The Unplanned Podcast with Matt & Abby - Life update, family planning, and getting a dog Q&A

Episode Date: November 5, 2025

Matt & Abby sit down for a super honest Q&A — answering your biggest questions about family planning, travel with toddlers, and how life has changed since their miscarriage. They open up about whether they’re scared to get pregnant again, how they budget with kids, what’s been hardest about getting married young, and what’s helping them move forward after everything they’ve been through. This episode is sponsored by CashApp, Betterhelp, Little Spoon & NutrafolCashApp: Download Cash App Today: https://capl.onelink.me/vFut/kssum24w #CashAppPod. Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App’s bank partner(s). Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC. See terms and conditions at https://cash.app/legal/us/en-us/card-agreement. Discounts and promotions provided by Cash App, a Block, Inc. brand. Visit http://cash.app/legal/podcast for full disclosures.Betterhelp: Our listeners get 10% off their first month at http://betterhelp.com/unplannedpodcast #ad Little Spoon: Get 50% off your first online order at http://littlespoon.com/UNPLANNED with code UNPLANNED at checkout.Nutrafol: Nutrafol is offering our listeners $10 dollars off your first month’s subscription and free shipping when you go to http://nutrafol.com and enter promo code UNPLANNEDPOD. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Now streaming on Paramount Plus is the epic return of Mayor of Kingstown. Warden? You know who I am. Starring Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner. I swear in these waltz. Emmy Award winner Edie Falco. You're an ex-con who ran this place for years. And now, now you can't do that.

And Bafto Award winner Lenny James. You're about to have a plague of outsiders descend on your town. Let me tell you this. It's going to be consequences. Mayor of Kingstown, new season now streaming on Paramount Plus. Are you scared to get pregnant again with all the what ifs? That was the question I wanted to answer. What was the hardest thing about getting married young?

It wasn't hard. It is still so fun that we have that history together. We talk about it all the time. Yeah, I'm like, how cool is that that I'm married to my high school sweetheart? Best thing to bring on the plane to entertain toddlers. Probably just your phone. Honestly. Why don't you have a dog?

Talking about getting a dog, you get like the most aggressive opinions. 80% of the feedback is like absolutely do me. not get a dog, it will ruin your life. Welcome back to Unplanned. We are your host, Matt and Abby, and check it out. We have a new studio. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's really a work in progress.

Clearly, it's not all set up, but this is what we have for you this week. So stay tuned to see how it evolves. I'm really excited for some of the changes that are happening. Also, just personally, it's really nice because this studio is actually located in our own home, which is the... very time effective for us because we were driving like 45 minutes to an hour to and from the studio. And so on filming days, it was like a little tricky. And now we just go downstairs. And it might be confusing because a lot of you thought that we recorded in our living room.

We did for the first like year and a half we recorded in our living room. But now that we've been doing this a while, we started like realizing, wow, it's like hundreds of hours of time to like set up and tear down lights, mics, cameras. And above that, like above all else it's also hard to just like clear out our living room when we have children like yeah we used our kids would be like knocking over expensive cameras and microphones and they would want to come in when we were filming all the time so so well yeah but that'll probably be a problem again it's not in a common space though so I feel like they're less likely to come in yes they're very occupied they're hanging out with their grandma so yes anyway we have asked you guys once again on our podcast Instagram

haven't followed us the unplanned podcast on Instagram go check us out go follow us stay up to date with everything going on with the pod the episode we did recently answering your questions you guys seem to really like it so there were a lot of questions we didn't get to and we wanted to further that discussion so first question that we have is are you still going to get a bigger car soon so you might have seen if you follow our youtube channel we made a youtube video of us shopping for a three row is that what's called a three row vehicle um because when we were going to have a third baby. Like when we were pregnant, we did need a bigger vehicle to get our whole family around. And that conversation has kind of been put on pause. Yeah. Since everything. I mean,

we've been talking about it more and more. And like, you were really sweet. We're like, let's still get the car because we're going to do it. And like, I'm having a hard time. We're not even in the heavy questions. Like, why am I like this? But this is just how I am. Like, it's like when you set up the cameras and the lights, like, that's when I feel like, oh my gosh the emotions are like closer to the surface but i like i am less teary nowadays just so you know that it's hard for me to make wait what were you to say i'll just say we should just freaking get the car i feel like it'd make you happy yeah i do think it'd be happy it would make i think part of me that makes me feel happy and hopeful but the other part of me is having such a

hard time making plans for the future yeah yeah and so it's like getting the car right now just feels so like frivolous because it's like there's it's not a a need right now and it's not a need even in the near future so it just feels frivolous and so that's just kind of like that's kind of like what I wrestle with every single day of like this gives me hope and excitement and joy but also I'm having hard times making decisions there's so many families though that have two kids and upgrade to a two to a three-year-row vehicle I can name so many of our friends that have done that and they only have two kids they don't have three kids like do we even have many friends with three kids I don't think so like most of our friends just have one or two

Yeah, a lot of them have three-road vehicles, so... Yeah, so it's a very common thing. I don't think there's anything wrong with upgrading now, especially... It just feels less exciting. And that's okay. So maybe we'll wait. I don't know. We'll see.

Maybe we will. Maybe we won't. We know what we're going to get. So we landed on a decision, but which if you watch that video, you'll probably see what that decision was. So I do know that it'll happen down the line. But like, right now. it's not something I'm like super eager to do how do you get your boys to eat my little dude is so

picky honestly you guys we just bribe them we just we just tell them hey if you eat your dinner you get dessert if you don't eat your dinner no dessert it's kind of what it is you know you gotta got to have a reward for finishing the food and we're not even giving in that much food like sometimes it's so hard we don't even give them huge portions and we also only fix some things I'm like you have eaten this before we know you like this or it's like one degree off from something you've eaten in And you got to make sure, too, that you're not giving them too many, like, snacks or candy before dinner time because sometimes it's like, why are they not eating? It's like, oh, yeah, they had two juice.

Well, the problem is sometimes they eat a really late lunch because of their naps. And so then I'm like, they really might not be that hungry for dinner. So, yeah, I think there's a lot of negotiations happening in our household around meal time. I also just think that we serve them things that we know that they like. So when they're not eating, it's like, okay, they're either not hungry or they're. they're just trying to get out of eating. And we always just try to tell them the importance of eating. We're like, it is so good for your body.

You have to feed your muscles. This is how you grow. Like, we have a lot of conversations about that. And we also give them other options. Like, if they don't want to eat that, we'll give them another option. Like, we literally are bending over backwards for them. I just, it's not like we're like being all tough being like, you have to eat this or else you don't get dessert.

I want to read the next question so bad. What? It says, new boy mom here. What are your sons into? Our sons are into Star Wars right now, so hard. And not just Star Wars in general, like Darth Vader. I don't know what it is. Our two-year-old nonstop says, like, I want to see Darth Vader, dad.

Does Vader. Darth Vader. Like, he just repeats Darth Vader all the time. And Storm Trooper. And we were just in Disneyland and we bought actual lightsabers. Can I show them my lightsaber? Should I go get it? I bought an illegit one.

I think they know what a lightsaber looks like. Let me go get it real quick. Well, Matt's getting that. I do actually want. to brag on him a little bit. A sweet friend of ours brought dinner to us the other night after we had a travel day coming back from Disney.

And when she pulled up to our house, it was literally Matt with this lightsaber having a full on duel. I was in the bathtub. I was surely checked out for the night and Matt was like dueling with our kids. I feel like I need to turn the lights off temporarily.

Oh my. Just look at this guys. This is so off the rails right now. This is so sick. Wait. one second here we go ready for this

oh yeah baby yes we are all very impressed by your lightsaber Matt no I think it's really sweet how you guys all get so into it but our friends showed up with dinner and Matt is in the backyard

I'm not answered the door because I'm in the bathtub I'm surely checked out for the night and Matt is like full on dueling our kids and she said it was a really sweet scene to see like you're such a hands-on dad you like literally play so hard with them i said the stabby last night it's kind of like i'm the fraternity president and they're the pledges and i'm like i don't know if that's a good comparison to make though because don't they like abuse pledges yeah you're right that's actually a horrible comparison

they're like i'm the president of the fraternity and they're the upperclassmen and we like we just get to plan together no what am i saying they're the presidents they tell me what to do they're like they're like they're like i want to go in the pool i want to buy sir yes sir yes sir Yes, I'm the pledge. I do whatever they want. That's right. You're the pledge. And you do also get abused by that. I do. They hit me over head with light sabers. We've had to make it a rule of no headshots with the lightsabers. So if you have boys, our kids are very much into Star Wars right now. They're interested right now. It's not just Star Wars though. They also love superheroes,

specifically Spider-Man and Hulk and also kind of Iron Man. And Thor. Thor recently has gotten popular. Griffin really is more classic. He likes just like Mickey Mouse, Chippendale. Chicken, Chick-Dales. I mean. I meant to say chicken dales. Our three-year-old... No, Chip and Dale. Our three-year-old thinks that Chip and Dale are the chicken dales.

He calls them the chicken dales. No, he says chicken dale. And he's usually like, there's another chicken dail. Like, he's always surprised that there's two of them. It's hilarious. We need to point out their noses to them. I've tried to explain it to them so many times because it doesn't work. Chip has a brown nose, like a chocolate chip.

And Dale... Isn't it a black nose? Black and red? I think it's dark brown. Oh, really? Fact check me. Someone fact check us. And then Dale has like a red nose.

Anywho. What do you think your kids will be when they grow up? Well, if you ask them right now, they want to be firefighters. Yeah, they want me to be a trash truck driver and they want to be a firefighter and they both want to be firefighters with daddy. Which is kind of concerning if you listen to our interview with Dr. Raymond because apparently the brain health of firefighters is not good because they're like breathing in toxic fumes and stuff.

Oh, yeah. High stress. But we always talk about how they're heroes and they want to be heroes. Yeah. You also think firefighters are very attractive. I think it's the most attractive profession, yes. Yeah. So maybe one day I'll be one. People agree with me. I know other women agree with me. Okay.

No one's saying influence. I'm just kidding. Okay. Thank you to cash app for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. When you cash app your friends, do you guys round down or round up when there's like change involved? I feel like I always do the exact. I do the exact amount of change, down to the penny because I'm just like so particular about that. Yeah, it just feels official. And if someone overpays me, it bothers me. Like, I don't want you to overpay me.

Yeah, I don't want to tip. I just want to be paid exactly what you owe me. That's it. I think that's the best part of cash app. You can be specific. Yes. You don't have to carry around your pennies. Yes.

But if you guys did not know, cash app is way more than just a safe way to send and receive money. Because with the cash app card, you get tons of perks, like early access to concert pre-sales. Plus, discounts on everyday purchases at brands, you're properly already spending money on. It also keeps your money safe by automatically flagging suspicious transactions and letting you lock your card instantly if it's ever lost or stolen.

And for a limited time, new Cash App customers can earn $10 if they use code Cash App 10 and their profile at sign up and send $5 to a friend within 14 days. Terms apply. Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App's bank partners, prepaid debit card is issued by Sutton Bank, member FDIC discounts provided by cash app a block ink brand visit cash dot app slash legal slash podcast for full disclosures why don't you have a dog whoa that is a big question wait they said why don't you have a dog why don't you have a dog people we've been getting flooded

with questions about if we're getting a dog ever since Abby posted i want to know if we're getting a dog too we post abby posted leaked a photo of me holding a very cute puppy on her Instagram story, and everyone has been asking us to, you know, get a dog. We've been, well, no, I think here's the thing about, it's probably the same thing with having babies. Like, talking about starting a family or getting a dog, you get, like, the most aggressive opinions. And also, a lot of them are, like, unsolicited. They're like, no, don't do it.

You ruin your life. And people are like, yes, immediately get a dog. It's the best thing ever. Actually, I would say 80% of the feedback is, like, absolutely do not get a dog. It will be the worst thing ever. ruin your life. And then 20% of people that are like, dog lovers are like, absolutely. You should, I fully support this. Like, do it right now. It would be a lot of work. Let's just be honest, right? There's a lot of pooping and ping. I had a clean diarrhea off of our turf the other

day and it wasn't dog diarrhea. And, you know, for whatever reason, there was a popsicle stick sticking out the middle of it. I don't even know why. I can't believe I'm saying that out loud. And it made me think, man, do I really want to do this dog thing? Because I'm already like, I'm already dealing with this already like we go back and forth so much and we've been talking about this here let me just say this we have always known we were going to get a dog when we had kids in the house we knew that that was like that's something we'd said from the very beginning we'll have a dog after we have kids we will like after we start having kids we'll get a dog so that's like a given we're going to do it now finding the timing is like interesting and we're trying to do that so the people that are like

don't get a dog it's like we're like no one day we will get a dog that is like a fact but it's just trying to figure out the timing and right now we're really trying to navigate if the timing of right now is right or not and it's just something that we've just been internally discussing transparently for weeks and we're still really up in the air about it like I feel like every day one of us kind of leans more one way and then sometimes we swap so it's funny too because my brother who has a dog is not a dog person and he's like don't do it and then Abby's brother who has a dog or has two dogs is like a major dog of person. person. He's like, do it. And so, yeah, we just have so many conflicting opinions. Some days I think like, I'm like, I'm like, so down. I'm like, yes, do it? And then other days I'm like, do I really want to be cleaning more poop off of, off of the turf? We're at the point where it's like, we've talked through all the logistics, like what would happen if we got a dog, like how we would work out traveling, how we would work out taking the dog on walks, like everything. We've worked out literally every single part of it, like what rules we'd have with the dog. Like, we would get it

trained like things like that so now we just really need to stumble upon a dog that we fall in love with and then we'll be 100% in why do i think a golden retriever would be perfect we that's that's our dream dog is a golden retriever because they are just my grandpa my great grandpa had a golden retriever that i was so in our whole family was so what was his name Riley Riley he was the best dog in the entire world like so sweet and him and my grandpa This will make me cry because my pop ball has since passed. But, like, and Riley has passed. But they were just, like, best buddies.

And they would ride in his truck together. And he was just, like, I've always been, like, so in love with golden retrievers because of Riley. And so I would love to get a golden retriever for our kids. I know they're so good with kids. But I'm also worried because you're allergic to, like, pet hair. Yeah, we could just get a robotic vacuum that could suck that up every day. I know. Would you be able to pet the dog?

I would be fine. Should we test this? I could always take Clareton again. I used to take Clareton. Is that good? I took Claritin every day as a kid because I would get like allergies all the time. And it's gone down since I got older. But yeah, I would be okay.

Our dream dog would be a golden retriever. But we'll just see what happens. We're actually going to a little pet adoption event coming up. Wait, what? I didn't know that we were actually doing that. I'm going. Are you going? Me and the kids are going.

This is my official invite. Wherever I go, you go, babe. Where I guess I go. I'm going to a pet adoption event. This next question is freaking hilarious because I actually think about this a lot. It says, are you ever embarrassed to see family after a podcast talking about personal topics? Yeah, actually, yes, I am. Yeah, honestly, we just pretend like we don't talk about anything personal on the internet, especially like.

No, we don't pretend like we don't talk about anything personal. We don't just like casually talk about that stuff in front of your parents or your grandparents. We talked about very personal things like regarding our loss. What do you mean? Well, like, I'm talking. I'm talking. Oh, yeah, sex. So you can just say it. Yeah, we don't talk about sex in front of Abby's parents or grandparents. No, no, no, no.

But we'll talk about that, like, with our close friends. Why, we talk about it with your parents, kind of. Oh, yeah, but not like in, not in detail. No, we don't talk about it in detail on the podcast either. That's true. It's just, yeah. Yeah, no, it's, my parents are hilarious. Like, they, they don't. I would tell more to your parents than I would on the podcast, probably. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. My parents are open books, man. We've had them on our, on our, on our

YouTube channel. We've had them on the podcast. So it's more so my family. And I'm like, man, I just wish I could block my family from these episodes. But I don't think they watch it anyway. Yeah. So the only ones they watch are the sister-in-law episodes or like if family's on. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You saw your dad watching one of the sister-in-law episodes, didn't you? Did I?

Yeah, you told me that you saw, or maybe it was me. Did I see him watching the sister-in-law episode? Really? That's sweet. That was sweet. You didn't tell me that. Yeah. I thought I told you that. No, I heard my, I knew my mom listened to it. Do you miss life before being social media famous? That's hard to answer because we've been doing this for so long.

It's like we started it right after we got married so we hadn't even had kids yet. So I'm like, I don't miss that life of like not like before kids. Like I don't miss. But I do. If I'm being fully honest, I miss the simplicity. Oh, yeah. I think the magic of an extremely. simple life is kind of fun, especially like the magic of the first, well, I guess I had

started posting YouTube videos, but it wasn't our job. So like the first year of being married and we were in college, we had our own place, our own little apartment. We went on these really fun dates that were low budget on hikes in the mountains in Arkansas. Like we used to go to drive-in movie, like the drive-in movies in like Southern Missouri, because they, they would have like a double feature and you would just drive up in your car. Yeah. Well, also at that time we lived in a different state. Yeah. Life was just totally different then.

So simple. I do think that what we do for work adds several layers that I'm like sometimes I do just miss the simplicity. Yeah. You know, it's like I guess the grass is always, the grass is green around the other side, right? Right. I'm super grateful for what we have.

I think it's normal though to like always look back with fond memories on the past. But it doesn't, doesn't mean that I don't. like what we have now because I love yeah no I think that's just how it goes like you you can be grateful for what you have but also just be like there was some really sweet beautiful things about that time that I had to give up to live the life I have now so like everything is a transaction like that Matt how are you doing with your hair transplant great question hey check it out the baby hairs are coming in look it's growing in are you so happy yeah we're close to three months three months in on the hair transplant and you can see like the little baby hair is coming in and it's going to

keep thickening up they're going to get longer in nine months i should have the final result so i've been wearing a lot of hats still because my hair looks whack but uh i did recently get a haircut and that made my hair look so much better because i couldn't get a haircut for a whole month after the surgery super excited to see what it looks like in 12 months i was gifted that head spa experience yeah they were like we want matt to come too i was like i don't think that he can't because of Yeah, I might need a wait. No, there was a lot of exfoliation on the scalp happening. Oh, yeah, I can't do that.

No shot. There's all these rules. Like, I can't put dry shampoo in my hair. Technically not supposed to use hairspray. Wait, I guess you did do it one time with an electric razor. Is that fine? I don't even know. I can't use clippers on top of my head.

Oh, so no, you can't. They have to just use regular scissors. It's all these rules. There's a whole, they handed me like a Bible of rules. They're like, here you go. You and rules. I don't know. Yeah, I've probably broken a couple.

They said we couldn't be. It's looking good. I feel like we're starting to see the first little buds. They said we couldn't be intimate for like two weeks, two or three weeks. We definitely broke that rule. I was like, you can't tell me. You can't tell me. You can't tell me.

Well, I could tell you, but they can't tell you. Yeah, you can tell me. They can't tell me. I wasn't going to tell you that. All right. Okay. If offered, which one of you would go on dancing with the stars? Ooh, I feel like it would be Abby.

Why me? Because you are, you're like a freaking ballerina. No, I am. I haven't danced in so long. I have zero. I have very little confidence in my dancing abilities. But I do think that I think you would be a better option, especially as a male. Why?

Because you're a male that can dance. I did take dance. I took dance from the age of nine until 19. That makes you a really good candidate because I feel like it's harder for them to get guys. And then also guys that can actually stay in the competition. Like you would do really well. You could win it. That's very nice.

But I do think it would stress you out a ton. Oh, it would stress. me the crap out but it'd be so much fun though it'd be like it'd be like doing drugs like being up there yeah you would love to be performing in front of a crowd my heart would be like bo bo bo bo bo like if you're going crazy but i also think the fact that you'd have to memorize choreography like from monday and then perform when do you when no they start on wednesday probably and then perform it on tuesday you have a week to learn the choreography yeah for one dance yeah that's so easy i don't know your turn i used to i used to have to learn dances in an

hour it was like hey here's this entire freaking musical number learn this in an hour. I know, you're a little rusty. Oh, my gosh. Having a whole week to prepare is insane. I would crush that. No, seriously, because like, okay, put it in. Let me say this. When I was in a chorus line at the Muni where Abby and I met, I had to do the opening number and it's very freaking hard dance. There was a triple pirouette. Oh, wow. And it was like very hard to like just all the kicks, all the turns. There was that opening number and no chorus line was tricky. But I practiced it like crazy. And after, I want to say after like two or three days, I have,

it solid but that was my that was my issue like I could never learn choreography fast because if they taught and like when you do a dance audition they teach you a dance in about 15 minutes and you're expected to perform it so in 15 minutes my like short-term memory quick whatever I suck at that like if you give me 24 hours though I can crush the dance yeah I just need time to like get it in my body I think that would be a better candidate well I would love to root for you for you I would have a lot of fun I would be so thrilled and so honored this is an ad by better help. Shorter days are upon us, y'all. With, you know, that seasonal depression creeping up on us, it might be a good time to reach out to a family friend or a work colleague just to

check in on people and see how they're doing. And I feel like often when we do take that jump to reach out to friends and loved ones during a harder season, we always think, why didn't I do this sooner? That's also how I felt when it came to therapy. Therapy has been a huge benefit to our lives. Not only do we do couples therapy, we also do individual therapy. We've been going through a lot of crap in our life recently, which we've been very open about on this podcast. And I think that's why we're such big fans of BetterHelp, because it is certainly one of the most convenient and quickest ways to find a therapist that works with you and your schedule. Because with over 30,000 therapists, BetterHelp is one of the world's largest online

therapy platforms, having served over 5 million people globally. Their therapists work according to a strict code of conduct and are fully licensed in the U.S. BetterHelp does the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals and they just give you a short questionnaire to help identify your needs and preferences and their 12-plus years of experience in industry-leading match rate means typically getting it right the first time. But hey, if you don't like your therapist with BetterHelp, you can switch at any time, free of charge, no questions asked.

This month, don't wait to reach out. Whether you're checking in on a friend or reaching out to a therapist yourself, BetterHelp makes it easier to take that first step. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com slash unplanned podcast. That's BetterH-E-L-P dot com slash unplanned podcast. How was your trip to Disney? Amazing. It was so fun.

