Maternal Wealth Podcast - Own Your Birth
The Maternal Wealth Podcast creates a collective space for sharing all birth-related stories. I want to acknowledge birth's uniqueness, honor its variations, and remind us of the power we hold in giving birth.
As a Labor and Delivery Nurse, I see the impact of our stories. Let's share those stories with those who come after us to prepare them for what's to come. For those who came before us, allowing them to reminisce and heal as we realize we were not alone in our experiences.
Maternal Wealth is currently streaming in twenty-five countries: New Zealand, Australia, Slovakia, Canada, Finland, South Africa, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Rwanda, Poland, India, Sweden, Germany, Puerto Rico, China, Italy, Denmark, Brazil, Indonesia, Vietnam, Spain, Greenland, Cyprus, Tanzania and the United States.
Maternal Wealth Podcast - Own Your Birth
The Mental Load: Sharing Parental Responsibilities from Pregnancy to Postpartum
Parenthood's invisible work begins long before birth. In this eye-opening conversation with Paige Connell (SheIsAPaigeTurner), we explore how the mental load of motherhood silently shapes women's experiences from conception through pregnancy, birth, and beyond.
Paige reveals how women carry unseen responsibilities even before pregnancy—tracking ovulation, researching prenatal care, planning for conception—while these tasks rarely fall to their partners. Once pregnancy begins, the disparity widens as women download apps, research birth options, investigate childcare, and make countless preparations while simultaneously growing a human. This invisible labor continues through labor and birth, where partners often lack the knowledge to properly advocate for birthing women without specific preparation.
We examine the societal conditioning that creates this imbalance, where girls are groomed for caregiving from childhood while boys receive minimal guidance about future fatherhood. Paige shares candid insights leading to her advocacy work helping couples communicate more effectively about sharing responsibilities.
The conversation also tackles systemic barriers facing working parents, from inadequate childcare to inflexible workplaces and insufficient family leave policies that force impossible choices, particularly for mothers. Paige offers practical strategies for couples to recognize invisible labor, redistribute responsibilities more equitably, and create healthier partnership models for themselves and their children.
Ready to transform your relationship and create more balance in your home? Learn how to understand how making the invisible visible is the first step toward authentic partnership in parenthood. Follow Paige for more resources, and watch her upcoming audio course, "How to Talk to Your Partner about the Mental Load," on having productive conversations about sharing the mental load.
Music Credit
https://uppbeat.io/t/ra/cupcake
https://uppbeat.io/t/bosnow/lucky-day
https://uppbeat.io/t/soundroll/that-groove
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Welcome to the Maternal Wealth Podcast, a space for all things related to maternal health, pregnancy and beyond. I'm your host, stephanie Terrio. I'm a labor and delivery nurse and a mother to three beautiful boys. Each week, we dive into inspiring stories and expert insights to remind us of the power that you hold in childbirth and motherhood. We're here to explore the joys, the challenges and the complexities of maternal health. Every mother's journey is unique and every story deserves to be told. Please note that this podcast is for entertainment purposes only. It is not intended to replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always consult with your healthcare provider for medical guidance that is tailored to your specific needs. Are you ready? Let's get into it. Today we are doing something a little different. I have my sister, rachel Menendez, who is my partner here at Maternal Wealth, to welcome and chat with Paige Connell. I'm going to turn over the mic to Rachel to introduce our guest.
Paige Connell:Today we welcome Paige Connell, a working mom of four, who is known as SheIsAPaigeTurner on TikTok, facebook and Instagram, where she shares relatable viral content about the mental load of motherhood and advocates for childcare, paid family leave and equity in the household. She has been featured on scary mommy, the today's show, good morning America, and has worked closely with organizations like carecom, moms first, fair play care and across generations, and mother forward page has created several with organizations like Carecom, moms First, fair Play, caring, across Generations and Mother Forward. Paige has created several resources to help parents and their partners navigate conversations and learn how to take actions to help manage and alleviate the mental load of motherhood. Today, we plan to focus on how pregnancy, labor, birth and caring for a newborn pertain to the mental load and what it's like to carry the invisible work, constant planning and childcare that often falls on women, emphasizing the need for equal responsibility and partnership. Let's welcome Paige to the show.
Stephanie Theriault:Thank you so much for having me. We are so excited to have you here.
Paige Connell:We would love for you to share with our listeners what the mental load is, and when did you have that aha moment realizing this mental load inherently or systematically affects women in our society more than men. Sure.
