Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1272 - Is The Mum I Hoped to Be Turning Up? With Victoria Vanstone

Transcript

#1272 - Is The Mum I Hoped to Be Turning Up? With Victoria Vanstone · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:05
Speaker 1: Okay, Myles Flecks to start today's podcast. I get sent
0:08
Speaker 1: books all the time. Publishers want me to interview authors
0:11
Speaker 1: put them on the podcast, and a lot of them
0:13
Speaker 1: are parenting books. There's diminishing returns for me as a
0:16
Speaker 1: parenting expert. I'm just not that excited about reading parenting
0:18
Speaker 1: books because I find that generally they don't add a
0:22
Speaker 1: whole lot to the stuff that I do. I am
0:24
Speaker 1: good at what I do. I know what I'm talking about,
0:26
Speaker 1: and usually I just pick holes in people's parenting books
0:28
Speaker 1: because they're not what people really need. The stuff that
0:32
Speaker 1: I've written about is what people need. Long way of saying,
0:35
Speaker 1: I got sent a book a little while ago and
0:36
Speaker 1: I was just like, oh, here we go, another parenting book.
0:39
Speaker 1: And the title of the book made me feel even
0:40
Speaker 1: less inclined. Honestly, I'm like, mumming, I'm a dad. We're
0:44
Speaker 1: a really professional podcast. It's all about science and research,
0:47
Speaker 1: and clearly this is a memoir A year of trying
0:49
Speaker 1: and failing to be a better parent by Victoria Vanstone.
0:52
Speaker 1: And I'm like, I've heard that name. And I checked
0:55
Speaker 1: out the bio. I was like, hmm, hang on, yeah,
0:58
Speaker 1: I've heard of this podcast so Awkward, and there's something
1:01
Speaker 1: about Victoria Vanstone where I'm like, you know what, I
1:04
Speaker 1: had to catch an aeroplane. I'll take the book with me.
1:07
Speaker 1: I'll read a chapter or two. If it's okay, I'll
1:09
Speaker 1: keep reading it. Otherwise I'm checking into the bin like
1:12
Speaker 1: I unfortunately do with so many other books.
1:15
Speaker 2: I couldn't put it down. I laughed my head off.
1:17
Speaker 1: I just got so much joy from reading, and reading
1:21
Speaker 1: is about joy, right, Like so many times we read
1:23
Speaker 1: a book because we've got to get to the end
1:24
Speaker 1: of it. But this was a book that literally brought
1:27
Speaker 1: me joy. I laughed, I actually did cry. I literally
1:30
Speaker 1: got weepy a couple of times. And by the time
1:33
Speaker 1: I'd finished it, I contacted my assistant and said, you
1:35
Speaker 1: got to book this podcast interview in I have got
1:38
Speaker 1: to talk to Victoria van Stone. Could I Welcome to
1:41
Speaker 1: a Happy Family's podcast, Real Pairing Solutions, every day on
1:44
Speaker 1: Australia's most downloaded pairing podcast. My name is doctor Justin Colson,
1:47
Speaker 1: the book snob obviously, and today I'm joined by Victoria Vanstone,
1:51
Speaker 1: a comedy writer host of the award winning podcast Sober Awkward.
1:54
Speaker 2: Originally from reading in the UK.
1:56
Speaker 1: She now lives about ten k's from me on the
1:59
Speaker 1: Sunny Coast with her annoyingly nice husband, who she continually
2:04
Speaker 1: refers to as port John, the Dog, Sandy, and three
2:08
Speaker 1: as she describes them, sticky, loud but occasionally delightful children.
2:15
Speaker 1: Her book is called Mumming, A Year of Trying and
2:17
Speaker 1: failing to be a bit of parent. I could continue
2:19
Speaker 1: with the bio, there's so much, but I think I
2:20
Speaker 1: should just introduce you to one of the most delightful
2:23
Speaker 1: authors that I've ever had the privilege of talking to.
2:26
Speaker 1: I know it sounds like a backhanded compliment, Victoria, but
2:28
Speaker 1: I loved your book.
2:30
Speaker 3: I'm going to have to kind of send this straight
2:31
Speaker 3: to my mum afterwards, because what an intro that was.
2:34
Speaker 4: I feel very flattered. Thank you.
2:36
Speaker 3: Justin Yeah, you can be like my pet in my
2:39
Speaker 3: pocket all the time. Every time I'm feeling a bit down,
2:41
Speaker 3: I'm going to bring you out.
2:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, just save this podcast in your favorites and just
2:47
Speaker 1: play the intro every time. I'm not one of those
2:50
Speaker 1: people who likes it when I hear a podcast interview
2:53
Speaker 1: and someone starts reading a person's words back to them
2:55
Speaker 1: out of their book like that. Feels almost like lazy conversation,
2:59
Speaker 1: and yet I'm finding myself compelled to do it. I
3:02
Speaker 1: got to page nine and I read this, and this
3:04
Speaker 1: is kind of where you This is kind of where
3:06
Speaker 1: you got me. You start off by saying, deep inside me,
3:09
Speaker 1: somewhere is the mother. I wanted to be the one
3:12
Speaker 1: that Nils holds shoulders, looks her child in the eyes,
3:15
Speaker 1: and says softly, now, Fred, we're on the same team.
3:17
Speaker 1: We can figure this out together. Let's go on a
3:20
Speaker 1: treasure hunt. Find you mysterious lust shoe. I know she's there,
3:24
Speaker 1: but like the shoe, I can't find her. She's been
3:27
Speaker 1: replaced with a cheaper, a worn out substitute, a cheaper version.
3:32
Speaker 1: And then I know this a long quote, but it
3:35
Speaker 1: literally had me. This is that Tom Cruise bit, the
3:39
Speaker 1: whole you had me at hello. This is the bit
3:41
Speaker 1: that got me. It wasn't meant to be like this, mumming.
3:45
Speaker 1: I mean, I thought I'd love every moment, be patient, kind,
3:48
Speaker 1: and spend my days reorganizing bedrooms and ining name tags
3:51
Speaker 1: onto school shirts. I wanted to be one of those
3:53
Speaker 1: mums who hums jolly tunes as she throws wooden toys
3:56
Speaker 1: into wicker baskets, sews up holes in socks, and wears
4:00
Speaker 1: flouncy dresses with worn out maternity nickers beneath. I wanted
4:03
Speaker 1: to know the best chewy chocolate chip cookie recipe off
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Speaker 1: by heart and wear oven gloves. But as the years
4:08
Speaker 1: of tick by, I get the feeling that woman isn't
4:11
Speaker 1: going to show up. What has emerged from the depths
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Speaker 1: of motherhood as a grumpy troll who throws plastic cups
4:17
Speaker 1: at walls.
4:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I mean, where is she that woman? Even
4:21
Speaker 3: you reading that back to me, I'm like, where is
4:23
Speaker 3: that woman? When the hell is she going to show up?
4:25
Speaker 3: Because she certainly isn't here. A little bit of her
4:28
Speaker 3: appears every now and again, and I'm like, oh, there
4:31
Speaker 3: she is, But then she disappears after another round of
4:33
Speaker 3: lost socks and spaghetti on the ceiling and that sort
4:36
Speaker 3: of thing. So yeah, I'm still trying to find her.
