What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood | Parenting Tips From Funny Moms

We're often told that the American style of parenting is inferior—that we're doing it all wrong compared to, say, a laissez-faire Parisian whose kids eat whatever is served.

But is it our too intense/ too lax/ too snack-heavy parenting style that is making us (and our kids) so stressed? Or is it where we're doing that parenting?

In this episode, we explore the forces shaping parenting in America today, and the ways in which other countries offer parents more support. From the pressure to “do it all” to the lack of community support, we examine how our American struggles may be rooted in American ideals.

There's no doubt cultural expectations can shape our parenting decisions, leading to the "intensive parenting" that's so easy for others to criticize. But there's plenty about our circumstances as American parents that makes things harder.

Our friend Janelle Hanchett (whose writing inspired this episode) was exactly right when she wrote:

"As much as we may in the US give lip-service to universal healthcare, parental leave, labor rights, and childcare subsidies as key tenets of good parenting, just below these assertions is the implication that if American parents simply tried harder, they would not be so stressed and they would parent better.

The narrative bombards American parents relentlessly: Others do it better because they are culturally superior.

They are not better people. They live in societies with better policies."

Here are links to some of the resources mentioned in the episode:

Jannelle Hanchett on Substack: They aren't better parents because they're culturally superior

Claire Cain Miller for the NYT: Today’s Parents: ‘Exhausted, Burned Out and Perpetually Behind’

Reddit/attachmentparenting: Thoughts on “Bringing Up Bébé” book?

Kate Cray for The Atlantic: Parenting in America Keeps Getting More Intensive

Kate Juilan for The Atlantic: What Happened to American Childhood?

Joe Pinsker for The Atlantic: ‘Intensive’ Parenting Is Now the Norm in America

Patrick Ishizuka for Social Forces journal: Social Class, Gender, and Contemporary Parenting Standards in the United States: Evidence from a National Survey Experiment

Yu-Chin Her for Population Research and Policy Review: Having Fun or Having Kids? Leisure Aspirations and Attitudes Toward Parenthood in Europe

Susan Kelley for The Cornell Chronicle: Hands-on, intensive parenting is best, most parents say

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables.

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

⁠⁠⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This Deep Dive series revisits some of our past episodes about the joys and the challenges that come with raising kids with differences and disabilities.

Olivia Martinez-Hauge is a marriage and family therapist specializing in the treatment of families, couples, and individuals who are caregiving for children or adults with neurodiversity. She is also a licensed occupational therapist with over two decades of experience helping children and their families.

She is also a mother of three children, two with neurodiversity.

In this "Fresh Take" interview, Olivia explains

the grief and isolation that might come with special needs parenting

her own journey moving past those emotions by parenting "from a place of present"

the team of support that a parent of a special needs child needs

how we can change our friend groups, schools, and societies to be more supportive of families with children who have special needs

Whether you're a parent of a special needs or neurodiverse child, or just want to be a better friend to someone who is, you'll learn so much from this interview.

Find out more about Olivia and her work at The Center for Connection and Neurodiversity here: https://www.thecenterforconnection.org/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables.

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

⁠⁠⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why does modern parenting feel so difficult? If a chimpanzee knows what to do without reading a hundred parenting books, why doesn't it just come naturally?

Science journalist and author Elizabeth Preston is the author of The Creatures' Guide to Caring: How Animal Parents Teach Us That Humans Were Born to Care. Drawing from animal behavior, evolutionary biology, and neuroscience, this book explains why studying the parenting of every species from poison frogs to bonobos, from rats to birds, can remind us how human parenting is supposed to work—and how parental anxiety may result from the belief we were ever supposed to do things differently.

In this episode, we discuss:

Why humans are “cooperative breeders”

Why maternal anxiety and hypervigilance is an evolutionary advantage, not a personal failure

The truth about “mom brain” and what actually happens to the brain during pregnancy

Why fathers and non-biological caregivers are equally capable of deep caregiving

The role of alloparenting and why kids benefit from many trusted adults

Why caregiving is central to what makes us human

Here's where you can find Elizabeth:

https://elizabethgpreston.com/

@by.elizabeth.preston on IG

https://elizabethgpreston.substack.com/

Buy THE CREATURES' GUIDE TO CARING: https://bookshop.org/a/12099/9780593657102

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables.

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

⁠⁠⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How do you get kids to help out—ever, at all—without default resistance that makes it feel like it's not worth the trouble of your having asked?

Kids *should* contribute to their families' lives without their parents resorting to nagging or threats. Kids in other cultures, we are told, participate willingly and fully. Why does this seem so hard for so many of us?

We discuss:

Whether "chores" framing is part of the problem

How gender roles shape the expectations of who's helping

Whether they have to like participating for it to matter

Why we seem to find this harder than our parents did

Here are links to some of the resources mentioned in the episode:

Susan Newman for Psychology Today: Raising Baby Hunter-Gatherer Style

Jennifer Katzenstein for Johns Hopkins Medicine Wellness and Prevention blog: How to Get Your Kids to Do Chores

Reem Raouda for CNBC Make It: I’ve studied over 200 kids—parents who have an easy time getting their children to listen never use these 5 ‘toxic’ phrases

Amy Sutherland for the NYT: What Shamu Taught Me About a Healthy Marriage

Frank Bruni for the NYT: Tolstoy and Miss Daisy

Deborah Gilboa: GET THE BEHAVIOR YOU WANT...WITHOUT BEING THE PARENT YOU HATE!

Our Fresh Take with Michaeleen Doucleff, author of HUNT, GATHER, PARENT

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What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables.

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

⁠⁠⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This Deep Dive series revisits some of our past episodes about the joys and the challenges that come with raising kids with differences and disabilities.

What if we're looking at autism in the wrong way? Dr. Lynn Koegel, co-author of ⁠Hidden Brilliance: Unlocking the Intelligence of Autism⁠, explains how to engage with the strengths in kids with autism rather than focusing on what they're lacking.

⁠Dr. Lynn Koegel⁠ is a clinical professor at the Stanford School of Medicine. She and her husband developed Pivotal Response Treatment which focuses on motivation. She has been supporting autistic individuals for more than 40 years.

Dr. Koegel and Margaret discuss:

Why we're focusing on the wrong things when we assess kids with autism

The power of peer support

Connecting authentically with kids with autism

Dr. Koegel explains that professionals are often trained to look at what's "wrong" with children with autism rather than what's right. It helps to look at the differences in children with autism, as Margaret likes to say, as morally neutral.

Here's where you can find Lynn:

⁠autismPRThelp.com⁠

⁠@lynn.koegel on Facebook⁠

⁠hidden-brilliance.org⁠

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables.

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices