Wedding Industry Mama - Navigating the Unique Scenarios of Motherhood in Our Industry
A Podcast by and for Mothers in the Wedding Industry. Talking about our unique situation and how we can still be relevant even after we see those two pink lines. Each week, we will chat with another wedding industry mom and learn how she balances it all- focusing on a different aspect of this crazy juggling act each episode.
Wedding Industry Mama - Navigating the Unique Scenarios of Motherhood in Our Industry
Episode 3 - When the Publicist Becomes the Parent: Meghan Ely on Motherhood and ADHD
In this heartfelt episode, I sit down with Meghan Ely—publicist, speaker, and founder of OFD Consulting—to talk about the realities of being a mother in the wedding industry. Meghan opens up about her son Oliver’s ADHD diagnosis and how that journey has reshaped her approach to parenting, business, and balance. We also explore how she built a powerhouse PR firm while staying rooted in family life. If you're a wedding pro navigating motherhood, this one will resonate deeply.
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SPEAKER_00:Hi there, and welcome to Wedding Industry Mama, navigating the unique scenarios of motherhood in our industry. A podcast by and for mamas of the wedding industry so we can prove to us all that it can be done. My name is Meredith, your host and Wedding Industry Mama extraordinaire. I have been a part-time wedding photographer since 2004, a full-time wedding photographer since 2015, and a mother since 2020. I breastfed all of my babies for 14 months and have somehow managed to keep everything running without ever having full-time childcare, and I think you can do it too. I am so excited to welcome Megan Ely of OFD Consulting to our podcast today. OFD consulting owner Megan Ely combines In the Trenches event experience with a love of wedding PR to empower her clients to take their businesses to new heights. Her team's publicity efforts are regularly honored by the Public Relations Society of America, and more recently, EventX named her one of the most influential wedding professionals in the industry. A longtime industry speaker and writer, she is a wedding pro educator with The Knot and WeddingWire. She has regularly earned clients' press in such outlets as the New York Times, Brides, Martha Stewart Weddings, People, Bridal Guide, Architectural Digest, and Style Me Pretty, among many others. Megan is a past national president of WIPA and a member of the Allied Council for the National Society of Black Wedding and Event Professionals. That was a bit of a tongue twister at the end there. And apparently I can't say the word regularly very easily. So anyway, please welcome Megan. I'm so excited to have you here and welcome. Thank you. Yeah, I'm so glad you reached out and are willing to give us some 20-year experience on the wedding industry and having children and the ADHD aspect and all that kind of stuff. So welcome, welcome.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you. Thank you. I'm so excited you're doing this podcast. There's such a need for it, you know?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think that it's been kind of, I've spoken about this with the other people too, but I think that a lot of people hide that they're moms in the wedding industry. So I just really wanted to bring it to the forefront that like there are a lot of us out there and we're awesome and you can make it all work.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. It can be done. I mean, definitely with a lot of mindset, a lot, there's a lot that goes into it. It's certainly a hard gig to balance the two, but for sure.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. So can we start by you just telling us a little bit about your journey in the wedding industry? What led you to become a consultant and a speaker, PR rep, all of the things, just kind of give us a little walk through and then obviously throw in where you had your child. Yeah, we'll toss
SPEAKER_02:Oliver in there too. Absolutely. So I got my I started in wedding PR about 15 years ago, but prior to that, I was actually in the wedding industry. I worked for years, even though I'd been trained in PR, I worked in venues for years. And so I did that for a long time, but always knew I wanted to combine, you know, between, I would say, the working in the wedding industry and also representing them and So I started OFD in 2009. That's a longer story of how it all got started, but it started a couple years earlier than anticipated when a full-time job was just, was not the right fit for me. I think that's a, I'm going to leave it at that. That's a polite way to put it. And so I decided to do that. I started my, I started OFD the same year I was about to get married. We just bought a house. So there's a lot of like life things going on there. And so since then on the work side, since 2009, we've had the pleasure, sincere pleasure of working with all sorts of wedding pros. representing them getting them published I you mentioned speaking yes I'm on the road as an educator I travel globally to talk about how people can represent themselves you know the state of the industry things like that as well and so those are the things that keep me busy day to day but if we want to we want to add parenthood to the mix as well so I always knew at some point we'd want to have a family how many we weren't sure we landed on the one but at the time we knew we wanted to at some point but I'll be honest I wasn't in a rush to do it I actually really really really love children but I also didn't want to find myself in a spot where I couldn't I don't want to say balance the two but I just had if we're being totally candid I just run into a lot of people over the years who are just so overwhelmed they started having kids early on in in their you know small business ownership in the wedding industry and things kind of turned into a hot mess I remember this one talk years ago I was out and it was this wonderful person I it was like a photographer it was a thousand years ago but it really resonated with me because I She had just hadn't been prepared to balance the two. And during maternity leave, which was kind of a, I'm just going to turn off my computer and people understand her, her business just completely crumbled. And I thought to myself, I don't want to see a repeat of that in my own life. That scares me to be honest. And so I, you know, we waited and I ended up having Oliver in 2013. So it was four and a half years or no, four years after I'd started, which was still a little early, but I was also 32. And if I I just wanted more. I didn't, you know, I just kind of wanted to see where we went with that. So Oliver joined the family, uh, March of 2013 and by family, I mean myself, my husband and many cats. And so that's when, yeah. And that's when the great balance began. And he, um, now he's, he's a fixture at some of the conference. Like, it's so funny. He comes once in a while with Travis. And so now he's like really embedded in stuff, you know, it's, it's very sweet, but, but yeah, that journey of that, that huge, you know, trying to achieve balance started in spring of 2013. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my gosh. So, um, so that means he is 13, 11, 11, 11, 11. I almost
SPEAKER_02:said almost 12 to make you feel a little bit better. Oh my gosh. So he's like 11.9. I'm thinking 20,
SPEAKER_00:25. You're fine. Like what day is
SPEAKER_02:it? Who even knows? So no, he's, uh, 11.9 years old and he's in middle school, which is such a different beast, right? Like it's just so... It's so funny how the seasons are all so very different.
SPEAKER_00:I know. I know. So I don't even know that season yet. So you'll...
