Ep. 018 – Single Mom Parenting

Suburban Folk 0:00
Suburban Folk is now live every Thursday at 5pm. Eastern Standard Time. Just download the pod bean app and search for Suburban Folk or visit Suburban Folk dot pod being calm for the latest topic and login information. We will talk about what I learned from our most recent episode, give previews of episodes to come, chat with our audience and answer any questions they may have. We’re grateful for all of our listeners that tune in and are excited to share the show to a larger audience, subscribing rating and reviewing us on your favorite podcast platform is a big help and be sure to share with your friends as well. For those looking to support us even further, a donation button has been added to our website at Suburban folk.com all money received will be 100% redirected into advertising and getting the word out about the show. Now sit back and enjoy this episode of health, travel finance, parenting and entertainment. This is the Suburban Folk podcast. I’m looking forward to having some real talk with some real folks. Hey, this is Greg with the Suburban Folk podcast. Today I am joined by shahara. Right shahara. How are you?

Unknown Speaker 1:03
I’m fine. Thank

Suburban Folk 1:04
you for having me. Absolutely. I appreciate you taking some time to talk to me today. We came across each other on social media and what caught my eye is that you have a podcast called single mom Co. One of the things that we cover on Suburban Folk is parenting, what are the challenges? What are tips and tricks that people can look for? And I’m very interested in your perspective, because it’s all of those parenting challenges that we all have. Plus, being a working single mom, I’m sure has its own set of challenges that’ll be very interested to get into your perspective on. You are a small business owner, your livelihood is being a lawyer, as well as running the podcast. Can you give a little information about what your day job is?

Unknown Speaker 1:55
Sure, yes, I’m so I’m a business law attorney. I’ve been practicing for 21 years in the great state of Texas, I’ve had my business. I’ve run my law firm for 20 of those years. So probably about a year I worked for other attorneys. And then I started my own practice, doing working with small midsize businesses doing day to day legal advice, contracts, all that fun stuff for businesses, and I’ve been in nonprofits, and I’ve been doing that for 20 years. So about, well, probably a year ago, I got the idea to really talk about single moms who run their own business because I’m one and so I really wanted to do something I couldn’t figure out exactly what I wanted to do. And then I came up with the idea. Months later, after, you know, I knew I wanted to do the single mom CEO thing to start interviewing women. And so I interviewed about seven women who are like me single moms who are raising their kids, full time business owners, and just talking about what You know, what it’s like and the things that you have to deal with and what your concerns are, and all of those kinds of things just to kind of show that it’s possible and that you can thrive, while being a single mom and a business owner.

Suburban Folk 3:13
So your firm was a natural progression from, like you said, starting with a group and then just branching out to your own firm. It wasn’t any kind of major leap, let’s say, from what you were doing before, to what you’re doing now. Is it starting your own law firm?

Unknown Speaker 3:28
Not really, because, you know, when I was a baby lawyer, you know, I just, I really wanted to do business law. I knew this what I wanted to do, I couldn’t get a job in the corporate arena. So I guess my business was like a failed attempt to getting a job. I just, you know, I was like, Well, you know, I can do my own thing. I can hang my shingle. I have my law degree. I’m licensed to practice, so why not? So I just did it and, you know, 20 years later, I’m still here. I’m over. He’s curious for people that are not in the standard, call it corporate world. Do you think you could even go into that setting? This point?

Suburban Folk 4:10
Just being away from it and being your own boss at this this time?

Unknown Speaker 4:14
Yeah. You know, I thought about it. I’ve thought about it several times. Of course, I think any business owner thinks about just quitting and getting a job and being done with it. But it you know, the hard part about is that I’m so used to being flexible in my schedule. So there’s, like, you know, a couple of contract positions that I talked to people about, and they want you to, you know, be in the office at eight and leave at five and I’m like, Yeah, my life is I can’t do that. Like, my life is not built around that I drop off my kid and I pick him up and I can’t be in the office from eight to five, that’s just not going to happen. So I don’t need him. Plus, you know, I’m so used to being by myself most of the time that you know, office politics and all that stuff. I don’t really know how well I would do. One of my friends says Gone feral. And I think that’s probably kind of where I am to where I don’t even know if I can plug into an office at this point.

Suburban Folk 5:08
I totally hear you with the office politics piece. And I work for, you know, a corporation, but I’m a remote worker for almost a year now. And it is amazing when you hear friends, family colleagues talk about personalities at work, and it’s like, Man, this just seems like a lot of time talking about potentially non productive things. It gets harder and harder to deal with. So I, even from my perspective, I totally understand what you’re talking about and you hit one of the other questions that I had for you as far as the flexibility is concerned. And do you feel like having your business makes it easier for you to be flexible with your kids and sounds like the answers yet?

Unknown Speaker 6:00
Yes, it definitely does. I make my own schedule. And that makes all the difference in now. So about two years ago, I stopped doing litigation. So that has helped. So I’m not in court very, very often I’m we’re very rarely in court anymore. And so that helps a lot. Because when you have to go to court, you’re on the court schedule. And so that can, you know, kind of tear you away from what you normally wouldn’t do. So now that I’m straight, transactional, and I don’t really go to court, it allows me to have even more flexible schedule so that when things change with my kids and they get out of school early or anything like that, then I can I can be available where sometimes I wasn’t able to do that, and that is very, very valuable. I would say I know, leading up to having my kids there were things that maybe I thought of in concept around flexibility,

Suburban Folk 6:53
as far as Wouldn’t it be nice to you know, have the flexible schedule run certain errands, but once the kids were actually Around, it became less of a nice to have and more of a requirement to be able to be available when you know things come up and that aren’t conducive to the regular nine to five schedule. So it definitely I think when people get into that situation is helpful. For the podcast you mentioned sounds like you’ve had about seven episodes, you said and mainly wanting to sounds like start a community for folks that are in or for moms in particular that are in the same situation as you how’s it gone? so far? I’m guessing if you’ve done seven, you’ve been up and running for two to three months. Is it what you’ve expected?

