00:00:00
00:00:01
EP 58: Motherly Advice
1.6k Plays1 month ago
In today's episode, the moms are helping listeners with some tough situations. From difficult parental relationships, unhealthy (?) wine habits, parents who aren't parenting, and so much more. We're giving out our best motherly advice
Join the official Mom Group Chat Facebook group: Mom Group Chat | Facebook
Keep up with the Moms and join the conversation on our socials:
Instagram: @momgroupchat
TikTok: @momgroupchat
Questions/comments/need to vent? Email us at momgroupchat@gmail.com
Transcript
00:00:07
Speaker
There's no right way to do it.
00:00:12
Speaker
Oh, we're going to get into it. What up moms? My name is Candace and I'm here with my best friend Whitney. And this is the mom group chat podcast. And today we're going to be giving you some motherly advice. I'm excited. I have not looked at these submissions. So like These are going to be my authentic answers. Yeah, I think that's I'm happy that you didn't look at them because I there were a couple that I'm like, oh, it'll be exciting to hear Whitney's like authentic reaction to some of these. So which I don't like doing. I like a little prep. Well, not today. You are going to give me your authentic reaction here.
00:00:54
Speaker
But before we jump into that, I have like a random question. and I feel like in the last episode we recorded, we also talked about the TikTok algorithm a little bit, but I have a question that I've been meaning to ask you for so long. Do you get videos of people getting their like colors done? Yeah.
00:01:13
Speaker
I want to do that so bad. That does sound fun. I think about this all the time. like And actually, is the video you just posted in the yellow dress? like I don't think I look good in yellow. like That's not my color.
00:01:27
Speaker
video Oh, oh, from the last episode. Yeah, just like I think it washes me out. Like I can't wear yellow with my hair. I don't know. I just I see that not my color. Yeah, yeah. When I like it's just whenever I see the videos, though, and I feel like I have a hard time differentiating like what I feel like I'm starting to get the hang of it. But for a long time, I was like,
00:01:51
Speaker
i I feel like that looks good, even though if they're like, oh, look at how it washes you out. I'm like, I think it looks good. But I also am nervous about getting it done because I'm scared that it will hurt my feelings. Be like, no, my favorite colors are pastel. Like, how dare you? I am such a bright, like I like wearing reds and pinks and like bold colors, actually. And I'm so scared that I'll be like a light,
00:02:20
Speaker
I don't even know light spring and it's like the colors I don't like and don't like I don't wear a lot of like light blue or like pastel things. I prefer bolder, brighter colors. So I'm just scared that it'll be something that I don't necessarily want. I feel like you'd be you would still be bold. Like I don't see you as a winter. Yeah, I don't think so either. I think I'm probably an autumn or a um Is it summer, but like the one that's more bold? Yeah. I don't know. I don't know like all the categories, but, um, I don't know. I feel like it would also make me like it would get in my head a little bit and I would steer away from certain things. Like, even if I liked it.
00:03:06
Speaker
So I feel like it would make me in my own head a little. But like, what if they told me like I could never wear turtle turtlenecks again and I would cry because that's, that is me. I'm a turtleneck. But they don't tell you that, right? you know Yeah, I think it's more about colors. I don't think it's about styles. I think they would tell you like maybe you can't wear a yellow turtleneck, which we've, you know, a banana turtleneck.
00:03:34
Speaker
Did we discuss that like on here? How funny that was? We discussed it right before we recorded one episode. We talked about like a yellow turtleneck. I don't know why we brought that up, but I was like, would you ever wear a banana banana yellow turtleneck? And we were both were like, what the fuck? That like doesn't exist. And I swear to God, a banana yellow turtleneck popped up on my Instagram. And I was like, Candace, our phones literally listened to us. It was so funny. I know.
00:04:04
Speaker
I definitely wouldn't wear a banana yellow, but I probably would wear a mustard yellow. Yeah. A hundred percent. That's fall. Yeah. yeah I'm getting really excited for a fall vibes. I don't know.
00:04:16
Speaker
Yeah, it's that time where you're kind of over summer like, I know, I'm like getting to like the bare minimum in my closet where I'm like, I've worn everything. I'm not excited anymore. I'm ready to put on a sweater. I also feel like last fall, I did not buy a single damn thing new because I was pregnant. Yeah. And like i didn't i don't have it I didn't have anything cute last fall. And so I'm like, OK, I'm excited this year. I'm hoping to like do a little fall haul of new stuff, new sweaters. I got rid of a ton of fall stuff um when I was cleaning out Eevee's room. So I got rid of a lot of my sweaters. So I i actually need to do some shopping for fall. Yeah. I feel like you can't. I mean, it's just so hot there. like
00:05:06
Speaker
oh always like one month. So. Yeah. um It's kind of like that here, too, a little bit. It's like September, October, maybe. And then it just gets like kind of chilly um and not cute out. I don't know. um September and October are peak months in Tennessee. Gorgeous. So nice. So nice. I see you in a week.