We actually did an entire YouTube blog that you actually go check out. Now that we have a kid that is over 40 inches, that unlocks a whole new, like, level of Disney for us as a family. Dude, he's three, and he can go on the, the Tower of Terror. He can go on Space Mountain. he can go on Guardians of the Galaxy He can go on Rise of Resistance And like all these big rides are now Like there's very few rides he can't go on at this point

So it's really really fun And I think it was just like really cool for the two of you Because obviously I was with Augie But like for the two of you to get to like Dad and Son go on these big rides for the first time And I think that was like really special And then it was also just really special for Augie to like You know he's so in love with like

The characters And he's just fascinated by Spy Spider-Man and so getting to see him like crawl up a wall and fly through the air like shooting webs like he was just I literally took a video so it's so funny because like that's what they say like about parents like parents are always like when you become a parent you stop like recording what's going on around you and then recording your kids watching what's going on around you like my whole video of Spider-Man doing his really cool routine was just Augie's face just like like he was just frozen with awe and wonder and that was like oh I'll never forget that. They've been begging to go back. So we're probably going to go back at some point. Dude, should we go back? Of course we should. My parents are going in November to Disney World. And we were like, should we crash their trip? Maybe you should. They would love for us to crash their trip. That would be awesome. That'd be so fun. Do you ever miss life before kids? I would say I used to, but I don't anymore. Like now, like, the parenting thing has become so fun that

it's like, this is so much better. You also just get so used to it. Yeah. Like, you get so used to not having the freedom that you used to have. Like, there's a lot more hoops you have to jump through to do things that you used to do so easily. Yeah. But that just becomes your new normal. And then it's like, but you have so much more to gain by having them, like, in your family. There's just so much purpose in, like, raising kids. But I'll always look fondly on our early years of marriage.

No kids. Like, I'm so glad for the timeline that we had, like, Everyone's timeline looks different, but we had like, what was it, two years? No, we had over two years. We had three years of just the two of us. And like those three years were just like so spontaneous, adventurous, like honeymoon love. But also just like figuring. There's just such good memories.

I think back to that time so fondly, but I love where we're at. Best thing to bring on the plane to entertain toddlers. Probably just your phone. Honestly. An iPad? No, not an iPad. We do give them our phones on the plane. On the plane.

Dude, you don't want to have your kids screaming their face off on the plane. It's not like they have free range. We'll download a show on Disney Plus for them to watch on the plane. Yeah. Or for Augie, we usually download Miss Rachel. Yeah. And they will watch it. Or Star Wars.

We're working through the Star. Dude, Augie loves Star Wars. We watched the entire episode one together. He's obsessed. He loves it. That's crazy. I know. Yeah, I think, but also our boys know that we have, we're pretty like restrictive, not

restrictive, but like we don't, they don't have free access to screens in our house, but they do know that on planes they have free access. And so they definitely take advantage of that. Yeah, I think Griffin's watched the Paw Patrol movie at least 50 times. We bought it on YouTube and he's, every time he wants to watch that. Did he watch the Paw Patrol movie on the last page? No, he watched Zootopia. Oh.

Why do I want to take him to Shanghai to go see the Zootopia Park there? You should probably. I think it would be so. I could document that too. Be like me and Griffin watching Zootopia on the plane, going to Shanghai. Well, they're making a Zootopia too. And for that reason, too, we could watch Zootopia 2. Then we could go to the Shanghai Park and like get the big lollipop.

It's like paw shape. They have the popsicle. And then they have the little paw lollipop too from the movie. They have both. Okay. well, why can't me and Augie come? Well, because I don't think you guys would want to. No, I want to.

You want to? Well, I don't know. Family trip to Shanghai. I'm having a hard time making future plans. Is it easier to travel with a baby or a toddler? Really depends. Like, are we talking to newborn? It's easier to travel with a toddler.

We're talking about a newborn because like a newborn if they're sleeping. It's pretty easy. Yeah, if they just sleep, sleep, sleep, like, bro. But then when they get. Well, it's especially easy for you because you don't have boobs. But no, no, no, when Augie was, this was like a year and a half ago, when he was, when when was this. When he was one and he, like, could crawl and stuff, managing that kid on a plane.

Because, like, you give, you put on Miss Rachel. He doesn't care about Miss Rachel at that point. To be honest, his main problem is, uh, being restrained. Like, having to sit in a seat that's buckled is like basically torturous for him. So there's that, like, that age where they're mobile, yet they can't talk, yet they aren't going to like chill and watch a show for 45 minutes. That's the hardest time. Like, yeah.

So, for us at least. It was just like a full on. 12 months, I would say 10 months to almost two years was really hard. I mean, Augie's gotten significantly easier on planes. He still has his moments. Yeah. So I'm going to say, he's an outdoor cat, okay? You can't put an outdoor cat indoors and expect them to behave.

You cannot. We just always are like, whatever you need, buddy, we'll do it. We got it. I'm trying to like cater to him. This next one, car seats on planes. or loose kids. Car seats help them fall asleep. Yes.

No. There's the Duna car seat, which can like fold up and go in your car and then be like a stroller. We would take that on the plane when Augie was in that stage. And then he like one time he actually fell asleep in the car seat. One time. So I wish that we would have done that from the start because if you fly, oh, I think they're changing their policy.

But Southwest when they were like an open seating, whatever. If there was extra seats, you could just pop your Duna. Yes. We wouldn't even pay for a seat. We wouldn't pay for a seat. We wouldn't pay for his seat, but we'd go up before we boarded the plane and say, I think that's changing soon. It's going to change soon.

But we would see if they had any open seats. And then if they had open seats, then we would just bring our Duna on rather than checking it at the gate. But if you, like, if you are nice and become friends with flight attendants, like, they'll help you out sometimes. Oh, yeah. We've had flight attendants before that aren't the nicest, but there's been a ton of very kind, very helpful flight attendants. I mean, think about how tired they must be. Yeah. Just never know what day you're going to, you know, you know.

meet them on, right? They could be coming off of like a 12 hour journey and they're exhausted and they just don't want to deal with kids stuff. So yeah, it's if you, if you want to like secure an easy flight by the, by the ticket, if you want to go the budget route, try to like, try to, I don't know, be nice to the flight attendants. They might help you out. Yeah, a lot of times we spent just like standing by the bathroom. Yeah. That was actually the next question. Get them their own seat or no we have to now like they both yeah they're both over too so they both get their own seat but we are the kings and queens of not buying them the seat until they are too like we literally bought augia flight when he was one year and 363 days old yeah and then we switched for the flight

home like the return flight he was a ticketed passenger with the flight there he wasn't like it's just you got to take advantage of that advantage while you have it a free seat well not a free see a free ticketed passenger these are a lot of these are travel questions by the way because we do a lot of traveling with our kids uh we have one thing you love about traveling with two littles and one thing you wish you could change yeah i think i just love like seeing the world through their eyes and yeah experiencing things for the first time yeah and i think i think when the older they get the easier it is i would say for them to travel for sure especially like there's just less diapers to change you can communicate we're less rigid with nap times yeah not like

with Griffin he can skip naps now because he don't pack as much diapers yeah so it's just it's a lot way less gear i actually posted on my story as like one day you're perfectly timing your flight you're like you're spending extra to just fly the perfect time for your kids eating in nap schedule and you're flying with all of these suitcases of gear and supplies for your baby and then the next day you have two toddlers and you're flying backpack only smack dab in the middle of their nap time yeah and it happens so quick so if you're in the that stage where it's like really tough to travel with your baby or your young color.

