Amy Wilson, WHEN DID I GET LIKE THIS: The Screamer, the Worrier, the Dinosaur-Chicken-Nugget-Buyer, and Other Mothers I Swore I'd Never Be
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[0:41]Amy Wilson is the author of When Did I Get Like This?
[0:44]The Screamer, The Warrior, the dinosaur chicken nugget buyer, and other mothers I swore I'd never be.
[0:49]She is also the creator of Mother Load, a one-woman show, which toured 16 cities nationwide
[0:56]after its hit off Broadway run.
[0:58]Amy is co-host of the comedy-parenting podcast, What Fresh Hell, Laughing in the Face of Motherhood,
[1:03]a top 10 parenting podcast, and Apple Podcasts with over 4 million downloads today.
[1:08]Between them, Abby and her host Margaret Ables have six kids, ages 7 to 17.
[1:13]Welcome, Amy.
[1:14]Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read books to discuss.
[1:17]When Did I Get Like This, The Screamer, The Warrior, the dinosaur chicken nugget buyer, and other mothers I swore I'd never be.
[1:24]Thank you so much for having me.
[1:26]This is such a thrill for me.
[1:28]I know that you know this since we've already done your podcast and everything.
[1:31]But I read your book when it came out, which reminded me as in 2010.
[1:34]So I have that coffee over there, which I should have pulled out.
[1:37]I'm so honored.
[1:38]No, I loved it.
[1:40]At the time, I had like three-year-old twins.
[1:43]So I was in it with you.
[1:44]It was like right then.
[1:45]And so I reread it now to get a refresher and I was like, because, you know, my memory.
[1:50]I know what I've read, but then I can't remember what anything inside it.
[1:53]But I imagine you read all the time, right?
[1:55]Yes.
[1:56]But anyway, I read it again with fresh eyes and it was so funny to like, because I was so in the moment back then.
[2:04]Well, let me stop.
[2:05]Why don't you tell listeners a little bit about what your book is about, although the subtitle is very revealing.
[2:10]Yeah.
[2:10]And all of that.
[2:11]So the book came out in 2010, as you said.
[2:13]And at the time when the book came out, when I wrote the book, my kids were one, four, and six.
[2:20]And I was really in it in the salt mine years, as I like to say.
[2:23]Like, it's hard for the moment you get up into the moment you go to bed.
[2:26]Like, you are using your hands, taking care of somebody.
[2:29]And I think things have changed since 2010 and things have not changed.
[2:32]And so what the book is about is it's a series of essays and it's about all the times that I started from the place of wanting
[2:40]what's best for my children and who doesn't want what's best for their children, right?
[2:44]Like, of course, I want that.
[2:46]But then the sort of insidious messages that we get, like, well, if you want what's best for your children, you have to start using these flashcards.
[2:53]You have to mill your own baby food, you know, that kind of thing.
[2:55]So each chapter in the book, whether it's my birth plan or getting my kid into preschool or, you know, making mom friends.
[3:04]It would be something where I would always start saying like, okay, this time I am not overthinking this.
[3:09]I like, I am super chill.
[3:11]I am not going to fall for that this time.
[3:14]And then over and over again.
[3:15]I do.
[3:16]I think because a little bit, it's how I'm wired, but I also think society sort of makes us that way.
[3:20]I have sort of a, that's the BMI bonnet that I think society makes mothers crazy.
[3:26]And then it's like, oh, why are you mothers so crazy?
[3:28]Because you was the assignment, you told me to be, you told me to worry about every little thing.
[3:32]So that's what the book's about.
[3:34]Amazing.
[3:35]Yeah.
[3:36]In the beginning, you said it doesn't affect fathers the same way because the marketing is all to moms.
[3:41]This manipulation that we need this particular product or else we won't be and you made up some really funny examples.
[3:47]Like the whole book is so funny about how, well, do I need it?
[3:50]Do I not need this product?
[3:51]Well, of course, I want to be good.
[3:52]Just like you were saying.
[3:53]And it's impossible to get away from the guilt when people are intentionally trying to guilt us into buying things for their own benefit.
[4:00]And as a result, now we're all like a mess.
[4:03]Yes.
[4:04]And I'm a researcher too.
[4:05]So this probably was even worse for me because, yeah, like my spouse when we were going into the delivery room,
[4:10]he didn't know that there was something called vitamin K, I drops that the baby was going to get in their eyes, you know, 90 seconds after the baby was born and that that was either a must do or a must not do depending on what website you were on that day.
[4:24]So right.
[4:25]He was, he avoided all that because who would even care about that stuff.
[4:28]And I think there are mothers who are more blissfully like I'm just going to go with the flow, but I needed to have the best right answer for each little thing, which is of course bunkers, but I need to learn that the hard way.
[4:38]And you guys talked about getting a doula and he was like, why would we need a doula? I can do this myself and there was that whole conversation.
[4:46]Yeah.
[4:47]I probably should have gotten a doula. I mean, he was great, but he also, you know, when when you're in your labor and they see you in pain, like they freak out a little bit and how I think any partner would.
[4:57]partner reacted was, I think you really need to try and keep saying what she was super super hungry thirsty. I had to keep leaving the room to get more food.
[5:05]I can believe the room, but yeah.
[5:07]Oh my gosh. I also loved your whole segment on the doctor and the nurse and your weight as you are gaining weight for each baby and each subject of baby and how they made you feel and how the doctor kept saying, well, maybe not so many desserts and you were like, you said that last time.
[5:23]And what, you know, I already gave up desserts and now I'm eating like some equivalent of like some keto diet or whatever you were doing that was trendy at the time and you're like, this is terrible.
[5:33]Yes. Yes. I mean, if there's anybody who's listening to this, you're happens to be, you know, pregnant or about to be pregnant. I do feel like you will gain like your body wants to gain weight.
[5:43]and you can spend 40 weeks as I did sort of, you know, digging your nails into the ground while it drags you towards maternity pants or you cannot worry about it and eat when you're hungry.
[5:55]And I gained the exact same amount of weight and the two pregnancies where I did each of those things. So that was a real eye opener for me and this sort of.
[6:02]Yeah, this field bed culture. I don't know why they care so much if you gain 38 pounds instead of 35 pounds, but they do.
[6:08]And it's something you just have to kind of be ready for and put a sort of shield around yourself. I'm not going to gain 85 pounds or maybe I will and it won't be because I'm a bad person. It's because my body is going a little bonkers and it'll be okay.
[6:21]You have to sort of, you have to come up with that reserve of reassurance for yourself, which is really hard when you're in a time in your life when you're so off balance and unsure.
[6:32]And it's also like the only thing you can control when you're pregnant like there's so much fear.
[6:36]Even the story you told about finding out about being pregnant through the center and like not ever being able to sort of celebrate that right and like right.
[6:47]I struggle with infertility with my first child and it's a long road. I mean, some other people's roads were longer, but if you go through that at all, you know wanting to be pregnant not being able to it's extremely painful and right.
[6:58]So I finally got pregnant. That was right. It was the last thing I felt like and thank God. I mean that child is now 19 in a college, but finding out when I was pregnant with him.
[7:08]Yeah, it was it was cautious. It wasn't exuberant. Yeah, there was like no time to celebrate right right.
[7:15]Although eventually you did and you know, but even having that joy removed. I also say there's so much anxiety at every step of the way.
[7:22]And what can you do but wait right because everyone's like you know wait till this week wait till that week. But there's nothing you can really do. There's just all these things you can't do.
[7:30]And that's what you pointed out too. It's like the land of all the things like how do you exist in a state of not doing a million things like what do you do then.
[7:37]So I feel like I don't know. Maybe food is like the one thing you can do and you can do right. But I don't know what you want to find a bull right from the outside right if I gained 31 pounds. I'm okay. And if I gained 33 pounds. I'm at that person.
[7:48]That's something you can you can watch while you're sort of wondering what's going on in the factory inside.
