Fitting in Health (plus a family vacation postmortem!) Ep 105

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Speaker 1: Hi. This is Laura Vanderkam. I'm a mother of four, an author, journalist, and speaker. And this is Sarah Hart Hunger. I'm a mother of three, practicing physician and blogger. On the side, we are two working parents who love our careers and our families. Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long term career goals. We want you to get the most out of life. Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura. This is episode one oh five, first airing in early August of twenty nineteen. We are going to be talking about, gosh, what are we doing. We're going to be talking about getting in health. Either wise, I'm very babylay. You know, why did my brain just blip there? Clearly I did not get enough sleep last night, which we can talk about. But we're gonna be talking about making time for help both exercise, sleep, making time for mental health, all these things that become more challenging when you're a parent. But in the meantime, Sarah recently got back from her summer vacation, which was at times a bit taxing for her mental health. So, Sarah, why don't you tell us about that? Yeah? So, I think I had mentioned this trip a little bit previously when it was in its planning stages, and I feel like I made a number of mistakes that i'd like you all to learn from. Perhaps, So you know, Genevieve is currently nineteen months. To set the stage, She's very opinionated, She's very cute and charming. She will sit in a high chair for about three minutes, and I think I actually talked about on an episode very recently that oh, she'll sit so nicely because the other kids. Well, yeah, that lasted five seconds. Now she wants to get up as soon as she's sitting down. She is into everything. She is a whirling dervish of craziness. The other two are, you know, they're a little older, they're five and seven, generally more you know, easy to handle on vacation, but still have their moments, as all kids do. And you know, when kids are not happy about something, most kids, including Laura's kids, from what I've read, tend to make that pretty vocal, which can be not fun for everybody else. So I'm not going to nero ability to suffer in silence, and maybe that's a good evolutionary trait. I mean, I don't want my kids to really suffer in silence, but I did want to mute button on a couple of occasions. So okay. When we book the trip, we knew that we wanted to go to Legoland and that we wanted to visit Amelia Island. I did strategically avoid any flights for this trip because I didn't really feel like carding Genevieve on a plane. I didn't feel like doing the whole like moving the car seat rental car kind of a dance, and I wanted to keep costs a little bit more reasonable. We are still working on selling our house. Anyone interested in property in Miami Beach, there's a great house for sale. Anyway, So we planned this trip and decided we would go to Legoland and then go to Amelia Island. Now, I guess I wasn't in that much of a budget mindset because I was hotel shopping and I was very close to booking a room at the Omni, which is kind of a mid range but nice resort. But I read a few trip Advisor reviews that ended up kind of getting me scared or something, and I ultimately decided that, you know what, if I'm bringing three kids on my trip, at least I can stay a really nice hotel. So we stayed at the Ritz, which was beautiful. But I regret that choice because you were at the beautiful hotel with your three small children. Yes, because we were spending a million dollars a night, and that wasn't even really the problem. It was like this beautiful sanctuary of a place and there were other kids. And it's not that this staff was unfriendly. They were great, but it's just that there was no serenity to be had by me, and we were stuck in a very small room because they actually didn't have any sweet It's available when I booked, and I had talked about being on some waitlists, but I never got called back. So we were all in one room, which they did okay with the with the travel crib, and it was just kind of like being surrounded by elegance and couples relaxing and then there was us, So that was not good. The other thing that was not good is I think of yourself as a warning to all those couples of what all this relaxing together and romantic locations can lead to right. Yes, it was. It was quite a warning and no, I mean there were other kids. It wasn't like we were you know, there were the hush surroundings. But I don't know, it just it was not enjoyable. And I think the main things that were not enjoyable about it were that we didn't have enough space, so there was nowhere to retire to after the kids went to bed. We were just sort of stuck in our one room. And Genevieve's not going to go to bed when it is not dark and quiet, so that really limits the possibilities for everyone else. One night, we allowed her to watch Spider Man for about thirty minutes while the other kids were winding down and the lights were dim, and put her to bed. And I don't know if it was a com in coincidence or not, but that night she was up from one point thirty am to five am. No joke, like, no sleep. She doesn't like spiders. I mean, she was having little nightmares. I don't know if it was the Spider Man, but afterwards I postulated that maybe it was or just the staring at a screen right before because we you know, that was thankfully only one night out of five on the trip that she slept really badly. Actually, the other night was also at the RITZ, so maybe she just doesn't like the rits. I don't know, but it was kind of terrible. Josh actually took her for a beach walk at three in the morning. It took her forty five minutes to fall asleep during that beach walk, and then we put her in bed and two minutes later she's like mommy. So anyway, we paid all that for the privilege of that. So I just don't think a hotel is the right choice when you are a family with a toddler. I mean, feel free to weigh in if you love staying at hotels in one room with your three children. But I have a feeling most of you already knew better, and in fact I should have known better, but some how got lulled into thinking that a night's hotel would make it easier. It didn't. Next time we are going to stay at some kind of villa, we may try to do one at that omni that I didn't stay at the first time, because then you get to use the resort facilities. But it's