Unknown Speaker 7:38
Yeah, it’s been interesting. So I’ve launched though I pre recorded everything. It’s not a podcast, it’s really on YouTube. And then I posted on Facebook, I thought about taking the audio and take making it a podcast but I hadn’t really made any effort to do that yet. So really, it’s on YouTube and Facebook. Those are the two places where and LinkedIn where I’m on the most social placed there. I’ve gotten really good reception I pre recorded with seven women, I just aired Episode Four today. And they’re all very different, very different backgrounds, very different circumstances, very different things that they they do. And I like that because even though everybody’s different, and you know what they do is different and why they’re single mom is different and all that kind of stuff, some of the same things appear in what you have to deal with. And one is, you know, making sure that you have a great community of people that will help you and support you for all the things that you’re doing, taking care of yourself and loving yourself and being able to take time for yourself because you can get overwhelmed you know, by the kids, of course. And then also just making sure that you’re taking care of your business as well and kind of managing that as well, while you’re having your kids and understanding that you can’t be everywhere at all times. Like some people that maybe either don’t have kids or if there’s two parents in the homes, you at least have somebody else to watch the kids or do something else. But when it’s just you, you really have to make a lot more arrangements. So those are the like the common threads that I think we all talked about. And it was interesting to see that because everybody was so different in terms of their work and why they were single and all that kind of stuff, which was to me very interesting.

Suburban Folk 9:24
Yeah, I am curious. I have that as a later question here of what are the nuances depending on when somebody became a single parent or again, in this case, single mom, I imagine there’s probably nuances to how involved the other parent is, and whether or not that’s helpful or a detriment, I guess, depending on how the relationship is. And also I’m assuming even for the age of the kids and on that note, you have two kids, right? And their current ages.

Unknown Speaker 9:56
Yes. So I have to my kids are 11 years apart. So my oldest is I’m 22 and my youngest is 11. So they it’s like I have like two only children. They both like the world revolves around both of them, you know, and themselves. So, they, they’re very, very different. So my oldest just graduated from college, he just got a full time job. So we’re very excited about that. So he’s out of the house and doing his own thing now. And then I have my 11 year old that started sixth grade this year. And so Middle School is a whole thing. So it’s been interesting. Sure, my kids are about to be three and five, they’re almost exactly two years apart. And I am sure that the middle school years have its own set of challenges. What was it like having to sort of hit all those stages again, after you have your oldest that, I guess would would be 11. At the age that you had your youngest? Do you think it was easier to have to go back through all of the baby steps or the baby milestones? or harder to have to say, Oh my gosh, I’m doing this all over again. Yeah, I forgot. I forgot how hard it was. And I think it was a little harder because I was older. So when I had my first son, I was 24. When I had my second son, I was 35. So, you know, my age being, you know, being a lot older, just having a lot more to juggle than I had, you know, from when I was 24. So I felt like it was harder, just because I had so much more going on that, you know, it was harder for me to adjust to having a baby again.

Suburban Folk 11:36
That’s interesting, because I think I caught in one of your YouTube videos that you were probably finishing up law school with your first is that correct?

Unknown Speaker 11:48
Yes, correct. I had my first while I was pregnant when I was in my second year of law school. So I had him when I was in my second year of law school. And so I had to go through my third year and do the bar and all that kind of So he was a baby, you know, during my third year, Alaska.

Suburban Folk 12:03
And the reason I say that’s interesting is I think maybe people on the outside looking in would hear that and say, Oh my gosh, that is really hard, which it is to make sure you’re managing those things. But it sounds like you’re saying that when you were older, and I’m assuming at that point, probably, again, building your firm and really keeping things up that that was actually harder. Do you think that was just the age part of it and having not as much energy as you would in your early 20s? Or is it that that building up the business compared to finishing up law school really is more of a grind?

Unknown Speaker 12:40
Yeah, I think it was probably age more so than anything, but also when I had my youngest, all I had to do was focus on school. So I didn’t really have I mean, I was working part time, but I didn’t really have like as many balls in the air to juggle. So it was just law school and you know, my part time job and You know, taking care of him. And that was pretty much it. So, and he was a very easy baby. I will say that, you know, God bless me, you know with that in terms of that, because he was very easy baby. He was not a crier, and he didn’t make a big fuss and very quiet so I can take him to the library with me, and he probably was it quiet, you know, and not have not cry a lot or anything like that. So it was very easy, baby. And, you know, I had help, and I had a lot of help. And my friends, I was up in Lubbock, Texas, which I’m from Houston, Texas, and for those that aren’t familiar with Texas is very big state. So even though I was in the same state, I was like, eight hours away, drive wise from my family. So I had a lot of friends who were helping me and things like that. So I had a lot of support. So that helped. And so I don’t recall it being so hard in terms of raising him at that particular period of time because, you know, he was pretty easy. I didn’t really have a lot going on and all that kind of stuff. And then Kind of 11 years later, my oldest son is, you know, starting Middle School, I’m pregnant, I have a full time business that I’m running. I got married at this point, um, you know, just a lot more stuff that was going on that I didn’t have at the time when I’ve had my first kids. So, because there was so much more plus being older, you know, it’s just a lot more to manage than I had previously having the

Suburban Folk 14:29
older sibling their age 11. Was that a help? Or do you think that makes it harder? I mean, the obvious observation is you got two kids. So that’s one thing that makes it harder, rather than just one was he helped with the day to day duties for a new baby or not? Not so much.

