I have to like think about. It's just, you know, yeah. So that would be something. Um,
Kristen: I think I would like to read more. Like I like to read my books, but like read more quality stuff because I went through a phase where I was reading just a lot of like, cause I can read really fast. I will sit there um and spend two days reading a book and that's all I do. i like use the restroom and I read.
Kristen: i might eat some like finger foods.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. I relate to that heavily, but I'm not reading anything of substance.
Kristen: so know
Kristen: It's hard sometimes, but I enjoy substance.
Melanie & Kristen: To read. Yeah. It's hard all the time for me to read things of substance.
Melanie & Kristen: I just want to read fun things, you know?
Kristen: Yeah. Can you read more than one book at a time? Like, can you?
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Okay. Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: I can read more more than one book at a time and listen to an audible. Like, you know what i mean?
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: i'll on my commute to work, I'll listen to – it's a literary RPG book called The Primal Hunter.
Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: And there's like 15 books and counting. Like he's not done – And I can listen to that and it's super nerdy. It's super nerdy. it's like who It's like um playing World of Warcraft.
Kristen: Sorry.
Melanie & Kristen: Kind of.
Kristen: i'm
Melanie & Kristen: You essentially get like the character you're following. There's a bunch of different characters. but they They get to pick like their their class and their profession and and there's like points that they earn for things.
Melanie & Kristen: It's a whole thing, you know, and i'm I'm not really into that in real life. But listening to this, I'm so like engrossed in it. Why are you laughing? Yeah.
Kristen: I'm sorry. I have my window open for the lighting. And I was watching this this man in a Tesla. And he was like slow rolling in front of my house.
Kristen: And was like, what's he My first thought is, is he from the HOA? Like, is he going to give us something for our grass that is like has bald spots all over?
Kristen: and And then I was like, oh, it's probably my Walmart um grocery delivery.
Melanie & Kristen: Never a rat.
Kristen: So the dog's going to be barking in it in a minute. um And well, who was I was laughing because he was slow rolling.
Melanie & Kristen: now what else
Kristen: And then he was like trying to like turn around and he was doing like a five point turn. to turn around and there was a car that was like, had already turned down the street again and then was waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting. And then like, they thought he was gonna like make it because he had room, but he was like, no, no, let me back up some more. and And so I was like watching this dance of cars happening and I was laughing, sorry.
Kristen: like
Melanie & Kristen: That's okay.
Kristen: i get distracted, happens.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: and Let me tell Eddie to put the dog away. Put dog away. Okay, there we go.
Kristen: This is a good idea.
Melanie & Kristen: We were talking about books.
Melanie & Kristen: And um you've heard of the 75 hard. Okay. okay That I think I would fail just because of the reading part, because you have to read a non nonfiction.
Kristen: Reading component.
Melanie & Kristen: I get them confused. Nonfiction. And I think that might kill me.
Kristen: 10 pages. 10 pages.
Melanie & Kristen: I know. i know.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: a lot.
Kristen: That's a lot. Speaking of reading,
Melanie & Kristen: I was looking at my, oh yeah go ahead.
Kristen: I was going to say, I was watching, this man has a i don't know Instagram, TikTok, whatever. They're all one in the same. Like they're all getting shared everywhere.
Kristen: Um, but he is reading, i think it's Tolkien. don't
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: know, but like, lord i think it was like Lord of the Rings books. Um, With a fifth grade reading level because he was never taught to read more than that.
Kristen: So it's him like struggling through but like persevering and he reads a chapter a day.
Melanie & Kristen: He chose the Lord of the Rings.
Kristen: I'm questioning his choices.
Melanie & Kristen: There are so many weird words.
Kristen: Well.
Melanie & Kristen: That's like if you want to make yourself feel bad. Like, like read that.
Kristen: Well, I think he even was like, what did I do to myself here?
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Might as well have chosen like Anna Karenina with all the Russian.
Kristen: that's happening I love that book. There's more French, I feel like, than Russian.
Melanie & Kristen: i know you too. Okay. Okay. So i i was going to say, um, last year I read 141 books and this year that was my goal was to read 141 because i did Lassner and I only made it to 122.
Kristen: You win.
Kristen: Oh, ah well.
Melanie & Kristen: That being said, it doesn't record my audible stuff.
Kristen: Disappointment.
Melanie & Kristen: So it could have been closer to I think I almost made it or I did make it.
Kristen: Oh.
Melanie & Kristen: It was close.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Um,
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: But yeah, that's where I'm at with reading. I'm in the hundreds.
Kristen: He did not, in fact, put the dog away.
Melanie & Kristen: No. Hashtag husbands.
Kristen: I swear. I mean...
Melanie & Kristen: I didn't have my phone on me.
Kristen: Should we reflect on the viral workout and fitness trends of last year and see if we're interested in doing any of those this year? Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, sure.
Kristen: Or did we want to continue talking about books?
Melanie & Kristen: Bucks. um No, we should, we could do fitness.
Kristen: Books.
Melanie & Kristen: its Is that one of the links I sent you? I don't even remember.
Kristen: Yes, it is. Yes, I'm going through our show notes.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: So, oh, we could probably include those in the show notes. We can do all the links that we discuss.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. All right. Well, let's see. um Weighted vests, jujitsu training.
Kristen: That's Melanie's job to do.
Melanie & Kristen: And vibration plates offer accessible alternatives to traditional gym routines.
Kristen: Wait a minute.
Melanie & Kristen: What?
Kristen: Are we looking at the same article?
Melanie & Kristen: I clicked a little link. Yeah, five fitness trends that went viral. Right?
Kristen: Okay, well, I'm looking at, are you? Number one, I'm seeing 12, 330 treadmill trend.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Jiu-jitsu is number, where are you?
Melanie & Kristen: It's the very first sentence on the page, Kristen.
Melanie & Kristen: I just hadn't scrolled down yet. You're ahead of me.
Melanie & Kristen: What are you
Melanie & Kristen: even reading? 12, 3, 30. Okay. What is that?
Kristen: I thought we were just going to skip to it. I didn't realize we were reading the entire article on that one.
Melanie & Kristen: i wasn't. I read the first sentence. I love our podcast.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh my gosh. Okay. 12, 330. at a 12% incline at three miles per hour for 30 minutes. Fun.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: That's a, that's a,
Kristen: I can't. I have a hard time with that because I have such small legs, like short, that three miles an hour is like booking it for me.
Melanie & Kristen: I just envisioned you like one of those like cats with the short arms.
Kristen: Essentially. No.
Melanie & Kristen: What are they called? They're like, i don't know. Can't say midget anymore, right?
Melanie & Kristen: Dwarf cats. No, it's not a dwarf cat.
Kristen: Oh, no, you can't say dwarf. You can say midget.
Melanie & Kristen: Little people cats.
Kristen: Little people cats, yeah.
Kristen: I don't know. This is great.
Melanie & Kristen: Um, God, we're so PC.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, cool.
Kristen: Okay. I have tried it.
Melanie & Kristen: 13 calories per minute. You have, you just, it's not but it's not walking for you.
Kristen: i have tried it, yeah. It's... that
Melanie & Kristen: It's like a light jog.
Kristen: I literally, at that incline, yeah, it's like I'm, it's like almost like a gallop.
Kristen: yeah. It's
Melanie & Kristen: Like you have more than two legs.
Kristen: really fast. That's
Melanie & Kristen: Well, yeah.
Kristen: a high incline.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. Well, um, you were.
Kristen: There's short little steps, so it's like,
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. Okay.
Kristen: So, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: So it's like, like, if if like a little elf decided to go on the treadmill.
Kristen: Sure.
Melanie & Kristen: Or like um Fred Flintstone when he's getting ready to bowl.
Kristen: Or drive or anything. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, or anything. When he's getting ready for anything. Okay.
Kristen: Literally anything. Yes.
Kristen: I do have the Flintstone feet.
Melanie & Kristen: okay
Kristen: So, yeah. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: You're like weirdly confident about your feet.
Kristen: I have very cute feet.
Melanie & Kristen: I've heard you say that so many times.
Kristen: I've been told it.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. So this is saying that
Melanie & Kristen: you burned 13 calories per minute versus 10 calories per minute for that treadmill thing. ah Yeah, this feels like I've never heard of this.
Kristen: Mm-hmm. The first time I heard about this was years ago, actually. And it was Stassi. stasi Oh yeah, no Stassi from Vanderpump Rules like back in the day, which I don't even know if you're going to know that reference.
Melanie & Kristen: I think i I know who that is because you've you've compared you've compared Emma to her, right?
Kristen: It's my birthday.
Melanie & Kristen: They're
Kristen: Yes, I think they look alike. Yeah, but they also act alike. It's my birthday.
Melanie & Kristen: the same people.
Kristen: You'll have to look that up later.
Melanie & Kristen: I feel like I just need to watch to the show now so I can like be on your level. All
Kristen: Yes, I think I think the first few seasons of banner pump was really funny and then the one that we were talking about it's not about the pasta that's like later on she wasn't even on the show at that point she got kicked off the show, but now she's like the most famous and has her own show so
Melanie & Kristen: right.
Melanie & Kristen: Thank you.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm sorry, I'm reading this and it was it made me laugh. this um Maylee Wells Sutton, a certified personal trainer at Crunch Fitness in New York, previously told Fox News Digital, it's no surprise that higher intensity running burns calories faster.
Melanie & Kristen: Running at 12, 3.30 is certainly more intense than walking on a flat surface, but it's less intense than a run, she noted. like it's like, well, obviously you're going to burn...
Kristen: Did AI write this? Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Probably. I think it's funny that it's like, well, obviously you're going to burn calories more if you move more.
Kristen: So
Melanie & Kristen: Weighted vests. Number two.
Kristen: okay I do have a weighted vest and I've had my weighted vest for like five years.
Melanie & Kristen: You have a weighted vest.
Kristen: So again, I feel like the trends from last year, i was on those trends long ago.
Melanie & Kristen: I feel like, yeah, I mean... I know what a white vest is, but I don't remember it being like a trend, you know?
Kristen: My algorithm has just been what it is. i guess my algorithm has been on trend for a while. Now, I was watching a lady who was, I think she had lost a bunch of weight, but this was like years ago, but she was using like...
Kristen: heavy do duty do like 60 pound vest or like the ones that you can like take the weights out or add them in or whatever. So she started or she bought the big one, but like with removable weights and she started at very little weight. And then as time went on, she kept adding to it until she got to like, she wears a 60 pound vest. And I'm like, you go girl.
Melanie & Kristen: i think I think that we invested were a thing when the biggest loser was a thing.
Kristen: Minus 12.
Melanie & Kristen: Because what they would do at the end of like the season is they would make all this now skinny people wear all of their fat again and in like a weighted vest.
Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: They're like, oh, here's, you know, 80 pounds that you lost, wear it and hike up this mountain. This
Kristen: Yeah. it's It's intense.
Melanie & Kristen: is showbiz.