00:05:36
Speaker
I can't wait. I'm so excited for those of you listening. We are having our next little mom group chat photo shoot for some new photos. We've been using the same photos for over a year now. We need something new. We need some new life into our branding. So I'm so excited for you guys to see it. I think it's going to be really cute. Yeah, I have not bought anything still. Um, I have my newly sitting right there that arrived yesterday and I'm so excited. Everything in there is possibilities. So I'm hoping something in there works. I also, after this, I don't know if I told you that some Hannah's in town, so I'm going to lunch with Hannah and we're going to go paint pottery. I want to do that so bad.
00:06:25
Speaker
Yeah. So I'm really excited. I can't decide what I'm going to do yet. I think I might want to paint a birthday plate. That's exactly why I want to go, but I'm not going to. I don't have time. It's Margo's birthday month. I'm here. I can't. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, I get it. Um, we, or I've been, I broke my, you know, this mug cause I drink it on here all the time, but my favorite mug, the pink one with the lips.
00:06:49
Speaker
Oh, I've never noticed. Oh, okay. That's like my mug. Like it's yeah pink and it has red lips on it and it had a crack in it. And the last time I used it, it, um, started to leak through the crack, like my coffee. So I had to toss it. So I've been needing like a new signature mug. So I might need a mug. I don't know. We'll see.
00:07:12
Speaker
Anyways, sorry, yeah I digress here, but I was saying um I'll be in Hyde Park. That's where like we're going to lunch and there's some cute shots. There's an anthropology. like I might bop around a little bit and see if I find anything good. Love Hyde Park. It's so fun there.
00:07:30
Speaker
cute. It's really cute. Lots of little boutiques and stuff. Yeah. Okay. So we're going to get into these motherly advice submissions. So if this is your first time listening or you don't know what we're doing today, we had posted an anonymous form on our Instagram for people to write in with like sticky situations, like tough, uh, you know, life happenings that maybe you want like an unbiased opinion about or difficult you know, situation. um We got 39 submissions, so we're definitely not saying we're not going to get through everything. um So if you submitted and we don't, you know, talk about your certain situation, please know that we will probably do another episode of this and we might do it next time. um I feel like we're getting the tea, like what's the tea?
00:08:28
Speaker
I know I'm excited. The other thing I need to say just as a disclaimer, like we are not experts on anything. Like this is just like if you were to ask your friends their advice, like we don't know anyone in your specific situation. So we can truly give like an unbiased take here, but we are not experts on anything. That's what I need to say. Okay.
00:08:53
Speaker
Where should we start? Okay. I'm actually going to start with this one. Okay. Give me a softball. I need to work my way into this. Oh, I don't know if this is considered a softball, but okay. I'm just going for it. We have family with children close in age who choose to rarely ever watch their children when we are all together and in public, resulting in some dangerous situations.
00:09:17
Speaker
This makes me feel like I have to watch all six, three of mine and three of theirs, and their youngest is three. Therefore, I am stressed and often not a very fun person in these situations. Help. How do I make it not my problem, even though it's clearly not a priority to them? This is so tough. That is really hard.
00:09:40
Speaker
It's really I feel the way I would handle this is probably like I know it's clearly not a priority to them, but in these situations, like I would probably try to be as casual as possible. And like if you're out in public or you're out of playground or out of whatever, like I would probably come back to the group where they're sitting and I would probably say something like, all right, I'm tagging you in like, yeah, your turn.
00:10:07
Speaker
Like that's what I would say and or I would say something like. um All right, my 10 minutes are up like who's taking next shift or something like casual and funny almost to try to make like light of it. I know it's like what is this situation like are these parents like super laid back and do they like trust their kids like maybe they don't act I don't know as like, um, I don't know, out of control. Yeah. Like maybe they're just like more comfortable letting them do those things. Whereas like maybe your children need more guidance. Like, I don't know. That is so hard. Cause I feel like sometimes Chris and I take our eye off of Graydon, but he's like, I'm used to it. Maybe other parents aren't like, I don't know. I think I would do the same though. Like.
00:11:04
Speaker
Be like, Hey, can you see like, I'm exhausted. Like I'm going to go get a drink. Can you watch them? or yeah And then take a long ass time getting your drink. and Is it a situation where you don't trust them looking? Cause you know, they don't. Yeah. I think it's also to remember that every parent has a different like threshold of anxiety or a threshold of like worry for their kids. Like.
00:11:31
Speaker
I know being around other moms, like I probably, I have a pretty low, like I'm, uh, I would say a pretty chill mom in these situations. Am I going to completely like leave them be to hurt themselves? Absolutely not. Especially with the three year olds, I get that, you know, they're little. And if you're at like a playground that has super tall, like yeah whatever, but at the same time, like you're not responsible for all six of those kids and like,
00:12:00
Speaker
I don't know if this is controversial to say or not, but like maybe their kid needs to get hurt in order for them to like wake up and start to pay attention more. it That sounds terrible, but but like it's not your responsibility. And if you feel like you need to watch your kids, that's fine. But like if their kid is about to do something dangerous, like part of me is like let him, honestly. Get hurt in a safe way. like not Don't let them like run across the facking street.