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I know. Well, it's one of those things I tell people, listen, just think back to your own years of middle school and have a lot of empathy for that time period. I don't think any of us look back and think, you know, junior high was just so amazing. So that on repeat.
SPEAKER_00:I've actually heard, I mean, I have two daughters, but I have heard repeatedly that if... that that someone wanted to sell their daughter up the river when they turned 12 oh my gosh you know it's
SPEAKER_02:so interesting having Oliver like he's he's still very much like being an only child it's kind of an interest it's this different relationship it's the we're just a little threesome making our way through the world here and so he's still at a point where he tells me everything I think question mark but yeah there are times he'll be like mama I'll pick him up he goes I have to sit in the front because I have tea to spill and I was like okay get up here I have tea to oh my god yeah he does wow I love that yeah so he still is in that you know at this point but we absolutely know that that's that's gonna change over time probably
SPEAKER_00:oh my god I love that though that's so great like I I mean I barely just caught up on the tea and I'm like very ingrained in my you know toddler's life so I think that like even knowing that lingo tea I honestly just picked that up like maybe that's so funny that's
SPEAKER_02:my TikTok addiction speaking like that's what this is
SPEAKER_00:yeah I you know what I've never gotten stuck on TikTok somehow I mean I I enjoy the videos when they are posted to Instagram reels but I never I never jumped on TikTok
SPEAKER_02:I was gonna say consider yourself lucky to have that time on your hands now because i use too much time on tiktok like go do something better with your life like spending time with your family you're reading like i said here my friend one of my friends i was chatting with him and i said you know my good reads is just kind of sad i've got it i i love reading and i just haven't prioritized it he goes well maybe if you weren't like on tiktok and i was like oh okay okay you just got called out yeah no no it's well deserved it's well deserved so i said okay this is the year i'm actually going to get back into reading in a meaningful way oh my gosh
SPEAKER_00:that is so funny yeah i I mean, I actually just recently, I know we're going on a little bit of a tangent, but I just recently put the time limit thing on my phone. Oh, good for you.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I set it for 15 minutes for Facebook, 15 minutes for Instagram because I realized like, whoa, I, whoa, look at the time. And I'm like, I've been on here for a half hour. This is crazy. I mean. Oh my
SPEAKER_02:gosh. Yeah. Or when they're like your screen time for the week. And I'm like, I don't, that's not my business. Yeah. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00:Well, the other thing I think that we get into a trap in the wedding industry is like we need social media to to like have our business thrive. Right. Sure.
SPEAKER_02:Sure. And, you know, I see that and it is important. I think social media is part of our business. But then if I'm sitting there watching cat videos, I can't justify that. You know, business development.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I love the fact that you have multiple cats and joined your family of cats. That's hilarious. So so it sounds like so he's pretty involved then in. the business, right? So he comes with you?
SPEAKER_02:He's involved in the free upgrades on flights. That's what he's involved in. He knows what I do. He can explain it. I've caught him off to the side telling his friends, she doesn't have a boss. No one can fire her. And I'm just like, babe, everyone can fire me. All my clients could fire me. But he's just really very sweet about that. He comes to the occasional conference when school lines up. And so he's involved in that sort of way. And during the pandemic, as much younger, he was showing up in webinars behind me and I would offer like I would take I would literally like he would just quietly come into pet cats and leave and I would offer him um you know I'd offer the audience I'm like if you can catch a cat or a kid behind me I'd take a screenshot and send it to me and I'll send you a Starbucks gift card oh my gosh I love that yeah so that's about is it but no he he he's on my coattails for the upgrades and travel but that's about it so he but you know when you have as you know it well I work from home for those who do work from home. I mean, it does get integrated in some way or another.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So I know you started OFD. consulting at 2009. He was born in 2013. Yes. Was he, um, were you still doing venues at that point or? No, no. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I was all done with like, I, when I started OFD for 2009, 2010, like around that time, I did a little bit of moonlighting at a local venue and did the Sunday weddings while I was ramping up OFD. But I was at like, that was a part of it too, is I, you know, I have so much respect for wedding pros who balance all this, but I just, I needed some semblance of a weekend back and needed that. Like I needed to be on my own terms with the company. So I had been on my own for quite some time.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. But I'm imagining you, you work with a lot of mothers in your business, right? I
SPEAKER_02:work with a lot of parents. Yeah. I work with all sorts of different people who have kids from all over. And having been on, I was on the WIPA board for a long time. So in associations and a lot of us, not all of us, but there are a lot of people with kids in varying ages as well. So there's definitely, you know, I'm always very mindful when I'm working with, and I work with a lot of journalists that have kids as well. And so it's kind of one of those things I try to be very mindful of, you know, when is spring break and things like that, just to be extra mindful. Snow days is not the day to ask for, if I can help it, ask for something urgently from a press standpoint, because it's just snow days are crazy. You know, the kids are home, especially, and of course it depends too, when you have, when you're working with someone who has very young kids, it's very different than someone who has an 11 year old. 11 year olds can do their own thing. You know, they have autonomy and independence and friends to play with and things like that. So definitely a different world versus when they're toddlers and you have to really keep an eye on them.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. I mean, what's been shocking to me in this all is that most of the time I'm spending... making sure they're not killing each other. Um, not necessarily themselves,
SPEAKER_02:just each other. I love
SPEAKER_00:it. Pushing each other and in not great spots to push each other. I mean, not that it's ever good to push someone, but like, you know, if they're pushing each other next to the stairs, that's a big problem. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:That's going to be a problem. I was so happy the day I could remove like the stair thing at the top. You know what I mean? It was like, okay, with that in swimming, when I knew those two things were locked in, I felt like my stress level level went down considerably in terms of
SPEAKER_00:like
SPEAKER_02:woes about safety. behind a glass which I think a lot of people set that up that way so we're all watching and a lot of parents were on their phones but I'm just like staring at him and this was the new coach and the new coach kept turning his back to the little kiddos and Oliver was sitting at the end and he literally turned his back and walked away and Oliver went in and no one was there oh my friend pushed me and I ran in and taught okay I'm just gonna say it girl I think I taught everybody all the children a new word that day I ran out to the pool and I'm like he's behind you because like literally he was under the water and no one noticed like i almost killed someone that day and so i mean the the coach was scared straight it did so we actually moved out moved swimming after that but parents keep your eye on the kids because you just never know like when you got someone new and all that but yeah i i might shout out to all the parents uh who had to go home and and explain what that word was that i shouted at the kid with the coach that day
SPEAKER_00:oh no i mean i'm surprised you didn't literally break through the glass that was in front of you you know
SPEAKER_02:The door was right there. So like, I think that would have been an option. But then it would have been two of us who were in distress.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah. We I was actually at a party this summer. And it was, it was a pool party. And they hired a lifeguard to make everyone feel better. Uh huh. Which I don't know if that was actually maybe counterintuitive, because then parents were like, Oh, there's a lifeguard. And sure enough, the lifeguard didn't even see that this kid was floating. He was okay. Thank goodness. But like, all of a sudden, I look at I hear the mom scream and the kid, I look at the poor, I think he was maybe two, just floating there. And I was like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. And he was okay. But like, isn't that crazy that, you know, even lifeguards don't necessarily see everything.
