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Todd: Here we go. My name’s Todd. This is Cathy. Welcome back to another episode of Zen Parenting Radio. This is episode number 813, I think. Why listen to Zen Parenting Radio because you’ll feel outstanding and always remember our motto, the best predictor of a child’s wellbeing. I. Is it appearance, self understanding.
Todd: On today’s show, we are gonna talk about Kathy’s substack and what was the name of it? Do you remember? Um, it, it’s, uh, what do you, what do you think about when you wake up? What do you think about when you wake up in the morning? But first, um, you and I are doing an event. This Thursday that is open to anybody, but we’re specifically inviting Team Zen and Men Living folks.
Todd: And well, if people who are not on Team Zen or Men Living want to join, what do
Cathy: they do?
Todd: Uh, [00:01:00] just scroll down the show notes and there’s a, there’ll be an RSVP link there.
Cathy: Okay. And is that through Men Living? Oh yeah. Will they sign to Men Living? Okay. So if you are not in Team Zen or Men Living, but you wanna come to this talk, like Todd said, just scroll down and you’ll register through a Men living type thing.
Todd: And it’s called Men Marriage and Menopause, navigating the change together. And it’s gonna be fun. We’re gonna, we’re gonna have some fun talking about that. Um, are you ready? Are you prepared? I am prepared. Are you? Well, I mean, I’ve been listening to the podcasts. Good. Uh, equipping myself, getting resourced, so, yeah.
Todd: Nice. Um, I have a quick parenting story and then I wanna do, um, one thing I’ve read in the news that’s interesting, but my parenting story is, um, we have a 17-year-old daughter who just had her junior prom. And I love her so much and she is very busy with school and college applications and prom and all the things like junior year, like they say, it’s like one of those [00:02:00] crazy work activities.
Todd: Yeah, she’s working expectations, whatever, all the stuff, grades, and I, you know, I, I have created the space for her to just like be busy with friends. Like this is what’s supposed to be happening. They’re not. 17-year-old children are not supposed to be concerned about how their mom and dad are doing. Is that a fair assessment?
Todd: Yes. I’m
Cathy: so curious to where you’re going with this.
Todd: So yesterday, um, she was, she’s like, dad, can you go get Chipotle for me, Uhhuh? And this is a daughter who has access to a vehicle and she can get in the car and she can go to Chipotle for herself. But she’s asking me to do it. And there’s a part of me, a smaller part of me that’s like in my brain, I’m like.
Todd: I’m, I’m, I’m relaxing on a nice Sunday afternoon. I don’t want to go to, I didn’t say this to her. I said it in my head. Okay. Um, there’s these, all these reasons why I’m like, no, I don’t wanna do that. ’cause you could do it. And I’m sitting here enjoying my Sunday afternoon. It was like 80 degrees outside yesterday.
Cathy: No, it was only 68 yesterday. Yeah. Today is [00:03:00] 80.
Todd: Oh, I thought it was in the high seventies yesterday, but I could be wrong. Anyways, that’s the, the temperature is not that important part of a story. Sorry. Um, and, but there’s a bigger part of me like, uh, you know, maybe we’ll talk about Ping, like this is, of course my daughter just doesn’t want to go, but she’s asking me to do something.
Todd: And I’m like, yes, of course I will. And I, the only reason I share that story is. At this kind of crazy time in our kids’ lives, I will do anything I can to try to connect with her, even if it’s doing her a favor. ’cause that’s really what it is. She’s like, I don’t want to go, will you go? And I did it and I did it.
Todd: You know, gratefully. And, um, if there’s any parents, I have a feeling there’s a lot of dads out there that are like, yeah, these kids, how come they can’t do blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That’s all true and she’s asking me for some help, so I’m gonna give it to her. That’s all.
Cathy: Okay. So there’s a lot of things to shape that narrative that you’re, it sharing it up.
Cathy: Okay. Number one [00:04:00] is that you tell us all the time that your love language is acts of service.
Todd: Correct.
Cathy: So like, when I, like today, I, um. I wanted coffee, ’cause I went to yoga really early, and so I wanted coffee, but I knew you were heading home in an hour. So I’m like, will you pick me up coffee? I can go do it myself.
Cathy: Sure. I just, you just tend to like to do stuff like that. And I could be wrong, you know what I mean? I do like doing stuff like that. Right. And so our girls know that too, so there’s a lot of times that they’re like, um, dad, will you pick that up for me? Because you’re like, sure, I’ll get in the car and go do it.
Cathy: And it’s like your way of loving them. Right? Sure. Of course. There’s that, and also you have very strict rules about no door dashing.
Todd: Damn right. So even though Cameron didn’t quite follow those rules yesterday, but that’s okay.
Cathy: Did she DoorDash yesterday?
Todd: She sure did. She had a big bar
Cathy: crawl
Todd: from Chipotle in Iowa City.
Todd: No less.
Cathy: Well, you know what that’s, I gave her a gift card or the Easter Bunny gave her a gift card for that.
Todd: Yeah, she didn’t use it. She used our DoorDash account.
Cathy: Okay. So does [00:05:00] the gift card for DoorDash not work for the DoorDash account?
Todd: Um, I think you gave her a Chipotle gift card, right?
Cathy: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Cathy: I gave her Chipotle. Okay. Anyway, regardless if your buddy forgets, um, regardless, I think there are, you have boxed yourself into this place of nobody can do DoorDash. Yes. Because it costs money. Yes. Um, I like to do things for you girls. Yeah. Acts of service. Yeah. So. If you were to tell the story differently, like, can you believe people are asking me to do things?
Cathy: I’d be like, yes. You created that kind of scenario. Yeah. Now, at the same time, I appreciate the advice to other people because basically what you’re saying is you enjoy giving your kids a break because like you said, she, we, our daughter graduated on Friday from college. By the way, can you do a uh, sure.
Cathy: Lemme do a elevation. Uh. Good job, Jason. So, JC has graduated from college. So we had to drive to Michigan on Friday and Skyler came with us. Of course, Cameron uh, is at school and she’s has finals coming up and stuff, and she couldn’t come, but we all drove. And then we had to come [00:06:00] home early on Saturday morning ’cause Skyler had prom.
Cathy: So, and then Thursday night we had a gala. It was just one of those weeks. And everyone was busy. Everyone was crazy. So on Sunday it was like the first time we were all like, huh. And so Skyler’s doing laundry. And she’s like, can you go get my food? So it kind of. Do you know what I mean? Like it’s not about, ’cause I think sometimes we have a narrative, I’ll take it off you for a second, that if our kids don’t do something for themselves, they’re lazy.
