Eps 5: You Don't Have to Love Every Moment with Becca Maberly

This week on Heidi at Home, I'm joined by Becca Maberly, founder of A Mother Place, antenatal and postnatal educator, bestselling author of Nobody Tells You, and one of the most refreshingly honest voices in the motherhood space.

In this episode, we dive into the parts of motherhood that often go unsaid. Becca shares her experience of not loving every stage of parenting, feeling like she wasn't a "natural" mother, and the pressure so many women feel to enjoy every moment when the reality can feel very different.

Together, we explore maternal guilt, the mental load and those early years of motherhood. We also talk about how parenting evolves over time, why Becca has enjoyed some of the later stages of motherhood more than the early years, and what life looks like now as she navigates raising older children and teenagers.

We also discuss the importance of having open and honest conversations with our children about bodies, relationships and sex, and how Becca's own upbringing, with an obstetrician and gynaecologist father, has shaped the way she approaches these conversations with her sons.

Finally, Becca shares details of her new community, The Commune, a space designed to support women through the realities of modern motherhood with honesty, connection and support.

This is a warm, funny and deeply reassuring conversation for any parent who has ever wondered whether they're the only one finding parts of motherhood difficult.

Find Becca here:

Website: www.amotherplace.com

Instagram: @amotherplace

The Commune: https://thecommune.world

If you enjoyed this episode, please follow, rate and review Heidi at Home, and share it with a friend who might need to hear this conversation.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:13

Welcome to Hiding at Home, where we have real connected conversations about motherhood life and everything in between. Because motherhood isn't just one thing. It's messy, emotional, beautiful, and constantly evolving. Here we go beyond the surface to talk honestly about what it really looks like and how we can grow through it, not just survive it. On this week's episode, I'm joined by a really lovely friend, and actually I've known Becca for a very long time, lovely Becca from a mother place. She is an author of a great book, Nobody Tells You. No. Nobody tells you. And a teller of how it is, basically. Becca, welcome. Thank you for coming. Oh no worries. And it's your middle, no, little list's birthday. No, my oldest birthday's birthday.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

Yeah, so today is 15 years since I first became a mother.

SPEAKER_02 1:00

There we go, then nice little celebration. And um, yeah, mum of two boys, obviously, two older boys. So we will also be chatting about that transition from little people trenches to where you're at now, where she was just telling me that actually at weekends you get to sort of chill out until 12 o'clock midday when they wake up, which sounds amazing. Um, so should we start with your early days experience? Do you think? Yeah, if you can remember it. I can. No, it feels like yesterday. Because part of your whole thing is that you like to talk about not loving every second, right? And actually, sometimes how it can be really hard and really challenging, and sometimes you can hate it. So talk us through Wilf, happy birthday to both, but talk us through your journey with him when he was born and that period where you really struggled.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Well, I was one of those kind of annoying people that had a textbook pregnancy. Um, I got pregnant really easily. Um, one go. Amazing. Really? Much to my husband's um devastation. Oh, well, it will take a while. Yeah. And uh had a great pregnancy, and I was absolutely brilliant at giving birth. Really good. Um, no pain relief, and I was in and in and out of the hospital in hours, and I thought, yeah, I'm really failed it. I am really good at this. I'm gonna write a book. Um, and um got home and then proceeded to have a pretty shitty time for the next five years, I would say. Um my I had read all the books, I'd read all the manuals, but my son hadn't, Wilfred, the one whose birthday it is today, he had not read any of the manuals, and he in fact seemed to contradict absolutely everything that I had read. So, you know, I had the routine ready to go, I had read everything about breastfeeding, I'd gone to all the courses, and yeah, he just didn't want to play balls and he didn't fit the mold, and I was unable to breastfeed him properly. Um, ended up putting him on formula much earlier than I had intended to, which I found really, really heartbreaking and something I still feel sad about today. And he didn't sleep. I mean, perhaps if I'd known about you in those days, that would have been um helpful, but he didn't sleep through the night till he was about 18 months. Um, and then his brother came along at 22 months, and he too didn't sleep through the night till 18 months, and I yeah, I just didn't have enough sleep, I didn't have enough time for myself, I didn't have enough support. My husband had a really, really busy job that took him out of the country a lot, and I felt really lonely, really sad, really angry that I hadn't prepared for it all properly, and yeah, I just hated the whole experience.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

Do you believe looking back, you talked about like doing all of the reading and doing like all of the things in advance that there was a sense of almost like loss of control as well because when you do prepare so much and then they just don't do what you want them to do or what you think they're gonna do, definitely you sort of feel like what's going on?

