February 11, 2025 • 56 mins
Send us a text with your feedback here!
In this deeply moving episode, Jillian Cajigas, mom of one, joins Reesa Morala, LMFT, to share her emotional journey through pregnancy loss, high-risk pregnancy, and early sobriety. Jillian opens up about her struggles with uterus didelphys, the grief of a prior miscarriage, and the overwhelming feeling that her body had failed her. She reflects on how she navigated mental health challenges, found support, and worked toward healing while preparing to welcome her child.
As they discuss parenting resilience, loss, and emotional recovery, Jillian also shares her go-to Korean Beef recipe—a flavorful and comforting dish perfect for busy parents looking to create meaningful moments around the dinner table.
🔹 Subscribe, like, and follow for more authentic parenting stories, mental health insights, and easy, family-friendly recipes!
💬 What’s been your biggest parenting challenge? Share your story in the comments!
🥢 Tried the recipe? Let us know how it turned out!
******
Keto Korean Ground Beef Bowl Recipe
Credit: https://lowcarbyum.com/korean-beef-paleo-recipe/
INGREDIENTS:
1 tablespoon sesame oil or olive oil
1 ¼ pound lean ground beef
3 cloves garlic minced
½ teaspoon SweetLeaf stevia drops
½ teaspoon blackstrap molasses can be left out or replaced with a low carb sweetener
¼ cup soy sauce or coconut aminos for paleo
½ teaspoon fresh ginger minced or a couple dashes ground ginger
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper I like it spicy, use less if desired
1 bunch green onions sliced
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Heat a large skillet over medium heat and brown ground beef with garlic in the oil. Drain off fat.
2. Add stevia, molasses, soy sauce, ginger, and red pepper.
3. Simmer and stir for a few minutes to blend seasonings.
4. Serve over cauliflower rice and top with sliced green onions.
******
Disclaimer:
The insights shared on this platform are for informational and educational purposes only and do not constitute professional advice or treatment.
For crisis situations or ongoing mental health concerns, contact a licensed mental health provider or your local crisis hotline.
Views expressed are those of the individuals speaking and do not represent this channel’s official stance.
******
Host: Reesa Morala, MA, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. Reesa is a parenting specialist with a niche in supporting couples. Find Reesa hosting couples and parenting workshops nationwide!
Make sure to like, follow, and subscribe!
For the video version of this episode find us at: https://www.embracerenewaltherapy.com/
If you are a parent ready to share your real-life parenting struggle and dish up a recipe with Reesa, apply here:
https://www.embracerenewaltherapy.com/real-family-eats-guest
If you are experiencing a mental health crisis or need personalized support, please seek help from a licensed mental health professional. If you are in immediate danger or experiencing a crisis, contact emergency services or a crisis hotline in your area.
Suicide and Crisis Line: Text or Call 988
Go to your local hospital or call 911
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Viewers be advised.
Today's episode contains themesof death and loss and may not
be appropriate for allaudiences.
It wasn't me that failed,and it took a really long time
for me to come to termswith that.
And, you know, a lot of talkingwith therapists and talking
with other women who had gonethrough this Hey everyone,
(00:26):
thanks for joining me.
My name is Reesa and I'myour host.
We are talking to real familiesabout real stories here on the
Real Family Eats, where we'vegot food for thought
and thoughtful food.
So let's eat! Hey, everyone.
(00:53):
So my guest today is Jillian.
Jillian, thank you so muchfor being willing to chat
with us today.
I'm so excited to hear aboutyour story and for the recipe.
So thank you for being onour show today.
Yeah no problem.
Reesa, it's great tobe here with you guys today.
Wonderful.
So for those that don't knowyou like, I know you.
(01:15):
Can you introduce yourselffor me in kind of a little bit
about yourself?
Yeah.
So my name is Jillian.
I currently live in Florida,so it's nice and toasty here.
I'm a mom of one livingchild, and, I work
at the happiest place onEarth, so.
(01:35):
Very cool.
Okay.
And so I know you're goingto introduce a recipe to us.
One that I don't thinkI've ever made, so I'd love
to know what the recipe is.
Tell us why you chose thisrecipe today.
Yeah.
It's called Korean beef.
We just call it Asian beef.
In our house, we actually don'teven make it with beef.
(01:57):
You can use any groundmeat. Meat?
Substitute if you prefer.
No meat in your house.
It's pretty versatile.
I chose this because it'sa super easy weeknight meal,
and you don't havea lot of time, and you got some
ground meat that's dyingin your fridge, and
you got to use it up, andyour kids are hungry.
(02:21):
This is great.
Super quick.
Most kids will eatrice and meat, and we
usually add a couplepotstickers on the side.
If you have them in the freezer,you throw those in a steamer
and they're good to go.
My kid loves this meal, and it'sbeen one of our go to since me
and my spouse started eating.
(02:42):
And after, you know,we got married.
It's a weekly meal that I make.
Very cool.
And so where did you find thisrecipe?
I found it online.
I just searched Korean beef,and this one popped up.
It was a great one.
If you know, if you're countingcalories and I think it's
technically paleo and keto and awhole bunch of other things
(03:04):
if you modify it a little bit,but we can add the, website
in later.
But I grew up eating tonsof different cultural foods,
and so I was craving Asian foodone night, and I was like,
we got some ground beefin the fridge.
Let's see if we can use that to.
Wonderful.
And yes, we will absolutely havethe link to the recipe
(03:26):
that Jillian shared with usin our show notes, so you can
definitely check it out there.
Okay, so talk me through.
I think I've got all theseingredients.
What am I starting with today?
You start with a little bitof either sesame oil or any oil,
honestly that you have on handin your pan, okay?
(03:46):
And you're just going to startthat warming up.
You don't want to get ittoo hot.
I usually do it about ona medium. Okay.
I measure maximum amounts. No.
Okay. Love it.
I do a lot of measuringwith my heart.
Not a whole lot of measuringbased off of measurements.
(04:07):
I feel that very much so.
I'm, You know, it feels likeit's going.
I feel like this is the correctamount.
Let's go with that.
Yes.
And sometimes, I mean,that's the real life
story, right?
When you've got kiddosand they're running amok,
sometimes it's like you don'thave time to grab all of the
the exact measurements you'rejust going to like, oh, yeah,
(04:27):
let me just throw that in there.
Exactly.
I usually do about a thirdand a half and whatever oil
I have on hand, I always have,sesame oil.
I just because we eata lot of Asian inspired foods
here at our house.
Okay, so I always have thaton here.
So I'm going to startmy morning off at about,
(04:50):
like a medium, almosta medium high.
And then we'll addin our garlic, which you measure
with your heart for sure.
Yeah.
This is I think three garliccloves.
That is never enough of garlic.
It's always going to be morein my life.
(05:10):
Absolutely.
You know what's so funny is myespecially my always from a very
young age is always likemama puts garlic in everything.
I love.
And that's just his way of life.
So I feel yeah.
Yeah. Oh yes.
I put my garlic in as everythingis starting to heat up.
And then once it startsto sizzle, I know that my pan is
(05:31):
hot enough to put me meat in.
Okay, that's just how I do it.
I alrighty, so I'llget this going.
And while this is cooking,I'd love to hear a little bit
more about your story you weresharing with me.
That you had a little bit ofa different experience
with pregnancy and kind ofyour journey there, and I'd
(05:52):
love to hear a little bitmore about that.
Yeah.
So, you know, traditionallyin media and hallmark movies,
people get pregnant and thenmagical time happens and it's
all the great picture perfectpregnancy and nothing
(06:14):
goes wrong.
And they look so beautifuland they, you know, have perfect
hair and skin and everythinggoes great.
That was definitely not my,experience with anything.
I yeah, I unfortunately did havea miscarriage, as our first
pregnancy, which just rocked ourentire world to the core.
(06:40):
You know, we were tryingI was trying to become sober
at the time, which didn't help.
Ensure sobriety, I imagine.
Oh, yeah.
We're short on variety.
Thankfully, I was ableto stay sober because
my spouse is so rock solid.
But we spent a lot of daysjust crying, and that is my.
(07:02):
Yeah, I mean, that's what that'swhat was such a big loss, right?
And I think what you justsaid there that sometimes
that's all you can do is tosit there and mourn that loss.
And exactly it doesn't mean thatthat you're doing something
wrong.
(07:22):
Yeah, exactly.
And so, you know, when we didget pregnant the second time,
we were so excited andso just joyful.
And then the issuestarted, about six weeks after
we found out we were pregnant.
So we were probably about 9to 10 weeks long.
(07:45):
I started bleeding,which of course is not
what anyone wants to have afterthey've had a miscarriage.
And so I, of course, immediatelywent to the doctor
and I was like, what's going on?
You're like, let's take,you know, ultrasound,
some tests, you maybe having amiscarriage.
It's, you know, it's stillpretty early in your, in your
pregnancy.
(08:06):
And that's when they officiallydiagnosed me with what's
called a bi cornea at uterus.
So basically I have you servicesthat meet down to 1
or 2 uteruses, like you havea uterus that looks down to
one cervix.
Oh, wow.
(08:27):
Yeah.
And the two halves of the uterusweren't talking to each other,
so it looks kind of likea heart shaped balloon.
Almost. Okay.
And the two halvesweren't talking to each other,
so the one half that didn'thave our embryo in it
decided that it was time to havea period that.
(08:47):
Gotcha.
And the other side was like,no, no, no, there's a there's an
embryo in here.
So we're doing something in herefor that.
And so my body for the entirepregnancy, almost every
four weeks decided it was timeto bleed.
And I really thought I should.
(09:10):
Of course, no woman wants tosee that.
You're not supposedto get a period while you're
pregnant.
You know, it's one of the it'sone of the perks that come
along with pregnancy isyou don't have to deal
with that.
Yeah.
Did you now having gone throughyour miscarriage and even though
(09:31):
the doctor's telling youhey this is what's happening
every four weeks when you'recutting that bleeding, did
I mean, what was goingon through your brain?
I'd love to kind of.
Your anxiety immediatelygoes through the roof, and.
All rational thought leaves andyou stop everything you're
(09:54):
doing and go to the doctor,and they think you're crazy
because you're in thereall the time.
But you just have to say, for mymental health, this is what
I need.
