Social Distancing

were all well rested. Well, I well, okay. So the elephant in the room, around the whole globe, fin in the on the planet is coronavirus, and so I, as usual as a virgo, I like to plan. So we're trying to start strong with the positivity where our kids are off school for two weeks um and so I'm I'm just trying. I'm trying. This is not normal, this is not this seems so normal for where we are right now. I know it's not necessarily true for I

don't know. I have country. I have friends around the country, like I have friends in l A and Richmond and Pittsburgh, and like they are, they're feeling the panics like more. I feel like it's hitting the the pressure to lockdown. I feel like it's hitting other parts of the country more quickly than here in terms of how how fast the disease got here, because we knew that coronavirus was hitting a town over for us for days and they were kind of like barely putting together a response. And

now I think people are starting around the country. You're starting to realize this is an issue, and they're locking down, maybe even before they kind of need to. I don't like this is so unprecedented. I don't know what the right answer is in terms of our response. Yeah, yeah, we're not everyone's everyone's pretending to be an expert. Everyone and an expert. I'm guilty of this. I'm sure if you listen to the podcast, I probably spoke last week

with some authority about something I had no authority. There's so many like self ordained experts on the internet, and also so little like accurate information going out in terms of what's happening, like especially from our federal government. Um, but I I you know, I got to dry cough. Are you Okay, too soon. Not funny, not funny. So let me just drink some more whiskey as we're doing

many coping mechanisms. Um. So I'm trying to enter this two weeks of no school strong and just like try to have some healthy coping mechanisms, which was I went for a jog today. We took the kids on a nature walk, social distancing, and then my body was like that's enough. I need a long nap. Um this three hour nap and these dry coughs. Did you have coronavirus? Oh okay, let's not pretend that what just happened didn't

just happen, which is Beth had me stop. I just had a little cop I had like a throat tickle thing going on. Oh that good thing. That's a symptom of the pandemic that's hitting our symptom. I don't I don't feel sick. But I'll tell you one thing that is happening that I I don't think. Um. I so last week I was carrying I had like a really

bad day with the kids. I can't remember which day, just getting them home from school and may even that, you know, sometimes they get tired and hungry and they melt down on the way home, so I had to carry Mayven inside. So she's on my hip and her head is next to my head and she's screaming, tantruming, trying to get me to stop, and she's screaming in my ear. And when I woke up the next morning, I had a little bit of blood, like dried blood in my ear, and I think she might have slightly

like ruptured my ear drum. No big deal, um, but I looked like I looked this up online and looked at for reasons why her ear is bleeding, and that seemed like the most plausible one. And it's also one that doesn't really require any treatment. So it seems like a really dumb time to go to urgent care when there's like infectious disease spreading around us. So I'm trying to ignore it. But I do like my ear does I feel just like a tiny bit pressured, if that

makes sense. Yeah? Um, and so yeah, so kids are a nightmare and that's the lesson. Um, well, I hope it's to pop deer drum and uh not not this disease. It's definitely not this disease, isn't I trust me? That I googled coronavirus ear bleeding and that it's not a thing. Um um. So yes, we are very close to New Rochelle, which is locked down. Was the first town is totally locked down, and now our schools are locked down. Is it totally locked They just did like a one mile radio.

It's not totally locked down, but all the schools and all now all their their public spaces. And I think the response around here has been okay so far. I mean, we don't know how bad it's going to get in New York City, and that's concerning. But like the fact that they canceled school for two weeks I think is good. The fact that they waited until after Friday to give

us time to finish up the week. I think given the situation, what my concern is like, we don't know how long this lockdown is going to last and what is going to be necessary and this I feel like this coronavirus situation might go on from Hanson months, so like, I don't I don't think you want to pull the trigger too soon on this, but it's like it's so

hard to tell with all the weird information. Well, I mean, what's clear at this point, you know, it's the great danger is that everyone too many people get sick too quickly in it overwhelms the health care system. I know. And then I saw something online today that was like trying to debunk that theory and say that that's not good. I don't I didn't have time to read it, and

then I lost it. And well, this is every conversation is somebody sees something like that and then they're like, I saw a thing that but I don't know, and so we're all well. And then sometimes I understand like people who are like, it's just a flu, it's nothing, like, that's wrong. You should we should be taking this seriously and we should be social distancing. But then sometimes I think people put stuff out to try to calm people down, and then other people are like, no, you can't be calm. Yeah,

everyone has to be panicked. It's like there's a there's just like a lot of stuff flying around out there where I think you should stand for him, go to the CDC website, stuff like that, but you should try to stay offline right now because I think it's just like a there's a lot of fearmongering. You should be prepared and vigilant and on top of that positive. Yeah it is. That's take care of your mental health right now while we're in this very uncertain be smart, but yes,

don't don't kill yourself. Don't go don't kill yourself. Okay, uh, rate up, follow the rules, be safe, stay away from each other, and lock it down and then enjoy it. I am taking our children um away from here to a to a family member's house that's totally empty right now, away from everybody, because a few hours away. Just for anyone's who's concerned that we are spreading disease from our the center of disease, we are. We have socially isolated

now for a day or two. I think we're okay, you're going to try not to you're taking the kids, Oh yes, for the record, I'm taking them directly to a house and literally not stopping until we get there and ordering groceries. So we're not spreading If we're going to try it, yeah, I don't. Personally, I don't think we have it right now. I know it could be incubating, and that's been my fear all along, because our children are disgusting and lick everything, and we're in a huge

freaking hotspot right now. But I don't think so far. Knock on what I don't think we have it? Um, but my parents were supposed to come this past weekend, the story part it's benefit. It was postponed to name my parents were to come, and uh, actually it was my little brother. It was like, you, guys, you can't come. You shouldn't, you know, and they're they're older, they're anymore. Your little brother has a baby too. Well, I guess he's worried about your parents. No, no, yeah, we're all

of my brothers and I are all reading statistics. We know that we are low risk, but our parents are older and they're higher risks. We said, they put they put your parents are healthy. I did read today that people there's like a list of things that put you at risk, and it said people with endocrine issues are more at risk, which is like not great news for me because of my thyroid issues. What. Um, but I

don't like, I don't really know what that means. You know, I didn't get more information on that little little Uh yeah, I don't know. Ill. I've probably said this before, but I don't fear death. Um, I thing, I don't think you've ever said that. Well, I personally, I believe there's an afterlife, and I believe in reincarnation, and I think that the world that we currently live in is much more of a pressure cooker painful situation than we will

ever experience on the other side. And if I'm taken from here, my concern is for you guys, but not for me. Boy. You know what, It is so funny because I don't believe any of that. But I have a similar attitude where I mean, it's easy to say when you're healthy and relatively young to say, like, I don't fear death, but I don't bother worrying about it. Um, I'm a very like you know, you die and there's nothing type of attitude. So the conclusion is there's nothing

I can do about it. Let me enjoy being here and and part of that is loving the people I'm around and making them happy. I also, like, because I'm, you know, a crazy person and I'm into manifesting type stuff, I don't I just don't think it's a good idea to like feed the fear in these situations. And I think we should be realistic and like, I don't not believe in science. I know this is disease is real and people will die from it, so we should try

to be careful about spreading it. But prepared and positive. Yeah, prepared and positive, guys, Be prepared and be positive and take care of yourselves. I really do think like, especially as a parent, we've kind of, um unwillingly been subjected to a lot of social isolation in the last two years, and I do think we're like more prepared for this than other people, Like because we're lonely, is that what

you're saying. No, just because we've had to develop a lot of coping mechanisms for the fact that, like we we can't commute into the city to hang out all the time and like do whatever we want, and sometimes we don't get to leave the house for days, and we you know, like I like I in a way, I sort of feel like we've been preparing for this. We're we're you are an introvert and I'm a secret introvert, and that we we get sick of people quickly and

want to be by ourselves. So yeah, I also like, prior to this, I was already feeling pretty overloaded with the world and my workload and all this stuff, and that stuff is kind of still there, but it's kind of nice to be in a place where everyone is like overloaded and like confused about what's happening. And I'm like, this is our careers as entertainers. This is this question mark of what's next has been there all along, and it's like sort of refreshing that like, now we're all

in this place of like what's going to happen? Not to I totally relate to what you're saying, not to downplay the people that are now suddenly in a very are your real tricky financial situation. Like we have a lot of friends who have a gig based work that suddenly he's just super dried up. Um, you know I work where the Magnet Theater where I work, Yeah, it shuts out for two weeks, no ticket sales, no classes,

and that's a huge challenge. It's a good time to check in on people, like your elderly neighbors and see if you can go like pick up their prescriptions for them, or if you have like friends who our stay at home parents or whatever they need groceres. Like it's just a good time to check in with people if they're if they're gig economy, revenue has dried up. If you can send them some groceries, if you have the ability to do that kind of thing, it's a good idea. Yeah.