[7:53]I also think like you I had three pregnancies I have four kids but I have twins. So I feel like my comfort level with my changing body and the knowledge that it would go up and it would go down came over time.
[8:06]And I want to like share that but you never can really internalize that maybe until you've gone through once or twice. I know anybody who tried to reassure me I was like no, I'm still going to be in my head about this because I don't know it's going to happen.
[8:19]It was that was sort of the whole point of my book like I really wanted people to be able to sort of jump the line right and I hope maybe they did that you may be you started.
[8:26]You avoided 10% of the beating yourself up because you read about me doing it and thought I'll kill skip that part. I hope that's true but I do think you're right to a large extent.
[8:35]You just got to go through it to figure out like okay I was crazy when I did XYZ.
[8:40]I think the book is great and I will sing from the rooftops and try and tell people all the things I feel like I've learned.
[8:47]The instinct is to share and help. I'm just not sure how much people.
[8:53]It's not just with this. I mean it's really with anything. You can prep people for grief. You can prep people for all sorts of things that will happen in life.
[9:01]And they can kind of know it but I think internalizing it.
[9:04]Well anyway I'm obviously of the school. Let's share and help people. That's all we can do but I do feel it's our responsibility in some way to help in case we help one person maybe then it's better than no people.
[9:17]Right and I do think that's much better than our mom's motherhood is that there is a sort of people will bear witness to all kinds of things and you do realize that you're not alone.
[9:29]There's a lot of different ways that moms can connect and have that connection during a time, which is to say like okay during the pandemic okay like this is the hardest time anybody who's home with little kids right now.
[9:42]You are doing something harder than anything I ever had to do in my kids for a little, but there is this opportunity for connection in other ways which is I think helpful.
[9:51]So my kids are able to put on their clothes and all those things less the hands on and I'm like what would I have done.
[9:58]I mean I would have just done it because we all.
[10:00]I'll have to spend whatever has happened
[10:02]and do one day at a time.
[10:03]But yeah, there's a lot of stress,
[10:05]even with not even having a vaccine for the younger kids
[10:07]and having that anxiety on top of the anxiety of everything else.
[10:09]I mean, yeah, yeah.
[10:11]And the mothers who feel left behind,
[10:14]you know, in this conversation, like, okay,
[10:16]guess we don't let it rip,
[10:17]everybody should just get back to the left.
[10:18]Like, I have a two year old and I have kept him
[10:22]in a plastic bubble for the last two years.
[10:24]And now you're telling me, oh, well, like it's a really,
[10:27]it doesn't make any sense.
[10:28]We're asking them to make sense
[10:29]because it doesn't make sense.
[10:30]It's true.
[10:31]And then of course none of us know
[10:33]the long-term, even emotional effects as well have.
[10:36]And then I'm like, does this, is this gonna end?
[10:38]What if my kids have to wear masks the entire time?
[10:42]I don't know, that they're in school.
[10:44]Anyway, let's bring the room down, right?
[10:45]You'd be like, I'm really sorry.
[10:47]Oh.
[10:48]The, we're also called the warrior on your cover here.
[10:50]Yes, that one.
[10:51]That's me.
[10:52]I'll just worry everybody.
[10:54]So in addition to writing this book,
[10:56]which was absolutely fabulous.
[10:58]And just as relevant today as it was then,
[11:01]you turned this into a one woman show
[11:02]and took it around the country.
[11:04]It was started off Broadway, you went national, right?
[11:06]Tell me about that experience.
[11:08]It was so crazy.
[11:09]It was terrific because I went to about 16 different cities.
[11:15]And if I was going for longer than a day or two,
[11:17]I would bring my baby with me.
[11:19]My youngest was learning to walk
[11:21]while we were doing this show.
[11:22]So if I had to go for a week,
[11:23]I'd bring my babysitter and we would, you know,
[11:24]we'd all be hanging out in the hotel together.
[11:26]It was such a privilege to perform,
[11:29]I mean, I've performed for lots of different groups.