And thankfully, I had a superawesome, Doctor who, even though
he thought I was crazyfor wanting to be in there
(10:17):
all the time and gettingnumerous ultrasounds and paying
way more than youprobably should during a
pregnancy.
I was like this is what Ineed for my mental health, and I
need to make sure that thatheartbeat is still there, man.
How did you.
So I feel like so many parentsthat I talk to, you know,
(10:38):
there's that apprehensionthat the fear to kind
of advocate for yourself,especially in a doctor's office,
because it can be reallyintimidating, really scary.
You know, and if they'retelling you, oh, this is
not necessary, you know,there can be a real propensity
to kind of.
Okay, well, I guessI just have to, like, quiet
this anxiety.
(10:59):
Like, I'm so curious aboutwhat kind of shifted for you
that you were like, no, no, no.
Like, I am 100% advocatingfor myself because that is
so amazingly awesome.
I one had an amazing medicalteam who, even though they
kept saying, you know,for your type of uterus, this is
(11:25):
unfortunately normal.
I said, I don't care if this isnormal.
I it doesn't feel normal to me.
And from what I've seenin society and from what
I've seen in moviesand from what everything I'm
reading online, this shouldn'tbe happening.
(11:46):
And I don't care that I'ma special case.
I wanted to be treated as thoughthis is not normal.
And so they just kind of had tolisten to.
I can understand that.
Yes, this is normal for me,but my brain can't comprehend
this. Yeah.
Because I one can't trustmy body because it failed
(12:10):
the first time we tried this.
And so there is isn't there is alack of trust between my brain
and my body to be able to do theright thing.
And there is a lack oftrust between my brain
and itself to know that, thatthis is normal for me.
(12:34):
So I just need to be ableto visually see that there is
a heartbeat on that monitorand tell this happens again.
And, rational thought leavesmy brain.
Yeah.
I heard you mentioned in therekind of the feeling that my body
has failed me.
Would you be willing to talka little bit more about
(12:56):
about that in that narrativethat was going on for you?
Oh, yeah.
I mean, I had being partof the 1 in 4 club, which is
not a club that any womanshould ever have to be
a part of.
You know, 1 in 4 women will gothrough a miscarriage in
their life.
(13:19):
It it breaks all trust betweenyour brain and your body.
How can I trust my bodyto be able to do what it is
supposed to be able to dobased off of science
and thousands of years of womengiving birth to babies?
(13:41):
That.
Why can't mine do that?
Like, what is wrong with me?
And why?
Why did my body fail?
Something that comesso naturally to so many
other women.
And I had to remind myselfthat, you know, that I'm
not broken.
(14:02):
My body is not broken.
I this one just didn't work out.
It's like any job or any,you know, Pair of shoes
or dress like this onejust didn't fit for me.
It didn't work for me.
(14:24):
This one time, I wasn't it.
I didn't do anything wrong.
I did it.
I did it.
I did not fail.
My body did not inherently fail.
This just didn't work out.
And it could have been somethingwith the embryo or, you know,
(14:44):
something that happenedin, in the pregnancy itself
that we don't know.
But it it wasn't me that failed.
And it took a really long timefor me to come to terms
with that.
And, you know, a lot of talkingwith therapists and talking
with other women who had gonethrough this and inherently
being like, you weren't the onethat failed.
(15:07):
The pregnancy itself failed.
Yeah.
And I'm so glad that youmentioned that far.
First, kind of of it sounds likethe work that you had to do
and the initiative to go intothat work, to be able to kind
of tease out that narrativebecause you're so right.
And I've heard that from so manyfolks, and like, this is not
(15:28):
what it's supposed to be, right?
This is this isn't what you'readvertised.
When when people talk abouthaving kids and then this is
your body, you shouldshould like that word.
Right?
So many times gets used oflike what it should look like,
what it should be doing,what it should be capable,
and that, you know, thisthis equation involves that
(15:48):
if it can't do it,then it somehow is a dysfunction
on your end that you'reyou're somehow less than.
And yeah, and gosh, if you'rekind of that you were able to
to tease out that narrative isis huge because I know there's
so many, so many other mothersout there, that maybe
(16:09):
are struggling to do just that.
Yeah, it's it's crazy how aloneyou can feel when you don't know
that other people aroundyou are going through the exact
same thing.
You know, you feel very alonewhen all of a sudden
they're like, you'reyour pregnancy is no
(16:31):
longer there.
You know that heartbeatisn't there anymore, that it
just stopped.
And you know, your, your worldis shattered and you feel
completely alone and you forgetyou one have someone right there
who's going through it with you,your spouse or your partner
or your significant other.
(16:53):
And also that if you countfour women, one of those women
have also gone through it now,statistically speaking.
So it's like, yeah.
And but society has putsuch a stigma on talking about
miscarriages and pregnancyloss and infertility
and all these other thingsthat it's like you don't
(17:15):
feel like you can talk about itbecause we're not supposed to.
It's not the pretty part ofpregnancy that everyone wants to
hear about you.
Don't we want to hear aboutthe baby showers and the,
you know, the pretty things ofyour hair's growing and
your cute belly and the cutedresses and the getting ready
for the baby.
And you.
No, I, I want to hear aboutthe ugly parts of your pregnancy
(17:37):
because I had an ugly pregnancy.
Yeah, I absolutely.
And I think you you made agreat point.
And I do want to make sureto, like, take a moment
and highlight that, you know,you had a partner that was also
experiencing that.
You know, I know I justmentioned kind of moms out there
that also very much affectscan affect the partner as well.
(17:59):
Male partners and included.
Yeah.
I do want to take a momentto mention that, because
sometimes there can besome of those feelings as well
that are hidden, right, that iffor whatever reason there are
fertility issues, that that canalso impact just as much,
and there's a very real storythere for the partner as well.
(18:22):
And so I just wanted toI thank you for mentioning that
because you're you're so right.
Oh, yeah.
Because, you know,everyone views male presenting
partners as the strong, dominanthousehold head of household,
you know, and they don'tgive them space to grieve
because dads lose babies, too.
(18:45):
I absolutely and no one talksabout that.
It's always oh but butbut the mom is during
the pregnancy.
Yes.
My body carried a pregnancy,but his heart was just
is full of love and excitementas mine was.
And it's hurting just as much,if not more, because not
(19:07):
only does he hurt,he has to watch his partner hurt
and go through that same amountof hurt that he's feeling
and he can do nothingto help it.
And also, you know, femalepresenting partners who you know
may have contributed to theirspouses pregnancy.
They hurt just as much as well.
(19:28):
Yeah.
And and I think whatyou mentioned there is,
you know, it's for for everybodythere's some sort of hurt.
It may look different.
It may present differently.
Because that's another piecethat, you know, for some it may
present in those, those tearsand that crying.
For others it may presentin, in anger and in disconnect
(19:49):
and like shut down almost,you know, so kind of having that
face, having that compassion fornot only the caring partner,
but for the non caring partneras well.
That there's those are very realthings that, as you mentioned,
don't get talked about enoughbecause there is this,
this facade, right, thatI feel like it's been
(20:11):
handed down generation aftergeneration of this is
to, to survive.
We've got gotta paintthis picture that
this isn't easy so that peoplewant to do it.
Exactly.
Like, I almost feel dupedinto becoming like, it's
so perfect.
It's an easy thing, but it isan ugly, gross experience.
(20:34):
And no one tells you the uglygross parts.
Yeah, absolutely.
I'm.
I'm so curious.
From that.
Did you did it threaten yourrelationship with your not
caring for, No, man, becauseI really needed them,
(20:58):
in the sense that I had.
If they had not been here,I would have turned to
alcohol again.
And I probably would not bealive today.
And so I was very much aI need you to be here to stop me
from going up to the liquorstore.
(21:18):
I need you to be here to help meremember to shower.
I need you to remind methat I'm still a human and I
deserve a bath.
I need you to help me toremember to eat.
Because my grief was sohand over comforting
(21:39):
that self-care went outthe window, man.
And to my partner.
Oh, yeah, go ahead now.
Go for it.
I want to hear more.
Yeah, without.
Without my partner.
His name's Tony.
Without Tony, it reallywould have been just me slowly
(22:01):
killing myself with a bottle,and I.
I relied so much on him and hisstrength and I had no family
in town besides what I callmy Florida family, who I love
so much.
They are not related by bloodor paperwork in any way,
(22:21):
shape or form, but they'reamazing people.
And, I grew up with themin Minnesota, which is where
I'm from.
And I love them dearly.
And so it was very much,if I wasn't around them,
I was around Tony.
And he was really my onlyfamily here in Florida
that I could talk toabout how I was feeling or,
(22:45):
you know, what was going onthat day or, you know,
everything that I wasthinking or not thinking that.
Yeah.
Okay.
Pause for just a moment.
I've got my ground.
Me and that's nice and brown.
(23:05):
What do I do next?
Yeah.
So now you can startadding in all of your soy
sauce, molasses mixture,all of that.
Get that in there.
Start, bubbling that up.
Okay.
Mine's still Browning, soit might take bit longer.
(23:30):
Perfect.
So, I'll keep mixing.
I wanted to take a momentand ask you because you
said something that I think issuper powerful.
And what you just mentioned,that I, I wanted to circle
back to and and that'sjust the phrase that I deserve
a bath.
Can you tell me more about that?
I yeah.
(23:53):
When when I was going throughthe thick of it, you know, the
the worst parts of the,depression and, you know,
emotions that followed themiscarriage.
I had.
I didn't feel like I deservedto, to live, which, you know,
(24:18):
is a scary thought.
I didn't feel like I deservedthe basic human, necessities of
of food or, you know, a bathwhich lots of people think
is like a luxury.
Like we all showerand we all, you know,
wash ourselves.
(24:38):
But to sit down have, like, abubble bath with, you know, a
glass of sparkling whatever,and a book or watch a movie
on, device and just soak ina bathtub.
I was like, I, I, I don'twant that.
And nor do I feel likeI deserve that, because that's
(24:59):
how how could someone who failedagain, it also goes back to me
having to deal withthe fact that I felt I failed
at something that is soingrained in our society that
every woman should be ableto do this, that if if I failed
at this, why?
Why should I deservesomething that, you know,
(25:20):
everybody should be ableto have that.
And so he had to remind me that,you know, you're also human.
You deserve to screamfor dinner.
You deserve to make those goofychoices that you know you
you want to make of.