00:12:29
Speaker
but like horse okay if they're going for the monkey bars and you know they can't do it like they gotta try and they say that that's like a developmental thing you need to let them climb and get hurt and figure out their boundaries so totally touch and go I would say yeah I would say the first like first plan of action is to do the kind of casual comment like all right tap tag you're it like you know whatever and if that doesn't work I say let it really yeah Let it rip to where they like learn the consequences of their actions. I don't know because you cannot control the way other parents like parent their children necessarily. So yeah, I don't know. All right. Solid advice. Yeah. OK.
00:13:25
Speaker
yeah
00:13:27
Speaker
All right, ah this is about making mom friends. How do you become comfortable asking mom friends over? I just feel like I need an activity, food, plenty of toys their kids would like, and then I overthink it and get scared. My kids aren't going to play well, and then just end up not inviting them over. Also, the feeling of rejection stresses me out. Is this normal?
00:13:51
Speaker
I am on the same page as this person. like Did I write that? Yeah. I tend to wait for people to ask me over. i i Not that like I don't think my kids are gonna play well together. like I just get in my head about it a little bit. I love making mom friends though. Like I am so down to do all that stuff, but I also did that before I had kids. I never really had a lot of people over. I'm the person that likes to be at someone else's house. So it's really hard for me to plan ahead. That's kind of what it boils down to. I don't plan ahead.
00:14:33
Speaker
um But I don't think you have to overdo it with kids. Like, whenever it's the summer, we just put all the water toys outside and they have so much fun. And if the parents stay to hang out, like we just make sure we have like beers and stuff so we can casually drink and catch up and make friends with them as well. But I don't think it has to be overthought in any way.
00:15:00
Speaker
Yeah, I would say that's my advice too. is to like I know it's hard, but to try not to overthink it. like No one is thinking about all of those things like you are. and Sometimes you just got to rip the band-aid off. and I would say to ease your anxiety, what I would do is to plan one like special thing. like Like she said, if you have all the water toys out and you buy a box of popsicles, like that's enough. like yeah Or if you want to if if the adults are coming over to like set out chips and salsa, so at least there's like something. But you don't need to do all the things. like You don't need to have snacks, have a treat, set out something super fun. Make sure that you don't need to text that family ahead of time and be like, does your kid like dinosaurs or like whatever?
00:15:48
Speaker
if I have learned anything about kids is just them being in a new environment with the new toys that you have in your place like they're going to be so into it and you don't need to overthink it so much. Yeah and sometimes um I think if if it's like a new play date situation or a potential new mom friend like meeting somewhere mutual like a park or going on a walk I think can kind of ease that anxiety that way you're not having to per se entertain like sometimes I prefer going on a walk with a mom so that we can actually talk and um get to know each other more. Yeah and and we're in motion um or just like like I said at the park and the two kids can play together that way you don't have that kind of pressure but
00:16:36
Speaker
if you are wanting people over, having one activity is perfectly fine. And it could be just yeah a movie. It doesn't have me to be anything like crazy. Totally. I was gonna also mention the like neutral place too, because I feel like if I have anxiety about things, sometimes it's like my house. like My house isn't clean enough, or like it's not cute enough, or like it's old.
00:16:58
Speaker
like whatever it's uh and so sometimes I get in my head about that and so meeting at a mutual place or like finding one of those like open play like playhouse things like we have that little play place here in Tampa somewhere like that can be great to where like the toys are new for everyone and everyone can kind of find their own thing that they like, and it's a neutral ground for both you and the other mom. so And the thing about them not getting ah along, like I feel like kids fight. Yeah. They're not going to get along the whole time and be perfect angels. like There's going to be a pipe ah point where they fight over the same toy, and they're not sharing. And I think as long as like you know that and the other parents are on the same page, like, hey, this is just how kids act. like
00:17:50
Speaker
I think it happens. It happened. to us yesterday, we went to a splash pad and this was like an open area and Graydon stole another kid's truck that he was playing with, like sending it down this little river thing. And I had to go take it and then he threw a fit and I had to hand it back to the mom. And the mom was like, thank you so much. Cause her kid was clearly upset. And I was like, Graydon threw the biggest tantrum and I had to pull him aside. And I was just like, this just is the way it is. It was the end of the day. It was almost five o'clock. He was tired. Like, yeah.
00:18:22
Speaker
It is what it freaking is, you know? Totally. You got to kind of let all the expectations fall because kids are kids and they're always going to keep you on your toes, you know? So for sure. And don't be afraid. Like mom, friends are so important. I feel like they've like changed my life as a mom. Like they made me feel so much less alone. So this uncomfortable feeling that you're feeling is worth the eventual relationships you will build and the peace you will feel with mom friends who are in the same like boat as you. So embrace the uncomfortability a little bit to and to get the reward of mom friends. That's what I would say.
00:19:08
Speaker
That was beautiful. Oh my God. Thank you.