[11:31]I have this sort of past life as an actor,
[11:33]but there is nothing like a room full of moms
[11:39]on a night out.
[11:40]Right.
[11:41]They're with their friends.
[11:42]They, they got their own babysitter, right?
[11:44]Maybe they've had a glass of rosé or two.
[11:46]They are ready to laugh and have a good time.
[11:51]And as I would be telling these stories,
[11:53]just looking out in the audience,
[11:54]because there was a one woman show.
[11:55]So I'm looking at the audience the whole time,
[11:57]watching like somebody reach across two or three people
[12:00]and like punch your friend in the arm,
[12:02]like that's you.
[12:03]She's talking about you right down the movie,
[12:05]like I know, I know and the two of them laughing
[12:07]just a sort of shared experience.
[12:09]It was such a privilege.
[12:11]It was so exciting.
[12:12]And a one person show is a total, you know,
[12:15]high wire act, you get out there.
[12:17]And it was just me and the person on the booth
[12:19]playing the sound cues.
[12:20]And if you forget that where you are,
[12:24]you just got to dig yourself out.
[12:25]There is no other.
[12:26]When you're on stage with another actor
[12:27]and you could get your lines, you lock eyes
[12:28]and there's just something, you communicate
[12:31]and the other person is like,
[12:32]weren't you gonna tell me about that thing from that time?
[12:34]They can lead you back to the path.
[12:36]When you're out there alone.
[12:37]It's scary, but it was exhilarating as well.
[12:40]Wow.
[12:41]So did you have a script you followed or did you?
[12:43]And by the time or?
[12:45]I did, no, it was a very tight script.
[12:48]And it was interesting, interesting you say that
[12:49]because I looked at sort of Jerry Seinfeld's standup.
[12:54]I mean, he's just very funny,
[12:55]but there's also something extremely conversational
[12:57]about his work.
[12:59]And I think most standups, they sound,
[13:01]John Mulaney is another one.
[13:03]They sound like they're just thinking of this right now
[13:06]for the first time, right?
[13:07]There's a cadence, there's a approach,
[13:10]but it's very carefully calibrated.
[13:12]And so this was like that.
[13:14]It was a script that was down to the, you know, word.
[13:17]And I was always let her perfect about it
[13:19]because that made me feel safer on stage.
[13:20]I actually very, really diverged from the script
[13:23]including when like, you know, somebody walked in late
[13:26]or whatever, I didn't stop the show.
[13:27]I wasn't, I wasn't a standup back.
[13:29]I wasn't engaging with the audience.
[13:31]But it was very let her perfect.
[13:33]And at the same time, I realized you get more laughs,
[13:36]the more you are really, you are this person.
[13:38]You are Alice in Wonderland going to the prenatal class
[13:42]for the first time and the more the actor on stage
[13:44]can be experiencing it for the first time,
[13:46]the funnier it is.
[13:47]I saw Jerry Seinfeld twice at the beakmen, I guess.
[13:50]Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[13:51]Because I took my kids back, anyway,
[13:53]I was like, well, I'm sure it'll be different this time.
[13:55]And it was like the exact same show,
[13:57]which is still areas they still cried laughing.
[13:59]But yes, to your point, it was, yeah, it's very, yeah.
[14:03]It only seems off the cuff.
[14:04]It's very, it's nailed down.
[14:06]Yeah, that's, that's me, that's my style.
[14:08]I love that.
[14:09]Wow.
[14:10]But you're not still doing it, right?
[14:11]Now, now it was a great experience.
[14:13]And then, you know, what kind of derailed the tour
[14:16]or sort of, you know, brought it to a, to a premature
[14:19]and maybe was the recession of 2008 on that was,
[14:22]you remember the birdie mate, birdie mate off days?
[14:24]I mean, there were so many theaters
[14:26]that I was going to perform at who reached out to my age
[14:30]and instead of like, we're canceling our entire season,
[14:32]we're really sorry, so it kind of came up against that.