And if you have people that you pay for for things that you're canceling, maybe pay them anyway. Yeah, we're talking about canceling our cleaning lady for this week and just paying her. Um, we have I have to figure how to do that. I like, our cleaning lady showed up this week on a day that was not her day of the week to clean and not her week that she usually comes because she comes every other week. And I like, in the midst of all this Corona stuff,

I was like, is she okay? Like, is everyone okay? What is happening? Um, it's been just very surreal around here. Oh boy, oh boy. Yeah, and we've been oh boy, it is It's crazy. You know what? Despite all that, Like, yeah, you know what, stay positive, Let's just take a second ago. This is one of the this is uh one of the craziest things I have, um in my life. I have a yoga teacher that I don't actually see her very much in person, but she was a prenatal yoga teacher.

I had and then we've like I just I stay in touch with her on Facebook um because she's also like a small business owner. She now has her own yoga studio and teaches meditation and and like she she was one of the people in our community that was like the quickest to like sort of sound the alarm bells and be like this is bad, Like we should we need to start doing stuff about this. And she was like first she was like disinfecting her business like crazy.

And then a couple of days and she was like, you know what, we just need to shut this down into remote classes because we don't know what's happening. This disease is very close. Her son goes to school in New Rochelle where the virus is sitting, and like and every like she would post on Facebook a lot, and so many people were treating her like a crazy person and like she you know, like like one of her meditation students threatened to sue her for not hosting the

meditation class in person. It's like, I think right now, what I've seen, especially even before this with the election, there's a lot of people arguing for things that I do think they need, like things like healthcare. I understand

people are very in need right now. But I think what you have to understand about people right now is that are the state of our country has made them so traumatized that they're not always in the right mind in their reactions two things, you know what I mean, Like people are just like people are losing it and

it's but it's not their fault. It's not their fault that like, there's so many pressures on them with the gig economy and the lack of health insurance and a lack of mental health care and like a lack of ability to pay their bills. I just blame everything on social media for making and taking taking all of the not not to undercut what you're saying, but in the midst of all of that, then giving you, on top of all of that perfectly legitimate stuff you just said,

fourteen unnecessary, vague things to worry about. I don't think social media is always great, but I don't necessarily think that's like the root of the problem, just exacerbates all everything. Before we have social media, people were suffering. Sure, sure, you just didn't have to see it, you know, yeah, well yeah, oh boy. Anyway, what was good did happened this week. Good that happened this way. We got into our new house. We did. We were able to go

in and start planning some renovations, which is great. Measurements taken. Things are moving along. I think it's actually going to happen. Do you know what's crazy? I didn't tell you this. So I shot a commercial this week and when I was on set, I met this older woman. I told her where I was moving. Uh, and she and she's like, oh, I grew up like three blocks from there, like my

family's house was there. I lived there forever and then she just sold it like a year ago, and then moved to an artist loft a block from the Magnet Theater where I work. Wow, and we really connected. That's great. What does that mean? It's a sign? I know, But of what that this woman and I are pet ships in the night. There's just I don't know. I think there's a lot of signs happening for me personally lately. Was the dumbest one the dumbest sign mm hm, oh

well this is okay, this is actually really funny. So I had a doctor's appointment and I came out and we were kind of like me and the doctor. We're talking about like kind of how much better I'm doing since I started seeing this doctor, and I was feeling

good about the steps I'd taken for my health. And then I got in the car and I turned on the car and the radio started literally playing the song I saw the Sign by Ace of Bass, which was a very beloved song of my deceased brother growing up, and we would have like dance competitions and we would

dance too. I saw the sign by Asa Base a lot, and it just kind of felt like like I, especially in light of what's happening now in the world, and like all this like it feels like to me, it feels like really more important than ever that people are taking care of themselves so that they are the best equipped to deal with what's happening. And I it felt like the steps that I have been taken to try to take care of myself were like validated in that moment that it was like it literally felt like it

was like I saw the sign. It's the most literal sign. It was so funny. But I also like, on the on the drive to that same doctor's office recently, like I saw a bus stop ad that said I'm proud of you. And I was like, yeah, that's for me, Like that's like all these things. I'm just like, yeah, that's that's a sign. You know what. Today, I when I was napping and during my nap, you know, I'm like, I don't know if I talked about this on the show much, but like I'm pretty into this very dumb

thing called angel numbers. And so it's like if you see a repeating seven seven seven, whatever, that's like supposed to have a meaning. So during my nap, I literally saw seven seven seven, like in my in my mind's eye while I was laying in bed, and then I got it from my nap and picked up my phone and it was five on my phone. Good God. And I was like, yeah, see, it's all proof of something. You don't have to believe it. It just makes me