Speaker 3:So I didn't know the word mental load probably until my fourth child was born and I think I heard it on a podcast. So to be honest, I wasn't familiar with it and didn't recognize how it was showing up in my own life for quite a while. But once I did, once I became familiar with the term, I started to kind of see how it shows up in everyday life, whether it's in just our relationships with our siblings or our friends, our parents, but most specifically our relationships with our partners. And I think the mental load in particular is a buzzword. Right now. Everybody is talking about the mental load, but I think most people think about it as it relates to their relationship with their partner and parenting, specifically Because I think parenting has a unique way of really increasing the mental load that women in particular feel, and I say that because women do a disproportionate amount of work when they have children, whether it's childcare or domestic labor, and along with that comes the mental load.
Stephanie Theriault:Considering the mental load regarding women getting pregnant, whether through choice, meaning welcome intercourse, ivf or IUI. How does the mental load affect women in the moment that they find out that they're pregnant?
Speaker 3:I actually think the mental load affects women before they find out they're pregnant. Obviously, again, talking about when it is intentional and as planned as possible, I would say most women are in charge of things like monitoring their ovulation right. They're the person talking to their OB about when is it appropriate to get off birth control and if I'm off birth control, should I be taking a prenatal. These are things that women are doing typically even before they're trying to conceive, to make sure that they can set themselves and their partner up for success in that journey. And so I think oftentimes we think about the mental load as being something that happens post birth. I actually think it happens well before pregnancy. I think women tend to be the ones responsible for navigating what that journey trying to conceive looks like, and so I think it starts there. But obviously, again, when you're pregnant, I think, especially if you're a birthing person and even if not I adopted my two older children I think it tends to fall disproportionately to women. Because there's this assumption that women inherently know and because it's our bodies, oftentimes we assume that we should take on the responsibility, right, so we're the person going to the doctor's appointments and taking the medications, we're the person with the app on our phone telling us how big our baby is and what we should be doing. We're the person asking questions and doing research on doulas or midwives.
Speaker 3:Typically, women are doing that, and it's not that men are not capable of participating in that, but oftentimes I think we've positioned it as something that women inherently know how to do, that we're just good at it, and that our bodies know what to do.
Speaker 3:So, therefore, we must know what to do too. And what I know to be true from my own experiences is the second I became pregnant. I was asking everyone I knew who had been pregnant before me a million questions, and I was researching online and I was downloading the apps and I was talking to my doctor and even towards the end of pregnancy, I was checking my blood pressure. I was doing all of these things, and this work is not nothing right. It adds up and a lot of it is invisible. It's that researching, it's that behind the scenes work that tends to happen, and I think it's really important that we acknowledge that and address how our partners can participate in that work, because I actually think this is a huge part of preparing our partners for what parenting is like, because so much of parenting is gathering knowledge and information and building community, and so often that falls to women.
Stephanie Theriault:So much of what you're saying resonates with me and when I'm interviewing other women for the podcast, I also have three children and in my work with the patients and seeing all the preparation that goes into just getting to the point of delivering a child showing up at the hospital, there's so much that goes into it that I think even when I'm in the room with my patients, the partner doesn't even realize all the work that women have done to get to that point to be where they are ready to birth their children.
Speaker 3:Yeah, 100%. I think so often our partners are sometimes clueless, right Even going into the hospital. They don't know what's in our baby bag. They know what's in theirs, but they don't know what's in ours. They don't know why we're packing diapers and ice packs. They don't know that.
Speaker 3:But that is stuff that women spend so much time learning and trying to understand. And I think if you're in a relationship where you have a partner and they're participating, they're going to be at the hospital with you or wherever you're birthing. It's important for them to understand that and to know and to be a participant. And my husband didn't know any of that going into the hospital. He knew it coming out, that's for sure, and was super helpful and hands-on when we were there. But wouldn't it have been nice if he also was researching what will my wife need in the hospital after birth? Wouldn't it have been nice if he had been researching what happens if she ultimately ends up with a C-section? What will she need? What will her care look like? I was doing that work right?
Speaker 3:And I think so often again, we place this burden on women and birthing people because we say, hey, you're the person with the baby in your belly, you have to do this right and it falls to you when, in reality, we can both be doing this work and we can be having conversations about it and talking about how to support one another. And that is the mental load, that invisible work that we're doing to prepare. And it's not nothing. It can be a lot and it can be incredibly stressful, I think, especially when you're having your first, it's stressful, but even with the second, third, I think about things you know you were talking about preparing to get to the hospital. It's like who's watching our kids? What do we need to tell daycare? Does daycare have the right person listed for pickup? How do we make sure that if tomorrow I go into labor, everything is good for our other children? That is a lot of work, and so I think oftentimes we just don't recognize how much these little things truly add up.
Stephanie Theriault:Coming from the perspective of a labor and delivery nurse, I feel like everything that we're talking about about the invisible mental load also contributes to what I'm seeing as an uptick of women who are choosing pregnancy and parenthood without a partner. Yeah, absolutely. Do you also believe that this could be attributed to the invisible mental load? Doing it alone specifically yeah, so women who are choosing IVF, they're choosing IUI, they're choosing to be a parent, to be a mother and have children without a partner.
