“We could have a baby by NEXT YEAR” - The Turning Point in our Surrogacy Journey

0:00Have you ever been stuck on a weight loss plateau, trying everything and anything you can to lose that extra weight and reach peak health? We've all been there, but Noom's unlocked a secret to reaching the mountaintop. Go in micro. The Noom GLP-1 microdose program starts at$79 and is delivered to your door in 7 days. Start your microdose GLP-1 journey today at Noom.com. That's N-O-O-M dot com. Noom. Microchanges. Big results.

0:56Transcription by CastingWords

1:01your waist is so small you've got a scarf around it that's so cute it's not even a scarf actually no sorry it's a handkerchief i love this headscarf trend because it means that i can cover my stoma bag around my waist isn't that quite sweet but don't you need to have the longer flap on the other side yeah it is actually the wrong way around because when he's not blown up yet i like this outfit it's kind of like spanish meets western yeah I'm like in Yellowstone. Yeah, that's not bad. That's great. I am giving Weston. You haven't even seen Yellowstone, have you? No. I'm just assuming they're all cowboys.

1:34I've actually been to Wyoming before. I went on a dude ranch with my mum and my brother. That's epic. When I was 11. Or like a bit older, actually. I think I'd just started my period. It was really an awkward trip. Oh, no. Because I didn't have any sanitary products. And I had to bounce around on horses for a week. It was so uncomfortable. And there were no shops. It was in the middle of nowhere. And then my mum was like, why aren't you getting in the jacuzzi? Oh, no. And I couldn't even say. Is that not the moment where you're like, mum, you need to help me out here? I've got a situation. We'd never really had that kind of relationship, which is pretty tricky.

2:10Really? Yeah. But it's fine because obviously we all know I went to boarding school and everyone loved talking about periods when we were there. And it was a competition. Who could start first? Oh, God. So I got my resources. Okay. From my mates. let's talk about um last weekend let's talk about it what our little a little thompson family yeah we did our little double date with sam and tally our lovely trip away and it was all good until you're not convincing me i had a great time you had a good time yeah well yeah you've had the best time i've ever seen you have to the point where now and everyone's going to think we're totally fucking nuts because we've not bought a house in the cotswolds we've not bought a house in Gloucestershire or Devon or the seaside and now we've decided that we're going to buy a plot of land and build a wooden cabin yes um because you love that kind of lifestyle so much mate I had an epiphany when I was there I just realized how much I love that rustic also it really highlights that you don't need that much space we were in a one bedroom cabin yeah it was like a studio cabin studio cabin with a small kitchenette I mean it was really nice it was probably like it's quite luxury still yeah it's not it's not how do i describe it they have tried to make it rustic but it's still got touches of the luxurious finishes and stuff either way either way you haven't got like amples of space but it just goes to show that simplify things i just love you know what's funny though is because you say you said that when we were there this isn't that big so like we could feasibly build this ourselves on some land but looking around that space like it's probably the square footage is probably bigger than our house at home what the cabin yeah it's quite big bruh no anyway we had this like beautiful cabin right we all arrived separately because no one likes traveling together so we need three cars i went we should talk about this by the way this is so like my family would find this really bizarre why the idea of not just like we're all going to the same destination so let's just catch a ride would you want to catch a long ride with all of your family in the same vehicle?

4:18No, but how do you, like the Thompsons just, have you just arrived at this place where it's like, you don't even need to discuss it or offer it up? Oh no, but people offer, my mum will offer and everyone will say no. Well no, Sam will refuse to travel with my mum. I feel like my mum would take great offence if I was like, I'm actually going to drive myself, I'll see you there. No, we always do that. Sorry, when we were just in Devon, we had five cars between three families and regularly we would want to be on our own. we were never on Ryan we had all the kids in the back yeah fine but that is basically us on our own yeah so we would always volunteer Ryan and I to take the kids so we didn't have to speak to the grown ups and we'd just play really loud music and corrupt them actually the highlight I cut you off carry on Sam basically drove with Tally I went early with my mum because she's actually the only person I feel safe with when on the motorway even though she can go quite fast she is my safety net no this shit It wrecks me, man.

5:15Because you, and I actually, this, we did have a fight on the way back because I said a few passive aggressive comments. But basically, I think what I said to you was, you and my mum drive the same speed, but like she's a really smooth driver and you're quite jolty. I'm not 65. I'm 35. I like to make like driving fun. Yeah, but by fun, what do you mean by that? Like dodging other cars? And like being really pedal heavy? I like to like hit turns, try and find the apex a little bit. On the motorway? No, like through the Cotswolds country lanes. It's so horrible. I know what you mean about a smooth ride.

6:01My dad would be the same. He'd be like, keep it smooth or keep it straight. I'm like, no, let me just drive. Let me have fun. But if you know that I like a smooth ride, why can't you just give that to me? No, because you already make my journeys quite stiff because you don't speak to me. You sit there on your phone, Leo's at the back sleeping, and I'm just like a show. I may as well wear a suit and a fucking hat at this point. Not really. When you're driving like that, you get fired immediately. If I was an Uber driver, what would you give me on the rating? I would literally get you fired. I'd call Uber headquarters and be like, my name is Louise Thompson.