No, still travel because I do think it's good for them to like, you know, learn that they can still survive and thrive outside of like the walls of their house and they're really strict routine and all of their comforts. I think it's good for them. But it does get so much easier. I'm sure some things get harder, but I would say overall the experience is a lot easier. 100%. Wait, what was the other part of the question?

What's something you wish you could change? Would you change? I would say, like, I wish we wouldn't have flown with so much stuff before. Like, we used to, this was so stupid. Our podcast gear takes up, like, three suitcases. So we would try to, like, to save money, like, include a podcast recording if there was a gas in a different state. And then we had, like, a trip there.

We would, like, take our kids and then take all the podcast gear. And then I would be, like, hauling, like, 10 suitcases. through the airport it was just a nightmare so recently when we went to disney we did backpack only oh my gosh so convenient so convenient i mean there was just not that much stuff stuff to carry yeah i wish we could cut to us in the airport struggling to carry everything and our children why did we do like no i'm talking out this past trip oh we still had a lot to carry okay even then it's the car seats yeah but you know they'll be in those car seats for a while so we better make friends with them but the car seats though you can get these lightweight ones those are like what

they weigh like five pounds oh yeah we got They're just from Amazon. They're like Contigo or something. But they're really lightweight. They're really cheap. And you can get a bag to go with them so you can wear it as a backpack. And we have what's the best age to travel with kids that you've experienced so far? Definitely a three-year-old.

Like he can do everything at Disneyland essentially. He is extremely like vocal. Yeah, he's basically like just, yeah, another, he's just her friend. Like he's just hanging out with us. He's such a dude. Yeah, he goes to the bathroom on his own. Yeah. I have to wipe, okay, I have to wipe his butt.

Yeah, we don't have to. Yeah. I mean that every that I had my parents wipe my butt when I was three like everybody does no actually no at a lot of preschools apparently a lot of preschools they you can't go until you wipe your own booty because I guess it's probably a safety policy oh I guess we need to teach him how to do that well he's not going to preschool so yeah I'm his pre school teacher hey we'll work on it that that leads into our next question how do you navigate potty on the plane um we just we just we just we just go on the plane and then if he has to go on the plane we just we just go on the plane we just go on Honestly, I kind of like when they have to go on the plane. It's my hot take. It's a fun activity. You just get to, like, stand up. You get, it breaks up the flight.

Like, it's like, okay, we got an activity right now. No. We're going to go to the potty. I do that myself. Like, I go to the bathroom. Is that why you go that many times on a plane? Yeah, I go sometimes, like, three times on the plane. I trust me, I know you go a lot of times.

And that's why it stresses me out when you're, like, the middle seat and someone has to get out a lot of times for you. But if someone's, if I'm in the middle seat, I'm going to only get out like once, maybe twice. Sometimes you do it way too soon. Like, I like, this guy's probably thinking, did he just go to, like, did he not intie out at the airport? People are like, who the freak does this guy think he is, man? He's going to the bathroom three times on this one plane. Like, there's an acceptable time you have to wait before you go.

Yeah, no, I've ranked that rule. I don't care. I don't freaking care. You have a tiniest bladder. I do have a tiny bladder. What is up with your, your bladder is insane? You can hold your pee like so long. I don't understand it.

But I still pee my pants. Actually, that's true. You do fear your bed. Thank you to Little Spoon for sponsoring this portion of today. episode. Every parent knows that feeling when you have a failed dinner, meaning that your toddlers have refused to eat what you have fixed. This happens literally every day to us, you guys. There's a lot of negotiations happening, but at the end of the day, we just want them to have full bellies. And that's why I have stopped stressing over last minute meals and started using Little Spoon. Their recipes are

made with pediatricians, packed with hidden veggies, and somehow our kids still ask for seconds. Everything's made with real ingredients, no artificial flavors, sweeteners, or dyes, and it's the rare combo of convenient and healthy. Absolutely so convenient. The fact that they're ready-made meals, I can just pull out of the fridge, take off the lid, and they can just dive in. That is priceless as a parent. Oh, and here's the exciting part. Little Spoon is now in Target. Plus, Target has an exclusive frozen line. Think their cult favorite chicken nuggets, meatballs, and sliders, and you can find them in the snack and freezer aisles. Little Spoon is the meal time hack

parents can't stop talking about. Try their no prep, nutrient-packed meals and snacks for babies, toddlers, and big kids. Get 50% off your first online order at little spoon.com slash unplanned with code unplanned at checkout. That's L-I-T-L-E-S-P-O-O-N dot com slash unplanned.

And don't forget to use our show's code for 50% off your first order. Do you board early? Absolutely not. Why do you board early, you board early just to sit on the plane longer? That's so stupid. No, you got to save that time. So your kids, like, as soon as you sit down in your seat, a timer starts.

Yes. For your kids, like, before they can bust. You let your kids sprint around the airport, you know, crawl around on the floors, do whatever, get all their energy out. Maybe not that, but. Maybe not crawl on the floors. Well. But if they do, because they will do that, just like, try to remember to, like, sanitize their hands a little bit.

Yeah, do some tag. Do whatever. Find the playground in the airport. Get the wiggles out. Yeah, we love airport playgrounds. Yes. But yeah, we wait until, like, we're the last people of the board usually. Not, like, we just follow the last person in because their little attention spans.

Next question. Have you guys ever used a child leash while traveling? Actually, we have. Is that, is that controversial? Is that like, are do people opposed to that or something? I'm sure it is. My parents did that with me, and I feel like that's a safety thing. When you have a baby and a toddler and maybe even three or four kids, like, it's literally

just a safety thing. You have to keep your kids together. Yeah. And it wasn't like he was, like, sad about it. Like, we haven't used it, haven't had to use it recently. Um, it's obviously better to have just more hands on deck. If you're going to go somewhere with really little kids, that's very busy. But, um, yeah, I think it's just a safety thing.

I don't have any problem with that. Yeah. Doesn't hurt them. I don't, I don't see the problem. Yeah, I agree. It's not like I'm going, I'm taking my kid out on walks with it. It's only when there's like a ton of people around. Yeah, you're like a creditority area.

Yeah. also the air tag we didn't do this at Disney but no of our friends had an air tag on their kid I thought that we need to do that put a little air tag on their shoe and then you can like if they ever get away so fast God forbid get away yeah yeah there could be shady people you never know how is it to navigate nap time when you're traveling um you know we ran into this issue on the way home from our trip because we traveled at I think our flight left at 2 o'clock 2 30 right 2 30 and our kids our boys nap time is at noon so we just like essentially skip nap time and it was hard.

Put them to bed early. The flight. Our kids are not sleep on the go kids. They don't sleep on the go. They both did not fall asleep on the plane. We even brought the car seat. I brought our kids car seat or two-year-old's car seat on the plane. Didn't work.

Can I actually tell you something? What? I was walking past this mom who had two toddler girls that were probably about the same age as our kids. I think their oldest was a little older than our oldest and their youngest was a little younger than our youngest. But they were very similar. but they had two girls.

Yeah. And they were sitting in their double stroller unbuckled. And in my mind, I was like, what did this mom do special to have her two kids sitting in their stroller unbuckled and they're not trying to hop out? I know. I'm like, is it just because they're girls? Like, if we had our kids unbuckled in their stroller, they would be bailing like you would not believe.