4:38
Speaker 3: But I think she's arriving occasionally in my life, which
4:42
Speaker 3: is nice. It's nice to meet her sometimes.
4:43
Speaker 1: And the idea is that you wanted to show up
4:45
Speaker 1: more often. But look, the research around this is really vexing,
4:50
Speaker 1: and we talk about a lot on the podcast. In fact,
4:51
Speaker 1: just a few weeks ago, we did an episode on this.
4:54
Speaker 1: Since the nineteen seventies nineteen and eighties, research into parenting
4:56
Speaker 1: and happiness shows that as the kids come along, your
4:58
Speaker 1: happiness declines, and the more kids you have and the
5:00
Speaker 1: older they get, the more unhappy you become, until they
5:02
Speaker 1: become teenagers, where your happiness it's rock bottom, and then
5:05
Speaker 1: when they move out of home you start to feel
5:07
Speaker 1: happy again. The number one symptom of emptiness parenting is
5:10
Speaker 1: non stop smiling.
5:12
Speaker 4: So it makes total sense.
5:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, and yet there's.
5:15
Speaker 1: So much meaning, there's so much delight, there's so much
5:18
Speaker 1: heart that goes into it, and we say parenting makes
5:21
Speaker 1: us happy, and in some very real and tangible ways,
5:24
Speaker 1: it does, even though the science doesn't pick it up.
5:27
Speaker 1: Let's go through your parenting statistics. How old are your
5:29
Speaker 1: kids at the moment, and how do you deal with
5:32
Speaker 1: the fact that you're not the mom that you hoped
5:34
Speaker 1: you'd be.
5:35
Speaker 3: I think, well, my kids are six, nine and thirteen,
5:39
Speaker 3: so I'm still in the trenches as it were. I
5:42
Speaker 3: was a traveler and a bit of a nomad before
5:44
Speaker 3: I had children, and I imagined that my children would
5:47
Speaker 3: slot into my life. I never imagined that they would
5:50
Speaker 3: have their own personalities or characters. I thought I would
5:53
Speaker 3: mold them into the people that I wanted them to be,
5:55
Speaker 3: and not have all these interesting intrinsic character traits that
6:00
Speaker 3: I did not even see coming. So it's been a
6:03
Speaker 3: bit of a shock for me motherhood. I think that's
6:06
Speaker 3: more of the point. And also I find that we're
6:08
Speaker 3: living in a world where imperfection isn't accepted, and I've
6:13
Speaker 3: found that embracing my imperfections whilst writing and whilst being
6:17
Speaker 3: a mum has actually kind of been my superpower as
6:20
Speaker 3: I've gone along and learned who I am as a mother,
6:23
Speaker 3: because I do think it kind of takes some training
6:25
Speaker 3: to work out who I want to be and who
6:27
Speaker 3: I actually am. And I think there was a point
6:29
Speaker 3: very early in the book where I was shouting too much,
6:32
Speaker 3: and it's a trait that's carried on throughout my family. No,
6:35
Speaker 3: my mum shouted at me, and now I shout at
6:37
Speaker 3: my children. I hear my mum's voice ricocheting around my house,
6:41
Speaker 3: and I realized that I didn't want to be that person.
6:44
Speaker 3: So this book is about that journey, about me trying
6:46
Speaker 3: to become the mum I thought I wanted to be,
6:49
Speaker 3: but actually it was so interesting writing it because I
6:53
Speaker 3: was trying to do better, But the point kind of
6:56
Speaker 3: got lost along the way because I didn't really get
6:58
Speaker 3: that much better.
6:59
Speaker 4: But that was okay.
7:01
Speaker 1: Writing does something, the processing that's required, the level of
7:06
Speaker 1: thinking that's required.
7:07
Speaker 2: It's different to speaking right.
7:09
Speaker 1: You can be a little bit loose, you can be
7:10
Speaker 1: a bit glib, you can say things and people get
7:13
Speaker 1: what you're saying even though you're not actually saying it
7:15
Speaker 1: quite clearly. But when you have to write, it demands
7:19
Speaker 1: a level of discipline and thinking that is completely different.
7:24
Speaker 1: And what you've done in this book is articulated precisely
7:27
Speaker 1: that start off with a parenting course, committed for the
7:30
Speaker 1: next twelve months that I'm going to be a better parent,
7:33
Speaker 1: And then you kind of get to the end and
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Speaker 1: you say, I don't know if I'm that much better.
7:36
Speaker 1: For what it's worth, I'm reading the book and I
7:38
Speaker 1: think you are. I think you are immeasurably better. I
7:42
Speaker 1: think there's no question about it. But you're sort of going,
7:44
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if I'm better, but I know that
7:46
Speaker 1: now I'm more intentional, I'm more connected to my kids,
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Speaker 1: there's something else that has happened. Is that a fair
7:52
Speaker 1: response to what you're describing as a lack of evolution.
7:55
Speaker 1: I think there actually has been absolutely.
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Speaker 3: I mean, it took me to write down and see
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Speaker 3: it in black and white to understand that I wasn't
8:03
Speaker 3: as bad as I thought, and I realized there was
8:06
Speaker 3: this backbone of unconditional love when I was growing up.
8:10
Speaker 4: There's a scene in the beginning of the book where
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Speaker 4: my parents leave me by the side of the road
8:13
Speaker 4: as a child.
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Speaker 1: I was going to read that to you today instead,
8:17
Speaker 1: but I went for the whole mumming thing. But my goodness,
8:20
Speaker 1: they just they left you on the side of the road.
8:22
Speaker 1: They've filled up the car and driven off, and they
8:24
Speaker 1: don't they literally don't realize that you're on in the
8:27
Speaker 1: car and exactly.
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Speaker 3: And I stood by the side of that road with
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Speaker 3: my sister with a feeling of that my parents were
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Speaker 3: coming back.
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Speaker 4: I never ever questioned.
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Speaker 3: I knew it was a mistake, and that was the
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Speaker 3: unconditional love that was the scaffold of my life and
8:41
Speaker 3: is what I bring to my children. I stood there
8:44
Speaker 3: strong by that road, knowing that my parents were going
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Speaker 3: to pull up at any minute, come out of the
8:48
Speaker 3: car and grab us and take us on our holiday.
8:51
Speaker 3: And at the beginning of the book, I say, this
8:52
Speaker 3: isn't a book about perfect parenting. It's a book about
8:56
Speaker 3: always coming back. So sometimes I'm not perfect parents very often,
9:01
Speaker 3: and I don't think all of us mums are. We
9:03
Speaker 3: live in this world of comparison where we're supposed to
9:05
Speaker 3: be perfect all the time, but it's not perfect. And
9:08
Speaker 3: when I'm at mother's groups and things, the stories that
9:10
Speaker 3: I hear, you know, I went to the shops and
9:13
Speaker 3: left the baby, you know, I left the baby in
9:15
Speaker 3: the house and had to drive back down the road.
9:17
Speaker 3: The humor and the reality of parenting is very, very
9:20
Speaker 3: different than the expectation. And it was such a joy
9:24
Speaker 3: to write this book and go, look who am I
9:26
Speaker 3: as a mum and who am I going to become?
