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June 6, 2025 35 mins

Big news, friends. Jessie Stephens and Amelia Lester are bringing a whole new vibe to parenting podcasts with this brand new mini series: Parenting Out Loud. 

If you're deep in the trenches, Parenting Out Loud will help make your world feel just that little bit bigger with the week's hot topics explored, examined and digested. Because if parents are thinking about it, we're talking about it. 

On this week's episode, grandparents get a long overdue performance review, we unpack the article that stopped us in our tracks, take a deep dive into Mormon Wives (and mothers), and investigate the playroom that got Amelia all riled up. 

Plus, recommendations: A fool-proof recipe, a genius toy to get kids off screens and a book that shines a light on sibling relationships. 

Come join the conversation. New eps drop Saturdays. No shoulder spit-ups required. 

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Recommendations

Jessie wants you to bake these oat bars AND recommends the toy, Tonies.

Amelia wants you to read Intermezzo by Sally Rooney.

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    Episode Transcript

    Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
    Speaker 1 (00:10):
    You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.

    Speaker 2 (00:13):
    Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
    that this podcast is recorded on Hello and welcome to
    Parenting Out Loud. I am Jesse Stevens and I am
    joined by Amelia Lester. We are embarking on a mini
    series all about what's happening this week through the lens

    (00:37):
    of being a parent. And to be clear, we are
    not going to be talking about wheatbits in our hair
    or vomit on our shirts. This is not your mother's group.
    It's a series that we hope will make your world
    feel just a little bit bigger. In short, if parents
    are thinking about it, we are talking about it. Welcome
    Amelia Lester. How old are your kids now?

    Speaker 1 (00:57):
    My kids are five and seven. They're both in school,
    which has given me an unexpected sense of order and
    serenity because I know where they'll be most days and
    I don't have to think about it anymore. And it's
    not all the day care fees. No, it's very cost efficient.
    I moved back to Australia from the US, where I
    spent the last twenty years on and off last year,

    (01:17):
    and I guess I should say that in my day
    job while my children are at school.

    Speaker 2 (01:21):
    I am a journalist and I have a toddler as
    well as a niece who I claim as my own.
    And you may know my voice from Mummy are out
    Loud or I also hosted The Baby Bubble recently with
    my twin sister Claire and Hello Bump, which is all
    about pregnancy. I'm on Mummeyre out Loud thirty three times
    a week, so I'm sure you know me well. On

    (01:42):
    today's show, the grandparents are not okay. In fact, they're
    reaching their limit. Since when did grandparenting become a full
    time job? Plus the boy who came back, the searingly
    honest article that got us thinking about what it means
    when your world as a parent implodes and the reaction
    of the people around you. But first, Mormon wives, We've

    (02:05):
    got Ballerina Fum, We've got this secret lives of Mormon wives,
    We've got tradwife culture.

    Speaker 1 (02:09):
    People keep grabbing my arm and telling me I have
    to watch this, And as someone who loves selling Sunset,
    but that's kind of the extent of my reality TV immersion,
    I need you to explain why it's suddenly the zeitgeist.

    Speaker 2 (02:23):
    I have looked at what it is about this moment
    that has made Mormon culture so prominent, right because there
    was an article in the Washington Post end of last
    year which was all about how twenty twenty four was
    the year of Mormon women specifically, and this is what
    the article said that Mormonism, and to be clear, that's
    the theology of the Church of Jesus Christ in the

    (02:45):
    Latter day Saints, and it emphasizes a Christian view of
    God and Jesus while incorporating sort of unique doctrines and practices.
    So as someone who grew up Catholic, recognize some things,
    don't recognize a lot. But it pairs very well with
    social media and capitalism.

    Speaker 1 (03:02):
    But isn't it like all about not drinking coffee or
    alcohol and wearing odd undergarments?

    Speaker 2 (03:07):
    Yes, well, I think that the That's what's interesting is
    the way in which it is engaging with the present moment,
    right because part of Mormonism is about the performance of purity.
    It's about performance, which obviously lends itself to social media.
    It is about perfectionism, which you'll see in like a
    Ballerina farm representation, where it's all the matching clothes of

    (03:30):
    the kids and the beautiful hair and the beautiful home,
    and there's something quite alluring about that.

    Speaker 1 (03:35):
    So Ballerina farmers Mormon.

    Speaker 2 (03:37):
    Yes. And it's the prairie dress as well, which is
    there's something that feels quite nostalgic about it because in
    the US, probably even more than here, but in Australia too,
    parents are kind of broken. So the idea that you
    live in this stunning farmhouse with all the kids you
    could ever want, and you barely need to leave the house, yes,

    (03:59):
    really works in I'm in. And the other thing is
    that Mormon women traditionally are not meant to work outside
    the home. Now social media has given them a loophole
    means that they can work. They can actually make a
    heap of money and never walk out their front door.
    So they're doing the cooking and the sewing and all
    of that quite aspirational stuff and we're or consuming it

    (04:22):
    and making money is part of Mormonism in a way,
    it's not part of Catholicism.

    Speaker 1 (04:28):
    Right.

    Speaker 2 (04:29):
    It's like God blessed you if you walk around with
    something very fancy.

    Speaker 1 (04:32):
    And because it's very intertwined with it's a very American religion.
    It was fun in the United States I believe in
    Upstate New York. I have seen the Book of Mormon. Yes,
    so I bringing back knowledge to this and it makes
    sense that therefore it would be more comfortable with capitalism.
    So is this show about them sort of performing their

    (04:53):
    purity on social media because that sounds a bit boring.

    Speaker 2 (04:56):
    Well, I think that it's about the hypocrisy, and I
    suppose this is what makes it an interesting rich text
    on social is that we know what the doctrine says,
    and we know what the Bible says, and then you've
    got people putting both in their face, or drinking lots
    of soft drink, or doing.

    Speaker 1 (05:13):
    Lots of soft drinks. My god, this is crazy talk Jesse.

    Speaker 2 (05:18):
    Or doing certain drugs. It's like the loopholes that they
    find while also looking stunning. And also I read this
    line in The Atlantic recently that said America loves mothers
    more than it loves women, and I thought, there's something
    about these Mormon mothers that we find particularly aspirational. If
    you're in that, then you get a lot more license

    (05:39):
    to sort of muck around with the other stuff. But
    it does make it addictive.

    Speaker 1 (05:45):
    I also read that there's a whole subplot of something
    called soft swinging, yes, And I don't think they mean playgrounds.

    Speaker 2 (05:54):
    No, no. And I think that it's like there are rules,
    but they're weird rules.

    Speaker 1 (05:59):
    Right, And I think part of this also, I agreed
    completely on the tadwife element, and it so speaks to
    the anxieties of our times and not knowing whether the
    robot overlord's going to take over, that we're all diving
    deep on people who are perfecting their bread recipes. But
    the soft swinging, I think is also part of an
    exploration of polyamory that is happening amongst elder millennials right now.

    (06:22):
    Oh so true.

    Speaker 2 (06:24):
    And that's the thing is that Mormon wife slash Mormon
    women are mothers, but they get to be sexy. And
    we'd all like to still be a bit sexy. But
    this vision of motherhood that we've been left with is
    kind of like your asexual, your drab, And so there
    is something that feels almost aspirational, being like, look at

    (06:44):
    their incredible sex lives. Yes, and they're pretty and they're
    great mums.

    Speaker 1 (06:48):
    It's prairie a dressment make it sexy. It makes total
    sense to me. Now are grandparents underperforming? It's time for
    a performance review. A recent article in The Atlantic unpacks
    a sentiment amongst millennials that their parents are not chipping
    in enough to help with their families. But then it
    argues that contrary to that perception, grandparents are doing a lot,

    (07:09):
    doing more than ever. In fact, we're in the era
    of something called peak grandparenting. Let me outline this argument
    because I'm very curious to see whether you agree, Jesse.
    It argues that parents struggle has become grandparents struggle because
    grandparents now aren't just the disciplinarians or the playmates that
    they used to be, but they're co parents. And a
    sociologists quoted in the article says that grandparents fall into

    (07:31):
    three categories. You're ready for them. Yes, there are those
    who look for every opportunity to look after their grandkids.
    Those people are called Anne Stevens.

    Speaker 2 (07:38):
    Yes, exactly right. That is my mother to a TEA.

    Speaker 1 (07:42):
    Second category those who don't want to do any care
    of grandkids. I don't actually know many grandparents who fit
    this description.

    Speaker 2 (07:48):
    I do, and we'll get to them.

    Speaker 1 (07:49):
    Okay, good, Yeah. And a third category, which I really
    that's what I want to talk about today, is grandparents
    who want to be involved, but they also want to
    set boundaries. Some strategies that these grandparents try. They commit
    only to doing fun things with the kids. That means
    no dentist visits, no math tutoring, just the fun stuff.
    They semi regularly ignore their adult child calls and they

    (08:10):
    help out only on certain days, and they do this
    because they're tie it. It's only very recently that we've
    developed this idea that grandparents should be always available. And
    oh yeah, looking back on my childhood in the nineties,
    I realized that was true. It's a very recent phenomenon.
    It's basically happened for reasons you might expect. A lot
    more people are working outside the home now, parenting itself

    (08:32):
    has intensified and people are living longer. So Jesse, what
    do you make of this rise of grandparenting as a
    full time job? And what do you say to these
    grandparents who say, I love to be around my grandchildren,
    but I also need my me time.

    Speaker 2 (08:47):
    I worry about the ones who don't have the guts
    to say that, because I think that you can easily
    be exploited and then feel very exploited. But we talk
    about the Sandwich generation, right, the generation that has elderly
    parents who might require care and kids. But now there's
    like a club sandwich generation, which is that those kids
    have grandkids. So they're kind of smushed between these three generations.

    (09:11):
    And let's be honest who we're talking about here. Are
    we talking about grandparents or are we talking about grandmothers?
    Because the economy relies in order for mothers to go
    back to work, they require their mothers or their in
    laws to give up some paid work, to give up,
    whether it's exercise, whether it's socializing, all of those things

    (09:32):
    which are like sacrifices after having done that for a
    period of their lives, which is a big ask. So
    I think that the economy and I remember, I think
    it was last year jd. Vance was being asked about
    the situation in the US and he said, maybe grandparents
    could step up more. So you want them to fill
    holes in the economy or the fact that childcare is

    (09:54):
    prohibitively expensive, or that every family requires two parents to
    be working pretty close to full time. You're then relying
    on the unpaid work of this generation. I think it's
    about how much of it is a choice, right, Because
    in some situations, if you've got a mum who says
    we can't pay the bills, unless I go back five

    (10:16):
    days and you have someone in their seventies doing five
    days a week like that is an enormous ask. And
    I don't think culturally we've decided yet whether child rearing
    is work or not. Like I think that our conception
    of work is really like confused to an extent.

    Speaker 1 (10:36):
    That's so true.

    Speaker 2 (10:37):
    What's your relationship like with your parents and help?

    Speaker 1 (10:41):
    Well, this article really opened my mind because I moved
    from the US back to Australia last year in part
    because I wanted to spend more time with my parents,
    and I wanted my children to spend more time with
    my parents. And that has been such a rich and
    rewarding experience I think for all parties, and I think

    (11:04):
    for all parties, it has also been a challenging experience.
    It's been both those things in part because my parents
    have had to make trade offs. I don't want to
    speak for them, but I can see and observe that, yes,
    they have gained the company and the friendship with their
    grandchildren that is so special, which can't be nurtured in

    (11:25):
    once a year trips, but they've also had to give
    some things up. So the first and biggest thing they've
    had to give up is they're retired. They used to
    enjoy traveling. They kind of feel like they can't travel
    like they used to now because I need them because
    both my partner and I work full time, and although
    both my children are in school, there's just so many

    (11:46):
    cracks that you have to paper over or stand over.
    And so, for instance, anytime one of my kids is sick,
    I call them, and I hate doing that because when
    it comes to planned social events, I never call them.
    I have a little bit of a rule, which is
    that if I'm doing something fun, I have to get
    a babysitter because it's not fair to use them as

    (12:09):
    just sort of unpaid labor sitting around my place while
    my kids are asleep. I want them to be able
    to do fun things with them and to develop their relationship,
    and doing bed time not fun, not to be in
    a relationship, So I get babysitters for that. But when
    they're sick and have to come home from school, I
    do have to call them because I've got to make

    (12:29):
    money and do my job. So I'm aware that that
    means that, for instance, my mom might want to go
    to her exercise class as you mentioned, or my dad
    might want to do his projects and then they have
    to drop them to pick up the kids from school. Yeah,
    and that sense of freedom that is being sacrificed, I
    think is real. And I really loved that this piece

    (12:50):
    articulated that in a non judgmental way, because I think
    this is a conversation we're only just beginning to have and.

    Speaker 2 (12:57):
    Just because you love someone doesn't mean it's not work.
    And there was some really good points. I think it
    was in this article. It might have been another one
    that was more Australian focused, and it was saying that
    one in three grandparents in Australia help out with childcare.
    But there's been studies done about grandparents and life expectancy
    and how it really helps with cognition, really helps with

    (13:19):
    not feeling lonely, and how those connections can give you know,
    some people are totally new lease on life.

    Speaker 1 (13:27):
    And yet when I throw this back at my parents,
    this is helping with your cognition.

    Speaker 2 (13:31):
    Exactly, I'm giving you ten extree years. I've given you purpose.
    But on the other hand, I was speaking to a
    family friend recently who said that she moved cities so
    that she couldn't be asked because she was starting to
    feel so trapped by the expectations, and I think she
    was in a bind because you offer child one a

    (13:53):
    certain level of care, so you go, I'll look after
    them a day a week. But then their second child comes,
    maybe their third child comes, But then what if they
    got siblings, and then you've got seven and you're like,
    I'm doing fourteen days a week with children, and I
    don't have the retirement that I want. I don't have
    any of the freedom. And then I think it also
    puts adult children who are adult parents in a situation

    (14:15):
    of going maybe they feel entitled to that privilege. Like
    I know, I'm not sure what your experience is, but
    when I speak to friends about I'm almost self conscious
    about how much help I get because I know that
    it is such a privilege and not everyone is afforded it.
    Either they have lost their parents, and this is a
    particularly difficult time to feel that loss, because they know
    their parents would have loved to their parents can't due

    (14:38):
    to disability due to mobility issues, or their parents don't
    want to, and that stinks.

    Speaker 1 (14:45):
    Yeah, it must be hard. I'm curious for you because
    you do have two grandmothers who, by all accounts pretty
    enthusiastic about the task. Yeah, but that must put a
    bit of pressure on you to just be a little
    aware of how much you're asking them to do. You know,
    they're never going to say no. You know they're always
    going to express delight about being asked. But do you

    (15:07):
    have to therefore second guess how much you're asking to do?

    Speaker 2 (15:10):
    Yes. And the big one has been my twin sister
    had a baby five months after me, So we now
    constantly check in and go how many days.

    Speaker 1 (15:19):
    I've got to coordinate.

    Speaker 2 (15:20):
    We've got to coordinate because mom A's not gonna tell
    us and so I got no, she's not doing five
    days between us. She'll do one day with me and
    maybe she'll do one or two days with you. But
    I know her exercise class is on a fast and
    we are not asking her. We're very careful about that
    because we want to protect her, because if we ask,
    she will say yes. And that relationship, like watching my

    (15:43):
    daughter's relationship with her two grandmothers, is one of the
    greatest jows of my life. Like it is, oh my god,
    they love each other so much, but you're also like,
    you need a break.

    Speaker 1 (15:54):
    Yeah, they need rest. One thing I thought was really
    interesting is that there was a study done in twenty
    twenty one of British grandmothers, and apparently all these British
    grandmothers were like, why do I have to supervise these
    children on everything? They were like, I've got to supervise
    their whole work, I've got to provide them with educational activities,
    and all of them were taken aback by how intensified

    (16:16):
    grandparenting has become.

    Speaker 2 (16:18):
    I've had to go. My sister and I have talked
    about this. When they are in the care of grandparents.
    I think it's different. If it's paid, I think it's different.
    If it's someone who's babysit whatever.

    Speaker 1 (16:27):
    Then you can just tell them exactly what you want,
    want to.

    Speaker 2 (16:29):
    Do what you want, and there's a really clear exchange
    going on. But when it is family, and you also
    know that they raise their own kids like they do
    have a good cv, you just go is your rules?
    Like I called Mum the other day and it was
    ten am and Luna had a bickie in each hand
    in this movie and I just went.

    Speaker 1 (16:47):
    Wait, now was.

    Speaker 2 (16:49):
    Between her eggs? It was the gross motor skills. That's
    what Grandma's teaching.

    Speaker 1 (16:54):
    Are you truly able to surrender control?

    Speaker 2 (16:57):
    Like that I am in that situation. There are moments
    where it's hard because I go, when she's with me,
    she's not getting wikis, But I go, it's my rules
    when I'm looking after her and the grandparents, and maybe
    it's my Nan lived with me growing up, and interestingly,
    I didn't feel like she was a parent in that
    she didn't that supervision that do your homework. There was

    (17:17):
    never that. But she was just this presence, a companion
    I thought Nan was. And I laughed with Mum sometimes
    I go, Luna thinks you're just a friend who comes over.
    She doesn't know it's care.

    Speaker 1 (17:27):
    I am so glad you raised this, because I think
    this is the other thing that has changed over the generations.
    I also had my grandmother living with us for much
    of the time, and she and I were really good friends.
    And she did not supervise my homework. She cut up
    cubes of cheese for me to watch the Barcelona Olympics. Yes,
    I am that old. And then get smart always gets

    (17:48):
    in the afternoon mash did you ever have mash on them?
    Burjoe's catchphrase was the other one?