SPEAKER_00 4:17

That loss of control thing, I think, was a huge thing for me, which I don't really realise uh until sort of later on. But I'd say definitely a type A personality. I've been used to my whole life, a having quite a structured kind of life with school and university and career and stuff like that. And I'm used to like lots of people going and learning the thing and then just doing the thing and getting on with stuff. And this was I think the first thing in my life that I felt like I just couldn't do, yeah, and I couldn't understand why I couldn't do it because I'm smart, I'd read the books, I've been to the course, um, you know, and I my dad is an obstetrician and gynecologist, and I was like, I know all this stuff, and I have access to amazing information and resources, and yet here I am, and I can't breastfeed, and I can't get my baby to sleep, and I'm not bonding with him, I'm not enjoying it, and I'm frankly quite shit at it. Like, why? And that I think, especially as a type A person, I think that's a really hard thing to try and get over. I know lots of friends and lots of people who'll be listening to this are perhaps you know a different personality type, maybe more relaxed, maybe more comfortable with uh, you know, just going with the flow. But if that's not your personality type, I think it can be really, really hard.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

Yeah. And I'm picking up on like a sense of failure ultimately, feeling like you've not done it well enough or you're not good enough.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Yeah, because I think I'm not I definitely wasn't one of those girls that grew up wanting to become a mother that was never sort of like my calling, and I would never have described myself as a very maternal, ooey-gooey kind of person, but being a mother is kind of it just feels like a sort of basic thing that every woman should know how to and should be able to do. And I felt like yeah, I just couldn't do it, and the bits I was doing, I wasn't doing well, and I was waking up most days with like a sense of dread, thinking, Oh god, I've got to do it all again, and yeah, that just felt pretty grueling.

unknown 6:25

That's so odd.

SPEAKER_02 6:26

And and I suppose, in a way, you can often expect to feel like that for a little bit of time in the early weeks, but presumably what you're saying is those sort of first few weeks, those first few months passed, but you kind of still felt the same and it still kind of wasn't clicking.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

Yeah, I'm quite a positive person, so I would wake up every morning going, right, today's gonna be different. Today he's gonna feed well, today he's gonna sleep well, today he's not gonna cry all day. Today I'm gonna feel more at ease in this role. And you know, years down the line, it still didn't feel any better. And I don't know, perhaps if I'd gone to the GP and said, Do you think I have postnatal depression? Perhaps I would have walked away with a diagnosis, with medication, with support, uh, that kind of thing. But I didn't do that. So to this day, I don't know if I officially had postnatal depression or not. But my feeling is I probably had, you know, there's a broad spectrum, right? And I I probably did have it. So I think because of the support that I did have that enabled me to, you know, sort of keep my feelings or to keep myself kind of from spiralling, like I know that that some people do. So, you know, I have a very supportive husband, very supportive parents who who did as much as they could, but there were times when it still didn't feel like enough for the issues that I was having.

SPEAKER_02 7:51

It's a lot, isn't it? And I think, well, support we know support's changed so much because you now run obviously a postnatal sort of support services in terms of your courses and things like that. So there is probably more information out there more than ever. But I'm wondering, even so, and actually, overwhelm comes into it because then there's almost too inf too much information. But what did support look like in those first few years when you had two small boys 15 years ago? Was there much that you could access?

SPEAKER_00 8:18

Or it mostly looked like picking up the phone to my sister who had a uh her first baby the same time as mine, and mostly looked like just offloading on her, but I think that was tricky because she had a very different baby to me. She had one that was sleeping 21 out of 24 hours a day, and my son was sleeping six out of 24 hours a day. She had a baby that she could feed and then pop down in the cot and walk off, and her daughter would sleep, and my son would, you know, feed with difficulty, throw up everywhere, scream. I'd be rocking him for hours, walking around the block with the buggy. You know, there were days where I I did 10 miles of just walking, walking, walking, trying to get him to sleep, and he didn't, and you know, she would listen, and you know, that's that's an you know an amazing source of support, just having someone to listen. But I don't think she really ever got it because she had such a different experience, you know, our experiences were complete opposites.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