Like they would not even sit down. Like they have to be buckled in to like know that they can't jump out and run away. No, I think it's just like our, our boys are, they're all boy. And I, I know that's like a stereotype, but they, they really are. They just, they want to get dirty. They want to play in mud. I know a lot of girls are like that too. Yeah, there's girls that, like, there's tom boys. There's also boys that like to put on princess dresses and, and play with, like, have tea parties, you know, like, you have, you have the exceptions on both sides. Yes. But like, the stereotypical response is that, that's just not our, but I feel similarly when I see parents pushing their toddlers around in strollers and their toddlers and their toddlers just. And their toddlers just. And, just passed out, like, asleep in their stroller. I'm like, how did they get them to do that? I think, like, our kids could be, like, so exhausted, but there's not a chance they would even close their eyes for an extended period of time. The only way would be our youngest on a long car ride if he's in a car seat.

Maybe in a car. He would. Maybe in a car. But our oldest in a car. Strollers never. Our oldest in a car, maybe. Maybe. If it was a very long car ride and he was, like, way past nap time, very tired, he probably

Maybe. There's a very slim chance. How do you navigate a full day at Disney with kids? We've basically just like go to the park in the morning, come back to the hotel. I think that's the key. Come back for a little siesta. Even if your kids don't, this works great if your kids will nap, which our kids will nap. But even if they don't, I think it's good to like go during the day when there's like less crowds, get a lot of stuff done, get your day kicked off because you're already probably starting your day off early with little kids. take a break and it kind of just helps them like there's so much stimulus in Disney World it kind of helps them decompress and like chill out a little bit and if they can sleep that's even

better kind of just cool off you know wash their hands and like just change their outfits maybe get reset and then go back to the parks and then keep them out a little later than you normally would have because they got that rest in the middle of the day that works out best for us 100% next we have some like financial questions which thank you to whoever asked these because I love answering financial questions. I actually wanted to be a financial planner before I became a YouTuber. So this is kind of fun.

It says how to budget with Littles and wanting to do all the activities, trips, toys, ATC. I think it really just comes down to like looking at how much money you have coming in and then deciding on, okay, this is the percentage of that dollar amount that I want to put in savings. And then with whatever's left over,

you got to create a budget. As far as low cost, toddler activities, I would just say take advantage of what your community has to offer. That's like what we've done like, look at your libraries, look at like your community center, look at like there's so, I can tell you so many that are local to us. Trunk or treat. Like we just went to a, there was a old folks home that had a trunk or treat thing. Yeah, that was a fun activity.

We're also doing one at like a little kids like activities. There's just look at what's going on in your community because, um, There's usually a lot of good events, especially, I would say start with libraries, fire stations do things, police stations do things. Like, there's a lot going on and a lot of those are free. So, and kids think it's really, really fun. Next we have, is it important to marry someone with somewhat similar levels of financial stability? I don't think so, but I do think that if somebody is like in a lot of debt, you probably should have at least a conversation about what that looks. like because you don't want to like if someone's in like i'm going to give an extreme example a quarter

million dollars of student loans that's a lot to take on like you're taking on that financial burden with them if you're combining your finances and you know joining everything together which a lot of married couples do and we did so you know you might you might really want to seriously think that through yeah um i also think that financial statuses change dramatically throughout your lifetime and marriage is like a life long decision so it's like don't make this you're like at the top of your priority list but it is definitely something to consider because when you agree to marry someone you are taking on all of them and that includes their debts they're everything you know yeah 100% how did you get started with investments when I was working at a financial planning firm I ended up

just like starting it myself I just opened up a Vanguard account which actually is really easy It took me like 10 minutes to do that. And then from there, I just, I think I fully funded my Roth IRA in college because I had saved enough to then put into the Roth. And what I love about Roths is it's like saving, if you're in America, it's for your retirement and you pay the taxes on the front end, but then you're never taxed on that money ever again. You're never taxed on the gain. So if you invest $6,000 and after 50 years it grows to be, I don't know, $100,000, you're not

taxed on that when you take it out, which is awesome. Like, that's really, really cool. Love Roth IRAs. If you don't know what a Roth IRA is, look it up because I love Roths. And I want to fund our kids Roths too. Oh, actually, we did. So we actually did do that. Should you tell your spouse about your credit card debt or keep it a secret?

Definitely, definitely tell them. Definitely don't keep that a secret. Why would it be a secret anyway? Because usually, I guess maybe if their credit card is separate, like it's only theirs. Yeah, well, technically, I mean, there's nothing stopping you from opening up a credit card and not telling me about it. Oh, that's true. Mm, great idea.

We've just always told each, if we've ever opened up a bank account or credit card, we've felt like I needed to keep anything a secret. So that is, uh, don't do that. Well, maybe they're in a financially abusive relationship. That's true. And it could be like a way to get back at their spouse because they're mad at them. No, like maybe someone's withholding funds from them. Oh, frick.

That's not good. Yeah. Go tell somebody that cares about you about that because you should not be keeping that a secret. Yeah, it's really serious. Um, what was the hardest thing about getting married? young what would you say maybe the judgment that was maybe for me like I felt I didn't feel judged maybe it was all in my head but I was just like intimidated by that okay like I thought people were

like I didn't want to be viewed as like a child you know I'm to be honest I don't which was funny because somebody called you a child bride that didn't mean for you to hear that but yeah but you still heard it yeah well I guess it's a personality difference yeah like I yeah I would say that it wasn't hard. I don't know. It really was so fun. It was really fun. It was so fun. It was so fun. And it's funny. And it's still so fun that we have that history together. We talk about it all the time. Like you're my high school love. Yeah. I'm like how cool is that that I'm married to my high school sweetheart? I know. And I think it's like really, really special. We beat the odds. Oh yeah. I don't know. I really don't think it was hard. I don't think it was. It felt very natural.

I felt like the most natural next step in our relationship at that. And we just so happen to be young. Next question is, did your finances change following your podcast with Rameet? If you guys haven't seen that episode, we interviewed Rameet from how to, is it the Netflix show How to Get Rich? Is that what it's called on Netflix? He has his own Netflix show. It's pretty cool. He has a book on how to build wealth.

I think it's called How I Will Teach You to Be Rich. Wow, it's been like a year since we interviewed him. But very smart guy, very good with money. yeah now every time i see a book i'm like this is my rich life and i get it oh yeah because he taught he told us that there's certain expenses you know if you if you budget properly there should be certain expenses that you can spend you know and i do think more about my relationship with money after talking to him i'm like oh i don't want to be like a worrier yeah and like thinking about that and then also just like facing those things head on like i was telling you the other day i was

like sometimes i feel like i'm being smart with my money when i worry about it and it's like it's actually doing nothing for me. Well, the thing that I did. And I learned that like those money personalities from Rameath. So I, I, what I used to do is manually invest our money. So we invest in ETFs, which if you don't know what that is, essentially ETF stands for exchange traded fund. You lost me. And ETFs, that's, okay, let me like simplify it. No, you're doing good. ETFs track and index. So that could be the S&P 500. That could be the NASDAQ. That could be, what's another popular one the uh why am i forgetting the the other main one i said p 500 the s p 500 is the most popular one but uh oh did you say that one already i did say okay but yeah

they track essentially what an etf does is it tracks the performance of an index like the smp 500 or the nasdek and your return on that investment is essentially like how the market performs we should probably put something in the show notes to better explain this. I'm also not a I also don't have my license in financial planning. I never like finished out my schooling to get it. But anyway, that's what we invest in. And after talking to her meet, we started doing automated investments. So rather than me manually investing, we have an automated amount every single month that goes out of our savings account into our investment account and is automatically invested. And it just like like clockwork is always happening. I don't even have to think about it. And,

I love that because it's just, yeah, it's just like dollar cost averaging every single month, you know it's happening and one day it'll grow to be hopefully a really big number because the time value of money is a real thing. And I love that. Yeah, that's smart. Thank you to Nutrifold for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. If you're anything like me, you've seen a million ads about hair grow supplements and asked yourself, sure, but does this thing really work? I also felt that same way. But when I was consistently taking Nutraful, I went to the hairdresser and got my haircut, and she was telling me, Abby, your hair has grown like double what I normally see between visits, between my clients. Like, what are you doing? I'm like, well, I am taking Nutraful. Do you think that stuff actually works? And she said, absolutely. Her clients that use Nutraful, she sees significantly more hair growth, thicker, stronger, faster growing hair.

