Letters to The Coop: Facing Fear, Ditching Regret & the Power of Girlfriends

Kit (Host) and Harper (Producer) are cracking open The Coop mailbag to tackle Coop Chicks’ burning questions! From rediscovering passions at 50 with the “ready, fire, aim!” mindset to taking fearless leaps and celebrating why girlfriends are the ultimate MVPs, Kit is serving up advice with her signature Southern charm and wild stories (raw egg milkshakes, anyone?).  This one is packed with heart, laughter, and a whole lotta wisdom.

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This episode was produced by Kit Hoover and Harper McDonald. Business Development by Casey Ladd. Editing by You & Me Media.

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Transcript

This transcript was automated by AI. Inconsistencies may be present. 

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[00:00:00] 

Hey Coop Chicks, huge favor. I need you to follow The Coop with Kit. Wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, click that follow button. That way you'll get all of our episodes immediately downloaded. 

kit: Welcome to a special edition of the Coop with Kit. Okay, I'm sitting here with my producer, Harper McDonald, and you guys have DM'd us so many questions that we're going to call this, what are we calling it, Harper? Harper. Council. Ask the Coop. Ask the Coop.

The Coop Council. The Coop Council. I don't know. Mailbag. [00:01:00] The one that 

still goes to the post office. Mailbag. Mailbag. Yeah. The 

kit: Coop Mailbag. Just rolls right off your tongue. It just goes. Well, you've asked for some advice. to be answered. And clearly I have zero qualification to answer any questions. So this will be true.

We will be weighing in on all of this, but I certainly love to give my opinion. 

harper: Yes. And you've been through a lot in your life. And while we're not going to make this an interview about you, though, I would love to, we'll work it in a little bit. you've been through things. You've, you've been through big things in your career.

You've been through big things in your life. And I know whenever I need advice on something, I come to you and I say, Hey, I'm trying to figure this out. 

You come back with some fabulous advice from your mom or your dad. It's just this one liner that encapsulates it in the most poignant of ways and the most charming of ways. and it makes sense to me that people are writing in and asking your advice on things.

So, thank you for that, Harper. You do 

kit: the same for me. So, to our mailbag we go. 

harper: [00:02:00] Mailbag. Here we go. I'm cracking open the mailbag. Okay. 

I just turned 50 and I feel like I'm stuck in a rut with my career and personal life.

What's your advice for finding new passions and rediscovering my spark? 

kit: Who's this from, Harper? 

harper: This is Julie from Arkansas. Julie. What's up, Julie? 

kit: Ooh, Jules. Um, first of all, The one way I lead my life is ready, fire, aim, Jules. 

Don't worry about having all the answers of where you're going or even the path.

Just try whatever you're interested in. Don't overthink it. Ready, fire, aim. All the women on our podcast, especially the ones over 50, I feel like have not even hit their stride.

So you are prime right now to take off in your life for what is meant for you. So go for it, girl, for whatever you want and report back to us. but the time is now. 

harper: And do you remember Rachel gave fabulous advice on this one too, Rachel Hollis? She had said, figure out the things that [00:03:00] you don't love.

Figure out the things that are not your passions, right? So to your point, ready, fire, aim on the things that you are catapulted 

kit: toward, right? And to her point, and my dad used to always say this with jobs. Part of figuring out what you want to do is figuring out what you don't want to do. So to Rachel's point, try all the things, and if it doesn't work, that's okay.

I also have no fear of failure in the sense that, who cares, Jules? Just try it.

 Okay. This one's really funny. Okay. 

harper: Okay. I just found out my mom joined a dating app and is getting more matches than I am. Should I feel threatened or just laugh about it? Who's this from? 

kit: This is from Susie. 

Doesn't say where Susie's from.

kit: Susie. Sus. Your mom sounds like my cup of tea. No, there is no jealousy ever with mothers and daughters and friends and family. This is outspoken. standing Suze, you give your mom a big fat high five and be right there for as I'm sure she's there for you. I think this is [00:04:00] unbelievable.

I mean, think 

harper: about your mom. Okay. So let's just talk about bug. I'm not saying that bugs on a dating app or anything like that. But bug could 

kit: be. Bug is single right now at 85. 

harper: Right. And single. Smoke and hot. I 

kit: have to tell y'all the funniest story. Bug and I were just down, at Amelia Island and we're over at Cumberland Island, which is this private little island.