Todd: And that’s all I’m trying to do is I’m just trying to reframe that narrative. Correct. And, and really the intention is when our kids are, um, deservedly more involved in their 17-year-old life than worrying about the wellness of their mom and their dad. I will. Leap at any opportunity, not any, most opportunities to try to support them.
Todd: Right. So it felt good. Yes. But I also wanna just honor my inner critic or the old school dad in me that’s like, no, go do it yourself. And I, not that I wanna honor, but like I just need to. Be honest and share that there are these competing parts in my, you know, personas or whatever you wanna [00:07:00] call it. And I chose the one that felt the most.
Todd: Right. That’s all right.
Cathy: Yeah. I think that we sometimes will look at a situation through a very
Todd: narrow, narrow lens, restricted closed lens.
Cathy: Yeah. And instead of like recognizing, you know, ’cause that whole idea of our kids are lazy ’cause they won’t do this or won’t do that, but you’re not noticing what they’re doing all day long already.
Cathy: They’re doing all the other things. And don’t we want to treat them or treat them, teach them to ask for help or to say, Hey, can I rely on you to do this, and then I’ll do this for you, or, you know, I’ll do my part. You do your part. Like if we, if we teach them a sense of. Full on independents, do it all yourself all the time.
Cathy: They have a hard time asking for help. Yeah. So there’s this place in between, again, it’s not all about Chipotle, that’s just your example. Yeah. But I, it, it happened yesterday, so. Right. And, and I like, there’s so many times that the girls don’t ask for help because they do wanna navigate themselves. That when they do, it’s like an opportunity, you know?
Cathy: And, and then if you know, and Todd didn’t do this at [00:08:00] all, obviously he’s just sharing your inner thoughts. But if we do things for them and we’re like, Ugh. You know now, now you owe me, or I can’t believe you asked me to do this. Or if we’re gonna judge them the whole time while they ask.
Yeah.
Cathy: Then don’t do it.
Cathy: Yeah. Like tell them, you know what? I’m gonna be resentful of this because I am watching. I know the masters wasn’t on, but if it was on, I’m doing
Todd: something. Let’s be clear. If it was. Two Sundays ago when Rory won and she asked, you wouldn’t have left. Yeah. I’d be like, well let’s wait until after the tournament.
Todd: Correct. And then I’ll be happy to go help you out.
Cathy: Correct. So there’s a whole bunch of nuance in there. Of course. I think the thing that I love to break apart and like, you know, destroy this idea of when our kid asks us to do something for them, that they’re lazy. Right. And I think the more we are able to support them with really small things, it adds up.
Todd: Um, and that’s, and, and thank you for kind of like tying that all together because it through a very narrow lens. Like she has a car, she can get in the car just like I can, but she’s also doing 89 other things, but I’m only [00:09:00] gonna focus on this one thing that she’s choosing not to do. So anyways.
Cathy: And a lot of times that’s because, why would you do that?
Cathy: Number one, because you’re tired and don’t wanna go, and you don’t have the ability to say no. So you just get annoyed at her.
Mm-hmm.
Cathy: Or you. Start to go into your own childhood. If nobody did this for me, why should I do this for you? Yeah. You don’t understand how difficult it is or, you know, there’s all these like layers, parts of ourselves that come to the surface when someone asks us to do something and the best thing we can do is either decide to do it and do it.
Cathy: It doesn’t have to be like joyfully, but do it with a sense of integrity and just do it. Yeah. Because if I’m, I don’t, if
Todd: I’m doing it out of spite or like rudeness, then whatever deposit I’m making is, you just went through it. Yeah. Um, and, and, and, you know, just to kind of complete the thought, it’s really about the age, like 17, like junior in high school.
Todd: They’re just so busy. And, um, and there’s this like, um. [00:10:00] Uh, innocent. There is, um, a misdirected thought like, how come we don’t do this? How come we don’t play together like we did when we were 10? Like, all of that narrative still exists in me. Oh, I’m aware. And I just, the fact that you’re bringing it up again, and I, I need to keep reminding myself, these kids are not supposed to be attached to me.
Todd: The way they were when they were nine years old. Yeah. Or five years old. It’s just different. And then this, this sweet spot, the second two years of high school is just really tricky.
Cathy: Well, and allow them to attach to you in a new way. Yes. So if you want them to attach to you in a way, like they did when they were 10, you’re gonna be running into a situation either A, where they push you away.
Cathy: ’cause they’re like, I don’t wanna do that. Or they’re trying to attach to you in that way, and it’s not in their integrity and they feel annoyed by it, and they feel like they have to be a certain way around you.
Todd: Well, I have a quick story. Okay. I was getting gas on the way home from Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Todd: Okay. This weekend. Okay. On [00:11:00] Saturday morning so we can hustle back for prom prep. And I, when the kids were little, I used to like walk around the car and make silly faces. Yes. And just be an idiot. Just be a clown. Uhhuh. And I did that on Saturday and Skylar looked at me and she kind of smiled and then I stayed there and she, let’s just say she stopped smiling.
Cathy: Yeah. Because it’s weird. Not, you are weird. I was trying to make her laugh. Right. But that makes a 10-year-old laugh.
Todd: I know. But sweetie, it was a really funny face.
Cathy: If you came around and stood at the window of me while I’m like looking at my phone or reading something and you’re like, just looking at me the way that you would a 10-year-old, I’d be like, uh.
Cathy: You know what I mean, sweetie?
Todd: I have a feeling if I came around to your side, you’d be laughing.
Cathy: Well, maybe because you and I have an adult relationship. Right. That would be funny. So this is the thing, like this is not, you know, no throwing shade at you. Like you’re putting yourself out there as a good example.
Cathy: And we all have to do this. Like, what did I, you know, what did I think? I think moms and dads go through this [00:12:00] and I’ll just speak from my, you know, perspective. I have had to learn over the years. You know, think about how needed I was. Right? Mm-hmm. Like you’re all, you’ve always been needed, but think about Sure.
Cathy: The immense amount of need.
Yeah.
Cathy: And that you each year have to let go of a little bit of that so something new can be created. That’s
exactly right.
Cathy: Because if you keep trying to hold onto that, like, I’m gonna do a silly face and they’re gonna think I’m funny versus. Something new. I, and, and again, what does that mean saying play me a song right now, saying, um, means, dad, you wanna sit up in the front seat with me?
Cathy: Do
Todd: you? It means dad, go to Chipotle for me.