[14:36]And then I, I mean, I loved it.
[14:37]I did that show a couple hundred times.
[14:39]And so I guess I could have tried to pick it back up
[14:42]two years later, but there is a point in your life,
[14:44]in my life when I kind of think,
[14:47]have I gotten out of this, what I will have gotten out of this?
[14:50]And I think that was true for that,
[14:51]I wouldn't have learned anything more
[14:53]from doing it 50 more times,
[14:54]even though it was super fun.
[14:56]It was of course hard work, too.
[14:57]Back to the acting for two seconds.
[14:59]I read that you had a regular role on Felicity.
[15:01]Is that true?
[15:02]Yes, who are you?
[15:03]Yes, well, I was a real show.
[15:05]I was recurring on Felicity.
[15:06]There's regular and there's recurring.
[15:07]So there is your on every week.
[15:09]So I did, there were a couple of shows
[15:10]where I was on every week 20 years ago.
[15:12]Felicity, I was recurring, which is okay.
[15:15]So, oh my gosh, her friend who is African American
[15:18]had an affair with the professor, okay?
[15:20]Are you, are you, are you that level Felicity?
[15:24]I don't remember that, I was the actress.
[15:26]But anyway, that was a plot line for her in a season
[15:29]that she was having an affair with the professor.
[15:31]I was a college student who had had an affair
[15:34]with the same professor and I came to, you know,
[15:39]warn her off in a couple of different episodes.
[15:41]Interesting.
[15:42]And it is funny out of that show, and it was a great show.
[15:45]But that show out of everything I've done is the one
[15:49]that women of a certain age, right?
[15:51]Oh, sorry Felicity.
[15:52]Yes, I'm dating myself here.
[15:55]Yes, although kids, they were funny,
[15:58]it's on some streaming platform.
[15:59]So I'm including myself and women of a certain age,
[16:02]by the way, just that you remember Felicity, right?
[16:04]I guess.
[16:05]The Alli McBeal, not kind of.
[16:06]Yes, yes, yes, oh my gosh.
[16:08]I literally can like feel the couch I was sitting on.
[16:11]I call it with watching Alli McBeal by two girlfriends.
[16:14]I can like, I'm immediately, when you say the words
[16:16]in it, right then.
[16:18]It was, I mean, there was so much less TV than.
[16:20]So Alli McBeal in Felicity, they were shows for us.
[16:23]They were shows with a young woman as a central character.
[16:27]And she wasn't just chasing boys.
[16:30]It was, they were, they were revolutionary.
[16:32]I'm sure that seems silly now, but they were.
[16:35]I'm glad I was following a revolutionary pattern.
[16:37]I feel good now that I'll make it.
[16:39]We were watching revolutionary television,
[16:41]don't you understand?
[16:43]Love it.
[16:43]Thank you, CW, whatever it was on.
[16:46]Okay, so then fast forward, when did you start
[16:48]what fresh hell the podcast?
[16:50]That was five years ago.
[16:51]So after that tour, I worked on a second book.
[16:56]I have a pitched a second book, sort of a version
[16:58]of when did I get like this.
[17:00]That was for sort of seven to 14 year olds.
[17:03]Like my experience of that stage of parenting,
[17:04]which I think is a very interesting sort of a liminal stage.
[17:08]My experience of that stage of parenting
[17:10]was very much that people were like, just you way.
[17:13]You'll see that that sort of thing
[17:15]which always kind of freaked me out
[17:17]and I didn't understand what they meant.
[17:18]So that's what the book was about.
[17:19]Couldn't sell it because the publishing industry
[17:22]sort of felt like that's not a age group
[17:24]that there are books about.
[17:26]So I was sort of like, how about this one?
[17:27]But there was a proof of concept in the marketplace
[17:29]that books for that middle age.
[17:31]So I didn't know what to do with that.
[17:32]And was working on some other projects.
[17:34]And then an old friend of mine, Margaret Ables,
[17:36]who had been head of video at Nick Mom,
[17:39]Nickelodeon had a channel called Nick Mom.