00:19:14
Speaker
Okay. All right. Let's do a more tricky one. Okay. This one's long. Okay. Okay. I am an only child and my mom has always been difficult, opinionated, and manipulative. I've learned to live with her, deal with her, but my husband, who I've been with for eight years now, finally had enough about a year ago. Since then, he has been very snarky and rude to her, and talking to him about it doesn't help. He says she's not nice and he's not going to be nice to her anymore. and
00:19:45
Speaker
Then we went on vacation with my husband's family. They have a vacation home and invited us for 10 days earlier in the month. As she always does, my mom kept our two small dogs while we were away, but several times times made comments about me compensating compensating her for keeping them. I thought it was weird, talked to my dad who agreed, and while I was very appreciative, I did not pay her.
00:20:09
Speaker
This past weekend, my mom asked if she and my dad could keep our two-year-old daughter overnight. We said yes and took her there and then drove back a two hours round trip. My parents loved watching her and I loved having them watch her. I want them to have a good relationship.
00:20:24
Speaker
They came back yesterday to drop her off and my mom says, I think we should watch her one weekend a month. I said, not that often because that would then we would have to let her other grandparents keep her once a month and that would only give us two weekends a month. My husband and I both work full time, so the weekends are our chance to spend quality time with her.
00:20:44
Speaker
I tried to explain all of this and she absolutely lost it, got up and left. Then she was texting me some rude and really hurtful things, including, sorry, I'm such a bad grandmother and I love and love keeping your daughter.
00:20:58
Speaker
ah Never once did anyone say or allude that she was a bad grandmother. And she also texted that she was only good enough to keep our dogs when when we need her and she will never ask again to keep our daughter. I feel that I have asked very little of her in general. She always makes a huge deal about things and makes sure to let me know that I'm inconveniencing her. Meanwhile, my husband's mom is so helpful to us when we need it.
00:21:25
Speaker
Prior to all of this, we saw them at least not if not twice a month. It's not like they don't ever see my daughter. I just feel devastated about all of this and like I didn't do anything wrong. I also don't know where to go from here in terms of our relationship. My dad is the best dad and grandfather ever and I feel like this is going to hurt him too. What should I do?
00:21:47
Speaker
Okay, this is really hard. I can relate to this a little bit. I think that there is a sense of entitlement, I think, with grandparents, and it comes from a place of love. I want to be very clear about that. Most of the time, it comes from a place of love.
00:22:07
Speaker
i The other thing I'm going to say about the generation above us, like our parents' generation, is I feel as though they are not as emotionally mature as we are and as the generation below us is. There is so much more like healthy conversation around communication and emotions and all of those things. So I want to start by saying that because I feel sometimes like it's harder to rationalize with boomers than it is with people of our own age and the people in the generation below us.
00:22:45
Speaker
This is your mother. And if you want her to have a um if you want her to have a relationship with your daughter and your husband and with you, I think you're going to have to communicate in the clearest way possible to where it does not get misconstrued in the minutia of a conversation. yeah What I personally would do in this situation is to write a very well thought out and clear text
00:23:22
Speaker
or email or something written that is full of love and understanding while also being very clear about what you would like to see the relationship be with your daughter and your mom.
00:23:40
Speaker
what i would do probably is to ask her not to respond right away i have had experience with. People that are similar to this i would say and i feel like they have a tendency to react right away and say things that they do not mean in the moment and but usually after a period of like processing and really thinking about it and understanding that this, the way that they react to this is going to affect the future of their relationship with your with your granddaughter. Most of the time they approach the situation with a loving, like a nicer ah film, if that makes sense.
00:24:23
Speaker
This is great advice, Candice. Oh, thanks. Because I feel like sometimes grandparents forget like you are a parent. These are your decisions with your children, like yes, what they say.
00:24:42
Speaker
And their advice is so important. And like her wanting to take her every weekend is so sweet. Like that is very nice. But I get why you wouldn't want to give up a weekend and then potentially have the other family feeling like they deserve one too. I totally get that. um But like you said, it was out of a place of love.
00:25:05
Speaker
nothing um But setting boundaries is so important yeah and and your expectations, like you said, um of what you you see it to be. and so and I don't know. You asking for help is hard. i can I feel like it's hard for me because I'm having to plan ahead. My family lives an hour away, so me asking for help is like,
00:25:32
Speaker
kind of hard um and not having that support system super close, but I think yeah, just setting your boundaries and like you said, writing out a nice text is going to probably like set it in motion again, like yeah relationship and um the thing with the husband. I know.
00:25:53
Speaker
I feel like after kids, everyone's relationship changes. like Yeah, it's really hard. Because they get way more involved than they ever were. So they kind of infiltrate into your family a little bit. I think just the relationship everyone's relationship in general turns a corner. But um just trying to be kind. you know Yeah.
00:26:17
Speaker
I would I would have a little bit of a level set with your husband to it's clear that you probably feel similarly to him about your mom in some aspects, but she is still your mom and you still ultimately would like.