Black and white. Have you seen the trend on socials, which is I think it's sort of reels going around with my experience of motherhood is different to yours because I don't sleep. I don't know if you've seen that sort of trend, but the it's been going around recently where you sort of filmed yourself doing whatever, and it talks about how if if you're not sleeping, your version of motherhood is completely different to someone whose baby, like you say, with your sister, is doing I don't know, whatever. So let's say seven to seven from six months or something, and that lack of sleep as well, playing into all of those feelings around failure.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

And I remember her saying to me, I don't know why everyone says they're so tired. I feel fine because she was going to bed and getting a full night's sleep. She would have to wake her daughter up to feed her if she felt she needed feeding. And yeah, like I said, I didn't I didn't get a full night's sleep for for nearly five years, which I think just I mean, that of course that's going to affect your your experience of motherhood, right? That's brutal.

SPEAKER_02 10:13

Yeah, yeah. And 100%. You just think so differently, don't you? And your anxiety is it's just it sleep impacts everything. Um I would love to dig into, as you say, like if I'd have known you back then, the why, because I always believe that there's something going on, but that's not what we're here for. What I'd love to know is for those listening who either see that in their own experience currently or on reflection, also felt the same. Do you have any advice on how you've managed to kind of get through and therefore slowly get over it, or are you not quite over it? Like, how do you because obviously I know you talk about it a lot now on socials. Is that in a way your therapy for my therapy?

SPEAKER_00 10:50

That's that's how I started doing everything that I do now. So that was um 2011 my son was born, and you know, towards the end of that year, in fact, even earlier than that, mid-2011, I was just absolutely furious with my mum for not preparing me properly, uh, friends who'd had babies before me for not preparing me, um, the world, social media wasn't really such a big thing then, but the books that I read, the courses I'd done, the women I'd spoken to had painted this whole motherhood thing in this sort of like ethereal kind of light, like I was gonna be sitting there in this white cotton nighties with the sunlight streaming through, looking lovingly into my son's eyes, and just loving every moment, like everyone tells you to, and time goes so fast. And there was I with time dragging on, not loving every moment, covered in puke, um, you know, and just not getting enough sleep, and just hating every moment and wondering if I was the freak, like what was going on, and so I started writing about that, and yeah, just writing about my whole experience, and then that turned into you know videos and the things that I do now and I'm known best for on social media, just being honest and shining a light on things that felt like taboo 15 years ago, because there was nobody talking about you know, maternal rage, there was no one talking about the mental load, relationship changes, um, not loving every moment, failure to breastfeed, you know, not feeling maternal, all that kind of stuff. No one was talking about it. And, you know, although now a lot more people are talking about it, and depending on what your algorithm is serving you on social media right now, you might be hearing a lot about it. But I still think it's a very small minority of people who feel brave enough and strong enough to talk about that kind of thing. Because there's a lot of shame, I think, associated with saying that you're you're not enjoying one of the most basic parts of being a woman or being a person, which is like reproducing and nurturing your child and you know, saying I don't like it and I don't love the job is yeah, that's it's difficult for some people to say. And in certain cultures, you know, uh you would just wouldn't hear that. And so if I can encourage people to, you know, share their feelings or at least you know let them know they're not alone, then yeah, that's that's uh that feels good.

SPEAKER_02 13:31

Feeling seen, and it's almost, I guess, in a way, quite healing for you to know that your content then reaches people who felt like he do but actually can see themselves in it and therefore validating, isn't it? Ultimately, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

And it feels yeah, it feels good for me to be able to time what was a really negative experience into something um that's now you know positive and helps, you know, tens of thousands of women. And you know, the courses that I I uh produced, uh some, you know, there's the semantial courses, postnatal courses, um, some general parenting courses and uh sort of work-life balance courses, they they just address things in a really kind of honest and open kind of way. I never um pretend to be an expert, I'm not a parenting expert, I'm not a sleep expert, I'm not a breastfeeding expert, I'm not a midwife, I'm none of those things, but I have been through some dark times and come out the other end and you know, happier and stronger, and that's just my wish for any mum who's who's going through what I went through.

SPEAKER_02 14:36

What would you say to that mum listening now who maybe doesn't even have a baby? Maybe she has a two-year-old and she just kind of you know looks forward to bedtime and gets up in the morning and has that sense of dread that you had. Is there anything you could say to her that would make her feel like you know there is an endpoint?