Kristen: Yeah. Oh my gosh. There's that whole documentary now about the biggest loser coaches being like scary. don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: What do you mean? They were always scary. Nobody liked them.
Kristen: Well, yeah, but like now like the contestants are like, oh my gosh, they ruined my life by making me skinny in a mean way.
Melanie & Kristen: They yelled at me.
Kristen: I was
Melanie & Kristen: And I'm just like sensitive. Jiu-jitsu, family fitness and self-defense. There it is. There's you there's the jujitsu. Okay.
Kristen: going to say, let's do like, okay, so treadmill trend. Would you be willing to try that treadmill trend? You have a treadmill.
Melanie & Kristen: Maybe. 12, 30 minutes.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Jeez. I don't even know if my, I don't even know if my treadmill goes to 12 incline. I think it only goes to 10.
Kristen: Okay, well, you can start somewhere. You can start 10. You'd have to go to 3.5.
Melanie & Kristen: Start at 10 and then stay at 10.
Kristen: Maybe.
Melanie & Kristen: It's not going to go anywhere else. Start at 10. Start at 10, then what? Like, and then take something and put something underneath my treadmill. So no, um,
Kristen: ah way
Melanie & Kristen: That seems like it would hurt me, that it would give me shins once.
Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: If you're walking?
Melanie & Kristen: At a 12% incline, I don't know. Anyway, I think what I'm currently doing is pretty good.
Melanie & Kristen: um We do weightlifting and then I do and a mile of walking. And I do that Japanese walking style thing.
Kristen: Please explain, I don't know what this and what this is
Melanie & Kristen: Or just kind of... It's Japanese or another kind of Asian. I don't remember.
Melanie & Kristen: and Okay. It's where you... walk at like a regular pace for three minutes. And then for the next three minutes, you do like fast walking and then you just alternate.
Melanie & Kristen: And that's supposed to it's like, yeah, but not like that.
Kristen: parahu All right.
Melanie & Kristen: No. But yeah, it's supposed to be like intermittent. That's not the right word. But you know what i mean? Like HIIT training or something. Like where you go fast and then you go back down and it, I don't know, tricks your body into thinking you're doing something more than you are.
Melanie & Kristen: And that's where I'm at in my life, tricking my body.
Kristen: all right
Melanie & Kristen: Jiu-jitsu for family fitness and self-defense. Who's doing that? Oh, Ivanka Trump. That's why. Ivanka and Giselle Bündchen. This seems like a rich people thing.
Melanie & Kristen: let's Let's our whole family.
Kristen: It is very expensive, i will say.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, let's let's our whole family just do jujitsu.
Kristen: Have you seen the videos?
Melanie & Kristen: As a life skill.
Kristen: Have you seen the videos of, like, the guys doing jujitsu?
Melanie & Kristen: No.
Kristen: And they're like, tell me you're gay without telling me you're gay.
Melanie & Kristen: but
Kristen: Because the grappling gets...
Melanie & Kristen: Oh my gosh. Oh, they also have like a number thing. It's Jujitsu. They described Jujitsu. Ivanka and her family described Jujitsu as a physical, mental, and emotional practice grounded in their 753 code.
Kristen: What that is, we don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: who but
Melanie & Kristen: Philosophy aimed at spiritual, mental, and physical wellness.
Kristen: I have three code.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Okay. got to look that up now.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, what is that? 753 code.
Kristen: Oh, it's a martial arts philosophy, particularly in BJJ, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and karate.
Melanie & Kristen: pres Brazil.
Kristen: you It's arrived.
Melanie & Kristen: Did you ever watch that?
Melanie & Kristen: Brazil. I can't tell.
Kristen: Are you talking about the, like, the Miss Universe or something? Or no?
Melanie & Kristen: No, um it was Bob's Burgers.
Kristen: Oh, yeah, no.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah
Kristen: I had a completely different friend.
Melanie & Kristen: And Tina, Tina's like, i want to learn, I want to learn Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, whatever. Oh, what was it? um Capoeira.
Melanie & Kristen: And the teacher the whole time is just like, Brazil.
Melanie & Kristen: It's like whipping his hair. Brazil. Okay, sorry. tell me Tell me about the code.
Kristen: Can you go back to whence you came? Like, go back. Okay. It's the dog. um All right. So, particularly in BJJ and karate, derived from the samurai's bushido, focusing on holistic wellness through seven virtues, rectitude, courage,
Kristen: benevolence, politeness, honesty, honor, and loyalty. So that's the seven virtues. And then the five keys to health, nutrition, exercise, rest, hygiene, positivity, and three states of mind, which I have no...
Kristen: it Dog, you're...
Melanie & Kristen: Is it spiritual, mental, and physical wellness?
Kristen: parting
Kristen: Kind of. Zanshin, moonshin, and furushin. For a balanced life. Oh, wait. Maybe there's more down here. Let me see. Five keys. Oh, yes. Zanshin. Alertness. Sustained awareness.
Kristen: Moonshin. Looks like moonshine, but not. A mind without thought. No mind. Got that one covered.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And furushin. Immovable mind. Emotional balance. Developed by the Valente brothers. Yeah.
Kristen: Here I am thinking it's some some like ancient code of you know whatever.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, no.
Kristen: now the Valente brothers.
Melanie & Kristen: um Oh my gosh.
Kristen: But like for, I mean, I think that's a really good thing. Like rectitude, moral correctness, doing the right thing. I kind of like that. The whole, the seven virtues, the five keys to health, proper hygiene. love how they have proper hygiene.
Kristen: Do you have a hard time
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. You have to tell people to like take a shower. Yeah.
Kristen: Well, I have a hard time with stuff like that. And and I noticed that with my kids too. Like I remember being probably 10 at a Christmas and Aunt Barb coming up to me and going like, give me a hug and then going, are we just like doing showers optional?
Kristen: It's like, okay, B. too.
Melanie & Kristen: She is so funny.
Kristen: Um,
Melanie & Kristen: love her so much. Now we're so emotional.
Kristen: you too um I mean, she's also the only one who ever gave me like clay mud masks for my acne. And, you know, I love her.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And gap sweaters. Oh, she like got me like the best gap sweaters and like a gap dress. and I remember. I love those.
Melanie & Kristen: You were like lived in gap clothes.
Kristen: Anyway.
Kristen: It was a big thing. uh, Gap clothes. And people were just talking about like, bring me back to the nineties, like nineties fragrances. And it was like all the Bath and Body Works lotions and Gap dream, Gap dream, um, perfume, perfume.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Um, I was like, Oh my gosh. Yes. I had that. I wore it. I loved it. But anyway, I like this seven five three code So anyway, I might,
Melanie & Kristen: Do you remember the Hollister Malaya perfume?
Kristen: I just remember Hollister being like you walk in and you're punched in the face with whatever fragrances they were selling. I don't know the names of them specifically.
Melanie & Kristen: Malaya, they i remember i they sold it with like the old style like ch-ch on the end, the little like ch-ch.
Kristen: Oh, yeah, no.
Melanie & Kristen: And I was like, yes, please. And it smells so good.
Kristen: Oh.
Melanie & Kristen: The end. um All right.
Kristen: Hmm. But what i was talking about was hygiene. Like, do you have a hard time ever with hygiene? That's a very, like, typical.
Melanie & Kristen: If I have nowhere to be, yeah, I'm not doing anything, you know? But if I'm working out, I'm going to shower afterwards. Like I don't sit in it. You know what i mean?
Kristen: Hmm. Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: to you? i mean, i listen, I will sit in it for a little bit and then and then when I get to it, I'll take a shower. But like I'm not going to not take a shower that day, you know?
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, so you disagree.
Kristen: No, I don't disagree.
Melanie & Kristen: Good job.
Kristen: i just don't shower every day because I have – I'm not not saying that's the right thing. I'm just saying I have a hard time sometimes.
Melanie & Kristen: Even if you're working on it, it's sweaty.
Kristen: And I think – well, I dry off, so.
Melanie & Kristen: I don't like the feeling. i don't like the feeling of, and I don't like smelling. i have like this weird thing, like like I don't want to smell, so I, i you know what I mean?
Kristen: I think that's why most people have personal hygiene. Like they keep it up so they don't smell.
Melanie & Kristen: I just, i just like would like, when I was younger, I would over-perfume myself because I just, like, I'm so worried about it, you know, even though I was clean.
Kristen: overcompensate for like, got it.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah. ma
Kristen: Well, I, okay. So people have described like the issues with the hygiene and I never thought it was an issue before until I heard people say like, do you ever like put off taking a shower because you know, there's so many steps involved.
Melanie & Kristen: Yes.
Kristen: And I was like, oh, well, there it is. That's what it is. Because I know if I take a shower and my hair gets wet.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And okay so back in the day, I had really thick hair.
Melanie & Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Kristen: It's not as thick as it used to be. I've lost like probably half the volume of my hair. And it would take like I would wash my hair at night. I would sleep on it. It would be wet until like noon the next day. Like it just stayed wet.
Kristen: which is kind of gross now that like i I've learned like, you know, bacteria and like mold can grow on your scalp.
Melanie & Kristen: Mold, yeah. Yum.
Kristen: So,
Melanie & Kristen: I never had that problem.
Kristen: yeah so I'm like, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: It's always been pretty, like, fine and thin.
Kristen: um So, but that was the thing. It's like, well, if I do this and I know I have this step, this step, this step, this step, like I have to like, or I, you know, I'll need to dry my hair, you know, as an adult, I have to, I'm gonna have to like get the blow dryer out and dry my hair and,
Kristen: So then I swapped to – I'll do like a quick body shower because i can do quick ones. Like, you know, we're talking you like under five minutes. They do not need to be long.
Kristen: Like, save the planet. Like, let's get in. Let's get out. My husband can't do that to save his life. He has the same routine if he takes a shower at night as if he takes a shower like at night.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, mine too.
Kristen: And then again, five hours later in the morning and it's the same thing and where he's like scrubbing his feet. And I'm like, did your feet get dirty? Like, walking in your slippers from the like shower to the bed and back like I don't understand he's like I
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, mine will shower before workout and then after a workout and then like later that night.
Melanie & Kristen: I don't know. My philosophy is why are you taking a shower before you're going get sweaty and gross?
Kristen: okay before you get yeah
Melanie & Kristen: That doesn't make any sense. Well, I want to shower so when I put on my clean workout clothes, it's not like – but you're going to get sweaty. i don't understand. Yeah.
Kristen: I don't get that one either. but
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, it's a weird it's a weird compulsion, but...
Kristen: i don't think Eddie will do that. Yeah, I get it. i mean, I get it from his perspective. I don't get it from my own, but like I can understand it from like, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Let's move on to number four, TikTok's 50 jump wake up ritual, which I think is just literally waking up in the morning and then you jump 50 times and that's what it is.
Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Does that have to do with like lymphatic drainage and all that stuff? Oh, oxygen to your brain and blood flow.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, it says, it says, and um Catherine Smith, creator of the trend, creator of the jumping, um admitted that she's not naturally disciplined.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: She says, I'm a lazy person by nature. I always have been. i'm I'm never gonna, or I'm never gonna do something that I don't want to do, she says in a TikTok clip.