like a mile away where there's these villas that are actually privately owned that you rent and you have your own kitchen, and you have your own bedrooms, and we could put the kids to bed and actually like enjoy a glass of wine in light. So yeah, that was that was a little point for me. The separate room is key. I mean, there's some hotel chain like Embassy Suites has some of you know, mostly the two room suites for instance. Yes, and I've actually had a great experience at Homewood sweep Home in Orlando one year. You can get a lot of space there, but I don't think Amelia Island has those kind of chances. Orlando made the cities. But yeah, just going on like Verbo or Airbnb or getting a house because then you've got the kitchen and then you've got bedrooms for the kids, and yeah, there's I think that's often a little bit more family friendly, especially if you've got young kids and if you have a lot of kids. The other thing was that Josh had thought, oh they have a kid's club, Well that's so great, which I guess could have been great, but again, Genevieve didn't fit within the age requirements. Of that kid's club so worthless. I mean, what are we going to do? Put the two and then keep it like it didn't make any sense. So the other thing we messed up on is this is like a major confession to our listeners, because I'm supposed to be a great planner and maybe I am, but didn't communicate things well because somehow Josh didn't realize that he was supposed to have Monday and Tuesday off. One might argue that's his responsibility to know, but he did point out that if you're going to book a vacation at a very weird timeframe, it might be good to emphasize that because you had like Monday to Friday off. Yes, yeah, and I had to work Monday because I was on call, which was also terrible because coming from a week of call into a vacation mistake. But then also we realized, like literally as we were about to leave, that he had clinic on Monday and like thirty patients booked. Oh, we had to actually cut our trip short by one day. And actually that ended up being fine because we were ready to be done and you guys were like, let's leave the writs in any case, Yes, and the Writs was generous enough to not have us like we call them and we were past the window by a day, but we explained and they did. They were very nice about it. They did not charge us for that day, so thank goodness. But yeah, I think being I think booking a longer period of time, being really careful about what's before and what's after your trip. I wish I had scheduled a like a date night for afterwards, because it's true, you've just spent all this time off, but unless you've engineered alone time into your trip, you don't get a lot of just quiet evenings to talk. So that would have been really nice kind of debrief. Although we did do that to some extent. On the way home, I will say, I have a couple of positives to share. You want some happy things, Yeah, let's do the happy too. It wasn't all bad. It wasn't And you know, in my memory, I'm sure it's gonna get whitewashed over time, and I'll just remember that wonderful trip we took. Lego Land itself is awesome. I still maintain it's like Disney Light. It's so easy. It wasn't even crowded there was one day when my kids just kind of went on every ride without any line. So I highly recommend that, especially if you're local. I'm sure the California one is great too, and I think there might be a New York one or something, but this was the Florida one. The road trip part was fine, Like the drive was very easy. iPads are the best, or actually tablets. I think they're like chromebooks. I don't know what my kids have, but whatever they are, Josh ordered them. They work really well and kept them very occupied. A lot of Minecraft was happening. We even at one point I learned how to put the iPad on the mode where the kid can't like press any buttons so that Genevieve could watch a couple of episodes of Mickey Mouse when we got a little desperate, and that worked out beautifully. So the drive itself was fun, and playing DJ with Spotify, especially if you kind of delve into lost and forgotten hits of the eighties, can be a very fun way to spend several hours driving down the Florida Highway. So there were some fun moments. We ate snow crab, we ate ice cream. I mean, the ocean was great. We had a good beach day, so there were positives, but we could have Maybe we're going to do better next time. I'm going to report in twenty twenty about the summer trip that we took that was super relaxing or maybe at least somewhat relaxing. And also, Genevieve will be a little older then too. I mean, she's true moving target. Parenting is a moving targetsving target. And by the time she's three and a half, I mean, she'll basically be where you know, Cameron was when she was born. And so then you know that that's starting to be a bigger kid, and you know, yep, it will get You've only got you know, two more years of this, so it's true. But I think I think since next year, she'll still be at least, you know, kind of like a big time. Now she's like a little toddler, then she'll be a big toddler. I think we can put a lot of these ideas into action, and yeah, I'll report back. Yeah, yeah, Well, trips with toddlers are hard. I mean that's just one of our recurring themes here on this podcast. And you know, one of the issues that Sarah and I occasionally take with other people who write about say productivity or time management, and talk about vacations as if they are relaxing, wonderful things that you know, whereas work is stressful and a vacation is not, I would go, I'll show you time for yourself. Yeah, right, Sarah is more relaxed at her job than she was from one to five am in the ritz with Yes, in a way, that's probably true. That is probably true. Yeah, yes, that's fascinating. Although okay, so on that note, we do have some upcoming truly relaxing vacations. I have a couples trip planned for weekend. I have a girls trip plan. So I do feel like, you know, this was the family fun, and I will get some of that rejuvenating self care fun having planned both of them for an advance, so I'm excited about that. Yeah. No, those will be those will be great. Well, so we can transition into the body of this episode where we're talking about making time for health, which is a question we get in some way, shape or form a lot that you know, as we try to figure out listener questions, and so we thought maybe we kind of combined this all into one