Kate Mason (00:01):
Have you ever felt like every other parent got the parenting manual and that yours is somewhere under a pile of laundry right next to those stale rice crackers and the unmatched socks? Do you sometimes feel like the only mom in the school car park that didn't bring the kale snacks or the mindfulness jars to school and was really just proud that no one's going to school barefoot today? Have you ever looked around your house mid chaos and thought, is this motherhood or just a really poorly managed circus with snacks on the side? And do you know what? Have you ever bribed your child with snacks, screen time, or even cold hard cash just to get through the day and called it gentle parenting? Are you done with those parenting books that make you feel like a total failure and honest enough to admit that? Do you know what? In parenthood and motherhood, whatever you like to call it, we're all just winging it. So if you're nodding along, then today's guest is your new best friend. I'm Kate Mason, and welcome to Parenting and Personalities. This is the podcast that connects you to the ones you care about the most.
(01:20):
Today I have the absolute pleasure of talking to the very funny refreshingly honest mom of three Victoria Vanstone. Victoria Vanstone is a co-host of the wildly popular sober awkward podcast, recently crowned best wellbeing podcast at the Australian Podcast Awards and named one of UK Guardian's Most Culture changing podcasts of the last 15 years. Vic began writing on the day she gave up drinking and turned her thoughts into a popular blog called Drunk Mummy, sober Mummy. Her debut memoir a thousand Wasted Sundays is a hilarious and heartfelt account of life before and after alcohol. Her next book, momming, A Year of Trying and Failing to Be a Better Parent, is out May, 2025 and speaks directly to the not so Pinterest perfect mums who are hiding in the Audi car parks everywhere beyond podcasting and writing. Vic is the founder of Kapa, a free social network, supporting those questioning their relationship with alcohol. And when she's not making people laugh, you'll find her yelling about missing shoes, hiding in the airing cupboard or brushing past her out of the carpet. Just another day in the life of a sober, slightly chaotic, deeply honest mum. Welcome Vic to the show. It's great to have you join us today. Hi.
Victoria Vanstone (02:59):
Hi. Thanks so much for having me. It's lovely to be here,
Kate Mason (03:02):
And it's a pleasure that we've got so much to discuss. We're just going to look lightly at your award-winning podcast, so awkward. But really today we are here to discuss your new book, which is called Momming, and you look at the chaos of parenting and with a lot of humor and honesty. So before we start, I would really love to look back at what did you do in your earlier years before you became a podcaster and an author? What did you do?
Victoria Vanstone (03:31):
I got sacked. I got sacked a lot from a lot of places. Yeah, I haven't had a successful career. I think my only successful career was my drinking career. Unfortunately,
(03:40):
I left university early, having only been there for three months. I wasn't very good at school. I was particularly bad at English, believe it or not. And I went off traveling in about 1999 and I'd never came home, so I just lived out of a bag in various countries. I had bars in Thailand. I did enough work for me to pay for my next plane fare throughout my life, and eventually I ended up buying jewelry in Thailand and selling it in markets in Australia and in France. So that became my main job, was working all the weekend and night markets in France for many years and just to save enough money for the next trip really. So I was a real travel bum and I always loved writing on those trips. You should see my diaries. I mean, we get them out at our live shows. My diaries of those times are proof that I did have a story in me somewhere that I perhaps didn't know how to tell at the time.
Kate Mason (04:39):
Wow, what a life. So everywhere, all over the world, was there anywhere in particular that you visited the most and loved the most?
Victoria Vanstone (04:48):
I ended up teaching for a little bit in Thailand doing that sort of TEFL teaching, and I lived there for about six years. During the early two thousands, I had a Thai boyfriend and this lovely kind of beach life. But I remember after a few years of being there and being on another paradise beach with not a penny in my pocket, I sort of thought, gosh, I think I've done this. Now it's time to go and be responsible. So I ended up moving to Australia, but during those 10 years, I traveled to Nepal and India and America and lots of wonderful places and thoroughly enjoyed my time, but unfortunately drank my way through a lot of it. So I think I lived in Sydney for about two years and never saw the Opera House or a kangaroo.
Kate Mason (05:30):
Okay, we won't hold that against you.
Victoria Vanstone (05:31):
Thanks.
Kate Mason (05:33):
Probably a bit too honest, but that doesn't really matter. It's all good. It's all good. Have you seen them yet? Have seen I've seen them now, kangaroo. Excellent. Well, that's all good. You don't need anything else to fit to the country, that's all. Great. Great. So when you created a podcast, which we'll just touch on lightly today because we'll be talking about that in another podcast. So when did you do that and who did you do it with and what brought that about?
Victoria Vanstone (06:02):
Well, it's very relevant to my momming book actually, is that I started writing on the day that I gave up drinking and that led me to start writing a blog, which led to the podcast Sober Awkward. And it was generally about me trying to find my voice and my place in the world without alcohol. And I found writing was a real therapy for me in those early days of sobriety. I was really putting it out there, of course, not ever thinking anyone was going to read it, but I ended up writing a book about it as well. So yeah, writing became my outlet. I didn't know what to do with my thoughts a lot of the time, even when I was a backpacker. So putting them onto paper seemed to heal something within me, and that's what's happened ever since I gave up drinking is that I've managed to heal a lot of my issues and deal with a lot of shame and regret and guilt by putting my words onto paper.
Kate Mason (06:54):
Excellent. And so in doing so, I gather that you have children?
Victoria Vanstone (06:59):
Yes, I have.
Kate Mason (06:59):
Or three? You have three. Okay. If you're momming, then obviously you obviously, did you get married or you have a partner or how did life spin out in that respect then from traveling all the time and three kids?
Victoria Vanstone (07:15):
Well, yeah, the mother and the party girl had quite a severe collision at some point, and I had to understand that alcohol and hangovers and children were not a great combination, and that caused a lot of anxiety actually. And I became quite anxious every time I drank, and it led to me questioning my drinking habit, which of course led to me stopping. And the main consequence was that I had a child in the room beyond my hangover crying and needed my help, and I wasn't able to go to her because I was too busy feeling like rubbish. And since I stopped drinking, I had another two children and they are now my inspiration. I'm not sure they'll be very happy about that. But the woes of motherhood and the manity of it, I have found absolutely fascinating actually. And I think when I first had children, I just presumed I would be a natural, and I think a lot of us do. We want to be this earth mother in a floaty dress that knows the great chocolate chip recipe, cookie recipe, and knows all of this momming stuff off by heart. And unfortunately, I didn't. And I was surprised. I was actually surprised by that, and I found it very, very difficult. And I read so many books, so many books, Kate, that made me feel so guilty because I couldn't achieve what they were me to do, and I ended up feeling like an absolute failure.
Kate Mason (08:47):
The sad part is that I think you're right. My daughter's pregnant at the moment, and I keep saying to her too, you can't do all the fun things that you're now like life changes and then you don't want to scare people. That's really an, I kind of sit there and I think, oh, I'm being really unfair saying this stuff because maybe it won't. Maybe she will become an earth mother, but I don't think so. So I think it does become a shock for people, and you are right. You sit there and think, oh my God, this actually isn't what I wanted. This isn't well what I thought it was going to be even. And often it isn't a drag and it's boring and it's not exciting, and you're tied to a house and a child and yeah, pretty hard. Anyone that's listening right now, if you are currently pregnant or you have children and you're loving it, great. Please don't listen to either of us.
Victoria Vanstone (09:42):
Yeah, well, no, I think it's good to know because I don't think it is always going to be great as any parent, even if you are that earth mother and everything comes naturally to you, there are going to be times that we are not prepared for and stuff goes down. Kids don't behave like you expect them to. And I think when I had children, I just presumed that I would pop them out and mold them into how I wanted them to be. And that was not the case at all. They all came out with these different personalities, different needs, different wants, different skills, and I found it so overwhelming and very quickly, even though I didn't want to turn into my own mom, I could hear my mom's voice coming out of my mouth whenever I spoke with my voice changing. I thought I'd be the kind of mom who would sort of kneel down and hold my child's shoulders and be like, come on, where is that lost shoe?
(10:33):
And let's get it together and be a team and all of that kind of cool mum stuff. But actually I ended up being the shouter and being like, for God's sake, why don't you look after your shoes? And it was not the person I imagined showing up the mum that I thought I was going to be completely disappeared very early on in my motherhood. And what was left over was somebody who was probably slightly hormonal. I had my kids a bit older, somebody who was probably quite irrational, who didn't have much patience, and I found myself sort of stuck in a rut where I didn't have the answers. And any books that I read just made me feel even more guilty. I mean, that paper plane of guilt was sort of gliding along next to me for many, many, many years, and I just couldn't see a way out because I saw the Instagram mums and the Pinterest mums all the hair with their perfectly curled beach hair and wonderful cookies and kale sandwiches that they'd made. And I think the only food I'd ever cooked in my early motherhood was that once I sent my child to daycare with a pound of cheese instead of his lunch and the daycare phoned up and said, Victoria, is your son all right just eating a pound of cheese for lunch? Or did you put the wrong box in his bag? Oh no, it's definitely the wrong box. Sorry about that.
