The Netmums Podcast - S12 Ep4: Love Island to Twin Mum: Dani Dyer’s parenting journey

Episode Date: February 6, 2024

This week on The Netmums Podcast, Wendy and Alison sit down with Dani Dyer. Known for her Love Island triumph, sparkling TV personality and 'Sorted with the Dyers' podcast alongside her famous father, Dani is also a hands-on mum to three, including a set of twins. Dani shares her experiences on parenting solo, the unique bond with her firstborn, the rollercoaster of raising twins, and how her family legacy impacts her parenting style. Dani opens up about the challenges she faced with anxiety as a new mum and the coping strategies that have helped her navigate the journey. She also discusses her collaboration with CBeebies' Little Learners app, emphasising the importance of quality screen time and early childhood development.

You're listening to The Netmums Podcast with me, Wendy Gollich, and me, Alison Perry. Coming up on this week's show... I just had no preparation for it already, so I was reading all different books, and someone's telling me to do this, and everyone's telling me to do that, and you can get lost in this world of what you're supposed to do, but I feel like you know best, and it's just, you know, everyone parents differently, and I think it's just accepting that. But before all of that... This episode of The Netmoms podcast is brought to you by Fairy Non-Bio,

the number one laundry brand for sensitive skin. They've partnered with Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity to support seriously ill children and their families. With every Fairy Non-Bio pack bought from Home Bargains, Fairy Non-Bio will donate 5p to GOSH charity with a minimum donation of £100,000. I know where I'm going after this. Now, on with the show. Hello, everyone. I just want to say one thing, which is thank goodness it's not January anymore. I don't know about you, but I just feel like February is so much better.

We've got Pancake Day. We've got Pancake Day. We've got Valentine's Day. It just feels like it's a bit less grim, a bit less grey, a bit of joy injected into the month. But I would say, Wendy, let's not get too complacent because, as a newsletter from my kid's school reminded me the other day, World Book Day is just around the corner, which means we've only got a few weeks to get thinking about costumes. Oh, World Book Day is just around the corner, which means we've only got a few weeks to get thinking about costumes. Oh, World Book Day.

It's the bane of parents' lives. It's lovely. It's such a lovely idea. Actually, my school, my kids' school does something really nice. You can go in your pyjamas or something you would wear to read. So you don't have to spend 42 hours with a cardboard box trying to make a costume. See, that's so nice, isn't it? Our guest today, her children might be a bit little for World Book Day. She might not have got to this level of torture.

We can tell her all about it. Today, folks, we are joined by a total popular culture legend. She's someone we've wanted to chat to on the podcast since we very first started, and she's here. Dani Dyer is, of course, known for winning Love Island, presenting an array of programs, being on Celebrity MasterChef, which to me is just terrifying, and her podcast with her dad, Dani Dyer, Sorted with the Dyers. She's a mum of three, including twins, and Alison certainly knows what that's like. I do.

And she's an ambassador for CBeebies, Little Learners app. Danny, welcome to the podcast. Hello, are you okay? Hi, Danny. How are you doing? I'm good. How are you all? We're good. It's a Friday, folks. We're recording on a Friday, and I think we're all pretty damn glad it's a Friday. And the sun is shining where I am. I don't know about you guys, but I feel like it's Friday.

The sun is shining. We're chatting to Danny Dyer. Life is good. Thanks, Gail. No, I do think it makes a difference when the sun's shining. Absolutely. So, Danny, you are three years into into motherhood and you've got three small people uh how is the danny dyer we're talking to today different from the danny dyer of three years ago

other than a shocking amount more knackered do you know what i think you change so much when you have kids like drastically change I think your priorities become you know a lot different but I absolutely love it I feel like it just ages you when you have kids yeah um but it's it is it's amazing like I absolutely love I love it I never thought I'd have three kids at the age of 27 though like never if you would have said that to me five years ago I'd have probably laughed but yeah it definitely ages you but it definitely makes you stronger um and yeah it just changes your life views completely and I also always want to apologize now to my mum and dad because I might have got a lot of that coming

back to me yeah I'll bet um now you were a solo parent weren't you to Santi for a while what do you think the biggest day-to-day challenges were looking back at that kind of period? Like what did that period of your life teach you? It's always a bit more scary, a bit more daunting. But, I mean, it was great because I had such lovely support around me. Like, my mum was incredible. But I just, you know, I loved it. We made so many amazing memories together. And he really did teach me, obviously, how to be a mum. And he's like my little best friend now. We have such an amazing little bond.