Cathy: Dad, go to Chipotle for me. Exactly. That’s a great way to like close it. It’s just, it’s the, and you never, you, I shouldn’t say never, but you don’t do this, um, very often, which is blame our kids for not No. Being, like I was telling Todd that. Something that, an algorithm on TikTok that, uh, came up for me and I have since switched it because it was getting a little bit scary, was kids.
Cathy: It was kids tape recording [00:13:00] their parents being mean to ’em. Oh yeah. Interesting. I just said tape recording. Um, so Gen X, they are using their phone and recording their parents unknowingly being mean to them and berating them. And so all of a sudden I got into this algorithm, you know, it’s like basically narcissistic parents.
Cathy: And you’re listening to it. And you know, for, from the position we’re in doing what we do, it’s unbelievable that people speak to their kids that way. Like, it, it, you know, it’s things like, this is your fault and you’re a piece of crap and you, you know, you’re a loser and I, I don’t even know why you still live here.
Cathy: Things that are just really awful and, um. You know that these are the extreme situations that we’re in, where there’s these little things that we’re just trying to twist and turn to stay connected, you know, in with the hopes of staying connected. And then there’s people that are completely being, you know, toxically abused every day of their life.
Cathy: So I know that sometimes when we get into the minutiae of these things, people are like, Ugh, what’s the big deal? But it is a big deal because our [00:14:00] relationships deserve our ability to. You know, pay attention and to not blame our kids for the, the relationship changing. That’s exactly what should happen.
Todd: Um, you know how you just said tape recording. I’m introducing a new sound effect to the show.
Cathy: Oh, I love it. I wanna hear it
Todd: and it’s whenever any of us say something like, tape recording. Okay, good. Let me know if this lands.
Cathy: Okay.
Cathy: It’s a OL, it’s hooking up.
Todd: What’s so funny is like the a OL was like, you know, 10 years after we were tape recording anything, we’re probably like doing CD ROMs or whatever. It was Uhhuh that we were doing laser discs, sweetie.
Cathy: So let’s go through some of ’em just for the heck of it. Okay. So we have floppy discs. Yep. We were just watching 16 candles.
Cathy: He’s like, do you know how expensive floppy diss are?
Todd: Let’s start with floppy discs. Floppy diss. And then they were the smaller
Cathy: Yeah, but we still called them floppy. And they weren’t floppy anymore. They weren’t floppy.
Todd: Okay.
Cathy: And [00:15:00] then we had, um, those things that go in the side of your computer. Uh, the, remember we used it for the conference all the time?
Cathy: ’cause we’d put everything on the external hard drive. It’s, but it’s not, it’s just a little, it’s not a fully hard drive. Oh yeah.
Todd: A little USB drive. USB drive. Yeah.
Cathy: Um, and then there is obviously airdropping. And then there is, but I even wanna go back further to like, what I loved as a kid. I remember being so excited because, um, my parents had the big tape recorder.
Cathy: Mm-hmm. You know, like the one with the, you could put a full cassette tape in it. And then in college, um, I got a small tape recorder with the teeny little tape recorder so I could like tape record classes and stuff. That was so fricking cool.
Mm.
Todd: All right. So I wanna be a journalist. My, yeah, you’re gonna be a gymnast, a gymnast journalist.
Todd: That’s what I said. Said, um, real quick, don’t wanna spend a lot of time on this. I just read that a Galapagos Tortoise at the Philadelphia Zoo, who’s estimated to be about a hundred years old, recently gave birth to four baby [00:16:00] tortoises, sweetie. Yay. Sweet. Let’s go for one more. One more tortoise. No. One more baby.
Todd: No. I’ve always wanted a turtle though. Um, a hundred years old. How’s this mom gonna like take care of her kid at a hundred?
Cathy: You know what we do not question turtles. Heck, they know what they’re
Todd: doing. Heck, heck no. Animals know what they’re doing. That’s right. Um, so sweetie, let’s talk about your sub stack, which now has a paid possibility, right?
Todd: Yes. So
Cathy: I would actually rather talk a little bit. I, I’m fine with talking about, um. The who wakes up first in the morning, but we actually talked about it a little bit on a podcast before. Maybe we didn’t get really in depth. So we’ll do a little bit of both, but I wanted to tell people that, um, you know, obviously I have, I’m on Substack.
Cathy: Um, it’s under Kathy Kanani Adams Zen Parenting moment is what I send out every Friday. It’s free. Um, if you’ve been on our email list, um, or you’ve recently subscribed, you get it every Friday, I just send it out, but I’ve added something. So this is. Additive. Um, and it’s [00:17:00] another, uh, subscription called Ping.
Cathy: And the reason that I called it Ping is because in my book, restoring Our Girls, um, I have a whole chapter about that. When penguins are trying to connect with each other or show like, have a bid for connection or, um, show each other that they love each other, they take pebbles in their mouth and drop it by their feet or give it to them, you know, beak to beak or whatever.
Cathy: Pebb is a way of. Uh, showing affection and, and making connection. Um, so we obviously can utilize this in our own lives as parents, where we can recognize that just little pebbles can make a big difference. Um, for example, sending memes to our kids that make us laugh, sending them a song, um, you know.
Cathy: Checking up about something that, you know, maybe they had a meeting that day that they were really excited about and just saying how to go. Or it could be, um, you know, maybe leaving a post-it on their door. It just, anything, that’s it. It’s not about gifts or money per [00:18:00] se. It could be, you know, it could be putting flowers in their room or doing something sweet like that.
Cathy: But it can just be little ways of. Saying, I care. I’m thinking of you. I am paying attention to your life because these are the things that actually build a relationship like Todd. Do you remember the conversations we used to have way long ago about how parents often think that parenting is about getting you to and from places and then planning a big vacation?
Cathy: Oh yeah. And those things are nice. But that’s not what creates a relationship. No. You know, we talk to a lot of parents. Um, it’s the small
stuff.
Cathy: That’s it. It’s the little things every day that make a relationship, and then the vacation is just kind of icing on the cake. Yeah. But if you’re expecting to take your kids on vacation and then have this deep connection, just because you’re in Hawaii, it doesn’t work that way.
Cathy: I mean, maybe it will for you and for some reason, but does it sustain? Yeah, because the sustain, the sustaining is the daily things that we do that are small. So my new subscription is called Ping, and I’m gonna send something every week that can be like a [00:19:00] reminder or an idea or something to help you connect to yourself and the ones you love.
