We acknowledged the traditional custodians of the land we're recording on today.
I already feel bad enough about that. Sometimes it's like you're not putting the idea into my head. Hello, and welcome back to Eat Sleep, Shit Repeat. The podcast soon to have a name change, and if Kiri Cells had her way, you would be referred to as Snott's because she wanted to call it eat sleep snot Repeat. What the actual fuck. I'm Kelly McCarran.
And I'm Kiri's Cells, and Kell was pretty brutal with her feedback.
We're going to get straight into things today because we have one hell of a guest later on in the episode. But first, peek and pit. But we're gonna make it snappy because our guest is more interesting than our silly little problems in offense.
Yeah, Queen through the.
Ship and I'm up first this week, so I'll start with my pit.
Last Friday, I was went for a lovely afternoon at my sister in law's house and we just had such a great time.
She was giving me all of her old.
Daycare clothes for rue, all hanging out, and then about two o'clock, I was like, all right, let's go. We'll go get some sushi, get back to our normal Friday mother daughter day with the girls. So I bundled the girls into the car and off we went. I got maybe just around the corner, and the sun was in my eyes, and so I pulled down my visor and guess what was right behind my sun visor? A huge, huge, hairy, long leg, big bodied Huntsman spider, and I lost my shit.
I was on a main road and it was so bad. I happened to also be drinking out of my drink bottle at time, and I used my other hand to pull down the visor. So at one stage I realized I was driving with no hands on the wheel because I automatically pushed the visor up to try and squish the spider, realizing it's not flush. So when I pulled it down, the spider was still there and then scurried.
Down onto the windshield the front.
Then I realized, okay, I had to like clock into gear here, Like what am I going to do? The kids are in the back. I'm definitely scared of spiders. I was pretty much hyperventilating by this point and screaming and ru was like screaming in the back because I'm screaming. I managed to get across four rows of traffic and then I just like throw my drink bottle with all the water in it at the spider. Then I just pulled into a random driveway, called my sister in law
and she switched into gear, came and got me. She was like, you get in my car with Rue. I'll stay with Suki. She checked that Suki was okay, and we drove back to her house.
Jim should do Survivor, like, honest, she should do Survivor. She would win. She's a woman you want around.
She just switched into gear and she's really scared of spiders too, But she was like, I haven't seen it, so in my mind it doesn't exist. So she had a good look, couldn't find it. Ended up spraying the car with rid. She was like, you need to sit here, eat food, have a glass of water, because she was like, I have never seen you like that, rattled. She had to move my car because it was blocking her curR in and as she moved it, she saw the spider
kind of dying and crawling along the back window. So we located the spider, but I could not drive home.
I called.
Charlie told him what happened, and I was like, I'm not driving home, like I'm too nervous with the girls in the car. It's also been raining heaps. It started raining again, so he ended up picking me up later.
Can nature just stay outside?
Yeah, I agree, and not in the car.
It's like, you know what happens, it's from parking under trees and huntsmen's drop out of trees into the car and because they're warm, they crawl inside. So avoid parking under trees when you're parking outside and hopefully that will help.
Can you please tell me now what your peak is because I've got the hebgbis.
Yes.
So our family were in town, Charlie's sister, George and her partner and our little new baby, Ronnie, so Suki's little new cousin. It's just like so exciting for them to come to town, Like they came at Easter and we just had the best best time and.
Then they came back.
Actually, George and I had hens that we went to on the Saturday, and George and I used to live in Sydney together, so it was a little bit of like the nostalgia for those times that we lived in the same city, and then just all of us being together on a Sunday at the local BOWLO like having family time. We don't get to do it because they live, you know, up north, so it's just.
Really nice anytime they come to town.
And even with my sister in law Gem and her husband, like Charlie's brother that live here. They've got three girls and Rue is just obsessed with them, obsessed with them. So I think the most time we all spend together, I just see their little cousin relationships.
Cousin relationships the best.
It's just so sweet and they just play so well together. It's the big, supportive, nurturing, loving family that I have always really wanted, and I feel like so happy to.
Have all, Like twenty year old Keys so happy.
She's like, whoa, anyway, what's your pit? What's your pit?
My pit is that I'm just so behind on my comms and I'm just so bad at it and it's really getting me down at the moment. It's not just one area as well. It's like Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, my emails, my actual text messages from my best friends. I'll go on there sometimes to text someone and I'll be like, oh, they messaged me three weeks ago and I just never responded. And I know that you're going to be like, oh, Kelly,
give yourself a little bit of slack. You're very busy, but you are also notoriously bad on comms, so I feel like you're just making an excuse for both of us being shit. So if anyone has like a hack that if they were really bad at comms and then they now are good at it and they have like a weird little secret hack, please let me know what that hack is, because it's really getting to me because it adds like this other layer of stress that I'm letting people down all the time.
Can I give you a hack now? Emoji is, using those emojis, doing voice notes, using Siri to dictate messages when you're in the car. It's really good. Like literally, I say it all the time, Hey, sirius and Kelly knew McCarry in a message, that's what you're saved in my phone as and it'll be like what do you want to to say? But I think taking the stress out of the response. Don't be like, oh I need to write back later, it's going to be too long. If it's going to be too long to a voice note.
If it's going to be too long, dictate the message.
Anyway, that's my pit. My peak is that two weeks ago Key, I had to call her straight away and she was so proud of me. I had proper canulas in my face and I didn't faint, I didn't get diarrhea, nervous poos, I didn't vomit, I didn't have to light well. I did have to lie down, sorry, but like I didn't have a panic attack. I was okay, what the hell?
It was amazing, what a win. I cannot believe you didn't pass out.
Why does no one else not have gas? Because it it didn't even really do anything. It was just such a good distraction. Yeah, So I was focusing on that and deep breaths and all that stuff that they tell you to do. Anyway, I don't even know. I was just so proud. Of course, if it was anywhere near a vein, I'm sure I would still have an absolute meltdown.
But the fact that I did something so intensive because a pr organized it, because like this new treatment in Australia that I was trialing for work, and I didn't know anything about it, which is my silly fault. But I turn up and then the doctor's like, you know, I'm signing everything, and she goes to your okay with canulas in the face, and I said, I'm sorry, Oh my god, no I am not okay, but I was there, Yeah, what are you going to do?
Walk out?
And also you know then I would have ruined the relationship with the pr if I'd walked out and not ruined it. But there are just so many layers of reasons why I couldn't just bail out at the last second. So I was, oh, anyway, I did really well.
I'm honestly so proud of you because it wasn't just a needle.
It was a canula, like a thick and.
Like going underneath the skin for quite a while. Reminded me almost like LiPo movements. You know when you see hears of LiPo and they go back and forth under the skin and you can kind of see the instrument. That's what it was, and that was in your face, Like I couldn't do that.
Luke was making a noise watching it.
I would too.
It was anyway, I'm proud of you to.
Talk to me sometimes.
Dolores sometimes you have to be a high rideing bitch to survive.
Okay, we have our first guest led Can I just be a bitch for a sec chat?
And it is a good one.
Our guest today is none other than the delightful Claire Stevens, friend of the pod and friend of ours. You definitely have read, watched, or listened to some of Claire's work because she is that bloody talented. It's actually kind of annoying because she's so smart. She's just one of those people that ticks every box. She is so smart and talented, but she's also just really funny and really nice. Claire
is a digital content creator, screenwriter, editor and podcaster. She's the former editor in chief at Mumma Mea, which is obviously where we met her, and she has produced some of the site's most viral content. She's the brains and talent behind the top comedy podcast Canceled, which she hosted with her twin Jesse for years and it was always charting.
She also launched the podcast but Are You Happy, which debuted at number twenty three in the whole country on the Australian Podcast Ranker and went on to be wildly successful. She works as a writer and producer on the Binge series Strife, and her first novel, The Worst Thing I've Ever Done, is due to be released in spring. Claire is also mum to a hilarious one year old Matilda and a longtime shitter. She has been with us, supporting us from the beginning, and we're so delighted to have
her on. Claire Stevens, Welcome to the pod.
Who I'm so excited to be here. I am such a devoted listener every episode.
We know, so we just adore you. So that's why we're like, even when we're reformatting the show, you were the first person on our examples of like a shitter led episodes.
Oh my gosh. When I heard you were having shitters on, I was like, oh my god, should I reach out?
But you know what, actually my example was it was Claire Stevens, how the hell did I write a book with a new boy?
Yes, you did do that.
It's not an aspirational story, I'll tell you.
That, listen. I'm sure it involves lots of tears. Yes, yes, many many, not just from Matilda. That's not what you want to vent about today. No, what do you want to venture about today.
Off, I have a rant, and I have to apologize because it's longer than a minute.
That's okay, to pease, I realized.
Okay, well, yeah, we weren't timing it, were we.
Whoops?
We make a lot of rules and we break it every single week.
Yes, okay, are we ready for my Rantay? Okay? My rant is generally about tradwives, but it goes in strange directions. Everywhere I look, I'm being told that your children are only young for such a short period of time, and it is so incredibly important to spend that time with them,
that to work is actually morally wrong. There are conservative commentators who say feminism has gone too far and it pushed women outside the home, and now women are less happy than ever because deep down we want to be at home with our babies, but we've been forced by angry feminists to go to work, and that stuffed up the economy to the point where women now need to
work in order for most households to function. I want to acknowledge that I do know a lot of women who have to go back to work before they feel emotionally ready, and there are a lot of mums who would love to spend the early years at home with their kids, and there are a lot of mums who do and to be totally transparent. If money wasn't as much of a pressure, I would probably work a little bit less. However, the tradwife aesthetic slash discourse has got
to go. So much of this conservative bullshit is idealizing a golden age that never existed. It never happened. There was no time in history where women walked around barefoot in silk slightly sexy nineties, doing crafts with their small families and being this imaginary perfect parent. This childhood they are asking us to create, never happened. Look at it from the child's perspective. A generation ago, it was my mum working with too many kids and not enough money,
no offense. Mum, I spent a lot of time in front of the television and inventing games with my siblings, and it was glorious. Two generations ago, it was my nana also working several jobs with seven kids who got no one on one time with their mother. Ever, three generations ago, it was more children because contraception didn't exist.
So where my time goes to paid employment, that woman's time went to her other fourteen children, and washing clothes and cooking and cleaning took longer because the technology wasn't there to expedite it. Before that, before industrialization and early capitalism, the nuclear family didn't even exist. We lived in multi generational homes which provided a village. So the grandmothers and the aunties and the cousins were all helping out, and
everyone was caring for each other. So a mother might be caring for a child but also their mother and also whoever else needed it. And cooking and cleaning is work. You cannot be constantly fully engaged with your child while cooking and cleaning. It isn't possible. This idea of complete self safe in the service of one child is a face, and I refuse to be beat up with a made
up stick. I'll also say that that guy who did that podcast episode about wanting a partner who didn't work and just goes on hot girl walks and is happy to see him at the end of the day, sir, it sounds like you're unaware that life also happens to women.
Even if a woman doesn't work and doesn't fucking hate housework like I do, she still might get the flu, and her family member might be unwell, and she might break her leg, and she might be stressed because the fridge broke, and you need to be there to support her. You not wanting to deal with the emotional load of your partner having a job. Is actually you not wanting to deal with the emotional load of having a partner. But that is another topic altogether. I just wanted to
get that in. In conclusion, research shows that even with more mums and dads working outside the home than ever, modern parents are spending twice the amount of time with their kids and parents fifty years ago. Stop glorifying a golden age that never fucking existed, you misogynistic to us. I'm done.
I'm sorry, well done getting that off your chest.
I actually really do you.
Look every time.
I see those freakin videos on social media that are saying like you know that one, it's Jordan Peterson's voice in the background and it's like young, yes, young man.
It's just so romanticized as well, because it's like, yeah they are, but you know what, you still have to pay bills when they're young, and they scream at you were lost, yes.
And like it just never happened. This year that we are idealizing, Like I think the act of being a parent is a constant exercise in guilt because you're never gonna feel like you're enough for your child, and that is kind of love, Like that's kind of what love is, feeling like you always want to give me because if.
You feel like you've given enough, well, you know what, you're probably pretty shit. You're a psychopath who doesn't love them that much. Exactly if you think you're done.
There's another like midwife such researcher who I always see on TikTok and she is always like going on about but breastfeeding and like the mum needing to be at home for the first five years, and her vibe is like if you're not going to be at home for the first five years, like why did you even have a child?
And I'm like, well, that's how we all bought there would be no.
Popular children human being.
I don't think I've ever heard it summarized so well with the generational differences, yes, and the invention of machines to help alleviate that stuff, Like, I don't think I've ever heard read it that clearly because it.
Is so true.
I mean I'm struggling so much at the moment with the house, and it gets me down so much, to the point where like people wanted to come and see Suuki as a newborn, and I was saying, like, no, but is.
That because you go on your phone and you see everyone with their perfect esthetic house where it looks like this kid doesn't even live. Yes, yes, And all the trad wife content where they've got like full makeup, beautiful gown on, it doesn't help and attached to their nipple, and it's like, that's just not realistic.
It doesn't help some of those creators who are doing that content.
What is it like when you turn that camera off?
Because I'm telling you, I'm spiraling about not even being able to show up and I don't even care what I look like on social media, but how you showing up so perfectly? Like surely there has to be a toll on that person showing up in that way. And then the other point I wanted to make was just about the fact that all of these tradwives are working.
Oh okay, that is the pyramid scheme of at all every panel I see where it's a woman and she's like, here's the case for not working. I'm like, what do you call speaking on a panel? Yeah, on a panel writing all of that. And I'm genuinely not saying that there is anything wrong with mums who stay home. I reckon, in an ideal world, I would love to have a period like that.
Why would you go for a hot girl walk every day?
I would freaking love that. And I think a lot of people would love that or have done that. I know so many incredible women who spent five years, seven years, whatever, yeah, and like, good on them. I'm parts of being a jealous of that. However, it's the tradwives who are like making a living out of time talking about it, and I'm like, no, no, no, no no. The definition of what you are proposing is someone that's invisible, like technically invisible because they're not writing or communicating.
The other thing about it is like the class version of it, because there are historically there's only one real group of people that could actually afford not to work exactly. And then the other thing is that the muddling of stay at home mum and trad wife because I never thought about it in that way, but I think what's really clever and the way that trad Wives has kind of got more momentum with it is piggybacking onto that. So people that don't actually want to be a trad
wife are now all lumped into. You know, you might want to be a stay at home mum, but you don't want to be a trad wife, but you're a lumped in together. So now there's this even higher level of excellence perfection that we're meant to reach is stay at home mums.
Yea, and is so performative and it is so classist.
It is so classist, and it's something I hadn't realized before, Like everyone looks at those mums and I was like, oh yeah, but be you know, objectively beautiful, have a perfect house, have the option not to have to go to work.
Every day even though you are going to work every day by filming content, going on past yes, monetizing, and they're.
Probably making a whole lot more money than you. That's ridiculous.
Then their partner swans in like as if they've had such a hard day.
Either of you.
Watched The Secret Live of Mormon?
Why no? But I need to, okay, because it's.
Really interesting because if you haven't seen the show, a group of Mormons became very famous. There was a swinging scandal.
They've got a pilot out of it.
It's glorious, it's old housewives, it's raw reality TV, and they just want to stab each other in the back.
It's perfection.
But what was really interesting about that is that all of them have done so well and they're in this very traditional relationship of genders. But because they're making so much money, their partners are a little bit like, oh, but now you're kind of outgrowing that. And one of them gave their husband an ultimatum and he actually left his medical school placement in order for her to be
in mom oh. But that I felt was really interesting because a lot of these famous people are making enough money to pay all of the bills, so then you're not actually in a traditional gender at.
All. You are the breadwinner.
I love that honesty, though, that they're being honest about when they're not being honest about the fact that they are working and they are making bank and that they're just like this silly little woman at home looking after the children and baking things from scratch. That's what I don't like because it completely like undermines all of the progression that we have done over the past decades, longer than that.
But it's like stay at home mums generally are not placing any judgment on the mums who go the traditional work. I'm saying the majority. I'm sure there are something outline and mums who go to work and not fucking passing judgment on the state at home mums. But that's why we get so freaking triggered by the ones on TikTok who are yelling at us, because it's like, stop, I'm not judging anyone, why are you yelling at.
But I also feel so guilty enough about my exactnesses and you know, the days along but the years assured, and then they'll post those things that go it's crazy that for the first few years of our children's lives, we see them for half an hour in the morning, then we send them to daycare for someone else to look after them while we go to work, and then we see them. I already feel bad enough about that, sometimes not for the time.
It's like you're not putting the idea into my head.
I recently said something about you know those when something awful happens and then people post like themselves crying and they go make sure you hug your babies extra tight tonight. Everyone was thinking, yeah, yeah, yeah, you need to point it out and make other people feel really bad, like and also like, does that mean that you think that that person didn't hug their child like tight enough that that doesn't awful happen?
Have perspective already because most of us do, and I find but it's so incredibly unfair to do that to women. And I do feel like this conservativism and this idea
of traditional values is creeping in further and further. And we have probably all experienced the difference between a marriage with kids breaking down where the mum worked and a marriage with kids where it breaks down and the mother didn't work, And how different the trajectory of that woman's life, I know, And how unfair it is because all of us, like we would love to think that the partners that we have right now, we are going to be with them for the rest of our lives, and they are
good men and they would look after us. But the fact is that's not always the case. Statistically, Statistically, it's not always the case, and it's not the case that they would be that good human when things end because there are men who don't pay child support in all of that, and you end up being a woman who is living a really fucking hard life. And I think that the whole child wife thing is very ignorant.
Of that because it's take into consideration the one percent who it doesn't matter if they break up because they're earning enough bank themselves. But also even if they weren't, like they would get enough in the breakup to set themselves up for life and it doesn't matter. But it's for all of the people in the lowest socioeconomic brackets that they're the ones that are really impacted so much.
Your feminism was about us just having the opportunity to do things, but also having something to fall back on, making our own money, and I think that that creeping in of those traditional values erases that, and then it just makes us way more vulnerable to being able to survive on our own, which is really scary, because surviving on our own even in the way of like something
happening to your partner, you know. And then you're like, because there was something I was reading, it was like learned helplessness on both sides, right, Men are like, I can't tie my shoelace.
Not that, but you know that's an example.
Stuff with the kids that they.
Can't do right, and then women are like, well, I can't do my taxes, I can't do this, and that like that's the stuff that will really negatively affect us overall from that traditional wife then coming in, because that's the stuff that's our power, and that's how we bring ourselves out of stuff, being able to be fully functioning in society without someone having to do that for us.
And that's so true that it's like the women that you see on panels or TV shows or whatever talking about like, oh, but my husband would never leave me or whatever. It's like doesn't even have to be your husband leaving. It could be your husband to die or getting sick and medical bills, it could be more sorts of unpredictable things. But I think what you said, Kelly about people who are uber wealthy, they have the luxury
of buying into this idea. And there's this thing that I've heard spoken about called luxury beliefs, and it's like the kind of beliefs that, yeah, you can have if you're privileged enough to have them. And I think the traadwife thing is exactly that most of us. And the same thing as like women not working. I'm like my working class grandmother in I don't know, the nineteen forties, nineteen fifties, whatever was working.
She was working at what my nanny did for so many years. She plucked chickens. She cannot eat a chicken, although I think she does now because of her dementia, she forgets that she hates chickens. She plucked chickens for years. And yes there was a fair few years where she wasn't working because she was looking after the four boys, but that wasn't like this endless time that she was spending with young children. She always had different jobs. And the thing was is that one of her biggest regrets
is that she wanted to be a nurse. That's all she wanted to do, but she couldn't because it wasn't women didn't go to university, or if they did, it was a huge deal. And so she was a dressmaker, or she was plucking chickens, or she was also working at a factory that my par worked at, but she wasn't not working. And the same thing with my mom,
like even though my dad was the primary breadwinner. My mom was always working because they wanted to do different things and they had a big mortgage and it wasn't an option not to.
Yeah, And it's almost like there's like a historical amnesia, Like I look at my Nan, and my Nan had to drop out of school in year eight because her mum got sick, and her brothers were allowed to finish school and continue education. But it's like, you're the girl, so you have to be thirteen fourteen and looking after
the whole family, cooking, cleaning and all of that. And I remember looking at my Nan at eighty and thinking, Nne, you're really smart, Like it would have been so interesting to see what it would have been like for her to finish.
If she'd been able to do what she wanted to do.
Yeah.
Yeah, And it's like we know, like there are just endless statistics about the value of education in every aspect of like the depth of life that somebody's able to experience, the kind of like cultural joys they can experience, and then not to mention life expectancy and all of that. But it's like the creeping in of these traditional values then creeps in on that stuff. It's like, well, if you're not gonna work, what's the point in education. I think it's so dangerous. And I see debates play out
and I'm like, it's not a debate. The debate's done. Yeah, did the debate we try to go?
Yeah? And I also have a huge problem with the women that comment on these videos saying, Oh, I totally get what this person is saying, and I really love just being a traditional at home, stay at home mum or whatever. Okay, that's great, but you don't need to encourage it. It's lovely that you are emotionally, mentally, and financially okay enough to do that, and that's great for you.
But just like I wouldn't say that every single woman should go be a nurse, you don't really need to say that every woman should be doing this because it's just not helpful and it's so dangerous, and it's also so privileged of you to come to that sort of opinion without considering everything that we just discussed with like, Okay, well what if that man leaves the woman?
Yeah, that's true. I think about how far we've come in the last few decades with gender and our understandings of gender, and I love and I hope that the way we're going is almost dismantling gender roles and gender identity in a way that changes what our lives look like. And then it's so bizarre that it's like this one movement is going on one side where it's like what is gender? Does this even matter? There's no gender binary?
And then on the other hand you have like, not only do we believe in this absolute, immovable boundary, but we believe that it should dictate how you live, Like how also.
Exclude so many different groups of people, but the couples exactly working mum, It excludes anyone that doesn't fit that really traditional boring.
Yeah, exactly.
I don't think that that is like a mistake, though I think one is because of the other. You know, it's a direct reaction to that. And I loved something I read It was like we've gone from girl boss to tradwife, And I think that that's nomous steak as well, because there is this ideal that really appeals to some women. Yeah, and the girl bossed it so hard that now they're like, I need a tad wife, you know.
Like it's interesting that how.
These different movements end up influencing something else, and it's always the pendulum swinging from far side to far side.
And I think it's like the medium is the message. I think it's because there is no room for nuance on the internet because the girl Boss movement had issues too. It's like T.
Shirts with hashtag girl boss and it Oh oh god, I was that that.
Had a choke hold on me. I'm not gonna lie.
Oh my.
I was just like, I have to girl boss.
This is lean in. Like I was so into it. I was so into it. And then I think it's having a baby that re clarifies it for you, and it's like, hold on, this is more complex than that. And I was really conscious Key, I don't know if you feel this, but like I did a podcast maybe six weeks after Matilda was born, and then I remember I did one where no one could look after her. So I did a podcast with her st to me
in the podcast studio. Yeah, and there was a video of it, and I was so conscious of like, I'm not doing this as a value statement, like I'm not yeah, I'm doing it because it was possible in that moment, and she happened to sleep, and there was every possibility.
She was going to wake up.
Yeah, I am not saying that women should do this. I know I don't particularly want to be doing this right now.
Well, I had a little like freak out the other day just because I'm very not good with my confidence. A lot of the audience who were listening to that wrote and then were like, you know, you just back at work and inspiring, and I'm thinking like, oh no, no, I'm not trying to be like and now I'm back working.
No, I'm a freelancer.
I need to be back in order for us to like be able to make money as a family.
This is not aspirational.
And I think that's the other thing about the Internet that like no room for nuance. But it also has become this weird thing where we think that everything someone else does is a statement on us. And then that's what annoys me about the trad wife thing is because it's being explicit about that. Like if I see somebody who's taken a year's matt leave and just looks like they are in heaven, which I see all the time, and I get a pang of jealousy, I'm like, ooh,
I've got to think about that. That's about me, that's not about them, but with the child wife stuff that is explicitly just getting a knife and going into that area women.
Because it doesn't exist. Yeah, it's just yeah.
I think your sister actually because she was so open when she was postpartum about loving it yeah yeah, and really loving being on Matt leave, and that she really liked her birth and she was actually really happy. And she was talking about how it was weird because a lot of the conversations are prior to her having that, she'd felt like it was all going to be just like quite negative.
But me and my.
Sister, who both had awful experiences postpartuman in birth, we're talking about it, and we were saying it was actually so refreshing and nice to hear someone speak about it in a way that was different, but also not twisting a knife in any way. She was really appreciating it, and it was actually really nice to hear that perspective, which is why it's you need to have different opinions and perspectives because otherwise the conversation would be so boring.
But you need to be able to have the conversation not just think that it's your way or the high way, because none of us are saying that it's bad to be a stay at home mum and want to cook and clean for your partner and your family. But we are saying that it's bad if you're saying that that's the only way to do things.
Yes, it's going to say they're all white.
He they are all white, and they all not all No, they're not white. Nara Smith is not white. True, true, Like it's dangerous because their views not there maybe personally, and also they probably don't loudly and proudly say their political beliefs, but some of them are just really far right.
Some of them are quite political in what they say, like a lot of them are. I think it does have like a religious understroyed for shit does.
But that adds to how dangerous it can be.
Completely I agree.
I saw a panel discussion recently. I don't know if you guys saw it. It was on Piers Morgan and there was Clementine Ford and she was the only one on this panel who was arguing against the trad wife vibe. And then there was a husband and wife and another woman and it was like she was mocked the whole time. She was made fun of, And I was like Oh my god, this is what we're living in, where like she would.
Have also just been saying what I just said, that it's not bad if you want to yes, yes, but don't tell other people. And then they're making fun of her for that.
Yeah yeah, and it went all these clips from it went viral, just made fun of her, and I was like, oh my god, this is the world we're living in, where like she is mocked and the power lies with these conservatives who also set it up so it can't be argued. Like I was like a panel where three of the four people and the host were against Yeah, argument, that's panel. Like, No, I don't know if you guys get all the Ben Shapiro stuff.
He terrifies me. But I also is his name Dean Withers, Dean the kind of blondie guard. Yes, he's like twenty years old.
Yes, do you know what?
I want him and that bloke from that shitty Australian podcast to have a debate. That's what I want because he's the only twenty year old I want to listen to.
Yes, who was able to argue against him? Like there's a British woman actually who was able to argue against.
I'm just period so many things. Ben Shapiro, He's just why do you have points that make sense about something?
No, there is a difference between somebody being educated enough to articulate and argument well and argue a point well and that point itself being valid. Like they are two different things.
Yeah, and so true.
Sometimes I see someone I'm like, wow, you are so smart. You're an excellent debater, like excellent strategies of like tearing apart in argument. I do not agree with your argument at all, And it's like smart people. That's the thing about smart people can argue even illogical, deeply flawed things very very very well well and make you question.
I mean, obviously there are some things that he could never make me question, but he does still always have really strong arguments, which if you're not that confident with your own critical thinking, maybe then you could watch something like that. He's got such a big platform and think, yeah, you're right.
And he speaks so fast and he interrupts people.
I've got a list of about five people I never want to debate with.
The I can live knowing I'm right and you're wrong and never.
Have to have a conversation.
You would put me in my place, and you would make me doubt every single thing about myself and my brain within five seconds. We can't have the tried wife conversation without touching on the ridiculousness and complete unrelatable of just how much it leans on that heavily aesthetic interest beige. Their houses look like no children actually live there. Their
kitchens are always spotless, everything is made from scratch. The toddlers aren't ever screaming at them about the baked goods being ready or being cut up in a certain way. Like there's nothing about the content that is a reflection of real life, which is fine if it's not designed to like, if your content is kind of like not designed to be relatable, if it's just like, oh my gosh, like I'm doing special effects makeup or I'm a high
fashion girlie. But this obviously isn't stuff that you just wear. Generally is very different to when it's being portrayed in a way that they are trying to make out that it's real life and that that's just what every day actually looks like.
And the implication is if you lived like this, your life would be calm.
And stressed, free to and you also you speak like this, to speak slowly and make bubble gum from scratch.
There's no screaming children. You have enough space where your children are playing somewhere else, which.
There's obviously a nanny. Yes, because you're working. You're not a stay at home mum. And the traditional definition.
Of that, because if it was, there would be mess everywhere because no one can clean up as they go that well, you would hear the children babbling, asking questions, then screaming. One of them would have a tantrum, one of them would fight with the other one.
I know. Yeah, they hire a studio like maybe Marcle. It's just all like a film. I didn't realize before I had a child was how much being a picky eater is innate. I always assumed that it was like nurture, that maybe, like my mum was too fucking busy to like introduce me to different textures, hence why I'm a pigire. Yeah, but having like experiment like Jesse has a child, I have a child. I am lazy with food. I do not do anything exceptional and my child will eat anything
that is biology. But watching Luna and Matilda, who at like if you compared them at the same age. Luna is picky and it is nothing that Jesse has done, and Matilda will eat anything. It is nothing that I have done.
I've heard Jesse talk about like she's home cooking and being so careful about everything that is in different things.
She does so much more than me, and I'm like, that is actually so unfair. And the tradwife thing, whereas Narah Smith doing all her bloody, weird milks and her weird foods. I'm like, those kids they are eating that. That is not an environmental thing. That is luck and it is not that if anyone behaved like that, they guess we'll freaking eat that. No.
And I was definitely like that at the beginning, and Rue I only wanted to eat pasta, so I just gave that up. I was just like, fine, you will eat that stuff when you want to eat that stuff.
I'm not gonna waste my time anymore.
Yeah. I do not cook anymore through the week at all.
Yeah. Well, the other day she was like, can I have some carrots? And I was like whoa.
So then I cooked her some carrots and she ate all of them and I was like, carrots are in I put them to bed. I didn't worry about it and said she'll get there in the end, and she does, because.
They get exposed in other places.
If your kids at daycare, they're getting exposed totally.
I love seeing them.
They're eating together at their little table, like all together, like a little cult.
It is.
It's so cute.
Is not at daycare yet?
No, she's doing though. I'm going to a place called Bubba Desk once a week where her working space with a crate. I want to ask you and essentially charge it on site, which is great for me a day roughly about saying okay, one sixty. I structure my day by being like, Okay, I'm going to do some writing, I'm gonna do whatever task, and then I'm going to go and put her down for a nap, and then
I'll come and give her a lunch. Like It's a really nice way, and it's also good for if you're still breastfeeding care and then they'll message you and be like hungry.
She wants she wants to can they be.
Or Matilda was very little. I did a few days when Matilda was maybe like four months.
Okay, I was actually gonna ask you about this because I'm kind of thinking about my.
She's just starting to get a bit vocal.
And I'm also like sitting here all day working and she's looking at me like, bitch, I have developed more.
Yeah, I wanted things to do.
She really wanted it when I arrived this morning because I entertained her.
That actually made me feel really bad.
Girl.
I was like, I just do not play with her enough.
Jess, and I always say it when I walk into Jesse's place. Me and Luna have our own little games. Jesse has her own little games with Matilda. And I'm like, I can't make her laugh like that. You can't make Luna laugh like this. But again, I think.
It's gonna make you both feel a bit bad. I can make my kids laugh like.
No one else. You're a performer, however, perform.
Also, you both know he is the most clingy mummies boy in the entire world, and that is that is why.
You're a little man. But I do think like there are these little fleeting thoughts that you have throughout motherhood, right, and I am working with my psychologist on these thoughts at the moment, Like all those little thoughts, which is like, wait, why can somebody else make my child laugh more. And that's why the child wife stuff piss me off so much, because I'm like, do not poke at the insecurities like
they are there. The mental health toll of those narratives as you are a mother is like, I think there are some amazing mental health benefits to being a parent, and I think there are some real challenges. Yes, I have a lot of friends who say, like, I don't want to have a child because I struggle with my mental health, and I'm like, reconsider that, because I think having a child can be exposure therapy for a lot of shit.
Also, they force you to get out of bed in the money exactly exactly.
Depression. My thing with depression exactly. My thing was always like lethargy. And then I'd get into a cycle where it's like I feel shit because i haven't got out of bed and I'm.
Over the head exactly for a few days and you.
Can't is actually a form of therapy, and I genuinely think it is exposure therapy for perfection because it's like, your kids not perfect, and you learn that you love them as much as you could possibly love anyone anyway, Yeah, and then you kind of start to look at yourself like that, and then you're like, no day is going to be perfect, nothing I do is going to be perfect, and yet this little human is growing and developing still, Like I genuinely think it's like a mental such a
good point, like I do think there are parts of my mental health that have improved, but then I think there are challenges, and I think some of that fucking content just plays in.