9:29
Speaker 3: And what I learned was that I was enough in
9:31
Speaker 3: the first place, and that unconditional love that I felt
9:34
Speaker 3: while I stood by that road as a little kid
9:37
Speaker 3: is still existing in my world today. And even if
9:40
Speaker 3: I do get things wrong, my kids have something to
9:42
Speaker 3: fall back on, and that is that scaffolding, that unconditional
9:46
Speaker 3: love that I try to bring into everything, even if
9:49
Speaker 3: I do occasionally throw plastic cups at walls.
9:52
Speaker 1: So you're very very funny. You're quite a reverent. I'm
9:56
Speaker 1: a non course language person. You don't mind a bit
9:58
Speaker 1: of a swear. And as I'm reading the book, I'm
10:01
Speaker 1: kind of going, this is really confronting, but my goodness,
10:04
Speaker 1: there's so much heart. I just love it so much.
10:06
Speaker 1: I'm not going to read anything else to you after this.
10:08
Speaker 1: This is the last thing I'll read to you, I promise.
10:10
Speaker 1: But this, just this is a sense for people who
10:13
Speaker 1: are listening to chat and going I wonder if I like,
10:16
Speaker 1: where is this really going? Every page is punctuated with
10:19
Speaker 1: joy and humor and delight. I just laughed so much.
10:23
Speaker 1: Until I was eleven, I thought girls got pregnant. I
10:25
Speaker 1: should just quickly menagine content warning. If you've got the
10:27
Speaker 1: kids in the car, the next thirty seconds could be
10:29
Speaker 1: a little bit of an issue, but other than that,
10:30
Speaker 1: will be very very polite. Until I was eleven, I
10:33
Speaker 1: thought girls got pregnant by letting a boy put his
10:35
Speaker 1: tongue in their mouth, that an orgasm was something that
10:38
Speaker 1: lived in a rock pool, and that the blowjob was
10:42
Speaker 1: when you had your hair done at Carol's on High Street.
10:45
Speaker 3: It's actually, I mean, it's funny because it's true all
10:50
Speaker 3: of my stories.
10:51
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, people said I don't believe it. I can't believe it.
10:54
Speaker 4: I was like, I couldn't make this quite honestly.
10:58
Speaker 1: You are ridiculously But in the book, as much as
11:02
Speaker 1: it's funny, like we've already covered, there's a lot of heart.
11:06
Speaker 1: But something happens during this year of trying to month perfectly.
11:08
Speaker 1: That is just every parent's greatest nightmare. You have a
11:14
Speaker 1: near death experience. Walk us through that and talk about
11:17
Speaker 1: how that left you feeling.
11:19
Speaker 3: We were on a campa van holiday to Perth and
11:22
Speaker 3: I've how did my son a chupper chup? And I thought,
11:25
Speaker 3: I'm not really sure whether I should be doing this.
11:27
Speaker 3: He was kind of you know, four or five, and
11:29
Speaker 3: it was like, I'm handing it over. But there's a
11:31
Speaker 3: stage race or thing. Well should they be allowed this?
11:34
Speaker 3: It's a bit choky. Anyway, we took off in the
11:36
Speaker 3: campavan and I heard the noise that any mother you know,
11:39
Speaker 3: or father would hate to hear at any point throughout
11:42
Speaker 3: their lives.
11:43
Speaker 4: And it was my you know, my son unable to
11:45
Speaker 4: get air.
11:46
Speaker 3: And I turned around and we tried to revive him,
11:50
Speaker 3: and he was going blue, like it's your worst choking nightmare.
11:53
Speaker 3: You know. There's a reason we cut grapes in half,
11:55
Speaker 3: because all parents are pretty paranoid about a choking situation.
11:59
Speaker 4: So my worst fears were playing out in front of me.
12:02
Speaker 3: I had to run out into a road, I had
12:04
Speaker 3: to shout for help, you know, and get an ambulance there.
12:06
Speaker 3: And it was just one of the most well, it
12:08
Speaker 3: was the most terrifying experiences. And in that moment, you
12:12
Speaker 3: know how they say life slows down and you see
12:15
Speaker 3: your life flash in front of you, I just thought, gosh,
12:17
Speaker 3: I'm now becoming the mother who lost her child. That's
12:20
Speaker 3: who I'm going to be now. And within this kind
12:23
Speaker 3: of chaotic moment, there was a slow thought in my
12:27
Speaker 3: head was this is who I am becoming. And it
12:30
Speaker 3: was so frightening. Luckily, my son Fred survived that day.
12:34
Speaker 3: The one of a builder run out of a building
12:36
Speaker 3: site and stuck his fingers down my son's throat and
12:39
Speaker 3: saved his life somehow. We're not really sure how it
12:41
Speaker 3: happened and how he managed to revive my little boy,
12:45
Speaker 3: but I feared afterwards that one of my children would
12:48
Speaker 3: die at any moment. It shows the fragility of life
12:52
Speaker 3: very clearly to me. One minute we're okay and having
12:55
Speaker 3: the holiday of our lives, and the next minute we're
12:58
Speaker 3: in a life.
12:58
Speaker 4: Or death situation.
13:00
Speaker 3: And that kind of shook my ground beneath me because
13:04
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, well, well, everyone's okay and we
13:05
Speaker 3: all survive, and aren't we a strong and lovely family
13:08
Speaker 3: to the point where, oh gosh, this could change at
13:10
Speaker 3: any moment and everything could fall apart. And it left
13:13
Speaker 3: me feeling very very anxious, very concerned about the health
13:17
Speaker 3: of my children, feeling like someone was going to die
13:19
Speaker 3: at any moment, and actually I had to go and
13:21
Speaker 3: have some therapy and to understand the reasons I'd got
13:25
Speaker 3: completely overwrought with anxiety and panic that one of my
13:28
Speaker 3: children was going to pass away at any minute.
13:31
Speaker 1: The vulnerability is enormous, and I mean, it reminds me
13:35
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, I was surfing and caught
13:38
Speaker 1: a wave, went headfirst into a sandbank. The wave just
13:42
Speaker 1: absolutely drilled me, and I fractured my neck and my
13:45
Speaker 1: back in the same area and had it sort of
13:48
Speaker 1: carried out of the water and the ambos took me
13:50
Speaker 1: off the hospital and that kind of thing. And it's
13:52
Speaker 1: that fragility, like you said that, that vulnerability when you
13:55
Speaker 1: look at it.
13:57
Speaker 2: There's a couple of things that stood out to me.
13:58
Speaker 1: Number One, you were willing to say I'm not doing well,
14:00
Speaker 1: so you went and participated in a therapeutic approach to
14:05
Speaker 1: help you to work through it. Do you feel like
14:08
Speaker 1: you ever really get over that? Is it always sort
14:10
Speaker 1: of there in the back of mind, or at some
14:11
Speaker 1: point you just learned to function again.
14:13
Speaker 3: I think that's one hundred percent right. Yeah, you've hit
14:15
Speaker 3: the nail on the head. I mean I am over
14:18
Speaker 3: that situation. I did get help to understand that that
14:21
Speaker 3: is something that can happen in life. And when you
14:24
Speaker 3: have children, what you also create is risk. And you
14:28
Speaker 3: love people that much, you also create a fear of
14:31
Speaker 3: anything happening to them.