00:26:32
Speaker
to have a relationship with her but it should be on your terms as the parent of your child and I think it's important that again it comes from a place of love not a place of like hate or resentment and I think it's important that you and your husband like are a united front on this and like try not to like he should he should really respect that it is your mom and you guys are family and even like you are going to approach this as a team but it has to come from a place of love from him too like it's yeah it's hard I mean
00:27:18
Speaker
The other thing I would say is like if if you do some of these things and start that in motion and like send her a nice text or email that is like comes from a place of love and it is still not being received,
00:27:33
Speaker
like ask if she would ever be willing to meet like with you and a counselor or something to like talk through it. I feel like that's like kind of intense. But if you the relationship between your mom and your granddaughter is important like And I would also pose that question to her too, be like, how badly do you want a relationship with me and my daughter? Because like that that is at stake here. This is a hard situation. Well, and I feel like kind of what you said too.
00:28:05
Speaker
that generation gas lights a little bit, um saying like, sorry, i'm I'll never ask again. like How many times have any of us gotten in that response back from our parents? I mean, 100%. Yeah. um And you have to remember like how I try and think about this like and take take the same advice. like receive that information, don't react right away. Like eat your words a little bit because that is like just how they grew up and how they learned from their parents. And so sometimes you have to just like let that stuff kind of roll off yeah because they they just say it to say it. um They try and get your feelings. They try and make you feel bad. I think we all have gone through that in in some capacity, but
00:28:54
Speaker
it it's She was trying to be helpful. That was her way of being helpful, but it was overbearing. that's just yeah It was overwhelming, overbearing, and just set your boundaries and have that conversation. um Yeah. Sending you lots of love and luck on that, and hopefully things get better, and your mom will see the value in like you setting those boundaries in order to have a relationship with you and your daughter.
00:29:22
Speaker
so Okie dokie. Let's do a quicker one. Oh, OK. This is a good one. I think that's like quick and lighter.
00:29:35
Speaker
um I may be drinking a little too much wine once the kiddos go to bed, but I have a very stressful job, and I'm not loving it right now. My son is at a very busy, fun, but exhausting age, and sometimes all I look forward to is a few glasses of wine. How can I relax without drinking? I would say, number one, like are you hurting anybody by doing this? Not that i like I'm a huge,
00:30:04
Speaker
drink her during the week or anything, but like you doing it after he goes to bed, like are you not able to wake up and feel your best self in the morning? If that's something that makes you happy, like go at it sister. Everyone has their everyone has like a vice or something they do to relax. so Yeah, I would probably like evaluate the effects of it. Like if it's something that you're feeling like shit every morning, it's probably, you know, yeah I would say maybe try to like mix it up and do like a wine spritz cocktail to where you could still have multiple, but maybe like wine wise, you're having like one glass instead of like two or three.
00:30:51
Speaker
to where like maybe you mix it with like some grenadine and uh like make a fun cocktail or something with like sparkling water that still feels like a treat and like something you can relax with um otherwise like relaxing for me looks like playing on my phone watching a show or reading a book and if you're not into reading i highly suggest like diving back in with either the A Court of Thorne and Rose's book or fourth wing, like those kind of just like started my love. Take you to another dimension. Well, they started my love for reading again. Like if you've fallen out of it, those two will launch you right back into reading. So I highly suggest doing that. It's something I've been doing all year and I hadn't done it in like two or three years. So yeah.
00:31:45
Speaker
The other thing I would say is don't feel like you have to switch it up like cold turkey to be like, okay, starting tomorrow, I'm not drinking wine at a night anymore. Maybe challenge yourself to once a week, switching up what you do. Like, like maybe one night a week this week, you switched to reading a book for an hour or you color in a coloring book, I don't know, like choose a different relaxing, or maybe you take a bath instead of drinking wine. So you don't have to like, I hate when people are like, just stop a cold turkey, this thing that you've been doing forever. Like that's not realistic. I would just baby steps.
00:32:28
Speaker
Like change one night a week for the next two or three weeks and see how you feel. Do you wake up the next morning after that one night and feel better? Like maybe that's a sign that you do want to like cut back a little bit, you know? Yeah, great. Cool. I like that one.
00:32:46
Speaker
um Okay, let's see. Okay, let's do this one. The question itself is short, um but I think it's important to talk about. um I have so much anxiety around trying to conceive. Can anyone relate? How do I relax like they tell you to do? It is so stressful without even like needing to be. It's like something you'd maybe, me personally, something I didn't care about.
00:33:18
Speaker
my whole life and then all of a sudden you're trying and you're getting a negative. You're like, what am I doing in the world? Yeah. I know. And then you're like so excited for that moment and then you're so disappointed. It's it's really hard. um Yeah. I would say my advice like may not be for everyone, but it's my truth.
00:33:40
Speaker
So I'm gonna say it it's that I felt more empowered when I had actual data and like felt like I was Okay, cuz okay. I i know what you're saying yeah Yeah, the anxiety that you have around trying to to conceive like the the core of that is You're like the scare like what you're fearful of is the inability to get pregnant, right? So let's just like Just think about that for a second as someone who's like in the middle of trying to conceive like that's the fear. Okay, let's say you go a year and you don't you are unable to conceive like what are the next steps? That's how my brain works. Like I need actionable like
00:34:27
Speaker
Plans and so like think ahead a little bit and when you if you do get to that point which um there's a good chance you won't When you do get to that point like you want to come super prepared with like actual data of what's been happening. So for me I've talked about it on this podcast, like I tried to conceive with Alice for like eight or nine months and it took us a while and I had that total fear of like, Oh, it's not working. I'm not getting pregnant, whatever. And then the second time around, I really started to collect data with like tracking my ovulation every single day, which some feels.