SPEAKER_02:No, no, not necessarily. And so, yeah. So now we've, sorry, we've deviated, but now we're scared. Yeah. We've scared everybody into kids swimming. So sorry about that. No, oh my God. No, I mean,
SPEAKER_00:this is a mom podcast period. So I think that relating it to the wedding industry as best we can. But I mean, at the end of the day, we're all moms, right? We all have the same worries, stresses. I mean, and that goes into why it's so difficult to balance wedding industry and motherhood because you really can't take your eyes off them. I think I have maybe two hours a day Um... where I can actually focus I mean even in scheduling this podcast with you you know so um we were going back and forth like oh well my kids wake up at this time and you know and that's been the case with everybody I've chatted with too but a hundred
SPEAKER_02:percent there was a lot of freedom for me I'll say that first year was rough for me because with the younger it was like I really insisted I wanted him to stay at home or be with I had a friend who kindly took him on she was wonderful and she'd been a teacher and we had kids the same age and so she took him in and he was she had at her second and it was the same age as Oliver. So she took him in, like God love her, she was able to do that. And so I got about 18 hours to myself a week, but then I got, but I have a 50 hour a week job. It's not like, so I had to do nights and weekends for a year. But once he went out a year, I did send him to daycare a year earlier than expected. I mean, the business doubled because I could get back to a regular schedule. It's just so hard trying to find that time, you know?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, I think that's the biggest constraint of all of this is the time. I used to spend about 70 hours a week on my business in the on season in the off season probably still 40 I mean I'm still you know trying to promote and you've got this the same situation because you're running your own business that's what everybody in the wedding industry is they're pretty much running their own business and also trying to watch children and not to like put the dichotomy of men versus women I just saw the like this reel that was talking about how this this girl doesn't ever interesting yeah she doesn't take advice from like successful men so say billionaire men that are saying how to advance um she says it's a completely different perspective because he said that he had this one particular person she was talking about he had a kid when he was like 15 so super young and then um and then he you know a couple years later like was doing the in the trenches like staying on people's couches and all that kind of stuff and she said my first thought it was, where is this child? Where's
SPEAKER_02:the kid?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Probably with the mom, you know, if the mom did that, it wouldn't have worked.
SPEAKER_02:You know, I think I would expand that a little bit too. I think it'd be hard. I don't know if I want to put a gender behind it. I think it would be like someone with kids who's not like the primary or an equal parent. That would be hard for me to take, you know, regardless of gender. I'm lucky that that was one of the biggest things is having someone who my, my husband, Travis is very much an equal partner. And there are times where I lean in more, he leans in more. and so and so forth so it's always been um because we both put food on the table here you know what i mean we both have that when it comes up but yeah i know i i would have a hard time if it was someone who knew especially if we had someone who was like a working professional who had a partner who was staying at home that's a totally different like i couldn't like to have someone who could actually without splitting duties like just have someone running the household like that's a totally different life i think you and i can both agree that would be yeah i was like yeah i would you know be great to have someone who who was at home all day handling all the things. But alas, that we take that on. And so it's always interesting. I always have to remind people, like my husband gets it, but with small businesses, I have to remind people, like, well, I don't have the flexible schedule. Like, I have 40 appointments this week. I don't have a flight. Like, I have corporate hours. It's not like, oh, 2 o'clock, let's go to a late lunch. It's like, no, I can't do that at all. Actually, it sounds terrible.
SPEAKER_00:And I didn't mean to affirm it to gender roles. Oh, yeah, no. I mean, I know with, with same sex couples, there's always one parent that seems to take on the mental load more, you know? I
SPEAKER_02:agree with you. No, no, no, no. I totally got the intent. And I do agree that you, you know, you can't help it. It'd be one person just takes on, as you say, that mental load. And it's something that I've had to work on myself over the years because when I first got, when I first got started with OFD, I went from being, you know, equal in pay to making almost no money because I had started a business. And, you know, I, I overdid the mental workload of the household. And we just did, that's how we did it. He and I both, it just naturally fell into it. Kind of like, well, I'm not making what I did. Let me do all the things. But when we started to even back out, it was like, oh, wait, we both realized we needed to recalibrate because, you know, you can't, and it's not always about the finances. I want to be careful in my own wording because I'm not saying all the value goes to how much someone makes. But, you know, when they're both contributing, it's like, oh, wait, I can't be the one doing all the things. But don't get me wrong. And you'll see this down the road. There are some things that I'm better at. with mental workload and then some things he's best with. And like for me right now, shout out to anyone else trying to figure out summer camps for summer 2025. Like I know at the time of this recording, it's January 29th. So it's like, well, who's thinking about that? No, everybody is. Everybody. I'm already doing
SPEAKER_00:school enrollments for September.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, 100%. We just did enrollment. But like I said, but that's my thing. Like I have a color coded spreadsheet with all the places. One of my friends, she was so funny. She said her husband took a look at my color coded spreadsheet and was like, Like she could be in finance. Like what? What is this? But I was just like, I just got to stay organized. So there's some things I lean into for mental workload. I'm sure you see it as well because it's my strength, but we try to even it out where we can.
SPEAKER_00:Right. I mean, I think that's totally key with your partner having the balance and knowing who has what strengths and playing into those strengths. So that's, you know, that's what my husband and I do. I had to give him a very detailed list this morning about how to get our daughter on the bus, which you Oh, wow. do I need to know all this I'm like absolutely you do
SPEAKER_02:you do for now but eventually hopefully the kid takes on some of that burden
SPEAKER_00:yeah I know well it's their rule like you have to be the one to buckle them in maybe because they're concerned oh got it that's so interesting yeah the bus they make you come on and one time I had to hand the baby I didn't realize that and I had to hand the baby to
SPEAKER_02:the
SPEAKER_00:bus driver you're like can you take this baby that's wild yeah can you take this baby because I have to buckle my child it well they they knew obviously but um so yeah so then how okay so in the midst of all of this you have your business running and then your son gets diagnosed with adhd can you talk a little bit about that like how how did you know and how and what kind of did that change and tell me everything
SPEAKER_02:no i really appreciate that and that was one of the reasons we connected because i was like i just felt so lost when it was all happening to me yeah i was like i wish there was more out there for again i so i want to be clear i don't have adhd i am the most neurotypical human alive. Like you look at me and you'd see my come from a long line. So I, my lived experience as someone who is being support system for people with it. So I just want to be super clear. Yeah. So what's interesting is you said diagnosed, but actually it starts when he was about three and he was in daycare. And at the time, and I'm sure there are parents here who are absolutely like nodding, is there's this point where all the kids are like biting each other. Like they're just two or three years old and the kids just can't help it. We would get these things called, I call them affectionately bitograms, where like a kid would bite another person, another kid, and then you get a little notice about it. It was just, not to be blasé about it, it was just very, it was just something kids did at that because they don't, they're still learning to talk more, blah, blah, blah. So anyways, we get to about three and a half and those of all disappeared except Oliver's still doing it. And, and he's acting out in a way that is not conducive with what he's doing at home. And it's just like, and, and I, and the thing is from the very beginning, I believed that the teachers, I wanted to be partners with them. At no point was I fighting this. Like I wasn't like, well, it must be something you're doing. It's like, no, no, no. These are the professionals. Like I'm always going to win on that. And so he ended up, um, it was just, it came to a point where there were so many unexplained behavioral problems that we had the most heartbreaking sit down with this wonderful take care. We'd been there since beginning. Um, both all of us in tears literally not not all of the rest of us in tears she's like i don't know what else we can do we can't keep him and so god love them because they i and i won't say they're amazing once in a while i actually do write the um owner to let her know how well he's doing because she she did everything she could more than most and so we and um they actually i said okay if he's gonna leave they gave us like a couple days note like let's finish out the week or something but we we were about to well anyways long story short what we did was we pretended he graduated because he's so little. What are we going to say? Oh, you got kicked out. Like he still doesn't stay, doesn't know. And so we created, like he loved rainbows at times. So we created a graduation certificate and on the way out, not in front of all the kids, but the teacher and I handed it to Oliver and say, good job, you've graduated. Like, can you believe they let me do that? Because what am I supposed to be like, hey kid, you've got problems and we can't figure out what it is and you're kicked out. Like I can't. And he's going to see that stress. So they let me pretend on the way out to do a graduation, which is incredible. Like I still am. am grateful for this. Oh my gosh. I know.
SPEAKER_00:I would have been like tear streaming. I cry at everything. Oh,
SPEAKER_02:well, I am just horrified that I have no coverage of him. So like, and he's still very young. And so we, we hopped around. Um, we saved all our pennies and put our money into another place that this, this, at this point, he's still very young, no diagnosis, this therapist who was really, she's, she was just, she was lovely, but she was so pro very expensive private schools. Her kids went to private schools. I don't think she understood that not every could do that like it was wild to me like so i just felt like there was definitely uh like we were like wait what like these the enrichment you know thirty thousand dollar a year it's like that's not like what everyone can do so anyways it felt uneven but she did recommend this place and i i brought him and i was very up front i had i started getting all his testing trying to figure out what's going on and i remember we paid paid the piper like up front the entire semester it was a real stretch for us when we handed the owner the paperwork she looked at her executive director she goes okay and she goes I'm going to tuck this away and just get to learn him as a person and I'm like I don't suggest that I suggest you look at the medical paperwork about him but she didn't listen and within a couple weeks he's having problems again and they said he can come back next week but you have to you have to he has to have like a professional whatever with him and it was going to be six thousand dollars a month which was beyond not possible like I can't stress oh my goodness how not possible that was and so we we took him um we were about to move because at this point we realized we had bought at the bottom of the market and many years ago 2009 so we thought we we had such a cheap mortgage we would just we we could afford to send him to private school all these things not like the upper not like the billion dollar ones but it turned out I was like this kid's not going to be able to get into anything and so we in this crazy time decided to with everything going on with this this diet no idea what's going on he has no place to actually hang his hat and be in in like pre-k at this point or preschool pre And we decided to move to the suburbs against my, against my will, but to know that he was going to end up in the right public school for him when the time came. And so in this meantime, we're doing all this private, whatever. And, and what it came down to is finally landed on someone. And I'm going to tell you, and sorry, it's a little bit of a long story. Yeah. How it all came to play was we got kicked out of our second preschool and I'm a disaster. I mean, just this dark place. And I go to my email. I write everything. every parent I know on my email list who live in Richmond, every single parent I did, any person I'd ever met in my life, I said, I am reaching out because I am lost. And I had the, like, I am still overwhelmed at how lovely everyone was. And one of my, my college best friend, Mary Catherine saw this email. She knew stuff was up that day. She drops off her kids at their daycare. And she asks for a meeting with the executive director and shares my story. And they sat down and I still have the post-it note with all the recommendations that i followed to a t and that's what put us on this path so to this day i'm so grateful for that but what we landed on eventually without boring you and all the things is like while i'm trying to find him a new school all these things is he was he's very clever he's very smart no problems with cognitive stuff but it was leaning towards adhd and at the time none no one in our family had it what we didn't realize is my husband had it but he'd never been diagnosed you know it ran in his family but if they didn't have diagnosed like it was It wasn't evident at the time. So he, um, he got the likely ADHD diagnosis at five, but technically I believe at least at the time, six is the first time you can actually really get the true diagnosis of ADHD. So we kind of muddled along and landed on a, um, this, this pre-K that she runs it. She calls it grandma's law. And it's a lot of kids who have stuff going on and like ADHD or like suppose. And so he was there, he muddled through. And then we finally in kindergarten, got him into a school that started with all the IEP, all this. And so I will say, and then I'll stop because this is like a long story. But during this time, what really saved everything was one, just being candid with people and asking for help. But then the minute we really suspected this, because really, we had suspicions by the time he was four, he went into early intervention. So I did about, we took him to about five hours worth a week of interventions. And all of it, like all of that has changed the trajectory of his life. So we were very fortunate to have insurance to cover most of it. And we paid some out of pocket and just made sacrifices. But yeah, it was like this really intense three years of what is this? What's this hyperactive? Like no one else has it. But now we realize my husband has it too. You know, it's all this. And then it was the landing on a school, getting into the public school system and just going like my whole life. became his services, because I knew if I could put three years into it, and he's still does some stuff, but it's not, I mean, he's 11. He really doesn't need any of the, like he does a little bit of behavioral therapy once in a while as a spot check-in. But all of that while trying to balance a business was absolutely the hardest part of owning OFD. So that's a very long story. But I share that because I think, I know people are going to hear this and go, oh my God, something like this is happening to me. You know what I mean? Like it's just a tough place to be.