Melanie & Kristen: How I've gotten to the point I am right now has been very, very, very baby steps. That's not grammatically correct. so the first thing So the first thing is morning jumping. What I do when I get out of bed, my feet touch the ground. I jump 50 times.
Melanie & Kristen: is she like Is this like English as a second language? like Or did they just misquote her?
Kristen: Catherine Smith?
Melanie & Kristen: what a
Kristen: i don't know. It looks pretty Anglo. Like Anglo.
Melanie & Kristen: All I'm saying is that... She credits the habit for providing a quick mental lift. How do you get oxygen to your brain? Increase your blood flow. How do you increase your blood flow?
Melanie & Kristen: Increase your heart rate. Jump up and down.
Kristen: Okay, question for you.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: When you wake up in the morning, this is also, this is going to be tied to like the hygiene thing in my eyes.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, okay. Okay.
Kristen: Do you have to stay in bed for a little bit? Or do you just like, I'm up, I'm out of bed?
Melanie & Kristen: It depends on how tired I feel when I wake up. If it's like – okay.
Kristen: On an average day,
Melanie & Kristen: When I wake up, I kind of like spend a second like getting my eyes to open. So maybe I'm laying in bed for an extra like 10 minutes or something. and then And then once I'm awake, I'm like, can't be here.
Melanie & Kristen: i can't be here anymore. I'm done.
Kristen: So you need a 10 minute, 10 minutes to open your eyes.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm done laying in the bed.
Melanie & Kristen: to like acknowledge To like acknowledge that I'm done sleeping.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: It's kind of like a, yeah.
Kristen: So that's a trend. You need a transition time. Like that's, that's your transition time.
Melanie & Kristen: Sometimes it's not though. Sometimes like if the sun comes in through the window and it touches my eyelids, I'm like, well, I'm up, you know?
Kristen: But are you out of bed when you're up?
Melanie & Kristen: I don't like to spend a lot of time in the bed now. Like I just need some kind of something to, it's more of like acknowledging that, that sleeping is over, you know?
Kristen: Hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: It's like, like mourning the loss.
Kristen: mourning the loss of your sleep.
Melanie & Kristen: Exactly. That's exactly what it is. Mourning the loss because I know that I'm not going to be staying in the bed, you know? um so I, yeah, I get up, I like stretch out my neck and it pops every time, every morning.
Kristen: Nice.
Melanie & Kristen: I do like one of these. I put my hands behind my back and then I click this and it goes pop.
Kristen: Oh, that's good.
Melanie & Kristen: And then I like that and then it pops this side. because I don't sleep correctly. they' like in the position that I sleep and I put my hand under my pillow, but it like, I think it just like hyper extends my shoulder or something.
Kristen: L5s1.
Melanie & Kristen: Also like my knee is up and then I gotta to like do my back. I saw something on Tik TOK or something, Instagram reels. And it's this physical therapist lady,
Melanie & Kristen: And she was like, oh if you have this certain back pain where it's like the sciatic nerve pain, um like through your butt cheek and down your leg, it is it has more to do with the front muscle, like in your hip.
Kristen: l five s one
Melanie & Kristen: So you need to release the tension in that. And it will. And then you can start doing the exercises that like everyone says you should do. Because if you don't do that first, it's not going to do anything.
Melanie & Kristen: And she's like, I've created this tool. And the tool is essentially this hook thing.
Kristen: The hook thing.
Melanie & Kristen: ah
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: I saw somebody do it. And it's like this skinny person. And so you can like see everything.
Melanie & Kristen: and i'm like that looks painful like it's just like it like if i don't even know like it's like hammer and i like
Kristen: It
Kristen: goes around the pelvis, yeah.
Kristen: Do you remember when Emma had physical therapy for like months because of her hips?
Melanie & Kristen: yeah was that one of the things does it hurt
Kristen: Well, no, she didn't use the hook, but they essentially were doing the same thing in physical therapy um for like for the same reasons. Like her stuff was.
Kristen: her muscles or her tendons were too tight.
Melanie & Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Kristen: What was happening is she was, um, they were so like tightened and like shortened that they were pulling the pelvis in on one side, kind of like,
Kristen: having it, okay, if it's like this normally, one side was like pulled in a little bit. So it was like making her like completely off balance to the point where her pediatrician was like, it looks like she has some scoliosis. Turns out she doesn't have scoliosis. It was just because her hip was so turned inward that it was affecting like
Kristen: everything else. But I think Eddie has that problem too, but he's got the whole back issue.
Melanie & Kristen: I think I have that problem. Also, I don't know if i told you this, but when when you were talking about how she might have scoliosis and you didn't know the actual verdict yet, I had told Aunt Barb and everyone and Shane was in the room and he was like, no, thing she doesn't have it.
Kristen: I remember him. And Shane was like, no, she doesn't.
Melanie & Kristen: I have scoliosis and I know things. She doesn't have it. He was fucking right. let's it
Kristen: hasn't seen her. It's like,
Melanie & Kristen: He just knows things, Kristen.
Kristen: He goes, the colors speak to me and they say no. Or the numbers.
Melanie & Kristen: He was right though. That's all I'm saying.
Kristen: Well, I mean, to be fair, she did have like very minor, but like not enough for them to do anything about it is what they said. So, I mean, technically she does have it, but it was very minuscule.
Melanie & Kristen: I feel like that looks very painful to do the hook thing. When I saw the guy do it, was like, oh, No.
Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: now
Kristen: Well, I think you can get the same kind of idea. Like, well, what they were doing is, they you know, like those handballs, like the small, like for that, you know, against a board handball.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, yeah,
Kristen: They're like, take one of those and like go up to a wall and basically, or like on the floor. No, that's what it was, like on the floor and roll over it, like on that spot.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Kristen: And it is painful. Yeah. It's like foam rolling when you have like the tightness, like in your IT band. Sucks.
Melanie & Kristen: Yep.
Kristen: Okay. um So what I was going to say is I have a really hard time getting up in the morning. So I can't imagine like jumping.
Melanie & Kristen: jumping immediately afterwards.
Kristen: No, it would not happen. Eddie.
Melanie & Kristen: Also, like I'm not wearing a bra. So it's just going to be like, yeah, that doesn't sound fun.
Kristen: I mean, not for us. Maybe for our husbands. Might enjoy it. Sorry, kids.
Melanie & Kristen: Also, like my bedroom's upstairs. So I can just imagine it's just like,
Melanie & Kristen: The dogs are going to get riled up. Like, no, that sounds like a terrible plan.
Kristen: Yeah, I know. Okay, but... This is where I thought of like, I like there, there's something different between the two of us with my husband and myself, because he, the alarm goes off.
Kristen: He sits up right away and he's out of bed within 30 seconds.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, no, I don't do that.
Kristen: and I mean, it's, um I'm just like, I'm like, I've been awake for 20 minutes laying here and I'm still not ready to get out of bed.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: So it's, it's definitely different. And then I was thinking like, gosh, did i was I like that when I was younger? And it wasn't to that. length of time, but I do have memories of waking up to a radio alarm clock and I would listen to K-Rock.
Melanie & Kristen: you were. if
Kristen: And i would allow myself a certain like amount of time before I had to get up. So, you know, like commercials are usually like scheduled at certain times. So my alarm went off in between the commercial times. So I would always like be on a song when I would wake up.
Kristen: And so I would finish whatever song started and then I would listen to one more song. And that's what I was like, and now I have to get up. Like, and I was like, oh my God, I did that for years.
Kristen: And I never thought that was like a like has a hard time with transitions. I always thought that was just normal until I met my husband who just jumps out of bed. And I'm like, what's wrong with you? Why are you weird?
Kristen: Turns out I'm the weird one.
Melanie & Kristen: What's going on? yeah Aunt Barb will set alarms. I don't know why she does it because she doesn't get out of the bed when the alarm goes off. She'll just snooze it. She like, she's literally said, I scoop it up and I hold it next to me and I snooze the button and then 10 minutes ago off. I snooze it again. 10 minutes ago, I snooze it again.
Melanie & Kristen: So why even set the alarm? Just wake up when you want to wake up when your body wants to wake up, you know?
Kristen: my aunt barb would like sleep until like noon a lot or like 10 i just i remember her yeah
Melanie & Kristen: They're big nighttime people though. So i feel like it's not as crazy sounding when you know that they're staying up pretty late, you know?
Kristen: i think i read that the average like sleep cycle for a neurodivergent person like or not the average but like the most normal for like for their brains is 2 a.m until 10 a.m m sleeping and I was like okay I can see that like I can if I stay up long enough I can do that but I've had to get up so long so early because the kids in high school here so like they have to be up by six and so I have to get up by six because i don't have to worry about Emma
Kristen: But Nathan asked me how many times I've woken him up. Like, hello. He's like, oh, I'm up. You weren't up, bro.
Melanie & Kristen: dad used to come into my bedroom and and then like quietly like as soon as he opens the door like a whisper of like a whatever a sound i was awake but i was like if i keep my eyes closed i can i can go back to sleep right but he would like
Kristen: Hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: tiptoe in and go over to the shutters and open those motherfuckers. And I'd be like, and he'd be like, okay, bye. i love you. And I'm like, I love you too. Can you close the blinds?
Melanie & Kristen: Every single time, every morning, like take a hint, you know?
Kristen: now
Kristen: Well, think about how sweet it was that he would come in and wake you up.
Melanie & Kristen: It was, and I told him I really appreciate it, which is why he kept doing it. That was something about dad that i really that I really like and I try to emulate, is that when you would tell him that something was important to you, he would do that thing and make sure that, you know?
Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. To his detriment sometimes.
Kristen: He would... He would always, well, yeah, let's say he would always, like, come in and say goodbye, like, before he left.
Melanie & Kristen: But...
Kristen: Or, like, if he got home, I think he would come in and say, like, goodnight. And I learned that, yeah, not everyone, oh gosh, not everyone says i love you as much as our family said it.
Melanie & Kristen: I was annoyed that Eric didn't say it as as often as I said it in the beginning. and he was like, you say it a lot. was like, no, I say it normal amount.
Kristen: I love you.
Melanie & Kristen: The normal amount.
Kristen: I love you.
Melanie & Kristen: It was normal. When you get off the phone, you say, okay, I love you. a bye-bye. and you'd be like, okay, bye. I'm like, excuse me.
Kristen: How dare you exit that conversation so rudely.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. yeah Yeah. Like, what? it Are you mad at me? Are we fighting?
Kristen: If we weren't before, we are now. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah we're fighting.
Kristen: yeah
Melanie & Kristen: No, he's learned.
Kristen: so So, yeah. So, it was... oh Yeah. Okay. I had a funny story about Nathan as ah as a toddler, but, I mean, it was just about opening the curtains.
Kristen: He would come in, oh dark 30. It would be, like, 6 or before, and Before he would just like wake me up and I'd be like, can you not? Like, it's really early.
Kristen: And then he moved to like going over to the, we had a slider door in our master at our old house with curtains and the sun would come in every morning and he would move the curtains, kind of like what dad would do with you, but he would move the curtains. So it would just, you know, go right into my eye.
Kristen: And then when I was like, oh you know, he'd be like, oh, good. You're awake.
Melanie & Kristen: You're up.
Kristen: Could you possibly turn on the TV for me? was like, and he was still wearing like pull-ups.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, my gosh. That's funny.
Kristen: So like he, I have to preface that by saying he had a very extensive vocabulary. Like at two, he was speaking in paragraphs and using words like actually when correcting people. so
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Surprise, surprise, you're awake now. you help me with that? Thanks. hey Honey, sweetie pie.
Melanie & Kristen: all right well we're on the last one so let's just get through this vibration please you have one oh how do you like it
Kristen: I just got one for Christmas, yeah.
Kristen: I like it. So it was really funny to me that, you know, once Christmas happened, was seeing all these memes with like the perimenopausal women in their forty s that are, you know,
Kristen: It's like, how is your Christmas going? Like kids in the nineties. Um, and it's like the ladies on the vibration plate, wearing the weighted vest, wearing like the, the red light mask, which I'm like, Oh, mother's day, mother's day. We'll we'll get that. We'll have the trifecta.
Kristen: And, uh, so yeah, I'm waiting for
Melanie & Kristen: What does that mask do?
Kristen: What does the mask do? Well, red light therapy is supposed to help with like inflammation. red light is supposed to be good for like bacteria. So like possibly helping with like breakouts. You don't have that problem.
Kristen: I've never not had that problem. So different strokes.
Kristen: But I do like the vibration plate.
Melanie & Kristen: I don't like it because it just going to make all my fat shake in front of people.
Kristen: Well, I don't do it in, mean, I do it front of my kids because they all come in and, in well, they all do it too. So it's like, they are funny.
Melanie & Kristen: they don't have any eyes They don't have anything that jiggles on their body.
Kristen: They what?
Kristen: They, well, no, but it's, it's still like, i mean, they don't, they don't judge.
Melanie & Kristen: itp
Melanie & Kristen: Maybe boobs.
Kristen: They just sit there and wait their turn. They all enjoy it. So, um,
Melanie & Kristen: Take a ride at Disneyland.
Kristen: Kind of, but it was interesting because I was, I'm like, is this just like a gimmick? Like legitimately, I'm like, is this worth it? Or is this just stupid? I don't know. um But the amount that i had to urinate after using it the first few times, it led me to be like, oh, I wonder if this is like inflammation leaving my body.
Kristen: Like, I don't know why that would be, i don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Someone can correct me.
Melanie & Kristen: Uncle Jeff would just take Mobic, like a, calls it Mobic.
Kristen: A what?
Melanie & Kristen: I think it's short for something. It's like meloxicam for inflammation. Anyway, he just has a pharmacy at his house.
Kristen: Oh. Yeah, I don't go to the doctor. Yeah, I don't go to the doctor.
Melanie & Kristen: Like, I'm feeling inflamed. He's like, oh, he like gets like this giant pill thing and opens it up. And he's like, well, what do you want? got this. I got this. All right. Well,
Kristen: Let's read through the vibration plate thing because we didn't read through that.
Melanie & Kristen: ah
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Why don't you do it?
Kristen: So vibration plates, platforms that use whole body vibration are trending as a potential shortcut for fat loss and strength. Let's see here. Using constant muscle contracting and relaxing, the machines may help with strength, flexibility, circulation, and bone mass, according to fitness tutorials. Experts also warn that the plates are no substitute for the basics of good health, like regular exercise and a healthy diet.
Melanie & Kristen: Surprise, surprise.
Kristen: aye Nick Wilson, a fitness trainer at F45 Training in Hollywood, California, previously noted that vibration plates can indeed boost neuromuscular demand, forcing muscles to contract more frequently, and that even 10 to 15-minute sessions can offer some benefit.
Kristen: While they enhance muscle activation, vibration plates alone are not a high-calorie burning workout. Not according to my plate. That thing says I burn like 800 calories in 10 minutes and I'm like, don't know if I believe you.
Melanie & Kristen: With my Fitbit, it says.
Kristen: Oh my gosh. So it says it does not replace cardio or strength training for weight loss or conditioning. But some research suggests that vibration plates may help support weight loss when paired with calorie reduction. Surprise, surprise. And could also help to reduce back pain and high blood pressure.
Melanie & Kristen: I wonder though, like if you just removed the plate and did all the other things it's saying to do, like, you know, eating better reducing your calories, it would still reduce your blood pressure and help with back pain.
Kristen: Well, 100%. Okay,
Kristen: okay but the reason, I don't know.
Kristen: Yes, I guess, but...
Melanie & Kristen: Like, yes.
Kristen: but we're
Melanie & Kristen: Like a hundred percent. Yeah.
Kristen: Well, no, because... The reason i got the vibration plate was for to help with lymphatic drainage. So i could be eating in a caloric deficit. I can be on the treadmill. I can be doing all this and I could, you know...
Kristen: Be following a nutrition plan. Like I've done all of this in the past and there's been like nothing.
Melanie & Kristen: Thank
Kristen: And I've had like lymphatic massages done in the past also. And the massage, or I guess the therapist, I guess she called herself.
Kristen: She would always comment about how much like liquid I had in my body. Like, she's like, you carry a lot inside, like you're not like expelling it like like a regular person does.
Kristen: And I don't sweat a lot, which is weird.
Melanie & Kristen: I have a question.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: If you're not drinking like a lot of water, like ah like if you're trying to like on a fitness journey or whatever, if you're not drinking a lot of water, but you're exercising and weightlifting or whatever, do you, you know, when you drink a lot of water and your pee is a little bit like, it's not as
Kristen: Potent, like it's clear.
Melanie & Kristen: potent yeah it's not as yellow yeah um but if you're not drinking a lot of water but you're still like exercising and stuff do you think that that's lymphatic drainage expelling
Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: like lymphatic lymphatic whatever it's just liquid right it's just water it's like water weight
Kristen: I've always had a lot of water.
Kristen: I guess. I don't know the theory behind it.
Melanie & Kristen: I'm wondering because like, you know, I'm not drinking a lot of water like I should be. And, um, and I feel like my pee is a lot lighter for no reason.
Kristen: Oh, interesting.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. And then I was like, well, maybe my liver's not working, but if my liver wasn't working, it would be darker. so you know, these are the thoughts.
Kristen: Your liver or your kidneys?
Melanie & Kristen: I don't know which one does the filtering kidneys, my kidneys, but then it would be darker.
Kristen: Kidneys.
Melanie & Kristen: Right.
Kristen: I don't know if, I mean, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. All I know is that they say like if you have a massage and they're moving all the stuff, they're like, make sure you drink a lot of water to help flush your body because it's moving a bunch of stuff around and you're wanting to like get rid of that.
Kristen: So I don't know. So I like it.
Melanie & Kristen: I feel like my body is just getting rid of it anyway. You know? Seems like it.
Kristen: Well, think about it.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: If you're on the treadmill and you're doing But you're doing lymphatic um movements too. Like if you're like really pumping your arms, doing that like the, you know, Japanese or other Asian walk that you were talking about.
Melanie & Kristen: Some kind of Asian walk.
Kristen: It's... Well, yeah, but it's it's moving your lymph. Like your lymph...
Melanie & Kristen: But I'm not doing that.
Kristen: Okay, well, just...
Melanie & Kristen: just well I'm just like regular, like a model.
Kristen: Strike a pose.
Melanie & Kristen: Strike a pose.
Kristen: Well, I don't know. All I can tell you is that before the vibration plates, i was noticing because I had not gone on the treadmill for a hot minute because my husband decided to put stuff on the treadmill as like a storage thing for a minute. And I'm like, I finally had to say to him, you know how like you get mad if we put stuff on your like tool, like Area.
Kristen: Like he's got.
Melanie & Kristen: Area. Yeah.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Not a box.
Kristen: He's got like a debt.
Melanie & Kristen: It's like a, yeah, I know it's exactly what you're talking Mm-hmm.
Kristen: Yeah. Yeah. You're like, don't put stuff here. But I'm like, that's my equivalent. That's not like, don't, don't put boxes here. Because if he's like, well, you can easily move them. I'm like, but I'm not going to.
Kristen: Like, it's hard enough for me to like, want to do anything. And if there's even a single extra, like, roadblock to getting that done.
Kristen: I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: I'm just self-aware enough to know. Ooh, I'm hearing myself.
Melanie & Kristen: Say it again. Are you still hearing yourself?
Kristen: I'm hearing myself. No, I'm not.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Oh, I am.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: was weird. Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Sorry, I muted my mic for a second because Eric was coming in through the the front door and it was making a loud sound. I just just didn't want it to be like interrupting your thought.
Kristen: Oh, it's okay. I heard him, but I don't know. It must have been...
Melanie & Kristen: I unrooted it.
Kristen: Oh, I was wondering if when you muted muted it, it went to like your computers speakers.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, that would be annoying. It shouldn't because it's like supposed to be coming out of that, but.
Kristen: I don't know.
Kristen: Okay. Okay. So all have to say is before I started, i know, like tangents, before I started, i was noticing my legs looked a lot more like cellulite-y. But it's like I could just tell, like I can move it. I'm like, this is it's liquid in here. Like, come on, get out.
Kristen: And I've been using the vibration plate every day between 10 and 20 minutes. And I can see a difference.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, hey.
Kristen: So I'm like, something's working.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Anyway.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, now I hear me.
Melanie & Kristen: Whatever, it's fine. Um... What would you say your body shape is? Like I'm an inverted triangle. When you're talking about like having,
Melanie & Kristen: um
Melanie & Kristen: I want say cottage cheese thighs. That's not well what you said, but that's what it is, right?
Kristen: I think essentially. Well, and i I never used to carry my weight in my legs at all. Like I'd always, i i also had more like inverted triangle, definitely broader shoulders.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Kristen: um
Melanie & Kristen: Like when you're at your most fit, do you find that your hips are more narrow?
Kristen: As.
Melanie & Kristen: Like going, like, okay.
Kristen: ah They're still more narrow. and My shoulders are broader. Like it's the widest part on me is my shoulders.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Okay. Same. That's a fun thing to have.
Kristen: Yeah. Super.
Melanie & Kristen: But like my, i have like fat on my leg.
Kristen: Especially when you're five foot two.
Melanie & Kristen: I have like no fat on my legs. Like it's just, it's just, I have like Olympian calf muscles.
Kristen: Muscle.
Melanie & Kristen: There's no reason for them to look so defined because it's not like, I'm doing anything, you know, until recently. But like when I was just sitting like around like couch rot, you know, like reading for hours and hours on end, like my calves still look freaking great.
Melanie & Kristen: Like they had like the line down the middle.
Kristen: High performance athlete.
Melanie & Kristen: They had like you like defined.