happy and that's all that matters, you know what. That's where I can get on board, where I'm just just like I love patterns, I love connecting things, and that's how I I've grown to appreciate your love of it is to let go of my need to, you know, try to debunk it for no good reason and then just go like yeah, that's a that's fun. I like it. I'm behind seven seven seven five five five is your cough? Okay? Yeah, I just just I swallowed some coronavirus. Coronavirus, and now

it's time for did you knows? This is where we learned something and share it with you, Beth. So, I thought that was kind of interesting topic for discussion right now. This is an article from huff Post called how to work from home without losing it with your partner or your kids. That's not applicable at all. Who can imagine what that would be like? It's by Katherine Pearson. I'm just gonna sort of go through her bullet points, um.

She says plan in twenty four hour chunks, um, and just sort of like the what she's acknowledging is like, we don't really know what's happening. I think a lot of us, and that you kind of have to take it day by day and just be like, what's the plan for dearload? Three things? I pray. This woman in my mom group who is also a Broadway actress, Laura Bananty, she posted a Twitter thread this week. Um, she was like, if your high school musical got canceled because of coronavirus.

Please share videos of you and your uh like classmates performing and the videos are so good. It's just like, oh my god, that's great. It's such a good thread. I'll to send it to you later, but it's just like really quick sidebar. I played Jesus and God's Bill in high school and it wasn't until halfway through the performances that I realized that the entire text of the play was from the Book of Matthew, one of the the Bible, from the Gospel. You were like, hey, wait,

is this religious? I was like, I was like, this is one of the Gospel, the Gospel's Gospel god Spell. Oh, and I realized that I had memorized most of the Book of Matthew, and I was like, I really missed. Boy,

I'm seventeen or night. Okay. So she also talked in this article about establishing blue zones, which is carving out areas in your home that are strictly yours, which they acknowledge is very hard if you live in a tiny apartment, and it's sometimes like it sometimes means that you have to take a conference call in the car, which is something we're very familiar with. UM, but It's just like I do think it's good to sort of be like, Okay, how are we going to map this out? What's the plan?

And yes, the plan will go out the window when your kids come in and pull on you. But um, things to know. It says work in shifts, which a lot of these things are we're we are already familiar with because we already try to work on the weekends all the time. Um, And it says focus on the upsides. This is where I'm really trying to like lean into right now. It's like, Okay, this is like under other

circumstances where there wasn't a health emergency. If it was like you have two weeks off with your kids and you have to spend time with them, I do think the goal would be like, Okay, let's make this quality time. Let's like obviously go easy on ourselves. There's gonna be a lot of screen time, but like also like what how can we make the most of it? Can we do crafts? Like how can we enjoy each other? Um, I'm going to be alone in a house with our two kids for at least like for like four days

or something. I think like two days. I think I'm committed to making a movie with him. M that's funny. Um, yeah, I will put a some sort of tape based mustache on Maven and make her a villain. I think it would be a western western. Yeah, she's got a cowboy hat. Okay uh. And then it says, make friends with your anxiety. It's normal to feel anxious. Make friends with friends with your anxiety. Could you unpack that please? Well, it's just saying like it's normal to be anxious in this kind

of situation. Don't fight it. Be honest with yourself about it. Like I was telling my I have I have friends who are kind of dealing with different I think this is hitting everyone in different ways, and it just kind of triggers whatever your particular anxiety is. Like I was telling you today, like, it's interesting to me that in moments of stress, your anxiety always goes to financial anxiety for some reason. Um. But like I have a friend who has a newborn baby, and she's anxious because it's

just like she has a newborn. She's already anxious because

she's trying to sleep train and she's exhausted. And I mean, so that's on a newborn I guess it's like a few months old baby, but she's tired, and so I was telling her, like it would already be very normal for you to be anxious in the situation, Like just go easy on yourself that you're anxious, Like it's okay that you, as a person with a baby, are anxious when there's also a global pandemic happening, even though logistically I don't think this is going to really affect your

baby directly. I just turned it into a story make friends with What is it? What does the title? Make Friends with your anxiety? Yeah, I'm picturing anxiety is your hyper neurotic friend who comes over and you want to validate their concerns, but you also want to let it flow through you so you can help them calm down. Your anxiety is your neurotic friend, right, well, welcome them in.