I don't know if that's like that boy and mum kind of thing. Like, I feel like I'll still be running these baths when he's like 30. See it's an all-girl podcast we've got all girls so we don't know. Yeah and trust me when they get to 13 that's a whole different world. I'm glad I got my boy. Yeah so I just love their names you've got Santi, Summer and Star and you managed to steer clear of a Danny. Were you ever tempted to call one of them Danny? No, never. Like I was never,

because a lot of people were thinking that when I was pregnant with Santi, I was, is she going to name him Danny or her Danny? Because I didn't know the gender. But no, that was never a thing. And my dad always says now, if he knew I would have followed his footsteps that he wouldn't have called me Danny either.

But it was a thing in that area. Where we lived, a lot of people called their children by the same name. It was just a thing. It's quite common that we had George Clark, the Channel 4 presenter on last week, and he called his eldest Georgie. So I think it is more common than you think. It is common.

It is, but I think it's because obviously where I was a girl people a bit more like why did he call her Danny but it does work there's not that many Dannys I've not met many girl Dannys actually yet um no I'm a fellow twin mum Danny my girls are five um if you had to sum up being a twin mum in three words what would they be I would just say I'm on a roller coaster at the moment. And every twin mum or dad I meet, they always look at me and they're like, are you OK? Like, it's like that.

I had it the other week. I was in ZZ with the three kids, like my mum and dad. And there was a twin dad there and he sat there. And the girls must have been about four or five. And he just kept looking at me, looking at me. i and he could see then i had the twins and he just looked at me did the same thing like is everything okay and i was like um that's it he knows he like he's probably thinking back to oh i remember those days because your girls are they about nine months old now yeah they're eight months eight months first year is a complete and utter blur so

definitely that newborn stage for me was was tough yeah I'd say it's hard when you feel it feels like you need to have like octopus arms like you need to be doing so many things at the same time it just feels impossible at times doesn't it especially when they are so little yeah and I think it was like that first because we had a couple days in the hospital with them and then when we come home I remember my little boy just asked me for a juice he was like mommy can I have a juice I just started crying I was like I don't know how to get you a juice I had a baby in each arm and you just I've just learned I think that along the way that sort of had to juggle like having three kids and stuff but yeah I remember

when I was pregnant with twins and everyone was saying to me oh my god like you're nervous and it was just as hard that I thought it was going to be. It's so difficult. But that's so not helpful that I think that pregnancy rhetoric where people say, even if you're just pregnant with one, the doom mongers are like, oh, newborns, they're awful. Oh, thanks. And when you've got a toddler, they're like, oh,

just wait till you've got a teenager. Oh, great. Can you just wind your neck in? Yeah, there's a you just wind your neck in yeah there's a lot of that i would say there's a lot of that i've had it before where i've been out shopping and someone go oh rather you than me oh yeah you would get so many of them comments now when you have twins i'd say all the time all the time what's your three words all Alison? Oh, goodness. Way to throw it back on me, Wendy. I would say, I'm stealing Danny's word, rollercoaster, 100%. Difficult, because it's so much harder than I thought it would be, but also incredible.

Seeing these two little characters develop and become so different, they have each other, having having that bond it's just incredible to watch so would you say alice and he's got easier or harder i would say it's got easier but it was there are different challenges so now it's like one because they're in different primary school classes so one of them will get invited to a birthday party another one doesn't or a play date and so it's just sort of managing and making sure that the happiness of one of them will get invited to a birthday party another one doesn't or a play date and so it's just sort of managing and making sure that the happiness of one of them doesn't make the other one utterly miserable which is just it's a balance it's a juggle you know yeah i suppose as like kids grow up there's all different challenges i know that's what it is really but it does get

easier i've always wanted to know about twins is what do you do when they start walking and they run in different directions? This is it. When you're at a park, you need, especially if you're on your own with them, you need to be kind of able just to quickly scoop one of them up under one arm and then bolt it and get the other one up

under the other arm. It is terrifying. My goodness me. Sorry, not to scare you, Daddy. It's all good. It's all good. It's all good. It's all good. What's it like having a TV icon as a dad, Danny?