episode. That people say, well, you know, now that I'm a parent, now that I'm working and raising children, where do I find time to exercise? Or some people just make it very sort of defeat us, like, oh, well everyone knows, you know, once you have a job and kids, you'll never find time to exercise again, and other such things. And you know, we've both found that that's not necessarily the case. So we wanted to talk a little bit about how people make time for their health, both their physical health and their mental health. Just to review real quick, Sarah, you're a morning exercise there, Yes, ninety eight percent of the time I do my workouts in the morning, unless there's some like today, I probably will use the time my nanny's here in the afternoon because I had to do some podcast prep this morning, as one might imagine. So yes, I mean there are exceptions, and I've actually had to learn to be a little bit more flexible with the exceptions. But for the most part, around five forty five to six am is my preferred start time. Yeah, I my usual time that I exercise is kind of mid afternoon. That's what I've done during the school year because it's when I need a break. The kids are usually out of the house at that point, and so it's just very convenient time to get out and run. But with the summer, that's it's you know, ninety five degrees at two pm. It's not really a it's not ninety five degrees here. I think that's gonna happen once this summer, but still eighty five is pretty unpleasant as well to run in. So I've been trying to do earlier. So if Michael is here, I will get up and run around seven am. If he is not here, I will run at eight am when our nanny comes to work, and then try to be back in order to do our camp runs at eight forty five because with like two three different camps you need multiple drivers anyway, So I try to be back for that and then start my work day when I when I get home from that. You know, the mornings have a lot going for them. I mean, certainly when people ask like how can I fit exercise into my life? I think mornings tend to be best for most people. I mean, just because you get it done so then you're not thinking about it the rest of the day of when am I going to find time Like the emergencies have usually not arisen at six am, whereas by four pm there's all sorts of great reasons for you not to go do it. You know, you only have to shower once, if that's something that is of concern to you. I think in general people probably are a bit more concerned about cleanliness than they need to be. But you know, that's certainly an upside for that. You could trade off with a spouse, Like if there's two of you, maybe each of you gets two mornings during the week, and then each of you could do something on each of the weekend days, and it's like, you know, both of you have just exercised four times a week, and it's great. But you know, if you don't have that, if your spouse travels, or you don't have a spouse or whatever it is, you know, you can still get at early as long as the kids wake up with thumb predictability and do like a treadmill workout in the morning or a workout video in the morning. And that's what you tend to do, right, Yes, usually, well not a treadmill, but yeah, usually I either run outside or I do like a thirty minute online workout just so convenient, so just it's right there. Yeah, actually, and I have a new hack ready for my new hack, let's hear the new hack. I turned the sound off and I listen to a podcast one I workout because I started get board listening to Autumn Calibrazy for like the ninetieth time. I'm like, I kind of don't need the queuing anymore. And there's a nice countdown timer, so I don't need to hear her say like three, two one. Plus I've done them so many times that I kind of know how many reps I can do, like I don't need her. So I figured that out, and now I've increased my podcast time. So it's kind of part of that. You're probably more excited about it, Like, yeah, I was kind of excited about it, about the hack, and this isn't she sounds so stupid because I know this is what like ninety nine percent of people do anyways, like listening to music. But so I explained, when I run outside, I never listened to anything, and partly it's just like so zen of you. Well, no, I'm more like safety issues. I guess I'm concerned about hearing traffic or hearing somebody if that's you know, on trails or something like that. But you know, when I'm running out of treadmill, I would feel like so dragging and everything, and I realize, like if I put on you know, Taylor Swift or Katie Perry or something, I'm like, wooho, I can run all fast. I'm feeling all excited. Like while I'm listening to I don't know Taylor Swift singing about being twenty two or whatever that song is that she's like, I can run like I'm twenty two. I was like, I'm twittering, but she's talking about partying like she's twenty two or whatever. But I guess it feels sort of like that at six am. I don't know that we can power, which you know it like, of course yes this. I feel like, you know, most of humanity figured this out, that the reason you listen to music is that it pumps you up and gives you energy that you wouldn't have had. That you can borrow that from the music. But some of us learn slowly. It's okay, I learned slowly about vacations. Well, I actually have more to say about exise exercise, but let's take a quick break to mention our sponsors today. Our first one is one of my favors, DoorDash. DoorDash is the first on demand platform to launch food delivery in all fifty states, with the largest delivery coverage in the US. 