Speaker 3:I like to say this Everyone has the mental load, right. It just looks different depending on your situation Whether you have kids, you don't have kids. How many kids do you have? Do you have a partner? Don't you have a partner? What kind of support system do you have? Right?
Speaker 3:In some instances this might sound crazy, but a woman with a husband might have more mental load than a solo parent, because not only are they preparing for a child, they're doing the work for another person, and sometimes, when you talk to women, they. And sometimes, when you talk to women, they say, honestly, the most exhausting thing is my husband, not the kids, not all that stuff, it's him and the amount of work that he adds to my plate. And now, that's a somewhat cynical view and I don't think that's the case of most men, right, but I think that is aversion, right. But when you're a solo parent, I've definitely heard from a lot of single moms in particular who say you know, yes, I have this same mental load, I have these same problems, but it really depends on your village, right? Do you have support? What does that support look like? Both paid, outsourced support, but also a village that maybe you've created, and sometimes that can alleviate the mental load. Sometimes it doesn't. I think it's really just a different version. I think in both scenarios there's a lot of work involved and a lot of mental load, but I do think there, systemically and logistically, it's a lot of work to be a single parent. It is a ton of work and you don't have that secondary person to fall back on if you get the flu and say, hey, you've got the kids tonight. You don't have that, or maybe you do in the form of a village. I think it just really depends.
Speaker 3:And I imagine that most people who go into solo parenting or choosing to parent on their own have these conversations with themselves about okay, what do I need? And I think the hard part is I don't know how you all feel. But I think the hardest part is we don't know what we don't know. So so much of this happens and we go oh my gosh, I wish I'd known this before. You know, I had kids and I would have prepared differently, I would have had different conversations. And that's the tricky part about all of this, especially as parents. There's just some things you will never know until you are a parent. You just can't possibly understand it.
Stephanie Theriault:I agree a hundred percent.
Paige Connell:And just related to what you were just saying, I think it's great that we have this access to like social media and accounts like yours, where people who have kind of gone through this already and you're sharing this information with people.
Paige Connell:Like you say, we're doing the research, but we have I feel like we have so much more information now than we used to, where we know these terms like the mental load and visible labor, so we want to find out how that's going to affect our lives, and so they find pages like yours, talk about it and break it down Like this is what to expect, this is what I'm going through, and I think that's really helpful for people where, even when they get to that point, they're going to be going through their own you know issues and things that they have to get through, but at least they have these resources that can they can be like okay, this is what I can do, this is what I can rely on, this is what I can do moving forward. So I think it's really helpful for people to have that information available. So thank you for sharing that information. I know you've had a lot going on, so it's great that you've been able to get that out there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think it's. You know, a lot of times when you talk to women in particular about their experience of parenthood, they will say you know, I was really angry, I felt like nobody told me the truth, nobody told me the reality. And there's often this idea that like we can't really tell expecting parents the truth because we'll scare them, right Like we'll scare them. And I think I even saw a comedy bit once from a comedian. It was a man who was like oh yeah, parents are always like come on, do it, it'll be so fun. And then when you do, they're like ha ha ha, we tricked you, you're in it now with us.
Speaker 3:And it's like we kind of sugarcoat it sometimes to new expecting parents. And I don't think that's fair. I don't think we should scare anyone or give worst case scenarios, but I think by sugarcoating the experience specifically I think about postpartum and what that can feel like and all the emotions tied to it and also the impact on your marriage or relationships by sugarcoating those things, we set people up to fail and we set people up to feel like individually they did something wrong or they didn't do enough research or they didn't pick the right partner. And so often most of our struggles are a result of systemic issues, societal conditioning and expectations and the fact that we just don't talk about it. And we don't talk about it because we're afraid and we have shame and we don't want to.
Speaker 3:It can be embarrassing Telling your friend like hey, fyi, a week after you have a baby, you might wake up soaking wet and need to change your whole outfit and your sheets. Nobody said that to me and I wish they had. I wish somebody had said hey, this is some of the crazy stuff that might happen and if it does, it's okay. So often we keep that to ourselves and we wonder am I normal? Is this normal? And I think it can create just this cycle where we continue to encounter pregnancy and postpartum and relationships without all the information, which can be really difficult to navigate.
Paige Connell:Yeah, absolutely For sure. A lot of people that I work with they haven't had children yet. I'm just like, if they do decide to go down that path, I'm always thinking about if they come to me and they're like, tell me what it's like about having kids, and I'm like, okay, how can I present this to them in a way that's like realistic, but also I don't want to scare them either.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I mean, that's the thing. I don't think we should scare anyone, but I think you know everyone I know who's had a child or given birth. When we get together I don't know if you guys experienced this like I will meet a mom at the park for the first time and she'll be telling me about her hemorrhoids and we're just like talking because it's like, once you've done it, you're like, okay, we need, and you're talking to someone else who's done it. You're like, okay, let's talk about it, cause that was crazy.
Speaker 3:And I feel like I find that people on the other side of birth tend to share information with each other, but they don't tend to share it with people who are expecting, necessarily, and so it's like, behind the smoke and mirrors of it, all right and yeah, I don't think we want to scare anyone and I would never want anybody to feel like that, but I do want people to feel prepared and I wish I had been more prepared for certain aspects of pregnancy and birth and postpartum, and I'm not blaming anyone. I just think that nobody really told me and I didn't see it online and I tried to stay away from the scary baby boards and so it was really eye-opening to actually walk through it myself, and I think it's just important that we have that perspective as we proceed together.
Paige Connell:Yeah, no, absolutely. I definitely agree on that.
Stephanie Theriault:We paused this episode for a quick message from our sponsor. At Maternal Wealth. We aim to ensure that you have access to the best and the most appropriate care. That's why we created a Maternal Healthcare Provider Database. Maternal health providers can easily create profiles to promote their services and business, helping to increase access for those seeking their care. This is a one-of-a-kind database that offers a new and exciting way for women to search for and find maternal health providers near them and tailored to their specific needs. Profiles feature badges that highlight various services, such as TODAC, friendly practices, all female practices, LGBTQAI plus inclusivity, language options, access to vaginal breach services and more.
Paige Connell:How does the invisible mental load affect women during their pregnancy? So we can even break it down by trimesters. Do you think that the invisible mental load during the first trimester looks different from the second trimester or even the third?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I think it's important to say what the mental load is. So the mental load is often invisible, and so you might call it invisible labor, but it also has things involved like cognitive labor or emotional labor, and so those are the things we've talked about, right, the researching, the managing and monitoring, right, like, do I feel a kick? Do I not feel a kick? Am I kick counting or not kick counting? Right, like all of these things that we have to be thinking about throughout our days doing research, whether it's like on the best hospital, or what kind of methods you want to use after, are you breastfeeding or not breastfeeding. All of these things tend to fall to women. But I think also another portion that often doesn't get acknowledged as often is the emotional labor involved and the work of managing your emotions and your partner's emotions, and that's a big part of pregnancy, I think, is that there's a lot of unknowns, and, especially for anyone who's experienced any kind of pregnancy loss, I think there's a huge amount of emotional labor that goes into the mental load during pregnancy.
Speaker 3:As a person myself, I had two pregnancy losses and then ultimately did IVF, my first successful pregnancy. I remember feeling crazy anxious, yes, pretty much the entire time. I never felt like I felt quote unquote what I used to tell my therapist I don't feel safe, I don't feel like she's safe and I don't feel like I'm safe. And I felt that way the entire time, and so I was constantly trying to manage my emotions, too, where it was like, don't be stressed, you'll hurt the baby, but then being stressed because I was worried about the baby, and it was this whole experience that I think oftentimes, unless you've kind of gone through that experience, it can be really hard to recognize how much work that is right that took a mental toll on me, and so not only was I constantly researching and learning and building out plans, but I was also managing all of these big emotions and also planning for what our future was going to look like.
Speaker 3:Looking into daycares, right. So every trimester obviously brings something different, but I think there's also real work, right. It's like who's buying or planning the registry, who's getting on a daycare waitlist or interviewing nannies, who's doing this work, who's consulting with the state to make sure we're going to be able to get paid leave. All of that is also a ton of work that tends to come along with being a pregnant person, or just an expecting parent, and so that work, too, cannot be discounted. That is a ton of work and adds a layer of stress and complexity to an already really busy time of life.
Stephanie Theriault:I want to talk about the mental load, the invisible mental load, when we go into labor, wherever we choose to deliver, whether it's in the hospital, in a birth center, at home. Often I see this hands-off approach when it comes to the partner at the bedside. When the woman is in labor and I think about how the mental load is for laboring right, she has to be in the zone, she has to be in a safe space, and men are asking me, or partners, male partners, are asking how can I support her, what can I do? And for me I can guide and help. But it's also a little bit frustrating because I think that this question should have been asked before the moment of labor has begun. What kind of advice do you have for partners to help prepare outside of, like a birthing class or a mom's class for male partners to prepare to support women in the act of labor and birth?
Speaker 3:So I'm definitely not an expert on this, but I think you know, at least not in birth. I've only done it twice. So I will say from my experience to your point I think I wish more men were reading the books. I wish more men were following accounts. I wish more men were asking questions and coming to appointments. I wish more men were having conversations with their partner about what they want and what they don't want. Right, at what point are you comfortable with an epidural versus not right? What do you need from me when it comes to advocacy? How do I advocate for your needs when you can't right? Because I think I jokingly tell people like I pushed for like four and a half hours.