Kate Mason (11:49):
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I forgot the sandwich and the neatly cut up fruit.
Victoria Vanstone (11:54):
I said he does like cheese, but I don't think he'll eat a whole block. So yeah, I fail a lot.
(12:01):
And I think I've written this book for all the moms that feel like they're failing and are kind of hoping that unconditional love is enough, because I do love my children and I've been trying very, very hard for a year to try and get better at it. Whether I achieve that or not is something that you'll have to find out in the book. But I think it's kind of acknowledgement of all the mums that are kind of sitting in an Aldi car park for a bit too long, crying into a bag of hard avocados, not wanting to go home, the mums that have sat on the toilet, keeping the door closed and having a bit of peace and quiet for the first time in their day. So it's kind of an acknowledgement of those mums and saying, look, you don't have to be a Pinterest mom to be a good mom. It might all seem crazy some of the times, but this is what parenting is and it's not your fault when it goes wrong.
Kate Mason (12:56):
And so for you, was it a parental disaster or a failure or something that actually drove you to go, do you know what? I'm going to study this, I'm going to become a good parent, whatever good parenting looks like. So was there a failure and what did good parenting look like? What was the model of parenting you were trying to follow when you did this?
Victoria Vanstone (13:20):
Well, when I first started writing, I thought it was going to be about a journey of me becoming better at it, but actually that's not what the book became. It became me understanding that failing is okay as long as I keep trying. So there's kind of a conglomerative fails if there can be. It was just a lot of things that I was doing wrong and I was buying them snacks in the supermarket when they were being naughty or actually paid my daughter to go to bed once because she was staying up too late. I gave her $5. There was a lot of things which were very clearly red flags, parenting red flags that I didn't really hook onto until I spoke to some of my more together, not so winging at mums at the school gates. And they were like, oh, when I pulled a pie out of my bag and they were pulling out some bliss balls, I was like, okay, maybe I'm not as good as this as I thought I was. But when I started writing, I understood that my failures were part of it, and this is what parenting is. It's partly failing and it's partly having wins. And it doesn't mean that the failing is bad, but I always make a big comeback. I always try. And I think that unconditional love that supports me and my family, I fall back on that a lot. And actually that's enough.
Kate Mason (14:36):
And I think kids understand and they understand, and if you're making some mistakes and you explain that this is a mistake and it didn't work out this time, but next time I'm going to try a bit harder or I'm going to change what I do, you're just setting an example for them because life's going to be full of mistakes and failures for them too. So by admitting to your own failures, I'm with you cooking and me, my husband still says after 44 years, Kate never learned to cook. And I said, I never wanted to be a good cook, so I had no desire to, I do have to do the basic stuff because I came across food colorings and all that type of stuff for my kids, and getting rid of them was a lifesaver. So I have had to do basic meals. I can do a roast and vegetables. I think probably that's about it, but I am with you and I think today I wasn't How old are your children?
Victoria Vanstone (15:27):
My youngest is six, and I have a 9-year-old daughter and a 13-year-old son.
Kate Mason (15:32):
Yes. So I wasn't brought up in the era of Pinterest and Instagramable people looking just absolutely amazing and feeding their kids all these beautiful stuff. And I'm saying to my daughter, they she'll say, oh, those outfits look just beautiful in the Sea Magazine for, and I said, they're going to vomit on it straight away. You're going to end up in a bonds all in one from Target. That ain't going to be happening. It is really not going to be there. But all of those things that are extolled by an influencer or by somebody out there that's just not real too. Do you find that has stressed you out in your parenting?