6:33And there's a driver called Ryan Libby who tried it on. tried it on he was talking too much even though I pressed the button not to talk to me I know what and he was really dangerous he was reckless driving do you know what though you feel it much more when you're a passenger especially in the back like you really you can feel the movement on the pedal a lot more when you're driving you're in control of it right so you're kind of dictating the whole thing but you know when I am do you know what would be great is if you could drive me a little bit that would be great I actually can't what do you mean you can't you literally tell me you love driving that car but you never drive it when I'm in it because I can drive in a city but I can't drive on straight roads.

7:10Okay, so, all right. So how about if I'm going to drive, let me fucking drive. Do you, but okay, on a serious note, would you like me to drive?

7:22No. Like, do you mind that I'm a passenger princess? Did you say that again, sorry? Is it okay that I'm a passenger princess? No, absolutely not. I don't want you to be a passenger princess. I don't want you to be a backseat driver or a princess up front either. I just want you to be like a DJ, like a co-pilot. Be like, what do you want next, dude? Just cool. I'm not cool. Just be like, you take the wheel, I'll handle the music. We'll stop off for a coffee. It's none of that, mate. You're either like head down on your computer or your phone or you're in the back like jabbing me with instructions.

7:55Should we take it back to just the most ridiculous part of this trip, which is the fact that Sam and Tally turned up. I'd been there for six hours with my mum. I tried to call Sam, no answer. Weird, because he is normally a pest. called Tally. She sounded so disheartened. They'd been at the reception for two hours because they didn't have a room. So they hadn't even booked a room. Mate, I spoke to your brother. He called me. He was like, bro, I'm 15 minutes out. I was like, cool. I'm a little bit behind you. I was probably like 45 minutes behind. And he was like so amped. He was like running through the itinerary.

8:30He's like, let's go straight to the gym. We'll hit the sauna and then we'll go for a beer. And I'm like, this sounds great, dude. I'm on my way. got there and he's like half cut at the reception of this check-in area with tally he's got two glasses of red wine like sort of almost all gone between them i'm like what are you doing like all you're supposed to do is grab your key and go he's like bro big problem we don't have a room and i'm like what do you mean you have a room apparently they just didn't book they didn't book at all well there's no there's no there's no like that is so typical and i'm like like the one time that they like poor tally actually gets to go away with him and like he can't he's not even capable of booking a room so then he's like they're trying to negotiate with the people at reception being like look if i pay this amount can we have the farmhouse they're like no and what about if i pay this amount they're like no so they end up in a pig in a piglet which is actually really a cute room it's it's the entry-level room but it's not quite the cabin that i think they had in mind and so then they refused to come to our room the whole trip because they were like we're not we're not doing it we're not seeing it and actually kudos to tally and i think this is quite a big green flag because she didn't kick up a fuss at all like she's pretty uh she's pretty low-key she's not a princess no that was great i clocked that as well that was great because there would be girls they'd be like but now we don't have a bath and now i can't take the pictures that i wanted to take in the bath with the lake and all of that stuff that people go there for yeah that would be a red flag moment one thing actually you mentioned about the red wine i find it quite funny because sam has never been a drinker no i know i've never seen him drink a glass of red wine in his entire life but now he drinks red wine and so they were drinking red wine on this entire she obviously likes it and he's trying to keep up in some ways quite it's actually really sweet although you can tell he doesn't really enjoy it i can see these little like squirms when he's drinking wine as if to say like i don't really want to do this but let's go with it anyway oh my god that's the ultimate and he very rarely he very rarely finishes the glass as well he did ask my mum for a pair of nail clippers across the dinner table on the second night is that a bit of an ick like oh sorry i need to clip my long fingernails mate oh that was a fun weekend though i thought i thought that i thought the dynamic was pretty good yeah it was good yeah i went to the gym with your brother on the morning after the first night it was that was nice i actually really like hanging out with sam do you one to one-on-one it's a very different speed to what everyone else is used to like he's a lot slower and he actually listens no sorry he listens and asks me questions i'm like hang on a second bro this is kind of refreshing i love it man yeah he doesn't ask a lot of Give me this version more.

11:20We had like a good little. What did you talk about? I don't know if I can see it on camera. You always get to talk about the good stuff when I'm not around. No, we just spoke about where he's at with Tally. Okay. And he feels really optimistic about it. I did his episode, his pod, Staying Relevant. I get confused. It's called Staying Relevant. Last week. And he was all in on that relationship. He said he thinks he's going to marry her. Yeah, well, fair. We were making a plan, a path to parenthood. Like how many years he's going to have kids in. So we're going to time it with our third. Oh, for fuck's sake.