Unknown Speaker 14:48
Not so much. He was not you know?

Unknown Speaker 14:51
Yeah, he, you know, I think maybe he’s a boy thing or whatever, but he just was like, whatever. It’s a kid but you know, I still need all my stuff. So that was pretty much his thought process. And again, he was starting Middle School. So it was just a whole lot of things about him and he played soccer select soccer. So he’s busy with that. So yeah, he really wasn’t that into the baby. Not so much.

Suburban Folk 15:17
Was he relatively self sufficient at that point? I mean, obviously couldn’t drive. So you got Yeah, for soccer and other activities, you’re having to make sure he gets there. But I guess in the home life, day to day as far as homework and those kinds of things, maybe Did you get a little bit of a break there?

Unknown Speaker 15:30
Yeah. He was very self sufficient. I mean, again, this one, my eldest, which is completely different from the baby, was very, he’s very quiet, very mild mannered. I mean, I had a lot of stuff I still had to do with him at school and stuff like that. I was in a PTO at his school and very, you know, active at the school, so I still had a lot of stuff but him as a person was pretty easy to manage. He he really was an easy kid comparatively and time. terms of you know, being able to raise, he really didn’t cause a lot of ruckus.

Suburban Folk 16:03
That’s probably about as much as you can ask for, again, back to your point of the middle school age. I feel like a lot can come up. Like I said, I haven’t gotten there yet, but what the way I hear it described is less frequent issues, but the issues that come up can be certainly more complicated than just, you know, making sure that infant and toddler don’t hurt themselves on a day to day basis. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 16:25
middle school is an interesting time. You know, they’re they’re kind of coming into themselves, figuring out who they are a lot more social issues. And so you know, brain development, it’s just a whole lot. They’re going through a whole lot. So because they’re going through a whole lot, you’re going through a whole lot. That’s the best way I can explain it. So you know, it just you never really know what’s going to happen with you know, a preteen just anything can happen at any moment. So you’re just kind of walking on eggshells. For now how they feel.

Suburban Folk 16:55
I can’t wait. Yeah, it’ll be fun. Maybe we’ll start with current schedule that you deal with and then work backwards through certain stages of development. What is your day to day activity schedule? Or I guess I should tell you, your kids day to day activity schedule, and how do you manage that with your business responsibilities.

Unknown Speaker 17:17
So right now, so I made the smart decision to send my kid to a school that’s nowhere near my house. So, because of that, I drive a lot, I’m in the car a lot more than probably any normal person would be. So you know, we drive him I drive him, I get up in the morning, driving to school, drop him off, get back to the house, and then I’m probably starting work, you know, around nine. Now once I get myself settled, probably about 9am and about 3pm I gotta start shutting it down because I got to pick him up at 350 unless he has, you know, some after school activity and then you know, maybe I have another hour, hour and a half I can work so that’s Pretty much our schedule. And then once I pick him up, I pretty much shut down my office hours, I’m not really working anymore because we have after school activities, he does coding and robotics, Boy Scouts, all those different things. So I’m taking him to all of those places. So my office hours are really like from nine to three. And that’s pretty much it, unless, like I said, he has something after school, and then maybe I can get another hour in. But for the most part, that’s, that’s what it is. So my clients are very acclimated to my schedule, they really know. It’s funny how they know when I’m in my office, and when I’m not in my office, and when I’m dropping off my kid and when I’m not dropping off my kid and they, you know, will email me around 830 saying, Hey, I know you’re dropping off your kid, but soon as you get in the office, you know, call me first. So they’re emailing me like right at 830 because they know, you know, I’ll be back at the house by nine and so that’s when they’re going to start you know, messaging me and you know, contacting me and things like that. So That’s pretty much my schedule because I do a lot of contracts and I work with businesses, a lot of my clients don’t really want to come into the office, I do have an office, but you know, they they’re doing their business and they don’t really want to come in. So a lot of my stuff is done remotely via email. I do my contract, send it to them, you know, maybe we’re meeting video conferencing, those kinds of things. So I made it created my business around making sure that I was able to pick up and drop off my kid and take, you know him to wherever he needs to go. That has helped and my clients, for the most part, for the most part, are very understanding and they just work around my schedule and they really don’t care long as I get all my work done. They’re fine.

Suburban Folk 19:49
I tend to find very similar reactions as far as around a remote schedule, like I mentioned before, and like we were talking about, it’s amazing when you really reflect on a typical office work day? How much non productive time there is. So even though three o’clock I think for most people sounds like, Oh, that’s coming off early. And yeah, it is based on nine to five. I think that if you stay focused on what the tasks are that need to be completed in the day, you’re still in the position to have a full day’s productivity be completed. It just, you know, people maybe aren’t used to hearing something that’s not nine to five. And it is good to hear that most of your clients are pretty understanding of that schedule. And I also find that that is the case for fellow parents in particular, you know, maybe doesn’t get talked about as much but, you know, people know what those challenges are. So I’ve luckily also found similar understanding in the work world with the activities that you mentioned. Do you have to get yourself To those are they already on site? So you can kind of work through it at that point? Or do you get him to where he needs to go? Like so the coding or Boy Scouts and then work watching him do whatever activity?

Unknown Speaker 21:10
Yes. So it depends. So so he has two robotics teams that he’s on one at school. So the one at school, he stays after school to do so then those are the days that he stays after school. I have like an extra hour to work. So that’s helpful. So he does that. Boy Scouts, I have to take him there. So usually, like I said, his school is far from where I live. So once I pick him up, I’m like, okay, we’re not going back home. So you just need to know that, you know, we won’t be back home until eight, nine o’clock. So we’ll go to do whatever we need to do. But from school, I’m picking him up and taking him wherever. So if it’s Boy Scouts, we go to Boy Scouts. Sometimes he does swimming would do that. On Saturdays. He has another robotics a different robotics team different from the school he has and then he does coding. class as well. So I’m taking him to all of those things. But you know, he, I said, if you want to do these things, they’re fine. But you have to understand that there are certain things that you’re going to have to do. That means we’re on a very tight schedule, you don’t have a lot of play time. So you know, you can’t really play like you would want to play. And you have to get your homework done on top of that. So he’s on a tight schedule. These are things he wants to do. And I’m saying to him, fine, but if this is what we’re going to do, then you have to be able to maintain the schedule that we have, because we’re not home. And when we do get home, it’s very late. So those are things I have to explain to him to say, you know, you got to be able to stay on top of it because the minute you know, your grades start dropping or things don’t happen. All of this stuff is going away. And that’s kind of how we do it.

Suburban Folk 22:49
Going back to the name of your show. single mom co what struck me is how much do you compare managing a schedule like that to manage Your business? Do you think that everything, as far as scheduling is concerned parallels between business world and parenting? Or what do you think is different?

Unknown Speaker 23:10
I think it’s all from me, it’s all the same to me. It’s like, I have to schedule everything. So just thinking about from the time I wake up to the time I go to bed, just about everything is scheduled. So I mix kind of mix and match parenting schedule and my business schedule within that. So like I said, You know, I have from basically nine to three to do any work stuff, my, my, my my day job, so to speak, and that would include the single mom, CO, all of that stuff has to happen between nine and three. There are some times where I can do it after that, but that’s very rare. So it’s very rare that I’m doing any business like after that time, so I have to make sure that I get that. So that means that like you said, I have to be very focused. I have to make sure that I’m going Staying on top of things, if I’m networking or anything like that, all of that has to be scheduled. And then after that fact, I have to be able to schedule all my son’s activities and know when I’m supposed to be and where I’m supposed to be. And do all of those things there. Sometimes I can sneak some work in. But a lot of times I can’t do it. Because even when you have these after school activities, you know, they have parent meetings, and you gotta expect you to work and volunteer and all that kind of stuff. So you still have more work, so to speak to do, because even though it’s your kids activity, there’s stuff that parents are expected to do. So I’m wearing, it’s not often I can work while he’s doing those things.

Suburban Folk 24:40
Yeah, I would assume even just to stay engaged in it as well. You’d have to do the expected items that come with being the parent of the child and the activity. But even if you’re not might even be hard to just stay engaged in what they’re doing all together. I would assume. Again, we haven’t quite gotten to that age range yet. I think we’re going to Start soccer here next year, that definitely makes sense that it’s more than just getting them to the activity, there’s a certain level of engagement that you have to have. We talked a little bit about the support system. And you mentioned, you know, during your move from Houston to Lubbock and having to rely on friends, what does the support network look like? Either for you or again, just in general, what you’ve discussed with your guests so far,

Unknown Speaker 25:30
I think for the most part, it’s family, you know, you have a good family support system. For me, my mom is a big help to with my son and we don’t live too far apart. So when I need to do something, or if I have to travel, or something like that nine times out of 10 she’s the person that’s picking him up and dropping him off and doing kind of replacing me and all a lot of that stuff. So she’s very helpful. I have sisters and aunts that are here around me. So that helps A lot to have my family support that’s here. So that helps a lot. And then I think for a lot of other women, it’s the same thing having the grandparents having aunts, you know, uncles, those kinds of people around to help and give you a break having really good friends. So for me, when my oldest son, you know, was young, my friends that were around my age had kids his age. So you know, he could always go and play over my friend’s house we get, I can hang out with my friends and their kids play and all that kind of stuff. So with my youngest son is a lot different because I’m older, and all of my friends, majority of my friends, their kids are older, so they don’t really have a lot of kids. Well, many of my friends don’t have kids my age, so my son’s age, so I have to kind of make new friends so to speak. So you know, it becomes a little bit more of a challenge because you don’t have as much of a system as you had where you have friends and people’s houses. They can go over and things like that but you still kind of make friends with their moms and their friends moms and dads and things like that, so that they can still have a place to play. And you can go out and enjoy yourself and, and do things. So it’s really about having, hopefully you have a good family system, that helps tremendously. But then also you have connections with friends that have kids their age so that they can watch the kids and go spend the night and do other things that helps as well. So that makes a big difference.

Suburban Folk 27:26
How does coordinating with the other parent if they are in the picture, of course, does that play into the overall support system again? Is it a detriment? Is it another form of support that makes it easier again, I’m sure it is very dependent on the relationship between the mother and father but what what have you found in talking with folks?