SPEAKER_00:Well, so then how did you, How did you navigate the business end of it while this was all
SPEAKER_02:happening? Yeah. So what I did, I worked myself to death a lot of the time. I was working nights, weekends, anything I could do to make up for the time that was lost to taking him to think. Because my husband does work a corporate job. And so there was more flexibility at that time for me to do it. I never gave myself a raise. And I made sure that any extra money went straight to outsourcing. So I have an amazing team. I continue to grow the team. I contracted. Um, we lived on what we lived on so that, um, knowing that we had to pay for these services and stuff, but I, you know, I paid myself a living wage, but any extra money went towards, um, really building out the team because I just, I knew we were going to get on the other side of this, which we have for years now. But my concern was if I, if I didn't put the time into the business and say, I can't do it all right. Cause that would be the, that would be the most likely thing, right? You're just like, I'm overwhelmed. I can't do anything with the But the business would hurt long term if I didn't put the time I had to put into it, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah, of course. I mean, and I think, you know, for better or for worse that you probably because you outsourced everything, then you're set on a trajectory for, you know, not having to be in the business as much. Right. Because you already had that system in place.
SPEAKER_02:A hundred percent. That's what I always say. And it kind of goes back to my old way of thinking, which is not every not everyone agrees with me on this. And I respect that is when Oliver was a baby, like I would work when he was napping. I know everyone's like sleep while he's sleeping, but I couldn't, I just physically couldn't do that most of the time. And
SPEAKER_00:so. Yeah, you can't. I mean, you can't run a business like that. No, no, I
SPEAKER_02:got stuff to do. And so for me, it was like, I need to put the hours in now and Travis will take him nights and weekends and in between when I'm nursing him. And I'm going to just kind of kill myself in the early years. And yeah, am I going to miss some of these baby moments? Maybe not a ton because I was at the house, but what it does is I knew if I put my eye on the prize to like, just get him to school where I could, I could build a career that allowed me to be more involved when he would remember. Does that make sense? So like, he always had one of us, don't get me wrong, but it was like, I was willing to sacrifice some of that time as a baby so I could build a business to be the mom I wanted to be when he was older. And it, I felt like the impact was really going to be there. So.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, I think that's probably part of why so many people stick with the wedding industry and kind of catch that bug is because you realize you do have more flexibility with time. And if you can make it work in a way that allows you to be there more present, and a lot of people don't have that opportunity to 100% to be with their children, they work nine to five, they come home, they see their kids for an hour or two before bed. And that's it. I mean,
SPEAKER_02:yeah,
SPEAKER_00:you know, even if I'm working, and I know the kids are in the background playing, it's, you know, I still feel like I'm more present. And they they get to be with me more than they would have otherwise. otherwise
SPEAKER_02:yeah we're just doing our best you know when it comes to all of that and and everyone's going to make their own decisions for that you know I think having that mom photographer speak a thousand years ago at a conference I happen to be at it really impacted me I saw that when she stepped away in a way that that wasn't planned it just really wreaked havoc on her business and I thought I just can't I saw her in her her real tears on stage and I thought I've got I've got to learn from this you know and do something different
SPEAKER_00:oh interesting so she She spoke about, um, she, she spoke about what had happened and that her business had tanked in the meantime.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Yeah. Like, yeah. Like she had like, I'm leaning into parenthood. I'm doing all these things, but like, she hadn't really planned the way she like in hindsight. So it was like maternity leave. She just kind of shut off her computer, said people wouldn't understand, but they don't understand because you're running a business. You can't book someone for a wedding and then be like, Oh, I have no plans in place for being gone for eight weeks. And so she realized leaning into parenthood without a proper plan in place really tank things for her and it was a hard climb back up and it was so heartbreaking to listen to and I think that always and that was years before I had had a child and I thought to myself I'm going to remember this conversation for a long time you know and and the importance of you know having more of a plan as a parent and it is my responsibility to my business to be you know it's always interesting you know it's like I knew Oliver was coming and I had to make plans you know he was coming and he would need care and I had to figure that out I couldn't like just wing it and hope my business like survived that, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Based on that, that very, it ended up being a very impressionable talk I heard all those years ago.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I'm trying to think to myself, like if I had a plan, I guess I, I mean, I had automated emails going out. Which
SPEAKER_02:is a great start.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And so she just like went, she just went blank, like not going to answer anybody.
SPEAKER_02:Well, and it was a plan, you know, for me, and maybe I'm on the other end of the spectrum, but for me, it was very much a who's in charge of what everybody knows. And the thing is, I had 100% retention of all my clients because I had a plan for them. You know what I mean? There was no blip in the company because of that. But everyone's different, right? You know, in terms of their superpowers of getting things prepped and all of that stuff. And it also depends on everyone's business as a parent. It's a different percentage of their life, right? And it's a big percentage of my life. So that's why I put in the time that I did. But I know some people listen to this and be like, well, I'm not gonna, I don't need to do that. It's like, well, that's the That's fine. Don't do it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I would say part of. why I think I wish I had prepared more and didn't realize is that you feel like your brain goes to mush for a good six months at least. Um, and I, I think I lucked out. I mean, not that this was lucky for anybody, but COVID happened six weeks after I had my first.