Victoria Vanstone (16:10):
Absolutely. Absolutely. The comparison and what I've learned not only in motherhood but also in sobriety, that being my authentic self is actually always enough and admitting to my fails and knowing when I've gone wrong and then trying to learn different ways of doing things. So I think I've learned to be open about who I am and what I'm trying to do, and that really helps being a writer as well, because obviously I can see my fails in black and white and go, actually, I learned from that. Every single time that I've done something wrong, I have gone up a level. I've sort of 10 Xed in my parenting gone, okay, now I realize that that wasn't the right thing to do and now I can try better. And the book is based around a kind of year of those fails and me trying to get better, whether that's an exercise regime or trying to get a bit woo woo or everything else that happened in that year, but I know exactly what you mean.
(17:02):
Those stages in parenting that we get to. There was a time where we were going out for dinner a lot, but every time it was a total disaster. Somebody would choke on a piece of meat. Everybody needed a poo halfway through the meal. I just ended up in restaurant toilets for the whole time and with sticky sort of seven up covered flip-flops afterwards. So I was like, actually, I don't ever want to do this again. And there's these stages and these expectations that we have because of these comparisons that we're trying to live up to all the time. And for me, I realized that my stages now and my children's stages, wherever they're at, and I'm no longer sort of striving to be like anybody else, I'm just striving to be us and to be a house that is full of love and kindness and often tears and tantrums, which is a natural part of life. I mean, it isn't perfect. If you walked by my window, you'd probably think, gosh, that is absolute chaos going on in there, but I promise you is organized chaos and everybody is safe. I think that's all that matters.
Kate Mason (18:05):
I think that's the thing too, is that chaos does happen. And when I watch people out at restaurants now with their kids and they're giving them iPads, which I do disagree with, but they're giving them that to keep them still and quiet. I look at my daughter and I say, time to take them home, not time to sit them on something that just obliterates their mind. You go home when they're being naughty and they're running off, you just apologize to the people you're with and you go home. Nobody else wants 'em in a restaurant either.
Victoria Vanstone (18:33):
Nobody wants them. Nobody wants them. Yeah,
Kate Mason (18:35):
No, we're all sitting there now. And I said to my husband the other day, oh my God, that's going to be us in a few years time. Shaking your head no. We'll be sitting there with the screaming child. I said to him, if she doesn't take it home, we'll go home. Whatever. We'll leave. There's no way I want to be sitting in that restaurant either. There are times where you actually do have to make that move and just go home and have your chaos at home too, isn't it?
Victoria Vanstone (19:01):
Absolutely. Yeah. And I think it's great. Often when we go out, I go, right, guys, this is time to go. We don't have the iPads. We just had a seven months traveling around the world with the kids. We just got back and we did it without any devices, which was amazing, which was really hard as well,
Kate Mason (19:16):
Actually. No, I was going to say, you should be huge. That's a huge effort
Victoria Vanstone (19:20):
To be proud of. It was a huge effort. I think there's a book in there somewhere. I did make a lot of notes. I do too. But I wanted to teach 'em to look up and look at the world and be like, this is the world. It's not inside that little device. And it's been a really good growth experiment for us to go, look guys, it's not about that. Life is for living and it's for looking up and seeing the world and learning about everything. And it was a challenge at times because even other influences came into play, like other people's TVs and other people's phones, and they're kind of being shoved under the kids' noses no matter what I did. So it was quite challenging. But I recently got back and I said to my 13-year-old son who has never had a phone, I mean, we can get you a phone now. He was feeling a bit left out, and I bought him one and I took all the apps off and I handed it to him, literally Kate, I've won it parenting this week. I handed it to him and he said, I don't want it, mommy. I know. Write
Kate Mason (20:15):
That down. Did you make him sign a document?
Victoria Vanstone (20:16):
I was like, that's the perfect ending to the book, George. Thank you very much. That's right. And I never need to write
Kate Mason (20:22):
Again.
Victoria Vanstone (20:22):
That's it. I've won.
Kate Mason (20:25):
Fantastic.
Victoria Vanstone (20:25):
Excellent.
Kate Mason (20:26):
That is excellent. And that's one of those parenting triumphs, and you have to go with that. That's
Victoria Vanstone (20:31):
Amazing. I have literally been telling all my friends that in a very smug voice,
Kate Mason (20:36):
And they're all bitching behind your back probably. I dunno. How do she think that? I can't believe. I can't believe that show off. That's right. Next year he'll want one. And you'll be like, I know, okay, I did really well for a year, but it doesn't matter. And like you say, that's influenced him up to then. That's pretty
Victoria Vanstone (20:53):
Darn good, is great. I think he was just that age. He was out school. It was that age where they were all getting into it and we kind of removed them from that situation. They've gone back going, okay, actually I don't need to speak to my friends at school out of school. We're going old school. And it feels really good, actually. It feels very
Kate Mason (21:11):
Smug. Well, I hope that you managed to stay smug. I think that's fantastic. And the other thing about travel, we used to go overseas and it would totally like you say, well, when we went, they did detach from their phones and you actually got your kids to yourself. Even if it's just traveling interstate, it doesn't matter.