You don't feed You don't want to feed the anxiety, right like you don't want to consume the news seven, But you also don't want to try to push it down and deny it you gently. Yeah, So anyway, um, and I guess that's the I guess that's the last point of this article, but I thought it was interesting. I think also if you want to work from home really effectively, UM, have your husband take the kids out of town so you can be alone for four days. You keep saying four days, and I don't think it's

going to be that long. Three or four. You said Tuesday, Wednesday. We'll see what happens. Right, You're gonna miss us too much? Nope. I ordered an Apple TV to be sent to the house where we're going great. It was that our arts and crafts, well, arts and crafts would also be good. But there'll be some of that too. Oh, I'm really committed to the movie. Now, please email us the title of Okay, now, don't these assignments shut would you give

our listeners assignments? It's completely self serving and not Yeah, that's not why else would I have? Why else to have a podcast? That's not how you create engagement when you if you're not why I'm doing it, I'm doing it because well, it's not effective or useful. It will be for what I need, listeners. I'm going to shut up. Listen, I'm going to shoot a movie with my kids. I just want you to email with the title of the movie should be, and that'll be an inspiration for the script.

That we write. It's not for the podcast, it's for me. I was joking with my friends, like I think so many of the women I know, their reaction to coronavirus is like, okay, pretty practical. It's like stock up on food, toilet paper, like make sure my kids are taken care of, like maybe something to entertain the kids. And then like our male partners or like men we know, are like what's going on with the stark market, Like maybe I should buy a weapon. Like it's just like they're like

their reaction is like, so I need to get a catapult. Yeah, it says like stuff that have Like I understand we're all anxious right now, but like, could you redirect that to something useful to the collective? You never know what you well, I just I'm not saying all men. I've seen, um, some nice men doing nice things, and I think, you know, I saw what. Okay, I'm talking to some nice thing,

but there's a really nice thing on. Yeah, you ignored me for a full week when I said we should be stalking up on supplies, so I had to do like three store runs by myself. And then we'll say I'm handling everything else very well. What does that mean? Everything else? I'm taking our kids away. Okay, there's a lot of big things to deal with that. I sent days stalking up on food. And then you were like, what if we just left town and left all this food? And I was like, can we wait a couple of

days while we eat the soup? I made like and well, I mean, in my defense, when you stocked up, we didn't know everything was going to be canceled. No, we knew. This is like where things were leading if you're following the um. Some nice things I've seen people doing online. So there was a Twitter threat of someone who they were at. They were going to the grocery store, and this elderly couple was sitting in their car with the window cracked, and they were like, hell, help help, and

they were like wanted. They have been waiting for someone for like an hour to come along and maybe go inside and buy their groceries for them, because they were very old and they didn't want to get sick. And so this person went to the store and bought their groceries for them, which I think is really nice. And then I've seen other people I know on Facebook like they'll like post a sign in their apartment building and be like, here's my phone number. Any like elderly neighbors,

anyone who needs help. If you can't, like, just call me or text me if you want me to go pick up your prescriptions or whatever. I feel like people are like I've seen things like that, like New Yorkers doing that. I think that's really great. Um. I just think like I do think, in spite of how scary this is, I think it's highlighting a lot of the

weaknesses in our system in a good way. I think we, like you know, we have to band together, and I hope that people will come out of this with a little more social awareness and social responsibility and stop going to bars and spreading disease. Being off work is not an excuse to go spread your germs around self. It's just just everyone, just the whole world. Take two weeks, then all those people who are sick. I think two weeks might be optimistic, though I don't know what is

going to happen. Well, well, I mean if we if literally everyone self isolated for two weeks, then there's that amount of time if there's no spreading that all of those people that are going to recover recover and now have immunities and it becomes way harder for things to spread. Yeah, but some people work in hospitals, some people are Amazon delivery people, like, they're still going out there. There's not going to be a zero spread, even if most of

us are pretty responsible. Right, Well, it's the more you can do all at once. That's the flattening of the curve. And it doesn't overwhelm the the system. You spread it out. Maybe get to the point where we get a little vaccine. And let's hope we get a vaccine. Considering our president turned down the World Health Organization test for this virus.