    Speaker 2 (17:54):
    And I loved old people.

    Speaker 1 (17:56):
    Loved them, and I'd eat my cubes of cheese and
    then she make me cupcakes. She wasn't providing me with
    any educational resources. Now, she wasn't even saying you should
    really do your piano practice. That fell to my mother.
    And yet I think now I do have this sort
    of expectation that my parents are going to, for instance,
    tell my son to do his piano practice. And why

    (18:16):
    did that happen?

    Speaker 2 (18:17):
    Yeah, that's so true. I think that we became more
    intensive and with that, we're projecting it because we're more anxious.
    But I notice it with my mum. Sometimes my daughter
    will be doing something and Mum will walk me out
    the front door and will be standing on the thing
    and I'm like, mate, who's watching? Luna wrote, well, like,
    I'm so intense in that situation, But I go, you
    raised two sets of twins. Yeah, we got out of
    it somehow, and I think she'll be fine. There was

    (18:41):
    an article published in The Guardian last month that I inhaled.
    It was so beautifully written and so rich with insights
    and detail about one of the most difficult things a
    parent could ever go through. And it's funny. I often
    actively avoid this content, but this was going around. My
    sister sent it to me. And told me I had
    to read it, and once I started, I couldn't put

    (19:02):
    it down. It was stunning. The story was written by
    Archie Bland and it's called The Boy Who Came Back
    the Near Death and changed life life of my son Max,
    and it tells the story of how when Archie's son
    Max was seven weeks old, he stopped breathing in his sleep.
    It was described as an interrupted sid's situation is what
    they think happened. They had a night nanny at the time,

    (19:25):
    her name is Gina, who realized he'd gone quiet, ran
    into his parents and they immediately called an ambulance. Against
    the odds, he was revived and as a result, Max
    lives with a disability. It's unclear he's not yet too
    how this will impact him going forward. They know he
    has cerebral palsy, which impacts speech and gross motor function

    (19:46):
    amelia separately. Without us even discussing it, you had also
    read this article. What do you think it was that
    resonated with people so much and made it so deeply
    kind of affecting.

    Speaker 1 (19:59):
    There are so many things in this piece that we
    could talk about for hours. One aspect of it that
    I want to talk about is this social packs and
    effects of having a sick child, because it's not the
    same as arching his family. Every situation is of course different,
    but having had a child in hospital for an extended period,

    (20:21):
    there were parts which really resonated with me. What I
    found interesting about it was how isolating it was, because
    you'd think that when you have a child in the hospital,
    everyone rallies around, and yes they did. You know, there
    were meal trains, people were constantly checking in with me.
    It's not that people didn't care, but it's that no
    one knows what to say. And the fact is that

    (20:44):
    nothing anyone says is the right thing.

    Speaker 2 (20:46):
    And in fact, a misstep or a clumsy statement does
    so much harm that I think that people get scared.
    And that's what I found in this, And maybe I
    looked at why I read it, and I think I've
    had friends in that situation with sick kid, go through awful,
    awful trauma of all different kinds, and you do the

    (21:07):
    gymnastics of trying to find the right thing to say.
    And I was looking through this going I found it
    really interesting what was the wrong thing to say? And
    also he said so early on in the piece, basically
    I don't want to be the story that you look
    at that then makes you really grateful for your own kids.
    That's really irritating.

    Speaker 1 (21:26):
    Don't pull out the aphorisms. Don't say things to him like, well,
    I'm going to hug my own children tighter tonight.

    Speaker 2 (21:31):
    I hate that. I hate that. I suppose there's a
    truth in that that whenever we consume things about parenting
    or kids, we're always seeing our own is empathy, but
    it also almost dehumanizes his own son. And I found
    he had a few things that people said to him,
    like comparing going, oh, well, you know, my son was

    (21:52):
    really slow to sit.

    Speaker 1 (21:53):
    Up, or like, my son's just forever throwing his porridge
    around the room. Yeah, he's a mess too.

    Speaker 2 (21:59):
    As though it's the same when it absolutely isn't. But
    I had someone close to me with a child in
    hospital for a time recently, and again I'm not saying
    that this is comparable or it's the same situation as
    the one depicted in the article. But the power of
    this piece is that some of the things Archie describes
    so beautifully did feel really familiar, and I hadn't seen

    (22:19):
    words around them before. It's interesting what you say that
    there's people rally but your focus is so singular, and
    I don't think there's anything like it. You are not sleeping,
    you have no appetite. It is hell on earth, and
    even being in that environment is hell on Earth. Like
    to be in an environment with other sick kids is awful.

    (22:41):
    And so to have him describe it, he describes the
    orbits of like you walk out of the hospital and
    still people understand this is around a hospital, this is
    like serious shit. But then you go into the quote
    unquote real world and there's just fury because it's like,
    you have no idea, how can I go?

    Speaker 1 (23:00):
    Yeah. So basically this happened in twenty twenty, and for
    that entire year, I was very aware of the fact
    that I was pushing my friends away because anytime they
    tried to reach out, I was filled with anger and
    resentment that they didn't know what I'd gone through, couldn't
    understand what I'd gone through. My life was so much
    harder than theirs, and I was just furious at them.

    (23:23):
    And he pulls out a few things that people said
    that really bothered him. So, for instance, one that really
    got to me was that he said, don't tell me
    that this is scary. Oh, how scary? This must be
    for you to have your kid in the hospital. And
    that got me because that's something that I've said to people.
    I would say say in hospital, is that must be scary,
    because that's what I think is the true thing to say.

    (23:45):
    But he says it's not scary. Scary is losing your
    kid at the shopping mall. This is a whole other
    existential level. And another thing that he doesn't want people
    to say is to talk about how it makes them
    grateful for their own lives and their own children, and
    just let's talk about where we're at. So then he
    mentioned some things that were helpful. One of them was

    (24:08):
    a friend of his pulled his son aside and put
    him in front of the TV with all the other
    kids that are social gathering. Didn't make a big fuss
    about it, didn't check if that was okay for his
    son to be there, just did this thing, this quiet
    act of grace that enabled both the father to get
    along with his socializing, but also for his son to
    feel like a normal child amongst the other children. And

    (24:29):
    I thought that was such a beautiful, practical thing that
    someone did for him.

    Speaker 2 (24:33):
    I love that, And I think there's a sense when
    someone's in hospital that the people around you really just
    want it to be over. So saying that it's scary
    being positive in a way that's actually not not realistic,
    just makes a person feel really unseen. People just want
    the good news. That's why they're checking in because they
    want the good news, and it's like it's not here.

    (24:54):
    And when it's when there's ongoing struggles, I think, Yeah,
    people lean on cliches, probably because I don't know what
    to say, but I think it's helpful to kind of go,
    here's what you do say.

    Speaker 1 (25:04):
    I didn't want people texting me for precisely that reason,
    saying how are things because it's exhausting to have to
    update people with uncertain news. A lot of stuff that
    happens in hospitals is uncertain, Like that's why I realized
    through this process, all this test came back and they
    don't really know what's going on, and a lot of
    the time they didn't know what's going on, and so
    it's hard to give people definitive updates. So I would

    (25:26):
    find myself sending these group emails and asking people just
    to read but not right back, because then I have
    the labor of having to respond to them. It took
    me a long time to get over the anger that
    I felt, a lot longer than it took for my
    child to get better. And I just really appreciate how
    he went there with this piece. He didn't hold back.

    (25:48):
    He could see that people were trying to help. But
    it's also important that people understand how hard it is
    to accept and receive that help at a time like this.
    If you've ever wondered how a secession character might design
    a playroom, the Wall Street Journal has you covered. A
    recent Wall Street Journal article featured a playroom that's getting
    me angry. It's a venture capitalist mother and a tech

    (26:11):
    entrepreneur father in the New York City neighborhood of the
    West Village. They purchased a two bedroom apartment next door
    to their four bedroom apartment just to turn it into
    a retreat for their young daughters. Okay, I don't know
    if they've heard of making a fort with blankets and
    dining room chairs, but anyway, buying a two bedroom apartment

    (26:31):
    works too.

    Speaker 2 (26:32):
    When I was a kid, I made that fort and
    I put the blankets out, and then I lit a candle,
    and I'll tell you there was holes in the bottom
    of those chairs.

    Speaker 1 (26:38):
    My mom still remembers that I live in a two
    bedroom apartment. That's my two young children's retreat. Anyway, Setting
    aside the extravagance of it all, what is making people incensed,
    and I guess by people I mean me, is that
    there are no colors in this retreat at the request
    of the color reverse clients. The designers embraced monastic restraint.

    (27:00):
    The Raw Street Journal rights it's very muted. The interior
    designer is quoted as saying, so let me paint you
    a picture, Jesse, because this is a podcast, hand tufted rugs,
    a custom mural chairs from Copenhagen, and fifty shades of beige,
    or as the designers call it, oatmeal, flax, cream, stone, rope,
    bone and ash. Why is everything to do with kids

    (27:22):
    suddenly looking like a Skims catalog.

    Speaker 2 (27:24):
    I love beige. I will launch a passionate defense of
    beigey it gets such a bad rap. And I bought
    like linen for my bed recently and it was oatmeal
    with flax. It was those shades that I went, that's perfect.
    And here's the reason everything to do with children is

    (27:45):
    over stimulating in my house. Despite my love of the neutrals,
    I've got a red Elmo, I've got a blue bluey.
    They yell in the middle of the night sometimes for
    no reason because they batchooes go off. There is plato,
    there are crayons there, and then you know, if the
    TV goes on, don't even talk to me about the
    colors that come up. We've got the wiggles, like there

    (28:06):
    is so much color. It is an assault on the senses.
    Raising kids is an assault on the senses. It is
    very overstimulating, quite like a nursery tour that I get
    given on on social media sometimes, and I love when
    they walk in and it's also neat, and.

    Speaker 1 (28:20):
    They've always got these special custom designed cubes. Yes, yes,
    And I tried doing that in my house and I
    made signs with my apartment and I made signs for
    them for the kids, like this is my son's toys,
    this is my daughter's toys. Do you know how long
    it took for that whole taxonomy to be completely tossed aside.

    Speaker 2 (28:37):
    That's what's so funny is that the naivety of a
    nursery is always like they barely go in there for
    the first first little bit, and then the way that
    people line up all the nappies, and I think, oh, never.

    Speaker 1 (28:48):
    Do that again. You never do the lining up of
    the names.

    Speaker 2 (28:51):
    It's just and the like washing of the onesies and
    the putting them back in. But the neutral, I mean,
    I will also say that it's a real benefit for
    hand me downs, like because we have a lot of beige.
    I have friends who've had boys girls. What's true, let's
    gender neutral, very ginger neutral, which is great. And if
    you don't know the sex of a baby is also
    really good to throw it in. I mean, look, I'm

    (29:12):
    not too essentialist about gender. I think girls can wear
    blue and boys can wear pink. But some people, yeah,
    that's why we go very yellow during that period. I
    think the beige, I've seen an attack on beige, and
    I just think I think we can allow it and
    embrace more of the beige.

    Speaker 1 (29:27):
    You know, you are convincing me here. And another thing
    about beige or oatmeal or flax or the cereals is
    that you can throw things on them and it's sort
    of just all blends into the sort of beige camouflage
    of it all.

    Speaker 2 (29:41):
    Vomit meal a light pool, I think you just smudge
    it in. It does look like it's tonal it's actually tonal.

    Speaker 1 (29:49):
    As my husband is fond of saying it's either blood,
    semen or urine, but I hope it's urine.

    Speaker 2 (29:57):
    We should say your husband is a doctor relevant information.
    He deals with bodily fluids for a living Amelia. It
    is time for our recommendations of the week. And look,
    the rule for the is that it's recommendations that might
    apply to parents parenting adjacent. That is the rule. What
    is your recommendation?

    Speaker 1 (30:16):
    It is a book. It is called Intermetso it is
    by Sally Rooney. She's a really unknown niche writer. You
    may not have heard of her. No, she's in fact
    probably the most famous writer of AH generation. I guess
    I have to say.

    Speaker 2 (30:30):
    I have a confession about this book. I started it
    and I put it.

    Speaker 1 (30:33):
    No, I get it. I get it. I'm here to
    sell you on it. It's not a new book. It
    came out last year and it got very mixed reviews. Yeah,
    I was not going to read it. I didn't enjoy
    her last book. I just sort of felt like I
    understood the stick of awkward Irish people falling in and
    out of love. Did not need to read that.

    Speaker 2 (30:49):
    The love awkward Irish people.

    Speaker 1 (30:51):
    But this was like, it's just too much. You know,
    this is like her third or fourth book, and I
    get it. But then I just picked it up at
    the library and needed something to read, and I think
    it's my favorite of her books, and it's absolutely the
    best book I've read all year. And I want to
    say what I think people miss They missed the point
    to me, I think that this is a book about

    (31:12):
    two brothers. It's about the relationship between brothers, and I
    love that because I have a brother and I'm always
    reading books about relationships between sisters. And I think that's
    because novels these days are read and written by women,
    so naturally I think we're going to gravitate towards stories
    about women. But this really made me think about and

    (31:34):
    reflect on my relationship with my brother, and it helped
    me to understand it a little bit more. I love
    that Sally Rooney made such a valiant attempt to live
    inside the minds of two men. This never happens.

    Speaker 2 (31:47):
    She did do that very very well, and the inner
    world of the men came across as very authentic well.

    Speaker 1 (31:53):
    To be honest, I have no idea if she did
    it well or not, because I'm not a man, but
    to me, it was just really compelling. Whether or not
    it was accurate or not, I will have to leave
    that to the men. But it did give me a
    sense that I understood my brother better, relationship with him
    a little better. So basically it's about Peter and Ivan Kubec.

    (32:14):
    They are brothers who live in Dublin, their fathers just died.
    They're both negotiating romantic relationships with women. It is in
    fact about awkward Irish people. I need to make that
    clear up front. But I loved getting an insight or
    feeling like I got an insight into how men think
    about women and how men think about their siblings. And

    (32:34):
    that's why I'm recommending it.

    Speaker 2 (32:36):
    Maybe I should pick it back up. I have two recommendations.
    My first recommendation is a Tony box.

    Speaker 1 (32:42):
    Have you heard of those? Yes? Yes, I have one,
    and I need to dig it up. Remind me why
    it's good.

    Speaker 2 (32:48):
    Okay, So the tony box is like a soft box thing,
    and then you get Tony's what they're called, and we've
    got like a gruffalo or a pepper pig, and you
    put it on top and it either sing songs or
    tells stories or whatever, and the idea is the way
    that a lot of people talk to me about it
    was you get them off screens. It's really inter active

    (33:10):
    and they love it, and so it's a great way
    for them to feel really entertained by pig without looking
    at a screen. As we know that is parenting in
    twenty twenty five. Just finding weaselways around screens.

    Speaker 1 (33:21):
    Is Luna's favorite pepper No.

    Speaker 2 (33:23):
    Her favorite is the dog because it does round and around.
    There's some song that she loves doing because she does
    the dances to it, but we have to do it
    every night. There's one that does lullabyes, so we put
    that on before bed. And full disclosure, this was a gift,
    so I didn't buy this myself, and then I looked
    up how much it was, and that's why I was
    a little bit self conscious about my recommendation because they
    cost I think it's about one hundred and eighty nine

    (33:45):
    dollars for a box, and the tonys are twenty nine
    dollars each, So I understand that that's a lot. And
    I always get funny when like toys are recommended that
    are really expensive and it feels like they would make
    parenting easier, Like I just don't love that I also
    think from what I've heard, they last for years and years.

    Speaker 1 (34:03):
    We've had us for years.

    Speaker 2 (34:04):
    Yes, and it appeals to a five year old in
    a different way than it appears to a two year old.
    I'm going to check another one out there, which is
    a recipe Amelia I your kid's PICI eaters. I know
    we're not meant to use that term, but are they picias?

    Speaker 1 (34:18):
    Not really, to be honest, but people.

    Speaker 2 (34:20):
    Who hesitate, I'm like, they're fine. It's the ones that
    are like my child.

    Speaker 1 (34:25):
    Oh, let me tell you.

    Speaker 2 (34:26):
    They grab the food and it's like, my child eats
    four foods. Let's just say that. The list in my
    phone of foods my Charlie's the God send for us
    have been these things called oat bars and this would
    work for kids. If that sounds fibrous, Yes, yes, fibrous
    and has nutrients. And I'm just like, if she has
    one of those, at least she had something. It's like

    (34:47):
    a really good music. But I would eat one. And
    so it's oats. You put in bananas, the more ripe
    they are, the better, and then you can literally throw
    in like carrots or dates or prunes or one time
    I throw on some beetroops, and then you check at
    the oven and they last. I make them every week
    and you can freeze them and whatever, and Luna lives
    off them, and every time she eats them, I feel
    like a good one because I know it has things

    (35:08):
    in it that is good. There is a link in
    the show notes. It's I do not cook. There are
    about two things I can cook and this is one
    of them. And it has saved my life over the
    last year.

    Speaker 1 (35:18):
    And do you know what else is greed about it?
    It matches your preferred color scheme. It does because.

    Speaker 2 (35:23):
    It's smushed into the lounge. It doesn't matter beije lounge, brilliant.

    Speaker 1 (35:26):
    It's fine.

    Speaker 2 (35:27):
    That is all we have time for on Parenting Out
    Loud today, but we will be back next Saturday morning.
    See you then, bye bye bye
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