[17:41]Do you remember that?
[17:42]Yeah, for a while.
[17:43]Yep, I do remember.
[17:44]And she was with that and then that ended.
[17:45]And she called me and said, let's let's have coffee.
[17:50]And we went out for coffee.
[17:52]And she said, so I had to say,
[17:53]do you like, what do you think if,
[17:54]why don't I cut you a podcast with me?
[17:56]And it's like a punchline now,
[17:58]but at that time I was like a podcast.
[18:01]So I listened to cereal and that was about it.
[18:05]And thought about it.
[18:06]And I had been sort of like telling myself
[18:08]in the universe, like I'm tired of working by myself.
[18:10]I'm tired of working on a book that didn't sell.
[18:12]I want to collaborate.
[18:13]I'm going to work with somebody and I had a collaboration
[18:15]with a guy that just didn't work for me
[18:17]because I ended up, we were doing what he wanted to do
[18:19]more than what I wanted to do, which is all on me.
[18:21]But I was like, my next collaboration
[18:22]is going to be with a female and something I want to do.
[18:26]And then this kind of, what do you think
[18:28]if we tried a podcast together?
[18:29]And I said, okay, you know, when we bought microphones
[18:32]and figured it out.
[18:33]And when we started, so we have about 400 episodes now.
[18:36]When we started, I did not know her kids' names or ages
[18:40]at a vague sense.
[18:41]But it's funny now because people assume,
[18:43]like she started a podcast with your best friends.
[18:45]And she's become, of course, one of my best friends.
[18:48]But at the time when we started,
[18:51]it was almost like we were interviewing each other,
[18:54]like we're talking to each other right now.
[18:55]And I think it really helped the show
[18:58]because we would pick a topic.
[19:01]Should you help kids with their homework?
[19:02]Or should you just throw up your hands
[19:04]and let them not finish?
[19:06]And we would sit down to record.
[19:07]And I really wasn't sure what she was going to say.
[19:09]Now I could probably pick pretty well.
[19:11]and vice versa.
[19:12]But at the time, I had no idea what she would say.
[19:14]And I just meant it kept it very fresh,
[19:17]the conversations kept, what fresh hell fresh?
[19:20]What fresh hell fresh?
[19:21]Yeah, what fresh hell is something that Dorothy Parker
[19:23]used to say when she was a humorous to about 100 years ago,
[19:26]she died.
[19:27]But she used to answer the telephone
[19:30]or the door supposedly and say what fresh hell is this.
[19:34]And Margaret's mom, who died a couple of years ago,
[19:37]she used to say that, you know,
[19:39]walking around her in 1970s, you know,
[19:41]cuckoo life with four little kids at home.
[19:43]What fresh hell is this when she walked around the corner?
[19:45]So when Margaret came to me that day and said,
[19:47]I think we should start a podcast.
[19:49]And I think it should be called
[19:50]what fresh hell laughing in the face of motherhood.
[19:52]I mean, it really happens like that, right?
[19:54]But you're just, the first title is the title.
[19:56]And I'm like, okay, sounds good.
[19:58]We never look back.
[19:59]I love it.
[20:00]Wait, so whatever happened with your book for seven to 14 year olds, I happen to have
[20:03]four of us right now. It's sitting on the shelf. I mean, I didn't write the manuscript,
[20:08]I have the proposal. So it's sitting on the shelf and it's funny because now, of course,
[20:12]I would probably write something a little different. If I was going to write it out because,
[20:16]of course, now I do have the perspective of a 19 year old. At the time, I was really writing from,
[20:21]I'm not ready to teach them how to drive. I'm not ready to have them even next. I'm not ready
[20:26]to talk to my kids about sex, you know, and of course, now I've done all those things.
[20:30]Well, we should talk with, if you have, I don't know, I mean, I'm writing Zippy books and I'd love
[20:36]to write. And if you want to talk about stuff project, I would love that. That would be really cool.
[20:40]I would love it. Okay, so I'll find about that after. Amazing. So what are you working on now? You
[20:48]have the podcast. You're about to write this book for me. No, I'm kidding. Yeah. What else is going on?
[20:53]It was ready for my new parenting book. I wrote a musical in the last couple of years,
[20:57]the book for a musical. I am a somewhat musical person, but two friends of mine from Yale,
[21:03]who are much more in the musical theater world, are writing a, we're writing a musical,
[21:08]sort of developed an idea about the wellness industry. And it was, it's a small musical about
[21:14]the wellness industry with an all female cast. And they wanted a woman to write the book. In other
[21:21]words, the scenes of the musical when everything happens when they're not singing. And they came to
[21:25]me. And I said, I don't, I would love to do this. I haven't really done this before. And they're like,
[21:32]don't worry. We'll teach you. So it's in process. It's just getting ready for it. Sort of it's first,
[21:38]it's done. It's ready for its first readings, which in a play is like, it's done. It's done enough to
[21:43]do it full out, full through around a table, right? And then you say like, Oh, this, that part
[21:48]doesn't work at all. And this thing doesn't come across. We're ready for that. So I'm really
[21:51]excited for those next steps. And I, and I really do like collaborating. I like working with,
[21:57]with partners. It's, there's accountability. There's also immediate feedback. You can tell if
[22:02]what you're doing is working. Yes. I think it's finding the right partner for a show for a team.
[22:08]Yeah. And then it's can be amazing. And then the podcast itself. So, so our podcast has been around
[22:14]for five years. We started a podcast sort of under our umbrella for younger kids called
[22:19]Tyler Perigatory. That came out that launched in the spring of last year, not still around.
[22:23]So we're ever seeing that. And we have the sort of kernel of an idea that we're going to start
[22:28]bringing more podcasts under our wing and run their advertising. Because there is a real burgeoning
[22:35]opportunity in podcast advertising. And not just for the, like, of course there is for Joe Rogan,
[22:39]but there's a lot of smaller independent podcasters who are women who have an all woman
[22:46]listening audience. I'm sure yours is largely female, not all female, but largely. And that's
[22:52]an incredible advantage in podcasting to have the demographic, your listeners be the people who
[22:58]advertisers want to reach the most. So I'm becoming like a podcast advertising nerd, which I
[23:03]couldn't have foreseen, but I love it. It's really interesting. Is your show on a network now? No,
[23:08]we sort of our own network and we work with them to these different agencies. And so we have
[23:12]resisted being becoming part of a larger network. Because we're doing it. It's working. It's working
[23:18]with how about the network. Yeah. That's amazing. I'm on the ACAS network, which I love. But for the
[23:23]first three years or something, I did it myself. You did yourself. It's a lot of work. And it is
[23:29]nice to have, yeah, there is nice to sort of hand it over. But yeah, we're realizing that having
[23:34]having a group of people that that reach moms, you know, it's funny because the parenting book,
[23:40]like writing parenting or creating content about parenting, I think is so crucial. And I love the
[23:46]connections we make with each of our listeners. It's harder to make that seem relevant or important
[23:52]to the larger world, right? Like it's sort of in a very narrow column, I think. And so that can be
[24:00]frustrating. Like you can't get, you can't get the larger world to pay attention to because it's
[24:03]just a parenting podcast. Therefore, it must not be very good, right? It must be a bunch of mommy's
[24:08]complaining. But it is in the advertising that I found out that no, actually, I mean, I know we
[24:13]make a good product. And actually, we're reaching really moms or moms are important. Moms are
[24:19]powerful. And by by honing our content, just for moms, we're, we're making something more powerful,
[24:24]not less. That's exciting. So I got advice when I started my podcast about how limiting it would
[24:29]be that I had the word moms in it. And I was like, I mean, if I could cover that entire demographic,
[24:34]I would feel good about myself. I mean, there's a lot of moms. I mean, of course, my show is not just
[24:38]for moms, much less, I think than yours. Like, yeah, really, that's just sort of the platform. And
[24:43]but I was like, yeah, I'm cool with that. I, you know, there are a lot of moms out there.