Kristen: Yeah. It's like the butt cheek on your leg.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, they're really big for no reason. Yeah.
Kristen: Well, they do say that your calf is your second heart.
Kristen: The body's second heart.
Melanie & Kristen: What does that mean?
Kristen: It has something to do with circulation.
Melanie & Kristen: that a good thing?
Kristen: That's why. Well, I think if they're like doing good, then yeah, it's good thing.
Melanie & Kristen: so if you have high blood pressure, but your calves look great, what does that mean? Because that's where I'm at.
Kristen: I don't know. I'm not a doctor. I can't diagnose you. But I can say it's the reason why they say like if you're going take a long flight to get up and walk or to wear compression socks so you don't so you don't get developed deep vein thrombosis, but do you really fly?
Melanie & Kristen: I never get up a plane.
Melanie & Kristen: I just kind of do this.
Kristen: like Okay, well, you're moving them.
Melanie & Kristen: like you I'm on a plane. just go like this with my legs. Yeah.
Kristen: Yeah. Yeah. My legs are so short that I can just do this. it Here's the seat and it's just.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh my gosh. You're really going to make people think that your legs are just really like tiny, like, like those cats.
Kristen: Well, all I can say is that i work at an elementary school and the fourth graders are taller than me at times. So that's fun.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, should we talk more about new year's resolutions or should we get into some Reddit stuff?
Kristen: We can do a Reddit thing. Maybe one Reddit thing. Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay. Do you wanna talk about the mom one?
Kristen: Um, yes.
Kristen: Okay. And I'm going to do this in like a PG. going to read it in PG.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: So am I...
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, go.
Kristen: The a-hole. I'll say that. That's fine. That's PG. For telling my daughter-in-law that I will never be her mother and to leave me alone. yeah This lady was very upset because she like named her and everything.
Kristen: This is mostly about my daughter-in-law, Kat, in case we were wondering. Her mother ran out on her when she was just a child and she went into foster care.
Kristen: According to my son, she's currently seeing a therapist. My issue with Kat is that she has repeatedly stomped on my boundaries. She's a very touchy.
Melanie & Kristen: That's a really, yeah. Like i was just like, those are all these adjectives. Anyways, it's <unk> actually a verb, but whatever, you know what mean?
Kristen: She's a very, what?
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: I said it's actually like a verb, but I said adjective. Go on.
Kristen: You did say adjectives, yeah. I didn't know what you meant. i was just gonna smile and continue.
Melanie & Kristen: Descriptive. She's very descriptive. She stomped on my on my bad verb.
Kristen: Those are adjectives, but oh, okay. Yeah. All right.
Melanie & Kristen: Anyway.
Kristen: It's a verb. um She's a very touchy person and refuses to call me by my name and only refers to me as mom.
Melanie & Kristen: So dad would do that.
Kristen: I... Yeah, he did.
Melanie & Kristen: To his in-laws. he That's a very like old school thing to do.
Kristen: He did.
Kristen: I go back and forth with Myrta and I'll be like, i'll I'll sometimes say like mom and dad to Steve and Myrta. But like I said before, she's been my mom.
Melanie & Kristen: Longer than.
Kristen: She's like, you know, mother-in-law longer than my mom was here.
Melanie & Kristen: Same with mine.
Kristen: yeah. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: So yeah. So, okay. So this lady corrects her every time because she's super mean. Since I'm not comfortable being called mom by her and i want her to use my name. Okay. I've already formed an opinion, but let's continue.
Melanie & Kristen: I don't know. I feel like if you're asking someone to do something, like like if you're not comfortable with something, you're setting a boundary.
Kristen: Oh my gosh.
Melanie & Kristen: So –
Kristen: This might also like going back to um like horoscopes. I am a cancer. So I am the mother of the Zodiac. And knowing this cat's like background, I'm already like, oh, like lost little puppy.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, but you also you also only know Kat's background from this other person who's writing this at a moment where she feels at the end of her rope with this person. So-
Kristen: And I'm still siding with her already, so that just goes to show. Anyway. There have been multiple times when she's asked inappropriate questions, mostly about why I'm not close to my own mother.
Kristen: She sounds like she could be a little, like, neurodivergent, too. It's what I'm picking up on.
Melanie & Kristen: cat or the mother-in-law?
Kristen: Cat.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Maybe both. Who knows? Because, you know, birds of a feather usually attract one another.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: They flock together, but they also attract. Um... But like maybe different different sides, you know?
Melanie & Kristen: like For context, my mother was horrible. That's the context.
Kristen: Oh, that was the next line, yes.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Why I'm not close to my own mother. For context, my mother was horrible. So again, it sounds like Kat has already like clocked that this mother-in-law like does not know or like wasn't loved properly and she just wants to love on her.
Kristen: Sure, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: It seems like she wants, it seems like instead of her giving love to her mother-in-law, feels more like she wants her mother-in-law to treat her like her own daughter.
Melanie & Kristen: And she's not getting that.
Kristen: Well, yeah, that too.
Melanie & Kristen: And the mother-in-law is like, but you're not. So, okay, continue.
Kristen: Okay. Kat keeps pushing for details and insists I should get closer to her because family sticks together. She basically tells me to forgive my mom and she doesn't understand not being close with one's parents.
Kristen: I told her to drop the topic multiple times and she refuses. Because of all this, I am not a huge fan of hers. Is this mom from like the Boston area? Because...
Melanie & Kristen: I just feel like I'm on the mother-in-law side.
Kristen: Oh my gosh. I feel like the mom is a boomer and she's like, no, you're dead to me. Get away. The family.
Melanie & Kristen: but Why does Kat keep bringing it up if the mother-in-law is like, I don't want to talk about it?
Kristen: No, you're dead.
Kristen: I feel like.
Melanie & Kristen: Why is she forcing the mother-in-law to talk about it?
Kristen: Let's continue to read. i don't know.
Kristen: Let's see here.
Melanie & Kristen: spoke into my phone.
Kristen: i've spoken to I've spoken to my son about it, and he asked me to be patient. I've also talked to Kat multiple times and asked her to respect my boundaries. She always says she will, but then goes right back to ignoring them.
Kristen: This is where I might be the jerk. My daughter, Sam, 20, and I are taking a weekend trip. Sam as has medical issue and needs to see a specialist a few states over.
Kristen: She hasn't disclosed the issue to the rest of the family yet. She plans to when she has a firm plan. Somehow, word about the trip got back to Kat, and she called me asking why she wasn't invited.
Kristen: I told her it's an an important trip and not a fun one. She accused me of lying, claiming it was a mother-daughter trip that she was excluded from. I told her again this is not a girl's trip. She wouldn't let it go and started demanding that she come, saying that she's my daughter and needs to be there.
Kristen: I said no again. Okay, I would never do that part, but okay.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, I mean, she sounds like she's really clingy for no reason. Like,
Kristen: Well, i don't know if it's for no reason. It sounds like she's like, you know.
Melanie & Kristen: she sounds like she has mental issues.
Kristen: Well, she was in foster care and she was like.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: You really thought you learned boundaries there.
Kristen: Um, that's when I, let me just finish. Hold my finish. That's when I snapped. I told her I will never be her mother. Ooh, language of warning. Just because she married my son does not make me her parent. I told her to leave me the beep alone.
Kristen: And that even if this was a mother-daughter trip, she still wouldn't be invited because she isn't my kid. I then hung up
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: I feel like she has every right to do that because if this – it sounds like her daughter-in-law was just like, you need to invite me, da-da-da-da, da-da-da, like just like coming at her like – and she's trying to respect her own daughter's wishes by not telling her why the trip is happening but still being like, look, it's not like a fun girl's trip. It's just – it's like an important thing i I need to go with her on. And for whatever reason, her daughter-in-law is like, no, you're lying. Like what does it matter?
Melanie & Kristen: What does it matter? Like you weren't invited, period.
Melanie & Kristen: Get over it And if we do another trip sometime, i'll you know, I'll invite to that one, whatever. Like, come on.
Kristen: Well, apparently she won't because.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, not not a girl's trip, not a not a mother daughter trip.
Kristen: Well, this is reminding me of that one video of the parent that went viral, I believe, where she was like, let's normalize trips with just our, you know, family of origin. So if if my son or daughter is now married,
Kristen: those people aren't invited. Sometimes I just want a trip here, like with, with these people that I love.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: And I was like, automatically like, no,
Melanie & Kristen: That's different. That's different because it's not like the the mother-in-law is going, okay, now my husband and I going to take just our children and not their not their sit and get significant others on this trip and you're not invited.
Melanie & Kristen: It wasn't like that. It was just her and her daughter for a specific medical reason that she does not need to disclose to someone else.
Kristen: Right.
Melanie & Kristen: And she didn't even call it like a mother-daughter trip. And even if it was one, It's weird that the daughter-in-law is getting so bent out of shape about it.
Kristen: Sorry. Oh gosh.
Kristen: Oh my gosh.
Melanie & Kristen: What are you doing? Yeah,
Kristen: I was getting my cord.
Kristen: have to plug my computer in Thought I could do this entire time, but I can't. Um...
Melanie & Kristen: good tax.
Kristen: So I'm thinking this is a story that has multiple layers.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Kristen: I don't think the mother-in-law is including all of the layers. I think she is cherry picking. I think that because usually when people tell a story,
Melanie & Kristen: yeah
Kristen: They tell it in a light most favorable to them anyway, because that's how they're viewing things. So it's like,
Kristen: I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: She kind of did a backstory. She said, i mean, I see what you're saying, but she kind of did a backstory saying like there have been multiple um instances where I've set boundaries and she doesn't care.
Melanie & Kristen: and
Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: And so it sounds like, I don't know, it sounds like this conversation that she had with her
Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: about the trip started off with like a trying to be like, you know, i wasn't trying to not include you. This, this isn't like a girls fun girls trip. This is something that I, Sam asked me to go on with her because of something important that I can't tell you about because it's not to, it has nothing to do with me and I'm respecting her wishes.
Melanie & Kristen: And instead of just being like, okay, I understand. She was like, no, you're a liar. It's a mother daughter trip. I'm your daughter.
Kristen: Well, that's what I'm saying.
Melanie & Kristen: you're not.
Kristen: It seems like there's been maybe like another instance or two where stuff has happened where she wasn't included, perhaps.
Kristen: Because it just seems like that would be a weird place to go from out of nowhere to like.
Melanie & Kristen: It seems like she feels like she's not being included in things that she has nothing to that she shouldn't have anything to do with.
Kristen: Like. Like what?
Melanie & Kristen: I don't know. I'm off the top of my head. What if like what if ah her daughter, her actual daughter um was in town and they go out and to lunch or something?
Melanie & Kristen: I can see this girl cat being like, why wasn't I invited to that lunch?
Kristen: Right.
Melanie & Kristen: It just feels like, well, first of all, you weren't here. And second of all, like this wasn't like a thing. And also, I don't need to run all my plans by you, you know?
Kristen: so I have thoughts.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, why don't we finish? you want to finish the rest of it? It's just one paragraph.