(21:29):
Just
(21:29):
Getting away sometimes is such a great way of bringing the fold back in, so to speak. I think that's a fabulous way of doing
Victoria Vanstone (21:38):
It. And so I know we always say time passes quickly, but I want to absorb them. I want to absorb every moment and enjoy it. I mean, they'll probably hate me for it at the moment, but I think one day they'll look back and go, gosh, mom, you did something pretty radical then for that period of time. And thank, well probably not thank me for it, but
Kate Mason (21:58):
I
Victoria Vanstone (21:59):
Don't,
Kate Mason (22:01):
No, they do. Mine do. Look, they do turn around and they do. They are grateful. You have to drag it out of 'em sometimes. But they are grateful. And let me tell you, there's no harm in paying children as long as there's no coercion involved. It's not bribery. It's all good. Just a little gift to sometimes just get them on the way. My husband is big on that. I've always said to him, listen, I'm trying to bring them up, responsible and all the rest of it, and there you are. Oh look, I'll give you 50 bucks if you do this for me. I'm like, this is his adult children, not young children. He's got a job to be done. They just hang around and just wait. They love it. So that's also a different type of person. Some people would really frown upon that in our household. Different story, your household.
Victoria Vanstone (22:45):
I think you'd find that in most households though, there's stuff that goes on, whatever works at the time, whatever works for you as a mom to be able to manage a situation because situations are thrown at you all day every day. And sometimes they can be really challenging and really confronting. And I don't know all the answers. I'm not a parenting expert. I don't know the best way to deal with a lot of situation, and sometimes I have to fall back on bad habits. But I know when I'm doing it now, I've done enough work on myself to go, okay, that wasn't the right thing to do, and to move on from it and try and learn a better way. And I think that's all we can do is try to keep learning as moms.
Kate Mason (23:22):
Yeah, I agree with you. Did you work out, you said you're turning into your mother, which is really funny. I was just talking to someone about that the other day. And did you work out that you like being your mother and doing that or have you changed the way that you handled that? I mean, is there just an occasional about personality?
Victoria Vanstone (23:42):
I think I've taken on a lot of my mom's traits. I love my mom dearly, but the shouting growing up, I think it's just so unhelpful. And I know that my kids don't respond well to it. And I remember being a child myself, and whenever my mom did shout at me to clean up my bedroom, I never thought, oh, maybe I should clean up my bedroom. Then I just thought, I hate you. So I know it doesn't work. And it's funny how you can fall into habits that you've even experienced yourself and know that they don't work, but still fall back on them. It's quite incredible that generational impact that that has. So I'm much more aware of how I use my voice. And also, I grew up with a mom who was always on a diet. I do talk about that in the book, and I'm trying to change my language around my body in front of my children as well, instead of talking about food in a kind of negative way, although I've put on weight, although I don't look good. So I'm definitely trying to change a few things that I grew up with. But I do find it hard, and I do find myself slipping backwards sometimes, but I try and be conscious of the words that are coming out of my mouth probably a bit more than my mum.
Kate Mason (24:52):
Yeah, yeah. And that is a huge thing these days for that in that sense. We're even having discussions around that at the moment because Sam's family are Italian and they love chubby chicks and chubby and Cass is going, oh my goodness. All of the things that words play and bring into. And you might mess around and say silly things and you don't know what Well, to tell the truth, we're never going to know what impacts a child thing,
Victoria Vanstone (25:25):
But it's never going to be perfect, is it? That's the thing. It's just rubbish, which should be perfect, and we're going to get it right all the time.
(25:30):
That's
(25:30):
Right. Because we're not tell them not to go to Thailand. Because everywhere I went, they said, oh, hello wick, you have a stomach, like a jackfruit. I was like, oh, I think that's a compliment, but I'm not quite sure how to take it. Did you ever look at a jackfruit just to see? Have you seen one? Oh, no, no, I do. They're actually right. I have had three
Kate Mason (25:54):
C-sections. Yes. But it's definitely not a compliment then. No, it's not. But it is the truth. And young women, I mean men as well, just growing up now, everything is that hypersensitivity.