You want to take a bubblebath, okay?
(25:42):
You just you deserve totake a bath.
And I think we punishourselves when we intrinsically
feel it's something thatshould come so naturally to us.
That we we go down the roadof punishment because we,
we don't know how to forgiveourselves as human beings.
(26:05):
And there is that sense ofI have to be able to
forgive myself.
And it took a lot ofbubble baths.
Yeah, a lot of bath.
But we got there eventually.
There's still thingsthat, you know, you have
to remember that, you know,I'm still human.
We still make mistakes.
(26:27):
Absolutely.
And I what I really appreciateand why I'm so thankful that you
were willing to even, talka little bit more about that
is because you're so absolutelyright.
I've heard that so many times,kind of this idea of,
that you're bringing you'rebringing me really good at
convincing you of some of thesenarratives, like you're
(26:49):
saying that that, hey,I deserve this, this punishment.
This is, you know, hey,I don't get to have this luxury.
Like you said, have a bath.
Like, that's that's for peoplewho don't fail.
And to kind of have even justjust that, that thing that so
many people do take for granted.
I don't, I don't knowthat people would look at a bath
(27:11):
and go like, oh, this issomething that my brain might
try to convince me I'mnot deserving.
But it is.
Gosh, when you're in it,like you said, and those are
the thoughts that are goingon, it can be very,
very difficult to remindyourself otherwise.
That real quick pause.
If you haven't already,start your rice in your rice
(27:33):
cooker or instapot. Yes,I always measure mine with my
knuckles or fingers.
I am so that we do.
We absolutely do the the fingermeasure.
I mean, that's how I was taughtby my, my, my Filipino family.
So that's what we do.
(27:55):
Yeah.
Yes.
I have my rice.
That one.
I made sure it was in therecooking. Nice.
Thank you for the reminder.
But yeah.
So, you know.
Yeah, we we did that.
But yeah, back to, you know,we pregnancies because it didn't
(28:16):
just stop with thebleeding. Okay.
The mental health part of that,it it continued to get
ugly as we, we got to thephysical pregnancy part of.
Okay, you know, you make a birthplan, and you, your, you know,
your medical team triesto follow it as closely
as possible.
(28:37):
Well, we got closer to our, ourpregnancy deadline, and,
they were like, he's breechand it is not safe for us
to turn him.
Okay.
So C-section it is coolon that one.
(28:57):
Yeah.
Did that feel scary like thatnews like when they came in and
they told you that?
I can only imagine allthe thoughts that are
happening in that moment?
It was definitely scary.
It was something that wehad talked about as
a possibility becausethankfully, my birth team
had said, you know, hey,with your uterus,
you know, this, this, this,and this could end up being
(29:19):
a possibility.
We again, it wasn't ourfirst choice.
No, nobody's first choice is to,you know, get cut open and have
a huge scar for the restof their life.
But that.
So that was it.
Scary. Yes.
(29:40):
Were we completelyblindsided? No.
I talked about it and said,you know, if if it is the case
that we do need a C-section,then with some other
medical stuff both I andmy spouse are dealing with,
we should probably just timemy tubes at the same time,
because after thiscrazy pregnancy of bleeding
(30:02):
all the time, I do notwant to birth another human
being.
No thank you.
That was an that come to,Was that a difficult decision
to come to?
Not super hard to come to.
I'm adopted.
And so for me, adoptionwas never out of the picture.
(30:25):
It's better to adopt a childthan and an adopted child. Yeah.
I I'm I'm always down toadopt 5 million children.
You know, I'd love to havea couple more kids
running around if if the cardswork out and, you know,
everything goes perfectly,I think maybe 1 or 2
more running around.
But, you know, it'sit's not cheap.
(30:47):
And I know that absolutely.
It's, you know, it's notalways in the cards for
people either.
But so it was something of bothwith some medical stuff for me,
some medical stufffor my spouse.
Like, let's just have onepregnancy, that makes it.
And that would be great.
(31:09):
Okay.
So, you know, that wasnews for us.
And then right after HurricaneIan down here in Florida,
I started feeling grossthe next morning.
We had no power at our house.
We were at my Floridafamily's house for the day,
and I was like, I don't feelgreat.
(31:29):
And I have not felt this babykick in a while.
Wow.
We should probably goto the hospital.
And they were like,okay, let's go.
So we went and they'relike, yeah, you're actually
having contractions.
You're only like two weeks outfrom your due date.
So we're probably just gonnatake him today.
We were like, oh, oh, surprise,surprise.
(31:52):
Two weeks earlier than wewere expecting.
Yeah, we have no power atour house right now.
Oh my goodness, we love this.
Yeah.
And, we had already decided onhis name Ian, way ahead of this
hurricane that was named Ian.
Oh my goodness.
You mean like, just likean accident?
(32:12):
Yeah.
We were like, great.
This is awesome.
You know, like, so when you eatand we were like, well, we eat
breakfast like two hours ago andthey're like, okay,
we have to wait about six hours.
And it's like, you're kidding.
Oh yeah.
So now we have this anxietywhere we're calling people
and letting them know,like, hey, can you check
on the house?
(32:32):
Can you check on the freezer?
Make sure nothing'sdripping, like trying
to coordinate someone,making sure that we end up
with power eventuallyin our house.
Thankfully, our dog is withour Florida family
like nothing's going the wayI want it to.
We're expecting our baby tocome today.
We get into the O.R.
and they start the procedure andall of a sudden I hear the
(32:57):
surgeon say, get somebody elsein here.
And my heart dropped, oh mygoodness, yes.
What's going on?
Like, my dad has a biomedicalengineering degree.
My grandfather was a colonrectal surgeon.
I've been around enoughmedical staff to know that when
the surgeon calls inan extra pair of hands, it's
(33:20):
never a good reason.
And they're like, he's stuffedin your incision.
His head is stuck insideyour body.
Oh my God.
Oh, great.
So awesome.
So I find out later frommy spouse that the doctor
(33:43):
is literally one legup on the table trying to
pull my child out ofmy incision.
Oh, my goodness.
And thankfully, they finallyget him out, and all of a sudden
my baby is whisked away,not chest to chest like we had
talked about and my spouseleaves my side.
(34:07):
I am stuck prone on my back,which I can't turn my head like.
I can't see anything behind meand I am literally screaming
what is going on?
I find out from the anesthesiaurologist.
Yeah, I'm completely left alonewith my anesthesiologist and
the surgeons have basicallytold nothing.
(34:29):
There's like noises coming fromthe other side of the curtain.
You know?
I can't hear anything behind me.
I'm also half deaf, so thatdoesn't help anything that I
can't hear anything going on.
But I find out later Ian hadit was a nuchal cord
times three.
So his umbilical cord waswrapped three times
(34:51):
around his neck and he wasnot breathing.
Wow.
So not only did we have thiscrazy pregnancy our room has now
and nothing the waywe want it to when my kids
are breathing.
And no, it's telling meanything.
What's going on?
Oh, incredible.
You finally get him breathing,they get the little CPAp on
(35:13):
and he's not taking good breath.
I don't get him on mefor the next, you know,
15 minutes.
It feels like eternity.
Of course.
And so finally they bringhim over and, you know,
you're you're crying and,you know, you see your baby
for the first time and it'sthe best thing ever.
(35:35):
But it's just such a horror showleading up to that moment
that nobody talks about.
Yeah, we see those prettypregnancies that go perfect
a plan.
I had two pushes andthey were out and
it was perfect.
And then we cut the cord and Iimmediately started
(35:58):
breastfeeding and it was great.
Yeah, it's not always great.
And I feel that those storiesalso need to be told because you
feel so alone when you'retalking about pregnancies
and those mom groups and you'relike, I had a horrible one.
(36:20):
So it wasn't great.
Yeah.
And I think, again, this isn'tnecessarily right just to
scare someone.
Oh, no, not to just normalize.
Like, these things happenprobably more than you think
they do.
And like you said, it can feelso incredibly isolating
(36:42):
and lonely to kind of feel likeyou're sticking out in that way,
but not in a way that like,you got to choose to stick out
for that.
Exactly.
And yeah, this is not to scareanybody.
Like, don't get right.
If you want kids in your family,by all means.
And you're able to I don't meanto get pregnant and have babies,
(37:04):
but you know, there arethose families that are
struggling or, you know, didn'thave pretty pregnancies or and
they feel like they can'ttalk about them because
everybody else around themjust had the pretty perfect
birth plan home, water,birth, whatever they chose
to do.
And it was exactly howthey wanted.
(37:25):
And I love that for them.
And I'm so glad everythingwent perfect for them, that it
just wasn't my experience.
And it's not to say it was abad experience.
I got a really great humanout of this.
And you know, I learned a lotand I learned just how strong
I am.
And through all of this, what Inever want to repeat it
(37:47):
for myself.
Now.
Never again.
No, thank you.
Yeah.
Do you feel like, asI just heard you mentioned
in there, like you were ableto see kind of the strength
that your body was capable of?
Did that shift or helped shiftsome of that narrative from that
feeling, the feeling of failureto look at what I did, I
(38:14):
yeah, because, you know,I ended up.
Having a super awesome humanand being able to say,
I did it right.
I did grow a humanand I was able to bring life
into this world, evenif it wasn't perfect.
(38:36):
And that did help with some ofsome of the narrative of
I failed because I didn't feelthis time, you know, and and
he ended up beingreally awesome.
So I absolutely.
So I'm curious.
Clayton, I know you mentioneda couple times your Florida
(38:56):
family and it soundslike you, you had that ability
to have a kind of a supportsystem around you.
Were there things that,looking back on it, your support
people were able to door were able to provide
that, you know, as a supportperson that's listening
right now that wasreally helpful for you
(39:17):
and being able to kindof navigate this journey
that, you know, give themsome insight, give them
some tips of somethingthat maybe worked out for you
or was really appreciatedby you. Yeah.
That one don't show upempty handed.
If you're going to go visiteither a new mom or someone
who's pregnant, either bringsomething to do, whether it be
(39:45):
a board game or somethingto take their mind off of it.
Even if you're visiting someonewho's recently had, you know,
a loss or is going througha rough time and you want
to be that support person, bringsomething to do to get their
mind off it, or thatthey can talk to you while doing
something else, or and or,you know, a meal that's always
(40:09):
super helpful if you'regoing to be that support person,
whether it's a loss or a newhuman being.
But also don't expect to holdthe baby or go with the
mindset of a givers mindset ofthere's a pile of laundry
on the floor.
There's this need to be put inthe laundry, or does it need to
(40:31):
be put away?
Can I have that?
Because not every parentis going to want to separate
from their child right away,but they would have to separate
from their child in orderto put that laundry in.
Or and I think those werethe things that were
more helpful of whenpeople would come over and bring
(40:52):
a meal and then, hey, where'syour vacuum?
Can I vacuum something realquick for you while we
visit and talk or yeah,you know, I didn't have the
brain capacity after birthingmy human to even say, yeah,
could you do X, Y and Z or,hey, could you bring me this?
(41:12):
Hey, I really need this.
And so it was so helpfulwhen people just showed up
with caffeine and, andand then just said, I've noticed
this needs to get done.
Where is the tool to do that?
Yeah.
No, I just want you to.
(41:33):
Yeah.
Not how do I do that?
But where are the tools?
And that's a lot easierfor some people to just say, oh,
that's over there.
Or they might say, oh, don'tworry about it.
Yeah, don't believe them.
So just do it anyways.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I think you make agreat point.
You know often times and Itotally can appreciate
(41:55):
their coming from rightthat place.
This is a brand new human.
I'd love to meet themand I'd love to spend time
with them.
And sometimes we forget thatparents or parents,
right, is also just meetingthis person on the outside,
which looks very differentthan, you know, for the
caring partner to kind ofhave it internally.
(42:17):
And so these are also they'rejust getting to know this person
that they are now being,you know, entrusted to, to raise
and to grow.
And so there's, there's a lot ofbonding that they're
also needing and wantingto do as well.
So as much as your heart wantsto also pick up that little
baby, unless you're kind ofawesome.
(42:38):
So can you please takethis child?
I need to go use the restroom,that it may very well be that,
like you said, kind ofcoming in and and supporting
the household may be the besthelp that someone can provide.
Oh, yeah.
That that is some of thebest things that were
given to us were the dayswhen people would come over
(42:59):
and say, hey, I noticed thatthis hasn't gotten done,
let me do this real quick,and then we can sit and chat.
And that's those are thosemoments.
Then when I was like, canyou hold my baby while I do
something else?
Because they had alreadyhelped me with one way,
I was much more willing to thenentrust them with my new
(43:21):
human as well and be like,I really need to use
the bathroom.
Or, you know, I need to shower.
I need to, you know, take a walkoutside.
Can you just watch my humanso they don't die?
Absolutely.
So. So true.
I'm.
I'm so curious.
(43:42):
Like, if you could kind ofgo back in time.
Is there anything that you mighttell yourself in order
to prepare as, as best you canfor kind of that journey
or anything that you would offerto anyone else who might
be walking a similarlooking journey that,
(44:02):
that I think that one,it is okay to cry.
They are just extras.
It's not sadness, it'snot happiness.
It's not a bad thing.
It's not a good thing.
It's it's just extras.
It's just your body's wayof opening these.
When people so often see cryingas a bad thing or it's
(44:26):
not strong or it's not,you know, insert taboo subject
here.
They're just extras.
You know, my mom would say thatall the time is it's
okay to cry.
They're just extras.
Because so many times itwas just, I'm in the
grocery store.
(44:47):
I'm not allowed to cryabout this kind of bread.
I'll just do it. Yeah.
You don't know these people.
They're not going tosee you again crying.
The truth is, no one cares.
Absolutely.
But also that, you know,there's always someone
who is going throughthe same stuff.
It may not look exactlythe same, and they
(45:09):
may not show it the same way,but there is always someone
out there who has either gonethrough it or is going
through it, or willgo through it, and you can
then choose to findthose people, or you can
choose to be that person forthe next person.
It just depends on who.
(45:32):
Do you want to find the peopleto help you, or do you just
want to be alone?
I think if I had, if I hadknown that ahead of time,
it would have been easierto go out and search for that.
For people who had gone throughsimilar situations.
(45:54):
And I think you make sucha great point that sometimes
there is that fear, whetherit's, it's a narrative
in your head as far as if youask for support, if you go
and you seek that out, that itmeans something about you
even more, you know,kind of like we talked about
kind of that, that ideaof failure or weakness
(46:15):
or whatnot.
And and you're absolutely right.
That there are those barriersfor a lot of people
to be able to to reach outthat hand and ask for that help
and see what their needs are,because there's so much of this
conditioning that when westate our needs, we're acting
selfishly, right?
We were, oh, you know,you're all about what you need.
(46:38):
Well, what about the rest ofthe world?
Like, goodness gracious.
Like, I think thatthere is enough for everybody's
needs.
Like, really core needsto be met.
It's that willingness.
It's that compassionand that grace to be able
to extend that and leavespace for for people that are
asking for support because youtake a lot of gumption
(46:59):
to be able to say, actually,I do need help.
Yeah.
And and that is not a weakness.
It is a strength to it.
It takes a very strong humanto realize, hey, I can't do this
all on my own.
I do need help.
I think it almost takesa stronger person
to realize that than it doesfor someone who just
(47:22):
tries to power through ontheir own.
Were there any resources orsupport services that you found,
that were really helpful to youthat maybe other people
don't know?
Well, I mean, I used a bunchof different mom apps, but one,
I think it was that youhad a baby list or baby center.
(47:46):
I honestly don't rememberthe name, but it was one that,
there were different, like,moms chat groups, and you could
search by different,like, issues.
And so I just wanted to typein my uterus, a whole group
of people who had like, uterusespopped up.
And it was we were able to justchat about issues we had
(48:09):
together.
And okay, that was amazing.
I was like, I, I, of course,have deleted all my
pregnancy apps because Idon't plan on ever doing
that again.
And I don't, but I think itwas either like baby center
or baby was there one ofthose mom tracking pregnancy
things that you can likeget on a chat group or whatever?
(48:31):
Okay, so don't be afraidto search different apps or, you
know, groups or even just onlineand say, you know, buy Cornwood
or whatever your issue isor what your needs are.
Support group, you know,you never know what's going
to come up.
I think me through Disney,they have a really great,
(48:54):
system of support for,like if you need to just talk to
somebody, there's a, there's a,number we can call.
So I don't know if there's,like, a national number
that people can call.
I know that there's, like,the suicide prevention hotline.
We call that on in case it, yes.
(49:14):
Sometimes you just need to talkto somebody, and it's
not because, you know, you'resuicidal.
It might you need someoneto listen, and they do a really
good job at that, too.
You.
And so sometimes it's just, hey,I'm not thinking about suicide,
but I definitely am not ina good place.
And so they can talk toyou about that too. You.
(49:35):
And I think that's that'sa great point.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And the crisis hotlines, there'stons of different ones.
There's ones for militaryfamilies.
There's ones for, you know,suicide hotlines, there's ones
for LGBTQ.
There's, you know, don'tfeel like you failed
if you have to call thosenumbers because you didn't feel
(49:57):
you're being super strongand you're realizing that,
you know, you need to talk tosomebody, you need that
extra help.
Yeah, absolutely.
Thank you so much for sharingthat.
So definitely, again,all of those resources will be
in the show notesfor anybody who who maybe say,
hey, this resonates with meand I and I would like some of
(50:18):
that support.
Because you're absolutely right.
It's the more we can put thatword out there, the more that
we can normalize askingfor help, seeking out support.
Hopefully, you know, I canreach my I.
I said it multiple times,that dream of being out of
a job, right?
Because everybody is outand thriving and being awesome.
(50:39):
And so some of the ways isasking for that support.
Learning the skills, learning,really unlearning.
Maybe some of those ways ofavoiding and not talking
about these issues.
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian, thank you so much.
So I've got my Grammyand we just put this on.
(51:01):
Right.
Is that what I'm hearing?
Yeah, yeah I do, I do a bigold scoop race and you just
scoop it on your racehowever much you're in.
Okay, I do, so I knowthat there were green onions.
And you just do you normallymix it in or sprinkle it on top
so that it kind of keepsits integrity?
(51:21):
It doesn't get all that.
What do you do?
We if we have them,which we don't always have them.
Sometimes I just use,freeze dried chives.
Those were great.
You can get those at Sam's Clubor Costco.
Okay.
Honestly, a lot of this stuffcan be substituted for other
(51:41):
things as well, but, yeah.
So we just sprinkle themon top that way we don't get all
the mixed in and whatnot.
But I'm just finishing steamingmy rice.
Yeah, that.
(52:02):
So how are we looking at you?
Oh, that looks beautiful.
You did this?
Things.
I'm so excited to try this.
And I know that Josh, you know,my partner was like, hey,
make sure you make extrafor dinner.
So he's super excited to try it.
(52:22):
It's such a good one.
And we love it.
The first time we tried it, TonyTony does not cook.
Can't cook to save his life.
Never has been able to.
We also.
We all have our strengths.
Definitely washing dishes.
(52:42):
We.
That was one of the ruleswhen we got, when we
started dating and then gotmarried is I will cook you every
single meal if I neverhave to wash a single dish.
And he was like, dang,this sounds like a great plan.
Next. So, he, lovingly does allthe dishes, and I love it
(53:04):
because I never.
We did this one of thefirst meals that I ever
cooked for him, and he wasjust astounded, like, it's
such a good flavor and it justtastes so good.
You can add a little gold using.
If you're feeling alittle spicy,
you can switch it up with somefish sauce.
(53:26):
If you want to have alittle more savory, like,
y'all can just go crazy with it.
Depending on you know how you'refeeling.
If you don't like, Ginger,leave it out.
If you're not a big fan of,you know, garlic.
I don't know why, but you canalso leave that.
(53:47):
It's so versatile, you can'treally mess it up.
And if you don't have molassesor you don't feel like getting
molasses, you can use,brown sugar if you have it,
because brown sugar is justwhite sugar with molasses in it.
And it does just aboutthe same thing.
Very cool.
Okay, I love it.
And I love the facility becausethat helps, right?
(54:09):
That helps with the parent life.
When oh yeah, you just don'thave the time because that's
that's the theme, right?
You don't have the time.
And parenting is hard and you'redoing 50 million things at once.
Yeah.
And this is definitely onethat everybody loves to eat.
We all love to eat this.
Even in, one and a halfyears old.
(54:30):
He loves eating this one.
He will ask on a regular basiswhen I ask him, what do you want
for dinner?
He goes, plastic potstickersbeef back, and it's like
you, plastic and beef.
Okay, that sounds great, butyou love it.
Oh, thank you, Jillian, so muchfor being willing one
(54:50):
to teach us this recipe.
And two, to be willing topull back that curtain and share
your story and shinethe light on these areas
that need more light and needmore space and time.
Because they are realand they do exist.
And they're incredibly scaryand lonely when you're going
(55:12):
through it and you feelall alone.
Yeah.
So thank you so much.
And thank you for being a gueston our show.
And so everyone out therewatching again, remember,
check out our show notesfor any of this resource is
and we'll see you next time.
If you or anyone that you knowis struggling with any of
the topics that we discussed intoday's episode, make sure
(55:34):
to check out our show notesfor support and resource
ways you can get help.
Thanks again for joiningus on today's episode of The
Real Family Eat.
If you're a parent readyto share your real life
parenting story, make sure toreach out to us and our website
found in the show notes.
And that goes for today's recipesocial media's support
(55:57):
and resources.
All of that can be foundin our show notes,
so make sure to check them outand make sure to follow, like,
share, subscribe, and stayup to date on all things
the real family eats.
I hope you'll join us next timefor more food for thought
and thoughtful food!Enjoy your eat.
Viewers be advised.
Today's episode contains themesof death and loss and may not
be appropriate for allaudiences.
It wasn't me that failed,and it took a really long time
for me to come to termswith that.
And, you know, a lot of talkingwith therapists and talking
with other women who had gonethrough this Hey everyone,
(00:26):
thanks for joining me.
My name is Reesa and I'myour host.
We are talking to real familiesabout real stories here on the
Real Family Eats, where we'vegot food for thought
and thoughtful food.
So let's eat! Hey, everyone.
(00:53):
So my guest today is Jillian.
Jillian, thank you so muchfor being willing to chat
with us today.
I'm so excited to hear aboutyour story and for the recipe.
So thank you for being onour show today.
Yeah no problem.
Reesa, it's great tobe here with you guys today.
Wonderful.
So for those that don't knowyou like, I know you.
(01:15):
Can you introduce yourselffor me in kind of a little bit
about yourself?
Yeah.
So my name is Jillian.
I currently live in Florida,so it's nice and toasty here.
I'm a mom of one livingchild, and, I work
at the happiest place onEarth, so.
(01:35):
Very cool.
Okay.
And so I know you're goingto introduce a recipe to us.
One that I don't thinkI've ever made, so I'd love
to know what the recipe is.
Tell us why you chose thisrecipe today.
Yeah.
It's called Korean beef.
We just call it Asian beef.
In our house, we actually don'teven make it with beef.
(01:57):
You can use any groundmeat. Meat?
Substitute if you prefer.
No meat in your house.
It's pretty versatile.
I chose this because it'sa super easy weeknight meal,
and you don't havea lot of time, and you got some
ground meat that's dyingin your fridge, and
you got to use it up, andyour kids are hungry.
(02:21):
This is great.
Super quick.
Most kids will eatrice and meat, and we
usually add a couplepotstickers on the side.
If you have them in the freezer,you throw those in a steamer
and they're good to go.
My kid loves this meal, and it'sbeen one of our go to since me
and my spouse started eating.
(02:42):
And after, you know,we got married.
It's a weekly meal that I make.
Very cool.
And so where did you find thisrecipe?
I found it online.
I just searched Korean beef,and this one popped up.
It was a great one.
If you know, if you're countingcalories and I think it's
technically paleo and keto and awhole bunch of other things
(03:04):
if you modify it a little bit,but we can add the, website
in later.
But I grew up eating tonsof different cultural foods,
and so I was craving Asian foodone night, and I was like,
we got some ground beefin the fridge.
Let's see if we can use that to.
Wonderful.
And yes, we will absolutely havethe link to the recipe
(03:26):
that Jillian shared with usin our show notes, so you can
definitely check it out there.
Okay, so talk me through.
I think I've got all theseingredients.
What am I starting with today?
You start with a little bitof either sesame oil or any oil,
honestly that you have on handin your pan, okay?
(03:46):
And you're just going to startthat warming up.
You don't want to get ittoo hot.
I usually do it about ona medium. Okay.
I measure maximum amounts. No.
Okay. Love it.
I do a lot of measuringwith my heart.
Not a whole lot of measuringbased off of measurements.
(04:07):
I feel that very much so.
I'm, You know, it feels likeit's going.
I feel like this is the correctamount.
Let's go with that.
Yes.
And sometimes, I mean,that's the real life
story, right?
When you've got kiddosand they're running amok,
sometimes it's like you don'thave time to grab all of the
the exact measurements you'rejust going to like, oh, yeah,
(04:27):
let me just throw that in there.
Exactly.
I usually do about a thirdand a half and whatever oil
I have on hand, I always have,sesame oil.
I just because we eata lot of Asian inspired foods
here at our house.
Okay, so I always have thaton here.
So I'm going to startmy morning off at about,
(04:50):
like a medium, almosta medium high.
And then we'll addin our garlic, which you measure
with your heart for sure.
Yeah.
This is I think three garliccloves.
That is never enough of garlic.
It's always going to be morein my life.
(05:10):
Absolutely.
You know what's so funny is myespecially my always from a very
young age is always likemama puts garlic in everything.
I love.
And that's just his way of life.
So I feel yeah.
Yeah. Oh yes.
I put my garlic in as everythingis starting to heat up.
And then once it startsto sizzle, I know that my pan is
(05:31):
hot enough to put me meat in.
Okay, that's just how I do it.
I alrighty, so I'llget this going.
And while this is cooking,I'd love to hear a little bit
more about your story you weresharing with me.
That you had a little bit ofa different experience
with pregnancy and kind ofyour journey there, and I'd
(05:52):
love to hear a little bitmore about that.
Yeah.
So, you know, traditionallyin media and hallmark movies,
people get pregnant and thenmagical time happens and it's
all the great picture perfectpregnancy and nothing
(06:14):
goes wrong.
And they look so beautifuland they, you know, have perfect
hair and skin and everythinggoes great.
That was definitely not my,experience with anything.
I yeah, I unfortunately did havea miscarriage, as our first
pregnancy, which just rocked ourentire world to the core.
(06:40):
You know, we were tryingI was trying to become sober
at the time, which didn't help.
Ensure sobriety, I imagine.
Oh, yeah.
We're short on variety.
Thankfully, I was ableto stay sober because
my spouse is so rock solid.
But we spent a lot of daysjust crying, and that is my.
(07:02):
Yeah, I mean, that's what that'swhat was such a big loss, right?
And I think what you justsaid there that sometimes
that's all you can do is tosit there and mourn that loss.
And exactly it doesn't mean thatthat you're doing something
wrong.
(07:22):
Yeah, exactly.
And so, you know, when we didget pregnant the second time,
we were so excited andso just joyful.
And then the issuestarted, about six weeks after
we found out we were pregnant.
So we were probably about 9to 10 weeks long.
(07:45):
I started bleeding,which of course is not
what anyone wants to have afterthey've had a miscarriage.
And so I, of course, immediatelywent to the doctor
and I was like, what's going on?
You're like, let's take,you know, ultrasound,
some tests, you maybe having amiscarriage.
It's, you know, it's stillpretty early in your, in your
pregnancy.
(08:06):
And that's when they officiallydiagnosed me with what's
called a bi cornea at uterus.
So basically I have you servicesthat meet down to 1
or 2 uteruses, like you havea uterus that looks down to
one cervix.
Oh, wow.
(08:27):
Yeah.
And the two halves of the uterusweren't talking to each other,
so it looks kind of likea heart shaped balloon.
Almost. Okay.
And the two halvesweren't talking to each other,
so the one half that didn'thave our embryo in it
decided that it was time to havea period that.
(08:47):
Gotcha.
And the other side was like,no, no, no, there's a there's an
embryo in here.
So we're doing something in herefor that.
And so my body for the entirepregnancy, almost every
four weeks decided it was timeto bleed.
And I really thought I should.
(09:10):
Of course, no woman wants tosee that.
You're not supposedto get a period while you're
pregnant.
You know, it's one of the it'sone of the perks that come
along with pregnancy isyou don't have to deal
with that.
Yeah.
Did you now having gone throughyour miscarriage and even though
(09:31):
the doctor's telling youhey this is what's happening
every four weeks when you'recutting that bleeding, did
I mean, what was goingon through your brain?
I'd love to kind of.
Your anxiety immediatelygoes through the roof, and.
All rational thought leaves andyou stop everything you're
(09:54):
doing and go to the doctor,and they think you're crazy
because you're in thereall the time.
But you just have to say, for mymental health, this is what
I need.
And thankfully, I had a superawesome, Doctor who, even though
he thought I was crazyfor wanting to be in there
(10:17):
all the time and gettingnumerous ultrasounds and paying
way more than youprobably should during a
pregnancy.
I was like this is what Ineed for my mental health, and I
need to make sure that thatheartbeat is still there, man.
How did you.
So I feel like so many parentsthat I talk to, you know,
(10:38):
there's that apprehensionthat the fear to kind
of advocate for yourself,especially in a doctor's office,
because it can be reallyintimidating, really scary.
You know, and if they'retelling you, oh, this is
not necessary, you know,there can be a real propensity
to kind of.
Okay, well, I guessI just have to, like, quiet
this anxiety.
(10:59):
Like, I'm so curious aboutwhat kind of shifted for you
that you were like, no, no, no.
Like, I am 100% advocatingfor myself because that is
so amazingly awesome.
I one had an amazing medicalteam who, even though they
kept saying, you know,for your type of uterus, this is
(11:25):
unfortunately normal.
I said, I don't care if this isnormal.
I it doesn't feel normal to me.
And from what I've seenin society and from what
I've seen in moviesand from what everything I'm
reading online, this shouldn'tbe happening.
(11:46):
And I don't care that I'ma special case.
I wanted to be treated as thoughthis is not normal.
And so they just kind of had tolisten to.
I can understand that.
Yes, this is normal for me,but my brain can't comprehend
this. Yeah.
Because I one can't trustmy body because it failed
(12:10):
the first time we tried this.
And so there is isn't there is alack of trust between my brain
and my body to be able to do theright thing.
And there is a lack oftrust between my brain
and itself to know that, thatthis is normal for me.
(12:34):
So I just need to be ableto visually see that there is
a heartbeat on that monitorand tell this happens again.
And, rational thought leavesmy brain.
Yeah.
I heard you mentioned in therekind of the feeling that my body
has failed me.
Would you be willing to talka little bit more about
(12:56):
about that in that narrativethat was going on for you?
Oh, yeah.
I mean, I had being partof the 1 in 4 club, which is
not a club that any womanshould ever have to be
a part of.
You know, 1 in 4 women will gothrough a miscarriage in
their life.
(13:19):
It it breaks all trust betweenyour brain and your body.
How can I trust my bodyto be able to do what it is
supposed to be able to dobased off of science
and thousands of years of womengiving birth to babies?
(13:41):
That.
Why can't mine do that?
Like, what is wrong with me?
And why?
Why did my body fail?
Something that comesso naturally to so many
other women.
And I had to remind myselfthat, you know, that I'm
not broken.
(14:02):
My body is not broken.
I this one just didn't work out.
It's like any job or any,you know, Pair of shoes
or dress like this onejust didn't fit for me.
It didn't work for me.
(14:24):
This one time, I wasn't it.
I didn't do anything wrong.
I did it.
I did it.
I did not fail.
My body did not inherently fail.
This just didn't work out.
And it could have been somethingwith the embryo or, you know,
(14:44):
something that happenedin, in the pregnancy itself
that we don't know.
But it it wasn't me that failed.
And it took a really long timefor me to come to terms
with that.
And, you know, a lot of talkingwith therapists and talking
with other women who had gonethrough this and inherently
being like, you weren't the onethat failed.
(15:07):
The pregnancy itself failed.
Yeah.
And I'm so glad that youmentioned that far.
First, kind of of it sounds likethe work that you had to do
and the initiative to go intothat work, to be able to kind
of tease out that narrativebecause you're so right.
And I've heard that from so manyfolks, and like, this is not
(15:28):
what it's supposed to be, right?
This is this isn't what you'readvertised.
When when people talk abouthaving kids and then this is
your body, you shouldshould like that word.
Right?
So many times gets used oflike what it should look like,
what it should be doing,what it should be capable,
and that, you know, thisthis equation involves that
(15:48):
if it can't do it,then it somehow is a dysfunction
on your end that you'reyou're somehow less than.
And yeah, and gosh, if you'rekind of that you were able to
to tease out that narrative isis huge because I know there's
so many, so many other mothersout there, that maybe
(16:09):
are struggling to do just that.
Yeah, it's it's crazy how aloneyou can feel when you don't know
that other people aroundyou are going through the exact
same thing.
You know, you feel very alonewhen all of a sudden
they're like, you'reyour pregnancy is no
(16:31):
longer there.
You know that heartbeatisn't there anymore, that it
just stopped.
And you know, your, your worldis shattered and you feel
completely alone and you forgetyou one have someone right there
who's going through it with you,your spouse or your partner
or your significant other.
(16:53):
And also that if you countfour women, one of those women
have also gone through it now,statistically speaking.
So it's like, yeah.
And but society has putsuch a stigma on talking about
miscarriages and pregnancyloss and infertility
and all these other thingsthat it's like you don't
(17:15):
feel like you can talk about itbecause we're not supposed to.
It's not the pretty part ofpregnancy that everyone wants to
hear about you.
Don't we want to hear aboutthe baby showers and the,
you know, the pretty things ofyour hair's growing and
your cute belly and the cutedresses and the getting ready
for the baby.
And you.
No, I, I want to hear aboutthe ugly parts of your pregnancy
(17:37):
because I had an ugly pregnancy.
Yeah, I absolutely.
And I think you you made agreat point.
And I do want to make sureto, like, take a moment
and highlight that, you know,you had a partner that was also
experiencing that.
You know, I know I justmentioned kind of moms out there
that also very much affectscan affect the partner as well.
(17:59):
Male partners and included.
Yeah.
I do want to take a momentto mention that, because
sometimes there can besome of those feelings as well
that are hidden, right, that iffor whatever reason there are
fertility issues, that that canalso impact just as much,
and there's a very real storythere for the partner as well.
(18:22):
And so I just wanted toI thank you for mentioning that
because you're you're so right.
Oh, yeah.
Because, you know,everyone views male presenting
partners as the strong, dominanthousehold head of household,
you know, and they don'tgive them space to grieve
because dads lose babies, too.
(18:45):
I absolutely and no one talksabout that.
It's always oh but butbut the mom is during
the pregnancy.
Yes.
My body carried a pregnancy,but his heart was just
is full of love and excitementas mine was.
And it's hurting just as much,if not more, because not
(19:07):
only does he hurt,he has to watch his partner hurt
and go through that same amountof hurt that he's feeling
and he can do nothingto help it.
And also, you know, femalepresenting partners who you know
may have contributed to theirspouses pregnancy.
They hurt just as much as well.
(19:28):
Yeah.
And and I think whatyou mentioned there is,
you know, it's for for everybodythere's some sort of hurt.
It may look different.
It may present differently.
Because that's another piecethat, you know, for some it may
present in those, those tearsand that crying.
For others it may presentin, in anger and in disconnect
(19:49):
and like shut down almost,you know, so kind of having that
face, having that compassion fornot only the caring partner,
but for the non caring partneras well.
That there's those are very realthings that, as you mentioned,
don't get talked about enoughbecause there is this,
this facade, right, thatI feel like it's been
(20:11):
handed down generation aftergeneration of this is
to, to survive.
We've got gotta paintthis picture that
this isn't easy so that peoplewant to do it.
Exactly.
Like, I almost feel dupedinto becoming like, it's
so perfect.
It's an easy thing, but it isan ugly, gross experience.
(20:34):
And no one tells you the uglygross parts.
Yeah, absolutely.
I'm.
I'm so curious.
From that.
Did you did it threaten yourrelationship with your not
caring for, No, man, becauseI really needed them,
(20:58):
in the sense that I had.
If they had not been here,I would have turned to
alcohol again.
And I probably would not bealive today.
And so I was very much aI need you to be here to stop me
from going up to the liquorstore.
(21:18):
I need you to be here to help meremember to shower.
I need you to remind methat I'm still a human and I
deserve a bath.
I need you to help me toremember to eat.
Because my grief was sohand over comforting
(21:39):
that self-care went outthe window, man.
And to my partner.
Oh, yeah, go ahead now.
Go for it.
I want to hear more.
Yeah, without.
Without my partner.
His name's Tony.
Without Tony, it reallywould have been just me slowly
(22:01):
killing myself with a bottle,and I.
I relied so much on him and hisstrength and I had no family
in town besides what I callmy Florida family, who I love
so much.
They are not related by bloodor paperwork in any way,
(22:21):
shape or form, but they'reamazing people.
And, I grew up with themin Minnesota, which is where
I'm from.
And I love them dearly.
And so it was very much,if I wasn't around them,
I was around Tony.
And he was really my onlyfamily here in Florida
that I could talk toabout how I was feeling or,
(22:45):
you know, what was going onthat day or, you know,
everything that I wasthinking or not thinking that.
Yeah.
Okay.
Pause for just a moment.
I've got my ground.
Me and that's nice and brown.
(23:05):
What do I do next?
Yeah.
So now you can startadding in all of your soy
sauce, molasses mixture,all of that.
Get that in there.
Start, bubbling that up.
Okay.
Mine's still Browning, soit might take bit longer.
(23:30):
Perfect.
So, I'll keep mixing.
I wanted to take a momentand ask you because you
said something that I think issuper powerful.
And what you just mentioned,that I, I wanted to circle
back to and and that'sjust the phrase that I deserve
a bath.
Can you tell me more about that?
I yeah.
(23:53):
When when I was going throughthe thick of it, you know, the
the worst parts of the,depression and, you know,
emotions that followed themiscarriage.
I had.
I didn't feel like I deservedto, to live, which, you know,
(24:18):
is a scary thought.
I didn't feel like I deservedthe basic human, necessities of
of food or, you know, a bathwhich lots of people think
is like a luxury.
Like we all showerand we all, you know,
wash ourselves.
(24:38):
But to sit down have, like, abubble bath with, you know, a
glass of sparkling whatever,and a book or watch a movie
on, device and just soak ina bathtub.
I was like, I, I, I don'twant that.
And nor do I feel likeI deserve that, because that's
(24:59):
how how could someone who failedagain, it also goes back to me
having to deal withthe fact that I felt I failed
at something that is soingrained in our society that
every woman should be ableto do this, that if if I failed
at this, why?
Why should I deservesomething that, you know,
(25:20):
everybody should be ableto have that.
And so he had to remind me that,you know, you're also human.
You deserve to screamfor dinner.
You deserve to make those goofychoices that you know you
you want to make of.
You want to take a bubblebath, okay?
(25:42):
You just you deserve totake a bath.
And I think we punishourselves when we intrinsically
feel it's something thatshould come so naturally to us.
That we we go down the roadof punishment because we,
we don't know how to forgiveourselves as human beings.
(26:05):
And there is that sense ofI have to be able to
forgive myself.
And it took a lot ofbubble baths.
Yeah, a lot of bath.
But we got there eventually.
There's still thingsthat, you know, you have
to remember that, you know,I'm still human.
We still make mistakes.
(26:27):
Absolutely.
And I what I really appreciateand why I'm so thankful that you
were willing to even, talka little bit more about that
is because you're so absolutelyright.
I've heard that so many times,kind of this idea of,
that you're bringing you'rebringing me really good at
convincing you of some of thesenarratives, like you're
(26:49):
saying that that, hey,I deserve this, this punishment.
This is, you know, hey,I don't get to have this luxury.
Like you said, have a bath.
Like, that's that's for peoplewho don't fail.
And to kind of have even justjust that, that thing that so
many people do take for granted.
I don't, I don't knowthat people would look at a bath
(27:11):
and go like, oh, this issomething that my brain might
try to convince me I'mnot deserving.
But it is.
Gosh, when you're in it,like you said, and those are
the thoughts that are goingon, it can be very,
very difficult to remindyourself otherwise.
That real quick pause.