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I years ago listeners saw an ad for mm Lafleur and it was beautiful clothes, and so it caught my attention. I'm like, well, I need more clothes for work. So I began shopping and I counted in my closet. I have six dresses, two pairs of pants, one skirt, a few tops. So you can tell, I'm what an inventory. How many of those dresses are blue? I know that's your same toly all of them, but they have a lot of blue clothes, which is on a very pretty blue at that. Actually, my dress that I got is also blue and it has the gorgeous name of Cerulean Milange and it really is just beautiful. So yeah, check out their dress selections, check out their dresses. Mmlaflour makes it easy to get dressed so you can focus on what's important in your career and life if you don't have time to shop for yourself. They also have expert stylists who will help you put together looks that work right for you. So right now, new customers can enjoy twenty five dollars toward their first purchase or Bento box with the code best of b E stof. Visit mmlaflour dot com slash best of for more details and to re this gift again. That website is m m LA f l e u R dot com, so like mm the flower in French, slash best of for more details and to redeem the gift using code b e stof awesome. Okay, so I wanted to say one more thing about exercise since that was the topic we were just on, and that is that remember why you're doing it. You are probably not. I mean, maybe you are training for the Olympics and that's amazing and you should tell us all about that, but you probably aren't. You're probably doing it for fitness, to feel good, to look a certain way, or the way you want to set a good example for your kids, to get more energy, for the mental boost whatever. And you don't have to spend a million hours or do very specific things like there's no way to win at this juncture in doing your workouts or lose really, And I think it took me having three kids, or at least a couple of kids, to figure that out, because there was certainly a time when I felt like, well, if I can't run five, like what's the point, Like that's not a real workout. And now I've found that fairly short bursts can get the job done, and something is better than nothing. It doesn't have to be every day. It's fine to take breaks and have periods of laziness and get back to it and just generally more forgiving about the concept of exercise itself, which I guess it sort of sounds like do less exercise, but that's not really what I mean. It's more just think of it more as sort of just an ongoing part of life rather than some big deal thing that you have to get in specific way every single day. Yeah, I think this is the biggest mind is shift for people, is because they've you know, before kids, they've been in the mindset that what it means to exercise is to go to the gym for an hour after work, and so they you know, even people are very good exercisers, have built this into their life that they go to the gym three or four times a week after work for an hour, and so they come home at what's seven thirty or so and then order food or cook food at that point. And clearly, if you have young kids, that's probably not going to be your top priority with your schedule at that point, because you know, if you want to put to bed, for instance, you probably want to come home before seven thirty. And so because you can't go to the gym for an hour every night after work, you talk yourself into this idea that oh, well, you know, you just can't be a working parent an exercise like I would be failing my children if I did that. But I think that's a very limited way to look at this first start, as I mean, you could go to the gym for an hour every night after work. I mean, there's no rule that you can't, you know, especially if your kid is waking up at like five am and you're spending five to eight thirty with them every morning, like you know, maybe you don't actually have to go put them to bed every night too, So so maybe you do your time together in the morning, and you can go to the gym for an hour every night after work, or you know, don't make it every night, like you know, if you're co parenting with someone, you can trade off each of you gets one night off you can go to the gym then. So again it's not you're not part of that gym scene, although I don't know if you really want to be part of the scene when you're like married, what sort of thing is going on there? But you know, you can certainly take your favorite class, like if you you know, loved the Thursday night power pump class like that, that would totally be reasonable to do. And you give your partner Tuesday night and he or she can go do their group bike ride that night or whatever it is that that person loves to do. And I think big fitness projects are still reasonable too, Like I still think I would like to run another marathon, but it doesn't mean that I need to like always be running a marathon or like always go to that Thursday night class. Like you can go to it one week and then the next week you have a work event, and then you can jump back into the third week. Like there's, yeah, are you gonna do a marathon again? Yeah? Probably I will. Okay, I sound surcribed. I don't know. I mean I've thought about it too. In fact, I thought about, like possibly ending the running streak by doing a marathon be a way too, And I for a variety of reasons, I don't think that's gonna happen, but it would be an option. I think it would be a fun ending as a way. But then you'd probably be like, well, now I'm gonna do a fifty k Okay, now I'm gonna end it with I'd at least need to take a day off, right, One would think you would think maybe I will just state for the record. So I have this app at use Strava, and I it like show it has this new thing it didn't used to have it where it kind of shows you, like where you are for the month in terms of how many times you worked out where they overlay a graph of your prior months. You can kind of see the slope of the line. And mine is so laughable July because I was sick and then we went on vacation, which I mentioned. Oh yeah, by the way, was gonna mention. Josh and I both decided we wish we had worked out on this shop a lot happier. We could have done it. We just sort of like, I don't know whatever anyway, So I've only worked out four times in July, and it's like, what the fit sixteenth seventeenth sixteenth, that's like terrible, Well, it's that terrible. I mean, so you could have done zero in July. I could have done zero, but I don't. I don't know what my point is with that, except that I guess I'm more accepting of the ebbs and flows than I ever was before. I'm like, that's cool, and maybe I'll do a marathon in six months and maybe I won't whatever. Well, and I also point out you're probably walking like fifteen thousand steps a day around Lego Land. I mean, it's not like that's true. Although they were like only like in tight circles. Following general people have lifts like you're like a figure out, you know what. I bet I did get a lot of like arm works armor. Yeah, that account that totally counts, totally count. So yes, you can totally make time for exercise. And I feel like that's a lot of the questions I actually get from people. A lot of people email me questions, how am I going to find time to exercise, Like, well, you