Unknown Speaker 27:53
I think it varies. Um, I’ve had one of the moms that I spoke to her husband passed away. So obviously, you know dealing with the grief of losing a husband becoming a widow and that’s you know why she’s single single mom now that plays a completely different dynamic than you know being divorced, which a lot of the moms are divorced and you know you have to have that dynamic is trying to create a whole new household with peer co parenting and then there’s some parents that just weren’t never were never married, but they still have to co parent and everything like that. I think the consensus was is that you want to have and I feel this way to you want your child to know their other parents and you try your best to make it as calm. I don’t know the right word. Maybe it’s calm or as peaceful for the child as he possibly can. And it doesn’t really matter how you personally feel about them, but the child is the one that comes first and so that in that having that thought process and understand That, then it doesn’t really become a big deal because you’re always able to say, Well, whatever they need, that’s what we’re going to do. And sometimes it’s in monetary sometimes it’s time, sometimes it’s a little bit of both. Sometimes it’s not enough, you know, you can argue about all of those different things, but you just try to make it as consistent for the child as possible. So in my case, my ex husband lives in a different state now, so he’s not here. So you know, when I leave and go out of town, he can’t stay at his dad’s house because his dad’s in another state. So it really, you know, my reliance on my family is very, very key. But when he comes and visits and things like that, he goes and takes him for a week and I have a free week and I’m enjoying my free week when I know so those kinds of things you just have to do. I think with CO parenting in any situation. You really have to just think about, okay, I want my child to be as happy as possible. I don’t ever want to put this in a position where they have to choose between parents, and I never want them to feel like, you know, they have to love one more than the other. I’m okay with you loving your dad and I’m okay with you wanting to be with him and I’m okay with you and joining and doing whatever. And that’s okay. And whatever help comes, then it comes. But you just have to accept things as they are. I just really believe that you can’t be angry or bitter with the other person about anything because you don’t want that to affect your child’s relationship. They need to have their own relationship.

Suburban Folk 30:34
Yeah, it seems like it should be common sense to make sure that you have the best interest of your child at heart. But you know, when some of those emotions and you know, relationship nuances can happen. I think it’s probably easier said than done. Have you had to use any after school care or when your kids were pre k did you use like daycare type settings or other services other than family.

Unknown Speaker 31:04
Yes. So with my first son, I used it a lot more than I have with my second son. So with my first son, yeah, after school care, summer care, putting him in summer camp, all that kind of stuff was a must. Because that was kind of the beginning of my career. Even though I had my own business, I still had to, I was doing a lot of litigation, and I was still having to build what I needed. So I definitely relied upon after school care and all that kind of stuff. But my mom retired when my youngest was born. So that was helpful, um, so that I didn’t have to do that. I work from home now more than I did when my son My eldest son was in school, so I work from home a lot more than I did before. So that helps a lot so that if he’s out of school or things like that, I have my own office in the house and so I can work from home he can go do whatever he’s doing and play games. Whatever and it’s fine. Summertime, I don’t put him My youngest in anything he’s at home. And if he’s you know, doing Boy Scout camp or maybe going somewhere with the grandparents or whatever traveling, he travels way more than I do. You know, he can go do that. And it’s fine. So I had to do it for my eldest son, I really don’t have to do it for my youngest. So he’s not really in any after school care or anything like that. I just keep him at home, but I can now where before I couldn’t do that, that is

Suburban Folk 32:32
an interesting comparison between Yeah, the sort of the early getting into your career versus where you’re at now and having some options and even with my kids being, you know, so close in age, we actually saw a similar shift from one to the other one being that actually my in laws actually were able to move down. So I definitely am with you as far as having that family help and Then I’ve had a little bit more flexibility available as as my wife. So it is definitely nice to be able to pull some other levers that you’re not completely dependent on a daycare or a nanny if you, you know, in a position to do that or, or other things as far as that that drop off and pickup schedule is concerned. And I never realized before having kids, what considerations were there as far as a daycare is concerned, I mean, even from the standpoint of when they get sick, and they can’t still be there, you know, if you’ve got to go and grab them and then figure out what you’re going to do while they need to stay at home in those days after that. So there are a lot more nuances than I appreciated before having our kids in daycare. And you know, we’re almost to the point of going from pre K to kindergarten and elementary school definitely want to be as open as we can to pulling the levers so that we aren’t dependent on after school care and that kind of thing. If we can help it With your schedule being what it has been over the years, do you feel like you missed out on anything? Or do you have a general sense of paranoia that you might miss out on anything? How do you feel managing your time has gone?

Unknown Speaker 34:17
You know, of course I miss out on things. And there’s sometimes where there’s things where I have to say no to that I don’t want to say no to. And there’s sometimes that I’ve said yes to things and realize that I just couldn’t do it and it just didn’t work. So there’s definitely those things where you just kind of have to say no, because you just can’t do it. And sometimes that hurts, you know, there’s a lot of lot of networking after our networking that I just can’t do and I don’t do that. I get invited to that. I’m just like, you know, I’m not coming at you know, after six o’clock, it’s just I shut it down. It’s like I’m just not coming. And I have to say no, because I just I literally just can’t do it. And so you know, you miss out on business opportunities. You miss it. On networking, you miss out on getting to know certain people because you’re not there. But I don’t regret it. Because one of the things that I’ve always had in the back of my mind from from after law school, I went to the CLE will continue in legal education for lawyers. That’s what we have. We called it. And it was for specifically for young lawyers. And I remember having this elder lawyer that was there. And he talked about his relationship with his son. And one of the things that he regretted was not spending more time with his son, and he told the whole story about it. But I took from that, that that’s not the feeling I want it my kid to have. I didn’t want my son to feel like I wasn’t there. I never wanted him to feel that way. So in my thought process is I always going to put these this time first, this was going to be the most important thing for me. So that’s what I’m going to do. And so I still make those sacrifices. I mean, just when my son got his job, my eldest son got his first Job, he’s moved to Tennessee. And so I had to take him up there. And I was supposed to be in a conference. And it was I paid for the conference, I was supposed to be there. But when we got found out about the job offer, and when he had to be there, I just, I couldn’t make both work as well to try to make both work. It was just going to be way too much. And I just had to say, I’m going to let this conference go. And I was supposed to be running for president of the region didn’t end up winning because I wasn’t there. You know, that kind of stuff happened. But I’m okay with it. Because I would have I wouldn’t have traded the time to take my son up to Tennessee. The time we spent together looking for apartment, you know, making sure that he was okay. I wouldn’t have traded that for the world. And if I wouldn’t have been there, I would have probably had severe mom guilt because I wasn’t there to make sure that everything was okay. So for me, that’s most important. So you know, not being at the conference. Yeah, um, you know, I missed out and you know, there’s things that could have could have should have would have happened had I been there, but it was that more important than me going to Tennessee. No. And and so I don’t have any regrets about that. I wholeheartedly agree. I almost sort of try to surround myself with people that have a similar advice. Like you mentioned for the gentleman you were talking about saying, you know, treasure these years. Make sure you don’t miss out on these things. Because you know the adage, nobody was on their deathbed saying, I wish I had spent more time in the office. But you, you.