14:33
Speaker 4: That is parenthood in a nutshell, Really, isn't it.
14:35
Speaker 1: Actually, now that you say it, we mentioned this in
14:37
Speaker 1: the pot I can't believe it skipped my mind. But
14:38
Speaker 1: while I was reading the book and reading about that
14:41
Speaker 1: and now just thinking about you saying this. About the
14:43
Speaker 1: same time that all this was happening, my daughter fell
14:45
Speaker 1: off a horse and the horse ran across her face
14:48
Speaker 1: and yeah, like fractured her eye socket. And that was
14:53
Speaker 1: maybe eight or ten weeks ago now and she's fine,
14:56
Speaker 1: she's recovering. There's been all kinds of medical interventions and
14:59
Speaker 1: things that were required, and you do you get that
15:01
Speaker 1: sense of everything and change in an instant with the
15:03
Speaker 1: smallest thing, your trip, stepping off the curb and you
15:07
Speaker 1: fall and there's a bus coming like this sort of
15:10
Speaker 1: stuff can can happen so fragile. What are your greatest
15:15
Speaker 1: learnings when you look at this near death experience? I
15:16
Speaker 1: mean your son literally you were watching him die in
15:21
Speaker 1: front of your eyes. What are your biggest learnings from this?
15:25
Speaker 3: I mean it is learning that my love means risking loss.
15:31
Speaker 3: I think I think that is part of having children.
15:35
Speaker 3: And I never realized that before I had children. I thought, well,
15:38
Speaker 3: you have them and they grow up and you teach
15:40
Speaker 3: them and you hope for a good life, and you
15:42
Speaker 3: you know, teach them to be good or bad, and
15:45
Speaker 3: you know what's right and wrong.
15:47
Speaker 4: And then there's some things you can't control.
15:49
Speaker 3: And I think that's what it's taught me, is that
15:51
Speaker 3: I can't control everything, and there's points where you have
15:53
Speaker 3: to try and let them go a little bit, and
15:55
Speaker 3: you have to stretch that umbilical cord much further than
15:59
Speaker 3: you wish too. And that is really confronting and happens
16:03
Speaker 3: in different stages throughout parenting. For me, it's happening now
16:06
Speaker 3: because I've got a thirteen year old son who wants
16:07
Speaker 3: to go to the plaza on his own, and they're
16:09
Speaker 3: always I'm always being stretched and tested as a mum,
16:13
Speaker 3: and it's me trying to learn how to accept those
16:16
Speaker 3: stretches and step into them without fear, which for me
16:19
Speaker 3: sometimes takes some therapy. I'm going to be one hundred
16:21
Speaker 3: percent honest with you. I have to reach out for help.
16:24
Speaker 3: This has happened. You know, I fall apart occasionally in
16:27
Speaker 3: my life because you know, there's a lot of chaos,
16:28
Speaker 3: there's a lot going on. I was a binge drinker
16:31
Speaker 3: for twenty five years. Any time I fall apart like
16:34
Speaker 3: I did with my drinking, I reach out for help.
16:37
Speaker 3: And that is something that I recommend to anybody. Don't
16:40
Speaker 3: ever suffer with anything on your own. And I had
16:42
Speaker 3: to learn how to live with risk and the risk
16:44
Speaker 3: that I might lose my children at any moment, which
16:47
Speaker 3: sounds like something we just should just push away and think,
16:49
Speaker 3: let's not think about it, it will never happen. But
16:52
Speaker 3: I was so confronted with it, it was so real
16:55
Speaker 3: that I had to go right, this is something that
16:57
Speaker 3: is part of my life now, and I have to
16:59
Speaker 3: deal with it, and I have to learn to live
17:00
Speaker 3: with it in a way that's not going to make
17:02
Speaker 3: me a paranoid crazy woman.
17:04
Speaker 4: And so that's what I do.
17:05
Speaker 3: I live with the fact that love contains risk, and
17:09
Speaker 3: it is heartwarming and heartbreaking all in the same breath,
17:13
Speaker 3: which I find parenting.
17:14
Speaker 4: You know, it's a life affirming and soul destroying.
17:18
Speaker 3: I think, I write in the book in one moment,
17:20
Speaker 3: one minute, I'm crying in a pillow, and the next
17:22
Speaker 3: we're running down a sand dune towards the ocean, and
17:25
Speaker 3: it can.
17:25
Speaker 4: Be that between two minutes.
17:27
Speaker 3: So I think it's the kind of absurdity and the
17:31
Speaker 3: joys and the risks and the love all mixed up
17:33
Speaker 3: in this crazy kind of world that we live in
17:35
Speaker 3: as parents, Especially when you've got three kids like me.
17:39
Speaker 3: It's kind of learning that the chaos is okay. And
17:42
Speaker 3: that's what I try to embrace now, is that it
17:45
Speaker 3: might not.
17:45
Speaker 4: Be great all the time.
17:47
Speaker 3: It might be awful sometimes, but there are moments where
17:50
Speaker 3: it is beautiful.
17:59
Speaker 1: Her book is called Mumming, A Year of trying and
18:01
Speaker 1: failing to be a bit of parent. You're an award
18:03
Speaker 1: winning podcast host, You're a writer. Essentially, you spend your
18:08
Speaker 1: day in front of a computer. You're a content producer,
18:11
Speaker 1: a content creator. It's one of those things that's really
18:14
Speaker 1: hard to switch off. It's one of those things that
18:16
Speaker 1: requires you to always be scanning your environment, finding content,
18:20
Speaker 1: jotting things down, making notes, looking for ways that you can.
18:22
Speaker 2: Recraft what you've built.
18:25
Speaker 1: Your daughter comes to you one day and says, and
18:28
Speaker 1: I quote, mummy, do you love your laptop more than me?
18:33
Speaker 4: This has probably been one of my biggest lessons in
18:36
Speaker 4: the book.
18:37
Speaker 3: You know, there's various things that happen, go wrong and
18:39
Speaker 3: go right, but this was one moment where I realized
18:43
Speaker 3: I was working more than parenting, and I was putting
18:47
Speaker 3: my children after my work. And because you know, success
18:51
Speaker 3: has come at a very odd time for me. I
18:54
Speaker 3: have never really had a proper job. I was traveling
18:57
Speaker 3: the world. I sold jewelry on the market, so I
18:59
Speaker 3: was kind of this traveling no mad with a backpack
19:02
Speaker 3: and no care apart from where my passport was going
19:05
Speaker 3: to next, So I never really had any stability. And
19:08
Speaker 3: then I found a career only seven years ago when
19:11
Speaker 3: I gave up drinking and started writing and podcasting. And
19:15
Speaker 3: so it's come at an odd time for me where
19:16
Speaker 3: I've got three children and I'm trying to be successful
19:19
Speaker 3: at the same time, and it can be really hard
19:23
Speaker 3: for mums, you know, trying to combine the work, the chores,
19:26
Speaker 3: making sure everyone's happy, making sure everyone's fed, and it's
19:29
Speaker 3: like I'm balancing all these plates. They're all spinning around
19:32
Speaker 3: and occasionally they smash on the floor. So for me,
19:35
Speaker 3: I actually ended up going to a breath work I
19:37
Speaker 3: went a bit woo woo in part of the book
19:38
Speaker 3: and went to a breath work course which opened up
19:42
Speaker 3: this side of my brain which I never even knew existed.