00:35:04
Speaker
Intense, but it provided me with data points to approach the doctor if it ever came to that Which made me feel like I had a little bit of control back And again, that's you really knew when you were ovulating so you had like you knew the days that you had to do it and It's like if it wasn't working, you're like, okay, then something we do need to take the next step. So you had great right right You had facts because there's something about trying to conceive that can feel like mystical. You're like, is it just magic? Like luck, like whatever. But the truth of the matter is it is actually a scientific process to get pregnant. Like you are ovulating at a certain time. Your husband's sperm matters. like
00:35:53
Speaker
I just saw a video the other day about like how if you've if your husband has been like drinking a lot that month, like you are actually way less likely to get pregnant because of sperm morphation. That's not the right word, but you know what I mean? so Morphology, I think that's the word actually. but Um, so that's my advice is like, I hate when people are like, just wait or relax. It'll let it, it's hard. Trying to conceive is such a mind fuck. And what I would lean into is like facts and what you can control. And then I would move as quickly as possible. If you do hit that point of collecting data for six to nine to 12 months ish. to start the process with your doctor to figure out to troubleshoot. And if your doctor is not willing to meet you there to problem solve, find a new doctor. I cannot tell you how many women I've talked to and have written us and all of those things whose their doctor didn't like was like, Oh, it'll happen. Just relax, keep trying. And then they tried for a whole nother year with nothing happening. And then they finally saw a doctor who was taking them seriously.
00:37:08
Speaker
And they were able to fix a simple problem that helped them to conceive. So be an advocate for yourself. Track data. I don't know. That's my advice. That's perfect. Sounds good.
00:37:25
Speaker
Okay. Let's see. Okay. How do you know when it's time to leave your due date group? The drama with people I've never met in real life is unreal.
00:37:38
Speaker
oh she what's going on it's dramatic um i feel like If you do have like a smaller group of friends that you're kind of close to in a big due day group, maybe break off. I think that that's yeah natural. like From what you say have said, like you came from a bigger group and it kind of dwindled down a little. I think it's natural to get close to certain people. um And if you feel like you need to do that, do it.
00:38:12
Speaker
Yeah. I'm all for protecting your peace in this it's not stage of life anymore. Yeah. i I would say if you've been in a due day group for a while, there are probably side conversations happening. Like you probably talk to these three or four or five girls more than, you know, the other five, six, seven, eight, 20 girls and I would bet that those side girls that you're talking to or you guys are talking about how much you hate the drama and how stressful it is. Like I would just focus on those friendships that bring you joy and make you feel comfortable.
00:38:53
Speaker
and try to drown out the noise of the other, I'm not saying like leave it completely. That sounds a little, I don't think you need to like announce that you're leaving or anything like that, but I would say just focus your energy on the girls that you feel more most connected to and are on the same page. Agreed.
00:39:15
Speaker
Easy peasy. Okay. Let's do another family one.
00:39:25
Speaker
How to navigate splitting holidays with our families. oh We live close. Yeah, i've I've got a lot to say on this one. We live close to both mine and my husband's families. And in the past, we have made multiple stops each holiday to see everyone. I'm sorry, I could have written this, which just ends up being crazy and stressful. We just had our first baby in June and want to stop all the running around and begin splitting holidays. My family gets Thanksgiving, his gets Christmas, et cetera.
00:39:52
Speaker
But I don't think it is going to go over well with my mother-in-law. His family is so small. So if we don't go, they won't do anything. On top of that, his dad passed away in January. Oh gosh, I'm so sorry. His dad passed away in January. So I feel even worse about potentially ditching them from for my family. But at the same time, my family has always taken a backseat and I want my daughter to spend some holidays with them too. Not sure how to navigate this one. Thank you for everything you do.
00:40:21
Speaker
Okay, but literally I could have written this. um Like, widowed mother in and all. Like, I relate to this so much. All of our family is here in Tampa.
00:40:33
Speaker
um This is a tough one. um I will say, especially if your father-in-law, or is it your father, father-in-law, the dad that just passed, yeah, father-in-law that just passed away, like your mother-in-law does need support right now. That's what I'm gonna say. I think losing a parent and your mother-in-law losing her husband, like the holidays are the hardest time.
00:41:04
Speaker
especially this year with um it being the first like round of holidays that he's not here for. So I don't know. This is so tough. I'm i'm inclined to say like that.
00:41:23
Speaker
I think everyone I will. I'll say like everyone feels this way, like split. um i I don't have family. close together like Chris's family is six hours away so we would have to make like an executive decision to either have them come to us or us go to them and then like not seeing my parents at all. um But I like what you're saying is I think like the within the first three years like splitting time isn't like unreasonable. They're still so little. I think as I get older like
00:41:59
Speaker
I think setting boundaries as um like Christmas, we're doing Christmas at our house, like come over if you want or whatever is totally acceptable. um It gets too hard and the magic kind of gets taken away. But I think for me being younger, like I split my time all over the place and I loved it. Like that was magic to me. And my mom always said she hated it because it was stressful for her.
00:42:26
Speaker
Um, so I feel like the holidays are kind of more for the kids. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, yeah, you might just run around a little bit at first. Yeah. And then my other. ah like other thing that you could do is, I honestly past me got really lucky because I married a man whose family really celebrates Christmas Eve and they don't do much on Christmas day. And my family is a Christmas day, like we're Christmas day people. So um we spend Christmas Eve with his family and Christmas day with mine.
00:43:06
Speaker
Um, and maybe it's something where you start a new tradition to where like maybe you're with your parents or his parents or whatever, or his mom on Christmas Eve and you're with your family, the opposite family on Christmas day to where you're splitting, but at least it's not.
00:43:22
Speaker
in the same day. I think, I don't know, we split Thanksgiving every year and it just, yeah I know it's a little bit stressful, it is. Something that we have stopped doing is for all of the smaller holidays. So Easter, 4th of July, like New Year's Day, we have stopped splitting those smaller holidays.
00:43:46
Speaker
Like, but the big ones like Christmas and Thanksgiving, we just kind of suck it up. um Yeah, it feels tough because it's back to back, I'm sure. But like, um but yeah, I feel like we typically do Thanksgiving with Chris's family, like they'll come up here and then.
00:44:04
Speaker
like honestly it's I'm not willing to budge on Christmas like me personally I want to wake up in my childhood home and so I'm always going to be with my parents yeah yeah I think it's also important to note and this is probably a sad thing to say but I don't know i'm gonna say it your parents are not gonna be around forever like your parents only have a certain amount of years left to have christmas or thanksgiving or whatever holiday with you and
00:44:40
Speaker
You just gotta to keep that in mind. like Think about when you are older and your kids have kids. like You're gonna want them around too. like I try to think about it from their perspective and and like I get it.
00:44:54
Speaker
You know, it's just hard for everyone. I think everyone feels hard. I'm sorry that you feel that way. I would say talk about it with your husband. And I feel like my advice for a lot of these questions is to like be a united front with your husband, like have deeper conversations with your partner to understand, to be on the same page, to approach things on the same page. And that's going to take you very far. So yeah, agreed. This one is about a childless friend.
00:45:25
Speaker
I have a friend of 10 years who has always said that she that all she wants is a family slash kids but all these years later she is still single and childless. I never ask about her relationships because none of them work out and I remember it sucked when people would check in on me like that when I was single. but I've always figured she would let me know when someone was important. Am I thinking about this wrong? Should I be asking more relationship questions? When we met, we were both new grads from college and single, um and now I have a husband and a child.
00:46:00
Speaker
um I can relate to this. um I have a few friends that are still single, don't have kids, and I feel like I kind of do what you did. like I think that this is a part of adulthood where you split at some point. like You have your friends that have families, and then you have your friends that are single.
00:46:24
Speaker
um And you tend to lean toward the people that you're most you most have in common with at the time. like It doesn't mean that I don't care and love and feel the same way about my friends that are single. It's just like we're not on the same page at the moment. So I tend to give them their space on relationships and kids. like We talk about anything but that. um And if they bring up My kids, like I'm happy to talk about them. They're just not like the main subject of our conversations. um Same thing with like not having kids, like I think that can be triggering to some people. And I definitely wait for them to bring it up. I'm not going to be like, so I have friends that are married and maybe they've been trying for a while. Like I'm not going to bring it now. Yeah. Yeah.
00:47:17
Speaker
I will say, I think I would personally ask casually the next time you guys are together. I probably would say, how's your dating? How's dating life? I would probably ask from a casual place of, what's it like out there? I don't know. And see how she reacts to that question. I feel like if she starts divulging and opening the door, maybe she does want to talk about it more. If she's like, oh, it's crazy, like, I hate it, and then moves on, I would probably take that as a sign, like, she doesn't really wanna talk about it, and that's fine too. But I- Yeah, I feel like that's not something I would text about, like, have a good look. I'm like, what's up? So you dating? Like, that's so frickin' awkward. Like, I would never do that. I would have to be, like, in person, like, at dinner or lunch, and then having it kind of flow into conversation if you are curious, or if you do, like, care.
00:48:12
Speaker
about what's going on with that but yeah I wouldn't just be like so you date yeah like that's so weird yeah I would I'm the same way I would only do it in person and I would really like almost use it as a gauge of like future like I would ask it to learn about if I should ask or not in the future yeah
00:48:35
Speaker
Okay, that was a good one though. I feel like that's a common common thing. Okay, this one's a little bit lighter. And again, we got like almost 40 submissions. So we're definitely going to do a part two of this at some point. Okay, um this one's more like tactical life things.