[24:48]Right. Who are looking for connection and content and something that's just for us and
[24:51]and somebody to say, I know, I see you. I know exactly what you're doing. And then I think, yeah,
[24:55]I think there's a lot of a lot of worth and value in that. I agree. Yeah. Similar strategies here.
[25:02]What advice would you give to aspiring authors? I guess like so, so I had this, the book that I wrote
[25:08]is sort of a memoir, you know, funny with the point. Everything I try to do is funny with the point.
[25:13]It isn't just comedy and it isn't, you know, reported nonfiction. But you're getting something out of it.
[25:18]And back in the day, when I was a full-time performer and I was writing solo shows,
[25:23]I always wrote my own material because that was how I got somewhere. That's how I got agents and
[25:26]people to see me. And so I wrote a solo show, not my below an earlier one called a cookie full of
[25:32]arsenic. And it was in the HBO comedy arts festival in Aspen, which was amazing. And then HBO gave
[25:40]me like a first look deal for two years and stuff. And I was working on something else. So I was
[25:46]creating ideas to pitch. And I said, well, I'm from a small town, you know, I'm from Scranton,
[25:51]Pennsylvania, which is sort of a typical small town. It's kind of quirky and interesting. It really
[25:55]shaped who I am. And I think I spent a lot of time, you know, trying to like not seem like I'm from
[26:01]Scranton. But of course I am. And you know, I think there's something universal in that, I guess.
[26:06]And I guess, you know, this HBO executive was like, okay, why are you telling me this? He said,
[26:13]usually when I go to see one person shows the difference between the ones that are indulgent and the
[26:17]ones that are affecting, is that they know why they're telling me this. So why are you telling me
[26:23]you're from Scranton? Why are you, you know, telling me that mothers are sold their own insufficiency.
[26:30]So they buy more things. I think that has really helped me. And that's become sort of the guiding
[26:34]principle for when I write. So it isn't just like motherhood is crazy. And here's some essays about
[26:39]how motherhood is crazy. Like, yes, why are you telling me this? If you can answer that question
[26:45]and you're writing, then it's ready, then it's ready to be to be written or to be pitched or
[26:49]whatever. I love that. Why are you telling me this? That's great. Great advice.
[26:55]I'm going to apply that to my own right. I'm like, I don't why am I telling people is that right?
[27:00]Right. I know it's right. You really have to unpack it. It's not something you can answer in
[27:04]a day. But I think it has made the stuff that I do better. This musical or this book or whatever,
[27:09]I can answer that question. And so hopefully that makes it more worthy of somebody's time if they
[27:13]they pick it up. I think it's different for fiction. Yeah. Yeah. Although even fiction,
[27:17]I suppose that that's probably true. I wrote one novel and it just didn't really work. What I
[27:23]learned from writing a novel is that writing a novel is really hard. And it's not for everyone.
[27:27]Yeah. I learned that too. Life is long. So who knows? It's off to you, novelist.
[27:33]Well, failed novel. Amy, thank you so much. This was so much fun. And thanks. I really appreciate
[27:38]you coming on. And thanks, everybody. I have to find you where you on Instagram and I'll be
[27:42]yeah. All right. So yeah, what freshhellpodcast.com is where you can find my podcasts. You can
[27:47]listen to it anywhere. You listen to podcasts. That's our website where you can find all the players.
[27:52]And we are on all the social media as at what freshhell cast, except on Twitter where we're what
[27:57]fresh media. Okay. Amazing. All right. Thank you, Amy. Thanks, Evie. All right. Have a great day.
[28:04]Thanks for listening to this episode of moms. Don't have time to read books. Don't forget to
[28:09]follow me on Instagram at zebioans and at moms. Don't have time to read books. Also sign up for
[28:14]my newsletter at zebioans.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on zoom
[28:19]every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan. Heck, texture sound for the sound editing.
[28:24]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.