19:44
Speaker 4: I am a bit woo wo.
19:45
Speaker 3: I didn't even know it was in me, quite honestly,
19:47
Speaker 3: and it really made it clear that I was prioritizing
19:49
Speaker 3: my work over my children.
19:51
Speaker 4: And so I have a funny, kind of peculiar.
19:54
Speaker 3: Characteristic whereas if I feel like I'm doing something wrong,
19:57
Speaker 3: I seek the answers to make it right.
20:00
Speaker 4: That's exactly what I did here.
20:02
Speaker 3: And I did it with my own self esteem when
20:04
Speaker 3: I felt like I wasn't happy with my body image,
20:07
Speaker 3: and I do it with all sorts of things whereas
20:09
Speaker 3: I go, Okay, this doesn't feel right.
20:11
Speaker 4: As a parent, I.
20:12
Speaker 3: Don't feel like I'm parenting in the way that I expected.
20:15
Speaker 3: So therefore, I'm going to find an alternative way that's
20:18
Speaker 3: going to give me some answers.
20:19
Speaker 4: And that's what I do in every aspect in my life.
20:21
Speaker 3: I knew at that point that my daughter needed me
20:24
Speaker 3: to play with her, and I was like, right, and
20:26
Speaker 3: I made some rules that day that I was going
20:27
Speaker 3: to turn off my laptop before they got home from school,
20:30
Speaker 3: turn it on after, you know, And I created a
20:32
Speaker 3: kind of pattern where my children wouldn't feel the loss
20:37
Speaker 3: of me, do you know what I mean. It's like
20:39
Speaker 3: they wouldn't feel that I was not there for them, because,
20:42
Speaker 3: you know, part of my giving up drinking as well
20:44
Speaker 3: is that I'm trying to be more more present and
20:47
Speaker 3: more available for my children and not preoccupied with with
20:51
Speaker 3: you know, wine or what's happening outside of my household.
20:54
Speaker 3: So when I'm in those moments with my children and
20:56
Speaker 3: I could see with her little glowing eyes looking at
20:58
Speaker 3: me saying, Mommy, I want to play with you. I
21:01
Speaker 3: knew I had to change, and so I seek the
21:03
Speaker 3: answers to make those changes.
21:05
Speaker 1: Your story reminds me of something that happened early in
21:08
Speaker 1: our family. I wrote my first book, which let me
21:13
Speaker 1: give a shameless plug for my book called What Your
21:15
Speaker 1: Child Needs from You. I wrote it years and years
21:17
Speaker 1: and years ago, and when my wife Kylie was reviewing
21:20
Speaker 1: chapter one to make sure that she was okay with
21:22
Speaker 1: the stories that I was sharing and where the book
21:24
Speaker 1: was going, she came across a list of statements. This
21:28
Speaker 1: is a questionnaire for parents to consider. My parents support me.
21:31
Speaker 1: My parents can saw me when I'm upset. My parents
21:33
Speaker 1: show they care about me. My parents show a genuine
21:35
Speaker 1: interest in me. My parents remember things that are important
21:38
Speaker 1: to me. My parents are available to talk at any time.
21:41
Speaker 1: My parents ask questions in a caring manner, and so on.
21:45
Speaker 1: And as we talked about those questions, she said, you
21:48
Speaker 1: know what we need to do. We need to do
21:49
Speaker 1: a parenting performance appraisal. And so we sat down with
21:53
Speaker 1: the kids one on one. I played with them in
21:54
Speaker 1: the living room. Kylie sat with them one on one
21:57
Speaker 1: in the dining room, and she went through and she
21:59
Speaker 1: took notes as they answered these questions, and some of
22:02
Speaker 1: the things that they said were just beautiful and delightful matters,
22:05
Speaker 1: feel like we were great parents, and other things that
22:07
Speaker 1: they said, we're a bit like you, hearing mummy, do
22:09
Speaker 1: you love the laptop more than me? I remember a
22:11
Speaker 1: distinct quote from our third daughter Ella. She said, when
22:15
Speaker 1: dad's busy on the computer, or you when you're doing craft.
22:18
Speaker 1: When Kylie does craft, it just overtakes the entire house,
22:22
Speaker 1: right the dining room table, the kitchen bench, the living room,
22:24
Speaker 1: like you can't find your way.
22:25
Speaker 2: Through the house. It's bedlam shed.
22:28
Speaker 1: When Dad's on the computer or when you're doing craft,
22:30
Speaker 1: it feels like, and this was a direct quote from
22:32
Speaker 1: a seven year old girl, it feels like you're not
22:34
Speaker 1: emotionally available to me.
22:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, And we just went, Wow, what are we
22:39
Speaker 2: doing here?
22:40
Speaker 1: I read that line and it all just came back
22:41
Speaker 1: to me. I thought, hmmm, they really they really require
22:45
Speaker 1: our presence, don't they. They just so bad and they
22:48
Speaker 1: do they measure their worth based on the amount of
22:51
Speaker 1: connection they're feeling seen and heard and valued.
22:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's taken me a long time to learn that.
22:56
Speaker 3: I hate to admit it. I realized that my you know,
23:00
Speaker 3: so I was excited about, you know, having a successful
23:02
Speaker 3: podcast and actually being you know, putting some energy into
23:05
Speaker 3: something that I thoroughly enjoyed for the first time in
23:07
Speaker 3: my life, and writing and people reading it and you know,
23:09
Speaker 3: that sort of praise and someone going, you are good enough,
23:11
Speaker 3: all of a sudden from me not really knowing myself
23:15
Speaker 3: or having an identity in this world, because I was
23:17
Speaker 3: just this kind of crazy party animal, and suddenly to
23:20
Speaker 3: have you know, these people saying, oh, yeah, you're a
23:22
Speaker 3: good podcaster and you're like an amazing writer, and it
23:25
Speaker 3: felt amazing, and that kind of overtook for a moment,
23:28
Speaker 3: it overtook my brain. It was very easy to latch
23:31
Speaker 3: onto the compliments of others because it made me feel good,
23:34
Speaker 3: and I was like, and that started to prioritize and
23:38
Speaker 3: I realized now that I was basing my own self
23:40
Speaker 3: worth on the opinions of others, which is very very
23:43
Speaker 3: risky ground to be standing on, honestly, very shaky. And
23:47
Speaker 3: so I'm getting better at that now. I'm not perfect
23:50
Speaker 3: at it either. I'm never ever going to claim perfection
23:52
Speaker 3: in anything, as you can probably tell. But I'm trying
23:56
Speaker 3: really hard to make sure that I am available and
23:59
Speaker 3: I have time for my children, and that my distractions
24:03
Speaker 3: are in my own time.
24:05
Speaker 1: Victoria, speaking about being emotionally available, there may be no
24:07
Speaker 1: better way to be emotionally available than to go camping.