11:58What do you mean? Our third. Josh, what the fuck's happening, runner? It's Josh even in eight years, isn't it? What? But I think that would be nice timing. It would be a good idea. Anyway, moving on. I think the lesson to be learnt from this trip is that women are actually better at planning than men how do we make that jump you entirely made the bookings for Sour House well well I was about to okay fine so we can blame it on her she's only 25 to be fair let's give her credit I think she was using Sam's Amex she's not a planner she's not a planner she's a type B yeah I don't think she is she plays chess you don't even know what chess is have I still got like pressure in my ears how you're going around what she plays chess so she can't be type B I don't feel like many type B people are playing chess fair I'm not I don't even know how to play chess exactly I think she's that's really bad isn't it I don't know how to play chess I would have been taught at some point but airhead over here would have forgotten by now we stick to Yahtzee if you know you know um yeah but okay boys just sam is not good at that shit so yeah i mean right i did ask you to bring my swimming costume it was like the one request i had and you didn't bring it yeah i did somehow skip over that one like how though i don't know because that was like one of three things in the same message and i got the other two but not the first one yeah so you brought obviously unsurprisingly the bicycle the skateboard and You didn't bring my sewing costume and the guitar.

13:43But like, could you just not be bothered? You were like, I can't be bothered to find it. No, I genuinely somehow did not register the first part of the message. I just saw skateboarding, guitar and bike. I was like, yes. Quite a lot of times when we've gone, or when you've gone away on your own, you are, you do like panic a little bit. What do you mean? You always say to me that I've got like this super skill where I can find really good places, restaurants, hotels. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. good flights, like cheaper flights. Yeah, you're great at that. I think that is actually a bit of a cop out.

14:15I thought you might say that. I think guys like to pretend that they're not good at certain things so that they don't need to take responsibility over that area. You did it when we first started dating. You said you couldn't cook. You literally said to me, I can only cook a bolognese or a chilli con carne. Which came out. And then you made one that tasted like fish. and it was so rank that um which you probably also did on purpose so you know and it turns out now you're basically like a Michelin star chef when it comes to a roast you're like a one pan man okay here we go this is this is gonna stump you my cooking is better because of you like I got inspired by your approach in the kitchen thank you first of all but when I first met you you lived in a flat and there was another guy and his room was literally like the size of the studio and the only thing in it was a treadmill smaller than this he had a Nordic treadmill which went up to 45 % incline that's basically walking on ceiling he was walking this guy I was like I cannot stick around like I actually didn't know if I could stay in the relationship mate it was that was a vibe that place do you actually miss it well no I don't but when I look back on it I think yeah mate that was great we were just doing our thing like we'd get excited about going around the corner to get a burrito should we get a burrito yeah dude well you and him yeah yeah men actually I'm just gonna say it like men prefer men when men find their men their dudes it's like bro it feels amazing does it does it just had it in Morzine man we'll get to that well let's get to that what was that trip like nah mate it was a um I'm quite tired now because I only got back last night but it was amazing it was a brand called Rawsome who I connected with probably six seven months ago really cool co-founders Will and Ed both dads to sons very similar age in fact Rocco is four and Rex is three and they have we've connected and I've shared our story about your delivery of Leo and everything that happened afterwards and I told them about my children's book and my letter to Leo writing and all the content and conversations we're having and from that they've given me and Leo the opportunity to create a character so Rawson is a is a brand that specializes in children's fashion yeah specifically ski onesies uh outer winter wear like puffers and trapper hats gloves mittens sorry what did you call that a trapper hat yeah you know that sounds so trendy with the like did How did you learn that when you were there?

16:53Probably at some point along the way with the brand, yeah. Nice. But it's a very fun brand. They create characters. They've got maybe 11 characters right now or 10. Leo's about to be the 12th. Oh, sick. So they have given us the chance. So in my children's book, the characters are bears. So we've created a bear ski onesie and all the accessories to go with it. So we went out to Morzine, which, by the way, is the ultimate playground. I had a friend actually used to go there when we were at school people have told me about Morzine along the way and I've never really clocked it and in fact we've been but you were super unwell so I think I've erased it from my brain but oh my god Morzine is unbelievable you get cold snowy winters you get hot sunny summers you can do everything from base jumping speed racing and skiing snowboarding you can wake surf on Lake Geneva which is just across the border into Switzerland Nice.

17:48And you said on the way here that it's actually really close. Oh, dude, the flight to Geneva. It's an hour flight. It's an hour and five minutes from... To Geneva. Yeah. So you're up and down. And then the transfer was an hour, again, to get from Geneva to Morzine. But anyway, so we were out there with Rawson. And I really love the brand. What was it like going away on a boys' trip? That was the first time me and Leo have been abroad, just me and him together. How was that? How was the flight? Mate, it was dope. we were scooting around the airport. He's obviously cute as a button. So people were just like looking at him, hanging off my little suitcase.

18:24As you wheel him along. And because it's just me that I was like, yeah, I'm going to take full credit for this. He's mine, which felt epic. So you're a trophy dad. Well, no, I just felt super proud. I was like, yes, he's mine. Because he was just on great form. And it's like, I guess the whole like, when it's just one parent, it's somehow a lot easier. Because it's just one way, like, It's me and him in conversation. There's no like input from mum or uncle, grandma, granddad. Do you know what I mean? You'll have your own experiences of this. But when we went away, it was still hard at times. It wasn't the most perfect or restful time, but he was on really good.

19:07It's actually quite cute because whenever you've gone away on your own, I normally get a bit of a barrage of messages like you're a bit homesick, which I love. or like something will have gone a bit wrong and you just like rely on me quite heavily. Whereas this time I didn't hear from you once. So Leo was your companion. Like he was your, me. Like he took care of you. Mate, we roll deep, me and Leo. What do you mean by that? Like you can't just say we roll deep and not explain what that is. Because I guess like some parents potentially on a thing like that where you're in the mountains and there's a few other kids there and you're kind of skiing and you're doing some kind of shooting for a campaign.

19:48Like I'm so there with him. Like I didn't really like, well, this is the example to use. On the second day of the shoot, like all these rad little French kids came over to join the shoot. And the parents just fucked off and like went to a picnic table in the skate park. And I was like, that's kind of cool. I like that you're able to do that and give the freedom and independence. But like me and Leo was like shooting me the whole time. And I'm like shooting him back and we're just in it. last week you did briefly mention that you didn't think you wanted to be a parent you didn't want to be a dad is this how you envisioned being a dad oh my gosh yes this is the version that i think all men would dream of going to the mountains sticking him in a really fun outfit and going skiing together it's epic did he actually ski did he what he skied he started off so by the way he's not scared at all and he's not kicking up a fuss about the boots or the skis like he was fitted by an ex-professional skier and he was like scooting around the show the boot room and everything else having a good time when we got on the snow he wasn't he wasn't phased at all so he started off in between my legs and I would hold him under the armpits and then I'd try to like progress to like arms out to the side and like he couldn't quite master like leaning his shins into the like by the way when we go skiing you'll be able to help him a lot more but I was trying to get him to like lean forward into the boots and keep weight through the uh weight down through the skis yeah he didn't quite get that for the first like few hours so there was quite a lot of holding but dude he he loved it and when he got more confident he was like i want to go next to you and hold your hand so i'd have one hand and ed the guy from rawson would have his other hand and we'd like to do two dads with little leo in the middle going down the quite fast like we were snow plowing we were trying to get him to plow uh anyway the next progression from that was he basically fucked ed off and he was like i'll just go with you daddy so just one hand and he was going down he didn't fall and if he if he crossed his skis which happened like sometimes i just because he's still so little i can just yank him up and just correct it so no tantrums because sometimes like weirdly he's had this regression with swimming where he used to be so good at swimming It's like a six month old.

22:02And then he got really scared and something happened. Now we're like, every time we're in the pool with him, we're looking at other kids that are swimming underwater. Like, what's going on here? But with skiing, he was really confident. Considering he's only ever really stood on skis when he was two with you. Yeah. It was great. But at the same time, I'm looking around at these French kids who are the same age and they are shredding. And I'm like, oh. So was Leo interacting with these little French kids? yeah there was a little guy called johan who was known as shark because his character was shark and he was quite sweet and he spoke he was actually english um so he they were quite sweet because he obviously has french lessons at school yeah does he hell he was not dropping any french no french like this morning i i because i knew he'd come back from france i was like and he went and it was like the scene from from friends doesn't joey does joey have a french girlfriend and phoebe's trying to teach him french and he and she's like you say je m 'appelle claude and he's like what does he say can't do it leo's the same he i got the same answer yeah i'm gonna have to feed back to the nursery the french did not help it's not it's not working for him money back please but no it was cute he's he's he's very social so he was quite happy just to roll in there But it's really inspired me to really focus even more on just giving him the opportunity to have that sort of fun.

23:30Yeah. I was like 11, maybe 10 when I first hit skis. I don't have the same opportunities Leo does. He's growing up in a different world. But I just think if we can, I'd love to get him into the mountains. I just want to get him into all this fun, crazy stuff. I don't want to stifle Leo with fear. Like fear is something that we interpret and perceive in our own mind. So I don't want him to have like a fear of falling off his skis or a skateboard or whatever. I want him just to be like, let's have a crack. He even said it to me one time. By the way, oh, this was the highlight of the trip. We were skiing down.

24:05I'm holding his hand and he looks at me and he's like, we were heading towards the chairlift, which he loves by the way. He's like, we're going on the chairlift. I'm like, yeah, I'm going to go back up. I'm going to do another run. He's like, maybe I can try it by myself. We see what happens. What on a chairlift? No, no. He just strung that whole sentence like that. he was like maybe I can do it by myself and we can see what happens he put his arms like this and we can see what happens it's quite funny when your child like doesn't speak that much and then suddenly they're just like a perfect sentence I was like yeah we can see what happens dude what so he just got scooped up like his little bum so he'd be next to me on the mat and I'd lift his bum and then like place him on the seat next to me and he'd be in he'd be like looking up at us like this oh my god I need to see footage of that even I'm scared of a chairlift I feel like you've come back in such a like a positive headspace do you think that is is this trip been good for your mental health yeah really good really good I think it's a combination of being around other dads and people with very similar values they're really really good blokes and they're amazing with kids they were so patient with Leo Leo loved them both I mean he spent a lot of time hugging and kissing them he was even giving them bolly hops what's a bolly hop oh I don't know people that don't know because this is very niche.