Suburban Folk 37:38
You do here regrets as far as Yeah, being there for your kids. A couple of quick stories from my perspective. I tend to be very frugal, probably to a fault and there was a program with the company I was working for when my son was born, where you could actually take your baby Be to the office like literally in your office space, up to eight months. And so the reason I joke and say frugal, you know, I’m looking at this, like, Hey, I’m saving myself, you know, eight months of childcare by bringing him in. Lucky for me, then I realized actually being able to go through that experience that wow, this was really cool that I could spend that much time with him when he was, you know, that little something else for people that, you know, aren’t familiar with daycare and every single sickness that’s possibly out there, they’re gonna get immediately it seems like there was even that added benefit that he didn’t get sick at all, when he was in an office setting. And then when we did, you know, put him into daycare, within two weeks, maybe even less, he was sick immediately. And then, you know, for the next year and a half, it seemed like he had a constant runny nose that it could never get rid of. Like I said, it was something that I didn’t necessarily appreciate for the bonding time. But it was really cool that I was able to, to do that. And the other is just travel in general. And what I’ve come to As a conclusion is it’s a little ironic that as your career progresses, the likelihood of you needing to travel just you know, if you’re going from higher position to higher position goes up. And of course, that means, you know, not in your single years when you first got out of college, when Hey, you know, sure I paid trip on the company, this is great. And you know, you can do that networking and do all that other stuff that you mentioned. But there’s, at least for me, there weren’t as many opportunities for that. So I am also similar and again, nice to, to hear your perspective sounds about the same that trying to use your time judiciously when it comes to travel. And if it’s not something you have to go to, trying to figure out other accommodations. You know, again, whether that’s WebEx is or video conferences, whatever it happens to be just really staying up on that. using technology to your advantage so that you’re not one of those people that saying, oh, man, I really wish I had those years back or, you know, if I had it to do over again, this is what I would have done.

Unknown Speaker 40:11
Yeah. And you know, I think it becomes a lot more stressful. I mean, when I think about it, there are things that I said I was going to do, I wanted, I really wanted to do but the logistics of it just stressed me out. And I said to myself, it’s not worth this, you know, not not even just in the sense of not being there for my kid or, or whatever, but just the stress of trying to figure out who’s going to keep them, you know, where, how long am I going to be gone? How quickly can I get there and get back? You know, all the activities that they need to do because nobody You know, my kid is in like a whole bunch of stuff. And both of my boys were always always busy. So nobody is going to want to keep that schedule that you keep for your kid right? Like even my mom who loves me and loves my kid is like I’m not doing All of that, you know, I’m taking the school and I’m picking up, but I’m not going to 24 activities after school, I don’t feel like doing that. And so then he doesn’t go. So then I’m like, Oh, you know, he’s supposed to be here, he’s not there, you know, if I was there, then he would be taken to all these different places, and those things would happen. So becomes, you know, order stress, making sure homework gets done, did it get turned in, you know, stuff goes wonky, when you know, you’re not there and making sure that stuff happens the way you want it to. And so for me, it became a matter of very stressful, and I just had to say, I have to slow this down. I can’t do it at the level that I was doing it before, because it’s not working. And you know, he’s fine, you know, health wise, but you know, it’s making me stressed out and so it doesn’t help you when you become stressed because you’re gone. And you can’t be there to make sure that things happen the way you want them to matter. And I admit I’m a bit of a control freak, so that might be part of it. But you know, Those things matter. And so you have to really make those decisions about what is not only in the best interest of the kid in terms of you know what you’re doing on a day to day basis. But what gives you kind of a mindset that you can be at peace when you’re gone and know that things are going to work the way you want them to worry if they’re, if they’re not, they you’re okay with it, the more you’re gone, the more harmful I think that is for your own peace of mind. I wonder to

Suburban Folk 42:27
what the balance is for any family that you have helping out, especially grandparents, letting them be grandparents, right? And how much you know, do you rely on them for discipline or like you said, even getting them to those certain activities versus you know, handing them off and they just get to spoil them for a while. I feel like there’s probably even that consideration of how much you’re able to be there and, you know, do that part versus if you’re putting somebody in your family in that more parenting role where they’re having to What’s a correct behavior or things like that, that they, you know, wouldn’t necessarily otherwise have to do?

Unknown Speaker 43:04
Yeah, it makes a difference. And I definitely don’t want, you know, from my perspective, my mother to have to do that, like, I don’t want to put her in that position where she has to be that I always want her to be, you know, they call her me, Mom, I want her to be me, Mom, right. And I adore her and love her just like I did with my grandparents. So, you know, obviously, there’s going to be some discipline, because when she has them, you know, you have to have that, but not to the extent that I would do. So I definitely want that to always be the case. So I always have to think about that, like, how much am I weigh? How much am I working, you know, what schedule Am I having? that I’m going to be somewhere that if I can’t pick them him up, or I can’t drop them off? What can I can do, and then you got other people that have other things to do to you know, they have lives and so you have to think about, okay, these people have lives too. So I have to be mindful of that as well. So I think in all of the things that I do in terms of how I keep my schedule, whether I travel, whether I don’t you know whether I do something that’s after work hours or not. I try to keep that in mind in terms of is this something that makes sense? Is it going to be the easiest thing for me to be able to schedule? Or is it easier for me to stay home? What’s going to be the less stress for me? And I asked what I really try to think about it, is it going to be more or less stressful? If I do this? And if it’s more stressful, then I just don’t do it?

Suburban Folk 44:28
Yeah, I think that’s a good rule of thumb. It was gonna end with some quick hits on the different ages or stages of development and would be very curious from your standpoint, again, especially since you went through, you know, those stages with your oldest son and then of course, had to do it all over again with your youngest son. Which stage is the most challenging, obviously, recognizing that there are different challenges as your kids get older, but from that baby range zero to two, what would you say were the primary issues that you had to overcome?

Unknown Speaker 45:06
I think from zero to two, both of them was just, you know, just making sure they stayed alive. You know, just trying to make sure that, you know, they weren’t getting any things putting stuff in their mouths, you know, making sure had diapers, all that kind of stuff. Now, they both when they were that age were in daycare. So they both had the daycare. Well, I think my youngest I had a babysitter and as opposed to daycare, but he did go to daycare after a while. So you know, just making sure getting them to him from making sure they have enough diapers, it was just a lot of I don’t know, care. So you had you had to really do everything so that that was hard. How about

Suburban Folk 45:49
sleep was How hard did that make it or lack of sleep in this case?

Unknown Speaker 45:54
So like I said, My eldest was much easier and probably I suppose him because I let him sleep. Going to bed with me. Because I’m in law school. And it was just easier. I didn’t I didn’t do the whole cry out thing when I was in law school because my sleep was way more important. So I just let him sleep in the bed with me. So that was pretty easy. My youngest Well, we didn’t know at the time, but he has ADHD. He didn’t get diagnosed until first grade. So, but he did not sleep. And so he was like a party, baby. And he was up all night and slept for like a little bit of time and up early in the morning. So that went and plus, you know, like I said, I was older. So that was very, very hard. I struggle and it was it was a lot. And then moving on to the Tyler rain. So roughly two to five before hitting kindergarten. What are the main challenges there that you experienced? I think, you know, just them coming into their own personality. I think that’s kind of when the time of their personality really starts to develop, allowing them to explore things that they like and enjoy and social interact socially. I think what I enjoyed most about That time is really kind of seeing them blossom into who they would end up being and enjoying learning about themselves learning about the world seeing what they liked. And to me that was a fun time two to five was was a fun time from what I remember, you know, probably wasn’t fun at the time, but I remember you know, fun for me to watch them kind of grow into their their person. I’ll admit, I’m certainly guilty of maybe some grass is greener syndrome, since that’s the age we’re in now. And, you know, maybe there’s a night where I just don’t feel like going through bath routine, and all that sort of random thinking, Oh, man, once they’re to the point where they can brush their own teeth and get showered and then they’re into bed. Boy, I’ll save so much time. It’s again, nice to hear somebody that has gone through it and can compare the other ages. saying that that’s actually you know, in comparison, one of the good times so enjoy those types of activities because they won’t last forever and even though they may seem tedious You know, in the moment, yeah, they’re not gonna last forever so that that’s good perspective. How about for that elementary school age like roughly six to 13 like the tween years. So, you know, the elementary school again, I think is this really kind of is a lot of social stuff that goes along with that, because they’re probably starting to play sports there, you know, at school, meeting new friends, you the social aspect of that, I think makes such a big difference. And how they connect with people makes a big difference. So I think that was interesting. The tween years. Again, you know, it’s just dealing with the attitude, I think is the most obnoxious thing, you know, that you have to deal with in terms of just trying to, you know, they’re mad and you don’t even know why they’re mad. They don’t know why they’re mad and it’s just like a whole bunch of, you know, oh my god and sighing and and you That’s all you hear all day, I swear if I’m like, my son yells, okay, mom, like sarcastically all day long is very obnoxious. So those those middle school years are, are not as fun. But you know, you do get to see the positive side of that is that they’re at that age, they’re still willing to talk to you. So that’s

Suburban Folk 49:24
good. And since you have gone through that age range, you know, with the 10 to 11 years apart. I’m curious with social media and just technology being what it is now, is there a noted difference that you’ve observed with where the technology is now that that your 11 year olds dealing with versus what your 22 year old was dealing with?