We're on a boat. True story. She's 85. And this man in his 60s came over looking like Indiana Jones. Saunders up to Bug and Bug actually knows a lot of history about Cumberland Island. It's where JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette got married. It's this magical island. So this man and Bug are chatting it out. And I swear to y'all, and I'm not kidding, and Bug is gonna crack up.

 my daughters and I were dying. Bug saddles up to me, she's like, You see who just sat down? It's saddled up to me, Bugs still got it. She does. She does. Listen, it's all about the twinkle. So Suze, I don't know how old you are, but do not worry. as Bug and I say, we love dancing eyes. Let your mom have so much fun with this.[00:05:00] 

Enjoy life. Laugh as much as you can 

harper: and weed that 

kit: garden for any of the bad ones in there, but have fun in the 

harper: https: 

kit: otter. ai I have never, that's such a foreign concept of ever being jealous of a mom or a daughter. That's just, that's not in me. I think

 jealousy, for all of our listeners, is a wasted emotion.

I have never felt it, I've never cared what the Jones is, I am not wired for that. 

 It serves no purpose. Yep. what do they say, the comparison's the thief of joy, and it goes with that?

Like, I don't So, no, don't even be jealous of your mom. Are you kidding me? Go, mom. 

harper: Okay. 

Dear The Coop, I'm afraid I'll wake up one day and regret the chances I didn't take. How do I stop letting fear hold me back? 

kit: Who's this from? This is from Lauren. Lauren in California? No, in Oregon. Oregon. Lauren in Oregon.

well Lauren, first of all,, it's never too late to start whatever you want to start. I'm actually a person who is wired [00:06:00] for no fear. I definitely jump before I look.

I do not look. I'm just a larger Do you want to talk about road rules? Yes. Yeah. Road rules. Oh my gosh. Should I tell that story quickly? Sure. Y'all. When I got road rules, , I was 24 years old. I had just gotten hired to work at this unbelievable ad agency in Atlanta called Tucker Wayne. And lucky I went through no less than eight interviews to get this, like I always wanted to be an advertising.

I never wanted to be on tv. I never wanted to be famous. This was never part of the gig. And I got this advertising job Harper. This was it. And it was a lock. So once you get in there, like, that was a pretty much stable job. Three days later, I got a call from MTV about this road rules to go into Winnebago and I Took the leap and it was a three month gig that was definitely gonna end there was no such thing as reality TV So nobody knew what the heck it was and I took the leap with no fear and I credit my mom and dad bug and Bucky 

I don't know many parents that wouldn't have said hey bird in hand you got this incredible job that you've worked [00:07:00] hard for. You want to get into advertising, but there was something about this other thing that I had to take the chance and I jumped.and I wouldn't be where I was with my career if I'd never done it.

It changed my life. It launched my career for you. So sorry to make that about me, Lauren, but Harper reminded me of that story. I think for anybody listening, God, I sound like a broken record, but regret is a wasted word. You can't, you can't build on it. You cannot build on regret. So let that go and you begin tomorrow with whatever you want to do.

 I will talk you through the jump. Just jump. Well, 

harper: and I also think it's like, what's the worst that could happen? Like, literally, what's the worst that could happen? Like just try. My dad always says, don't 

kit: take life so seriously. Right. And he's 90. Right. Don't take it so seriously. That doesn't mean don't work hard.

That doesn't mean give it everything you got. But don't take it so seriously. 

harper: Absolutely. how have you kept such an incredible relationship with your mom and dad, with Bug and Bucky? I mean because it's so coveted. I mean it. first of all, that you have both of them and in your life And daily in your life, [00:08:00] you speak to the two of them and your brother every single day.

I tell you how much I admire this about you. how have you credited that relationship after all these years? 

kit: I think it's one of my greatest successes, as well as my relationship with my kids and their relationship with one another. I don't know what it is about my mom and dad and brother.

There's just the four of us. And my parents divorced, when I was in my thirties. And the four of us are just thick as thieves. Can I still say thick as thieves, or is that Why can't you say Thick as Thieves? I think you can say Thick as Thieves. I think you can. I don't even know what that's referencing.

I think that was, 

harper: I think Thieves are still, I don't know. Is that okay? I do not know the historical reference to that one, so I'm going to say we're okay. 

kit: , no, but I um, I will say, , my brother and I talk all the time that our mom and dad are our favorite people on the planet. And I think it's because growing up we [00:09:00] were so their priority and they were never our friends.

So it wasn't that kind of relationship. But there's nobody we love or respect more. So I don't know, it must be like an earned thing, but the four of us truly love to be together and we laugh about that saying about keeping up with the Joneses. Not only did we never keep up with the Joneses, we were annoyed if the Joneses wanted to hang with us.