He just took it. We found out it was negative. No, I mean he turned the World Organization was sending the test around to different countries, and he and his administration decided that we should develop our own tests and waste time doing that, and then we developed a faultier test that doesn't work as well. Don't get me started. No, I am allowed to get starred. I didn't mean that literally,

that colloquially. Colloquially anyway, Um, we should say that we are recording this um two days earlier than we normally do, so the whole world could have fallen apart since we recorded this, so so sorry for Yeah, by the time you're listening to this, if it even gets released, we could be on fire. Yeah, we might. We might be on fire right now. Not not the world, just us

two today. So I really do believe there's like a collective unconscious and that we kind of like pick up on things, whether or not we are directly knowledgeable what's happening when there's tension in the world. And today Maybe and Brenn we're playing and they're talking about their like playing and Bryn was like talking about my sister who lives in Brooklyn, and he was like, Ali, her town got struck by lightning and she can't come. And then

Maybe was like, but I love her. And I was texted my sister to let her know they were saying this, and she was like, are they is this them processing coronavirus? Which like they we haven't told them that like much about it. I did, like I've been trying to tell Brenda wash his hands more. And then he gets angry and he told me I'll never meet someone with coronavirus in my whole life. Um, he did try to open the fridge with his mouth today and I was like,

this is what we were talking about. I know, it's our fridge. You'll be fine. We need to get better on the germs thing, because they are not kidding, they're real five and three year old. So we went for our nature walk today and there was by the way, the nature preserve has never been busier. Everyone, well, we can't go to a crowded places. Let's go where no one goes. It was still good, we were still able

to social distance, but the parking lot was packed. Um. But so we were walking and we passed these like three older girls, at least relative to Maven who walked by, and Maven was like cool, cool older girls. And as they passed by, I heard these girls go what did what do they say? They're like, can you imagine if my parents were dead? And then and then others like

imagine my parents are dead? And I realized, like, there, I've read hundreds, tens of thousands of stories written by kids, and there is a through line of stories written by probably aged seven to twelve year old girls who love to write about uh, young female protagonists whose parents are dead well, which is like every Disney movie even children. Yeah, children's fiction is full of orphan children and then romanticize it and make it seem sort of like really great

that your parents are dead, like Harry Potter. Um, But yeah, I already told you this. But I was at the same nature preserve like a week ago, and I was trying to go for nature walk and these two boys walked up to me, who are like nine or ten years old, and one of them was like, um, excuse me, Can I ask you the question, Um, if there are deer and they're walking towards you, is that dangerous? There's some deer over there. And then his friend interrupted and

he was like, no, no, that's not the question. The question is do you know what time it is? And I so I gave them the time. I told him what time it is, and then they were like, oh my god, we gotta get out of here, we have to go, and then they ran on. That's when the deers said they would come and meet us and walk towards us quiet devon. They're kind of trying to warn me that there was deer about because this nature preserved

we go to always has deer and deer. But like, I can see how if you're like a kid and there's this deer just like hanging out. You're like, uh, is this dangerous? Maybe it's not a dumb question? Really? Nine or ten? They're really cute alright, ten? Great age. Yeah, so the moral of the article, the moral of the article, well, it's just like the moral moral of the article I think is like, have a plan, set some expectations with each other, Like let's all try to support each other, yeah,

so that we can all get some work done. This next segment is called Listeners Want to Know, is where we take questions and comments from you guys. This email comes to us from Mindy. Mindy says first time writer Hi Beth and Peter. I've been listening to you guys for a long time, and I love every episode. I cannot find another podcast that brings me as much joy. So I am currently realist too for the fun of it. Is nice. You're gonna know more about us than we do.

I have a six year old daughter, Alicia, not Alyssa. Alicia, emphasized the I A Alicia, Alicia, Alicia Alicia. Well, you've definitely nailed it. I've definitely nailed one of those two. And uh so Alicia and twin month old boys and Grace. Congratulations on she goes. Yes, it is Hell. I love listening to your experiences with Brin due to the fact that him and my daughter are the same age and hit the same milestones. Pretty milestone is pretty close together. Anyways,

I'm emailing you for advice on a heavy topic. Beth. This will hit home and maybe triggering for you. I'm married to a wonderful husband who is the father of my twin boys, but not Alicia. I met him when

my daughter turned one. My daughter's father, or as I call it, orm donor, overdosed and passed away when she was two, never meeting her, knowing nothing about her being pregnant, with her knowing her father was an active drug user, and I'll just say not a nice person, was abusive, slash, manipulative, truly affected my way of loving real PTSD stuff. Oh. I had always planned on being upfront with her and keeping her in the know. However, after meeting my now husband,

all of that changed. He ended up being totally amazing and wanting. I wanted to be the father figure in her life, and that's what happened. She only knows him as dad. I know her to know. I want I know I want her to know the truth of him not being her biological father, but I'm not sure how Slash went to approach this. The past five years with my husband were so great, I um I didn't have this huge desire to try to dissect this information with a little girl now, now her being six, she's so

smart and capable of understanding a lot of things. But I don't want this to be confusing for her. She is aware that her at that her and Mommy have the same last name. I won't change mine until we get her officially adopted, which we are doing, but it is surprisingly giant pain in the ass. We live in Oregon and there are a lot of hoops we have

to go through. I was thinking of throwing a party with our friends and family when we get her officially adopted and our names changed, but still don't know if that's when I should dig deeper, dig super deep into everything. It may be this year or maybe next year, so she'll be either six or seven. Looking at Brent, do you think you would be able to understand something like this? If so, how would you approach this or would you wait until he's a little older, say ten to twelve?

When the concept may make more sense. Any advice would be great, thanks, mindy okay. My My immediate quick reaction to that is she'll understand, Yeah, I think okay, So I think, okay, take our advice with a grain of salt. We haven't researched this. I do think you should go with your gut in some ways on this situation. But my instinct is to not necessarily have a big talk sit down, but like just start offhand referencing the birth dad in this situation while she's still young, so that

it doesn't feel like a shocker when she's ten. I think, I don't think you have to sort of I don't in this situation because it doesn't sound like he was ever an active parent, especially like I don't think you have to be like you had another daddy or like make it confusing for her for what she can comprehend

at this age. But I do think, like, if you're talking like birds and bees, you can be like, mommy got you know, pregnant with this other man, Like there's sperm from this man, and you know, like I do think it's good to start planning seeds so she doesn't feel like the secret was hidden from her. I think

it's all in how how you say it. Um. I really think to my mom and these types of heavy conversations, who is so great at being positive and open and matter of fact about things, and she never like the if you're bringing a ton of weight to a thing you're sharing, that scares a kid and they can tell

that there's something important about it, right. I don't think you need to like sit them down, but just when you're talking about different things to be like, oh, yeah, well you're your brother's you know, I'm trying to think of a good way to say sperm sperm donation, but like, you know, we have different genes and you came from this guy, and yeah, you should say exactly what it is, which is that like, oh, you know you have a different biological father, and then explain what that means. I had.

I had a moment with the kids this week. That's kind of really fun to me because like so I probably said this before, but like my brother who died um when he was twenty one and I was nineteen, and he died of oxoually cotton overdose. It was very unexpected, but like we sort of we don't talk about him a lot with the kids because they never knew him, but like we're trying to sort of bring it up,

and I think he brought it up. So then this week Britain was drawing all of us as like eggs for some reason, and then he drew one egg with like scrabble on it, and he goes, that's Uncle Craig. He's cracked because he died, and like it really actually made me like simultaneously like laugh and emotional, like I was, like I was like it made me mostly like very happy and grateful that he knew who my brother was because I haven't really taken a lot of time to

talk to him about my brother. But I do want them long term to know that my other like my brother is a huge part of who I am and like how I came to be, and like I don't I want them to know that, like this person was in my life. And so I was really like laughing because I think my brother would really like to be remembered as like a cracked egg, Like I think it really would have made him laugh, but it's like that's

the way he's characterized by them. Well, when I read this email, um, the first thing I thought was this conversation I had with Brin because he came up organically, uh, because we're going, you know, talked about backwards in time and sort of our family timeline. And I had a moment where I was like, this is something that Beth should tell him. But because he came up organically, I was like, if I say that now, I'm going to turn it into a big deal. And it's important and

it's sad things. But so I just I just turned on my mind. I turned on my mom's voice and immediately just and it's this this tone she had or goes, oh, you know that mommy had a brother named Craig and he actually died, and he goes really and goes yep, And I said it was very sad. Um, yeah, and he he took he took too much of a medicine that he shouldn't have been and he died and he was very sad, and he could tell it was sad,

but he also it felt fine. So the way I was thinking about this when I read this email is the way you tell your daughter is as if this imagine that this event had happened to your daughter's best friend. And no, no, bear with me for a second, Like if this if your daughter's best friend had the same experience happened and she just found out about it, and then you had to tell that story to your daughter.

Oh like your friend who like your bio dad. Yeah, your friends, but your friends actually has a different biological father who passed away, so I didn't know about it. The tone you would use would be sensitive, but it wouldn't be It wouldn't be stern, and it wouldn't be overly precious. It would be a matter of fact and sensitive.

Bring that tone to it. One of my pet peeves about the grieving process is like as Americans were not very comfortable with death, and we like try to hide it away instead of just like talking about the elephant in the room, which is like for grieving people, it's like every other second you're thinking about the person you lost, Like it's not a mystery, Like it's not like you're not offending that person by bringing it up, you know

what I mean. And I think we have a tendency as a culture to be like, oh, I don't want to hurt someone's feelings by talking about this dark thing, litta blah blah blah. And it's like, no like knowledge it.

You don't have to necessarily like force them to get into it at various points, but like you should be mindful of the fact that people are going through dark things from time to time, you know, like I don't just don't show people fear, yeah, just like yeah, just like openly and be like, oh yeah, like you're this

these things you're dealing with. And I think the same thing for addiction, to be honest, like, just like because we create so much shame and fear around it that it makes it even harder thing to deal with than it is to begin with. So I would say six is the perfect age. I think any any longer and it starts to feel like we've been hiding something from you. But I think she'll completely under She'll have questions, she might to completely understand, but trust that six year olds

are very smart. They just don't have enough context sometimes together. You don't have to bring it up all the time, just like once in a while, just if it comes up, don't don't like run away from the issue. And I think as a six year old, she's probably going to process it in some weird ways and ask some weird questions.

And I think it's like it's good to let her lean into that and like if she has kind of like a sick fascination with it for a week, you know, like let her do her thing, because it's like that's how kids process and they they say and ask weird things and that's part of the process and it's good.

And just show her it's fine and that everything happened the way it happened and here we are now and she has her daddy now and her dad obviously, and yeah, I think I think the tricky part, I think is just sort of trying to find the terminology that is age accessible and also feels sort of respectful, respectful of the situation, which is that this man was never really

a dad to her. Her bio dad. He was, you know, he's the reason she is here, but he you know, he's not her dad, and she gets still gets to have her dad, and like you know what I mean, Like, I think those are the things you might have to think through a little bit. But I don't think it'll be as hard as it might seem in your mind, because your daughter is going to process it slowly over

many years. Show her that you are fine with it, and she will be fine with it, um ps its the ps here I will say, um just because well I'll just read it. I'll say I keep in contact with my ex as mom. She lost her husband about two years ago after her son, her only son. I am Mexican, have a huge family, lots of names, boylos uh. So my daughter just refers to her as Nana Lupita, which is not that uncommon for us to have a lot of relatives like that. Also, here's a pick of

my kids. Yes, no is a little redhead. My husband is not a redhead. Oh my god, alright, ready, cute picture. So this is a mini segment where we go we knows what they look like. Where I show a picture. I showed a picture of kids to Beth and she reacts because she loves all children, and you know this will be no different. Ready, Beth one two three, boom Oh he has glasses. A little kid with glasses. One of my friends kids just got glasses. And I'm like,

that's so cute. Gosh, I love these I love these children. Yeah, he's the redhead. What color hair is the Maleman's just kidding. But I think the fact that the biological grandmothers in the picture, I think only makes it easier because it's just you know, you say, um, what did she say, A Bola Lupizza or Nana Lupizza? She said, like, I think she can just be like, you know, Nana Lupizza had this son, and that's how you Yeah, yeah, you um, your biological father, uh you know, uh passed away before

you are old enough to know him. That's the fact you start with that. Yeah. I wonder if there's a book out there for this kind of thing, and just in terms of the terminology that kids are, what's accessible for little kids. Yeah, again I'd say, be okay with it, and she will too. Well. Um, thank you mindy, thank you for asking guests, and thank you for re listening. I hope you're not in this section where we were fighting all the time. Is that hard to get through?

What was our life like then? We don't know. I don't know. We've been We've been tired a lot. This has been another episode we know his parenting well. First of all, I just want to say we have gotten so many emails this week, um, because you guys like showing off your kids. And I'll tell you what, we love seeing pictures. We're gonna We're definitely going to do another another We Knows what they look like segment next week. Now that we have a ton of them, so keep

them coming. Um, we love you. We got a lot. We're going to be on the road next week, so stay safe, safe, stay rested, do what you gotta do. People touch other, don't be afraid of a little screen time for those kiddies. Keep your sanity. This has been another episode We Knows Parenting. Please tend us an emails and a baby pig, so would you know scenario advice?

Tell us how you're doing. We know spot at gmail dot com or can leave us a voicemail at three four seven three eight four seven three nine six, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, we knows pod and rate reviews, gribe on iTunes, and please tell you're expecting friends about my book. There's no manual, honestly, Cory Wisdom about having a baby manual. There's no manual. Okay, that's it. Bye,