If you haven't already,start your rice in your rice
(27:33):
cooker or instapot. Yes,I always measure mine with my
knuckles or fingers.
I am so that we do.
We absolutely do the the fingermeasure.
I mean, that's how I was taughtby my, my, my Filipino family.
So that's what we do.
(27:55):
Yeah.
Yes.
I have my rice.
That one.
I made sure it was in therecooking. Nice.
Thank you for the reminder.
But yeah.
So, you know.
Yeah, we we did that.
But yeah, back to, you know,we pregnancies because it didn't
(28:16):
just stop with thebleeding. Okay.
The mental health part of that,it it continued to get
ugly as we, we got to thephysical pregnancy part of.
Okay, you know, you make a birthplan, and you, your, you know,
your medical team triesto follow it as closely
as possible.
(28:37):
Well, we got closer to our, ourpregnancy deadline, and,
they were like, he's breechand it is not safe for us
to turn him.
Okay.
So C-section it is coolon that one.
(28:57):
Yeah.
Did that feel scary like thatnews like when they came in and
they told you that?
I can only imagine allthe thoughts that are
happening in that moment?
It was definitely scary.
It was something that wehad talked about as
a possibility becausethankfully, my birth team
had said, you know, hey,with your uterus,
you know, this, this, this,and this could end up being
(29:19):
a possibility.
We again, it wasn't ourfirst choice.
No, nobody's first choice is to,you know, get cut open and have
a huge scar for the restof their life.
But that.
So that was it.
Scary. Yes.
(29:40):
Were we completelyblindsided? No.
I talked about it and said,you know, if if it is the case
that we do need a C-section,then with some other
medical stuff both I andmy spouse are dealing with,
we should probably just timemy tubes at the same time,
because after thiscrazy pregnancy of bleeding
(30:02):
all the time, I do notwant to birth another human
being.
No thank you.
That was an that come to,Was that a difficult decision
to come to?
Not super hard to come to.
I'm adopted.
And so for me, adoptionwas never out of the picture.
(30:25):
It's better to adopt a childthan and an adopted child. Yeah.
I I'm I'm always down toadopt 5 million children.
You know, I'd love to havea couple more kids
running around if if the cardswork out and, you know,
everything goes perfectly,I think maybe 1 or 2
more running around.
But, you know, it'sit's not cheap.
(30:47):
And I know that absolutely.
It's, you know, it's notalways in the cards for
people either.
But so it was something of bothwith some medical stuff for me,
some medical stufffor my spouse.
Like, let's just have onepregnancy, that makes it.
And that would be great.
(31:09):
Okay.
So, you know, that wasnews for us.
And then right after HurricaneIan down here in Florida,
I started feeling grossthe next morning.
We had no power at our house.
We were at my Floridafamily's house for the day,
and I was like, I don't feelgreat.
(31:29):
And I have not felt this babykick in a while.
Wow.
We should probably goto the hospital.
And they were like,okay, let's go.
So we went and they'relike, yeah, you're actually
having contractions.
You're only like two weeks outfrom your due date.
So we're probably just gonnatake him today.
We were like, oh, oh, surprise,surprise.
(31:52):
Two weeks earlier than wewere expecting.
Yeah, we have no power atour house right now.
Oh my goodness, we love this.
Yeah.
And, we had already decided onhis name Ian, way ahead of this
hurricane that was named Ian.
Oh my goodness.
You mean like, just likean accident?
(32:12):
Yeah.
We were like, great.
This is awesome.
You know, like, so when you eatand we were like, well, we eat
breakfast like two hours ago andthey're like, okay,
we have to wait about six hours.
And it's like, you're kidding.
Oh yeah.
So now we have this anxietywhere we're calling people
and letting them know,like, hey, can you check
on the house?
(32:32):
Can you check on the freezer?
Make sure nothing'sdripping, like trying
to coordinate someone,making sure that we end up
with power eventuallyin our house.
Thankfully, our dog is withour Florida family
like nothing's going the wayI want it to.
We're expecting our baby tocome today.
We get into the O.R.
and they start the procedure andall of a sudden I hear the
(32:57):
surgeon say, get somebody elsein here.
And my heart dropped, oh mygoodness, yes.
What's going on?
Like, my dad has a biomedicalengineering degree.
My grandfather was a colonrectal surgeon.
I've been around enoughmedical staff to know that when
the surgeon calls inan extra pair of hands, it's
(33:20):
never a good reason.
And they're like, he's stuffedin your incision.
His head is stuck insideyour body.
Oh my God.
Oh, great.
So awesome.
So I find out later frommy spouse that the doctor
(33:43):
is literally one legup on the table trying to
pull my child out ofmy incision.
Oh, my goodness.
And thankfully, they finallyget him out, and all of a sudden
my baby is whisked away,not chest to chest like we had
talked about and my spouseleaves my side.
(34:07):
I am stuck prone on my back,which I can't turn my head like.
I can't see anything behind meand I am literally screaming
what is going on?
I find out from the anesthesiaurologist.
Yeah, I'm completely left alonewith my anesthesiologist and
the surgeons have basicallytold nothing.
(34:29):
There's like noises coming fromthe other side of the curtain.
You know?
I can't hear anything behind me.
I'm also half deaf, so thatdoesn't help anything that I
can't hear anything going on.
But I find out later Ian hadit was a nuchal cord
times three.
So his umbilical cord waswrapped three times
(34:51):
around his neck and he wasnot breathing.
Wow.
So not only did we have thiscrazy pregnancy our room has now
and nothing the waywe want it to when my kids
are breathing.
And no, it's telling meanything.
What's going on?
Oh, incredible.
You finally get him breathing,they get the little CPAp on
(35:13):
and he's not taking good breath.
I don't get him on mefor the next, you know,
15 minutes.
It feels like eternity.
Of course.
And so finally they bringhim over and, you know,
you're you're crying and,you know, you see your baby
for the first time and it'sthe best thing ever.
(35:35):
But it's just such a horror showleading up to that moment
that nobody talks about.
Yeah, we see those prettypregnancies that go perfect
a plan.
I had two pushes andthey were out and
it was perfect.
And then we cut the cord and Iimmediately started
(35:58):
breastfeeding and it was great.
Yeah, it's not always great.
And I feel that those storiesalso need to be told because you
feel so alone when you'retalking about pregnancies
and those mom groups and you'relike, I had a horrible one.
(36:20):
So it wasn't great.
Yeah.
And I think, again, this isn'tnecessarily right just to
scare someone.
Oh, no, not to just normalize.
Like, these things happenprobably more than you think
they do.
And like you said, it can feelso incredibly isolating
(36:42):
and lonely to kind of feel likeyou're sticking out in that way,
but not in a way that like,you got to choose to stick out
for that.
Exactly.
And yeah, this is not to scareanybody.
Like, don't get right.
If you want kids in your family,by all means.
And you're able to I don't meanto get pregnant and have babies,
(37:04):
but you know, there arethose families that are
struggling or, you know, didn'thave pretty pregnancies or and
they feel like they can'ttalk about them because
everybody else around themjust had the pretty perfect
birth plan home, water,birth, whatever they chose
to do.
And it was exactly howthey wanted.
(37:25):
And I love that for them.
And I'm so glad everythingwent perfect for them, that it
just wasn't my experience.
And it's not to say it was abad experience.
I got a really great humanout of this.
And you know, I learned a lotand I learned just how strong
I am.
And through all of this, what Inever want to repeat it
(37:47):
for myself.
Now.
Never again.
No, thank you.
Yeah.
Do you feel like, asI just heard you mentioned
in there, like you were ableto see kind of the strength
that your body was capable of?
Did that shift or helped shiftsome of that narrative from that
feeling, the feeling of failureto look at what I did, I
(38:14):
yeah, because, you know,I ended up.
Having a super awesome humanand being able to say,
I did it right.
I did grow a humanand I was able to bring life
into this world, evenif it wasn't perfect.
(38:36):
And that did help with some ofsome of the narrative of
I failed because I didn't feelthis time, you know, and and
he ended up beingreally awesome.
So I absolutely.
So I'm curious.
Clayton, I know you mentioneda couple times your Florida
(38:56):
family and it soundslike you, you had that ability
to have a kind of a supportsystem around you.
Were there things that,looking back on it, your support
people were able to door were able to provide
that, you know, as a supportperson that's listening
right now that wasreally helpful for you
(39:17):
and being able to kindof navigate this journey
that, you know, give themsome insight, give them
some tips of somethingthat maybe worked out for you
or was really appreciatedby you. Yeah.
That one don't show upempty handed.
If you're going to go visiteither a new mom or someone
who's pregnant, either bringsomething to do, whether it be
(39:45):
a board game or somethingto take their mind off of it.
Even if you're visiting someonewho's recently had, you know,
a loss or is going througha rough time and you want
to be that support person, bringsomething to do to get their
mind off it, or thatthey can talk to you while doing
something else, or and or,you know, a meal that's always
(40:09):
super helpful if you'regoing to be that support person,
whether it's a loss or a newhuman being.
But also don't expect to holdthe baby or go with the
mindset of a givers mindset ofthere's a pile of laundry
on the floor.
There's this need to be put inthe laundry, or does it need to
(40:31):
be put away?
Can I have that?
Because not every parentis going to want to separate
from their child right away,but they would have to separate
from their child in orderto put that laundry in.
Or and I think those werethe things that were
more helpful of whenpeople would come over and bring
(40:52):
a meal and then, hey, where'syour vacuum?
Can I vacuum something realquick for you while we
visit and talk or yeah,you know, I didn't have the
brain capacity after birthingmy human to even say, yeah,
could you do X, Y and Z or,hey, could you bring me this?
(41:12):
Hey, I really need this.
And so it was so helpfulwhen people just showed up
with caffeine and, andand then just said, I've noticed
this needs to get done.
Where is the tool to do that?
Yeah.
No, I just want you to.
(41:33):
Yeah.
Not how do I do that?
But where are the tools?
And that's a lot easierfor some people to just say, oh,
that's over there.
Or they might say, oh, don'tworry about it.
Yeah, don't believe them.
So just do it anyways.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I think you make agreat point.
You know often times and Itotally can appreciate
(41:55):
their coming from rightthat place.
This is a brand new human.
I'd love to meet themand I'd love to spend time
with them.