Speaker 3:I blacked that out. I don't remember it. I don't In the moment. I remember opening my eyes at one point and being like how long has it been? And my husband's like a wow, but I don't remember physically being present.
Speaker 3:I was really in it because there's so much happening and I knew that I could trust my husband to advocate for me. And my husband was actually incredibly hands-on the entire birth. But I think, knowing that if I'm not capable of answering a question, he is and he can advocate for me and tell them what I want and what I don't want and I think that is a huge part of it too, and understanding like, okay, a lot of women know, depending on the hospital, like some hospitals are going to tell you you can't eat, but you can talk to them about when you do want to eat and why you want to eat or what that looks like, right. And so I don't think as many men are knowledgeable on that part of it, right, about kind of what a patient's rights are. And I even learned, like you can request a different nurse. You can be like no, this isn't working, I need a different nurse.
Speaker 3:And I don't think men are doing the work to prepare for those situations beforehand. And I really wish couples in particular would kind of sit down and hash out this plan and say, okay, if this happens, we do this, if this happens, we do this, and if the unexpected happens, which it often does, let's talk about how we want to think about the end goal. So I really just think it's really just about working together. I think, again, we really assume that women are just going to lead the charge on this and that birthing people are just going to lead the charge and men are going to take a backseat, and I don't think they have to. I don't think they have to take a backseat. I think they can come to the table and say, hey, I've been doing some research and what do you think about this? And having them know like, yeah, nope, she doesn't want to push on her back, she wants to push this way. Being able to have those conversations and have men be just as knowledgeable as women are, would be hugely impactful in supporting a partner.
Stephanie Theriault:These conversations are also so important to have to discuss what is wanted for the baby once the baby's born. So knowing what the mom wants. Does the mom want a breastfeed? Does the mom want a bottle feed? What medications are you okay with or not okay with? So, if the mom is not in a state where she can really make those decisions, knowing ahead of time what, as a couple, you want for the baby, yeah for sure.
Speaker 3:I mean, I had a really complicated first birth and I ended up in the OR immediately after my daughter was born and so my husband was left alone with the baby and he was like, first off, that was like the scariest moment of my life. And I was with this baby and I was like, uh, and they're like, well, what is she trying to do? Is she trying to breastfeed? Is she doing formula? And he we had talked about it so he knew, um, but he was like, yeah, the nurses were all asking me, right, and so I think it is important for them to know do you want the medication on their eyes or not? Right, do you want to do those things?
Speaker 3:I think a lot of people maybe don't have those in-depth conversations with their partners and sometimes you know, we don't know. Again, we don't know what we don't know. But a lot of people are doing that research beforehand and a lot of women know the answers to those questions and a lot of men don't. And I think that's the missing piece and this continues often into, you know, parenting these newborn babies. I even think in the hospital, a lot of times women will tell you like every time the nurse comes into the room, they say mom, how's the baby? But they don't say dad, how's the baby? Right, like again, this responsibility is placed on mom, even though mom is also recovering. And so why aren't we saying to the dad oh, when's the last time the baby ate? And letting mom rest, for example, like let her take a beat and ask dad that question? All of these things with the mental load and these kind of disparities between men and women, I think happened so very early on.
Paige Connell:I saw on your site that next month April 2025, you are releasing an audio course about how to have productive conversations with your partner, about sharing the mental load. You've talked about the imbalance of the mental load with your husband, especially when it reached the point where you are considering divorce, which I'm sure was a very difficult time. Could you share with us how the new course will help guide women who find themselves in a similar situation to have a healthy and productive conversation with their partner, particularly during the newborn and postpartum phase, or any other phase that you would like to talk about?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So I think this is actually a course you can take really at any point in a relationship, and my goal here I like to be clear about this I'm not this magic tool that will save every marriage, but what I want it to be is a tool to help you have these conversations, to have productive conversations with your partner about the mental load, because I think what often happens is the mental load is kind of like a snowball right it's rolling down a hill and as it does it picks up snow and it gets bigger and bigger and faster and faster, and one day you look and the snowball is now a snowman or a massive boulder right of snow. And that is how I think about the mental load. It is typically not something that feels heavy overnight. It adds up over time and I think kids in particular really tip the scales when it comes to the mental load. And, like we said earlier in this conversation, I think oftentimes we're told that this is kind of an individual issue that we have to solve and that ignores the reality is that there are so many things, you know, from societal conditioning and expectations to systemic barriers like the lack of paid parental leave and the lack of affordable childcare. All of these things, I think, play into how the mental load works in a relationship specifically between a man and a woman, but just in general. And so having these conversations can bring up a lot of emotions, and I think the number one thing you'll hear from women in particular is that they feel resentful of their partner and you often hear this too in having a newborn. And women will say it's like my whole life changed and his didn't at all. And they'll say because it's like my body changed, everything about my life has changed and it feels like his life is mostly unchanged. And I think that is something a lot of women feel when it comes to the mental load too.