00:48:53
Speaker
um She titled it getting dinner on the table. Biggest working mom suggestions for getting dinner on the table after daycare pickup and getting baby to bed. It's absolute mayhem and so stressful even though I meal plan as much as I can. How can I make this part of my day more stress free? I think this is the most stressful part of the day. One thousand percent. The dinner, especially prepping it, like in there crawling at your feet or mommy, daddy, I want this, I want that straight into like, okay, play a little bit straight into bath time, straight into putting them to bed. It's just like straight up chaos from the hours of like four to seven 30 at night. Like that's just the way it is. Um, I mean meal prepping
00:49:46
Speaker
as much as possible. like I work from home, so honestly, I try and make everything. This is probably just for work from home people. I try and make dinner before I pick them up from daycare just so that I can pop it in the oven by the time dinner rolls around because if I'm standing at the stove, I'm going to get in a bad mood because there's going to be chaos all around me.
00:50:11
Speaker
Yeah. I was going to say, I wish I had like groundbreaking advice here, but to be honest, we're still figuring this out also. In fact, it's funny because we literally, Vinny and I just had a conversation about this two days ago where I was really honest with him. I was like, I'm going to be honest. Like these hours feel very like me heavy because not only am I trying to get their dinner ready and trying to get like them in the bath and ready for bed and then most of the time right now we eat after they go to bed and that's just because of this reason like it's so chaotic to make dinner at the same time as I'm like trying to
00:50:54
Speaker
do all of these nighttime things. So, um, and I was honest with any, I was like, I'm feeling like the evenings are very me heavy. Cause after we put them to bed, guess who still has to cook and do other things. It's me. Like, so he was like, all right, well let's problem solve how we can like relieve some of that. And.
00:51:14
Speaker
I think like, but I don't know, you already said you meal prep a little bit. Like we right now, like I cook from scratch almost every night. So for me, the fix I think is spending some time Sunday to like make the sauces or prep all the veggies and, and chicken so that it's already like sliced or like whatever. Um,
00:51:35
Speaker
Cause I'm not doing that right now. And like, so I don't know. I don't know if I feel like I'm not even saying anything groundbreaking here, but I try to look at yeah the hardest part. Like even if you do meal prep, I don't know. It's just like, you still got to get it on a plate while someone's like tugging at you and um The other thing, that's why I lean so heavy on like chicken nuggets and mac and cheese because it is quick and and that's just what they want. So, I don't know, maybe some nights.
00:52:12
Speaker
Lean into the chicken nuggets. Yeah. The other thing I would say is if it is something where you just need a couple of minutes, maybe it's worth. Okay. So instead of meal prepping on Sunday, you're going to activity prep on Sunday to where you have four different little activities that are set up that they only get during that dinnertime when you need 10 minutes, something that's going to keep them busy for 10 minutes.
00:52:38
Speaker
Like, for example, Julia Stern, who was on the, she was a guest on our show months ago, but she posted something on her Instagram the other day. I don't know if you saw it. She made a, with big construction paper, she like made a big face with like a big smile and like the little face had teeth. And then she placed packing tape over his teeth. And then with a dry erase, you like color stuff on their teeth. And then you give your kid a toothbrush and it's like their job to brush off the dry erase. So it's almost like they're brushing the little guy's teeth. I don't know. I'll show, I'll show an example. Cause I ended up doing it for Alice and it literally kept her busy for like 20 minutes. Like she just played independently for 20 minutes. So maybe it's something like that, like.
00:53:23
Speaker
for you tell your husband for 30 minutes on Sunday, I need to activity prep so that every day of this week I have something for them to do. Even if it's just like, one time I gave Alice, we have like containers of dry pasta that I, one of them we were never using. It was like chickpea pasta that I ended up hating. And I was like, I ended up giving it to her with a spoon and I told her to scoop it into a pot and ah literally kept her busy for like 15, 20 minutes.
00:53:52
Speaker
So even if it's something like that, it could be worth putting some time aside to do that, to keep the chaos at bay. I don't know. Yeah. All the prepping is tough, but yeah let's just know that you're not alone. like Yeah, you're definitely not alone. And this phase and season of life will pass and there will be a time where your children are quietly like you know, on the couch and you get to make dinner in peace with a glass of wine. Like that's, ah that's in your future. Well, this has been so fun. I really liked it. This is tough. It's hard. You know what we should do is next time you're going to put the prompts into Trello for us okay so that I don't see them and we'll switch it up. Okay. That works. Okay. Um, let us know what you think about this. Like,
00:54:49
Speaker
you know for once a month or once every two months or something, us doing this like advice segment, let us know if you like it. I will, well, this form actually I think is already in our highlights somewhere, but well but put it well I'll make sure it's in our highlights. So if you ever wanna submit, you can do that. And if we didn't get to your question today, I'm sure we're gonna do another one of these. But yeah, thanks for submitting all of your amazing questions and situations.
00:55:18
Speaker
I know y'all are so awesome. Thank you. All right. Love you guys. Love you. Bye. Bye. Thank you so much for being a part of our mom group chat. New episodes drop every Tuesday. And don't forget, the group chat is blowing up on our Instagram page. So make sure you're following along over there. All right. Got to go. My toddler just put something in her mouth.