SPEAKER_00 14:56

Gosh, I would say you're not alone, you're not the only one. It's not your fault. You know, you don't have enough support probably for whatever you're going through, and time don't believe the people who say that time flies because I don't think it feels like that when you are in the trenches, but things will get better. And I'm the mum of a 13-year-old and a 15-year-old now, and it's great, it's so much easier.

SPEAKER_02 15:24

I can see the joy on your face as well when you talk about them now.

SPEAKER_00 15:27

I can see it. Yeah, I mean, they're like proper human beings, they can work their own bums, obviously, they can make their own breakfast, not that they clear up after it, but it's a start. They for me, they are so much more fun to be around. That cutesy baby toddler phase just wasn't the one for me, and the school years were fine, but you know, that whole learning to read and stuff, you know, that's quite hard slog. And I know teenagers get a hard rap, and I'm only on the you know, at the the edge of teenage hood with a 13-year-old and a 15-year-old, but yeah, it's it's I think it's quite exciting and quite fun to see the people that they're becoming, right? They're becoming men and seem like quite nice men so far. And dancing you sure they're smelly and forgetful and messy and disrespectful at times, and the language is fruity, but yeah, we can sit around and have proper conversations and we can do stuff. And now when we want, you know, if if there's anything we want to do, we don't have to, you know, over plan it, take wipes with us, you know, plan it back mealtimes, naps, routine, all that kind of stuff. It's cool.

SPEAKER_02 16:44

I love this. We'll talk more about I think parenting older children towards the end because I know you've got some interesting uh recent facts, or we should say. Oh yeah. Um, we you touched on rage. I think it's really important to talk about that maternal rage. Like, what does that mean and what does that look like for someone who is experiencing it? Because I think you can talk about it, but maybe people don't recognise the term, but will be feeling it. And I know you've talked about that a lot. So when it when we talk about maternal rage, what does that mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 17:13

For most women, I think it's it's a bundle of intertwined and complicated emotions just totally spilling over and erupting. You know, there's if you're under-supported, if you're overstimulated, if you're tired, if you have a partner who is not pulling their weight, if you've got children with additional needs, if you've you know you're running on empty, and the smallest thing might set you off, whether that's your child putting down their glass too noisily on the counter, whether someone's spilt their cereal, someone's forgotten their lunchbox, someone trips over and hurts themselves, and you're finding that your first reaction is anger rather than um sympathy. Um, you know, just it can take the tiniest thing just to make you erupt and totally lose your shit. And it's so common, and again, it's another thing that's been shrouded in shame because the only mums who are portrayed like that in movies and books and things like that, you know, they're the baddies of the story, right? They're the they're the the evil ones. Yeah, but it's actually so normal, and you know, I'm I'm pretty sure it's been going on for for years, for generations of women who have felt you know underappreciated, under supported, all those things, who've just been pushed to their limits and just have had enough. And you know, it's it's again, it's it just makes you feel like a bad person, a bad mum, because you know, my child's just spilt their cereal, and here I am yelling at them, and it's such a tiny thing, and I can wipe it up. Um, but in the moment it can feel like the last straw, right?

SPEAKER_02 18:58

Yeah, it's it's that sense of, isn't it? Just carrying anger through your everyday moments, and as you say, your reactivity being very much on edge and coming out a lot more than maybe you would want it to be coming out, which is really, really hard. Do you feel like now it's 15 years? I mean, yeah, life has changed quite a lot. So I'm just wondering now, do you feel like the pressure of social media adds to that? Whilst it can also help by being seen, there's a lot of obviously I'm an expert, I give advice. There's a lot of expert advice, but there's also so much now that I feel like a lot of my clients now are sort of just a bit kind of dazed in headlights because they don't know what to do or where to go because there's just too much being thrown at them.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

I definitely think comparison can be a real trigger, you know. You might you might see someone on social media suggesting you all sit around the table and eat together in the evening, and they make can portray, like you know, a really beautiful setup, and all the kids are there and they're eating their veggies and saying thank you, mummy, and then you might try something similar and it goes to shit, right? Exactly. No one wants to eat their greens, and everyone spills their stuff, and they're fighting and crying, someone does a poo, there's someone at the door, whatever. And I think that ex that gap between expectations and reality for anybody in life, but particularly for mums, it can just be the cause of so much angst because you know you build something up, you're comparing yourself, and when the reality falls short, I think that can be a real trigger for many of us, right?

SPEAKER_02 20:31

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SPEAKER_00 21:39

I do think there are more people talking about it, that's for sure. But it's more like there are still big groups of people who aren't. So there's like that echo chamber, isn't there, on social media where you've got people like us. Um, you know, middle class white women uh from a privileged background saying, Oh, this is really hard, blah blah blah. So I don't know that necessarily everybody is is is getting that vibe, if you know what I mean. Not everybody is feeling that permission to be honest, not everybody is that information is not necessarily appealing to lots of groups in society. I've definitely seen lots of backlash from people saying, Oh, why all the mums all moaning about you know how hard it is? Didn't you know, just get on with it, shut up, you know, all that kind of stuff. Um, so I think it's just certain little sections, certain little like pockets on social media where you have a lot of that noise. And I think in in certain cultures and certain groups in society, you don't necessarily have that. And so you have people just carrying around a lot of shame and sadness. Um, you know, postnatal depression is something that you know I I see a lot of discussion around on my algorithm, but there are definitely groups of of women all over the UK, all over the world who who don't still know, you know, still don't know enough about it, and um you know it it's not all equal what we're hearing and seeing on social media.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Because we're we're in our own echo chambers as well, aren't we? That's a thing, so it can be really, really difficult. I think what would be great to talk about is um you have this idea of a commute. So we've talked about also everyone knows about the whole village thing, so we don't have our villages anymore, and where do we find our village? I think you've talked about that a fair amount over over time. But you came up recently with the idea of a commune. Do you want to tell us more about that?

SPEAKER_00 23:43

I think it's something lots of us have joked about in the past is this idea of a woman, women-only commune. Um, so a place where not like it necessarily was an anti-male sentiment, but more like a a sort of a just women doing their own thing, not needing men, and just getting on with the stuff and you know, in a very basic sense, just saying, do we obviously we do need men to make the world go around and to keep it? Um but and also will add, I do have a very supportive husband who I love very much. We do love men, but just this idea that when you have a bunch of women uh doing their own thing, together, helping each other, shit gets done. It's like I don't know if you've ever been away with your sister or a girlfriend and your kids, and you know, there's no men involved, like things just go like clockwork, things get done. Someone for someone offers you a drink, someone's emptied the dishwasher, someone's sorted the you know, the food prep, and things just can feel quite a bit. It's just a bit different, isn't it? It's a different vibe, and I think it's just an interesting concept. And I recorded a couple of videos about it that went viral, and so I thought, well, why don't I try and set up a digital commune? I don't necessarily know yet what that is or what it looks like or what it would do, but I just thought it was an interesting thing to um explore. So I said that if 10,000 women signed up, I would build something, and 15,000 women did sign up in just over two weeks. So I have built something very small, and at the moment it's invite only, but it's really interesting to see what it's becoming. It's quite a sort of quiet, slow burning thing, but that that could be something interesting idea, and obviously, without breaking any confidentiality, what what are the themes that are coming up?

SPEAKER_02 25:39

Are you allowed to share any of these?

SPEAKER_00 25:41

Yeah, well, today we were talking about uh what you know people's exercise routines look like and what supplements people were taking. We were talking about someone was hosting a meal and we were talking about you know meal um plans and recipe ideas and things like that. Then on a deeper note, people were talking about things that they were really proud of this week, things they were looking forward to. There's a little book club in there with people uh recommending book titles. It sounds like a community. It is that you would have had a hundred years ago. Yes, it's a tiny little community with women being really supportive to each other. We've got women in Finland, in Nova Scotia, in Bolivia, in um India, and you know, there's even one lady who lives on a narrow boat um in Norfolk, and there's a yoga teacher on uh uh in Sri Lanka, and everybody's contributing in their the ages, like there's people, there's people in their 20s, there's a woman in her 80s, and it's very small at the moment, but I'm interested to see where it goes. It's an invite-only thing. But if you want to to join uh the the waiting list, uh you can look at uh commune.world and sign up.

SPEAKER_02 27:00

Thank you they can have a look. And is that specifically for mothers or just women in general?

SPEAKER_00 27:04

No, no, loads of people on there are not mothers. Um so it's just a women-only commune with supportive vibes, and yeah, we'll see where it goes.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Goodness me, that sounds super exciting, and I think what's really interesting. So you talk a lot about you you talk a lot about sort of the men versus women, well, not men versus women, but women in that sort of situation. But you've also said I have a really supportive husband who isn't necessarily one of the husbands who doesn't do a lot and whatever else. So how do you how do you kind of feel about that dynamic post-children when it comes to relationships and how things can go? It sounds like you've managed to sort of work together a little bit more than maybe the majority, potentially.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

Yeah, I mean I don't know about that because it's hard to know what goes on behind closed doors, but you know, you know me, Id, I'm just a big advocate for saying it how it is, right? And so in those early days when my husband wasn't pulling his weight, I told him. I was like, dude, you need to step up, you need to be doing this, and pretty quickly that turned into him doing, you know, a feed in the night, then that turned into him doing all the early mornings. Uh then we we flipped rolls, so then I would do everything in the night, and he would from 5 a.m. It was his job, and to this day it's still the same. So when the kids get up in the morning to go to school, he sorts their breakfast, and that's his kind of role. It just sort of evolved naturally, but also with some you know, some some leverage from me for sure. But you know, I think relationship changes when you have a family are inevitable, and if you think about it, you know, you've got you and your partner, and you're just living your life, doing your thing, having a great time, grabbing your keys, walking out the door, saying yes to stuff, and then suddenly you've got this new noisy stranger that comes to live with you that shits and pukes and cries and keeps you up all night, and you know, that's gonna put any relationship to the test, right? And I think if you expect that and you understand that's gonna happen, you'll be in a much better place than the people who perhaps think, oh, my relationship's a bit dodgy, maybe uh maybe a baby will help because you know you really do you need that teamwork. I really do think that. And I know a lot of people find it really hard to talk to their partner about that kind of thing, they feel embarrassed or awkward to demand time or energy from their partner, especially if they have a busy job, that kind of thing. And I'm a massive advocate for just writing it down. Write them an email, yeah. Write them an email that they can read at work and be like, these are the things that I'm really struggling with, and then they can read it, they can process it in their own time and hopefully reply with some kind of positive um feedback, but it's really hard, and you know, I know lots of women who are in marriages but feel like they might as well be a single mum because they're not getting that help, and I think that's that can be really devastating.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

So you think reaching out, talking, essentially flagging it like this is not working, this is what I need. So really advocating for your own needs as a mother as such something else.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

They've presumably got their own busy life, career, you know, their extended family, whatever. And how would they know unless you tell them that you're sad or struggling or that kind of thing? I mean, you can just say I'm really tired every day, and they might say, Me too. And then you're just gonna go on like that forever. So I think if you do want some kind of change, you do have to to speak up and ask for it. And that's definitely something that I have done with my husband over the years, and I'm really lucky because he's he's responded well and proactively, and he's gone, you know, he's replied saying, Well, why don't I take on this this job so you don't have to do that? And yeah, he stepped up and he knows how to hang the laundry up, and he, you know, you know, and I'm at home more than him, so there's a lot more that I am willing to, you know, I take on a lot more than him, and I'm fine with that. Um, and my work is more flexible than his, but you know, he definitely does do his fair share.

SPEAKER_02 31:28

Let's talk then about transferring that onto your boys because so much, I think I've seen you talk about this, I'm pretty sure I have, but so much of what we do at home can be shared with our children from quite a young age, and I think that's something that often we don't get our heads around, so we do end up picking up after them and you know everything else. So, how have you tried to include your boys in, I guess, like the mental load of the house as they've gotten a bit older and they're physically capable of doing so? Well, that's something I'm actually quite good at.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

Having told you all the bits I'm quite bad at, like this is something I've definitely been good at. I've been very um strong on the empty the dishwasher, and the way that I phrase it, I don't say, can you help mummy by emptying the dishwasher? Because they're not helping me. They want the clean plates too, right? I'm like, can you empty the dishwasher? Yeah. Your turn, your turn. Um, can you go and put that load of laundry on? You know, pick your stuff out of the laundry bin, throw it in and press go. The liquid's in there, you know, all you.

SPEAKER_02 32:26

So do they put their own washing on now?

SPEAKER_00 32:28

They don't do like a a load of of their own. Fine. But you know, I'll say go add your stuff, and then they know how to turn it on. And similarly, they know how to hang it up. They hung up the laundry yesterday. Um, they didn't get it back in again when it rained, but we're working on it. They put their plates away after they've eaten, they both know how to cook a few simple things. Um, yeah, and they pick that I don't tidy their rooms or do all that stuff. They strip their sheets when I tell them to or ask them to, and um they can put their sheets back on again if I haven't done that. So I'm not like a taskmaster as such, um, but yeah, I just want to bring up boys who know how to do their fair share.

SPEAKER_02 33:11

And they're capable, aren't they? That's the thing. I think we often think, you know, for example, I've got six and eight-year-old. An eight-year-old is not capable of certain things, but actually he absolutely is. It's just it's just he can strip it. It takes more time how to do it. Yeah, exactly. I think I think in the in the daily life of like rush rush rush, it takes more time to stop and show them than it does for us to do it ourselves. But ultimately, what we're aiming for, presumably for both of us, yeah, in the interests of you know, future generations, is for them to be able to do those things rather than just assuming that someone has to do that.

SPEAKER_00 33:41

And but you know, an eight-year-old could take the the knives and forks out of the dishwasher and put them in the cutlery drawer, and they might put them in the wrong drawer, but yeah, you know, they'll know for next time, right?

SPEAKER_02 33:52

Definitely. We have exactly the same. He does the dishwasher every morning, and it's just I always say there's no iron team, it's teamwork. Yes, exactly. And and let's talk then about them getting older because you're sat here with a sorry, what did you say, 12 and 15? 13 and 15 and 15 year old.

SPEAKER_00 34:07

Um I just dropped them at the cricket club as I came to meet you, so they're there on their own, unsupervised, just hanging out, living their best lives.

SPEAKER_02 34:15

Yes. They lay in until whatever you said, 10, 11, 12am, 12am, 12 pm. It's obviously very different. So, at what point was the age where you're like, today what I'm actually starting to enjoy this now? And then obviously the journey through till now, where you're like, this is great, actually.

SPEAKER_00 34:31

I don't know when the exact moment was because all these things are slow burning, aren't they? Nothing kind of improves overnight. But I think by the time they were both at secondary school and getting themselves to school and from school, yeah, it started to feel better. I've never packed their school bags or anything like that. So even since they were the even since they were tiny, they've always got their own stuff ready, and we have a rule in the house that everybody has to have their bags ready the night before they go to sleep.

SPEAKER_01 34:58

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

So that in the morning everything's in your bag, ready for you to walk out the door, and that definitely helps the whole morning chaos uh thing. And it helps with the independence thing, right? Because they look at their timetable, they know what they need, they pack their swimming stuff, and off they go. And that's been revolutionary for me after years of doing, you know, the the primary school run and the awkward chats at the gate and all that kind of stuff, which I've got to admit I didn't love. Um and yeah, now I'm a free agent between the hours of about 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., which is yeah. Like life-changing, ultimately. It is, it is, it's but it's like what do you do? Oh my god, what don't I do? Um everything. I get my work done, I do some exercise, I can see friends, I you know, it's it's revelationary. Yeah. Well revolutionary, revelation. Revelationary. Revelationary, we'll go. It's a revelation. It's a revelation. Um but but it feels like the sort of the prize after the hard work. Yeah, absolutely. It doesn't feel like it didn't come from nothing, you know, it and it's yeah, as I've as I mentioned earlier, I just I at the moment I'm really enjoying being the mother of teenage boys. I love that. I don't know how many people would say that.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

I know I feel like I might be the opposite, but let's see, watch this space.

SPEAKER_00 36:22

It's funny because anecdotally, I have heard a lot of people who really love the baby years hating the teenage years. So I'd be interested if any of your listeners um share the same kind of thing as me. Like, you know, not loving the early years, but really embracing these years. I feel more like myself, I feel like less like an imposter. I think I felt like an imposter during those early years, not maternal, not a natural mum, not the kind of mum I thought I would be or hoped I would be, but now I feel like the kind of mum I thought I would be.

SPEAKER_02 36:57

I love feeling more of you just hanging out with them.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

And I can just see that you the way you talk about it in smile, it's just I mean, don't get me wrong, they are definitely total dickheads at times, and um, you know, we all have our moments, but in general, there are a lot more happy days than than sad days.

SPEAKER_02 37:15

So and shall we talk about sex and your boys and sex education? Because I think you've got quite a funny story to share that we should probably end on. So your dad is an obs and gyney. Yeah, so you have presumably grown up around the topic of sex.

SPEAKER_00 37:33

Was it an open thing in your household? I was like the Otis Milburn of the 1980s, and my dad came in to give my class sex education, and that must have been super awkward, was it? Or were you just so used to it that you were like actually? I remember feeling quite pumped by that, thinking that was quite a cool thing. Um, and he took us, we got in a mini-bus and went to the labour ward at the hospital. Yeah. Um wow. So yeah, it's always been a kind of open thing in our house. And anyway, my son uh was talking the other day about how he had had a sex education class at school, and I was asking him, you know, what it involved, and he said that they had practiced putting condoms on penises of all shapes and sizes, and all colours, and all levels of rigidness, if I say I remember it being a cucumber, yeah, yeah, yeah. But they have actual willy models and a bent one, a slightly soft one. Um, so that was amazing. And then they would talk about finger doms. Do you know what a finger dom is? I've never heard of this in my life. Finger doms, so people know them better apparently for grooming dogs, and people use them for um in the catering industry if they've cut their fingers, but they're like little condoms that go over your fingers, which you use if you want yeah, for you know.

SPEAKER_02 38:58

And as a mother of obviously two teenage boys with your experience and background, how how do you respond to that?

SPEAKER_00 39:04

Are you very open around like, well, you might need that one day? Yes, I mean a lot, I think like a lot of awkward things in life, it's quite good to not quite good, I often deflect with humour. I'm not saying it's a good thing to do, but it's just how we get around awkward subjects at home sometimes. So we we kind of laughed about it a bit, um, because I think they got the serious chat from school, and I'm just m delighted that they feel happy to share that kind of thing with me at home, and you know, and I you know, now that they know about all the different forms of protection available to them, that's only a plus, right? Yeah, yeah. I was just amazed because I did not know that such a thing was existed.

SPEAKER_02 39:45

I mean, I can't even I didn't know it was a thing. I can never imagine going home and sharing that with my parents, like never in a million years, even now. I'm not sure I'd want to tell them about it, to be honest. Or maybe they'll listen to this. Oh my goodness. I think just what I want to finish on. I've got one more question for you. But whilst you've sat here and said, like, I wasn't very good at it, and I felt like I did a bad job, what I can really hear from everything you say, and obviously I do a lot of parent coaching now and I work with parents of all different ages, you have a brilliantly connected and open relationship with your two boys, and that's almost as much as I think any parent could ever wish for. And you've done that, you know, so you have done that, and yeah, it just shines out of you, and I think hopefully that helps a little bit when you reflect back on how hard it was because you've you made your way through it and you're at the point now where actually you're loving it, they're loving it, and they've got a best friend in you, and that's just incredible.

SPEAKER_00 40:45

So yeah, I don't know about that, but yeah, it does feel it feels good to perhaps be able to show people that there's that that the path through motherhood is not necessarily linear, and not everyone needs to take that same path, right? Because what works for you might not have worked for me. Every we know we're you know, even I saw that with my own sister who had three very different children to me. What worked for her definitely didn't work for me, and but you know, we've all come out of it with great children, and so that's that's what matters the most, right? Is this you know being happy?

SPEAKER_02 41:22

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for sharing your story, and I know it's something you're so passionate about, so hopefully it reaches even more people on the podcast. Um, I've got one last question which I feel like maybe you will give a really solid answer on because it is literally what you um sort of live and breathe. But for you personally and motherhood, what has support looked like for you? So, in terms of what you need for your village, what what is that?

SPEAKER_00 41:47

I think for me, support has looked like the ability to say what's on my mind and have somebody or various people listen and say, uh, I see you, I hear you, me too, that kind of thing. I think that has been invaluable. Um great friends, a great husband, a great family. I know I feel I feel very privileged to have had those things. I know that a lot of people are parenting without those things, and that must be very hard. And I think in the absence of those things, being able to talk openly and honestly um is a real gift. And yeah, having someone even if not even if it's not a real person listening, even if it's just the internet or whatever, I think that helps.

SPEAKER_02 42:37

Just speaking up, talking, talking, yeah, which is what we're doing today. Thank you so much for joining me. Where do we find out more about your commune? Andor find you on social media and that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_00 42:49

Uh you can find me on uh motherplace.com or a motherplace on uh Instagram, and if you want to join the waiting list for the commune, that's uh commune.world. Hopefully that becomes an actual thing in real life.

SPEAKER_02 43:02

That would have been here first. Thank you again, Becca, so much. Thanks, Heidi. Thank you for listening to this week's episode. Don't forget to subscribe on whichever channel you find your podcast on, Spotify, Apple, or other podcast players.