Nutraful is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand, trusted by over 1.5,000. million people. And you can feel great about what you're putting into your body since Nutraful Hair Grow supplements are backed by peer-reviewed studies and NSF content certified, the gold standard and third-party certification for supplements. Adding Nutriful into your daily routine is simple. Purchase online, no prescription required, automated deliveries, and free shipping keep you on track. See Thicker, stronger, faster-growing hair too with less shedding and just three to six months with Nutraful. For a limited time, Nutraful is offering our listeners $10 off your first month subscription and free shipping when you go to nutraful.com and enter the promo code

unplanned pod find out why neuterful is the best selling hair grow supplement brand at neuterful.com spelled n utr a f-o-l dot com promo code unplanned pod that's neuterful.com promo code unplanned pod do we want to ask sad questions again or no should we just ignore these i actually feel like there's more things to like i feel like i kind of want to talk about some things because like i feel like things change as now we're like like getting further and further out from the loss. Like I do feel differently about things. Okay.

So I don't know. Well, let's ask how this. Are you scared to get pregnant again with all the what ifs? That was the question I wanted to answer because I'm not like in the comment sections right now for my mental health. But but I heard from our team that that was something that was like a discussion on our podcasts and on our clips was like, why would you ask this question to someone so fresh from loss? and what I would say to those people is you probably haven't gone through a loss because when you've gone through something like what we've gone through, you're discussing the possibility of another pregnancy and the timeline on what that would look like in the same breath that you

find out that you've lost your baby because that determines how they go about delivery and everything and it just, it's an important thing to consider for your own health moving down the line. So I think that they were probably surprised because they probably didn't know that, but this has been a discussion since the morning that we found out about everything. And it's been something that we've talked about and thought about. And it's something that I feel a lot of hope in, but I also feel shame and guilt. And it's such a like weighty thing. Like I feel like maybe I would have felt differently about this had I not gone through the loss or everyone probably does feel somewhat different. But when I've talked to other women, like,

the topic of another pregnancy is so layered and complex, but we're doing a disservice if we can't acknowledge that there is, there is hope there. Yeah. If there is no hope there, then maybe it's something, I don't, it's just we're not doing women that have gone through this a good service if we can't talk about this. Yeah, no. And so it's like, especially, you're taking my lead. We ran that question by me beforehand.

I read all the questions before we filmed the episode. afterwards I said oh yeah like I'm fine with everything that was said like let's put it in and so then people thinking like why would you ask that question I'm like oh that's a that's a daily conversation we're having and thinking about and it's on my mind all the time like I don't know and I feel like a lot of people can relate to that like you're thinking like you have this is a reality is that something that I have to think about yeah I don't get to continue that pregnancy that I had and I think it brings a lot of hope too like while it's still sad oh it's so terrifying and heavy and so different than it once was, but you're right, like, there is hope there.

Yeah. And I shouldn't feel ashamed for feeling that hope coming from that. You know what I mean? I shouldn't feel guilty for that being a desire that I have. Gosh, and it's so dark, too, because I think, like, now pregnancy is scary because we know about what can happen. Yeah. But then I think about parents that have lost a child post-birth, a child, like, whether

it's a three-year-old or even, like, even, it could be a 16-year-old. like if to go through something like that must terrify you for all of your living kids because then you're like actually I didn't want to talk about oh sorry go ahead oh you're good it must just be terrifying for all of your just like regular normal kids not not like babies in the womb because you're just like afraid of something happened like for whatever reason in my head I feel like nothing could ever happen at Griffin or Griffin or Aggie which I know that's naive to think that way but I'm a very like optimistic person and so I don't know I just like reminds me that I always need to be like very protective. of them while still you are very protective of them i mean i am yeah kind of make fun of you for it yeah i'm obsessed with them like wearing helmets and all that stuff but it's like no like if you think they're about to get hurt you can you sprint i sprint i did wipe out on our turk you're kind of spastic about it when i was afraid august you was in a fall well no i will say though i do feel differently about that than you like i do feel like since the loss like i feel like i've told you i've been thinking about it it's like there was like a jar in my brain that like self like this loss unscrewed the lid off of and that's like

this this jar held like the things that like happened to other people yeah and now I am the other people like something that happened to me that I never thought would happen to me really like I was always afraid of it but I kept telling myself like that doesn't happen to me that won't happen to me like I know it's common but it won't happen to me now that jar's off so now in my brain I'm catching myself being a lot more fearful about things that I never feared before that aren't even related to miscarriage. Like I was on a walk and I was like, I could

get kidnapped. But like a lot of those fears I'm feeling now are related to Griffin and Augie and something terrible happening to them because I'm like, well this terrible thing happened to our baby that I never thought would ever happen and now something terrible, like all these other terrible things that I thought would never happen

could happen and they could affect my children and they could affect our family and like so yeah, I do feel like a lot more fearful now about everything it just feels like anything can happen next question is what is something your friends have done for you that made this season easier and you guys i know we've said this but a meal train is so nice especially after going through something you don't know yeah meal train is this website where you can set it up for somebody people sign up to bring meals through different nights of the week and so far i want to say it was like two weeks that we had people i ended it oh you

ended it wow but yeah people just kept bringing people would have kept bringing after a meal i mean it was so nice we didn't have to cook or do any of that for two weeks and abby was able to have a lot more time to just go on a walk or read a book and i would take the kids to go swim in our pool or we're just like whatever it just like gave us so much more time to think through everything and not have to like keep on going if that makes sense that was really nice that was really really nice yeah i think and miltrain is like a great, great option. And that doesn't even scratch the surface of the things that people did for us. I mean, we still are getting flowers from people sending us those edible arrangements.

That was actually awesome because we could eat it. Like me and the boys, me and the boys love the edible arrangement. It's like no matter what you do or give to somebody, it's just the fact that they know that they're seeing your pain that you're in and they're showing up and saying, like, we're here for you. like that and that can be in so many ways it's literally like if you have that if you have that motivation you literally cannot go wrong i really believe that yeah we also have uh never move on but is there a time you would like to move on from this center of your lives i don't know

exactly what that means but i'm guessing they're asking about like you know we'll never forget what happened but like when do you think you'll be able to you know take the next steps forward I think we're also, like, I think we're making progress now. I think I've seen you make some big strides. Like the other day, you just seemed like so much happier. And I was like, Abby, like, you seemed so joyful today. Like, it was really cool to see that. Yeah.

And so that's awesome. I think, I think time heals. And I think, uh, yeah, sorry, what were you going to say? It seemed like I. No, I think you're right. I do think that. Yeah. I don't know what to say.