24:11
Speaker 3: Tell me about camping, Ah, do you want the best
24:14
Speaker 3: parenting hack of all time? Am I going to give
24:16
Speaker 3: it away on the podcast?
24:19
Speaker 1: I don't know if you should actually share it because
24:21
Speaker 1: what you did in this was part genius and just
24:25
Speaker 1: part a diabolical. As I have to I have to say,
24:29
Speaker 1: i'd judge you for a minute. I cannot believe that
24:32
Speaker 1: you do it, And at the same time, I'm going, yeah,
24:35
Speaker 1: makes sense completely.
24:36
Speaker 2: It's up to you whether you share it or not.
24:37
Speaker 1: But before you do it, I will highlight that when
24:39
Speaker 1: I take my kids camping, I make sure that we
24:41
Speaker 1: go somewherehere I don't have to cook, So I'm not
24:44
Speaker 1: going to cook on a campfire stove or anything like that.
24:46
Speaker 1: We're going to go camping and I am going to
24:48
Speaker 1: order pizza or I'm going to go and get some
24:50
Speaker 1: pasta or some fish and chips down the road. Wherever
24:52
Speaker 1: we go, there has to be food accessible, because I
24:54
Speaker 1: refuse to deal with all the rubbish that goes along
24:58
Speaker 1: with trying to cook and clean up the mess that
25:01
Speaker 1: happens with camping cooking.
25:03
Speaker 2: It's just too hard. Anyway, tell me about you and
25:05
Speaker 2: camping now that I'm well, there's a.
25:07
Speaker 4: Lot of things I don't like about it.
25:08
Speaker 3: I mean, camping in England was a little bit more
25:10
Speaker 3: straightforward because there weren't snakes and wombats and all sorts
25:14
Speaker 3: of horrible creatures wandering around at night.
25:16
Speaker 4: And yeah, I just find it hard work.
25:20
Speaker 3: I want to sort of pretend that I like fishing
25:22
Speaker 3: shirts and I'm happy to go camping, but I don't,
25:26
Speaker 3: so I have I'm going to share my hack with you.
25:29
Speaker 3: I go camping with my children, and there's a rule
25:33
Speaker 3: that we camp within a five kilometer radius of the house.
25:36
Speaker 3: The children don't really know about this because you can
25:39
Speaker 3: actually just drive around for a couple of hours. They
25:40
Speaker 3: wouldn't really know where we are, so they might think
25:42
Speaker 3: they were really far away. That's another just drive around
25:45
Speaker 3: in circles and actually just go down the road and
25:49
Speaker 3: I get there.
25:49
Speaker 4: We have a lovely time.
25:51
Speaker 3: I spend the whole time shouting car because I'm.
25:54
Speaker 4: Worried that one of them is going to get run over.
25:55
Speaker 3: They all disappeared into places where I've never been, with
25:58
Speaker 3: people I've never met before, which is.
26:00
Speaker 4: Also quite anxiety inducing. But what I do is I cook.
26:05
Speaker 3: I'm very there, I'm very focused, I'm very good mummy,
26:08
Speaker 3: and then I zip them into their little sleeping bags,
26:10
Speaker 3: and as soon as their eyes closed, I steal the
26:13
Speaker 3: kha keys out of my husband's shorts and I wheelspin
26:17
Speaker 3: at five kilometers per hour out of the camp site
26:21
Speaker 3: and I go home. I have a bath, I put
26:23
Speaker 3: on a good Netflix cults heeries usually, so I'm quite into.
26:27
Speaker 3: And I sleep at home and I get up. I
26:29
Speaker 3: set an alarm for five o'clock. I get back to
26:32
Speaker 3: the campsite before they wake up, and they don't even
26:34
Speaker 3: know I've been gone. There is no way that I'm
26:36
Speaker 3: going to sleep on one of those blow up mattresses
26:39
Speaker 3: with sand in it where I kind of shoot into
26:41
Speaker 3: the air when.
26:41
Speaker 4: My husband gets into bed. I just can't do it.
26:44
Speaker 3: And they all know that it's a good thing, because
26:48
Speaker 3: if I've slept well, I'm a nice mummy, and most
26:51
Speaker 3: mummies out there and Daddy's will know that if you
26:53
Speaker 3: haven't slept at all, that weekend is going to be
26:56
Speaker 3: a total right off anyway, because I'm going to be
26:58
Speaker 3: like that grumpy ogre stomping around on my dusty camping
27:02
Speaker 3: spot being just like a nightmare.
27:04
Speaker 4: So yeah, I sneak off and I.
27:06
Speaker 3: Sleep at home and nobody knows about it, and everyone
27:09
Speaker 3: is much better off.
27:10
Speaker 1: I still can't work out whether this is genius or appalling,
27:13
Speaker 1: but I love it genius.
27:15
Speaker 4: I really love genius.
27:17
Speaker 3: It's about the hacks I think parenting. If you can
27:20
Speaker 3: find a few hacks and kind of jump through some loopholes,
27:24
Speaker 3: then I'm all up for it. I'm basically like the
27:27
Speaker 3: anti parenting expert. I'm not going to tell you what
27:29
Speaker 3: to do. I'm not going to tell you to read
27:31
Speaker 3: books or make you feel guilty. I'm actually going to
27:33
Speaker 3: say to you, jump through the hoops and leave the
27:37
Speaker 3: campsite without anyone knowing, and find the loopholes.
27:41
Speaker 4: It makes life a lot easier. There's no guilt or shame.
27:43
Speaker 1: Then, Okay, so you're a self confessed non parenting expert.
27:47
Speaker 1: You've written a book about umming. It really truly is
27:49
Speaker 1: delightful I'm going to spin this around for just a minute.
27:53
Speaker 1: I've been interviewing you. Let's say that you're interviewing me.
27:57
Speaker 1: If there was one question that you could ask a
27:59
Speaker 1: parenting expert, what would you ask?
28:01
Speaker 4: Gosh, that is such a good question. I think I
28:03
Speaker 4: would ask.
28:05
Speaker 3: So if I read a parenting book and it was
28:08
Speaker 3: telling me how to do something and I was failing
28:11
Speaker 3: at it. For example, if my sleep routine wasn't working out,
28:16
Speaker 3: and I bought a book about kids sleep routines and
28:19
Speaker 3: still I couldn't achieve what the book was telling me
28:22
Speaker 3: to do. What am I supposed to do? How am
28:25
Speaker 3: I supposed to feel?
28:26
Speaker 2: That's a horrible question. That's such a hard question.
28:29
Speaker 1: I have a joke sometimes when if I give a
28:31
Speaker 1: presentation at the end of the night, I'll say, hey,
28:33
Speaker 1: my books are at the back. I can't promise you
28:36
Speaker 1: that reading this book is going to make you a
28:37
Speaker 1: better parent, but I know if you buy it, you
28:39
Speaker 1: definitely will be a better parent. Like to me, that's
28:42
Speaker 1: my big, big joke. You didn't even laugh, You didn't
28:44
Speaker 1: even smile that. I thought that was really really funny.
28:46
Speaker 1: Tough crowd. Clearly, I'm not the comedian in this conversation. Sorry,
28:51
Speaker 1: So here's my standard response. Actually there's a two part response.