You know what? I've always had a really normal life. When people say, like, what was it like growing up? I didn't even think he was famous or anything. Like, I've never really lived in that sort of bubble or anything like that. He's always been pretty normal. My mum's always kept him pretty on the ground but um yeah it was just like any other

dad really like it wasn't anything different or you know people said oh but there was like loads of famous people around your house I can't really count how many famous people I've ever had it's just always been pretty normal for us yeah that sounds nice though what kind of influence do you think that your relationship with your dad's had on your own parenting style and like the kind of family life that you want to build I mean he's so loving and so affectionate and we're very open like we literally tell each other everything like if there's that probably did shoot me in the foot a little bit when I was like a teenager growing up like telling them everything but he's definitely told me that I'd want my children to be able to trust me and be able to talk to me and you know the highs and lows of everything really do you

know I mean especially them teenagers so yeah he's definitely taught me to just have that like trust and always have an open arms always be there to listen and especially like the affection side of it I say to him like you sort of set me and my sister up for failure at the beginning because not a lot of like not all men but there's like cuddling and speaking how you feel and all that he was very like that and then like as I grew up I was like oh okay that's not that common as I thought it was um so yeah he's um he's really loving and I absolutely love that about him. Is he a totally soppy granddad? God, yeah. Honestly, when he comes to the hospital and met the twins,

he's such an emotional man. He really, really is. But I do love that. I really love that about him, to be honest. Also, isn't he famously a West Ham fan? So was he cock-a-poop happy when you told him that you were together with west ham player jared yeah you know what i think that was just a bonus thing because i think if jared was awful then the whole west ham thing would have been

like damn you know what i mean but he sort of knew of him knew about him before i did like he was saying oh he does this he does i was like does that. I was like, oh, really? Obviously, I was super into him. But yeah, he absolutely loves him as a person. But obviously, him playing for West Ham is probably just a tiny little bonus. I wanted to ask, at Christmas, there was photos of you wearing a ring and it was all over the paper that there were engagement rumours. Does that sort of stuff drive you absolutely potty? Yeah was it i'm not gonna put my finger up because it looked like i'm swearing but it was like a little ring i bought from um abbat lion um and i've had it for

ages so yeah i do have a lot of that like oh daddy wants to be engaged and sparks engagement rumors but i've had that literally since i've come off love island like constantly like danny wants to be engaged and sparks engagement rumors but I've had that literally since I've come off Love Island like constantly like Danny wants to be engaged it makes me look really demanding like in all my relationships that I demand an engagement all the time but I just feel like um it does but it happens it happens like I think there was one thing when I I think there was something printed that I was engaged although Jarrah's proposing to me and I was like oh well if he is then I know now don't I when I was researching you Jabba's proposing to me and I was like oh well if he is then I know now don't I when I was researching you literally every single article in the newspaper said friends are expecting an engagement any day now and it was like way back like a year ago and last

week so these friends they're they're so waiting Danny come on yeah these friends um clearly ain't talking to the right people are they but no But no, yeah, I'm not. I would never, you know, when it happens, it happens. I feel like I'm a bit like that woman off Bride Wars when she demands her engagement ring a little bit. That's how I'm coming across. It's hard to imagine how stressful it is for families when their child is seriously ill.

But Fairy Non-Bio has partnered with GOSH Charity to provide some comfort. That's right, Wendy. One of the areas that GOSH Charity funds is free accommodation for families close to the hospital so they're able to stay close by while their child is receiving treatment without having to worry about the cost. This helps ease the stress during what can be an extremely difficult time. Between now and the 31st of March 2024, for every pack of Fairy non-biodetergent, Fairy fabric softener or Fairy in-wash scent boosters that you buy in home bargains,

Fairy will make a 5p donation to GOSH charity. Which means that you can show your support as you shop. Now, back to our guest. When you did the Channel 4 documentary about your anxiety as a mum, I'm interested to know what kinds of coping mechanisms you learned and kind of did they make a difference? Do you still use them? Definitely.

I think it's more about like speaking to people and like sort of, you know, either if it either a fisherman or like a therapist or I think for me I wasn't prepared for all the emotions that sort of you know like when you get pregnant it's meant to be like this like amazing thing this amazing journey and you're meant to have all these feelings when the baby comes and I feel like all the positives are written down but not so much the negatives and I think for me I was so I absolutely loved you know having Santee but the anxieties I was always anxious but I feel like I put my anxieties onto Santee of like health but is he feeding well is he doing this is he doing that and

you can become in a little bit of a bubble I think obviously he was in Covid as well so you weren't really getting out as much and you wasn't meeting other mums probably like you would so when the sort of show come up about doing it it just felt so right for me because when I sort of met other mums and I was speaking to them I was like oh my god that's how I felt and it's normal to feel like that because it's like normality and you don't really know what it is at the beginning so I feel like being a first time mum mum actually is harder than when you have more children because I feel like you know what more to expect. I totally agree.

I think that's shock. You have no idea what to expect and how to feel when all your independence and all your freedom just stops. You can't just get up and go out anymore. You can't just do this. You can't just do that. So it can affect you in so many different ways, I think. But you go from only being responsible to what you for what you

need to suddenly being responsible for this tiny person that looks like they're going to break if you get it wrong and so I totally agree I moved house just before I had my first daughter so I also had gone from living in London to living in the middle of nowhere. And it's a real shock to the system. Absolutely. I think that's definitely what it was. I just had no preparation for it already. So I was reading all different books and someone's telling me to do this and everyone's telling me to do that. And you can get lost in this world of what you're supposed to do.

But I feel like you know best and it's just, you know, everyone parents differently and I think it's just accepting that it's so tricky though isn't it because we were talking about how you don't want the doom mongers to be telling you how hard it is but equally it feels like you need people like yourself danny to be giving your honest account of how hard you have found certain aspects it's really hard to get that balance isn't it yeah i remember when i went to like uh i did tumble tots with santee for a little bit and um I remember there was just this mum there and then I think it started at like 10 to 11 or something and then we walked out and she was like oh thank god for that most

of the day's done now and we just giggled because it was like you do feel like you're just living on the clock don't you sometimes and having that hour out and singing silly songs and just having bonds and meeting other mums that are sort of on your level is just so what you need it's just then baby groups my mum always says and not for the babies they're for the mums yeah that's so true that's so true um now you're working with cbb's on their brilliant little learners at my five rules yeah honestly they love it they play with it all the time um and it's all about early childhood development isn't it is that something that you feel passionately about absolutely because i feel like now we are in a little bit more of a generation i think where there are ipads

kids are on youtube a little bit more obviously than say like with my nan with my mum do you know what i mean so i feel like it's what your child's watching and having that sort of independent play and knowing they're learning knowing they've got their favorite characters on there I think there's been times of Santy's been on YouTube kids and although it's YouTube kids he's run off a little bit and gone on some ads and then there's monsters under the beds and then he's scared so it was right for me because they're moments that he is sitting on the iPad I wanted to make sure that what he's watching is completely safe. He's learning. Santa's three now and he loves to learn.

And they don't really know that they're learning on it, which I think is good about it. You know, you're not just going, right, sit here, read a book and learn. It's all the songs. We love Mr Tumbles. You know, we love Hey Dougie. Sort of playing together and knowing everything he's watching is completely legit and safe.

And he just really, really enjoys it. What's his favourite part? Who is the character of obsession at the moment? He loves, he's always loved Pepper, but I would say Pepper Big and Hey Dougie are his favourite and obviously Hey Dougie's on there and he loves Mr Tumbles because Mr Tumbles has taught him, you know, he loves to sing and I feel like in the singing world they actually learn and I love all like the mindfulness I really love that now that sort of as we

our kids are growing up we're like teaching them like really lovely things I just love all that I love singing it's so nice because I'm so sad now I'm brushing these teeth because of the singing the songs we have we we have a hey dougie toothbrushing toy that sits on our bathroom sink and it is the loudest thing ever. And every time my kids brush their teeth, they put it on and they have the toothbrushing song. But it's genius. It's so good.

I will never forgive Hey Dougie for the stick song though. It's just not good. I love it. I mean, I want to see BBs when it hits like 6 p.m and they're singled by hello moon you're like yeah let's go that's it that's it it's bedtime um it's so good though that the app is designed to support a child's route to school so my girls are in uh reception at the moment and the part of the app that they love the best is the alpha blocks game because they're learning phonics and they're pretty obsessed with alpha blocks

right now um do you feel any pressure though to have your kids being able to read or write or be at a certain level before they start school i don't think you should ever pressure your child i feel like every child is on their own developmental journey like santi for me was always late to everything like he was late for crawling he was late for walking whereas the girls might be a bit quicker for that but he's i feel like with intelligence he is very very intelligent and i don't know if that's from just the way he is he's an aquarius apparently they're very intelligent you know from nursery and i think it is what you do at home with them but i don't think you should always pressure on i think it's hard because you can compare and you can sit there and go on your child's in this mine he's saying i don't think you should always pressure on I think it's hard because you can compare and

you can sit there and go on your child's in this mine is and I don't think you should pressure it I feel like every child is on their own journey and you know you could only do so much and they'll get there you know whether they're two or five or six you know but I think you know just do what you can at home and don't put pressure on yourself really the twins thing is quite an interesting one with comparing as well because I find myself comparing them all the time but not in a not in a bad way in a more of a helpful way that I think that it's almost quite helpful to have that kind of benchmark where you think oh well one of them is is here and the other one isn't quite but that's okay like you know but it's just quite an interesting one to have that comparison yeah and I think I think when you have like a few of my friends have obviously

got an older child younger and they said they still do it I'll be like well you know Santy was doing this and they're not doing it's so easy to do that but mine are 12 and 8 and I still do it now of course you do but I feel like you just gotta let children be stop pressuring their children at the end of the day you know even the early years of going to school, it's all about having a little bit of fun and colouring and drawing. And it shouldn't be so forced on a child, you know, to be so educated. They'll get there. I think what I would say as well is when they get older.

So I remember being absolutely kind of like, okay, well she should be crawling by now or she should be walking and then when you kind of get into the realms of like secondary school and stuff you realize that it really doesn't matter whether they called it nine months or 12 months and it doesn't matter whether they ate a sweet potato when they were two you know none of it matters actually what you going back to the stuff you were saying about the mindfulness, that's the stuff that matters is teaching them to be landed little beings who can kind of cope with this crazy world

and all the input that we're giving them. Absolutely. I totally, totally agree with that. It's just all about them just being happy and, you know, bringing them up to just be their own person really you know and and enjoy life as much as they can I feel like children they're just so innocent and trying to keep that innocence for as long as you possibly can I think is what's important um and how do you handle screen time with your kids like are you quite

strict on when they can watch tv and when they can use devices yeah i think when we're out all day it's perfect and i love taking something out like as much as i possibly can but it's obviously harder now because i've got the twins and you know that beginning stage of that like routine and feeding and nap times and all that that can take his toll a little bit but definitely um i do try my best as well to obviously limit the screen time and when he has it. I sort of know when he wants it. If he just needs that little bit of winding down time, you know, like if he comes home from nursery,

he just needs that little half an hour sometimes or if I'm prepping dinner. But what I love about the app though is it's not about how much screen time they have with that because I feel like it's all completely educational and everything they are learning, they can have that independent play because like I said, he's not running away and seeing things that i don't want him to see so i think it's just definitely what they're you know what they're learning rather than how many

hours they're on it but of course i definitely limit it i'm not i wouldn't put him on an ipad all day long but i feel like there's always that some days more than others and it's crazy now because we're just living in a world where ipads are such a thing now ain't they like it's crazy yeah we spoke to a social media like safety expert on the net mom's instagram um a few months back yeah and she was saying exactly what you're saying danny that actually the whole notion of screen time is really outdated because kids these days are doing such brilliant educational creative things on screens that we shouldn't just lump it all together and call it screen time. And that's a bad thing. We should be looking at what they're doing.

So like you say, if they're using the CBeebies app and they're doing something educational, that's quality screen time, isn't it? Yeah, they're getting something from it because like you said, you know, there's the alpha blocks blocks, there's the colouring, there's putting shapes and stuff together, learning how to wash your hands by singing a song. It's what they're watching, I think, is what's most important, really. And I don't think there's a parent alive who hasn't sat there waiting for the bedtime hour to come so that they can put them in front of the bedtime hour and just have a minute just have a second to breathe i do have cbb's on quite a lot in the day it's always

in the background really but i feel like because it's in the background sandy's not that bothered by it like because um he always will play his toys and but and if he's on he's on you know i've never really been one of them around the tv and stuff you know he's not one that's ever really been glued in front of it but I think when you make such an obsession of it and you're not having things all the time then it becomes more of an issue I just try and keep it really chilled in the house you know some days he's going to be on the ipad more than others and I'm fine with that really so if you could go back and give danny of three years ago or love island danny some advice what would you say to her what would i say to her goodness me um i think just to enjoy every day as much as you possibly can and i'm a warrior i've always always been a warrior i

overthink everything and i still do that now really so maybe in five years time I can give myself better advice but I think just to like live every day as it is and and stop questioning myself I've always questioned myself um and just try to you know enjoy every moment I'd say especially when I come off Love Island I wish I would have just gone just enjoy it for everything it is the highs and the lows um yeah completely that's brilliant advice um well danny thank you so much for joining us today it has been so so great to chat to you thanks for having me take care bye