(26:09):
And as I say to people, the thing my mom said to me, look, we are quite a tall family. Mom's not, but we were quite a tall family, and I remember growing up and suddenly having these thighs appear and I couldn't fit into things. And I complained to my mother and she said, don't worry, dear big thighs run in the family. Oh, thanks. Oh, who? So I'm off sobbing in my bedroom, and she's just thinking, well, they do. There was no, she wasn't being nasty or anything like that. And I say to people, the things that stick with you for life. Oh gosh, I know. And I've told my daughter, I know I will have said something wrong, and I just want you to know, I'm really sorry. Okay, great. It'll probably come out on a psychologist couch at some time of your life, but I just want you to know I'm really sorry right now.
Victoria Vanstone (26:55):
Well
Kate Mason (26:55):
Done. Just how do we know?
Victoria Vanstone (26:56):
How do you just got to own it, I guess? I know when something derogatory comes accidentally out of my mouth and I've said the wrong swing, I know it straight away because I get little piercing pin in my heart. I'm like, okay, that was just silly. That was too far, but that was too far. Yeah, it's often the case with me. I kind of just, I don't really speak my mind. I'm not going to be horrible, but sometimes maybe a joke goes too far, especially with the kids too. So we've had to invent a swearing day in our household because I do swear quite a lot. So I've invented a day where we allow the children to swear as much as they like, and that seems to help with the swearing in the house. But if they swear out of that day, then they are not allowed to have the swear day. So actually they don't swear for the rest of the year, which is good.
Kate Mason (27:42):
So are they allowed to swear out of the house? No,
Victoria Vanstone (27:45):
We make sure we go where? Where there's just,
Kate Mason (27:47):
Yeah,
Victoria Vanstone (27:47):
There's no police or judges or local authorities.
Kate Mason (27:52):
That is so funny. I really look forward to hearing how that turns out. That would be great. I was a school teacher and so used to hear some funny things, some very funny things. We all have our ways, however
Victoria Vanstone (28:04):
We get through, however we survive, I'd
Kate Mason (28:06):
Say. Absolutely. Absolutely. So when is Momming coming out?
Victoria Vanstone (28:11):
So it's called Momming, a year of trying and failing to be a better Parent. It's going to be out in Australia on the 1st of May. You'll be able to get it at any good bookshop or online. I think I'll be doing an audio book at some stage, but I haven't booked that in quite yet. But yeah, it will be out on the 1st of May everywhere.
Kate Mason (28:30):
Oh, that's magnificent. It's just wonderful to talk to you. And so what's your one piece of advice you could give a guilt stricken parent about becoming less guilt stricken?
Victoria Vanstone (28:43):
Just maybe hide in the cupboard a bit longer. Next time? I'm not going to say it's not going to happen. I'm not going to make you feel better about it. I'm going to say this is parenting, but just keep hiding for as long as you can until someone notices.
Kate Mason (28:59):
Thank you so
Victoria Vanstone (28:59):
Much. Thank you. See you soon. Thanks, Kate.
Kate Mason (29:04):
Welcome to the chaos and the comfort of being real. Please share this episode with a fellow caregiver who might need a laugh, a little boost, or just a gentle reminder, you don't need to be perfect. Just love your kid. Keep showing up and know that some days just getting out of that door is a real win. And before we go, here's three takeaways. You don't need to be perfect, just present. And even if that means showing up with a block of cheese instead of a packed lunch, laughter is a real form of therapy, especially when it's paired with honesty and perhaps a couple with a friend. You know what? Progress isn't always pretty, but it's worth it. Keep trying even on those tough days. And just a final note, remember that you're doing better than you probably think. Perfection isn't the goal. Connection is be kind to yourself and take the pressure off and know you are not alone in this. We've got your back. Thanks for listening to Parenting and Personalities. If you enjoy this episode, we'd love it if you could leave a rating and a review that would help others learn about this podcast. If you're interested in discovering more about you and your family's personality types, you'll find my book, who is this Monster or Treasure in My House on Booktopia or Amazon? If you have an episode idea, please send a note to the personality coach@gmail.com. Many thanks to our producers at Stories and Strategies, and we'll see you next time.