Leslie Hudson
Hi, welcome to Life After Baby. I’m your host, Leslie Hudson, from bottles to books, diapers to dorms and everything in between. Each week I interview parenting experts to help me navigate life as a new mom. So today’s guest is Hilary Sutton. She is a writer, consultant, podcast host and speaker. And she’s passionate about telling stories that are begging to be told. Hilary is the CEO of HSL digital a content marketing consultancy. She lives in DC with her husband and daughter. Thank you for joining me today. Can you tell me a little bit about yourself?
Hilary Sutton
Thank you for having me, Leslie. This is so fun. I love talking with other moms, especially, you know, work from home moms and, and moms just in this phase with a littles. So yeah, I mean, you’ve set me up really well there for sharing about myself. I live just outside of DC with my husband, and my two year old, and I have been working independently and remotely, really, for my whole career more or less. And the past, I don’t know, five plus years, I’ve really been working within like, two main focuses. One is content marketing, and freelance writing for clients. I’ve branded as HSL digital, and I work best with entrepreneurs who might not be quite ready to hire a full time marketer, but they need someone to speak into their marketing strategy to help them make sure that their website copy is sparkling.
It’s wonderful and really does speak into their strategy. So I do that with HSL Digital, there’s more information about that HSL digital.com. The other side of things is where I really explore topics that are my passion, and it’s sort of self generated content. So I have the podcast Hustle and Grace, where I interview high performing creatives and leaders on how they, how they hack, being high performing career oriented people, but also have meaningful lives outside of work. I also write about careers. I’ve contributed to lots of magazines and publications. I have a few courses too, that I have just sort of organically generated over the years. Those are around personal branding, launching a side hustle, freelancing, and things like that. So that’s, that’s pretty much me in a nutshell.
Leslie Hudson
Sure thing I would imagine, since you have been working from home for so long, and you’ve interviewed so many people on those topics? What are some strategies that you found from working from home before you had your daughter? And then afterwards that worked really well?
Hilary Sutton
Great question. For one thing, I mean, it’s interesting, because it’s like, whether you want it to be thrust into working from home or not so many of us are now. I think other people probably have figured out some of their own hacks and strategies. But for me, something that I noticed from the get go was, I had to have a dedicated workspace. So what that is for me is you’re kind of seeing it because we’re doing you know, zoom, and you’re, we’re doing like a video call. We moved into a new townhouse a couple of years ago. There is a little loft above the master bedroom, and the people who lived here before me used it to store Christmas decorations. I was like, Oh, no, like that is a great place for me to disappear and hide and have a dedicated workspace. So I have a dedicated desk and just a work area, where when I come up here, my brain knows. Now it’s time to work. And I’m also not distracted by you know, if I was sitting in the kitchen, you know, seeing like dishes pile up and hearing someone knock on the door and seeing the mailman go by and like having all these distractions. When I come here. It’s relatively distraction free. And so I noticed that from, you know, the beginning of when I started working from home, that that was helpful for me. So that’s probably my biggest takeaway. And I know it’s not possible for everybody. But for me, that’s really helped me focus and kind of have drawn some mental boundaries, right? So even though I’m at home, I feel like I’m at work and I’m able to concentrate in that way.
Leslie Hudson
I agree. I I worked in the nonprofit world for years. I have our own digital marketing company and we kind of transitioned about three years ago to work from home. My biggest thing is, you know, I like having an office, you know, door shut when I’m in there. I know I’m in work mode when he sees me there he knows, you know, don’t disturb me. I think like you said, having those boundaries. I’ve also seen, you know, even if you can’t have an office like a set area where that’s only where you work. You know, you may not, like, be able to move in and stuff, but just always keep in one place. I think that’s great advice.
Hilary Sutton
Yeah. All bets are off when it comes to COVID. So like, all the rules are being rewritten for me, because I don’t, I need maybe 10-15% of the time, a change of scenery, like, that’s why I used to really enjoy going to co-working spaces and going to work at coffee shops. I bought a standing desk from IKEA, that’s really easy to move around. And it just currently lives in the corner of our dining room. I’ll work from there, sometimes, that gets a lot more light, sometimes I have to watch my daughter while I’m doing work. I like having that standing desk option when I’m with her because she can’t, she can’t, you know, get up there and get on my computer.