Speaker 3:And sometimes when we bring up these conversations, we want to really address it with our partner and ultimately what happens is we just end up fighting about the laundry, for example, and we don't get to the root cause of the issue, and oftentimes it can feel like an us against them problem when it comes to the mental load. You're not doing enough, I'm doing everything, and then what men hear is you're awful, and then they get defensive, and then there's a lot of shame and then it just becomes this fight and we don't actually get anywhere. And so the goal with the course is that we build the tools and understanding to be able to articulate the mental load, to be able to make the mental load visible, because that's a big part of this conversation. It's mostly invisible, and so the person who's not responsible for it truly doesn't see it and or acknowledge it, and so it can be incredibly hard to get on the same page about what sharing that looks like. But also tools to have this conversation, ways to address common roadblocks right, like the idea that there's this common narrative that women are nagged. That is actually something that is much more complex than I think people realize, and so in the course we really do a deep dive into all the things that are at play as it pertains to the mental load. So that way we are best equipped to have a conversation with our partner that will actually be productive and will hopefully result in meaningful change.
Speaker 3:And I think one thing I will say is I think this course is helpful for anyone who wants to understand the mental load better and have conversations about it.
Speaker 3:But in order to actually change this dynamic in our relationships, we do have to have willing and able partners who are open to engaging in these conversations, because these conversations are very, very layered and there's a lot of deeply rooted ideas about ourselves and our value that we have to unpack when we have these conversations, and it can be really tricky. And so, one, I like to give people grace. But, two, I think it's really important to note that your partner can't really be dragged along through this process, but it doesn't mean it's not possible. I know a lot of men who want to be amazing dads. They want to be amazing partners, and truly, I think we've all been done a very huge disservice by the way that we've been raised and the expectations that have been placed on men and women, and specifically with parenting, I think the bar is incredibly high for moms and very low for dads. And why is that? There's so many reasons why that is, and I think it's really important that we have these conversations to unpack all of that.
Paige Connell:Well, that sounds amazing.
Paige Connell:Yeah, I think that will be really helpful for a lot of people who want to have these conversations but haven't done it in a productive way that they actually get results that they need to make their lives better and more sustainable.
Paige Connell:It reminds me a lot. I saw on your website you had talked about Fair Play. It reminds me of when that book came out I think it was five or six years ago. What a big deal it was, because it talked about this mental load and also tried to give tools and resources for people to use, about having those conversations, but also having it broken down in a way that their partner could actually see all the work that they were doing and how it needed to be distributed more evenly and to try and come up with ways to make that happen and I saw on your website that you were associated with that organization as well, or you worked with them, I believe and come up with ways to make that happen and I saw on your website that you were associated with that organization as well, or you worked with them, I believe.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm a Fair Play facilitator, so I've kind of gone through their training and I'm able to talk about the training and go into kind of how couples can navigate Fair Play. That is where I started my journey with this whole thing was Fair Play. I heard Eve Rodsky on a podcast and it really just opened my eyes to what I was experiencing, because prior to that I really couldn't articulate it, and having the words to articulate what was happening to me made all the difference. It really was such a game changer, and so I think what Eve has done with Fair Play and now the Fair Play Institute is absolutely amazing.
Speaker 3:I think it's a great jumping off point for couples and I think the game in particular is really, really helpful for navigating a way to hold ourselves accountable to this work and sharing it in a way that feels equitable, because oftentimes I think we have the best intentions and our partners will say like, yes, I'll do more, but it's too vague, it doesn't really give us tools to move forward in a way that holds both of us accountable and has structure, and I really do think we need that.
Speaker 3:Our homes are kind of like a business and Eve says as much and relationships aren't a business our partnerships with our partners and our relationships with our kids but the actual home laundry, cooking, cleaning bills, buying food, all these things it is kind of like a business and so it's important that we work together to manage it. And my goal for all couples who kind of either go through Fair Play or any of my tools is to have a marriage where things are thriving, where your home runs like a well-oiled machine or company, because when it does, it gives you more time to enjoy your life. You're no longer worried about whether or not you have groceries or clean dishes. You just know that things are working. Yeah.
Paige Connell:I think that's the dream for a lot of people to have a happy, healthy home and it's nice that there's tools out there that people can utilize to get to that point. You did talk about how the bar is so high for moms, but I also see on your social media you talk a lot about how society is just not set up for working mothers, which I think you also touched on earlier as well, and you're a working parent. Stephanie and I are working parents too, so we understand what it's like being in the thick of it. Do you want to talk a little bit more about why the society is just not set up for working parents at this time?