know, first change your idea of what exercise means, but then think about the whole week, think about where you can fit it in, think about stuff you love, because you're not going to do something you hate. That's just not going to happen. But sleep is also a key component of health, and so this is another one that tends to be harder for people, although my time diary studies have found that most parents do in fact sleep. It's and I love hearing that because it feels like everyone else loves to say the opposite, and I'm like, I don't know. It seems like I don't know where they're getting their number, or it's some online survey that people play that you fill out when you're tired, and I mean, like, when are you going to google like how to sleep more? Yeah, I don't know that. Time diary studies definitely find that people sleep a reasonable amount. I would say the vast majority of adults sleep somewhere between seven and eight hours a day when you average it over the week. Certainly there are nights where you get less, and people are probably thinking of the nights that they get less when they are answering that question, But then they're never adding in the night they got like ten hours of sleep because you know, they crashed on the couch or they you know, their partner got up with the kids, or they slept later. You know, they're just not adding that in, or because it occurred on Saturday or Sunday, which turn out to beautily they didn't count. Be kidding, it didn't count. So the vast majority of people somewhere between seven and eight hour day. I would say, like ninety nine percent of people need between six and nine. Like there's very few people who are outside that norm. There's some people who for whatever reason genetically need quite a bit of sleep, and that's difficult if that's you that you have to work with, but that's life. I mean, there's nothing you can do about it, so I mean, you know, and you're probably better off just figuring out how to accommodate it than being miserable for all of your waking hours. And then there's that is hard though, because it's like, you know, there are one hundred and sixty eight hours and you start going down on them, and it is sort of unfair that more of us, some of us get a little bit more than others for that reason, but it's probably not that common. Well, I mean totally normal to need say eight and a half hours a day like that is a totally normal number. But compared from somebody who needs seven to somebody who needs eight and a half, that's an hour and a half a day. And when you are in it's somewhat the crunched mode of again building your career, raising young children, that can feel like quite a bit and again there's nothing you can do about it, so it's not worth getting upset about. You could also tell yourself that probably the vast majority of people who do only need seven don't spend that extra ninety minutes. Well, I mean, so if that's remotely helpful to you, maybe they're getting to watch a little bit extra television or spend or time on Twitter. But you don't want to be on Twitter, so it's all good. There you go. Yeah, well, I feel like I'm definitely one of those people who sleeps less some nights and more other nights, and that's okay. I know people who will set their alarm like specifically for a number of hours. Sometimes I stay up a little later than I should. I still tend to get up early, and then I'll sort of make up for when I can. Either on the weekends, I'll take a nap during Genevieve's nap, or I'll alternate who's going to sleep in with Josh or on my day off, I mean sleep later. Yeah. Yeah, Well, in general, I mean, you're best off I think figuring out what time you need to wake up, which for many people that's pretty set, whether it's you know, getting kids to school or getting to work or whatever or both. Counting back the number of hours you need and the at least having that as your target, right, because I mean, I feel like people often don't connect the two at all, like like somehow the amount of sleep they need and the time they wake up are like two entirely separate variables that don't need to be simultaneously encountered. And taking a tip from last week's episode, you know, if you really think about that sleep affecting how that day is going to go, then counting back and your night, your day starting with the sleep to kind of preface your day, then that might be enough motivation to count and actually plan for that. But I see on the days where I'm not, I mean, and my promise is still the unpredictable wake ups. It's a lot less frequent than it was, but Alex is still an early riser. And this morning he elected to wake up at five thirty and came and found me, and because he loved me so much, he also lied because he knows he's not supposed to get out of his bed till six. So I'm like, Alex, what time is it? He's like six oh one. I'm like, okay, fine, Wow, I don't have my contact and I have no idea what time it is. So funny. Well, he's so close to I mean he technically he's old enough to just sort of do stuff on his own, but maybe maybe he needs to get a little older to be brave enough to Yeah. Well, I mean I then go set him up watching cartoons. But it's just like getting him to that point, like you know that he can't really navigate the menu to to get it set up. And I also put like that'll happen soon though, because Cameron's like a pro, yeah, you know, And I give him, give him food like you know, waffle or raisin bread or you know, raisins or something, and so he has a snack, has a little water, and then he can just chill for a while and I either try to go back to sleep, which is which I normally do, but I didn't manage to this morning, so I was up working that Sarah. I got the surprise of emails from me stamped before six am, which never happened. It was weird, but the net result is I'm paying for it. Like I just sat here unable to introduce this episode, and I mean, for me, it's the patient notes. The patient notes are so easy when I'm rested, and like insurmountably hard. Like it's not the patient interactions, and I don't think it's like what I'm actually doing for the patient, but it's the documentation. There's something about that it's like required because I guess it's just like a little boring, you know, and so you're not so engaged, And yeah, I just can't do it when I'm super tired. And I like what we heard about our recent expert, you know, really thinking about your efficiency when you're not sleeping, Like you're just wasting time if you're going to spend three times as long doing something that's not very much fun because you're tired. Yeah. So I have a line in my speeches that sleep and exercise don't take time, they make time. And I think that within reason, that is true. Yes, I agree. I don't think training for like a one hundred mile race is making time for you. No, but I think like running three miles a day and sleeping eight hours a night is not a bad investment of time and that will probably make you feel more productive in the other you know, eight you know, that's eight and a half hours. That's like, you know, fifteen and a half hours you have for us. There are things that will be a better fifteen and a half hours. I totally believe that. Yeah, all right, Well, our next topic is food, and by the way, I do think it's probably time to get a new food related expert on. So if you have suggestions, I do. We do have one that contacted us that I think would be a great fit. I'm not going to mention her. But if you have other suggestions, she's busy. He's important. If you have people who are great with meal planning, cooking at home, efficient styles of cooking rather than gourmet styles of cooking, let us know because we owe you another meal product. I would say I would actually like to have a female chef because I think the restaurant business is fascinating. So I would like to actually talk about oh does that because you know somebody? Those could be two episodes running cooking and then also yeah, and succeeding in the in the food world, the food, hospitality, beverage world is so yes, if you know people in these realms, or if you are people in these realms, please let us know because we want you. Yes, so you know, I have been on a slightly healthier eating kick for the past three months only exception of your ice cream on your We had ice cream six times on vacation. I was like, wow, I was impressive, that's awesome. Well, what could I say? I will buy Ben and Jerry's like chocolate peanut butter ice cream for the house. I will not bring it into the house. I will not put any of that in my freezer because then I know it's there and it would be very tempting to eat it. Whereas if I have to, you know, if I'm on vacation and walking to an ice cream parlor and waiting in a twenty minute line, it's a very intentional choice. It's a very intentional choice. So I think not putting stuff that you don't want to eat in the house, and so that that involves being good about grocery shopping like and whatever that's going to involve for you. Totally agree. I mean I think I think the more forethought you could do with your eating, the healthier going to be. I mean, I know I make the worst choices when I've gotten myself into that last minute desperation mode where oh man, why didn't I think about the fact that I would need to eat lunch today like every other day? Oh my god, my body needs food again, exactly Like, what can I get that's super quick or free or readily available. It's never good. It's never healthy. It's like, if I pack or if I even know that I'm going to order take out from somewhere reasonably healthy, I will thank myself for it later. So I don't know, Planning strikes again. Planning strikes well. And one thing, I mean, one thing you could do that's not really planning, but then at least you have stuff. I mean, since I work from home, it's it's not quite the same thing, but you know, somebody who has an office freezer could totally do this, but bringing in frozen meals, but that are a reasonably healthy ones, so ones that aren't really know the sodium bombs, but like read the label and you know, find one that's sort of like three hundred four hundred calories and you can always jazz it up with extra fruit and veggies on the side, but keep it in your freezer and then you always have something. And so even on the days when I'm like, oh, I'm really hungry, I don't feel like making anything. I don't have any groceries. I'm like, but I have the frozen meal that I can put in the microwave in four minutes later, I have lunch. I've been getting into the Fronterra, you know Rick Bailey, like Mexican. Oh oh oh yeah, I've been to that restaurant at at least one airport, if not hair, I'm sure I always stop there when I'm in the like H and K terminal of O'Hair. But no, it's at They're good. Yeah, And I saw I top it with like sour cream and it's really good. Nice, So jazz it up a little bit. I have thought about doing that, just getting a bunch of stuff for the work freezer, or like you know, bringing in a few meals and then like a bag of baby carrots and some cheese and then you're like stocked for the week. Kind of a thing. I still have my fridge in my office from my breastfeeding days, so you could put it in there. I kind of want to keep it. Yeah, yeah. And one one thing we've also found in terms of like I'm part of eating healthy, I think is just eating a lot of like produce, because if you're eating a lot of produce, you just have less space for anything else in your stomach and you do the box. Yeah, we do the box. So we get a Hungry Harvest produce box every two weeks. And I first learned about this through the Frugo Girls website. And I don't know if it counts as frugal or not. I mean, she also has a very strong, like environmental aspect to what she does, and may part about spending less is also about well, but her growth three budgets are like inspiring. She are inspiring. But so she and I now we spend twenty five dollars every two weeks on the Hungry Harvest produce box. And what Hungry Harvest does is they rescue produce, so if it's slightly misshapen, if it is not regulation sized, if sometimes it's just that the farmer grew too much and like his buyers won't take it, so they have extra. And so the idea is that they're creating a market for food that would otherwise definitely go to waste. And then there's another component. I think there's a you know, addressing food insecurity. On the other part, their mission statements sort of like every every vegetable has the right to be eaten and every person has a right to brush vegetables or something like that. I'm butchering, but that's about what it is. So it's you know, you get a lot of produce every two weeks, and I think if I were cooking all the meals, this would drive me crazy. And there are reasons I did not do the CSA thing because I kind of like to know what I'm going to cook. And if you know, people are like, well, it's so exciting, you know, you get random stuff. I'm like, oh, that's not sure, that's so exciting. But Arnana, who cooks our meals, is actually cool with it, like she likes it and so awesome that she's you know, tried different. What was in your last box. We got a lot of cabbage, But if I just had some leftover for lunch, you know, you get like we had some blood oranges. Recently, we had a head of some of it stuff you'd buy anyway, like a head of cauliflower. And I have no idea what was wrong with it. I guess it must have been slightly misshapen or like, you know, well, sometimes it's just overproduced, over produced, you know, it's it's going to be based on the seasons. Right now, you get more like zucchini than anyone needs. But you know then you get say blueberries in June and apples in August, September, and and so you know, it's it's just a cool way to sort of increase the amount of produce in your house, which is a way too And then I feel like if we do have to dump it, like if we've bought too much and we don't, it's it's like it was going to be dumped anyway, So it's head for the period a market, and if it's dumped on the second time around, well that's you know, probably not as bad as if that makes sense. Yeah, that's awesome. Well maybe I'll look back at we used to do that in North Carolina. Actually it was a very cool CSA where you could choose so you were not surprised by like eight pounds of rudabaga. They gave you a menu and you just you know, clicked online each week and then you thought what you want to Yes, that was nice. Yeah, So let's why don't we pivot real quick to mental health? Making time for your mental health and what that means, like what does that mean to you? I mean, I think this a lot of This comes down to acknowledging that it is important for you to have some time for yourself, for reflection, for relaxation, for fun. Also a little throwback to our last episode with our great guest Julie Morgan Stern last week, because without that, I mean, why are we doing this and we can't even function right. You get burned out at a certain point. So I think that just purposefully being you know, quote unquote selfish or just thinking of yourself and making sure you figure out some things that you want to do and logistically figure out how to make that work and doing it is very important for mental health, at least for me, and I think for most people men and women. Well, I think one thing that's been good for me to realize is that, I mean, I'm fairly introverted, and part of that is needing like quiet personal time to recharge away from other people. And it turns out that your children are also people, and so especially and they don't observe necessarily all the adult rules of like not talking to you at the same time as somebody else talking to you, and so it's just like too many voices at times. And so I've I've recognized, like sometimes I need to like go away from that, and you know, if it's at night, like you know, sometimes the kids like, can we just read in the same room with you? And I'm like, no, you cannot read it. And some of it sounds sort of ridiculous because it's like why couldn't they read quietly in the same room, And I'm like, no, Actually, I need to be by my own space, in my own space space for a little bit, and I'll like read for twenty minutes and then go have a conversation with them. And I think that that's better than like sitting there resentful that there's somebody else like in my space while I'm trying to have my quiet reading time. So like today, so we just took that a family trip, as we mentioned, and yesterday I was kind of like a stay at home mom because our Nannie was on vacation and that was fun. I had a good time of Jen Weave today or Nannie came back. And after this podcast, I plan on disappearing, yes for about five hours, and then I do have to go to the kids. Well they really want me to go to some night at camp. But I mean I could tell myself the story that oh, like I don't get that much family time and the kids would like me to pick them up from camp and go to the thing tonight and or I don't know, but really like that is a story, and an equally valid story is Wow, I just had a family trip and then a day with my kids, and now I need some my time. Yeah, exactly. I don't think you're probably under investing on that. No, especially if you are, you know, during the work day dealing with other people and have sort of less flexibility with that by all means, yeah, take the take the time off. Who So shall we move to our Q and A Yeah, although I did want well, i'd want to do one shout out to therapy h which just because I think if we are going to talk about mental health, I mean there's I had like meditation on there and screen time, but those are very individual. I think therapy is fairly universal that if you do get into a crisis mode, you should absolutely seek out someone to speak to. I did it once in my life. I would one hundred percent do it again. I should have done it other times, Like once I did it the one time, I was like, well that was not a big deal. All it is is like a person that you get to non judgmentally, like speak to kind of help you sort through things, who doesn't judge you at all. And depending on your insurance, you may not even have to pay that much for this privilege. Now. I know the mental health care network is not ideal in this country at least, so it's not always that easy. There are some online options now that are great or I've heard great things about them. I haven't personally tried them yet, but I would, and I just think it's underrated and deserves a shout out. Since we're talking about health, definitely definitely look into that as well. All right, So our Q and A. You want to read this one? Yes, this comes. This one's really mostly for you, or at least you had some great answers, so I'll read. The question comes from Kate. She loves best of both worlds and is an avid listener and a huge fan of Laura's books. And she says she has three children and her youngest is entering kindergarten in the fall. She writes, while I have never stopped working, I'm in a medical tangential medical field I but not a position sort of an ancillary worker. I decreased my hours after my third was born, to the point where I have been working only eight to twelve hours a week for the past six years. I'm now ready to begin leaning back in, but do not have the option of increasing my hours at my current job, a risk I knew I was taking when I was asked to cut back. I'm beginning to look for