28:55
Speaker 1: First off, when it comes to buying books about getting
28:57
Speaker 1: kids onto a sleeping routine, I'm generally against it. I
28:59
Speaker 1: don't think that those books are particularly helpful or healthy.
29:02
Speaker 4: Okay, interesting, but that's.
29:04
Speaker 1: Another story and I could upset a lot of people
29:07
Speaker 1: by saying that. So let's just focus on the main
29:09
Speaker 1: thing that I will talk to parents about. When you
29:12
Speaker 1: hear genuinely good parenting advice, scientifically evidence based, the sort
29:19
Speaker 1: of stuff that I would share in my books in
29:21
Speaker 1: in my seminars. There's a point that I make, and
29:24
Speaker 1: it's this, If you want to go and learn how
29:27
Speaker 1: to speak Spanish because you're going to go on a
29:29
Speaker 1: holiday to Mexico or Spain or wherever, how many mistakes
29:33
Speaker 1: do you need to make before you become fluent? And
29:37
Speaker 1: the answer will usually be somewhere around a million. Or
29:40
Speaker 1: if you want to learn how to play great music
29:43
Speaker 1: on the piano or the drums or the violin of
29:46
Speaker 1: the guitar, how many mistakes will you need to make
29:49
Speaker 1: before you become adept, before you become fluent, before you
29:54
Speaker 1: become really competent. And again the answer has to be
29:57
Speaker 1: somewhere around a million. I mean, I'm making up the number,
29:59
Speaker 1: but whatever it is, it's an enormous amount of mistakes
30:02
Speaker 1: before you become proficient and good at it. And I think, honestly,
30:07
Speaker 1: parenting is one of those things where we need to
30:10
Speaker 1: engage in deliberate practice.
30:13
Speaker 2: You can't just read a book and say, okay, well,
30:15
Speaker 2: now I'm going to be better. You might get some.
30:17
Speaker 1: General reminders about being available to your kids, or listening better,
30:21
Speaker 1: or summarizing their feelings when they're having a hard time,
30:25
Speaker 1: and that will in some way make you a better parent.
30:28
Speaker 1: But fundamentally, if you want to truly get better at anything,
30:31
Speaker 1: you have to you have to practice it. You have
30:33
Speaker 1: to make mistakes, and then you have to intentionally process it.
30:37
Speaker 1: And again, I guess that brings me full circle to
30:39
Speaker 1: you and your book about mumming a year of trying
30:42
Speaker 1: and failing to be a better parent. The fact that
30:44
Speaker 1: you sat down and were intentional and processed it and
30:47
Speaker 1: wrote about it it has to have made you a
30:51
Speaker 1: better parent. You jokingly say, no, I didn't really get
30:54
Speaker 1: any better at parenting in that year, but when I
30:57
Speaker 1: read the book, I can't believe that you didn't become
30:59
Speaker 1: more attuned to your kids, more aware of your own
31:02
Speaker 1: foibles and errors so that you can start to proactively
31:07
Speaker 1: guard against them.
31:08
Speaker 4: I just think it's yeah, I totally agree with you.
31:10
Speaker 3: I think it's about awareness, and I think just having
31:14
Speaker 3: awareness of my failures and my successes has enabled me
31:18
Speaker 3: to look beyond them almost and to understand that, you know,
31:21
Speaker 3: having lots of information, whether I agree with it or
31:24
Speaker 3: whether it works or not, is a good way to
31:26
Speaker 3: deal with any situation, isn't it. Whether you read the
31:28
Speaker 3: books and take it in and use those techniques, it
31:31
Speaker 3: doesn't really matter. But having the information, absorbing all of
31:35
Speaker 3: the information possible. I mean, it's the same with sobriety.
31:37
Speaker 3: I get a lot of people coming to me asking
31:40
Speaker 3: questions about how do I stop drinking?
31:41
Speaker 4: How do I get sober? You know? And I say, well,
31:44
Speaker 4: there's a varied amount of tools.
31:45
Speaker 3: You know, you can go to therapy, you can go
31:47
Speaker 3: to AA, you can, you know, go to rehab.
31:49
Speaker 4: There's all these different things.
31:50
Speaker 3: And at the end of the day, I hate that saying,
31:52
Speaker 3: but it's about whatever works. And for me, it took
31:56
Speaker 3: a lot of things in my parenting to work out
31:59
Speaker 3: what works for me, one of them was writing a book.
32:01
Speaker 4: But it was the same with my sobriety.
32:03
Speaker 3: I had to walk lots of walks and talk lots
32:05
Speaker 3: of different talks to be able to understand what works
32:08
Speaker 3: for me. And that can be the wrong psychiatrist for
32:12
Speaker 3: the first year of your sobriety and then you have
32:14
Speaker 3: to find someone else and you have to pivot and adjust.
32:16
Speaker 3: And it's the same with parenting.
32:18
Speaker 4: You know. I read all the books, and a lot of.
32:20
Speaker 3: The books made me feel really guilty, and that, you know,
32:23
Speaker 3: that paper plane of guilt is something that is glided
32:26
Speaker 3: along next to me throughout my parenting because of the
32:29
Speaker 3: high expectations we have in this modern culture. And I
32:33
Speaker 3: think learning and just using these tools, like your amazing tools,
32:38
Speaker 3: and using it as information is going to be something
32:41
Speaker 3: that is just going to help you. And whether you
32:43
Speaker 3: put it into practice or you fail at it, it's
32:46
Speaker 3: still just really good information, isn't it.
32:49
Speaker 2: Victoria.
32:50
Speaker 1: I really appreciate that question and your insights around it
32:52
Speaker 1: and the opportunity to share that my answer really is
32:55
Speaker 1: just practice.
32:55
Speaker 2: But let's go back to you and wrap this up.
32:59
Speaker 1: I love the book Mumming, your first book, though I
33:02
Speaker 1: want to talk about that for just a second, and
33:03
Speaker 1: the reason for it is as follows. Neither Kylie nor
33:07
Speaker 1: I drink alcohol. Where we're non drinkers, we're completely what's
33:11
Speaker 1: the word teetotal is and basically always have been. And
33:14
Speaker 1: so every now and again we get podcast requests where
33:18
Speaker 1: somebody says, could you just talk about mummy wine time?
33:21
Speaker 1: Could you talk about beer a clock? Could you talk.
33:23
Speaker 2: About parents reliance on alcohol?
33:25
Speaker 1: And we really have wanted to have that conversation, but
33:29
Speaker 1: we are not the right people for that discussion. You,
33:32
Speaker 1: on the other hand, host a podcast called Sober Awkward.
33:36
Speaker 1: You're really upfront about your extended sobriety and your effective
33:41
Speaker 1: decisions in overcoming alcohol. And your first memoir. I mean
33:46
Speaker 1: you're a memoir rest right Is that a word memoirrist?
33:48
Speaker 4: Nothing is?
33:49
Speaker 1: Yes, I think even if it's not, it works. Your
33:52
Speaker 1: first book was a memoir. The second one is as well,
33:53
Speaker 1: but your first one, I just want to touch on
33:55
Speaker 1: it for a sec in regards to this mummy wine
33:58
Speaker 1: time concept, A thousand wasted Sundays, just talk about parenthood, alcohol, sobriety,
34:09
Speaker 1: and your book wherever you'd like to take it.
34:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I classed myself as a socially acceptable binge drinker,
34:15
Speaker 3: just like most people I know. I sort of found
34:19
Speaker 3: a niche for myself between the pub and an AA
34:22
Speaker 3: meeting where I was sort of falling through the gaps
34:24
Speaker 3: because I didn't feel worthy of professional help. I didn't
34:27
Speaker 3: feel like I was bad enough to deserve anyone to
34:29
Speaker 3: step in or even to talk to it about about
34:32
Speaker 3: it to anybody. I started to suffer severe anxiety after
34:36
Speaker 3: I had my first child. I'd always been that party animal,
34:39
Speaker 3: like last man standing on any dance floor, and I
34:42
Speaker 3: was kind of proud of that. It was my identity,
34:45
Speaker 3: it was my persona, It was who people wanted from me,
34:48
Speaker 3: and I didn't look outside of that.
34:50
Speaker 4: Ever. I was never a daily drinker. I don't think
34:53
Speaker 4: I was ever physically addicted to alcohol, but I was
34:56
Speaker 4: definitely mentally addicted to this persona and a preoccupa to
35:00
Speaker 4: where my next drink was coming from when i'd had
35:03
Speaker 4: that first one. So, and I come from a family
35:06
Speaker 4: of party animals. They're all lovely people, but they do
35:08
Speaker 4: like a drink at a party. So I kind of
35:10
Speaker 4: absorbed that from a very very young age.
35:12
Speaker 3: And I feel like alcohol, whether it was culturally, environmentally,
35:16
Speaker 3: or generationally was coming at me at every direction from
35:19
Speaker 3: the moment I was born.
35:20
Speaker 4: And by giving up, I feel.
35:21
Speaker 3: Like, you know, maybe I didn't have a choice about alcohol,
35:24
Speaker 3: but now we have an alcohol free house. I hope
35:26
Speaker 3: that it gives my own children a choice about what
35:29
Speaker 3: they do with it. And it's been just a wonderful
35:32
Speaker 3: journey learning about the role not only that it plays
35:35
Speaker 3: in the individual, but also within our communities and how
35:39
Speaker 3: it affects our parenting. And when I had my first child,
35:42
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, I had this consequence to my
35:44
Speaker 3: drinking habit. I was the perfect mum, you know, with
35:47
Speaker 3: the excreeting, bliss balls for breakfast, with the perfect throws
35:51
Speaker 3: over my pram and at the weekend I wanted to
35:54
Speaker 3: let my hair down. I've met this amazing mother's group,
35:56
Speaker 3: and you know, while they sat at the table having
35:58
Speaker 3: a nice glass of wine, I probably up at the
36:00
Speaker 3: bar ordering shots, trying to give everyone a good time, because.
36:03
Speaker 4: That's all I knew.
36:05
Speaker 3: So there was no learnings or teaching about this transition
36:09
Speaker 3: from party girl to mum. And these two people collide
36:12
Speaker 3: halfway through my first book, A Thousand Wasted Sundays, where
36:15
Speaker 3: I'm in my bedroom with a baby crying beyond my hangover,
36:19
Speaker 3: and I can't look after my child. And so I'd
36:22
Speaker 3: never really had any consequences before. I mean, I blew
36:25
Speaker 3: a finger off with a firework, I had recreational drug use,
36:30
Speaker 3: a violent relationship. There were red flags whipping me across
36:33
Speaker 3: the face for many, many years, but this one was
36:36
Speaker 3: one that I couldn't run away from. I couldn't pack
36:38
Speaker 3: my bag and leave the next day. I had a
36:40
Speaker 3: child that needed me, and it took me four years
36:43
Speaker 3: of trying moderation and failing, and I think there's only
36:47
Speaker 3: so long you can go wrong at something before you
36:50
Speaker 3: have to reach out and do something about it.
36:51
Speaker 4: And actually I had.
36:52
Speaker 3: A second child, and six weeks after she was born,
36:55
Speaker 3: I went out and got hugely drunk, woke up the
36:58
Speaker 3: next morning with that anxiety monster sitting at the end
37:01
Speaker 3: of my bed, and walked into the lounge and said
37:03
Speaker 3: to my husband, I don't feel like an alcoholic yet.
37:06
Speaker 3: Alcohol is massive, having a massive impact on my life,
37:10
Speaker 3: and I feel like I need to do something about it.
37:12
Speaker 3: And that's when my journey to sobriety started. I reached
37:15
Speaker 3: out for help. I started writing about it. I started
37:18
Speaker 3: podcasting about it because I feel like there's this place,
37:21
Speaker 3: this really interesting sort of gray area where everybody's drinking
37:25
Speaker 3: at a social level. They're suffering with anxiety the next day,
37:29
Speaker 3: but they're not really sure if their problems bad enough.
37:31
Speaker 3: And what I worked out was that is, you know,
37:34
Speaker 3: it's not about alcohol. It's about finding out who you
37:37
Speaker 3: were before it and who comes after it. And that's
37:39
Speaker 3: what the journey is. And it doesn't matter whether it's
37:41
Speaker 3: one glass of wine a day or one glass of
37:43
Speaker 3: wine a month. It's about your own mental relationship with
37:47
Speaker 3: it and working out whether you're doing it for the
37:49
Speaker 3: right reasons and whether it's having any impact whatsoever.
37:53
Speaker 1: Hearing you say that, there are so many questions that
37:55
Speaker 1: I want to ask. We could do another full podcast
37:57
Speaker 1: about it.
37:57
Speaker 4: Yeah, totally.
37:58
Speaker 1: I'm just going to refer people to the book Thousand
38:00
Speaker 1: Wasted Sundays by Victoria Vanstone. Of course, the main purpose
38:03
Speaker 1: of our conversation today is about your most recent book,
38:06
Speaker 1: Mumming A Year of Trying and failing to be a
38:08
Speaker 1: better parent, Victoria. We're going to link to both of
38:10
Speaker 1: those books in the show notes. I can't believe how
38:13
Speaker 1: fast the time's gone. This has been such a delightful
38:15
Speaker 1: and fun conversation. So grateful for your time and really
38:19
Speaker 1: grateful for a your humor and be your insights in
38:22
Speaker 1: what turned out to be a surprisingly delightful read for
38:25
Speaker 1: the parenting expert who's a little bit snobby when it
38:27
Speaker 1: comes to reading parenting books.
38:29
Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
38:30
Speaker 4: I appreciate it.
38:31
Speaker 3: Thank you for being snobby and accepting me into your
38:35
Speaker 3: realm of the good ones.
38:37
Speaker 4: I appreciate one hundred.
38:39
Speaker 1: Victoria Vanstone, the author of Mumming A Year of Trying
38:42
Speaker 1: and Failing to be a Better Parent. We will link
38:44
Speaker 1: to that in the show notes. The Happy Families podcast
38:46
Speaker 1: is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. Thank you
38:49
Speaker 1: for all your great work, Justin, and if you'd like
38:51
Speaker 1: more information and resources to make your family happier and
38:55
Speaker 1: maybe funnier, now you need Victoria for that, visit Happy
38:58
Speaker 1: families dot com dot a