Kristen: That was it, basically. Oh, my son's, it wasn't the damn rest of it. So it says my son says I need to apologize and invite her that I'm a huge D to her that I was way out of line and need to make it up to Kat.
Kristen: The situation has spread to the rest of the family and everyone seems to have their own opinion. Sam is getting flack to the daughter, which isn't helping because I'm sorry, which isn't helping, especially since she doesn't want to disclose the reason for the trip yet.
Kristen: Am I being an a-hole and need to apologize even though those are my true feelings on her trying to make me her parent? And my thing is, is you can have those feelings and not be a dick.
Kristen: Sorry, I said it.
Melanie & Kristen: I mean, it sounds like she wasn't for a long time.
Kristen: It's like being a parent.
Melanie & Kristen: And then finally, like the damn birth.
Kristen: No, it doesn't. It sounds like she's been a huge one this entire time.
Melanie & Kristen: It sounds like she was setting boundaries. I think there's a difference. It sounds like she was being like, like whenever the daughter-in-law would be like, oh, you need to make up with your mom and da-da-da-da-da.
Kristen: Thank you.
Melanie & Kristen: It's like read between the lines, girlfriend. You know, like I, this has been going on since before you were even in the picture. I'm not, it's, it's, it's so much more complicated than just, oh, family's important because yeah, sure.
Melanie & Kristen: Family's important. But, you know, my mom has made it clear that she doesn't want to be an important part of that part of the family. So, no, I can't make up with her.
Melanie & Kristen: But instead of just dropping it.
Kristen: But she doesn't say that she told her that. She just told us the context. She doesn't say that she explained that to her.
Melanie & Kristen: Right. Well, sure. But it would be a much long, don't you think it'd be a much longer, like, am I the a-hole? Okay.
Kristen: don't know. It seems like to me, what I'm clocking from this person is that she's very buttoned up. Like, I keep my emotions here.
Melanie & Kristen: There's nothing wrong with that.
Kristen: You don't see that. I didn't say that. I'm just, this is how I'm picturing her. Whereas I feel like the daughter-in-law is probably, you know, experiences the world through her emotions is what it sounds like.
Kristen: Is very in touch with emotions. um And is probably very curious. Like when you go when you go through any type of thing, especially as a child, I feel like.
Kristen: where your home life is disrupted. um i mean, I grew up from the time I can remember with a father in the house, but just knowing that my biological father wasn't in the picture and I had never heard from him, that still affected me. And people are like but you had a dad in the house. I'm like, it still affected me.
Kristen: So I feel like.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, but it's not like dad was going, just call me Mike. Don't call me dad, I'm not your dad.
Kristen: No, no, no, I know he was I mean, he's my dad like that's.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And it was not, there was nothing that he was doing that was making me feel that way. It was just the knowledge of the fact that someone else didn't want to be a part of my story.
Kristen: You froze.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: It was kind of funny. i was like,
Melanie & Kristen: Oh. You're just pros doing the same thing.
Kristen: well, I froze myself.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: Thanks.
Melanie & Kristen: So closely I'm paying attention to you. Okay.
Kristen: thanks
Melanie & Kristen: Somebody commented and said, not the a-hole. Your daughter-in-law is trying to use you to heal her mother wound instead of trying to build a relationship with you organically. She sounds insufferable, to be honest.
Melanie & Kristen: And I think it OP responded. She said, that's 100% what she's doing. She is trying so hard that she's pushing people away from her. No one wants to be around someone who stomps on your boundaries and doesn't show basic respect to you.
Melanie & Kristen: It isn't rocket science to call someone what they want to be called. Keep your hands to yourself and not bring up sensitive topics.
Melanie & Kristen: Let's Not the a-hole. You don't just have a daughter-in-law problem. You also have a son problem. He is clearly enabling whatever Delulu world she lives in. Keep enforcing your boundaries.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, I mean, i don't know if I agree with that. Because, like, your spouse is above your parents. And once you get married, it's like your spouse is your person, your team. so Yeah, I think if he wasn't um on his wife's side, there'd be and more like a bigger issue.
Melanie & Kristen: But...
Kristen: Hold on a second. Trigger? Must you
Kristen: Oh no, no. Let's take that out. Come on. Go. Go see daddy. daddy. Come on. Thank you. Bye bye. Oh my gosh.
Kristen: He opens the door. It was closed. He opens the door by himself and lets himself in and then starts to make noise everywhere.
Melanie & Kristen: Here's another one. Not the a-hole. One, block her number. Only communicate through your son. Two, explain to your son that you are not required to ignore your boundaries to make someone else comfortable. That no is a complete sentence. That you are not required to apologize for getting frustrated.
Melanie & Kristen: That she doesn't listen to your needs, wants, or boundaries. That you don't owe her one explanation, let alone many. Ask why you would be willing, willing, why you would willingly take a trip with someone who chooses not to listen to you, who constantly disrespects you. Why would you subject yourself to that? And what works, and what works you to, you be expected to, that's not a sentence. Why, why should you be miserable on a trip? And why should your daughter be subjected to that?
Melanie & Kristen: I'm trying to find one that says, yes, the a-hole, but most people are saying no.
Kristen: Okay.
Kristen: Well, someone wrote, someone wrote, yikes, there's nothing worse than a boundary stomping person who accidentally stirs up trauma, which is what I think is ha...
Melanie & Kristen: one
Kristen: Can you please go to your father
Kristen: Okay. First of all, I don't think she understands what a boundary is because once again, she didn't grow up in a stable home environment where she was probably taught such things. Okay. Secondly, and I'm not saying that people shouldn't have boundaries. Like those are not the words that are coming out of my mouth. I think what I'm saying is, is Again, I don't feel like she knows what an appropriate boundary is.
Kristen: Like, I think that's the the major, like, takeaway here is...
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, but how many times does the mother-in-law need to like tell her?
Kristen: I don't think she's explaining it, though, to her. I think she's just, like, being like, no, don't want to talk about it. ni That's what I'm saying. I feel like she thinks it's, like, an inherent boundary.
Melanie & Kristen: you think it's an autism thing then?
Kristen: i don't think...
Melanie & Kristen: Because I feel like that what you just did is like a social cue to me to be like, oh, we're not talking about that. You know?
Kristen: What?
Melanie & Kristen: The way your body language was just now, do you think that the daughter-in-law is a little autistic or something? Because when the way you just did that would signal to my brain, oh that's something...
Kristen: The way moved in
Melanie & Kristen: No, when you were like when you're like, no, I don't want to talk about that.
Kristen: Did I move in?
Melanie & Kristen: The face, the like...
Kristen: Oh, like with the mom?
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, like if the mom's reacting in that way that you think that she might be, then that's like a social cue, like ah like a body cue, whatever, to somebody else to be like, oh, okay.
Kristen: what
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, were okay, I get it. Like, we'll drop it. But instead, it sounds like the daughter-in-law keeps bringing it up.
Kristen: Well, I think, okay.
Kristen: Because we don't know any of these people. And so I'm like, I'm like, and this, that's imaginary person that we're talking about.
Melanie & Kristen: We have lots of opinions on it, though.
Kristen: So I feel like this person, Kat, the daughter-in-law,
Melanie & Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Kristen: who's been through these struggles, again, probably doesn't know what an appropriate boundary is. Or I don't think she understands boundaries because I don't think she grew up with boundaries.
Kristen: And again, when you, it's like you're putting a person who never had a rule book And then you're expecting them to like as an adult, be able to play by the all the rules, but this but they don't know what the rules are.
Kristen: And then they're getting crapped on.
Melanie & Kristen: Well, she doesn't sound stupid though. She doesn't sound like a stupid person. I mean, she's, she got married, she'd gone to a relationship and you know, with all the issues that relationships have and then got married, you know what i mean?
Kristen: I don't think he's stupid.
Melanie & Kristen: So once again, it's not about, it's not about not knowing what a boundary is, but rather being able to like visibly see when somebody's uncomfortable about something, you know,
Melanie & Kristen: like when you so like When I see that on somebody, i immediately am like, oh, okay, we're not, I get it, you know, moving on.
Kristen: Yeah. Well, i I don't think, well well, I guess my point was is beyond not having the the rule book and all that, i I do feel like there's some other stuff that's going on that's hindering that process for her.
Kristen: And I'm sure like Once she got married, she was like, oh my gosh, I'm going have a family now. I'm so excited. Like, I never had a family.
Kristen: yay And like, she came in with all these expectations. And then this mother-in-law was like, hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: That's weird to me because when you're – I don't know how long they were engaged for before they got married, but even if it was only like a year, you kind of get an idea of what the other family is like, you know?
Kristen: Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: And um yeah.
Kristen: We have no idea. we don't know if they live near each other. We don't, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Right. I mean, they're making it sound like she lives next door and expects to be invited to every function that ever happens ever and all the time. So Yeah.
Kristen: Wait, let me finish reading this because I stopped after the first sentence. Okay, yikes. There's nothing worse than a boundary-stomping person who accidentally stirs up trauma. That being said, I'm not sure calling a person who has no mother, grew up with no family, and who would kill for what she romanticized that she missed out on entitled, an entitled person always has had and takes it for granted and expects.
Kristen: and she's never had, has always wanted, and is begging to finally get it for once. I fully appreciate your frustration and loss of patience, but being forever outside, keenly feeling the lack of belonging in a family is a rough feeling.
Kristen: So throwing it in her face that they will never be one of you, and you will never be her mother, is a little brutal, maybe? Maybe apologize for how cruelly worded it is, but say her constant pushiness makes it difficult sometimes.
Kristen: And you are not excluding her because she doesn't matter, but because it is a serious trip that you need to focus one-on-one. Say maybe some other time you guys can have a shopping outing or something so she can feel included.
Kristen: But again, reinforce, she has demons with her lack of family growing up, and you have your own with the family that you did have, that will take the sting out. Otherwise, she's going to be re-traumatized all over as well.
Kristen: Rejected as a kid, rejected as an adult. Be direct, but maybe try and be a little kind. Good luck. And that's kind of...
Melanie & Kristen: Did someone call her entitled?
Melanie & Kristen: Did the OP call her entitled?
Kristen: me go back up.
Melanie & Kristen: Cause I think it was more about like whether OP was a, was the a-hole or not for saying that.
Kristen: Let me go back up.
Melanie & Kristen: Cause I agree with that person that I don't think she seems like she's being entitled. I think it's more, it's more of like a trauma thing.
Melanie & Kristen: And um I don't know.
Kristen: I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: I think, I think what that person said is like perfect actually.
Kristen: I do too. And that was my whole thing is like, okay, you can address it, but don't do it in the way that you're doing it because you're doing it in a way that's like further going to cause issues.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. If there's anything to apologize for, it's how you snapped and, and said things in anger and, but then just re say, you know,
Melanie & Kristen: While I'm sorry that the way that I said, like the way about the way that that came out, that it should be more like, um
Melanie & Kristen: it's okay to have one-on-one time with people in the family, you know? And this is an important trip that I'm not at liberty to discuss because it's not my thing.
Kristen: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Melanie & Kristen: And, then you know, i don't know. It's, while Kat doesn't seem entitled, she does seem very pushy.
Melanie & Kristen: calling her a liar for, you know, when she was like, oh, it's a mother-daughter trip and I'm your daughter, so I should be invited to. when she said, i well, it's not a mother-daughter trip, and she' like, well, you're a liar.
Melanie & Kristen: Like, that's that's a little much.
Kristen: I guess when I read things, I'm always thinking like they're giving like the bare minimum detail of what was actually done and what was actually said.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And so I feel like like it's always in my head, I'm reading these things going, OK, well, they're reporting the worst things that the offender is doing with as little detail as possible for like
Melanie & Kristen: Right.
Kristen: the actual scenario. And so I think I automatically go okay, there's something that is probably worse that happened or worse that was said to have caused.
Melanie & Kristen: Or triggered her into feeling like it was a mother-daughter trip. Yeah. Like maybe someone else in the family said, oh yeah, like, you know, op and Sam are going to be taking a trip.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: It's mother-daughter trip or whatever. They called it that. And so that probably was triggering.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: But I don't know. At the same time, id feel like I would be like – like if if my mother-in-law was like, oh, I'm going to – I mean, she only has boys.
Kristen: I mean, most people.
Melanie & Kristen: But if she was like, oh, we're taking a trip and we're only taking –
Melanie & Kristen: like, I don't know, Anthony or something, my brother-in-law, I'd be like, okay, bye. Like, have a great trip. but You know?
Kristen: then
Melanie & Kristen: I wouldn't feel left out.
Melanie & Kristen: You know? i think I would feel more like there was injustice if she was like, oh, we're taking a trip and we're only taking Anthony and not Eric.
Kristen: Well, here's the other thing.
Melanie & Kristen: Then I'd be like, well, why? You know?
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: I'd feel more like for him, but He's her actual son though, so i don't know. That's different.
Kristen: Yeah. Someone else wrote, I feel so bad for her. She just wants a mother to love her, but it's okay if you don't want to be her. If you don't want her to be close, I'm just sad. And then someone responded to that saying, if someone was acting like about any other relationship, acting like probably like that, about any other relationship, how would you feel?
Kristen: If she was harassing a man like this because she wanted a husband, a place of employment because she wanted a job, a random other woman because she wanted a friend, I highly doubt this would be your response.
Kristen: Being someone else's mom doesn't mean you have to play that role to anyone and everyone. Okay, well, daughter-in-law, it's not anyone.
Melanie & Kristen: That doesn't make any sense because she is the woman's daughter-in-law.
Kristen: I know.
Melanie & Kristen: So it's not like not like she's dying for the position.
Kristen: Okay, so she goes on on and then
Melanie & Kristen: Right.
Kristen: And then anyone and someone responded to that basically by saying she's. Oh, wait, she's been harassing a woman to forgive her abusive mother mother. She's not a kind or nice person, but I don't see anywhere where she's explained to Kat that her mother was abusive.
Kristen: Like, I feel like, you know, she's like, well, she's asked me so many times, but like, I don't want to get into it.
Melanie & Kristen: ran
Melanie & Kristen: Well, don't you think her husband would have been like, oh, yeah, my my grandma's kind of a B.
Kristen: I don't know. Like a lot of, I don't think this woman has been talking to her sons about her childhood traumas. I don't think she's been talking to anyone about her childhood traumas. I think she needs some therapy as well.
Kristen: I do. Now, okay. So I think it's all like, it's an unfortunate situation, but here's the thing that I want this OP to think about.
Kristen: It doesn't seem like they have them yet. Kids, the the husband, and the daughter or the husband, the son.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, yeah, it's a good point.
Kristen: Yeah. And by being a total BZ, guess what? Grandma ain't going to happen.
Kristen: You know, because when, you know, your your son married her, that's their family.
Melanie & Kristen: Yep.
Kristen: And if you want to be a part of it, play nice. Otherwise, you're making your choice. And I'm not saying that, like, there can't be boundaries, but i feel like I feel like this is something that needs to be discussed with, like, a professional for both of their, like, sakes.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: Like, they both need therapy.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: And I don't think it's fair that everyone's, like, ganging up on the one, but I'm like, clearly this other one has issues, too, if she's, like, mm-hmm. She has such a hard time with like, and don't know, like, she's like, what? She's so too touchy-feely and she's too whatever. Like, that to me, like, I'm not a huge whatever, but like, I don't say, no, don't touch me, you know, at the same time.
Kristen: Like, if my kid, i have a I have two kids that are like, when they hug.
Melanie & Kristen: If,
Melanie & Kristen: I don't know, if ah somebody was calling you Chris and you were, because I know you don't like that nickname, right? If somebody was calling you that every time they talked to you and you repeatedly told them, oh, you know what?
Melanie & Kristen: Please don't call me that.
Melanie & Kristen: And then they
Kristen: That guy called me Chris for like years.
Kristen: It didn't bother me that much.
Melanie & Kristen: Okay, so maybe you're a terrible person ask. um
Kristen: Maybe I have no boundaries. I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Maybe you're just a pushover. i don't know.
Kristen: No, but it wasn't something that bothered me enough. Like, I think I've always just,
Kristen: there have been things that really bother me about certain like things people say or do. But I guess my boundaries lie more with like, like internal boundaries. So I'll just remove myself from the scenario if I don't,
Kristen: if it's like happening repeated amounts of times, i don't know. I'll just be like, okay, bye. don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: You're dead to me.
Kristen: Maybe, i don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: I do that. trim the fat in my life. I'm like, oh, no.
Kristen: Well, I think a lot of times, think lot of times you see the habits and you see like, okay, that's not gonna change.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Towards me anyway.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: so it's not even worth the conversation.
Melanie & Kristen: towards me anyway
Kristen: at Yeah. Just in general, just like, that's just one of their character things that isn't going to change. And you're like, okay. um I'm trying to think if I've had
Kristen: conversations, like, i don't know. For me, I'm always like, I'll just change myself. It's easier.
Melanie & Kristen: I was like that a lot in high school. And then I was just like, no, I'm done doing that. had a lot of people, a lot of like friends who would walk all over me because I allowed them to.
Kristen: I can tell.
Melanie & Kristen: And so i don't know. And like, you know, I've, I've talked about, i think I've cut it out of like past podcasts, but I've talked about like a certain friend that I had where I had a conversation with her and I said, well, it's your, it's a characteristic of your personality that you tend to
Melanie & Kristen: be around when it's something to do with you, but when it's, when somebody else needs something, you're conveniently unavailable. And, and I said, that's fine.
Melanie & Kristen: That's okay to have that kind of personality. You just have to find the people who are okay with that, you know? And, uh, she got very upset and said, I like, you know, and then started of listing all the reasons why she wasn't actually like that.
Melanie & Kristen: And the thing is, it's like, I was friends with this person for so long, like like decades, you know, and like, I have my own, you know, bullet points.
Kristen: you
Melanie & Kristen: So I'm just, I'm over it. and I just didn't let it bother me. I was just like, okay, you know, wish you the best. Um, i I'm not willing to be friends with somebody like that. I mean, literally this person called me after not speaking to me like for a year and a half just to be, and I was at work and I was like, got the call. And, and I was like, cause this must be important, right? This person never calls me and answer the phone. And the, she was like, you know, I'm pregnant. And it's like this whole crazy scenario and how I'm pregnant. And was just like,
Melanie & Kristen: okay, like, wow, that's crazy. And called me just to tell her, tell me like her good news. And then was like, okay, bye. Like, didn't one know anything about what's going on with me. it was just so weird. um But yeah, like,
Kristen: Do you think she
Melanie & Kristen: I think she's a little bit of a narcissist.
Kristen: has though?
Melanie & Kristen: I don't think it's an ADHD thing.
Kristen: Okay. was just thinking in terms of like with ADHD, like there'll be times they say like things kind of, if you don't see them in front of they disappear from you.
Kristen: Watching Emma go off on her beach cruiser with her big old sunglasses on down the street.
Melanie & Kristen: I don't
Kristen: She looks like she's from the 70s.
Melanie & Kristen: know.
Kristen: long hair is almost getting stuck in the tires of the bike.
Melanie & Kristen: my God.
Kristen: Anyway, like with objects, like the whole object permanence thing with ADHD, we're the reason why you know, I have eight of the same thing in my pantry is because I forget that I have it and I keep buying it. And then I'm like, oh crap, here's now I've got eight of them.
Kristen: It happens with people sometimes too. And like with ADHD, with ADHD, you work like time is a construct where it's like, it's either happening now or it's happening some other time.
Melanie & Kristen: Maybe. I think it's
Kristen: And that's literally how, is it happening now? Okay, if if it's not happening now, it's here, but like files and files and files back.
Kristen: And,
Melanie & Kristen: I think it's different because I think like you have this, this issue and a lot of people on mom's side of the family have this issue. But when you actually talk to the people who have those issues, they genuinely want to hear about what's going on with you.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: And so with this friend that I had, it's more like I'm a victim I don't do those things. You're the reason that you feel that way. Not me. It's very like gaslighting. And I don't even think she understands that she's doing it, you know, because all of the reasons that she listed to me of like why she thought I was wrong for saying ah an observation like about her personality was like, well, you know, I've always been there for you.
Melanie & Kristen: And like, ah you know, when you're, when your dad died whatever, I went to the memorial, like, okay, that's a normal friend thing though. Like I went to your dad's funeral too, like, cause you're my friend.
Melanie & Kristen: But like there was, um, when Marley, my cat died, um she saw it on,
Kristen: and
Melanie & Kristen: socials and she called to like say that she was sorry that the cat and that was very sweet and she let me cry about it for about 60 seconds and then she started talking about her own life so yeah okay
Kristen: But was she trying to like, okay.
Melanie & Kristen: no
Kristen: not Not like a, I'm trying to connect with you by sharing what I feel is like a similar thing and to show that.
Melanie & Kristen: No, it was like, this these are all my baby daddy problems. It had nothing to do with anything except her and things that like I didn't ask about. She literally just started talking about it. you know So that's what I mean. I think it's more of like a narcissistic quality.
Kristen: Well, just feel like a lot of times people with ADHD are often like told that they dominate conversations. And that they interrupt.
Melanie & Kristen: And it's not that she can't be, sorry, I just literally did it.
Kristen: Okay, I'm just gonna let you.
Melanie & Kristen: It's not that she can't be empathetic towards people. I just think it's very much like a a way to stop them from talking about themselves in order for her to talk about herself, you know?
Kristen: I would have to talk to her and like look at it because I just feel like a lot of times people, i don't know, like I could see it where I guess I can just see it from so many different sides. And I'm not saying that she's not this. I'm just, I'm i'm internalizing this going, oh gosh, like I know that I do this, that, and the other.