It's true because it's like all the mean stuff that you say in your head or not necessarily mean, like negative or questioning things that you do, and then looking at someone who's telling you.
Like, you're right, you need to be better off.
You would be better off to the right person that is really going to resonate and just make them feel awful, and it makes me feel awful and I know better, And.
I think the darkest thought a mother can have, and I think depending on how your mental health has been as a parent, you might have had this, Kelly, because I know I have this every now and then you have it where it's like, oh am, I even the best mother for my child, would somebody else be at.
The darkest thoughts is when you think you look at them and you go you would be so much better off without me exactly. When you're feeling clarity and not like that, you're like, of course that, you're like, that's.
Such an logical thought. But when you're in the depths of it, that's the thought you have, and that's the thought that some of this shit presses on because it's like because then you're like, well, I'm not the stay.
At home mum, I'm not all the time smiling.
I'm not that maybe they would be better off with somebody else, Like it's so.
And there's no way that that mum could achieve that exactly. So it's like they're just like, I'm just warning my kid's laugh.
And that's why social media can be so dangerous though when it comes to these things, is that, yes, of course you can look at it. It's just a form of entertainment. But when they're hammering different, really dangerous messages home. If you're already feeling so shit and you are looking at your kid and you're thinking, oh my god, you'd be so much better off without me, you open up
your phone. You open up your phone for entertainment or the news, maybe mainly to if you open up TikTok, you're looking for a little bit of entertainment, looking for a giggle, if you will. You're not looking for everything. You've just been feeling to be completely validated by a stranger with an objectively perfect house, perfect face, perfect children, smugly telling you exactly what you've just thought.
It's true. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
That's how we started the pod.
Yeah, and that bit funny, and I have to say, very unperfect.
I don't know if I've told you guys this, but I was struggling very early on with We had a thing where Matila just didn't latch in the first place, and then the breastfeeding kind of never never works off pumping. I was like triple feeding, you know when it's like and then you're pumping and then your formula for all that stuff. I was doing that for like five months, and I think I got to that five months and I was so broken and emotional and I was like,
I want to feel permission to stop. I have not felt it, and I was almost looking for it, and it was u Key. I think you were talking about your breastfeeding journeys. I think UK said something like giving a bottle is really cute, and that was it. I was like giving a.
Bottle is cute. You can't see their little face, no, you can see and then look the way that they're like caress your arm and when they.
Hold it with their tiny hand and the bottle is so big, and you're just.
Like how the bottle it's so cute. And it was you guys admitting like, well, not admitting like that even sounds bad, but it was you guys being honest about your journeys and how different they were. That it's like ket you enjoyed it and all of that. But it was like that she wait, like there was there's all that kind of stuff. It's like so many different reasons for it not to work, and it is not your fucking fault. No, And then I was like, I fucking did it five months, like I'm good, and that was
like the permission. But I could have gone for another six months and my mental.
Health would have just continued it fine decline. I recently got kicked out of a Facebook group before for yelling at someone who was, you know, very pushing the breast is best. I got so cranky, I said times.
It wouldn't be a thing, I know, because the fed's best doesn't rhyme yeah, it was.
Like catch anyway, listen, at the end of the day, I probably wasn't the kindest person to this woman. Yeah, I was removed from the group. Well, and I don't often comment because I have a lot of opinions and I have a lot of thoughts. But I don't often ever comment because I'm like, I don't want to argue with strangers on the internet, which is a.
Normal response to things that you see on the internet, Right, I just want to say that is the normal. You are the normal person, and that's you know, it's.
Not the normal. Well, what I did that day, which was start arguing with the stranger on the internet and then called her called her names because she was making other people feel But I didn't call her names, but I probably did a little bit.
Kelly, you're gonna get canceled.
Someone's gonna listen to this and be like, I thought that was her.
I thought I recognized her pop picture and her name. I'm scared by it. Don't shame other women about breastfeeding. I will shame you for breastfeeding then.
And that's the other thing about the breastfeeding thing, Like everyone's like breast is best like and you see the Likectatian consultants who are as saints, and I get it, and I get it, but it's like, believe me, in my bones, I know that breast is best. Yeah, I fucking know. I'm actually not naive.
Like so it's not brand neuine, it's not.
New information, I know. So you telling me that actually just confirms that any thought I had about like yeah, but maybe this is making me really struggle and I'm not okay and I'm an insane person and I can't have a social life and I.
Can't work, and my boobs hurt, I keep getting messed outs. Whatever it is. You know what, if you really want to start arguing about what is best for the baby, vaginal birth is without an EPI, yeah, probably arguably it could be the best. You know what, I'm not doing that, no introest. I would not, no, unless it was I had to.
Oh sorry, we're saying it in the company of miss miss Home Bertha Miss home.
Birth didn't get across the line. No, but you're.
Still laboring without paint relief.
I'm like, yeah, I just enjoyed it, which I know sounds crazy, and I don't want to get into that conversation but I did enjoy it.
I do think that there is this weird part of your brain that's activated towards like in pregnancy, and especially towards the end of pregnancy where you do go a bit earth mother and you go you go full. Maybe I have a really high pain threshold. And then I learned one centimeter, but I didn't that I.
Absolutely did not contraction that I have the least amount of pain. But I also think everyone is so different. Like I have a girlfriend that genuinely didn't think it was that bad.
Oh, I think I do have.
A high pain through because I had shingles the other day and I was like out looking at houses being.
Like, oh my god, this is quite painful, and.
It's that is meant to be really paying. It wasn't just the laboring like it's been confired.
Oh my god.
You know what.
Actually, I had a procedure done where I had canuless put in my face also as a needle frobe sleigh that I took pay.
Okay, I thought that when I saw you getting a hate needles and that needle is near your eye.
I've never had the gas before, so I didn't know what to do. That poor lady, how did she not lose her shit? Laughing at it makes you.
High or drunk. I didn't take it. I don't mind it.
When I was like super pregnant and had the compacted bow, you.
Know, like, oh, I mean the.
Time that you ended up in hospital, Like what a delicate way to say that you were literally full of shit and doctor Matt he just had to help you.
Can I tell you this?
They took me up to the delivery suite or whatever because they didn't know what was going on. And I was sucking on this thing for so long because I was in so much pain. It's super painful. And Charlie liked said to the midwives like, hey, is it okay that, like she's sucking for the baby, and they're like, oh, it's been on oxygen for ages, there's no gas.
And I was like, it's just like I was literally he told me that, and I.
Was like, bitches, it's like, also, don't tell me like placebo, like let me enjoy this.
I have no idea.
He told me months old, months after and a hind man, I mean, I get it, but like I wasn't a.
Lot of pain too.
It's really it's really.
Good but placebo effect. I think that's how I did the needles in the face because the gas. I wasn't sucky enough to do much, but it was such a distraction and I couldn't see it. Even though I was filming myself, I couldn't see it. And I was just like yabbering away asking her odd questions, and yeah, I think it was just destruction so very sam.
I forgot we had the gas during the home birth, and you know, like in the days after birth, like the midwife's checking with me, like how's your mental health?
Like are you you know, you have like a.
Bit of a baby blues moment and mine latched onto the berth for like a hot minute and she was like, you know, how are you feeling about the birth? And I'm like I just keep like replying the fact that we didn't use the.
Gas, like how do I use the gas? And she was like, key, I cannot stress this enough. It wouldn't have made a difference, would.
Not have opened enough to let yeah evenly like you oh, anyway.
But I think it's such a normal thing with birth that you convinced.
Yourself it was something you did.
So yeah, And my.
Big thing is and I think I told you this key, this was my theory about your first birth, Like I've imposed my own theory to you.
Did you talk about it with your psychologist?
Yes? So there was a storm and my water broke, and apparently a midwife told me afterwards that something with the drop in barometric pressure can rupture waters and so a lot of women go into labor when there's a storm, right, But I convinced myself. I was like, so what happened was my waters broke before they should have and that's why Matilda flopped into the wrong position, and that's why I didn't fully dilate, and that's why my birth was awful.
And yeah, I ended up weather's fault if you think about it.
Yes, But then I'm like, oh, it was the fact that I got dural. Then I'm like it didn't even freaking work. And then I'm like, was I pushing properly? Like all of that share goes through your head and you convince yourself that like it was actually your fault, which.
Is just because you like, you find a reason like, well, that has to be my fault, and it's like yeah, but you can't control the fuck and wear.
That and so yeah, yeah, yeah, and some just happens and it's okay, yeah.
And it is okay.
Yeah.
Anyway, let's wrap this up because we, the three of us, could probably just keep here. We could Birth Stories. Don't tempt this, because we will. I'll go out get us the bottle of water for it. We'll just sit around and thank you so much Claire for oh please any time.
I love this show so much. I'm just anyone who will listen. I'm like, here's a podcast, here go, here go. I just I think it's genuinely so important. We'll have mums being.
Honest, we hope. So recommendations, Kyri Cells, what have you got?
I wanted to recommend my breast pump this week. It is the Licevo wearable breast pump. Look, it is not cheap, so I realize it is hard times at the moment. I was actually gifted this, So it just depends where you're out and how much money you want to spend on a breast pump. This is just over five hundred dollars. But when I was out the other night, my sister in law borrowed it because we both needed to pump and dump at the hens and she commented about how
good it was. She was like, oh my god, I think I'm gonna have to get this pump because she said it was just the same as the.
Baby being on.
And it isn't super loud like when we were out you could not hear it at all. And it's super comfy. It's just really good, easy to use, easy to dissemble and clean, and comes in like a really cute little leather pouch. It's just great and I can't recommend it enough. I had a really shitty pump the first time around, so my pumping experience, I was very scared and hesitant to start pumping this time around, and it has made
the biggest difference. So if you're looking for a great pump, highly recommend the lice Evo.
I've got a rogue recommendation today, but it's the hydro Mamma by Minni and Me. It's basically just like an electrolyte sachet that you pop in your water. My favorite is the cola. It tastes like post mix from the movies that's watered down a little bit, which is so yummy. I need to have a lot of salt in my diet and the electrolytes. Whenever I haven't had this for a few days, I notice it. I get dizzy, I get vertigo, I get stomach cramps. It is so good
and they've got so many different yummy flavors. It's also perfect to have on hand even if you don't need it on the rag because it is quite expensive as well, but to have on hand for people, because it's good for kids as well, if you've got gastro in the house, or just anything where you're not having enough fluids, if you're sick, if you're pregnant and sick, this really icy when you're vomiting in the first trimestol throughout your pregnancy. Holly duly, it would be delicious.
I actually use this for my pregnancy, so I second that. And you can buy like a mixed flavor the first time around, so that you can tie all the flavors to figure out which.
One you like.
That one's your face and I really liked the was it pomegranate?
The purple one?
Oh yes, yum yummy.
That one was so good.
And you can turn them into icy poles anyway. They're just very multi use. Absolutely love them. But on that note, this episode has been going for far too long, but hopefully you've really enjoyed it. Key's got another shitty happy to change. So we are going to love you and leave you, and the only thing we're going to say is make sure you're following us and the episode production. Thank you Maddie, Thank you shitters.
Bye bye.