SPEAKER_01:Oh
SPEAKER_00:gosh. Yeah. So, um, all of my weddings. And so it was just really nerve wracking income wise because all of my weddings switched and I managed to, you I kept all except one wedding, but I don't think that had anything to do with that was more about the scheduling conflicts, not about having a baby in there. Yeah. No, I think that's amazing for you, though.
UNKNOWN:I think that that's great. And I think, yeah, it's just, again, to each their own with that. There's not a ton of research. There's a few resources out there.
SPEAKER_00:But in terms of actually sitting down and properly putting together, like a maternity leave is very different for a small business owner versus someone who is a part of an established corporation, right? And people take your work.
UNKNOWN:And so for me, I just learned early on to put the plan together. You know, I take a couple years ago, I took two weeks off in the summer fully, which I've never done in my life. But it
SPEAKER_00:It took like four weeks to plan that and put that together and
SPEAKER_01:it
SPEAKER_00:was wild.
SPEAKER_02:It shows we can do it, but we have to put the, I feel we have to put the structure in place if we want to do it successfully a lot of the time.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, for sure. Do you feel like going through the experience with the ADHD with your son has made you into a better business owner and empathize more with, you know, other? I love that question. I
SPEAKER_02:love that question. I think it makes me more empathetic. The minute you said it, I'm like, oh, I think it's more empathetic. I think realizing that brain, like really have a front row seat to seeing how brains work differently between my son and my husband and members of his family. Like that all comes out. It's like, oh, I'm surrounded by ADHD. I just didn't realize I was accommodating the way. And I learned over the years, like there's actually a relatively high percentage of people I work with who have ADHD. Oftentimes they have ADHD inattentive, which is without the hyperactivity. I think that's a proper term. And then when I was on the WIPA board, we actually had a decently high percentage of people with neurodivergency. And so I always kind of joked, I ended up being like the moth to the flame because I'm so structured because, and I think I'm just very mindful now of, of again, not having that kind of brain, but seeing how those brains work up close and personal in my own life that I've learned to be more empathetic. And also the kind of accommodations someone might need, you know, it's like, it's like, especially when I was running WIPA, like not running it, but I was president of WIPA. I don't mean to say running it. We have a, we have a team that runs it. I was the president. And, and so to be able to see and say, okay, well, if they do have ADHD, which is either suspected or they've shared with me or whatever, and whether it's medicated or not or handled or not or whatever I learned how to put things in a place to help them and they wouldn't know I was doing this but I tried to do things to help them succeed even more if that makes sense so I just I learned to be better at that so yeah
SPEAKER_00:yeah I think that's I mean it any bit of knowledge that you can take and from your own experiences and apply it it's almost like you know the universe has a plan and I think there are a lot of people out there that probably are have ADHD and don't even realize it I actually you know I think maybe our phones are listening to us I think they are but because as obviously I was talking with my husband about our conversation coming up and everything and suddenly I'm getting these reels about ADHD in my phone that's you're like wait a minute what is
SPEAKER_02:that no I think I actually I actually have a lot of girlfriends who are in their forties who have come across their own diagnosis. I have a lot, like a high percentage of my friends through work, through personal, through, you know, mom, friends and things like that. And I think that what I, from my understanding, it presents differently in women. You know, when I have a four-year-old. That's what this
SPEAKER_00:reel was about.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Well, it's very true. And so I, you know, with my son, you know, what I said, listen, when he was, I did a recital when he was at Christmas time and all these kids are standing there like little angels and he jumps through the entire three minute song. Like you can see, I mean, you don't even need, do we need to fill out the paperwork? Like this is what it is. No, but the hyperactivity is very, all his acting out when he was younger was a hyperactivity. It was an impulsivity that came with that, that he no longer, that now he manages through behavioral therapy and medicine. But if you, but a lot of my friends, it was always interesting. There are some people who'll say, and in my life, family, friends would say, well, I think I have ADHD. And occasionally I'll be like, well, I mean, you do. I mean, I, I, I'm pretty sure you do based on like me being surrounded by it. Oh yeah. Yeah. I've had a few friends and it's oftentimes it's like a relationship with time. I see that it's, it's a lot of my friends, not like this people I've run across. It's that weird relationship with time where, um, you know, it's very last minute, not having things that like it's, but that's the thing I see. Like I
SPEAKER_00:have one. I know I'm, I'm laughing cause it's me.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, okay. I was like, I'm not, I'm not. No, no, I'm not laughing in general, but yeah. interesting it's like if I sit with my family and I said okay like we've got let's say it's a Saturday it's noon we're about to have lunch and we got to leave at three for a family thing but we have a bunch of things to do what's best for my family what's best for a lot of people with this kind of weird time relationship that's unusual for me is we'll do a whiteboard and I'll do 12 to 1 1 to 2 2 to 3 and I'll say okay the next half hour I'm blacking out because of lunch and then you said you wanted to go outside and play four squares I'm blocking that but look how much time we have left to do these five things like that. There's a time blindness that sometimes comes with ADHD, which is why a lot of those things are done last minute versus because we think they have more time. And so those are the things I've learned to do. Like my house is, is very, it's like a combination central. There are whiteboards all over the house, like everything. When Oliver was little, I went to the craft store and made this like checklist thing where he'd have to, it was everything he had to do before bed. Right. And it's like, so I would take these little round circles, put Velcro on and draw like a toothbrush on it and a face to wash your face and so he would have to like so i just like made my own adhd like resources yeah shout out to michaels
SPEAKER_00:oh my gosh yeah i mean that's a hundred percent me i you know wait till but i always say that people that are late are optimists my husband thinks that i love that that's sweet my husband's like not that's not true and i'm like it is true because i just think i can get so much more done in that time and so i I'm I end up being late because I think I can accomplish so much more than I actually can. So which is
SPEAKER_02:one way. Yeah, absolutely. And that could be the case. You know, I in my own experiences, it seems that it's kind of a if someone's given 60 minutes and they have a bit of a time blindness, they don't understand what 60 minutes is really like. Like, you know what I mean? Like how long it was like, oh, there's more time here than there really is. You know, so there's a lot. But I just see that's what I see in my life. I mean, who knows? Yeah, we'll have to do a battle. You know, we'll have to revisit this down the road you have to let me know
SPEAKER_00:yeah I know I'm like I have to go get tested what's going on there was I mean the reel was crazy it was like describing me but then I looked at the comments and everybody everybody all the women are responding are like yeah this is like me all day like this is every woman ever isn't it things like what was one of them that just that you can't like if there's one minor thing that happens later you're stressing about it all day and it kind of throws in a mix of everything else like through the day. It like messes you up for the day. Cause you're thinking about this one thing that's happening later. That happens to me.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it depends. I could see if there was something very serious happening in my life, I could be focused on it, but, but I don't get hyper-focused the way people with ADHD do. So that's another thing too. That was the most interesting thing I probably learned is I remember when Oliver was little and I was like, what do you mean he doesn't have attention? He has this Lego robot thing he built. It was like 300 steps to build a robotic cat. And they're like, And I go, and he sat there and did the whole thing. And they're like, well, that's hyper-focused. So with ADHD brains, oftentimes, and I'm not an expert, but this is what I read and learned is, you know, they, they will latch onto something and that will be, they'll be so good at that. Right. They'll be so intense on that thing. And so that's always very interesting. I always joke with my husband. It's like when we have a million things to do, but he's like, I'm going to focus on, you know, organizing the Tupperware at this weird time. You know what I mean? It's like, well, no, we're hyper-focusing on that when we should be like cleaning the the house so let's not do that
SPEAKER_00:oh my goodness I'm like my mind is blown right now because I do think of like you know how I am too and um but people in my life that get very focused on on things and tasks and like almost like ignore socially everything else because they're so focused on this one thing that's
SPEAKER_02:it but it's different than if I am sometimes I sit in the sunroom when the weather is really nice and I'm just working no headphones staring at my stuff and And Travis walks out and makes fun of me. He's like, how can you pay attention out here? Because literally every yard around me is blowing, like doing leaf blowing. And so that's different because I have a neuro, like I am neurotypical. So that stuff doesn't distract me. You know, I'm not distracted by things. But with ADHD, when they hyper focus, they pick one thing. And usually it's not the thing that it should be right in front of them. You know, it's like Oliver gets home from, at the end days, medicine's worn off. He gets home from a guitar and it takes forever to get him up. upstairs to get ready to go to bed because he's like, well, I got to pet this cat and then I have to pet this cat. You just can't. He's hyper-focused, you know? So it's so interesting.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah. In terms of the late aspect, I've really had to hone in, especially for weddings. I would never, ever, ever be late for a wedding. Sure. So I, I, I literally three hours ahead of time, like I make sure there's a babysitter home at least an hour before we have to leave so that I can, cause I'll be trying to focus on getting ready to leave for the wedding and just the kids, um, you know, so I just, I plan an extra, extra amount of time just so I'm never, ever late for a wedding. So, so I was going to say,
SPEAKER_02:if I may say, I think that's wonderful. You do that. And that could be, that could be just something you do an amazing. If you down the road, get an ADHD diagnosis, then they would say, well, that's an accommodation you've created for yourself to to be a workaround for your ADHD. Interesting. Yeah. So I'm not saying you got it, girl. I'm just saying that it's amazing to see my husband's incredibly smart and has had ADHD his whole life. And it's interesting to see the accommodations he's built around himself before the diagnosis to make sure he's never late to anything. I mean, he's never been late to any, but if you look at all the things he has to do extra in order to, you know, be that kind of live in that neurotypical world, it's amazing. I have the great, the biggest, biggest amount of respect for people who have to manage you know a neurodivergency in a world that is not meant like it's not accommodating to that outright like I just have so I told Oliver when especially when he's younger he really was my hero I mean all he had to bet his brain was mapped it was it moves two and a half times faster than the brain of a kid his age and he has he actually I'm going to brag about him he has the genius level of some of the things that he does including fluid reasoning and that's a lot on a kid and it is awesome but it's a lot on a kid to manage on top of all of this hyperactivity. And so he's always been my hero to be able to manage in this world, you know, and be as delightful as he is. He stopped biting many years ago. So he stopped biting when he was like four. So we're good. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not something we have to worry about anymore. So
SPEAKER_00:yeah, I mean, I think I've heard many times, not that autism is the same as ADHD. It's not. But I've heard that, you know, parents of autistic kids have this realization of like, how their brain, their beauty, beautiful their brain is and how amazing they are. Like these, these autistic children, you know, any neuro divergences within children, I think that they're, they're amazing children. And yeah, it's just that the world's not set up for them necessarily, like you said, so. 100%.
SPEAKER_02:But I will say as a parent of someone, and if there's anyone else listening out there, I can't stress enough that dedicating my time to the best of my ability with resources I did have to early interventions leaning into it. There was no point where I was in denial about it. We just leaned right into it. I skipped the part where we're fighting on the diagnosis and just lean in. And the sooner you can get assistance is the better, way better off they are. It's night and day when you see someone like Oliver versus someone who is newly diagnosed at his age, it's like night and day. Oliver's just no problem managing in a neurotypical world practically compared to someone who it's a newer diagnosis. So you're doing the best you can. Yeah,
SPEAKER_00:of course. So when you were going through all of this, did you lean on any fellow wedding industry people and have anybody that was going through the same thing or similar? That's
SPEAKER_02:a great question. I didn't have any wedding pro friends who were going through the same thing. It doesn't mean they didn't listen to me and all those things. There were people who were personal friends, certainly. I was very lucky to have. I will do a shout out to one friend in particular, Tommy. who I will never forget this kindness of him but the day the first day where we had no coverage like no preschool I had the day I wrote the email okay I went in I had my office at his he's the renaissance it's a Richmond Virginia property him and John they own this great property and we had we had offices there and he I had let him in on this I said and it was no problem like it's my own office so I can bring in Oliver because I'm not working for him it's alongside him right you know he does his own thing and I'm owning OFD and all this yeah and so I brought and I said yeah I I'm bringing him and I let him in on it. And so at one point, and we were gonna just make a day of it with Oliver and it's very stressful to have this little kid running around like I had Legos for him and all this stuff. Well, Tommy, God love him, came down and grabbed him and said hey he's so great with kids can I take him up to the the venue I want to show him some stuff takes him up we do a whole like and I was there for part of it we did um photos in the photo booth all the things he was like Uncle Tommy and he just took him off my hands for a little bit and just brought so much like light on really truly one of the darkest days for me just just I was so stressed and I was so grateful he just came in and he was just so lovely to him and then later down the road when Oliver went through a bit of a blip when he was um at his new preschool it was one of these days where with how he is. And I think a lot of kids are like this. It's kind of a downward spiral. If you get in trouble for something and you're that young and you're dealing with all these things and blah, blah, blah, it just is a downward spiral. It gets worse and worse and you feel terrible about yourself. It gets just awful. And so I picked him up. He was having a rough day. And I wrote Tommy and I wrote my in-laws and a few other people. And I said, listen, Oliver had a rough day. I need this to turn around. And he feels like he's doing something good. And so I said, are you home? He'd love to run by and give you a few stickers like it was just very like like to give you to kind of brighten your day so you know just because that act of being kind and having someone praise you for being kind like that would just fix it you know what I mean like really not to because he was feeling terrible about himself and so Tommy was home and we brought him stickers and of course Tommy he's very animated and just like fell all over himself to authentically think over and that that was just those kind of kindness extended I will just remember for the rest of my life and so yeah One of the reasons I'm very passionate about talking about this is just because we don't, I just didn't have a lot of resources. I had to make the resources. I had to make a school group. you know for parents with kids with ADHD like there just wasn't a lot at the time unfortunately
SPEAKER_00:yeah I mean I think this is great too that this is out there now people are gonna be able to listen and potentially you know realize that they're not alone and yeah and I'm sure I mean the wedding industry is huge there's got to be lots of other business owners that have had the same oh totally and I
SPEAKER_02:get tagged I get tagged in a lot of groups like they'll say hey can you like I've had a few I'm on Voxer a lot like the voice recording back and forth and I've had some really great conversations with like good friends of ours have connected us and said you should talk to Megan and she's been through this and you know and it's you know I've met a lot of people that way
SPEAKER_00:yeah if I can say anything about motherhood in general it's just that we are very supportive of each other I think yes for the most part you know what I mean like every every mom once you've been through it you just you know and you get it and there's just a community that I had no idea about until obviously, I was a mom. So yeah, just the motherhood community in general. And
SPEAKER_02:I've been very fortunate on both sides, moms and dads. So I've had some great parents across the boards where they've just because they're both going through it, right. And so I've really enjoyed the chance to talk to a variety of different parents throughout the years. And it's so funny, because you get two parents together who are, you know, going through it, and you realize you get so much done in 15 minutes, like we have so many suggestions for you. That really helps,
SPEAKER_00:you know? Yeah, I mean, you have to be concise with time like you have no choice no
SPEAKER_02:you really don't you get so much more done yeah
SPEAKER_00:exactly so I love to bring it all together here what's one piece of advice you think you'd have for somebody going through it right now like what what's the one takeaway you definitely want them to have
SPEAKER_02:don't despair because there are so many there are more and more resources all the time and to you know be able to especially with this kind of for us my husband and I just not We skipped over the fighting against it stuff. You know what I mean? It's get to work, get to work. The fact is the earlier, the better. If someone gets diagnosed when they're 13, they'll be fine too. But just where you are, get to work to the best of your ability, knowing that I know it's different for everybody, but leaning into resources, even if it's the free resources online, I understand that not everything is covered by insurance. So I want to be very mindful of that. But there are low costs. There's support groups there. There's a virtual something called OutSchool, and they have really great ADHD classes for low cost and socialization and stuff like that, like little classes where the kids can practice being social with each other. And so there's just a lot out there. But the sooner you can dive in, the better off the family will be.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:You got to make it your job.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. That's a great piece of advice for anybody listening. Yeah. I do love to ask every mom that I speak with if they could name one or two women mothers that they see in the wedding industry, crushing it as well, just to, you know, give a shout out to fellow moms in the wedding industry.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. I love me some Michelle Loretta. She's BCH Consulting and I'm full disclosure, we're friends and I am a client of hers for many years. She does, she finances for the wedding industry. She's much more, she's a fractional CFO, but her kids are amazing. They're getting older. One is almost all of her. She's a little bit older and one's in high school, but I've always admired her philosophies on parenting. I just, I think she's incredible. I loved learning early on because I used to think that all kids had to like go through the standard, like sports and all those things. And then when I saw her youngest, he was doing break dancing. He's doing some of the coolest things out there. And I realized that kids really could pursue any interest. And I don't think I realized that until I saw her really, you know, supporting that. So I think she's amazing. I mean, there's so many wonderful parents, right? She's dance out. Megan Gilligan, it does an amazing job with her kiddos. It's so fun to see. I think she does a great job. She's very candid about her life and the balance and the things and all the things she's done to get to a point where she could balance it to continue to be the life she wants to live. She's also a podcast host, Weddings for Real podcast. And she does this great like recap every year of like personal and professional. I always I tell her I always enjoy listening to that. So those are I mean, there are a myriad of amazing people, but those two stand out. out as people I really admire. Yeah, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah, just to wrap it up, then I would love to just have you say, you know, where can we find you? How can we follow you? Just let us know how to get in
SPEAKER_02:touch. Absolutely. You can find me at OFTConsulting.com. Also on Instagram at OFD. Those are definitely the best ways to find me.
SPEAKER_00:Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Thank you for everything. Thank you for shedding light on this. I'm really glad we got to talk about all of it. And I can't wait to, you know, hear what people have to say about all this. It's going to be great. Absolutely. Thank you. Wow, that was an eye-opening conversation and I'm so glad I got the chance to chat with Megan about ADHD and how it has shaped her life and her experience within the wedding industry. Hopefully, it will help some of you maybe going through the same thing on what to do next and just for you to know that you're not alone. Next time, we're chatting with Carly Michelle of Carly Michelle Photography who just had her second baby. I cannot wait to share that soon and I'll see you guys there. Hey mamas, thanks for listening. Don't forget to hit that follow button and we'll see you at the next episode.