Kristen: And does that make me narcissistic or does that just make me like a lot of the other neurodivergent people who use this thing to relate to that thing? and
Melanie & Kristen: I don't think it makes you narcissistic. You're not like sitting there gaslighting people about things that happened that you did that they feel like you did to them. You know, like if I were to tell you like, oh, you made me feel this way, you'd be like, I'm so sorry.
Kristen: Okay. Yeah, no, I don't get a lot.
Melanie & Kristen: Like it was genuinely not my intention to do that.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: You know, like I just I get so scatterbrained, you know, and I sometimes forget important things that are happening or whatever, you know, but it's never directed in a way that's ever meant to be malicious or harmful to other people.
Melanie & Kristen: And I'm so sorry that I made you feel that way. That's what you would say.
Kristen: Oh.
Melanie & Kristen: And my friend would be like, um you're wrong.
Kristen: Thank you. I'm so kind.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah My friend would be like, oh, you're wrong. Like, i I talk to a lot of people and they agree with me that you're wrong. And here's why. Also, here are all of you the things that I think that you did that are also bad.
Melanie & Kristen: Like, you know i mean? let's blame shift. You would never do that.
Kristen: know.
Melanie & Kristen: And so I don't think that – You know what I mean? and so I have nothing but love for her. like i i just like i don't even but I'm at a point where like I don't even think about her anymore.
Kristen: Wish you the best. Yeah. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: like it's it's not It used to be like she was a very good friend of mine, but like I'm just kind of sick of being on the you know, the back burner, you know, in the relationship.
Kristen: yeah
Melanie & Kristen: Like it's, oh, what's, what's going on with you? Oh. And then like, just talk about everything that's going on in your life and not ask any questions about me. Like, it's just all about you. you know, I just, I just, I am at a point in my life where i don't want to have relationships like that anymore.
Kristen: yeah
Melanie & Kristen: So I don't, and I don't remember like why we even started talking about that.
Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: What was the point that?
Melanie & Kristen: I guess it doesn't matter.
Kristen: I don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. Yeah.
Kristen: and don't know.
Melanie & Kristen: Anyways, you're sweetheart. you would never be mean to people.
Kristen: Thank you.
Melanie & Kristen: In fact, I think it hurts you to be mean to people.
Kristen: I mean, usually, although some people, i mean, just it's so funny, like are so offended by things that I do that I feel are so innocuous that I'm just like, what?
Kristen: One, you're offended what? And then like you unfriend me on socials over that? Okay.
Kristen: Adult women are so fun.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, but those are people you don't necessarily care that much about in general.
Kristen: they
Kristen: No, no, it was, yeah, no, it was just a work colleague, but like, it was just funny.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, exactly.
Kristen: Like the fact that some people feel like they're free to say whatever they want. And then if someone says,
Melanie & Kristen: Whatever they want. ha
Kristen: Yeah, no, she was, this person was talking about, this was like right after Trump was elected. And she was talking about, well, that. She thinks Trump is the Antichrist and this, that, and the other. And I'm just like, listen, in a perfect world, is he my favorite candidate ever? No.
Kristen: But between the two options we had, i don't know. I'm going with Trump. Sorry. um But then, in like, we live in Texas, and Texas outlawed abortion unless medical emergency. Like, there's stuff that's in place for that.
Kristen: And I don't know how many times medical professionals were like, if it is medically necessary, if the life of the mother is at risk, if da-da-da-da, like, et cetera, et cetera, please seek.
Kristen: emergency, you know, help and it will be given. Um, and people here went crazy over it.
Kristen: And this person was talking about, a very unfortunate experience that she had where she miscarried and she had to have, um, a DNC, which is they go and they dilate the uterus and they,
Kristen: empty the contents out. And she was like, you know, well, I had to have like that, that procedure is an abortion. So that wouldn't be allowed in Texas. And I'm like, well, and I didn't even, okay. Because I'm like, okay. Old me would have been like, actually, actually,
Kristen: actually. um
Melanie & Kristen: Oh.
Kristen: And then here are the links and sources that explain why you're wrong. Because I'm all about, listen, if people have accurate information, it's not like I'm trying to change your mind because I'm right. It's I'm trying to let you understand that you have a flawed like thought process that you're making your decisions based upon.
Kristen: um And so if you want to keep those decisions, fine, but be as educated about them as possible and not just like, you know, that's an abortion.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: run Okay, well, no, like it wouldn't be allowed. And I'm like, you don't have to even be pregnant or have anything in your uterus. Okay.
Kristen: to have a DNC. I'm like, so I did not even comment on hers. I commented on my own page, like, and it wasn't even a comment. It was basically a doctor explaining why and that wasn't an abortion, um, because they had to make videos to tell people that that was not an abortion. um
Kristen: So I'm like, well, here, maybe this medical doctor who's describing this. And I'm just going to share it. Just be like, in case anyone is like concerned, like this is the actual information.
Kristen: And she like was so offended. She unfriended me and then was commenting like, I can't believe some people are so heartless and da, da, da, da. And I'm just like. And I'm like, literally, i had a DNC done five years after my last pregnancy.
Kristen: Because I had ablation done on my uterus. Like I had, okay, my periods were very heavy. i would like pass clots.
Melanie & Kristen: Back story.
Kristen: ask me, have to explain. Like, I'm not just going in for a funsies. You know, it's like I was, i went in asking for a partial hysterectomy and they're like, let's try this process, you know, first.
Kristen: And I'm like, okay, again, I was given information and I looked into it and i'm like, okay, let me change my mind. Like, I like this.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah
Kristen: Thank you. That's helpful.
Kristen: So anyway, so yes, they had to, because there was so much that they had scraped off and like burned off, like cauterized in my uterus. They, and they had to do a DNC. So I'm like, so is that an abortion? No, it's not an abortion. Like it's a medical procedure. It's exactly what it is. And I used to also work medical in the medical field um and with billing and coding and all that stuff.
Kristen: um And they're like, well, when you miscarry, it's called a spontaneous abortion. I'm like, yeah, and that's not outlawed. Like, I just don't understand why people are.
Melanie & Kristen: Something your body naturally can do.
Kristen: Yeah, it's just, it's so dumb.
Melanie & Kristen: yeah
Kristen: And it's like, and when you go in for procedures and they're like, people are being turned away. I'm like, newsflash, people have been turned away from yeah ah ers since the early 2000s when I was working in that field to say, let your body do its thing naturally. And then if there's any complications come back because
Melanie & Kristen: you're taking up the bed for other people who actually need it.
Kristen: are our ERs are, so yes. Yeah. They're so overrun by people. Okay. That's a whole other conversation, but like people who are going in for doctor services because they don't have insurance. Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah. And on that note,
Kristen: yeah Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Um, that'd be a fun thing to talk about next time.
Melanie & Kristen: Continue that.
Kristen: Okay.
Melanie & Kristen: All right. Well, we've been talking for about two hours yeah and I haven't eaten anything today yet.
Kristen: Oh gosh.
Melanie & Kristen: Pretty hungry. i also have to pee.
Kristen: But you look so pretty.
Melanie & Kristen: Oh my God, thank you.
Kristen: You're welcome.
Melanie & Kristen: Should I put...
Kristen: Your hair is so long.
Melanie & Kristen: I know. Thank you.
Kristen: Oh my gosh.
Melanie & Kristen: It's as long as Emma's. I don't think it can grow that long.
Kristen: Now Emma's is really long. It's like down to like the top of her butt crack. It's ridiculous. She like just cuts her own hair. She'll take it over and then she'll just be like. I'm
Melanie & Kristen: it
Kristen: like, cool. It's one way to do it.
Melanie & Kristen: And then when she puts it back, it's all uneven.
Kristen: She's like, no, it's not. It's fine. Okay. I don't argue, because why bother? She doesn't want to go to get her hair done, because they talk to her, and she doesn't like talking to people.
Melanie & Kristen: Why?
Melanie & Kristen: She should just say, i have autism and I don't want to talk to you, but I appreciate it.
Kristen: I think it's a cool experience.
Melanie & Kristen: And I'm not being mean. I just like, I'm really bad at this.
Kristen: I think it's, like, multi-sensory, like, stuff. It's, like, it's the cape tight tight around her neck. It's the it's the everything.
Melanie & Kristen: My, my person, it's like a robe. So it goes the opposite way and you of like, you know,
Kristen: okay yeah they've only done like super cuts because there's three of them none of them have gotten their hair cut by a professional person since we've moved here
Melanie & Kristen: Well, it's very in vogue right now to have long hair. I've noticed. I actually don't know if that's true, but I noticed a lot of people have long hair right now.
Kristen: all the young kids have long hair all three of mine have long hair
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Um... Eric's cousin's daughter. His cousin's like in his 50s. So his daughter 14, I think. So like around Emma's age.
Melanie & Kristen: And she, was like, oh, have you ever seen Hocus Pocus? And she's like, no. I'm like, I'm sorry, what?
Melanie & Kristen: Because it's not – it's one of those like movies that's always featured on like Netflix. It's like, oh, it's Halloween. Watch Hocus Pocus or whatever, right?
Kristen: Reform, yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: Even though it was made in the 90s. No, never seen it. It's just – it's an older movie. I don't know. I've never seen it. And I was like, but it's Hocus Pocus.
Melanie & Kristen: And so then I was like, how old do you think I am? she goes, I 27. And was like, Yes, that's correct.
Kristen: Yes. I wasn't alive when this movie came out at all.
Melanie & Kristen: and Not at all. And even I've seen it.
Kristen: Could that not wait? sorry.
Melanie & Kristen: Are you?
Melanie & Kristen: I don't think you are.
Melanie & Kristen: still talking.
Kristen: Come here. You might as well come here.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, now you're on now you're on the... Oh
Kristen: Look at how curly her hair is. My goodness. Come here. oh It's curly. It's still pretty curly.
Melanie & Kristen: my gosh. You look like the lion from the Wizard of Oz.
Kristen: It's not curly. was thinking she was like Lady and the Tramp with like the...
Melanie & Kristen: Oh, that too.
Kristen: It's a little smash because I slept on it.
Melanie & Kristen: So this is from wearing your like bonnet and then doing like a curly girl method.
Melanie & Kristen: Do you do a curly girl method?
Kristen: Well, yesterday I took a shower and went to bed on wet hater.
Melanie & Kristen: I just took a shower.
Kristen: Not really. and so this But did you use the kind like the brush to separate them? This is just... Oh my gosh. I would love... Although...
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah, that's crazy. My hair doesn't do that at all. my hair is I like styled it and everything. It's just like. Yeah.
Kristen: bye. i love you.
Kristen: So fun.
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Kristen: get so many. interruptions here love it okay
Melanie & Kristen: Yeah.
Melanie & Kristen: All right. Well, I love you. go pee.
Kristen: love you okay until next time it's been real it's been fun i'm gonna go on my uh vibration plate okay bye i will thank you okay bye
Melanie & Kristen: All
Melanie & Kristen: right. Okay. Have fun with your lymphatic drainage. Okay. Bye.