Unknown Speaker 49:51
Oh, yeah, absolutely. My my 22 year old I mean, he has a phone obviously in computer and stuff like that, but you know, he’s not really on a lot. Social media. I mean, maybe he’s on Snapchat or whatever these kids do these days. I don’t know. But you know, he’s definitely never really been too big on social media. He’s, you know, he doesn’t, he doesn’t really worry about that. But he does everything on his computer. He watches, you know, I got rid of cable because nobody was watching it with me. And it was like, This is stupid for me to pay for that. I’m the only person that’s watching it because they do everything on TV. So they’re watching you know, like Netflix and they’re watching YouTube. My eldest son loves anime. So he has some site where he watches all the anime he wants to watch. So they do that. And then my youngest, like I said, He’s into coding and robotics. He watches YouTube all the time. He’s into Minecraft like everything is connected. He’s connected, like all the time he wants to be, you know, on that’s our punishment. Like, I don’t have to worry about spankings or groundings or whatever else like if I tell him I’m taking away his electronics, the world has ended. So that’s it’s simple and hard at the same time, but he’s definitely completely into everything electronic. And if it’s not electronic, he’s not interested. He doesn’t want anything to do with it. So those are the kinds of things that I deal with that are very different between between the two of them, even in 11 years time, how much difference there is in terms of availability in terms of electronics. Yeah, that makes sense. We actually just had a block party a couple weeks back, and all the little kids were at the bounce house and I’m thinking, gosh, I know there are some, you know, 10 1112 up through high school age kids, I don’t see any of them here. They just out of activities. Well, they had one of those like mobile video game trucks. And so we stepped onto it briefly and I found them all.

Suburban Folk 51:51
They were all sitting in front of the screens on like, Okay, this is where we will be, you know, in the next five, five to 10 years.

Unknown Speaker 51:59
Yes. That’s it, that’s where it’s gonna go. And if it’s like, you know, you know, they don’t want to if you go somewhere and there’s no internet, it’s like, I don’t even understand, like, where are we in a 1920s? I don’t like why is there no internet? Like, yeah, it has to have, they have to be connected. And then the high school age, we haven’t really talked much about that phase. But one of the challenges for the high school age kids, so again, a lot of his social uniform, my eldest son, he’s personality changed a lot, you know, he was very, um, you know, had a lot of friends and middle school had a whole little crew. And then as he got to high school, it was kind of less and less people he wanted to be around talk to, kind of just morphed into kind of like a whole new person, almost two things, at least to me. And so, you know, trying to encourage him to, you know, keep his grades up and look forward to the future and all kinds of things that was that was very hard. I think, for me for him High School was probably the hardest parenting years that I had because he was so you know, into soccer and he was you know, very focused on his grades in middle school. And then when he got to high school that kind of all changed in he just really his personality kind of went, you know, did a whole one at so I think that was difficult to navigate as a parent and figuring out you know, what’s going on? Who are you Where did my kid go? That kind of stuff and you know, they don’t talk anymore. So like all communication is cut off at this point. So you very you not get any information anymore. So it becomes a little bit more difficult to know what their what the who they’re talking to, why they’re talking to them. You know, what’s going on in their brain because their communication is is it’s just over like once it hits High School, you’re not getting any more information out of them.

Suburban Folk 53:54
So it sounds like maybe what I’ve heard comparing the baby to toddler years of Yeah, maybe more frequent problems as far as them being headstrong or saying no a lot. But when you get into those older years, maybe less quantity of conflict or problems, but more complications in those problems. Does that sound about right?

Unknown Speaker 54:14
Yeah, I think so. And I mean, you just you just think about, especially in high school, again, you know, I think once they I think once they hit school age, it’s always going to be some social issues. I think the social issues just get more and more intense as they get older because they become more aware of them. And so that obviously affects you know, how they act and where they are because they are around these people way more than they’re around you. And they want to be around these people way more than they around you. And you as a parent were You were amazing and awesome while they were five, they don’t even want you be to be seen with you. You know, when they’re 15 they did the fact that you are even alive, it’s like repulsive, you know, like how dare you know, talk to your friends. or say anything, so they don’t want you around. So you gotta kind of have to navigate through that, but you still have to be there, you still have to do things for them, you know, they can’t drive still. So you still got to take them to all the stuff that they want to take be taken to, you still have to encourage them through school, you still have to make sure stuff is being done. You know, this is still a lot of that. And but it may be girls are probably a little bit different. My friends that have girls, their experiences were different. But still, you know, it’s still a lot of social management that goes into that, that you have to navigate through and make sure that they’re okay, because you really don’t know what they’re doing because there’s no way for you to know. Whereas when they’re five and six, and even somebody middle and elementary, you you still have a communication system that allows you to do that. But in high school, there’s no way the teachers don’t tell you anything you don’t know, the kids aren’t telling you anything. So it’s very hard to really kind of know what’s happening with your kid at that age.

Suburban Folk 56:03
I think that’s all the questions that I had. Was there anything that we didn’t talk about that you think we should cover? No, I think we covered everything that was great. Well, yeah, I do really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today. Do you want to go ahead and share your YouTube channel and other contact information so folks know how to get ahold of you.

Unknown Speaker 56:22
Sure. at YouTube. It’s my name Shahar. Right. So it’s youtube.com slash Shahar. This s h a, h A are a right w ri ght. You can find me there on YouTube. And I have lots and lots of videos not just single mom co but that’s one of the latest stats out there about business issues and matters and so you can contact me there. You can also go to Facebook, to single mom CEO success. So Facebook is single mom co success. And you can find all of our interviews that we’ve released today. That’s there. And we also have some things that are coming out soon. So you’re definitely interested in connecting with us there, make sure you do so. And you can find me pretty much anywhere on social media under my name. Shahar, right. And you can find me on LinkedIn, and Facebook and just YouTube. Like I said, I’m not on it on the gram, so I’m not that hip. But I’m definitely on other places. So definitely Google me look me up and you can find me and connect with me there as well. Perfect. And I will

Suburban Folk 57:29
be sure to put all your contact information in the show notes when we publish this episode. Well, shahara again, I appreciate it and take care.

Unknown Speaker 57:37
All right. Thanks for having me. Have a good day. Bye.

Suburban Folk 57:41
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai