241: Colorful Capes of Feelings- Andre & Constance Lewis

 Welcome to the Young Dad Podcast—whether you're balancing a baby on your hip, stuck in carpool traffic, or just finally getting five minutes to yourself—we’re glad you're here. Grab your juice box, grab a snack, and let’s jump into today’s real and honest conversation.

Today’s guests are Constance Lewis and Andre Lewis, co-creators of Miles and the Colorful Capes of Feelings—a children’s book inspired by her son Miles’ journey through brain surgery and medical challenges. Constance and her husband Andre turned their family’s experience into a movement to help children understand and express their emotions through color-coded capes.

A women’s health nurse practitioner by profession and a mother of three, Constance brings heart, story, and science into how we raise emotionally strong children. This episode is for parents navigating big emotions, caregivers who want practical tools, and anyone passionate about building emotional intelligence in the next generation.

You can find Miles and the Colorful Capes of Feelings, plus free resources and upcoming releases, at: 👉 https://www.colorfulcapesoffeelings.comVisit the website for interactive activity guides and everything YDP- ⁠⁠www.youngdadpod.com
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Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Emotional Expression for Children

05:35 The Journey of Miles and His Seizures

10:10 Navigating Parental Anxiety and Coping Mechanisms

15:40 Communication and Relationship Dynamics

25:26 Pregnancy and Family Dynamics During Crisis

34:24 Understanding Middle Child Dynamics

35:28 Navigating Emotions in Parenting

38:38 The Importance of Connection

40:21 The Role of Parents in Emotional Development

42:39 Balancing Parenting Responsibilities

46:10 The Journey of Parenthood and Fertility

47:12 Introducing the Colorful Cape Series

54:15 Advice for Young Parents

Episode Transcript

(00:10):
And welcome into the Young Dad podcast, whether you're outside
grill in on the lawn, or maybe you're inside changing dirty
diapers, wherever you're at, whatever you're doing, thank you
for being here and thanks for tuning in.
I'm your host, Jay. And today I'm joined by not one,
but two great guests today, Dre and Costas Lewis.
They are the creative behind helping children find their

(00:32):
voice through emotions. When emotions are strong but
words fall short, Andre and Constant Fluids believe in the
power of visual expression. As the creator of Miles and the
colorful capes of feelings, theyprovide children with a fun and
interactive way to identify, understand, and communicate
their emotions. Inspired by their son Miles.
Believe it or not, that makes sense.

(00:53):
It's inspired by their son Miles.
They didn't just pick a random name they like who face the
challenges of a seizure disorderand brain surgery.
Their book introduces color-coded tapes that represent
key emotions like courage, sadness, and bravery, helping
children navigate their feelingswith confidence.
Andre, a pediatric dentist, and Constance, a Women's Health
nurse practitioner, both bring professional expertise and

(01:14):
personal experience to the work.Their mission is to support
families and educators and healthcare providers and
fostering emotional resilience in children.
Through their heartfelt storytelling and advocacy, they
empower young minds to express themselves in a way that feels
natural, engaging, and effective.
So, with that, let's welcome Andre and Constance to the show.
Welcome guys. Thanks for having us.
Yeah. Thanks.

(01:35):
So much, of course, I'm excited to have you guys.
I did, of course, forget to tellthe audience to make sure that
they grab their juice box and they grab their snack and they
get comfy for, for our conversation today.
So I just forget that. Don't worry, guys.
Mom, right, yeah. Coffee, juice boxes, energy
drinks, whatever, wherever you're at, whatever you're
doing, you know, get it. Make sure you have it for the
podcast today and you're sippingon it as you go through it.

(01:55):
So with that, go ahead and tell the audience a little bit about
yourselves, your backgrounds, how this I settled briefly, how
this was all inspired, but more of the story behind Miles and
the colorful capes of feelings. So I'm a Women's Health nurse
practitioner. I was a NICU nurse for many
years and then neonatal intensive care, if anyone

(02:18):
doesn't know what a NICU nurse is, and floated the pediatric
some and then became a woman's health nurse practitioner,
helping moms get pregnant, have babies.
And I'm now turned sleep coach and a fertility postpartum
coach. So we have a son, Miles, which
we'll go over in a little bit about why we created the book

(02:39):
and how we came to that idea. But I'll let Andre introduce
himself. Hi, I'm Andre.
I'm a pediatric dentist and beenworking for almost 17 years now
and just enjoy, you know, playing and helping change the
stigma of the dentist for littlekids because it used to be a
terrifying place, but it doesn'thave to be anymore.

(03:01):
And it's little things like this, being able to take the
time, kind of understand their emotions and help them through
some scary moments. So, you know, feelings are real
and we're here to just make him go as smoothly as possible.
Yeah. So our son.
Yeah, so we have three kids. Oh my goodness, it's crazy
saying that. A 7 year old, A5 year old and a

(03:22):
2 year old. And our oldest son is Miles and
he's who inspired the story thatwe created for him.
Very. Cool.
Yeah. So for your guys careers, those
are some very cool careers. You know, going from the NICU,
going from working with brand new babies to also the dentist.

(03:42):
And I got to say my, my daughter's, they like the
dentist. They're, they're a little psycho
her, they're a little psychopath.
They, they don't mind the dentist at all.
The one thing they look forward to at their dentist is that they
always get little tokens and then they have like those like
prizes, like at the mall kind ofthing.
Like back in the day at the mall, how you would get like
quarters you put like for like tattoos and stickers and things

(04:04):
like that. But they have those at the
dentist. So they look forward to the
dentist. They don't fight it all.
They like going, my oldest is 8 now and she has, she just got
braces a few weeks ago. And so she's she, she doesn't
mind though. She's like, oh, let's go like
it's no problem, no big deal. And like, she keeps track of
when her next appointment is andoh.

(04:25):
My. Gosh, yeah, she looks forward to
it. So that's what we well,
psychopath we. Try to do, yeah, that's what we
try to do. I mean, it used to be the
opposite, where people were scared to go.
Oh yeah, I hated the dentist. Same.
Like I'm I'm so anti dentist. Like I had to get a second round
of straightening treatment on myteeth.
I had to get as an adult. I got Invisalign as as an adult

(04:49):
and retainers. I was like, I do not want to be
here. I will show up.
I'm like Get Me Out of here as fast as possible.
Like Get Me Out, Get Me Out. But my experience is scarred
because when they were taking mywisdom teeth out, they ended up
cracking my mandible. So I have a metal plate back

(05:10):
here and half my bottom lip is still numb 10 plus years later.
So yeah, I have a good, I have agood reason why you have.
A good reason. Why I don't like going?
Yeah. But it's all, well, it's fine,
but the dentist isn't that scary.
My kids like it. And so that's important.

(05:30):
I think it's important for our kids to to see like medical
professionals as well as like law enforcement and public
service and military as like good guys.
And they're not there to hurt you.
They're there to help you. They're not there to to hurt
you. Even though things might hurt
when you go there, maybe they pull teeth out or fill a cavity
or something, they're not there to make your life harder.

(05:51):
They're there to help you. Yes, exactly.
Speaking of life easier, that's why we created the book.
So a little back story is Miles,our seven-year old, at the age
of four, out of he's seemingly healthy baby.
We knew he was a healthy child and then at the age of 4 started
having seizures and we were like, whoa, what in the world?

(06:12):
This completely rocked our world, changed our life.
We had no idea what was happening.
Multiple doctors visits, multiple medications, multiple
doctors, and ultimately we realized he had a brain lesion
that had been there since birth.And so he had to have brain
surgery and he had brain surgerya year ago in May.
It's been amazing because he hasn't had a seizure since.

(06:32):
So that's amazing story. But in the meantime, we wanted
to develop a way for him to share his emotions with us
without using words because he found words a little bit more
difficult after seizures or whenhe was on medications or after
brain surgery. And he loved dressing up as a
superhero. So he thought, what if we do
capes and colors and have him name different colored capes for

(06:54):
his feelings? And then if he put that Cape on,
we would know how he was feeling.
He could express himself throughcolor instead of words.
Love that that's so unique and Ithink that's important for kids
to to find a way that works for them, especially younger kids,
especially kids that struggle with with speech.
I work in, I personally, I work in mental health, I'm a mental
health provider. And so finding a way for a kid

(07:16):
to uniquely express themselves in their own ways is just
exactly what you want to see because every kids different,
right? I feel statements as I work with
everyone, the character from inside out don't work for every
kid. The you know, the different
colors, what not red, yellow, blue-green, the primary colors
don't work for every kid, right?So being able to find a unique

(07:37):
way for them to even put something on.
That's really cool. So talking about the miles here,
when you guys found out about orwhen he had his first seizure,
can you guys kind of take us through that experience and what
that was like for you guys? What kind of was going through
your guys's head? Cuz he, you said he was 4,
right? Yeah.

(07:57):
And so you already had had your guys a second at that time as
well, correct? Correct.
So what was what was going through your guys's head?
His mom and dad is like, what the heck?
How? Like what was going on there?
Yeah, so we were actually out oftown on our anniversary when he
had his first seizure. My mom was watching the two of
them. And we just got a call in the

(08:19):
morning and my mom at like 8:00 AM and my mom said Miles is
having a seizure. I called 911 with the first
words out of her mouth. And I was like, what?
Are you serious? And so we just like started
throwing because we were only anhour and a half away drive.
So we just started, Andre just started like throwing stuff in
bags, trying to like pack our stuff up.

(08:39):
And I Facetimed her and I'm like, show me what?
Because I'm a nurse, obviously. And so I know I wanted to
diagnose the situation or assessthe situation myself, even
though I'm like panicking as a mom as well.
And I'm like in shock mode. And so, you know, she Facetimes
us and, you know, the ambulancesstart coming and the

(08:59):
firefighters start coming and the neighbors start coming
because she still had the baby. Mariah.
She was only, I think she was almost 2 at the time.
And it was like he was completely out of it and he was
unresponsive. And, you know, his oxygen sacks
were low and everybody was coming in.
It was just like complete chaos.And you're far away and you

(09:21):
can't do anything as a parent because you're watching this
unfold on FaceTime. And it was, it was, I still have
some trauma that I'm processing from that as well.
But it was terrifying. And Andre drove literally 120
miles an hour. Nobody was going to stop me.
No, I was in race car mode. Yeah.
If the cops would have came, I would have said follow me, yeah.

(09:42):
Escort me, please. Exactly.
Yeah. Try to keep up.
Try to keep up, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
We drove legit. We drove 120 miles an hour and I
think we got there in like 45. It was an hour and a half drive
when we got to the hospital in 45 minutes because we just, it
was insane. Yeah, that's, that's crazy.

(10:03):
So going, going, going through that, that process of trying to
understand what the heck this islike, what kind of toll did that
take on on you guys on just yourday-to-day on your thoughts?
What you guys went through just from like the parent perspective
here? Because I know, I know there's
other parents that have have gone through this that are, that
are hearing this right now that are like, you know, I, I went

(10:24):
through that or, you know, I have that fear kind of things
like that or it was there something similar?
So going through all of it, whatkind of told that take on you
guys? And then how did you also cope
with it at the same time? Yeah, I think that for me, I'm
such a calm person in a medical situation where I'm taking care
of other people. Like I just put that nurse brain

(10:45):
on and a code blue or an emergency situation, I can just
go right into it and stay calm and do what I need to do.
But when it's my child, I am notlike that, which totally
surprised me. I become extremely anxious and
overwhelmed and panicked. And so I lived in a fight or
flight state for the two years of my life that he was having

(11:07):
these seizures. And originally he started out
only having like 1 every three months and then it by the end of
the two years before brain surgery, it was he was having at
least one every 10 days. And although they weren't all
very dramatic like this one was,they still impacted our lives,
obviously. And there were some really
insane ones. I mean, he had his most severe,

(11:30):
significant seizure he had on mydaughter's birthday when she
turned 4 years old. So it was just like I lived in
fight or flight. When was the next seizure?
When was the next one? I was always on edge.
I was always panicking when I got a call from the school, when
I got a call from anybody. It was just insane.
I lived in anxiety fight or flight mode for two years of my
life and I'm still recovering from that.
And even to this day when he says when he because we're

(11:52):
weaning him off his seizure medication right now.
And so he'll like be like, I have a headache.
I feel like I'm going to throw up and I'm like, you know, I'd
have to just breathe, breathe. So I experienced it totally
different than Andre because I he's the more laid back
practical one in emergency with our kids.
So I'm very glad to have the grounded side.

(12:14):
As Constance explained, I think for any parent, you know, I was
feeling all of those same emotions, but we needed someone
to be strong, to be calm, to tryto be as objective as I could.
And so I was always trying to bethe other side of the off the
table, the other side of the grass, you know, and keeping
optimism. And obviously the fear for any

(12:36):
sort of seizure or any sort of medical condition is that your
child is not going to be the same after these sort of
episodes or, or, you know, the situations that they're going
through. And you, you just want your,
your baby. And so I was always trying to be
as, as optimistic, but also realistic to say, hey, anything

(13:01):
that we will face and that will come up, we can handle and we
will get through. But ultimately, we just have to
take it one day at a time. And that was probably the
scariest part because every day it was another thought of, is he
going to have another seizure and how bad will it be?
And can we stop it with medication?

(13:22):
And so there was so many things that kind of just go through
you. It really kind of brought us
together, but also had that tension of like, OK, we got to
breathe. We got to breathe together.
Yeah, I remember him. I remember the second seizure.
I knew he was having a seizure, but it was the only, it was the
first. The second one he had we were

(13:43):
there for and he wasn't yet on medication because they, they
thought it was a febrile seizureat first.
They didn't realize that it wasn't a fever seizure.
So I was like, he's having a seizure and he's like, I'm like
call 911 and Andre's like, it's OK.
It's I'm like no, call 91. I'm like, you know what I mean?
So him and I had to learn each other through this insane

(14:06):
situation. Our cues and our our, our
communication because we just kind of were on opposite ends in
a way. And and so we had to find the
middle. But for parents who are going
through it, it's hard because it's a strain on your own
relationship, I think. And then it puts a strain on
your other relationship with your other kids.
Because I remember thinking I was so focused on miles all the

(14:27):
time that my daughter didn't getas much of that connection that
she needed during her two year old stage is when a really big
time they need that. And so now we're repairing that
relationship, I'm repairing thatrelationship as well.
You're saying so many good things and it's I think it's
important for for couples here to here, like if, if you're

(14:48):
listening to this with a, with acouple, as a couple, then you
know, hearing this just like, you know, there's, there's a
balancing act here. You got to learn each other, how
the other person reacts in, you know, these high, high stress
situations. And I think it's really
important for one of you guys, one, to to be the calm because
if you're both, you know, havingthe the big reaction that can

(15:10):
lead to to more, more trauma forfor miles in the situation,
right, Like someone's got to be calm, Someone's got to be the
steady, someone's got to be the the laid back one that's still
taking it serious. Of course, Andrey, not saying
that you didn't take it serious.I get it.
I'm the same way. Like I'm like the laid back
ones, like, Oh, it's not that's fine.
It's not a big deal. Like it'll be fine kind of thing
like it's OK, OK kind of thing versus, you know, the other the

(15:34):
opposite of that. So I think that's important to
hear, but when it when it came to your guys's relationship,
let's let's touch on that first and then we'll go into your
relationship with your other kids.
What kind you mentioned that took a toll on your guys's
relationship? And what what way did that take,
take a toll on you guys? And, and how did you guys stay
at least somewhat connected through it all and not like let

(15:55):
this, you know, really put a divide between you guys?
Yeah, I think that what happenedwas it was just more about
communication of our feelings than anything because we didn't
quite understand where the each sides energy was coming from.
So I didn't understand. He was trying to, in his mind he

(16:18):
was thinking a certain thing andthen he didn't understand.
In my mind, I was thinking a certain thing, and I think it
just took time for us to communicate with each other and
actually tell each other our emotions and our feelings and
why we jumped straight. Why I jumped straight to anxiety
and why he was able to stay calmin the moment because that
really brought clarity to it. And I think that that's really

(16:41):
what changed the narrative for us.
And then also you can't just expect this is another thing is
I don't think you can always expect your partner to be the
one that fixes you, right? I mean, yes, they're there to
support you, but you have to fixyour inside yourself.
It's your responsibility to do that.
And they're there to support youand assist you.

(17:03):
And so I realized that it wasn'this job to always be the calming
anxiety or calming of my anxietyto fix my trauma from this that
I had to do the inner work. And so obviously now that Miles
is better, I've been able to focus more on that.
So I know for parents who still have kids that are in a fight or

(17:24):
flight state where you're just like, my kid is still still
having seizures or my kid still is have medic medical
conditions, like how do you do that in the moment?
But because he's better now, I'mable to take a step back and
calm and help myself. So I think I would.
I mean, what else would you say you think helped our
relationship with the? Well, you know, for me,

(17:45):
obviously Constance being a nurse, you know, they they as a
nurse, I think you could testifythings to think what's the
worst? So therefore you can fix the
things to make sure it doesn't get to that point.
Yeah, it is what I learned from this process.
So she was thinking the worst and then so, OK, how do I plan
so it doesn't get there. Yeah, me, I'm thinking the best

(18:08):
doing the opposite, just trying to keep us there.
But I also think that, you know,it's very when people have big
emotions, it's very easy, just as you mentioned, to give back
big emotions. And you know, that's not what
people need. You know, sometimes you just
need to sit and listen and let them get those emotions out

(18:29):
because they're, there's plenty of times I said the wrong thing.
I didn't say the right thing, you know, right.
Sometimes every once in a while,I did say the right thing and it
helped. But, you know, even just
listening to let her know that Iwas there to support everything
she said instead of reacting to be like, well, why are you
thinking that way? Or, you know, it's not going to

(18:49):
happen like that. And you know, it's like that's
her dealing with it. So let her have that emotion and
let me have my emotion of being positive, but just listen and be
there and be like, I understand,you know, I, I agree, I'm with
you and we will get through this.
Obviously not right now and not today, but we will get through

(19:11):
this because, you know, as with any storm, everything will be
temporary or can be temporary. It's just getting through those
tough moments. I love that.
And it makes me think of a podcast that I did with a
psychiatrist. His name is Doctor Bryan.
And kind of exactly. We just said, Andre, you know,
every storm. But he, he finished that one off
where we had the conversation where every storm runs out of

(19:31):
rain eventually. And I love what you're saying
here too. Like, you know, sometimes,
sometimes I said the right thing, sometimes I did,
sometimes I didn't. I think every single dad can
relate to that 100% to where it's like, yeah, sometimes.
Sometimes I did it, Sometimes I was there, nailed it.
Other times, not so much. And there's more.
So one versus the other. And then, you know, for, for the

(19:55):
wives, it's like more, Oh, I, I wish you would just just shut up
and listen and just let me get it out kind of thing and not try
to fix everything because because men, we're fixers.
We're fixers, right? And especially, especially being
a dentist, literally your job isto fix teeth.
Legit, your job is to fix teeth.And for Constance, her job is to
prevent the worst case scenario.So sure.

(20:19):
Like that's exactly what you're talking about here.
And so your careers definitely explain a lot of the reaction
here. It's like Andre's brain is like
literally programmed through training and school and career
to be like, OK, I see problem. Here's solution for problem.
Monkey see, monkey do, monkey fix kind of thing.
That's just man brain in general, right?

(20:41):
And then for Constance, it makesso much sense for you because
women brain is, let me go to theabsolute worst case scenario,
bounce to the second worst, to the fifth worst, to the third
worst to the second, back to theextreme, and then figure out
something in between. So we don't get to the worst,
but maybe we will get to the worst of the worst of the worst.
So let's also prepare for that at the same time and jump back

(21:01):
and forth. So it these things make total
sense. And that's a balancing act in
itself. And then also I think it was
interesting you mentioned earlier, like you totally would
think like your first instinct is like, OK, I can handle this
kind of thing. But you know, the reality of it,
like it's your kid. It's not someone else's kid.
Like IA 100% here. I think anyone that's a medical

(21:23):
professional, mental health professional in some way, shape
or form can relate to this and be like, Oh yeah, like I, I can
handle it for other people, other people's kids, other
people's problems, other people's relationships, things
like that. But then when it comes to their
own, it's like, I don't even know what to do kind of thing.
And then you can go to work the next day.
You handle the same problem for someone else and it's like, Oh

(21:44):
yeah, easy peasy lemon squeezy. Then you come home happens to
you. It's like, Oh my God, what is
going on kind of thing. So it's I I hear you guys here
so about jumping kind of a little bit to to the family
aspect. Now you mentioned that Miles was
4, your youngest was 2 and it's been a two year journey.

(22:06):
So you've also added one throughthis journey.
Yeah, we're. It's crazy.
No, just kidding. If I can do the math, when this
seizure happened, you were closeto pregnant or already pregnant
when this started happening, so.I had essentially I had a how
old was he? And the last seizure that he had

(22:28):
was in April of last year. And my son Micah, who's now two,
he was like 9 months and names. Yeah, nine months or eight
months or something like that. So, yeah, so in the middle of
his two year situation, I had a baby.

(22:48):
So I had a newborn. So I had to.
That's why I stopped working as a nurse practitioner in the
office because I had a newborn and Miles was having all these
medical conditions. So I had to go to multiple
doctor's appointments. I had to go to the hospital all
the time. I had to go to labs.
I had a newborn baby who I was nurturing and breastfeeding and
taking care of a three-year old.So yeah, so Micah was here

(23:11):
through it all. And I remember when Miles was
having brain surgery, I was still breastfeeding and I wanted
to be at the hospital, but I wasstill breastfeeding.
So I would have to go home and feed him and then figure out
who's going to bring him to me. And then it was like one night I
wanted to stay. And then there was mastitis
happened. It was just a hot mess of a
situation. But also I knew that Micah was

(23:35):
supposed to be a part of our family.
And he actually was very healing.
So he actually came in at the perfect time, even though it
sounds very overwhelming. And it was a little bit, but he
actually was my calm in the storm because I had something to
focus on while all this was happening with Miles and brain
surgery, Those quiet moments of breastfeeding him, I could just

(23:56):
go inward and focus on that. And that was my calming
mechanism through it. So he I call him my healing baby
because he did that in this journey.
Very cool, very cool. And then there's Andre.
You know, just going every day, fixing teeth and stuff and
normal stuff. So no, not to.
He was the poor guy that had to sleep at the hospital every
night with Miles and he literally wasn't getting any

(24:18):
sleep and he would still go to work.
And this man runs on pure energyand like loves his job.
It's pure cartoons and kid energy.
I don't even know. I love it.
I love it. So Andre, did you did you just
keep like your a change of clothes at work?
If essentially every day you just brought like a fresh pair
in, You're like, hold on, guys, give me, give me 10 minutes.
Let me just change and then I'llI'll get to that appointment.

(24:41):
Absolutely. I mean this.
Sometimes I love that. Like I said, it was late nights
and you're coming from the hospital straight to work.
And I mean, in a way, I guess itwas just the way normal doctors
do it when they're on call all the time.
But. You're so you're dentist like
I'm not. This is this is I picked
dentistry for this reason to nothave to do this.

(25:02):
Yeah. You're like, I picked the 9:00
to 5:00 medical career. I didn't pick this.
This is what I went to school for.
Just kidding, No, all all fun here, but it's it's interesting.
So I guess going back to to youryour pregnancy, so it sounds
like there your pregnancy went through this, the beginning of
the situation with miles and theexperience with miles.

(25:26):
So what, what kind of toll did that take on you?
What kind of Andre? And then also for you in the
same situation, what kind of things did you do to support
this pregnancy, but also supportmiles, but also support Mariah
at the same time, while also supporting a pregnant wife and
while also dealing with the stress?
Like what? Like how, how the heck did you
guys? Obviously you got through it.
We're here now, right? The storm ran out of rain, but

(25:47):
during that, how did because howdid you manage your pregnancy
because the stress level is high.
You mentioned you're in fight orflight.
So that's and then on top of that, you're stressed.
You're like, I don't want to overstress myself because I'm
not overstress the baby and all that fun stuff.
And like how did you guys balance that, help each other
out and work through that together?
That's such a good question. I think and being a Women's
Health advocate, especially for mental health and Women's Health

(26:10):
and postpartum, we had a, this is a whole another side note,
but we had a six year infertility journey and we had
to do IVF and a lot of stuff. So we had our kids through IVF
and then we were deciding if we're going to have a third.
And I was 40 when I had Micah. So also the age impacted the
decision because it's like now or never, you know?

(26:33):
And I knew he wanted to be in our family.
I'm very spiritual person and hewas calling to be in our family
because I was a big no for a while because I've had rough
pregnancies and I've had mental health challenges after Miles
and after Mariah. And it's taken a lot for me to
come back from that. And so I knew that it was going
to be a, if I did this at 40, I knew it was going to be a very

(26:55):
tough journey on my body, on my,not necessarily my mental
health, because I've done all the work to fix that, but on my
body. And so, but he was calling and
he was, I, I meant to be in yourfamily.
And Andre wanted the 3rd and we wanted four or five at some
point, but the infertility kind of just impacted that number.
Hey, there's there's still ways to get to four or five.

(27:18):
We do have actually 6-7 embryos left, so they could be Andre's
likes to have a soccer team. I'm like no, no, no, no.
Yeah, surrogate surrogacy. You could adopt some, you know,
there's, there's still ways to get that soccer team Andre.
You just got to just keep the pressure on.
Keep the pressure on. I'm just kidding.
I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.
I'm just kidding. I'm kidding.
I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

(27:39):
I'm kidding. I know.
Oh, my goodness. So, yeah.
So I knew it was going to be hard.
I knew that in the middle of Miles's situation.
So I he was my hardest pregnancy.
It was a rough pregnancy. I was sick.
It was hard. It was not fun.
But I think the reason for that is because of my stress.
I think that, and I truly believe this for Women's Health

(28:03):
as well, that when you are pregnant, your cortisol levels
will affect the way you feel in your pregnancy and your nausea
and your fatigue and all that kind of stuff.
So I think that my stress with Miles contributed to how crappy
I felt in pregnancy and it was rough.
It was a very rough pregnancy. And poor Micah, because he came
out so happy and he's the happiest, silliest baby.

(28:25):
So luckily it doesn't look like it that affected him.
But maybe your body protects kids pretty well in that sense.
And so I think that's probably why I had all the physical
symptoms because I was like taking it all on.
But I did have a rough postpartum.
I had a hemorrhage and I had to get 2 units of blood.
It was, it was crazy. We moved in the middle of Micah

(28:46):
being born. So we legit?
It's so much easier. So much why like why do we do?
This. Why not?
Why not? The day I went in, we didn't
need more safe. The day I went into.
Labor We moved out of our house and I was moving all of our
boxes at 37 weeks and we moved into an Airbnb for two weeks
before closing our next house onMicah's due date.

(29:08):
Why did we do that? Yeah, looking back now, it's, I
mean, all things considered, butthat's yeah.
Why would you do that? It just it happened.
We don't need we like our house was supposed to be done a month
before that and it just so happened to not be got delayed.
Because because what I see, likewhile you're moving, you just

(29:30):
said you're moving boxes. Yeah.
And you went into labor. All I can see is you picking up
a box, a light box. And then next thing you know is
like, set that box down. You take a breath, you look down
and be like that wasn't. Even time to go light boxes.
I was lifting heavy boxes and I was dancing with my other two

(29:50):
kids in the living room. They're like, no wonder your kid
came three weeks early. My.
God, right. You did it to yourself, Klaus.
No, I'm just kidding. He was meant to come early
though. He was supposed to be a 9 1/2 LB
baby. And I'm like, that's not
happening. That's a big baby I.
Had 9 1/2 LB baby not. Happy that's a big baby.
How big was he when he came out?Was he still pretty big?
No well, 7/2 for 37 weeks. He was 7 lbs two ounces.

(30:13):
So pretty good, yeah. He's a good size.
He was the same size as my othertwo who were born at 40 weeks.
Michelin. Oh, wow.
Yeah, he was. He was tracking.
He was. Tracking, yeah.
So I don't know how. To your body's like, Nope, let
me let me get this one out. Yeah, I don't.
I think that we just did it. I don't think we processed it in
the moment. We processed it.

(30:34):
Oh. You might have.
I was it. It just didn't go as.
Planned. You know, when life, when life
happens, life happens, you know?Yeah.
And as Constance, you know, alluded to, you know, one of the
things I think that truly, I hate to say it helped us, but
we're, we're we were battle tested.
I mean, we struggled through theinfertility journey for so long

(30:57):
and the ups and downs and the roller coasters and the doctors
and switching doctors medications and giving shots and
doing all these things where, you know, I mean, for me as a
man, I'm the one just kind of shooting her up and saying it
didn't work. OK.
But she's the one truly going through these body changes,
hormone changes, ups and downs, you know what I mean?

(31:21):
And it's like, you know, from Ohyeah, we, we, we have a
pregnancy. Is it going to stick?
Boom. And then you fall down that
roller coaster and, you know, now you're in this deep spot and
you're trying to lift her back up and you're trying to just be
there and be supportive. And to be honest, I think truly
that's what helped us through this the seizure journey was
because, you know, we, we, we knew if we could make it through

(31:44):
that to have a beautiful, healthy child until age 4, you
know, we can do a lot. You know, we just need to stay
together, you know, and obviously, you know, as we said
and wanted more kids and now we have these extra eggs and we're
saying, OK, baby #3 is calling us.

(32:06):
Hey, well, how do we life plan for that?
OK, We need more space in a house.
OK, We need this. We need that.
Do you love the practical side of it?
Yeah, yeah, no, that's that's me.
That's me 100%. That's me 100%.
It's like, OK, you feel that. OK, so let's do this.
Let's do this. Let's we gotta do this now.
Look here, we gotta make sure wegot the car here.
Do we have a big enough car? Do we got this?

(32:27):
Do we got that? Do we got such?
A man brain. Probably need a bigger because,
because that's membrane. OK, So like it's like men
membrane is so simple, right? Like just, and I explain this to
women all the time, right? And it's like our brains are
like a big warehouse, right? Big empty warehouse.
But you go inside this warehouseand it's just rows of shelves,

(32:48):
right? The big industrial steel shelves
with just stacks of like rows ofstuff, right?
With like the steel grading and everything, right?
Just like think of the Costco shelves and just like all the
way through this warehouse, sturdy, sturdy, sturdy, sturdy
as can be, sturdy as can be. And we have those, those black
and yellow boxes. We have them in the store

(33:08):
exactly the garage boxes, right?The garage boxes.
And we organize all the boxes are on the shelves, right?
But there's no boxes stacked on top of each other.
There's no boxes they don't touch either.
There's just enough, just enoughroom that is perfect, perfect.
And then we go to wherever box we want to get into.
We go down that row. We find that row, we get on our

(33:30):
little scooter, we go down to that row, we get off.
We go down that road to that box.
We pull that box off the shelf. We don't touch any other box.
We just pull that box out. We set it down, we play with it,
and then when we're done, we close it back up.
We put it back up. We get back on the scooter, we
go to the next one. That's Mambray got to.
Eat. Don't forget the guy we eat got
to grab. It yeah.
So then we leave the warehouse, we go eat and then we come back.

(33:55):
So but that woman brain is this big old spider web.
And I think of it as like a little like electric poles.
And like, like when you look, when you watch National
Geographic and they do like a spider episode and they go to
the details of a spider web and it's so intricate and it's so
intertwined. That's a woman's brain.
And you put like a little bolt of like electricity and it's

(34:17):
like all over that spider web. It's always just bouncing all
over the place. And that's the biggest
difference between men and women.
We're seeing it here in real time.
I'm just kidding. So I guess with with the other
children. So Micah comes into the picture.
But then we're then there's Mariah, middle child Mariah.

(34:41):
And it's always, it's always themiddle child.
This one's a middle child. My wife now is a middle child.
Yeah, Andre is a middle child. Yeah, I'm the oldest.
I'm the oldest. So I don't understand middle
child drama, but I see it for mywife all the time.
I'm like, oh, you're, you're acting this way because you were
a middle child and you didn't get the affection because your

(35:02):
sister and your brother were taking all the attention and you
were just the good middle child.Child.
She hates it when I call her middle child, and it's great.
I love it because middle child'sa real thing.
So for her specifically in all this, because she's literally in
the middle of two extremes here of her older brother going
through intense medical stuff, him getting all the attention

(35:25):
because of that, and then a new baby coming into the picture
that needs all the attention because he's a new baby.
And then she's just kind of, I don't want to say she's just
there, but at the same time partof it's just like her being
there, right? But since she's also at the time
2, now she's 4 almost or five going through all this years

(35:47):
later. And like, what kind of things
have you guys had to do to help her stay?
Feel included, Like she matters,like she's seen, she's heard,
and she's a part of everything. Absolutely.
I love this question because I didn't realize this while going
through it with Miles because I was so intensely having a

(36:08):
newborn and intensely having a child with medical issues that
it took me, it took her big emotions and her big reactions
and acting out for me to realizewhat was happening.
So it was a, it was something that I had to see and she gave

(36:29):
me that gift. And it's so at first seeing her
big emotions and her big reactions and her tantrums,
because out of the both boys, she has the biggest reactions,
the biggest tantrums, the biggest feelings.
And she's a Taurus as well. Her, her sign.
So I think that in the middle child and a girl.
And so I think it all kind of compacted on top of each other
that I, I'm like, what is wrong with her?

(36:49):
What is wrong with her? And then I took a step back and
I realized that she should be feeling this way.
And she's trying to tell me something.
She's trying to tell me that sheneeds more attention, she needs
more connection, she wants to beseen.
And it really was a gift that was given to me in a very hard
time. But also I, it had a good, great
realization. And so Andre and I worked really
hard at trying to have date dayswith each kid.

(37:12):
We would take, even with miles, we would take him out and I
would go and then we would switch and then my Andre would
go with Mariah and then I would go with Mariah and somebody
would watch the baby. And so we tried really hard to
do that. We still do that.
We still try to spend our one-on-one time.
We try each day, all right, because I'm a sleep consultant
for big kids as well. So I truly believe that kids
aren't going to sleep well and go down easier at night if you

(37:35):
if they don't have connection. So they need that connection
during the day in order to feel safe to sleep at night.
And so we try really hard to do at least 20 minutes of
one-on-one time with each kid every single day.
And so I needed to look inward again at what how I was
responding to her and what she needs.
She was asking from me because kids aren't bad.

(37:55):
They're really all good inside, like Doctor Becky says, right?
It's just they're trying to tellyou something and instead of
thinking they're defiant or they're a brat or they're
manipulative. Not that I thought these things
about her, but what other parents might think about their
kids, you need to get get curious about why they're acting
this way. Like, why are they doing this?
You know, and it's mostly because they need that

(38:17):
connection and they need that attention and you're not giving
it to them. And so over the last year, I
have worked really hard on this.And Andre can probably attest to
this with my connection with her.
And I have seen, we've seen a huge change and in her and it's
been a beautiful thing. I mean, wouldn't you agree?
What would you say about that aswell?

(38:39):
Being the troubled middle child as well, yes, you know, it's,
it's crazy because we used to say when she was younger, you
know, she just came out with this sass and it seemed like
this confidence and so on. And so, you know, the statement
would always be said, Oh, I don't have to worry about.
Mariah, she's going. To be fine, she's going to be
fine. So then you almost believe it,

(39:01):
and you almost, like you said, not forget about.
Her you don't nurture. It you don't, yes.
That. Confidence and so it was very
easy to not give her what she needed at that time because your
focus was on making sure Miles was OK and then obviously the

(39:21):
little baby was having what whathe needed.
So being the middle child though, and not being able to
breastfeed or do that, you know,I would be with Miles when he
needed, but I was probably more with Mariah.
He was. He gave her a lot of attention.
Doing whatever I could, you know, and obviously never having

(39:43):
a girl. I come from two other brothers.
So not even knowing that process, besides having a mom,
you know, of how to raise a girl.
It was tough. So, you know, it was one of
those things that I was learningon the fly as well.
But I tried to just be there. I tried to be present, you know,
I tried to. You know, there was many times

(40:05):
in my head I was like, man, she just manipulated me.
Like she is just playing my strings.
And you know, and I I always in my head, I'm like, OK, you know,
everybody said you have a, you have a little girl, she's going
to just play you Andre. She's just going to have you in
the palm of her hand. And in my back of my head, I was
always like, no, no, I'm going to be tough.

(40:25):
I'm going to be this. So you're.
Funny. You're funny.
You're funny. Exactly.
I get it. No, I I have two daughters.
So when it comes to that one-on-one time, do they how
often? And I don't I don't want to say
this in the wrong way, but how often are they just like I just
want to hang out with dad today or hang out with mom like who

(40:46):
who gets more of the who's the preferable one-on-one time
person? Well.
I was going to say that during that crazy time, Andre.
Like, really gay Marias, he was her steady rock of attention.
And so it was me that needed to work on that connection with
her. And so they have always had that
consistent steadiness. And he's always been able to
calmly approach her in her big emotions where I would get

(41:09):
overwhelmed and like, why is shegetting so mad again?
You know? So I feel like that calmness has
helped her. But they all want mommy.
I'm. I'm chopped liver.
No, you are. Not used to be on that totem
pole, Jay. And I right?
Do and I think I'm I might even be below the dog.

(41:30):
No, you are not rough below the dog crazy.
So you're you're above the dog. Don't.
Worry even the dog wants her more too.
Exactly. I walk the dog so she knows she
knows it's me, OK? She knows.
She knows. She knows.
Like, hey, I'm staying above this person.
I am your top of your totem poledog, not her.

(41:50):
I walk you. I feed you.
Like, remember, remember who's at the top of your totem pole.
Don't, don't get crazy. But no.
They all want me at night, but but the one-on-one time, they do
love going with him and doing like if it's a date day, they're
like I want to go with Daddy to the movies or I want to go with
Daddy to whatever, play soccer or whatever it is.

(42:14):
And I think that just goes with the ages too, you know, I mean,
obviously there's times where they just want mommy more and
there's times where they just want daddy more.
So, you know, I think obviously as a as a parent, you can't take
that personally too, even thoughyou want to.
You don't want Teddy to put you down from night night.
What do you mean? But you know, it, it's one of

(42:36):
those things that just it will we all have our time to come and
be there. So the key is just be there.
And when you're there, you know,put your phone down, put it
away. That's one thing I I try my.
Hardest to do. When I come in this house, it,
it's truly is kid time because alot of times I'm at work, so,
you know, she's got her hat on and I'm sure she's happy to be

(42:57):
like, OK, they're all yours. Yeah, I do, you know.
She walks in the door and I'm like see you later.
It's 20 minute mommy time to myself self.
Care. Yeah.
Love it. I love it.
I'm still. Finding her in the back.
Like. Blocking myself.
How do they find? Me.
Yeah, no, I hear that and I meanat least Andre, you have a good

(43:17):
excuse. Your hands are literally busy at
work to where you can't be on the phone cuz I mean, if you're
over here, if you're my dentist or my kids dentist and I see you
over here like no, it's OK, it'sOK.
Let me I'm. Just Youtubing, it's all right.
Guys, yeah, let me just I'm justwatching the podcast, just
watching the podcast. I'm watching WWE right now I'm
watching the highlights from last night, so OK, sorry.

(43:40):
A lot of jokes, a lot, a lot of fun, A lot of fun.
Yeah, let's see, that's really all the things I wanted to talk
about because it's interesting to hear the the experience of
how you guys got through it. I I love having that
conversation to see like, OK, this is the storm we went
through. This is how we navigated it.
And then I love what Andre, I love what you said.

(44:00):
Like we were battle tester from the IVF.
We didn't even get into that because I didn't even know that
was part of your guys story. I talked to a, a former NFL
player. He's a, he's a big voice for,
for IVF in that community. His name's Corey Parchman.
He used to be a wide receiver inthe NFL.
Now turn IVF advocate and authorand things like that.

(44:22):
Really cool dude had him on the podcast.
And like I've talked to two other other dads about like
their miscarriage journeys and things like that and and like
the fertility journey, like the toll I had like men and like how
they supported their their wife's and their their
significant others through that.And it's it's such a process and

(44:44):
for six years. I can't imagine the ups and the
downs and the the hopes and the like the the highs and then just
like the absolute depths of likelows and the the times where
it's like, should we just give up on this?
Yeah. Should we just quit?
Yeah. And I love what Andre was saying
too. Like, you know, he's like, I'm

(45:04):
just I'm just here giving you shots kind of thing, right?
Like, yeah, it doesn't affect meas much.
I guess it affects you. I'm not going to discount that
at all because it does. Because like you get hopeful,
you get excited. Like, you know, we've been
excited, me and my wife, we've been re it's my, my second
marriage, her first. But you know, we've had a couple
times where it's like. Yeah.

(45:25):
Yeah. To where we're, we're hoping and
then it just doesn't, doesn't come through for us and whatnot.
And it's, you know, it's, it's hard and as a man, but like, as
a woman, like you're, you're going through like all, like
Andre said, all the hormonal changes, all the shots, all the
medical treatment, all the things, all the UPS, all the
downs while you're trying to, you know, have a career.

(45:46):
And you know, it's, it's hard onmy wife because we had, we've
had a couple like times that we thought we're like, oh, oh, are
we? And now it's like, we're not.
And it's like we, I have the two, the two kids that I brought
into the marriage and whatnot. And it's like hard because I, I
see how hard it is for when that, when every month comes
along, it's like, hey, is this going to be the month to where,

(46:07):
where we're late and, you know, we finally get it kind of thing.
And then like her, her cycle comes and it's like, Oh yeah,
not this time, not this time. And it's just like defeat that
comes with that on top of everything else.
It's, it's tough. It's a journey.
And you know, six years of that,like wow, like 6 years.

(46:28):
I can't imagine the ups and downs that went through that.
And that's it. That's a whole nother podcast, a
whole nother like conversation itself to break that down.
But I love that that's part of the journey here too.
You mentioned that Mariah is a Toros and I I'm an Aries.
So her and I would vibe her and I would vibe hardcore fire, fire

(46:49):
meets fire. You know it's where it's at.
Fire too. We're Leo's.
We're heck yeah. Just just be lucky she's not a
cancer. Have a cancer.
My oldest daughter's a cancer is.
She, Mike, is a cancer. No Cancers are rough, Miles.
Is a Sagittarius so. OK, yeah, my, my littlest is a,

(47:11):
my littlest is a Scorpio. And she is the, she is the vibe.
She is. She's absolutely Scorpios.
Are the vibe. For sure.
Yeah, she's the coolest little kid ever.
But I guess going back to the tothe book a little, that's why we
were here to talk about the book.
But you know, the book guys, youguys get some book, you know,
the colorful tapes you guys are working on turning into a
series, right? Yeah.

(47:32):
And so what's like the big, likeoverall the big vision for the
colorful Cape series real quick.And then we'll jump into the
last segment of the podcast called The Dad Zone.
Yeah, so the book is launching on August 5th.
You can get it on Amazon on August 5th.
It's going to be awesome. We've put a labor of love into
this book. It's been about 8 months of
finding an illustrator and getting it right.

(47:53):
So colorful Capes of feelings, Miles and the Colorful capes of
feelings. And basically the book is about
how each week he meets a different friend and based on
what they're feeling, he gives them a colored Cape.
I've already, we've already written two other books because
each kid has to have their own book.
We were told this. You can't just have one for
Miles. It's not fair.
We made a book from Mariah, and it's called Mariah and Her

(48:16):
Colorful Tutus of Feelings because she's.
Very I love. That tutus, yes.
And then Micah is because he's little and it's a more of a kid,
a baby toddler book. It's Micah and his colorful toys
of feelings, such different toys.
And then I just came up with theidea of doing one that's mommies
have big feelings too. So I'm going to write a book

(48:37):
about that. So I love that.
Yeah, it just takes time to illustrate them.
So the first one's coming August5th, and then I'm hoping to
actually get Mariah's book out by the end of the year as well,
and they're all gonna be available on.
It's gonna be awesome. We have a website,
ww.colorfulcapesoffeelings.com and you can get updates there.
So we're excited. Very cool.
I love it. I love it.
I'm excited. It's just such a cool series.

(48:58):
Like books that are about emotions and especially books
that like follow up on each other that are like the same
theme. And even looking here, like, I
love that there's like, there's some color here, right?
Because you guys have, you know,mixed, You guys have biracial
babies, right? Mixed race babies.
I'm biracial myself. I know you can't tell.
I, I'm very, very not pigmented.It's the lighting.

(49:21):
Audrey can tell. I, I get that.
Like Audrey, like, you know, theone demographic of people who
can always guess I'm biracial and can guess that I'm part
African American, black, older black women.
Really. I think Andre knows exactly what
I mean. Like, they just know.
They know. They look at me and they'd be
like, yeah, yeah, they know, they know.

(49:44):
They know. They look at me.
They're like, oh, oh, yeah, yeah, you got, you got some.
You got a little some some, huh honey?
Well, my miles is the whitest ofour kids.
He's very, very light and I think most people look at him
and and they're like, oh, he I think a lot of people don't
think that he's bi racial, but you're right, I think that a lot

(50:04):
of black. Black.
Women are like you're, you know,yeah, that's crazy.
Like you said, it's that vibe. You put off that vibe.
Yeah. Do you, Andre?
Do you ever worry like when you're out with like Michael,
there's like, you must be a stepdad?
Michael looks so much like Andreit's not even funny.
OK. Yeah, and Mariah's the darkest
she's got. She's dark.

(50:25):
She's beautiful. She's beautiful.
That's cool. Yeah.
But Miles, when when we first had him, I mean literally, he
had platinum blonde hair. And so people would, I'd walk
into the grocery store and. What were you like?
Who's white baby's this? Who's white baby's this?
Who's white Like a TikTok? There's a TikTok auto who got
that white baby's this. No, but for real, he was white
and he had he had platinum blonde curly hair.

(50:49):
Oh my gosh. And people would ask me that I
would, but he was tan, like a beautiful tan and.
Oh, like a nice olive. Yeah, and I'd walk in.
That's what I I get that where? Did he get his tan from?
And I'd be like, his dad's blackand they'd be like, I love doing
that to people. They just blew their absolute
mind. Oh my gosh, blonde.

(51:09):
Hair. I'm like, yeah, everybody's
jeans are different. I guess genetics.
Susan. Susan, gosh, learn some science.
Anyways, let's jump. Let's jump into the Dad Zone and
then we'll wrap this thing up. So the Dad zone is 4 questions

(51:29):
to because the podcast, sometimes we talk about heavy
stuff. Today we talked about some fun,
some deep topics there. We got deep there a bit.
So let's we've laughed along theway the whole time though.
This has been super fun. So 4 questions in the Dad Zone
here, Constance, you get a special invite to the Dad Zone
today, very special. And you guys both have to answer
these questions. Welcome to the.

(51:51):
Warehouse. Yeah.
Welcome to the warehouse. These are the most warehouse
questions there are too, so they're literally as simple as
they can get. First question in the dad zone,
this is a YDP staple. Does pineapple go on pizza?
Yes or no I. Love pineapple and everything.
I mean if you throw ham with. It Joe just just pineapple?
Does pineapple go on pizza? No.