Cathy: So it’s gonna be a little more like, here you go, try this. So it’s gonna be do this
Todd: more resource driven,
Cathy: a little more resource driven, a little more like, um, idea. Something to practice. Yeah. Um, and, and I obviously, because it’s a subscription, it’s paid, it’s $5, um, a month. Or it’s $50 a year, which means it’s, that makes it a little less than $5 a month.
Cathy: Mm-hmm. Like what is, you know, so. You, you know, if you pay for it, then you’ll get that as well. Yeah. Um, US writers out there on Substack, you know, I do a lot of writing, I spend a lot of hours writing, and I give it away for free in many, many ways. I give it, you know, allow people to share it and use it. I put it on Substack.
Cathy: I, I love writing. It’s my joy. Um, and at the same time, I want to, when I wanna do extra work. That’s when I start to think there has to be an exchange of energy here. Yeah. You know, if I’m writing two things Yeah. Every week, then there has to be [00:20:00] some kind of exchange of energy and I’ve really appreciated those of you who have already subscribed.
Cathy: Thank you very much. Um, it means the world to me and I want to be in communication with you. You know, like when you can write comments, I’ll write back, you know, do q and a with readers. Like it’s, it’s really what I wanna spend my time doing.
Todd: Yeah. And how often do you think, uh, ping is gonna come out
Cathy: once a week, just like, uh, Zen.
Cathy: And do you know which day
Todd: of the week it’s gonna
Cathy: No, I, I’m thinking, uh, I’m figuring that out ’cause this is the first week, so I don’t know if it’s gonna come out on Wednesday or I’m writing right now. That’s what I was doing before we came down. Um, so I think it’ll, it won’t be the same day. Zen Parenting moment.
Cathy: Yeah. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll, I’ll kind of split it up, divide it up a little. But again, just to reiterate, Zen Parenting Moment is a free subscription. Yeah,
Todd: no worries there everybody. So
Cathy: if you haven’t subscribed already, scroll down, click on, you know, it says Kathy’s sub stack and then we gotta
Todd: put the ping thing in the show notes too, then.
Cathy: Exactly. Right. But if you subscribe to Zen Parenting Moment, it will give you an opportunity to upgrade. Oh, well, okay. So both of them drive you to the same place. Got it, got it. Um, but thank you for [00:21:00] that. So again, um, what we talked about last week in my free, um. Substack was, what do you think about when you wake up in the morning?
Cathy: And something that Todd and I talked about, I think a couple weeks ago, was the difference between he and I is that he, well, I’ll let you say
Todd: this. When I wake up, I think about my schedule and what I’m gonna get done that day.
Cathy: Yeah. And, and he’s very honest in sharing that in I, I said. In the paragraph that I wrote, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t love our kids as much, or that he’s not as connected to people.
Cathy: That’s not what it’s about. It’s about conditioning. He has been taught and trained to focus on himself and to get his things done because his value is based. In providing and working and being a certain kind of man. And there is a lot of conditioning in there that he doesn’t like sometimes. Some of the things that I bring up, um, around the way I wake up, which is, you know, is everybody okay?
Cathy: Where is everybody right now? Is everybody in the [00:22:00] house? What does everyone need from me? I think Todd, and I’ll let you speak for yourself, but I think sometimes Todd’s like, why do you do that? Like, just stop doing that.
Mm-hmm.
Cathy: And. What I always want him to understand is that’s my conditioning. Mm-hmm. And maybe mine is, mine is more extreme than a lot of women.
Cathy: Like I don’t, there’s a spectrum, there’s a continuum here. And I’m not saying mine is the only way. There are definitely people who are a lot more codependent or neurotic or, I don’t like that word, a lot more anxious about things than I am. And then there’s a lot of people who are less like, I’m somewhere in the gray, but it is conditioning.
Cathy: It’s not a Kathy thing. I know that part of my value in this world is based on how well I’m caring for people, especially with the title of mom and therapist, you know, and teacher, that those are things that, that you know, I have to
Todd: work for. Well, and today was an example. I woke up and played pickleball.
Todd: You woke up and did Yoga Uhhuh and now we kind of had a plan, or I don’t know if I explicitly asked you like, but we like to connect with our daughter before she leaves for high school. Of course. [00:23:00] And I, you know, I tend to play, you know, yoga is a 45 minute class. Pickleball is usually an hour and a half, something like that.
Todd: And you were the, the one that obviously was with Skyler this morning. Yes. And that’s like one microcosm of an example of that’s just kind of our rhythm. Is, I’m assuming that you’re gonna be there. Mm-hmm. And whether that’s fair or unfair, that’s just the reality of the way you and I dance together. And, you know, we’re trying to like look at that and see how we can reorganize that, but it’s, and it comes from.
Todd: The when, when we started having kids. Correct? No, it comes from
Cathy: our childhood. Right? It comes from our gender. Well, it started happening when we had kids. Correct. It started to be able to be seen. Yes. But you believed those things internally, like before you became a dad.
Todd: So I’m wondering if you’d be willing to share, uh, you, one of the things that I highlighted a few sentences.
Todd: Sure. Um, and just want you to riff on it, you said, [00:24:00] and it’s about the expectation, the cultural conditioning. You say it lives in the body and comes from real experience and expectation. I’m wondering if you can just expand, ’cause I think even when we were driving to Michigan with Skylar and my sister, you talked about like it lives in ourselves.
Todd: Yes. And I just wonder if you can expand on that.
Cathy: Well, I, I think, I mean, I tend to see things more spiritually or I see things more, um, emotional and, um. I literally believe that our feelings, our experiences, our traumas live in our tissues. And, and this is not just me believing this, that you know things I read, things I understand as a therapist, the research that I understand, it’s like ingrained, right?
Cathy: I also believe in a more spirit, spiritual way of understanding the collective unconsciousness. Which is that we all come from women who have historically been expected to do certain things and whether or not it’s in our DNA or in the EERs, in the air, whatever it may be. In the role modeling, in the pop [00:25:00] culture, there is a directive that women have, which is care for people, care about people.
Cathy: And even though there’s plenty of women who maybe their job is more focused on finance or accounting, talking about
Todd: generalizations.
Cathy: Generalizations. But I, I wanna say that because there are some people that they’re, they override conditioning. Mm-hmm. Right? They, and sometimes they go too extreme. You know, where they just push it way too far.
Cathy: Where they’re like, okay, now I don’t feel connected. And men do the same thing. Some men are, you know, more conditioned to be more traditional and some are, you know, they become nurses and teachers and they become, stay-at-home dads and they have that more caregiving vibe and they honor it.
Sure.