Speaker 3:Yeah, sure, I mean I think overall. You know our society was built with the idea that there would be somebody at home doing the unpaid labor to manage a home and to raise kids, and even though that's not rooted in any kind of reality, I like to call that out. Women have always worked, most women have always worked, but there's this narrative that you know historically they didn't. But our workplaces in particular are not set up in a way that is conducive to raising children in this current world. School days typically my kids go to school from 9 to 3. Most work days go from 9 to 5. So what does that mean? I either need after-school care or a nanny, or I need to adjust my work hours or cut back at the office. A lot of people only get 5 sick days. My kids have been sick probably 25 days so far this year, and so there's not enough sick time for parents to recover if they get sick, but to care for their own children.
Speaker 3:Our daycares, and childcare in particular in this country, are incredibly expensive. It is a privatized industry as opposed to social infrastructure, like many of our peer countries, and so families are paying astronomical amounts of money for childcare, and not only is it unaffordable? It's inaccessible. You often can't find safe childcare that you can afford, and so this disproportionately impacts women, who end up leaving the workforce. Women are twice as likely to leave the workforce or adjust their careers to accommodate for the lack of childcare or childcare gaps than men. We also just don't have things like paid leave as simple as that. It makes it incredibly difficult for people to have children and maintain a career because they can't afford to take unpaid time and they also can't go back with a two-week-old baby because there's no childcare for a two-week-old baby, and nor do they want to, nor should they Systemically. The lack of paid leave, the lack of affordable childcare, disproportionately impacts women. But even when our kids get older, the public school calendar or school age calendars are not conducive to having two working parents. You almost need somebody with a flexible job or arrangement or enough money to be able to outsource childcare at that age.
Speaker 3:I'm even thinking about my life right now.
Speaker 3:My kids next week have two half days in a row Wednesday and Thursday for parent-teacher conferences, and then the following week they have Monday off. So in one week, basically within seven days there are three days where I need to accommodate additional childcare, which would mean I need to either take half days from work or work from home with my kids or find childcare for them, and so a lot of working mothers in particular are really burned out and stressed because they are navigating all of this work and because of the societal conditioning that has basically said like this is mom's job, they are the ones doing this work or they tend to be the ones doing this work, and so I think it's really important that, as we have these conversations, we kind of look at the systems in place, look at these workplaces that really lack flexibility in order to be able to raise kids. These days, families do need more in way of flexible workplaces, in way of support, in way of sick time and paid leave. All of these things are incredibly important.
Stephanie Theriault:Earlier you mentioned, society has done a disservice to men and I appreciate taking the moment to acknowledge that there are men who want to be equitable partners, help in a more equitable way, to decrease the mental load, to share that mental load, and thinking about women who want to have the conversation, women who want to go to your course and learn more about how to have the conversation with their partners. What advice would you give to men who are listening to your message, who are listening to the podcast about breaking down that wall? I think there's this wall up that they're guarded and they're offended that we're even bringing it up. What message would you give to them to take a step back and listen and kind of start breaking down that wall so they can be the partner that they want to be and that their wife wants them to be.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I think it's really important that, again, we look at all the expectations and conditioning at play. I think a lot of men have been taught that in order to be a good man, a good husband, a good father, you have to be a provider, you have to be a protector. And what does it mean to be a good provider? I think most men associate that with having a good income right, having a good job. What's it mean to be a good dad? It means to be the fun guy. Right, like your kids, like you, they enjoy spending time with you. You're at dinner time with them, you show up at the soccer game.
Speaker 3:But I really encourage men to look at the double standards that exist between men and women and really analyze them. Right, most women these days are working, so they are also providing financially. Yet women are expected to do the daily grind of cooking and cleaning and laundry and all of these things that make the home function and are essentially kind of like a symptom of having children. Right, like laundry is not parenting, right, it's not really a part of parenting. It's a symptom of having children, for sure, and it's chores, but it really doesn't have anything to do with our relationship with our kids, and so I encourage men to one view themselves as more than a paycheck, more than a protector, and to expand on what those things mean. You can provide emotional support for your family, right. You can provide care for your family, and I think a lot of men believe that women are just inherently better at this stuff, right. A lot of women will hear that, like you're just better at getting the baby to sleep, you're just better at getting the baby to stop crying. Well, oftentimes women aren't just better at that. They've worked really hard at figuring that out, and I think it's also important to know and to acknowledge that as women in particular, right, I don't know about you all, but I was babysitting at a very young age.
Speaker 3:I had been kind of taught that it was normal for me to engage in care work, to take care of my little brother, to babysit neighborhood kids, to take child development courses in high school. I worked in a daycare in high school and all the way through college I had spent a lot of time with kids before I even had kids, and still that did not prepare me for parenthood in any way, shape or form, but I had an idea of what it looked like to take care of children, and as women, we do often talk to each other but also have been told from a very young age that part of our life is being a good wife and a good mother. When you're little, they're like how many kids do you want? When you're older, paige, and it's like I don't know. I'm six, I don't know how many kids I want, but those are questions little girls get. They read the Babysitter's Club. These are all ways that we're conditioned to be mothers from a very young age.
Speaker 3:And I think men, when you ask them because I have asked this on my platform before I've said men, what did people tell you about being a dad? Like, what did people tell you? And a lot of them say nothing. Nobody told me anything. They're like I learned by watching my dad or watching my uncle, or I saw some of my friends, but nobody really told me anything. Like nobody sat me down and we didn't like over beers, talk about fatherhood, and I think women have a very different experience of that Right and I think it's the way it's positioned too.
Speaker 3:We often tell women like your greatest accomplishment is going to be being a mother, right, and your children, and we don't tell men that we're like you are going to. Your accomplishments are your career and how much money you earn and the life you provide for your family, and I think it just really puts men in a box that is harmful to them, and so I think, if they're in a position where their partner is coming to them, I think it's important not to take it so personally and to think like, actually, this problem is bigger than me and, yeah, I've fallen into this box, but I don't have to stay in it and I can get out of this box and I can change and I can be different, and I think that is really freeing to be like I can be a good dad, I can be the person to make their lunch, I can know where their favorite stuffy is right, all of these things have value, and I think it's so important that men participate in this work, because it's not just important for your partner, for you to share in this work, but it's important for your kids, right? A lot of men will say I don't need to know the teacher's name, but my pushback on that is why wouldn't you want to know? Because if you don't know your teacher's name, that means you're probably not talking to your kid, right? Because if you talk to your kid, you know who their teacher is and they're going to talk about their day at school and what they liked, what they didn't like. They're going to tell you I hate when Mrs So-and-so gives me math homework.
Speaker 3:You're going to have these conversations with your kid, and so I think it's so important to do this work and to view it not only as important for your marriage, but also important for your kids and the relationship you build with them, because I think of chores like the laundry. I learned so much about my kids from doing their laundry. I learned what their favorite clothes are because they picked them out themselves now, and so I can see dude is wearing this orange jumpsuit twice a week. He loves this thing. I know that my daughter's growing out of her leggings. I know all of this stuff because I do their laundry, and I think all of that has value, and for too, too long, we have told men that they don't provide value in caregiving and they can, and caregiving is not just a job for women. It's a job that we can all do, and it has so much value and importance great.
Paige Connell:Thank you so much for that answer. That was amazing. Was there anything else you wanted to share for the podcast that you wanted us to add to this episode that you wanted to get out there?
Speaker 3:We've touched on it, but I think if you found yourself in a position where you're carrying the mental load or you're struggling within your relationship with the mental load, I really like to remind people that it's not your fault, that if you ended up in this position.
Speaker 3:Obviously, we all have some sort of accountabilities in our lives and our relationships. But so much of this happens outside of us and I think once you understand that and you realize that it's really freeing and you can start to work on it and address it in your relationship, in your homes and eventually we can address it outside of them too. You know, that's my hope. But I think knowing that you're not alone in this is so empowering, because when you feel like you're alone in these struggles and that you're alone in these struggles and that you're alone in your experiences whether it's through pregnancy and childbirth, raising children it can be really isolating and it can feel very hard to change things. When you recognize that you're actually not alone, it gives you power. Right Power is so important and plays a vital role here, and so I hope, if nothing else, people can walk away knowing that they are not alone in this experience and that, yeah, they have the power to navigate this in a different way if they want to.
Stephanie Theriault:I love how you're saying power, because this is a recurring word. This is a recurring theme in the podcast. I talk about how conception, pregnancy, labor, postpartum period it's transformative and it transforms us in so many ways. I talk about the highs and here we're talking about difficult times and with your content, with your message, you're opening the door for couples who find themselves in the difficult postpartum period to have that conversation, to transform together as new parents and have a healthy marriage, have a healthy family in a way that we all deserve to be. So thank you for coming on the show, Thank you for sharing your message and I'm so excited for our listeners to hear this episode and to hear your story.
Speaker 3:Thank you, it was great being here.
Stephanie Theriault:Hey there, amazing listeners. If you love what we do and want to see our podcast grow, we need your help. By making a donation, you'll be supporting us and bringing you even more great content. I truly believe creating this space for women all across the globe to share their story will allow us to collectively heal, grow and become more empowered in the space that we deserve to be. Motherhood, womanhood and however that looks and feels for each and every one of us, Every contribution, big or small, will make a huge difference. If you can head over to support us today, there's a link in the bio to support the podcast. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for being a part of this journey. Thank you for listening. Be sure to check out our social media. All links are provided in the episode description. Please give us a follow. If you or someone you know would like to be a guest on the show, reach out to us via email at info at maternalwealthcom. And remember stay healthy, embrace your power and you got this Bye.