(52:12):
No, OK, OK. You guys can fight about that
later. That's fine.
You guys can deal with that together.
I just I don't know what I just started there you.
Started you started a war. I'm just kidding.
What is your guilty pleasure? Food and conscious, I swear.
If you say if you say pineapple.Oh, I'm just kidding.
No, no, that's our safe word. My gosh, that's so hard because

(52:34):
I have lots of guilty pleasures.I love to eat.
She loves Jamaican food. Jamaican Food.
Interesting. Andres Jamaica family's Jamaican
I just like could eat all of it.Rice and peas and oxtail.
I eat it up, man, I want. I love it.
I love it. My, I have lineage from Haiti.
So we're we're right there in the Caribbean together.
Yeah. It's amazing.

(52:54):
Very. Nice.
What's your guilty pleasure? It's tough, you know, I'd
probably say like cherry ice cream, you know?
Well, because you're very intolerant and you shouldn't eat
it. So when you do eat it, it's
definitely an indulgence. And later, not in the bathroom,
sorry. Hey, it's worth it.
It's worth it though. Every time.

(53:14):
Every. Time.
Every time. Mine's an Uncrustable.
I love me. I love me some Uncrustables.
That's hysterical. Love me some Uncrustables.
Peanut butter. But do you, have you introduced
the kids to the peanut butter and honey Uncrustables?
Yes. They love it.
OK. Good, Good, good, good.
Good parenting. Good parenting.
Second, the last question here, who are three people dead or

(53:35):
alive that you would like to invite over for a dinner party?
That's. A hard question, Bob Marley.
Like it? Dead or a lot, I don't even
know, but there's so many people.
What about you? You would probably say a soccer
player because you're Andre usedto play soccer in college.
Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee.
Nice. Lost a blank on his name.

(53:56):
Oh my gosh, I like your Bob Marley answer.
He do. He was.
He was on my list. Yeah.
I think I would invite Chill Sandler because she's hysterical
and real and I love her, Yeah. Like would you guys have Kevin
Hart? You guys both have one more.
I actually think he is hilarious.
Yeah, probably him. Maybe Dave Chappelle?
Yes, I love the Chappelle Show. I used to watch that on repeat.

(54:19):
I used to have like the DVDs of the Chappelle Show and I would
watch those on repeat. I love.
Can you imagine? Dave and Chelsea together, that
would be. Oh my gosh, that would be
everyone be laughing the whole time.
I mean the whole time. So like Andre and I just want
funny, happy people around, I think.
Yeah, that would be so fun. And then last cartoon
characters. So I was trying.
To. Find you can name cartoon

(54:41):
characters. That's fun.
Jasmine. Oh my Lord.
Whoa, whoa, whoa. She.
Can bring Raja Andre. I like it.
I like bring Raja Raja. You could just have Raja there.
Jasmine doesn't have to come. They can Mariah was true when
the. Jasmine came.
That's true. That's true for.
The kids. I like it.

(55:02):
I like it. All right, last question here in
the dad zone. What is one piece of advice you
each would give so you both get an answer here?
What is one piece of advice you guys would give to a young
parent? So obviously, Constance, yours
is going to be to a young mom, Andre, to a young dad who's age
18 to 22, just starting out their their journey here on
parenthood. I think that I have kind of

(55:26):
something that entwines into it,two things that entwine into
one, but you don't have to do italone.
I think that a lot of day, a lotof things in the last
generational things in the last 10 years have made moms feel
like if they can't take care of their baby alone, they're not

(55:48):
strong enough, they're not resilient enough.
But that's a crock of crap to me.
I think that it takes support and a village to raise a child,
even if you're not a young parent, the young single parent,
even if you're me who is 35 to 40 having kids and I have a
supportive husband and a supportive parents.

(56:09):
His parents are here, my parentsare here.
They're amazing. And we couldn't have done it
without them. Like I couldn't have survived
miles of situation without our parents.
You don't have to do it alone and you shouldn't do it alone.
So even if your parents aren't around or if you don't have a
partner, find somebody that can support you because you should
never do it alone. You need support as well.

(56:29):
And so don't feel like you have to.
It's not a badge that you get onyour chest.
Like, oh, I did this all on my zone.
Like it doesn't have to be that way.
And it actually is better for your mental health and your
child's mental health if they'resurrounded by more people that
will love them. Very true, Audrey, you.
Know, do things that you love, be around things that you love.

(56:50):
You know, your partner, your job, your career, because when
you do have these kiddos, you know, there's so much love that
comes out of you that you just never even knew you had.
And so if you can, if they can see that all the things that you
do is because you love. Then love it.
I love it. Well guys, thank you so much for

(57:11):
the conversation today. This was a lot of fun.
Everything from a little bit of IVF talk to your guys's how you
guys got through it more about miles about his you guys
experience with dealing with going through that with a child
who was experiencing you know such medical needs and while
parenting and while having expanding your family and all
the things in between. This was such a cool, fun and

(57:33):
unique conversation and I, I personally really enjoyed it and
we got to laugh a lot. That was fun, Lots of fun jokes
and stuff. And then for the listeners, if
they're watching on YouTube or Spotify video or something, you
can see right here colorful capes of feelings.com.
You can see the books right here, Miles and the color
feelings. You can see Mariah on the
colorful tutus of feelings and then Michael Micah's colorful

(57:55):
toys and feelings. I love that you guys all have M,
They all have M names. I think that's really unique.
And then you can meet the authors right here.
Look at them adorable right there.
Look at that. And then yeah, just you can read
our books. Why our books?
It's so cool. Very interactive website and I
absolutely love it. I love the orange Cape.
And this is such such a cool concept that you guys have going

(58:16):
on here with the colorful capes and feelings and colorful tutus
and colorful toys. And just to express this so
unique, so cool. And listeners, if you're
watching this, please go and support this, this amazing
couple here, this amazing concept, these books here.
Because the more books about feelings that you have in your
home, the more that your kids have access to them, the more
the easier that they're going tohave a time creating a language

(58:39):
that's supportive of them expressing themselves and
getting these feelings and emotions and thoughts out of
their heads and being able to communicate with you, which will
essentially as a parent that will make your life easier.
Little hack there and then just to put a complete bow on this to
our listeners, if you're listening to this wherever
you're listening to it, you're listening to a podcast.
What do you got to do You know the things you got to do.
You probably listen to plenty, plenty of podcasts.

(59:00):
So go and do the things you can to do to support the podcast,
like comment, subscribe, interact, engage.
Engagement is huge for every single podcast So go and engage
with the content, please. It makes a big difference.
Leave five stars on Apple and Spotify on Apple leave a review
because why not? It takes 10 seconds.
You don't you're not doing anything anyway.
Go and if you're laying on the couch, just do it real quick

(59:23):
when you get out of the shower and out of the shower right now
because you oh, it's over. I can get out of the shower now.
Leave a quick review, dry your hands, leave a review, whatever
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ways you can support the show and get some cool gear, things
like that, go ahead and head down to the show notes.
Head over to Instagram, click the link in the bio as the kids
say and support some great brands that also support the

(59:43):
show. So with that, until next time,
take it easy. Remember, your kids aren't the
enemy, they just need to learn alanguage to communicate their
feelings. And with that, I'll catch you
right here on the next one.