I think we have to also, you know, if we’re being forced to work from home, without other options that we used to have, it’s important to, you know, look at every room in our house with fresh eyes, or every moment in our apartment with fresh eyes and see if there is there a space, it’s being underutilized? Is there a different way of looking at this, because i think, you know, if we’re doing this for the long haul, and it appears that we are, then we really do need to pay attention to those cues and the things that we naturally need to stay focused and get things done and try to adapt and and look at things creatively to to accomplish that.
Leslie Hudson
One thing we talked about before we started recording is we are both recording during nap times. And I know they’re you know, I’m sure with your interviews, you found that you know so many people have different beliefs. So there you have the people that are up at 4am. You have the night owls, you have people like us who are working around nap times. Have you found all your interviews? Does no one work for all or how do people kind of figure out what is the best workflow for them, especially with kids at home?
Hilary Sutton
Yeah, I think it’s one of those things where you have to have some real self awareness about what works for you. I actually interviewed Dan Pink a few months ago,he’s a nonfiction author, New York Times bestselling author. I was kind of a mess. I was just so nervous. But it ended up going well, but he wrote a book called “When: The Science of Perfect Timing.” He talked about how we’re all one of three groups, we’re night owls, which is you know, obviously, if you’re if you’re your sharpest in the evening, we’re larks if you’re a morning person, and then what really I am is what he called a third bird, which is someone who doesn’t want to get up at the crack of dawn and isn’t their best it’s exam, but also doesn’t want to burn the midnight oil, some someone somewhere in the middle.
He said, you know, pay attention to what time, you know, if you were completely left to your own devices, you know, take the baby out of the equation, take responsibility out of the equation, what time would you go to bed? And what time would you wake up in the morning, and, and then figure out like what that median hour is in the middle of the night, you can go onto my podcast and hear the whole thing on Hustle and Grace, but but basically, I think we need to know, in a perfect world, what time of day, we would get the most done and feel the most creative and the most productive. I know for me, in a perfect world, I would be doing a podcast like this at about 9am, but realistically, that wasn’t my option. It’s not my option during this season of life. So that’s part of being a parent period. And definitely being a parent of a small child. It’s like you just have to rise to the occasion. Like you’re not necessarily always going to be able to do things whenever is your best time of day. Sometimes you are, but sometimes you’re going to have to just rise to the occasion, just do the best that you can with what you have available. And I just think that’s part of parenting.
So I think it’s important to have awareness about when your best performing time of day is but then also give yourself grace that you know there are things outside of your control. And you know, we’re especially during this whole COVID time, you know, we’re all in this together. Everybody is not getting to do things precisely the way that they would like to so You know, I just say, have some flexibility, go with it, but also do have that self awareness to when you do get a choice to pay attention to that, and then act accordingly.
Leslie Hudson
Think also along those lines I’ve found over, especially recently, I’m really big on batching. You know, trying to have systems of, Okay, if I do social media updates on Mondays, and then I do podcast recording on Wednesdays and show notes on this day, I just found that, you know, that really helps my schedule. And I think also along your lines of once you kind of know what is the best time for you to work, I think also kind of arranging your day around those times. So if, you know, the first thing of the day, you’re not feeling creative. Maybe you don’t start that blog post, and maybe you read about your industry or tips from other people. I think it takes a while but I’m kind of figuring it out. Okay, this is like you said, This is my ideal schedule. This is also my ideal, the time of day and what I’m doing when, as much as you can, I mean, obviously things come up. But yeah, go ahead. Sorry. I just, you know, I feel like a lot of parenting and working from home, especially during this time, you don’t have to control. So trying to figure out things you can control, I think makes a huge difference.
Hilary Sutton
Oh, that’s a great point. Yeah. And the semblance of control is, is nice to have you, you just reminded me of another thought that. For me, one thing that has really worked well for me, in terms of creating a schedule and balancing that with parenting a little one is that I have, especially as a person who’s self employed, I am able to really wipe the slate clean of expected work hours, like I don’t necessarily work traditional hours. Today, I started working. I log on to talk to you at 115 in the afternoon, and I’m going to work until dinner at six, and then I’m going to put in a couple hours in the evening. I’m happy to get a few hours of work in on a Saturday afternoon or Sunday afternoon during nap time. Because for me, I mean, I was just telling someone, this yesterday, like, for me, I don’t I would be dissatisfied.