And sometimes we forget thatparents or parents,
right, is also just meetingthis person on the outside,
which looks very differentthan, you know, for the
caring partner to kind ofhave it internally.
(42:17):
And so these are also they'rejust getting to know this person
that they are now being,you know, entrusted to, to raise
and to grow.
And so there's, there's a lot ofbonding that they're
also needing and wantingto do as well.
So as much as your heart wantsto also pick up that little
baby, unless you're kind ofawesome.
(42:38):
So can you please takethis child?
I need to go use the restroom,that it may very well be that,
like you said, kind ofcoming in and and supporting
the household may be the besthelp that someone can provide.
Oh, yeah.
That that is some of thebest things that were
given to us were the dayswhen people would come over
(42:59):
and say, hey, I noticed thatthis hasn't gotten done,
let me do this real quick,and then we can sit and chat.
And that's those are thosemoments.
Then when I was like, canyou hold my baby while I do
something else?
Because they had alreadyhelped me with one way,
I was much more willing to thenentrust them with my new
(43:21):
human as well and be like,I really need to use
the bathroom.
Or, you know, I need to shower.
I need to, you know, take a walkoutside.
Can you just watch my humanso they don't die?
Absolutely.
So. So true.
I'm.
I'm so curious.
(43:42):
Like, if you could kind ofgo back in time.
Is there anything that you mighttell yourself in order
to prepare as, as best you canfor kind of that journey
or anything that you would offerto anyone else who might
be walking a similarlooking journey that,
(44:02):
that I think that one,it is okay to cry.
They are just extras.
It's not sadness, it'snot happiness.
It's not a bad thing.
It's not a good thing.
It's it's just extras.
It's just your body's wayof opening these.
When people so often see cryingas a bad thing or it's
(44:26):
not strong or it's not,you know, insert taboo subject
here.
They're just extras.
You know, my mom would say thatall the time is it's
okay to cry.
They're just extras.
Because so many times itwas just, I'm in the
grocery store.
(44:47):
I'm not allowed to cryabout this kind of bread.
I'll just do it. Yeah.
You don't know these people.
They're not going tosee you again crying.
The truth is, no one cares.
Absolutely.
But also that, you know,there's always someone
who is going throughthe same stuff.
It may not look exactlythe same, and they
(45:09):
may not show it the same way,but there is always someone
out there who has either gonethrough it or is going
through it, or willgo through it, and you can
then choose to findthose people, or you can
choose to be that person forthe next person.
It just depends on who.
(45:32):
Do you want to find the peopleto help you, or do you just
want to be alone?
I think if I had, if I hadknown that ahead of time,
it would have been easierto go out and search for that.
For people who had gone throughsimilar situations.
(45:54):
And I think you make sucha great point that sometimes
there is that fear, whetherit's, it's a narrative
in your head as far as if youask for support, if you go
and you seek that out, that itmeans something about you
even more, you know,kind of like we talked about
kind of that, that ideaof failure or weakness
(46:15):
or whatnot.
And and you're absolutely right.
That there are those barriersfor a lot of people
to be able to to reach outthat hand and ask for that help
and see what their needs are,because there's so much of this
conditioning that when westate our needs, we're acting
selfishly, right?
We were, oh, you know,you're all about what you need.
(46:38):
Well, what about the rest ofthe world?
Like, goodness gracious.
Like, I think thatthere is enough for everybody's
needs.
Like, really core needsto be met.
It's that willingness.
It's that compassionand that grace to be able
to extend that and leavespace for for people that are
asking for support because youtake a lot of gumption
(46:59):
to be able to say, actually,I do need help.
Yeah.
And and that is not a weakness.
It is a strength to it.
It takes a very strong humanto realize, hey, I can't do this
all on my own.
I do need help.
I think it almost takesa stronger person
to realize that than it doesfor someone who just
(47:22):
tries to power through ontheir own.
Were there any resources orsupport services that you found,
that were really helpful to youthat maybe other people
don't know?
Well, I mean, I used a bunchof different mom apps, but one,
I think it was that youhad a baby list or baby center.
(47:46):
I honestly don't rememberthe name, but it was one that,
there were different, like,moms chat groups, and you could
search by different,like, issues.
And so I just wanted to typein my uterus, a whole group
of people who had like, uterusespopped up.
And it was we were able to justchat about issues we had
(48:09):
together.
And okay, that was amazing.
I was like, I, I, of course,have deleted all my
pregnancy apps because Idon't plan on ever doing
that again.
And I don't, but I think itwas either like baby center
or baby was there one ofthose mom tracking pregnancy
things that you can likeget on a chat group or whatever?
(48:31):
Okay, so don't be afraidto search different apps or, you
know, groups or even just onlineand say, you know, buy Cornwood
or whatever your issue isor what your needs are.
Support group, you know,you never know what's going
to come up.
I think me through Disney,they have a really great,
(48:54):
system of support for,like if you need to just talk to
somebody, there's a, there's a,number we can call.
So I don't know if there's,like, a national number
that people can call.
I know that there's, like,the suicide prevention hotline.
We call that on in case it, yes.
(49:14):
Sometimes you just need to talkto somebody, and it's
not because, you know, you'resuicidal.
It might you need someoneto listen, and they do a really
good job at that, too.
You.
And so sometimes it's just, hey,I'm not thinking about suicide,
but I definitely am not ina good place.
And so they can talk toyou about that too. You.
(49:35):
And I think that's that'sa great point.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And the crisis hotlines, there'stons of different ones.
There's ones for militaryfamilies.
There's ones for, you know,suicide hotlines, there's ones
for LGBTQ.
There's, you know, don'tfeel like you failed
if you have to call thosenumbers because you didn't feel
(49:57):
you're being super strongand you're realizing that,
you know, you need to talk tosomebody, you need that
extra help.
Yeah, absolutely.
Thank you so much for sharingthat.
So definitely, again,all of those resources will be
in the show notesfor anybody who who maybe say,
hey, this resonates with meand I and I would like some of
(50:18):
that support.
Because you're absolutely right.
It's the more we can put thatword out there, the more that
we can normalize askingfor help, seeking out support.
Hopefully, you know, I canreach my I.
I said it multiple times,that dream of being out of
a job, right?
Because everybody is outand thriving and being awesome.
(50:39):
And so some of the ways isasking for that support.
Learning the skills, learning,really unlearning.
Maybe some of those ways ofavoiding and not talking
about these issues.
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian, thank you so much.
So I've got my Grammyand we just put this on.
(51:01):
Right.
Is that what I'm hearing?
Yeah, yeah I do, I do a bigold scoop race and you just
scoop it on your racehowever much you're in.
Okay, I do, so I knowthat there were green onions.
And you just do you normallymix it in or sprinkle it on top
so that it kind of keepsits integrity?
(51:21):
It doesn't get all that.
What do you do?
We if we have them,which we don't always have them.
Sometimes I just use,freeze dried chives.
Those were great.
You can get those at Sam's Clubor Costco.
Okay.
Honestly, a lot of this stuffcan be substituted for other
(51:41):
things as well, but, yeah.
So we just sprinkle themon top that way we don't get all
the mixed in and whatnot.
But I'm just finishing steamingmy rice.
Yeah, that.
(52:02):
So how are we looking at you?
Oh, that looks beautiful.
You did this?
Things.
I'm so excited to try this.
And I know that Josh, you know,my partner was like, hey,
make sure you make extrafor dinner.
So he's super excited to try it.
(52:22):
It's such a good one.
And we love it.
The first time we tried it, TonyTony does not cook.
Can't cook to save his life.
Never has been able to.
We also.
We all have our strengths.
Definitely washing dishes.
(52:42):
We.
That was one of the ruleswhen we got, when we
started dating and then gotmarried is I will cook you every
single meal if I neverhave to wash a single dish.
And he was like, dang,this sounds like a great plan.
Next. So, he, lovingly does allthe dishes, and I love it
(53:04):
because I never.
We did this one of thefirst meals that I ever
cooked for him, and he wasjust astounded, like, it's
such a good flavor and it justtastes so good.
You can add a little gold using.
If you're feeling alittle spicy,
you can switch it up with somefish sauce.
(53:26):
If you want to have alittle more savory, like,
y'all can just go crazy with it.
Depending on you know how you'refeeling.
If you don't like, Ginger,leave it out.
If you're not a big fan of,you know, garlic.
I don't know why, but you canalso leave that.
(53:47):
It's so versatile, you can'treally mess it up.
And if you don't have molassesor you don't feel like getting
molasses, you can use,brown sugar if you have it,
because brown sugar is justwhite sugar with molasses in it.
And it does just aboutthe same thing.
Very cool.
Okay, I love it.
And I love the facility becausethat helps, right?
(54:09):
That helps with the parent life.
When oh yeah, you just don'thave the time because that's
that's the theme, right?
You don't have the time.
And parenting is hard and you'redoing 50 million things at once.
Yeah.
And this is definitely onethat everybody loves to eat.
We all love to eat this.
Even in, one and a halfyears old.
(54:30):
He loves eating this one.
He will ask on a regular basiswhen I ask him, what do you want
for dinner?
He goes, plastic potstickersbeef back, and it's like
you, plastic and beef.
Okay, that sounds great, butyou love it.
Oh, thank you, Jillian, so muchfor being willing one
(54:50):
to teach us this recipe.
And two, to be willing topull back that curtain and share
your story and shinethe light on these areas
that need more light and needmore space and time.
Because they are realand they do exist.
And they're incredibly scaryand lonely when you're going
(55:12):
through it and you feelall alone.
Yeah.
So thank you so much.
And thank you for being a gueston our show.
And so everyone out therewatching again, remember,
check out our show notesfor any of this resource is
and we'll see you next time.
If you or anyone that you knowis struggling with any of
the topics that we discussed intoday's episode, make sure
(55:34):
to check out our show notesfor support and resource
ways you can get help.
Thanks again for joiningus on today's episode of The
Real Family Eat.
If you're a parent readyto share your real life
parenting story, make sure toreach out to us and our website
found in the show notes.
And that goes for today's recipesocial media's support
(55:57):
and resources.
All of that can be foundin our show notes,
so make sure to check them outand make sure to follow, like,
share, subscribe, and stayup to date on all things
the real family eats.
I hope you'll join us next timefor more food for thought
and thoughtful food!Enjoy your eat.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!