something new, but feel overwhelmed by the job search and interview process. I've been with my current employer for over fifteen years, so I'm feeling rusty as well as deciding whether to go part time or full time or sorry, full time or stay part time but at a higher level. I'm also wondering if I had to try a side hustle and just keep my current position, but don't really have any ideas of what I would do. Do you have advice or tips for people who are entering a transition phase of life and are looking for a change, but are not quite sure how to sort out the different options available. Yeah, and I actually think this is a great topic. It's one I think that we may address in a full episode in the near future of if you've taken a career break or skilled down to very limited part time, how you can kind of lean back in and what's involved in doing that. So look for that in the next few months. I think what the best thing our listener can do in this case is give herself the gift of a little time and space to think about it. So her youngest is just starting kindergarten, she's been with this employer for over fifteen years. She doesn't have to change anything right now, right she can give herself, you know, six months at least to think about it, to actually ask herself, well, what do you want your life to look like? What do you want your professional life, your personal life to look at. You could do like a mini retreat or I mean she could do a long retreat. I mean do whatever you want, like go stay in Tahiti for a week or something, but think about what you'd like your life to look like in three or four years and what you would be doing. You could talk to a lot of people who are in your field, or tangentially related to your field, or even fields you aren't in now but have always thought would be kind of cool to experiment and ask what they like about their job. I mean, ask what they do on a day to day basis. My guess is that you know, she's spent the past many years dealing with small children and just focusing on doing her job for her eight to twelve hours a week. She hasn't really seen what's out there, Like, she doesn't know the employers in the area. She doesn't necessarily know what they're looking for the skills that are in demand. So spend some time figuring that out. You know, she could certainly explore the entrepreneurial route, the side hustle, but to think about that, you know, try different things like ask yourself, well, what are things I like to do that I'm skilled in, and just do little pivots, like you know, I don't start a huge business, just do like one project and see how it goes. And you try stuff. You might find stuff you like, you'll figure out what you don't like. And that's also really cool to know that, because then you don't spend huge amounts of time and money starting a business with that and you realize, actually, I hate that. And you know, when Sarah was trying to figure out her sort of career transition, as she was sort of going from full time clinical work to also adding the administrative component, she designed her ideal week, and I think that that's something that our listener could could definitely try as well, right, right, Sarah, definitely. I also love the idea of the mini retreat. I mean, any retreat to me sounds good. Just that space and time and permission to think about what you really want. Your vacation was not right, Yes, and it actually, as you were speaking, you know, doing the kind of maybe lunchtime interviews with friends in other fields to figure things out. Not only might that lead to some ideas of what you want your job to look like, but that might lead to some job. I mean, I'm serious. You talk to enough people, they're going to know people who know people, and then you may find yourself fitting somewhere that you never even expected. So I agree taking that time to explore sounds awesome. And since you've been part time and it's been making it work for quite some time, it should be feasible to kind of continuing doing that. Yeah. And she doesn't have to only limit herself to part time work, right No, No No, No, I meant like to stay part time while she's doing Yeah, but she doesn't need to she can you know, her kids will be in school she'll have more time, and then she can she can not work more right away, but spend that time delving into what she wants and connecting with people, and she may find herself in the process. Yeah, who knows. And my guess is that in you know, it won't happen immediately necessarily, but like two years from now, you could be in something really awesome. So if you have that sort of long term view, that that can really help. All right, So our love of the week, Sarah. Yes, Well, I've got two vacation loves of the week. Number one is naps, because that's the best part about having It's one of the lovely perks of having a toddlers. They do often take good naps, and Genevieve took great naps. And the other one is snow crab. That is so good. Is that like a specialty in the like crab, it's like the same thing. Yeah, I mean you can order it. I think sometimes it's called King Crab, but those giant crab legs. My kids actually love it too, which maybe your kids would like to since I heard they just delved into lobster. Yeah, well that could be my love of the week. We just went to the Lobster House in Cape May. The trip itself had this whole you know family dynamic of one kid is unhappy and the others are happy, and like, what do you do with that? But I did manage to get the kids to try lobster and they were okay with it. They kind of liked it because who wouldn't, which was what I was trying to tell them, And yet they all ordered chicken figures. But what what you do, Like someday you're going to be really unhappy that, Like mommy was willing to buy you a lobster dinner and you didn't take it. Well, maybe next year you'll have at least one order of theres in one less order of chicken fingers. Yes, exactly, So we'll look forward to that as the children grow. Well, this has been best at both worlds. We have been talking about making time for health physical and mental, and also doing a little bit of vacation post mortem of the things we learn that are helpful to our mental health as we learn and grow on this journey. But we'll be back next week with more on making work in life together. Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore shoe Box on Instagram, and you can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together. M