If I was just getting my daughter ready for the day in the morning. And then I didn’t see her till dinner, and then I was giving her a bath. And that was it. So for me, I would rather give up some time elsewhere. And just recognize that, you know, we’re only in this little phase of life for like a blink. And so I kind of view it as a Season of Sacrifice where I’m working strange hours, I don’t have that much time to myself. But for me, that’s a choice. And I think we all have choices to make, you know what’s best for our family? Do we want to spend money on daycare? Do we not want to spend money on daycare? Do we want to have a part time nanny, do all these different things, you know, I think that you just have to get clear on what works best for you. And also don’t operate under the assumption that it has to be a certain way, because there might be a different way to do it.
Leslie Hudson
Absolutely. I think also, you kind of mentioned a little bit about self care. And I talked quite a few times with guests here. I think a big misconception of self care is Oh, I need to be able to go to the gym and you know, take a class and then a shower afterward, when really, you know, if you have that time in your schedule, that’s great. But if it’s just a matter of you waking up, you do a five minute meditation, you have your coffee, and then you get the day going, that’s great, too. And just kind of adding those little pockets in your day of how to recharge and make yourself feel better to either keep working on a project, or hang out with your daughter. I think it’s really helpful.
Hilary Sutton
Yeah, and I think sometimes self care is just asking yourself, how can I make sure that I’m operating and coming to the day from a place of help, so I can be present with my kids and I can, you know, be present in this meeting for work, or whatever it is. So that’s going to mean different things to different people. I know for me, what I’m, if I’m not getting the sleep that I need, if I’m not eating correctly, if I’m not able to stop what I’m doing and go outside for, for a brisk walk, then I know that something is off, like things aren’t balanced correctly, and it’s going to come back and results in burnout or it’s going to, you know, come back and result in like having a short fuse with my family or whatever. So it’s important to be putting those deposits in, you know, on a daily basis on a weekly basis.
Leslie Hudson
I feel like a lot of parents are in some aspect of their life feeling burnout, whether it’s burnout, from parenting, working, or teaching from home while doing all all the above? Oh, yeah. Have you found in your interviews with guests and your own work from home experience? How to kind of balance and protect yourself from burnout?
Hilary Sutton
It’s like the million dollar question, right? I think if I’ve learned anything, it’s that you have to have self awareness. Like I keep preaching this whole conversation. Be aware of how you feel when things aren’t right. Ask yourself, Why try to, to find some moments to reflect on that. And then I think, I mean, I know that everyone doesn’t have this luxury, necessarily, but I think it’s important to ask for help, you know, whether it is I mean, you know, if you have a partner, amazing, I think a lot of time, women take on more, because, in part, they don’t want to see their partner do something wrong, like incorrectly or not up to their standards. But I think sometimes you have to just let them take ownership of something. Step back, and just be glad that they’re doing it and don’t feel like you have to micromanage or you have to fix it correct or supervise, like, I think that that, for me, that has been a big piece is just, you know, if my husband wants to get up and give my daughter breakfast and dress her, you better believe I’m not going to criticize him. Together, I’m just gonna be grateful that he did it.
I think that that is a really big piece. I think, for me, something that is really critical for me in avoiding burnout is on a regular basis, just getting away, I call them quarterly zoom outs, and it’s where I just stop, put everything on pause, like once a quarter and reflect on, you know, how has my life gone these past three months? Have I reached the career goals that I want? Am I happy with how things have been just really reflecting on the past and then strategize and journal and dream and goal set for the future. Having those moments to just get away from it all a little bit, and reflecting and planning has really been healthy for me.
I just wrote a blog post earlier this week on my blog, HillarySutton.com. And I was reflecting on how, you know, we have a little as of this recording, we have a little more than a quarter of the year left in 2020. And in January 2020 Oh, man, I had so many big goals for the year, so many big plans. And so now, I mean, September, you know, Gretchen Rubin calls it the other January, because it is like the beginning of the beginning of the school year, beginning of a big portion of the year. For me, it’s a good time to, you know, maybe set some different goals to look at the rest of the year. I just think that it’s an opportunity to really look for us this year, to look at things with clear eyes, you know, we are not going to be setting goals that we would have set back in January, because things are different. So in light of the present reality, you know, what do you want to achieve? What do you want, what kind of tone do you want to set in your home, like, we’re like I was reflecting on this and words that came up for me, we’re calm and kind, because both of those are difficult for me to do in times of stress. But I don’t want my daughter to feel like chaos and, and being short with one another is normal, I want it to set a tone of calm and kindness. For me it has been critical and I think that it’s a good time, it’s a good time to do that. So that might be something that listeners want to consider also.
Leslie Hudson
I think sometimes we get so focused on you know, jumping from project to project or with the kids from activity to activity or milestone milestone that sometimes we just are so busy that you know we’re going through the motions and maybe thinking it’s the best way when there’s other things we could be doing differently and just taking that time to reflect. I think that is a great exercise for you know when you work for yourself and for your professional life and then also kind of taking a look back and in your personal life and your family life as well. And that just says a really good exercise I’m definitely going to start doing
Hilary Sutton
I think if a whole day away or a whole weekend away or whatever sounds like too much, this is a good time for you. To practice asking your partner, if you can step away for a Saturday morning, or whatever it is a half a day, three or four hours, and let them know, just just run the ship for a little while. Or, I mean, if you don’t have a partner, it is worth setting aside money for a babysitter. So you can have this time it’s going to serve you and your family. In the long run, for sure.
Leslie Hudson
I think especially since, like you said, this is kind of a time of resetting, and especially I feel like with COVID, a lot of families are starting new traditions. I think that’s a great thing for parents to do as well. I know one of our guests. They started when their son was a baby Saturday mornings, her husband would take the kid, first kid out, and then they had a second kid. And Saturday mornings where you, Daddy and son time and mom do whatever she wants and have that serve tradition. And the kids are seven and nine now. So I love that. Yeah, I thought that was a really fun idea. And especially, I’m sure the kids you know, when they’re older, they’re going to remember, oh, Saturdays, we went to the park and we went and got doughnuts. And that’s something really special for your partner and for your kids. Give yourself that little freedom to yourself. Well, this has been a great conversation, we actually have to take a quick break after our word from our sponsor. So we’ll be right back.
So welcome back to Life After Baby. I’m your host, Leslie Hudson. I’m here with Hilary Sutton. And we are talking about working from home. And I thought since this is a time of transition, I know there are a lot of parents that feel, you know, when they have, they might have one job before the kid and it kind of evolved into something totally different afterward, or 2020 is certainly the year of pivoting. So for parents that have either they’ve had an idea for a side project for a while they already wanted to start a company or they’ve seen, you know, a business that they’re really interested in participating in, what are some things they can do to kind of jumpstart or get that idea off the ground?
Hilary Sutton
That’s a great question. I think that you’re totally right. This is like, I mean, with everything, everything is off the table, and everything is on the table right now. So I think that this is a great time to consider starting something new. I think my advice would really depend on what someone’s idea is. I would want to tailor it for them. But I mean, begin to just do some research about you know, what else is happening in the marketplace around your idea? You know, are there competitors that have a business model that’s, you know, that you could compare to yours? Are you doing something different? I think before you want anything, it’s really important to think long and hard about who your target audience or customer or client is. Get crystal clear on the solution that you’re bringing and what the problem is. That needs a solution.
I read a book earlier this summer, called “Building a Story Brand” by Donald Miller and I loved it. I mean it was basically just taking the hero’s journey. construct from film and really storytelling in general, and putting that into business. And so, you know, the customer is the hero, and you, as the person with a solution, is really the guide. So you’re Yoda and the customer is Luke Skywalker, I don’t want to get my Star Wars metaphors messed up. I think it’s really important to think about, what does your customer, the hero, want? What do they need to learn? What, what kind of new and better reality? Can you help them? So think through that, think through the problem that they have and your solution, and really try to put yourself in their shoes? Before you even write a piece of marketing copy or, or put together a business strategy?
Leslie Hudson
Absolutely, I think, you know, in the beginning, while it’s kind of hard to paint that picture, once you have it, it’s so much easier to write to one person versus shouting it, every single person that comes by and hoping that they’ll want to hear your message.
Hilary Sutton
Absolutely. And I’m the kind of person who I thrive on variety, I thrive on having lots of options. And so I struggled for a long time niching down to know who my target audience was, and my target customer client is in my content marketing business. But when I did really commit to, okay, these are the kind of people that I best serve, that makes all of my marketing, content and copy and communication, just crystal clear. So people can say, oh, my goodness, that is for me, like, I need that. And I need her to do it. Rather than, you know, marketing generalist, wherever, because it’s so important to be able to connect with a customer. Because really, if you don’t niche down and say exactly who you’re for, you’re really not for anybody.
Leslie Hudson
That makes total sense. I think also, another thing along those lines is sometimes people think, Okay, this is what my area is going to be, this is my audience, and I’m gonna do this forever. And that’s not the case we see all the time, you know, you start as, okay, you’re doing marketing, and then your specialty is email newsletters, or social media, or you start a podcast, and then you start podcast coaching and like you have done like selling courses. I think we’re kind of, we’re stepping more and more away from the traditional nine to five, these are the steps you have to take to climb the ladder, and people are kind of designing their own.
Hilary Sutton
Yeah, I think, you know, you need to be specific and clear. It doesn’t mean you can’t ever change directions or add on an offering or whatever. But you have to be specific. I mean, that’s what I tell people, when it comes to content, you know, you need to have an editorial calendar, period. If it doesn’t mean that it’s immovable, it’s not set in stone, but you have to be going somewhere, you have to be having some specific direction. You can change directions, especially in light of, you know, unexpected circumstances coming up. But you know, you’ve got to aim for something, or you won’t even, you know, be anywhere near the target.
Leslie Hudson
Yeah, absolutely. So for parents, you know, that they have their idea for their business. Do you have any favorite resources you have for people who are just kind of getting off starting off on their entrepreneurial journey, favorite resources?
Hilary Sutton
I just mentioned that building a story brand book by Donald Miller is excellent. If you are, if you would like just a little kind of a mini course to launch. I have my side hustle starter kit that you can find on Hilarysutton.com. It’s a collection of a few different resources. If you just want to learn about launching something without it, it being your whole project that you’re doing all the time. That’s a good place to start. There’s also a story brand podcast that I enjoy listening to by the same author. I like the podcast, and leadership is a great place and a great resource as well. So yeah, I mean, I could go on and on. There’s lots of great Facebook groups. There. There’s tons of professional development available, both online and in books.
Leslie Hudson
That’s one thing that started one thing that I’ve appreciated since I started working with home is is just that is there is an abundance of resources out there, whether, like there’s courses that you offer great people to follow on YouTube or, you know, podcasts, it’s just kind of figuring out, okay, this is what I want to learn more about. And I think also kind of going back to schedules of setting a time of, okay, I’ve saved all these articles, I’m going to make sure I sit down and read them now, especially seeing what like, you know, you can probably sign up for an email newsletter and learn about anything. Absolutely, yeah. I think it just been figuring out the time to actually sit down and read on and, yeah,
Hilary Sutton
I mean, one thing that has worked well for me is putting time on my calendar for a meeting with myself. Because I, you know, my calendar, my schedule, is very accessible to other people. And so if it’s a priority for me, I’ve got to carve out time on my schedule and not accept another meeting during that time. So sometimes that helps me carve out time for professional development reading.
Leslie Hudson
Like you said, you know, even though you work for yourself by having that calendar, and making sure other people can access it, I think it is a great way to protect your time and schedule. Absolutely, yeah, that’s worked well for me. So, we talked a lot about, you know, if you’re working from home, especially if you work for yourself, or you’re creating your own business, you probably don’t have traditional hours, you may be getting up really early getting work done before the kids get up. You know, Sunday nights might be your best time to work or anywhere in between. So what are some ways that people can turn off their brains when it you know, what, it’s actually time to just stop working? Or how can we make sure that we don’t end up working, you know, 70 hours a week, and more than we really should be taking on? Mac?
Hilary Sutton
Great question, I think one thing that you can do is, don’t bring your computer to bed, you know, let your bedroom be your bedroom, and not be, you know, a second workspace. If you can even leave your computer, on your desk and dedicated space, like we were talking about earlier, I think that’s really helpful. I think that’s important. Also, I think he’s setting up those routines.
Those are rituals of, you know, this is how I start my day, this is how I get started working. And then having like a power around routine is really helpful, too, because a lot of it is just wrapping things up, you know, with what’s happening in your mind.
I really need to write everything down. I plot out, read almost every hour of my day. Everything on my mind and on my to do list goes somewhere in my schedule for my day. Because if I don’t write it down, I’ll either forget it and lose it forever, or it will keep me up at night. I’ll try to organize it, you know if I wake up in the middle of the night or whatever. For me, by writing something down, putting it in its place on my computer, and my phone or whatever really helps kind of make my mind into a state of calm. Another thing that I do is before bed, I’ll write down just a couple of things that I’m grateful for about the day, you know, highlights of the day or whatever. And I’ve really noticed that that helps me get into even like a subconscious space of gratitude and peacefulness before I go to sleep, so especially during times where I have higher anxiety, if I do that, then I’m more likely somehow to sleep through the night or to feel if I do wake up in the middle of the night, that I can fall back asleep and I don’t have to be working things out. You know, in my mind overnight, things are just kind of settled. And I you know, drifted off from in a space of like positivity and thankfulness.
Leslie Hudson
There is a blogger and author called The Lazy Genius. She just had a podcast about what type of list maker that you are. I’m a big planner, and I love my to-do lists. I thought it was really interesting because she kind of took the approach of you know, people are so quick to make their to do lists, but you kind of have to think about, you know, why you’re doing it and what kind of list you want to make, because she said like, some people are the tracker. And they, like you said, write it down. They live by their to-do list. It’s kind of like their roadmap, then they have the people who are brain dumpers, and they just get it all out, write it all down, they will clear their head, and then maybe they’ll look at it. The third or the developers and they look at it, it’s not really the road, but it’s kind of an exit off a road. And if they’re using it for kind of bigger planning, I thought that was a really good point of, and she’s like, you know, you don’t have to necessarily be one of those, you could be all them, or just depending on your day and what you’re looking like, but I think, kind of, and then she also said, you know, the developers might be more inclined to use a sauna or online to do lists and stuff. Whereas, you know, trackers might be all about their analog planners. So I think it’s also just kind of a matter of, you know, reading a bunch of different things and kind of with everything we said about your planner type, or your hours, just saying, Okay, what works for me what works for my family? To make us have a great day?
Hilary Sutton
I had a manager years ago that told me that she didn’t have to do lists, she just used email to like, fire off like instructions to people or respond to people. I thought, like, what a poor way of managing, like, No wonder it felt like, very difficult to ever predict, you know, what was going on or what needed to get done, it’s just important to have some kind of system that clearly works, you know, if you’re, if you’re dropping the ball, if things are feeling chaotic, you know, maybe you need to rethink your system. But you know, everybody can have a different system, like whatever works for you. And the way that your brain functions is perfectly acceptable.
Leslie Hudson
Absolutely, I know, my husband, I have two very different ideas of systems. I’m a hardcore planner, and he’s much more of a go with the flow. Let’s take things as they come. And I’ve learned by now, after dating for so long and being married, that I have his my system, he has his I don’t try to change his eye. That’s what works for him. That’s worked for me. But there you go. And, again, recognizing what works and what doesn’t. Yes, that sounds like a very healthy, rational way of approaching it. It is most of the time. So you have given us so much fantastic information. Where can people find more about you?
Hilary Sutton
Thank you. That’s really to say, Leslie, people can connect with me at Hilary satin comm I have some free resources there. We talked about the side hustle starter kit, there’s some resources there for aspiring freelancers, a social media audit checklists that can be grabbed there, if someone wants to check in on how their social media strategy is working, and different things. I’d love for anybody to pop over and say hi,
Leslie Hudson
I know you talked about some of your favorite business resources, what have been some of your favorite parenting resources. So I started this podcast to help new parents navigate postpartum life. So if you had a time machine, and you could go back and give your pregnant self and postpartum self advice, what would it be?
Hilary Sutton
For my pregnant self, I would definitely say, don’t worry about half of the things that people are telling you to worry about. I think it’s, you know, getting pregnant in the age of social media, I felt like I had an awareness of every potential scary or challenging or difficult or painful issue that might pop up with pregnancy, everything from your nose is gonna get bigger to you’re going to get mastitis or whatever. And I realized, in retrospect, I wish there was going to be something that was going to pop up and be extra uniquely challenging to me, but it wasn’t anything that anybody had warned me about. So instead of worrying about all the things happening to you know that the vast majority of them are not, and instead, like to look for those voices of positivity, because for me, I was very fearful going into pregnancy.
It’s just interesting, you know, in retrospect, there was a lot of wasted energy there for me. So that’s certainly what I would have told my pregnant self, for postpartum, I think that I would have said, everything’s going to work out, everything’s gonna be okay. She will sleep through the night, she will sleep in her crib. She will stop crying for most of the day. She will eventually walk and run and say the word bicycle and be funny and say sing Mama, like all of those things. That stuff is coming sooner than you can imagine. So don’t let yourself get too worked up about the problem of the moment because it’s so momentary.
Leslie Hudson
I think those are fantastic pieces of advice. I know It’s really weird. I feel like as soon as you become pregnant, it just sends out some message to everyone to then either tell you weird pregnancy advice, or like, one person was like, Oh, I had morning sickness for the entire nine months. Oh, cool. Just like, I don’t know what it is about. It opens the floodgates for comments, I think, on both their answers, I think just kind of taking a step back and mean like, that’s interesting.
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