Like, it's so hard because it's like you, like you do feel good, but then sometimes you feel a little guilty for feeling good, but I knew from the beginning, someone gave me this amazing advice to, like, invite joy. You don't have to, like, feel guilty or ashamed for feeling that in this season. Like, if that happens, like, allow yourself to feel it and enjoy that. And so sometimes I feel that. And then sometimes sadness just, like, wipes me off my feet. And I think that, like, in the stage I'm in right now, I'm in.

I can go about my day almost as normal, but my capacity is so much lower. Like my capacity for stress specifically is like very low. Like I get overwhelmed really, really easily right now or I get exhausted really, really easy right now. And actually I noticed I've been showing you I'm losing my hair like crazy. And I'm sure some of that is related to postpartum situation

because I'm still like postpartum. and but I'm like that hair loss doesn't usually hit you till like several months out like three four months and I'm not there yet but I just think the stress of like the residual stress from everything is just like causing I've shown you like clumps of hair it's like falling out I mean stress is a huge cause of hair loss the same pattern sorry it's not even the same patterns of hair loss as like postpartum because usually that's like right here but like it's not just right there It's like a lot of hair I'm like losing. Well, your hair looks amazing.

It looks super, super good. Thanks. But, yeah, I do feel like where I'm at now, I can definitely go about my day and I can act normal and feel somewhat normal. But it doesn't take much, though, to send me right back there. Actually, so many people have referenced this. There must have been a video go viral. I think some psychologist or someone made a video about, or a therapist. made a video expressing explaining the grief box it's like there's a button i'm not going to explain

it well but there's basically like a button in the bottom of a box and this like trauma that you went through is like the box and then pain is the button and the ball is just like what activates that and so sometimes like when you're so close out to a traumatic event that ball is going to bounce and press that button of pain a lot and like basically all the time it's going to hit it and be on there but as your life moves on from that traumatic event the box gets bigger and the ball is keeps bouncing around and it's since it has more space it doesn't press that button of pain as much but when it does press it it still hurts just as bad but it doesn't hit it as much and i do feel like that like we're at we're just at the beginning of like noticing that like i'm like the pain button

isn't pressed it was pressed constantly at the beginning it's not pressed as much but when it as much it's still pressed a lot but what it is pressed it's just as painful what are you each doing to fill your own cup as well as each other after loss. I've taken a lot more time for myself and like I'm just so grateful for you like that I'm able to do that like a lot of times I can talk about being stressed and exhausted it hits like right at dinner time and then it like overwhelms me at dinner time a lot of times like I do like I can really early in the morning I can like keep going and chuggle along and chug along and chug along by like 5 p.m is when stress and exhaustion kind of like really hit me and you like basically

always take over and like step in for me and that has given me like the space to like be alone and like journal if I need to take a bath and just kind of like or go on a walk like do those things those things are all like really good like in this time like any form of like self-care got a facial someone gifted me a head spa experience it was so nice and so nice and Just like taking those moments to literally, it sounds so frivolous or like extra. But I do think those moments that you intentionally take to recharge yourself, you will see so many more benefits in the long run in your marriage and in your family because you are able to show up better for everyone.

Yeah. And you have to be intentional about it. It's not like just like doom scrolling on your phone. You're like numbing out and you're like, I just needed an hour. That's not, that's not intentional. if you intentionally are like I'm going to use this time to like recharge my batteries that I feel like you will see benefits yeah you you woke up with the kids two days in a row when I was sick which was like really helpful for me because I hadn't been doing that very much I've been sleeping a lot I was like could not get out of bed I was so exhausted from this virus so that was super nice but like the yeah the mornings that I have spent with the kids like it's it's something that I look forward to like it's something that I look forward to like like it's something that I look forward to like Like, I literally, I wake up and I'm like, I get to go read Star Wars books to hockey and have a lightsaber battles. And that, to me, feels like something for me because it's just like what's what's the, like, I just, I just see so much purpose in family.

I see so much purpose in our kids. And I don't know. Therapy's also really great. Therapy's great. I love therapy too. That's been really helpful. And finally, we have, what is triggering? Wow, we're just going for the dark stuff.

now. I mean, now that we got all the fun stuff out of the way, let's just get, let's just get to this really dark, sad, you know, topics. I try to make a joke out of that. Whenever I'm uncomfortable, I try to make jokes, but I'm not very funny. Really, I would say social media, honestly, like, you know, there's something with the algorithm, especially with the stage of life we're in, the content we produce. We have a lot of friends that are parents and, you know, newlyweds, all this stuff. And we're so happy for it. for everyone, but it's almost like every single time you open up your phone, there's like a new pregnancy announcement or gender reveal or just something. Someone's pregnant. And so, and it's not that,

and we're so, we're so happy for them. But yeah, like Abby said, you know, you're at Disney. It's like it seems like everyone has a bump, which I think, I think it just sticks out to you more now and it sticks out to me more because we've been through this loss. But yeah, that's, that's triggering. So it's, it's been helpful to be off social media to have, like Abby, basically. just goes on to post stories at this point. Yeah, and even when I still go on to post stories, the only post I see is always pregnancy related. And like a certain part of me now feels guilty for making so much pregnancy content. But it pregnancy is something that should be celebrated. Yeah. And it is like a life that is so valuable. And pregnancy content is really

the only reminders I have of our daughter's life because we didn't get to see her outside the womb so I cherish it but right now I'm not in a place where I can consume it like without pain associated with it

so yeah there's that yeah what was I going to say in general I feel like right now I'm realizing how complex of a relationship I have mentally and emotionally with our pregnancy with our daughter. I was telling you I was talking about our friends last weekend and I was shocked because I was like

telling a story about when I was pregnant and I literally just used the phrase when I was pregnant and then I was kind of like slow down and I was like with our last baby because I feel like my pregnancy with both of our kids like it makes so much sense to me like that was me bringing to this world and now I'm just trying to rationalize that pregnancy because for a while I felt like I wanted to erase that or like I felt almost embarrassed about it like I just I feel like I have such a weird relationship with that pregnancy now but I'm sure that's normal and it's just something I have to work out because at first my instinct was literally to delete every video and picture off my phone and off our platforms from that pregnancy and I was like

that that's not right that's the only that's all we have of our pregnancy with our daughter like that is something to be cherished and like held on closely to but there is just like a level of just like but what was this all for like yeah so I just have a complex relationship with it and I imagine it'll even get more complex until it fits nicely into my brain yeah or maybe it never will but that's where we're at yeah that's definitely the most triggering type of thing but there's no like bad thoughts i have towards those people posting those things or people in my life they're pregnant but yeah i do feel a little guilty right now because i'm quite guilty i don't feel like i'm showing up for your pregnant friends or people with babies yeah that's okay that's okay

I just like I hope that I'll be ready too soon but I'm just still not there but I don't think nobody expects you to especially after what I know I know but people have been so generous and kind to me like I just want to return that favor too I think I think you I just says a lot about your character that you want to do that and I think you will I think it's just like right now the timing you need some time to just like heal and you will be able to return that favor to me and and you've done so much for our friends like before this i mean you were always making meals for people just spoiling people hosting people having book club like you're you're the best no you're nice i love you love you too sweetie okay well i think our kids need us we're gonna go stop recording this but uh thank you guys again for being here and we will see oh and if you haven't like been a part of this community we'd love to like have you here so if you could subscribe or put on notifications whatever that is for you we'd love to just like stay in touch because i want to say something like more than half of our viewers aren't subscribed to the channel

which is crazy so um if that's you maybe you should subscribe and just join the club we love you guys thanks for being here thanks see you see yeah see you