Like we just liked being the four of us together. Definitely an endorphin family. We would run road races in the morning and then play doubles tennis in the afternoon. And then, Harper, we'd have family dinner together. And we just love being together. I think we bring out the best in one another.

my mom was the, you know, matron of honor in my wedding. And my dad is just my Did she plan 

harper: your bachelorette party? 

kit: Heck no. Haha. Did she? Trevor, Boner, Lala, Buddha, those girls planned it. Bug did not go. Bug says, honey, I am not. I'm not that type. Bug said, I don't want any part of that, honey. That's for you and your friends. I'm not a hang on. But she did say, [00:10:00] I am not wearing a tacky bridesmaid's dress. I'm going to tell you that right now. So we laughed about that, but no, thank you for pointing that out. I just, they're my favorite. So I start every morning, you know.

630 with a cup of coffee calling my mom bug, 

harper: But you know what's so nice about that? And I think about that for a lot of people who have parents who might be getting a little bit older is in speaking with such regularity with them, then you're actually talking about what's going on for real versus, If you speak once every two weeks or something, or once a week even, you're like, so what's going on?

Oh, well, I had the, it's maybe more of a gripe with love session than it is how we feel in today. Yeah. And that is, that's so powerful, like to allow yourself. The ability to have that kind of relationship with your parents. It's, thank you for that. Really? Very cool. It's funny 

kit: you only know what you know.

Yeah. So I've always been like this with them, but I will say now, you know, my kids see it and I have that relationship with my three kids. Yeah. Especially my oldest who's living in New York, so it's really [00:11:00] cool. And my middle daughter, 'cause she's in college when they're away. Yeah. That they call and we just talk about everything and nothing.

And I think. When it becomes that, if they're a natural priority, so there's nothing about this that's forced, like, Oh God, let me call Bug. I look so forward to it. And then, of course, I'm gonna call her on the way home, and I'll call her when I leave here tonight, if it's not too late. And the same with my dad.

We're in constant contact. And my brother, who is my all time favorite person, he's 6'2 we're 13 months apart. He calls me Junior. Yeah, the golden child. The self titled, Golden Child. So 

good. 

kit: God, I've never met a bigger rascal, and I try to be him every single day. He's actually the funniest one of our family, and anybody that watched Road Rules, anything funny I said, I stole from him and his friend Kit Walsh, and so they do not let me live it down.

In fact, last night I was getting a text like, Junior, are you going to steal any more of our lines that you talk about and claim them as your own? And I said, Yep. Yep. Every day. So call your mom and dad. You can put that on track right now. 

harper: Call your 

kit: mom and dad. 

harper: Or 

kit: take them out if they're close by. I would love it.

harper: do you remember a piece of advice that your [00:12:00] mom has given you that you have given to one of your kids sometime in the last week? 

kit: 100%. Bug my whole life. has said to me life is not a dress rehearsal and I live it and I say that to my kids Weekly and now they say it without me even telling them when my oldest daughter was studying abroad Which by the way, if you're lucky enough to ever do that, we never did it I think it's like a fancy thing that's come about now, but Campbell said that every time she and her friends would go out to dinner, wherever they were traveling, they would raise glass and say, life is not a dress rehearsal.

Think about that line though, back to the viewer question about not taking chances or regret. What are you waiting for? This isn't a dress rehearsal. Right. This is our time. Let's go. Fail. Get up. Step down. You know, keep going. And so I love that quote. 

harper: That is so beautiful. Bug's 

kit: learning to needlepoint and I want her to put it on a belt for us, Harper.

She's going 

harper: to do a belt? Yeah. A coupe belt? 

kit: A coupe belt. This is Life is Not a Dress rehearsal. It might take a couple of years to finish. 

harper: Well, what is [00:13:00] she bringing out when she comes to visit? She's doing it. Can we help? Is that, is that, is that a, is that a joint? I don't know 

kit: if she can needlepoint together, but wait, she wants to go out with you and Honey.

Harper's mom's name is Honey and the four of us have the greatest time together. 

harper: I looked around for tea reservations, um, we'll, we'll talk about it. Yep. I've got a couple of holds for us. Okay. Okay.My friends and I want to start a book club, but none of us want to read anything.

How do we turn this into a wine and snacks club without admitting that we're not going to read anything? 

First 

harper: of all, 

This sounds like Thursday. Aren't 

kit: we 

all in that book club? 

kit: Sunday. You know what's awesome, Harper? You and I have our pickleball club, and I feel the same way when we show up with Cheetah and Megan.