Cathy: It’s just the understanding that for why these things are important, why I write about these things is I think it makes our conversations better.
Cathy: Because what I talk about in, in the, uh, substack that I wrote is when I talk to women about them engaging in these conversations with their significant others who happen to be men. [00:26:00] There’s a lot of blame. Men feel blamed. Men feel like, aren’t I doing enough? Men feel like, don’t you appreciate what I already do?
Cathy: Men, men get very upset and they get upset because they think they’re already working really hard and they already feel stressed and that somebody is telling them do more. And the thing that I’m, I’m trying to lay out is it’s less about more and more about can we have a conversation about divvying this up in a way we’re, we’re all.
Cathy: Feeling seen and heard. It’s not, I’m gonna do less, you’re gonna do more. It’s how can we see this big picture?
Todd: Well, and part of me was gonna say something like, uh, and I know it’s gonna upset probably some people, so I’ll say it and then I’ll kind of follow it up with something, the fragile male ego.
Todd: Mm-hmm. Um, but instead of saying that, even though I just said it is, I just, we get defensive. And I’m not used to being called out for being inadequate. And if you’re saying, Hey Todd, how come you didn’t, um, you know, wake up with Skyler this morning instead of play pickleball? There is a part of me [00:27:00] that that quickly gets defensive.
Todd: And I, generally speaking, women have more practice with being, having to adapt culturally mm-hmm. To fit in. And I, as a white straight man. Uh, I am not asked to do that as often, and that doesn’t excuse my behavior. It’s more just giving you a perspective on why I am, I, I keep saying I, uh, but I’ll say we why we are so quick to get defensive.
Cathy: Exactly. And, and if we understand that, like why, another paragraph I wrote is about the fact that that conditioning that’s ingrained in our culture too, white men should not be questioned. That’s a belief in our culture. And even though we’re like, yes, they should, of course they should, but there is a deep collective unconsciousness of that.
Cathy: White men should not be questioned that they are the leaders, they are the people that are in charge. And how dare you question a white man, right? I mean. You know, I just think about certain [00:28:00] things in our history most recently, like the Brett Kavanaugh hearings or something like that where, you know, you could have a man be so upset and so o angry and, you know, overcharged about something.
Cathy: How dare you say this about me? And you’ve got this woman who’s being so, you know, constrained and like telling her story and, and keeping it together. And yet she’s the crazy one and he’s okay doing what he’s doing. And then there’s all sorts of men in Congress saying, how dare you do this to this man.
Cathy: It’s because we should not, and I’m saying this in air quotes, we should not be questioning men. And then we, why We need to understand this. Both of us, all genders inside is then we can have a better conversation without individual men thinking we’re blaming them. I am not blaming you for something you grew up believing and understanding.
Cathy: ’cause we all swam in those, we all were swimming in those waters. But then how do we have a conversation where I say. This doesn’t work for me or us or our children. So how do we question this without you thinking I’m questioning [00:29:00] you. Mm-hmm. Individually, can we question our system? And if we shift our system, that’s what then shifts the bigger system.
Cathy: Yeah.
Todd: Well, and I just in, uh, in your substack you talk about some banker from the financial time.
Cathy: Yeah. It’s stuck in my brain. I’ve got it in, I remember reading it and I’ll never forget it,
Todd: and he said, I feel liberated. We can say the R word and the P word without the fear of getting canceled. It’s a new Don and I’m sure it’s after our most recent president got elected Uhhuh.
Todd: He’s like, now all of a sudden we, I don’t have to do anything anymore. No. Yeah. Because the woke, quote unquote woke culture doesn’t have any power anymore,
Cathy: and what I explain is that he, he says, okay, now I have freedom, but he doesn’t have freedom. What he has is permission to do whatever he wants to do.
Cathy: He doesn’t have to change. He doesn’t have to choose his words kindly, you know, in a way that makes sure everybody else may feel supported and cared for. He gets to just be his. Fullest, biggest, sometimes extreme, cruel version of himself, [00:30:00] and nobody gets to question him. That’s exactly what I’m talking about.
Cathy: What he’s saying to the world is, I get to do whatever I want. Do not question, but I will not listen to what you want. Yeah. And that is not everybody that is a. That is a cultural norm that some people take to an extreme. And can we talk about that norm? It’s kinda like we say this all the time, but I’m gonna say it again for people who are new or who are listening to this conversation.
Cathy: Patriarchy is not men. Patriarchy is a system. That was built by men a long time ago. So when someone’s talking about patriarchy, they’re not talking about you. Mr. Mann, across from me. They’re talking about the system that we live in, and that seems to be so not understood. There’s like a, you’re saying I’m a bad person, and you’re saying, I’m not talking about you individually.
Cathy: I’m talking about our system. Yeah. And men will, they play both sides sometimes where they’re like, well, it’s not all our fault and this is the thing and this is why. But then they’ll say, men built our culture, men worked [00:31:00] hard, so which one is it? And, and it’s both, but do you see what I mean? There’s kind of,
Todd: well, I, I remember having a conversation with a friend of mine who was in construction and he was talking about the awesomeness of men.
Todd: Correct. And there are awesome, of course there is an awesomeness in men and there’s awesomeness in women, but he’s like. You know, we looked around, there’s a bunch of skyscrapers around. It’s like men built this thing and mm-hmm. First thing you said to me was, yeah, I’m not sure how many women had the opportunity to work on this construction site when this building was getting erected.
Todd: So,
Cathy: and. Who was managing the children? Yeah. While they were working. Who was taking care of the paperwork, who was in the hospital taking care of the elderly, who was like the, the whole idea that anybody, regardless of gender, thinks they’re doing something all by themselves. Like people who are like, I’m self-made.
Cathy: I did it myself. Bullshit. Sweet.
Todd: There
Cathy: are,
Todd: I’m sorry. Don’t, don’t make me that. Now I’m gonna have to go back and, I’m sorry. Edit it.
Cathy: I’m sorry, but it, it necessitates a swear word because I’m not talking about any, I’m not talk, I’m talking about all gender of people who think they do [00:32:00] something alone. Yeah.
Cathy: There is somebody always how there is a barista who got you your coffee. There are people who built the roads. There’s police officers protecting you. There’s. Fire workers, putting fire workers, there’s firemen and fire women putting out fires. There are accountants helping you with your taxes. You’re not doing anything alone.
Cathy: Mm-hmm. And there are family members that have taken care of you and helped you and guided you. There’s a people who have employed you that have helped pay your bills like we are a collective.
Yeah.
Cathy: And that is for me, that mindset is what I look at grassroots wise in families. Yeah. Is we are a collective.
Cathy: And what Todd and I used to say, like bringing this down to the most micro level is with the girls when we’d talk about like, you know, people always talk about doing chores or whatever and when the, when it was time to put plates away, and again, they’re not perfect at it. Todd’s gonna laugh because sometimes we are left with lots of plates on the table.
Cathy: But when they were little. I would say, well, yeah, you have to put your own plate away ’cause it’s yours. Mm-hmm. Like, I didn’t [00:33:00] make it like a chore. I was like, doesn’t that make sense to you? That’s your plate. You put it away. Like everybody does their fair, fair share in the family. That’s your room. You take care of it, that’s your bike.
Cathy: You take care of it. Like that’s your job. And you know, and if someone needs help with their bike, you, you give them help. Like we are a team, we are a little town. Mm-hmm. Working together. Mm-hmm.
Todd: Well, uh, there’s two different directions I want to go in. Um, I don’t know if I’ll remember them both. So let’s start with this.
Todd: Okay. What I liked about your substack was you gave four examples of how men are expected to be strong and take charge and, uh, all that stuff. And you say, in real time, this is what it looks like. So this is what we’re trying to like, evolve through a dad who withdraws from their kid who is upset because he doesn’t know how to comfort without fixing.
Todd: This is what we’re trying to evolve through or transform through.
Cathy: Yeah, so like the way you set it up is when dads are expected to just be their role, right? Of strong provider, caregiver, or not caregiver, excuse me, strong provider. This is what it ends up looking like.
Todd: Second one, a man who says, what [00:34:00] more do you want from me?
Todd: When asked to engage emotionally with his partner. Number three, a man who handles the bills and the lawn but hasn’t had a meaningful conversation with his spouse in weeks. And then lastly, it can look like silence, defensiveness, or default to doing rather than feeling.
Mm-hmm.
Todd: And my defaults is definitely doing, and I’m working on the feeling
Cathy: like, and you have the feeling as well, honey, it’s not that you are minus the feeling, you just jump to doing.
Yeah.
Cathy: And I think that has a lot to do with your childhood. I think that you found that if. You know, your mom needed cigarettes down the street, or if your dad needed a donut, if you jumped into it and you went and did it really quickly, you could calm things. Yeah. And I think that when I say to you, can you just get me some green juice?
Cathy: ’cause we’re out and you keep ordering groceries instead of going and getting groceries, when you understood I was upset, you jumped in the car and when got green juice. Mm-hmm. You’re trying to fix the problem and that isn’t like a bad thing. Like doing is not bad. ’cause it’s like, well then what do you want us to do if we’re not doing it?
Cathy: But it’s [00:35:00] when the, you know. The feeling part is, do you understand how we got here? Sure. Do you, and not just you, Todd, ’cause I know you do. Um, we were just talking about before we started, I was listening to Elise Loan’s podcast. Um, and she was talking about our, how many lives that we’ve had here on earth.
Cathy: You know, how many, and you know, you don’t have to believe in this. You can just do this in kind of a fun way if you want to. But are we on. Which life are we on right now? Depending on how like D Deep we find ourselves to be or how much we understand the world and talk. So the idea is about reincarnation?
Cathy: Yeah, reincarnation. Or just like how many, ’cause I don’t know if that word translates for people, but how many times you’ve been here. Because the belief system in many cultures is that we are, every time we come back, we’re evolving a bigger part of ourselves and we get to a point where we actually get it, not get.
Cathy: Everything but we like understand why we’re here. And so what did you say? How many lives do you think or where do you think you’re
Todd: at? Uh, I first qualified. It’s just ’cause I’m not sure I believe [00:36:00] in that idea. You’re understood, but just go, going down this road, I said I’m in the middle or maybe towards the beginning
Cathy: and I said, I think you’re much more toward the mid middle.
Cathy: And the reason why, and maybe you’re even further than that, you know, who knows is because you do understand things you may initially be, um. Defensive about something like, you know, Kathy, I’m already doing all these things. I can’t believe you’re asking this of me, but you, you take a breath or a step back and you’re like, okay, that makes sense to me.
Cathy: And I, that is a very evolved human being. It’s not about getting it on the first Yeah. Shot. I just, I, you and I, well am my defensive.
Todd: You know, whether it’s, uh, withdrawal or fawning or whatever. I would love to say eventually that’s gonna go away. I don’t think it’s ever going away, but to notice that, that’s how I typically, what I.
Todd: Typically do when a threat is is in front of me. And, you know, we’re not worrying about lions [00:37:00] eating us anymore. So I worry about when my life partner is upset. I, I feel scared, I feel threatened.
Mm-hmm.
Todd: And I get either defensive or I fawn. I don’t get. I don’t get, I don’t fight very often. Not my style, but No mine either, but some people do.
Cathy: No, my, I don’t fight either. And I, what I, I use the word threatened a lot in that substack talking about feeling threatened because that is something I think a lot of men have told me is when their partners have said stuff to them, they feel threatened, they feel like they are being threatened and they’re pissed about it.
Cathy: Mm-hmm. They’re like, how dare you threaten me? Why are you blaming me? And there’s a lot of like. Making this suggestion that maybe our home could run differently. Some kind of personal slight where you don’t see me. Yeah. And again, if you don’t have a relationship where you are noticing the things that each other does, then these are very hard things to do.
Cathy: Like, I’m gonna take you guys back way in time. 15 years ago when Todd and I started Zen Parenting. One of the [00:38:00] things that we used to talk about excessively was gratitude. Okay. Which I still am, you know, uh, believe in. And there’s been so much more research around it, and it’s just the greatest thing ever.
Cathy: But we just hammered it to death because one of the things that we both realized is if I was able to say things to Todd, like, thank you for taking out the garbage. I appreciate that. Or I noticed you turned off the lights when you came up. Thank you. Not in a patronizing kind of way, but real basic way.
Cathy: It. It fortified both of us. We, he knew that I was noticing him and then he was more likely to notice what I was doing, and there was an energy in gratitude. Okay. And that was a real, when you think about 15 years ago, that was a real foundation for Todd and I. Mm-hmm. Is we’re gonna try and be grateful with, for each other what we’re doing.
Cathy: So when I do bring up something that I don’t feel is either fair or balanced, or a place that I feel like things are changing. Todd, we have this foundational basis to have this conversation where he knows I’m already grateful for him. You know what I [00:39:00] mean? Like he’s not like, oh, what now? Like, um, I can’t stand the word nag it.
Cathy: I think it’s utilized, I think it’s weaponized against women, but I did use it in the substack to point out how often we call women a nag when they ask us to reconsider something. When they ask, when a woman says, can you look at this? Or, I don’t feel safe here, or I don’t feel like you’re seeing me, or I don’t feel like you’re doing what you told me you do.
Cathy: We say they’re nagging me. But really what they’re doing is they’re asking you to look at something.
Todd: Sweetie, what’s all about gratitude?
So
Cathy: thank you.
Todd: That’s all. Just bring a little bit of
Cathy: that into your partnership. Yeah, and that’s like so old school. That’s why I said take you back 15 years because that’s a foundation. Like what do you want? You the foundation. Of your relationship with your partner and your kids to be based on? Is it you constantly critiquing everybody?
Cathy: Is it you believing you’re better than them, is it, or [00:40:00] is it you fortifying? I. The relationship when you have the energy and the awareness to do so.
Todd: So this is about understanding one another and what I liked about your substack. ’cause you usually don’t like, I think you said something like, you’re gonna like this one because there’s bullet points in it.
Todd: Yeah, I had put some bullet points in it and I like bullet points because my brain. Remembers bullet points more than paragraphs. It, so I just wonder, I get it, the four para, the four bullet points of like the old school and, and you put in, in real time, like what it would look like if you’re trying to evolve through this situation.
Todd: If you find yourself in a partnership where this is true in real time, this looks like how do we both wake up thinking about others? So it doesn’t always fall on one of us. Yes. How do we both consider our spending so no one person isn’t left worrying about the money? And that’s interesting. I remember I was going to a coach for a while.
Todd: God, I don’t remember his name, but he was a good guy and I was kind of just sharing my money. Scarcity worries with him. This is like 10 years ago, and he is like, well, what does Kathy, uh, say to you when you bring this up? Like, oh, I [00:41:00] don’t, I don’t really. Bring it up. And he is like, we should have like a mic, just a meeting with her once a month to tell her what is happening in our, in our income and our balance sheet and everything else.
Todd: And we don’t do that anymore. But there was a time where I’m like, all right, just once a month, just so I can unload a little bit of this. Not unload it, like dumping on you, but just sharing it
Cathy: well, and I feel like it, it helped a lot. Been able to sit down with David together. I know not all the time. And you’re looking at the day to day because you like to look at the day to day.
Cathy: Sure. Um, but I do understand. Yeah, I do understand the, at least the big
Todd: wide picture. Well, and, and, and I don’t know if you were thinking about me when you wrote this, but that’s like the other, because you first talk about, you know, we started this podcast out by saying, when I wake up, I think about me.
Todd: When you wake up, you think about others. Um, and I like that your second bullet point was if, if. What’s funny is in a lot of my friends’ marriages, the their female partner is the one that keeps in charge, keeps the books and the budget and everything else. That’s not true for us. No. Um, but I [00:42:00] appreciated you putting the money in just to kind of like, I don’t know, balance out the examples.
Todd: The third one you put down is, how about I mow the lawn and then you mow lawn. Now you like mowing lawn.
Cathy: I love mowing the lawn.
Todd: Uh, and keep, keep going sweetie. ’cause I don’t like dinner. Uh, how about you fix dinner and then I fix dinner. So just. You know, a little bit of conversation around this, and I think what we’re trying to do is like.
Todd: Get past the defensiveness. Mm-hmm. And say, how do we connect through this thing? Mm-hmm. And become stronger. And you, and you know, it’s sometimes super uncomfortable to get through it, but on the other side it’s always closer. It closeness, it’s,
Cathy: and let me give some examples that people might be able to laugh about or relate to.
Cathy: And a lot of these I. See on social media, on TikTok or on Instagram reels. And you know, one that’s kind of like a meme thing that goes around is it’s a woman saying, I tell my husband that it’s time to get ready for the party, and then she’ll tape him or tape him. She’ll video him and he’ll be like, chopping up branches in the backyard.
Cathy: And so he [00:43:00] thinks he’s somehow getting ready for a party or that’s what he’s. Gravitating towards, and that’s not helping her at all. Yeah. And like something that used to happen when, you know, um. Todd, when the girls were very young is it would be a Saturday and Monday through Friday I would be with the girls the vast majority of the time.
Cathy: And then on Saturday Todd would say, I’m gonna go clean the garage.
Oh yeah.
Cathy: And he’d go put his earphones on and clean the garage. And I was still with the girls by myself. Now, when I would say to him, um, like, I appreciate your cleaning the garage. Like, I have gratitude for that. And he’d be like, it needs to be done.
Cathy: You don’t understand. We need to get two cars in. I’m like, yeah, but I’m still doing the exact same thing I’ve been doing Monday through Friday, like. Bring the girls with you, have them help. Like, I don’t mind the garage cleaning, but it’s like, and again, I’m gonna throw one more out there, Todd, because this is probably the most consistent one.
Cathy: I hear men who go to the bathroom for 30 minutes. Oh yeah. Like, what the hell is going on
Todd: there? So we either understand it’s, it’s, it’s a, it’s a prehistoric cellular thing for [00:44:00] us guys. Oh, yeah. Dinosaurs before, this is before dinosaurs, even though I don’t think we existed when dinosaurs did. Uh, yeah. I, I’ll just, I’ll just take some time and You sure Do you female, you females?
Todd: Uh, I will say. If you are the caretaker in your family, you don’t have 20 minutes to go poop, right? You gotta go poop in two minutes because there’s a kid knocking on your door. You just
Cathy: go when you need to go. I feel like you and I have had these conversations where you’re in there forever. I’m like, what are you doing?
Cathy: And you’re like, I’m just waiting for things to get flowing. Yeah. I’m like, don’t. Why don’t you just go when you have to go.
Todd: A big shout out to Mike Rosen. This podcast is brought to you by the invention of the bidet.
Cathy: We all love a good bidet.
Todd: We all have a, and I used to think it was not a good idea, and I went on a road trip and my friend Mike put one in our bathroom without me knowing about it.
Cathy: For your birthday.
Todd: And it’s, it was like a $60 piece. You get a Home Depot and you don’t need to be a plumber to install it. So,
Cathy: and then my daughter, Cameron loved it so much that we had to like put one in their bathroom and now we’re like, [00:45:00] and it’s funny ’cause I remember my friend Manisha, who also has a bidet, she’s like, once you have one.
Cathy: It’s very hard to go into bathrooms. It don’t Oh, yeah. Because you’re kind of like, this doesn’t make sense.
Todd: Well, and I’m kind of ignorant as long as we’re talking about bidets. Uh, we were in Italy and there was some bidets uhhuh, though I don’t understand that system because it’s because they’re
Cathy: not on the toilet.
Cathy: Yeah.
Todd: You have to like get up and I don’t wanna stand up when I just pooped. Yeah. Someone needs
Cathy: to
Todd: fill us in. I mean, we’ll,
Cathy: I do it. Get,
Todd: I don’t, I I feel like aide and we, one time we rented a fancy hotel room in Las Vegas. Yes. And they had a heated seat, heated water bidet,
Cathy: heated bidet. Oh
Todd: my God. Forget about it.
Todd: It was the best.
Cathy: Anyway, but the, the, you’re right about all of that, and I think that the bathroom thing is, number one, you’re in the bathroom for such a long time that I can’t go in there. Mm-hmm. So I, my day is all kind of pushed back, which we’ve kind of figured out. Yeah. I think, but then the other one is just being gone.
Yeah.
Cathy: Like where, you know, when you’ve got young kids or whatever and when there’s a guy sitting in the bathroom for 30 or 45 minutes and they’re like, [00:46:00] well I just need time. It’s like, guess who needs time? Everybody does it. I have
Todd: had so many conversations with my buddies and they’re like, it’s so funny.
Todd: Um, I won’t name the person ’cause I don’t know if he wants to, but he’s like, God, me and my wife got in a fight. I’m like, what was it about? He is like, I spent like. Three hours cleaning out the garage. And she was so mad at me after I’m like, been there. Yeah.
Cathy: Done that. And she’s, and the thing is, is it’s how you tell the story in your mind.
Cathy: She’s not mad at you that you cleaned out the garage. You went into the garage cleaning out your friend and you thinking, I want to clean the garage. I’m gonna go clean the garage. I’m gonna go do that. You’re not thinking about what’s going on in the house. There’s kids who would probably like to be with you.
Cathy: There’s your wife is, would like to be busy doing things. That are different. Maybe she doesn’t wanna be, you know, maybe she wants to split up that time. Like there’s, there’s a thinking about yourself versus thinking about the whole, when
Todd: you forget the most important thing, what I. You don’t really give a crap how clean the garage is.
Cathy: Yeah. No. I never [00:47:00] spend any time in the garage, so you’re not doing that for me now. I appreciate you cleaning things out in that you can move the cars in, but I’m not getting any sense of joy or satisfaction from that. Right, right. Because most of the stuff in the garage is yours. Yeah. Stuff that you’ve bought, so I’m not even filling up the garage.
Cathy: So that’s all you baby. Right? And so there’s like a, I’m gonna clean my room, I’m gonna fill my room, I’m gonna clean my room, I’m gonna fill my room. And I’m like, I get nothing. So now on a very ping note to bring it full circle. The other day, Todd and I went to yoga early in the morning and he said, on the way home, we need to stop at Juul, because I realized we were outta peanut butter yesterday.
Cathy: We need to make a sandwich for Skyler this morning. And I said, thank you for thinking about her this morning because. He was like that. I know that sounds like a small thing and people are like, big deal. But that to me is, I’m right now thinking about what she needs this morning, not just what I need. And that makes, that’s, I see that it’s a little pebble.
Cathy: It’s a pebble. It’s like, and for her, she [00:48:00] may not realize that her dad just went to the grocery store unless he decides to pat himself on the back and tell her. But she then gets her sandwich. She gets. You know, everything flows. That’s the, I remember a long time ago, this is old news because we’ve talked about before, but I, um, you hosted a men’s group here and I was talking to the men about things.
Cathy: And I brought up things like putting away laundry and why that’s important and when, when the basket is left unfolded or when you know, men don’t care about that aspect, use it as a metaphor. They don’t care about that. They’re like, that’s not important. And one of the men is like. That’s just not a big deal.
Cathy: I, I don’t think we should have to worry about that. But what happens when you don’t put clothes away is kids don’t have socks. And when kids don’t have socks, their mourning goes a little differently. When they can’t find underwear, when they can’t find their baseball uniform, there’s somebody taking care of that for them.
Cathy: And if there isn’t a. Looking at the person doing it and saying thank you, or doing it yourself occasionally, then you don’t understand how the system keeps [00:49:00] rolling. And I think that’s something in a macro, I’m totally on a soapbox. On a macro level, I don’t think that people understand how much this country runs because of all of the unpaid emotional labor that women do.
Cathy: They’re taking care of elderly people, taking care of children, doing jobs that are much less paid. You know, you’d get much less money to care about people to, you know, to take care of some, you know, like Todd and I saw we were just in our own hometown. There was a big, um. Demonstration or activism, what am I trying to say?
Cathy: A protest, uh, in Elmhurst and when we drove by, it’s mostly women.
Yeah. Do
Cathy: you know what I mean? Women are out there protesting. There are men, but it’s majority women and that’s all unpaid labor. Mm-hmm. And, and I think as a society. It’s just about knowing that it’s not about, okay, then give me a, a big award.
Cathy: It’s about do you see the difference and do you see what we’re both contributing? Because I think men are like, look what I contribute. Look what I contribute. [00:50:00] Yes, you do. I’m not gonna take any of that away from you, but do you see what women are contributing and do you see how we could do this together?
Cathy: Yeah. So,
Todd: um. Are you okay if I close? Absolutely. Um, so a few things. Kathy and I are doing that event Thursday night on Zoom. Um, menopause, understanding it better. Yeah. So a lot of women don’t understand it either, it turns out, right? Yeah. I’m in
Cathy: the process of learning too.
Todd: Uh, number two, uh. Kathy Substack, ping.
Todd: Yeah. Uh, number three, Team Zen. Don’t forget, 25 bucks a month. Get on Zoom with Kathy and I a few times a month. And then lastly, restoring our girls. Yes. Uh, what’s the subtitle? I can’t read it. How Real Conversations Shape Our Daughter’s Lives. Help them with Teen Challenges and remind them that they matter.
Cathy: And I appreciate a lot of people over the weekend. Gave me, uh, reviews for my book. Yeah. Uh, five Star Review, so I really appreciate that. Um, and, um, thank you. And if you have read the book and you liked it or it helped you, I would love for you to give it a five star [00:51:00] review. If it wasn’t your deal. Don’t, don’t, uh, don’t do that.
Todd: Yeah. Uh, see you all next Tuesday. Keep trucking.
Round two. Change a little bit. And change a little bit. Pretty pleasant.