All we want to do is hoot and holler, and it takes a minute. There is nothing. Better than getting together with your girlfriends. There's just nothing. You and I are so lucky to have all of our friends. You've got all the awesome friends like I do from elementary school and high school and college and then new friends.

It's like, the girlfriends meet, they're magic. 

harper: I feel like every girl group has talked about At some point, just creating a compound of [00:14:00] just your best ladies around you and just drink wine, pretend you have a book club.

I mean, there's so many options. 

kit: I just had, as you know, eight of my best friends out from college and Harper loves all their nicknames and these women, gosh, so I've, We're adding up all the years, so I met all of them when I was 18 and we're still just best friends. And we said that same thing, like, that's what I want my back nine to be.

, more time with all of the women that I love, 

harper: you know what's great about girlfriends is it's not the big stuff, right, in my mind.

kit: It's not the fancy dinners or that. The greatest is coffee in the morning when you all come down. We sat for hours I've been here for hours with my girlfriends here, just laughing and hooting and hollering and loving on one another and just that, that feeling of comfort. Yeah, you and I are so similar, like shout out to all of our girlfriends.

harper: Um, okay. Dear Kit, I signed up for a 5K race to impress a guy I like, but now I hate running. Okay. Should I fake an injury or actually try to survive the thing? [00:15:00] First of all, who is this?

What is her name? 

kit: This is Anne. Yep. Anne. And where's Anne from? She's from Wisconsin. 

Annie. Hi. I love Wisconsin. I got some badgers. Harper she doesn't need to be impressing this guy. Nope. But I love that she signed up for the 5k.

Yep. Annie, 

this guy should be chasing you. We do not chase, we attract. But what I want to tell you is, um, I love running, and it's all over my social media because it's a free, happy pill. And for anybody that wants to start, because I know how hard it is, put on good music that you like. Run a song, walk a song.

Run a song, walk a song. Or as much as you can do, I promise it'll change your life. It's free. It's free. It costs you nothing. Free endorphins. And then, cute Annie, cute Ann, you get out there and you fly that 5K and you let anybody who's taken notice come after you. 

harper: you've ran a lot of races. 

kit: Yep. Um. 

harper: You've ran a lot of your own races. What, has there ever been a moment of like, I can't do this? 

kit: First of all, what Harper's referencing is my dad always says, run your own race my whole life. I love it. [00:16:00] You, you compete with nobody my whole life.

 Yes. Running can be hard. Recently my body's changing. I don't know if this thing called menopause or paramenopause but I've been so tired lately and I went on a run the other day and good Lord, I had no kick in my stag.

I mean, it was a death march and so it's hard, but I just gutted it out. But on a good day when you feel it, it's awesome. And I just like running because Rachel Hollis and I were talking about this, just mentally, it's, it's such a free, freeness for me and openness and I feel like it's when I do my best work.

It is and it's kind of a meditation 

harper: and it's your therapy but what do you tell yourself when you feel like you can't keep running? 

kit: That's where I push even harder. I think it's a 

harper: metaphor for life. I love it. So should she fake an injury or actually survive the thing? Um. Yeah. Annie, sweet Ann.

Let's go, girl. Um, sweet Ann. You got this. 

kit: I think, first of all, if you don't want to run it, you just bag it. I think that if you feel like it, go in, walk it, enjoy it. Just have fun in the 5K. I think it's a 3. 2. they play music, races are so different when I [00:17:00] started. Just enjoy it. Okay. 

harper: This is our last one.

Yeah. Ready? 

Dear The Coop, I've had so many insecurities about my body after having kids. I'm now 53 years old. How do I start feeling confident and sexy again? 

kit: What's her name? 

 This is from Megan. Chicago. Chicago. Chicago. I love Chicago. Megan, first of all, I think you have a beautiful body. I can't see you.

I don't know you, but I think as soon as we can love off and be for our bodies, we win. Easier said than done. We all have those moments. But, um, wow, you're 50 effin 3. Let's go. Like, celebrate that and let's go. I'd like for everybody to lead with gratitude with our bodies and all shapes and all sizes.

And I will say that my body has gone through total incarnations of everything. I'm five feet tall. I was about if you've seen road rolls, truth be told. And it wasn't even whatever, but I was probably 30 pounds heavier, And I did not care. I remember my jeans didn't fit.

And I said, we going to [00:18:00] roll tonight. 

I remember you tell that story. You're sort of like, it's weird. They all just it was just harder to put the jeans on. Truth be 

kit: told, it was a joke with the producers. They were like the little ones getting bigger by the second. True story. And my head ate my neck. And I just remember thinking, nobody's going to have more fun than I am.

 And you know what I've told my daughters. I said, if you don't come back beer fat swollen from college, you are not living. You're in college once.

Please eat late night food. Please go out, please. When in doubt. Go out is my role. This 

is the funniest thing they could had 

harper: shared. But they all mix 

kit: Dean's list. Like they work hard, but I love this. 

harper: Yes, yes, yes. But they're living life and enjoying but truth be told, women when they get older, it's, it's hard.

You don't, um, yes, we all wanna embrace exactly how we're feeling and we should be feeling great all of the time, but it, you don't feel great all the time and. I know that you are such a massive advocate of exercise and eating well and all that, but that's, it's hard. even Elizabeth Hurley was talking about this, in our interview [00:19:00] with her, and she was just sort of saying, like, 

Use good creams, try to eat well, and just have grace. Just have grace for yourself, 

kit: right? 

I do think Grace and laughter and having a great sense of humor I think is sexier than worrying about some hot body and I so true and as a mother of daughters You know, I've talked about this I just want them to love all the stages of their body and they will emulate what you do 

But that's exactly how I was raised. 

Harper, I grew up every single morning with a chocolate milkshake, with a raw egg, salmonella, bug put it in for protein. Wait, 

harper: wait, wait. She put it into the chocolate milkshake?

Into the chocolate 

kit: milkshake. Like 

harper: cracked it 

kit: in there? Cracked it in there. Didn't even scramble it up? Didn't even scramble it. My brother and I had a chocolate milkshake with raw egg. I might have just had, I might have just thrown it up in my throat a little bit. how about this? She followed it up with a peanut butter and bacon sandwich, and then a side of frosted flakes, and my brother Craig and I, Had it every single [00:20:00] morning from kindergarten through 12th grade.

That was our breakfast. I mean, that's your caloric intake for 

harper: life. Well, for life. And both of you are massively intelligent, highly successful, and full blown runners. You know what? I think it is that, like, That raw egg, that raw egg, bugs saw Rocky, put the 

kit: salmonella in there. Craig and I laughed too. Cause my mom, nothing ever expires in our house.

Right? So there's the milk is fine too. It's past the day cheese, all cheeses, blue cheese. It's all moldy and bug just chops that off. That's how we roll. That's what we say. We never get a penicillin 

harper: story. So there was one morning I was at your house. This is where we were going to record something early.

And. You said, Oh, let me get you some of my, you're going to have to fill this in for me. Do you want some coffee? And I said, great. You said, what do you take in? And I said, nothing. You said, you don't want anything. I said, no, no cream, no sugar, no milk, anything. I'm good. You said, great, but I really want you to try this.

And I said, okay. And you put something in it and I don't know what it was. It's called collagen powder. I'm a sucker. I love to [00:21:00] try anything. That's fine. It was clumping up in ways that, That, that coffee should not have clumps. I mean, it just, it just shouldn't. Then I hit her with a little 

kit: MCT oil and 

harper: Harper was like, 

I'm 

harper: leaving 

right now.

But I 

harper: remember, 

this 

harper: is what I think is really funny. I was sitting there holding the coffee and I'm looking down at it. And they're literally like coagulated white chunks in my coffee. And from a girl who truly puts nothing in her coffee. And you just said, no, it's fine. Don't worry about those things.

You just, if you just mix it up, you just swallow it down. You'll be fine. Just drink the coffee. The clumps go down with it. And I felt like you were your mom in that moment. 100%. 

Because I was like, that's something Bug would do. Oh my gosh. She'd be like, it's, it's, it's fine. Honey, 

harper: honey, it's fine. Honey, it's fine.

Don't 

kit: sweat the small stuff, honey. No, just, just drink it up. Salmonella, blue cheese, that's the penicillin, honey. Did you put blue cheese in my coffee? I probably did. Bug said, honey, that's why your doctor's file was so thin, honey. You went once a year. 

harper: It's the cutest thing I've ever heard. Oh my gosh. Well, thank you for answering all these beautiful questions.

Thank you all for 

kit: sending them. I [00:22:00] hope that wasn't too blah blah blah. 

harper: We have so many, so we might do this a few times because I feel like lots of people want to hear from you, not just about you, but just how you navigate stuff. Well, 

kit: thank y'all so much. Harper, see you for coffee in the morning, clumps included.

See y'all next timeon the coop. I hope y'all like this. This is a ball. Send more questions. Okay, thanks y'all.