25:19I don't know if a bolly hop is like a known thing, but my great granddad Jack used to do this thing when I was little. He used to like, almost like, it sounds a bit weird actually, but he used to like suck my little earlip. That's so weird. He'd go in for a kiss and then he'd like get my earlip and go like something quite cute, like a little horse bite. And it was called a bolly hop. A nibble. Yeah. And we did it like my brothers used to do it to my dad and mum. And Leo was obviously picked it up, but he now not only Bollyops me and you, but just like random people. And are they okay with that?

25:54Well, for the first like five minutes, they're like amazed how loving and sweet Leo was. And then after that, I was like, I think the Bollyops might need to be turned down a little bit now. Because this is the one bit of feedback with, not that like Leo's old enough to have a school report, but like early days, they just try and sugarcoat it with, he's so loving. He's such a loving child and he loves hugging and kissing. he's got so much empathy for other children but he is so tactile and he has no personal space boundaries like he likes to be on people and i don't know what's changed since being away he just i obviously spent the morning with him today he was right up in my face like here and would not let go but he's like a limpet he was like he was like that sucking on my face and my ears and i'm Like, I actually, that's really sweet for like a minute.

26:45But also you can't do that to strangers and I need to go now. Yeah, but that's exactly what he was doing. But do you know what? It's very sweet that the blokes, that Will and Ed are both very, very good dads. And you can tell they are just how they are with Leo and the other kids that we were shooting with. So it's really nice for me to have those men and friends now for Leo to hang with. Because this will be the first of many adventures with this brand, right? Well, that's cool. We could go on lots of holidays with them and their families. 100 % and from my perspective like going away with Leo one-on-one is such a special opportunity I've got only a few memories I actually went skiing with my dad when he was in the army and it was with the army ski team and I remember being in the white minibus driving across Austria and they were banging Top Gun soundtracks and I was like a little little boy in the back of the bus just looking up to all of these blokes like and it really stuck with me I think it's important for men to find that comradeship i feel even though i'm really tired i feel really good i don't even know if this is that relevant but i saw someone sent me something i think it was like in response to us talking a bit about the manosphere yesterday and it was jimmy carr's take on it because he's i think maybe spoken to louis through but he was being asked about it in a talk that he was doing and he was saying he really buys into the idea of pubs which is interesting because we've spoken about how like there are certain pubs that don't allow kids to go now but he said even as young as like 16 he thinks that boys should be going to pubs they should be having pints if that's what it's going to take because it is so important for men to get together in groups he was like as long as they're in a group of four and they're around some adults like that is the perfect environment for men or boys to learn how to be men and how to communicate properly because there's nothing nothing more dangerous than men being isolated so i'm so pleased whenever you go off and do something like this whether it is like a ski trip or you go on like a little camping trip with other boys and men or like you know men and their sons as much as i want to be there because i get really jealous i think it's really nice i know how important it is for you because it's a different experience than going away as a whole family or with your wife yeah labeling myself your wife i've started doing that recently by the way my husband and son are away i was like oh i know everyone's like did you get married i'm not a husband i think it's just easier soz when's the bet when is this bear costume coming out sorry i shouldn't call it a costume i'm a huge fan of this brand as well and i love that they make sports fun by like getting kids into it because they basically get to like this fancy dress outerwear slash fancy dress.

29:29Like they've got like unicorn onesies. Yeah, which is a big... A big seller. Yeah, it's a big favourite. So when does the bear come out? Because that's got to be the best seller. Mate, this winter. So like October, November time, the bear's coming out. So we need... Big news. We need all the... We can get Leo on the pod like dressed in the little costume. Wait till I show you... Honestly, wait till I show you the videos and photos. You've seen some of them, but... Oh, so cute. You'll be super proud. So yeah, when it comes out in October, we need to create a lot of noise up in here. I am proud of you guys.

30:01It's like an amazing opportunity that you've... We had a great time. How was your few days by yourself? I didn't really touch base much because I was really busy with him. Didn't really do much of the social media stuff again because I was busy with him, but I did see one of your... You slung up a reel where you're like scoffing cereal in front of the TV. I'm like, oh, is that what she does when she's at home alone? why did you do that pose i didn't have my crotch it's just what it's just what it gave me like vagina out no the energy of the video was like no one's like oh fuck it that's literally how i spent two days i i'm gonna be honest like and i just don't i don't think i can sugarcoat this in a way that is more palatable um i had the best two days i've had in a really long time epic it was phenomenal it was so quiet like my nervous system got so regulated I've realized I just need less noise sometimes the house was so tidy it was so peaceful it was really nice to be able to just eat junk when you are a parent because you're essentially just a role model all the time you can't actually do you can't live how you want to live so I decided to just strip things back and take it back to my uni days you can't live how you want to live I think when you have kids, you're living in a PG, definitely not 13, just a PG world.

31:24So everything is parental guidance. Like, you know, when you're watching something on TV, you've got to taper. Yeah, you're taping your child's experience of the world. So you can't watch shows with lots of guns and sex and violence and swear words. Well, hang on. Which you do all the time anyway. And you can't. And yeah, so you're going to say, like, what sexy shows do I want to watch? what were you watching when you were scoffing cereal imagine if I was like watching loads of like like cunt movies it's like a new character coming out here no probably just loads of trashy reality TV shows binge watching which is you don't have to like censor anything you're just letting it happen like it's so annoying so sometimes I'll just be in the kitchen and I really want a cookie and the problem is if I go and grab a cookie Leo's also going to want a cookie and I can't say sorry one rule for me another few so I'm starving and I have to like slyly have, I should actually just have a snack stash.

32:19Oh, a snack stash. Yeah, like in our bedroom. Maybe like a little midnight feast cupboard. Ooh, that's silly. You only eat sweets after he's gone to bed as well. Like every time you, every evening you'll come up to the bedroom with sweets and chocolate to eat in bed. It's really corrupt. Not every evening. It is, you do. And then like you have more willpower and then I'll eat like an entire bag of jelly beans. I tried that carrot one from Easter that I tried to put in the loft. Oh yeah. I have managed to get my mittens on that. I think I could re-gift it next year that the sweets would be fine.

32:51I actually went on a hunt around the house looking for those jelly beans. I was like, where are they? I love a bit of a sweetie. That's dope though. So you had a great time. I had a really good time. So I ate a lot of junk food and I didn't cook anything. In fact, like there wasn't any food in the house. I behaved like a teenage boy. Made it. I was like, what am I going to make? I had like a bread roll for lunch. This is like, this is like. And I just mooched about. And I actually didn't leave the house until I had to. So you came back and this morning you were like, are the cars still in the same place?

33:21I was like, yeah, I can't drive. I'm a teenage boy. So it was... Good, well, I'm glad you're in the last time. Restorative. What I'm getting from this is that me and Leo have got free reign to go on little trips then. I think we should do it more. Oh, that's big news. Because I'm going to take that and run. Amazing. God, I'm the luckiest woman in the world. Are we going to do our solo trip this year? What's our solo trip? Well, because when Leo goes and stays with your parents for like a few days over the summer. No, it's not a few days. It's probably going to be two weeks. Two weeks? Yeah, he wants two weeks this year.

33:56He wants, oh, great. Yeah, because he had a great time. He's like, I want to go two weeks. Yeah, but your parents are not going to handle two weeks. Remember last, when he was little, he used to, everything, he'd finish everything with see you in two days. Oh, yeah, yeah. Even if he was going for longer or less. Yeah, because I think they were sad. He was sad when he first got dropped off that he wasn't going to see us. So your parents are like, it's fine. You're going to see them in two days. So it'd always be like, see you in two days. But like every day it was like, see you in two days. It was so cute.

34:18They taught him a lot actually down there. They're better parents than us. They taught him how to potty, how to, they potty trained him. Yeah. Very strategically, we planned a trip, no pants and some nappies. And we're like, happy summer. The next, the next thing that they're going to teach him is to get out of the nighttime nappy. Perfect. Okay. Well, we can do that this summer. Do you feel any sense of guilt admitting that you just want to hang at home and take time off your child? No.

35:07microdose program starts at$79 and is delivered to your door in seven days. Start your microdose GLP-1 journey today at Noom.com. That's N-O-O-M.com. Noom. Microchanges. Big results. Initial three-week subscription and four weeks of medication from$79 plus tax and$179 per month plus tax for 12-week subscription thereafter. Final pricing depends on program selection. Noom GLP-1Rx program involves healthy diet, exercise, and support. Individual results may vary. Meds and personalization based on clinical need. Not reviewed by FDA for safety, efficacy, or quality. No affiliation with Novo Nordisk Inc., the only U.S.

35:44source of FDA-approved semaglutide. Not available in all 50 U.S. states. My wife won't stop talking about Jerry. Jerry. Says he saved us money on car insurance. Mine too. Found her a better rate and didn't waste her time. Who is this guy? Babe. Jerry checked again and found us an even better rate. Pulled 20 quotes from top insurers, showed them side by side, and helped me switch policies in the app. It's a car insurance app. Yep. Let's just... Never happened. Do yourself a favor. Visit jerry.ai slash acast.

36:27I don't feel guilty. Because I'm with him so much throughout the year. Like, I put in a big shift. like we do everything together I mean I've slept sleeped go back to school Louise I've slept in a bed with him basically every night for the last four years or at least until he falls asleep which is sometimes two hours and I'll lie there and I will get resentful about it but I still do it and it's completely my fault but I feel as though I am deserved of a few days off and I think it's important for him as well to not be so dependent on me facts yeah otherwise he will never flee the nest going to bigger school will be a problem facts i mean i'd love him to be a mommy's boy but i just i think it's important for him to know that like he can have a good time elsewhere because i do we have we you know i offer him a lot great stick by it i agree i'm a great mother yeah i am so take the take the break take the time off and then you know i was really excited to see him and then i saw him and we spent the morning together and then you're like and nothing had changed and it was hell and he wouldn't brush his teeth he wouldn't use porridge and i went back into like having to learn how to manipulate someone again negotiate negotiate it's no same thing basically it's really tiring try teaching him how to ski yeah yeah okay yeah so now the truth comes out right it's like it was such a beautiful trip but actually did you it was tiring like carrying him up and down the mountain unsurprisingly especially given that he is in this like slightly tricky phase at the moment the pushback phase and i actually wanted to share a message with you that someone sent me yesterday because it gave me so much reassurance that we're on the right path and I had so many people reach out about it once I shared this message and even friends voice notes it being like thank you for making me feel more normal so I thought I'd read it out hey Louise just enjoying the latest episode of the pod the science re leo between four and five years old children undergo a limbic leap which is essentially rapid development of the amygdala result mood swings hypersensitivity stubbornness huge tantrums etc etc all completely normal and healthy he needs consistency patience and empathy to help build emotional regulation also when he has excess energy this is a really interesting point running run also when he has excess energy which i found a really interesting point running around conversely ramps up the hyperactivity moving heavy objects pushing resisting is what he needs maybe ryan will get him on the weights such a huge fan of listening to you both keep being the incredible parents and humans you are i feel a bit awkward now giving myself a compliment but isn't that interesting so when limbic leap um that's quite comforting to know so i think we need to basically get him on the prowler which is a the thing that you use in the gym you like push tires on it isn't that right or weights yeah weights yeah yeah well so no running just pushing and moving heavy objects that's gonna help that's the answer so we'll try that next i don't feel so guilty because i spend so much time with leo throughout the year it's not like i'm putting an emma greed who mentioned that she's a three-hour mum.

39:49Three-hour mum? Did you read about that? There's this lady called Emma Greed, who's a very big businesswoman, and she has recently announced that she's a three-hour mum, which is pretty controversial. So she's been doing this press tour around the launch of her new book. She's gone into a fair amount of detail as to why she only spends the mornings with her kids, even on the weekends, which is pretty controversial. And there's been so much uproar about it, understandably, because firstly, most people can't afford to only spend half a day with their kids, especially on a weekend when they're not going to school um but i think like a lot of people are accusing her of being a bad parent who in their right mind would say i'm going to give my child a time slot over the weekend or during the week it's not very nice for the kids probably to listen to that she's basically said that she was never the kind of person that was going to be making star-shaped sandwiches at home like it's not in her dna she also happens to be really successful so she does have this like total army she has like a household manager who manages all of their staff so she's got cooks cleaners chauffeurs like a whole army of nannies for their four kids that they have four kids so it's like a highly unrelatable scenario and i just wanted to get your thoughts on it i don't think you can really preach too much from a highly unrelatable scenario or standpoint because she's operating in a completely different world to everyone else also it's very hard for me to pass too much judgment on it because i don't even know the context i don't know how old how old are these kids are they babies no they're like 11 7 and 4 oh okay twins at four okay so that's so at that point 11 and 7 in particular they probably don't want to be with mum and dad more than three hours over the weekend they want to go and hit their own stuff you gotta be you can't just like be a part-time in and out flip-flop mum or dad like I actually agree I think you can't be a part-time parent I don't really know like I the word part-time parent and like putting this time that you're going to spend with your kids into a category in a box and it's basically treating your children and your family units like a job and I think the reality is it's like when you have children it's so unpredictable and you always need to be there for them and you can't always just say like okay this is the time that I'm going to give you and allocate you and then we have a cut-off point and I'm going to go and look after myself because like part of part of the sacrifice you make when you become a parent is your freedom and you always I think should put your kids first and I also think that you need to be adaptable and I'm like probably the least adaptable woman that I know but like I've forced myself to be adaptable and I've learned that skill when it doesn't come naturally to me so i actually feel like quite offended by what she said i think you should i think i think it sets a completely unhealthy unobtainable version of what a successful mother might look like so she's faced quite a lot of backlash because obviously she is in a very privileged position with this entire team to look after her family like presumably when she's clocking off at midday and then she's going to fill up her own cup she's she might be going to the gym she might be going to do a social event she might be going for lunch with me or getting her nails done I don't know what she's doing she could be going back to the office to work because work is what drives her and makes her happy um but then she'll be handing over to a nanny um I think like the point I think the point that she wanted to make in these interviews was more of I think she wanted to like empower women that they could be successful and that they could be business women and i'm just not sure that this is like the right way to do it from my perspective that's not the right way to do it in reality it looks like she has it all on paper but she has had to make sacrifices by putting um work ahead of her kids and sometimes not spending that much time with them on the weekends and that's her being like vulnerable and just sharing like the reality of like how she's got to where she is and how she's had to lean on the help of lots of other people she also sort of says that at least within those three hours like she's creating really high impact memories so she's doing lots of big things with them and that that's okay because those will form their core memories but the way i see it it's like most of the memories that you have with your kids are created in those in-between moments like when you try to force fun and you force schedule things like you actually lose so much of the joy of just like existing and like hearing your kids say like silly words for the first time also you're just you're just creating this culture where they're expecting big moments the whole time so they'll just become almost numb to the to the detail of every everyday life so they'll become unappreciative and they won't see the the great stuff that can happen in the everyday they'll just be so accustomed to a closed out skate park or you know i mean like something fabulous that only the 0.00.00.00 % of the world can afford to do a friend of mine used to work with a really high net worth family and she used to look after the kids and she essentially became the kid's parent yeah but that's so that they would tell her everything they would tell their parents nothing and the only activities that the kids would do with their parent, with their mother, was go shopping to Harrods and go and buy really expensive stuff.

45:26I mean, that's just bullshit, isn't it? I don't think I would ever want to have that whole army of people in my home. I know you'd love to have a chef. Yeah, but that's to help me, not Leo. But do you think you would ever want to have a nanny? No. No. Not even if it was some hot Hispanic nanny. No. No. You love, Ryan just fancies all Spanish people. Your type, like on paper, just Spanish, like Spanish woman. If we're lucky enough to have a baby next spring, are we going to co-parent that baby for the first year of its life? What does that look like for us? What are we going to do? Who are we going to lean on?

46:07You've already told me that if we're having another baby, you're taking six months off maternity. Okay. You're already backing up. No, no, no, I'm not. I'm actually not taught. Well, no, this is a conversation that we're going to have that we're having now because I think it's important to think about it. I'd love to I would like to take six months off and like at a much like slower, reduced like work rate. In my mind, like you need you and the baby should have six months at least where you don't think about anything else but just nurturing and supporting and loving the baby. That is probably the best for the baby.

46:38But that's exactly what the baby needs. The motivation to have a second baby is to give you that. but it's also a crucial time in the development and the bonding. Yeah. And Leo was very unsettled because he was fighting against biology and I was trying to be mum and dad and looking after him. It was just chaos. The whole thing was chaos. So if we're doing it again, it's got to be really peaceful and just very, very different speed. And I just, I sound like a dictator saying this, but you need to lean into that as much as possible. I do realise like quite strongly like the fragility of life because I nearly lost mine and I didn't have that time with Leo at the beginning and so I know that creating like a huge amount of space at the beginning say if it is like six months nine months a year to be able to do that and to slow down is a very valuable experience so I am really excited about that time and I'm not going to sit here and say that I won't lean on people at all because I don't know like I can't predict what's going to happen but I do I'm excited to be able to like do less and just see what creative ideas come my way and consume a bit of trash when the baby's young enough that they do not know what swear words are and watch a lot of ipad stuff with my earpods and because that was what my friends because i didn't have that experience and i had friends that were like whose kids wouldn't go to sleep and they were like well can't you just like lie down in bed and watch something on your ipad with your headphones in and I literally was like, that was an alien concept to me.

48:10They were like holding their babies while they fell asleep watching stuff. I like couldn't hold my baby and couldn't watch anything. I was like staying at the ceiling on a sofa or like watching a clock. So yeah, going to revel in that. Should we give a little surrogacy update? Yeah. So we are going to transport some embryos. Well, I knew that was going to happen, but are you saying it's happening? It's going to happen in the next couple of weeks, which is so mega. What the hell? I've chosen the career company and this feels like the biggest decision of life. Someone, it was actually a bloke, reached out the other day and was like, how do you send embryos to another country?

48:56Like, do you FedEx them in a parcel? Which is mental, but maybe it's not to the general public because they would have no idea how these things work. I mean, tell me. so it's a it's actually it's crazy to me that this is someone's full-time job but there are companies several good ones in the uk that literally transport people's dna around in these little spaceship containers that are really really cold i think it's called cryo storage and someone will literally have like a little alien spaceship with a handle on it and they're going to be taking that in an airport and getting on an airplane with our babies how weird how weird is this to think that we have my baby someone's hand luggage on an airplane yes what and you know what it's two thousand pounds as well that's ridiculous so these guys are making some good money they did actually ask whether we wanted to do like an embryo transport share and save some cash and i was like i don't know how i feel about that i do not want these ones getting mixed up i I feel like we should have done the share.

50:01They're going to be in separate suitcases. Vessels? Vessels, yeah. Are they? How do you know? Well, I just, logic would suggest that they would put them in a separate briefcase. Like, what are they actually, like, what sort of, like, thing are they in? Is it like a test tube? Yeah, probably, yeah. Like, vile, like, in some sort of, like, science. Like Jurassic Park, do you remember that whole, like, test tube, like, vile, vile, cryo, you remember. I reckon it is quite like that so someone is going to take our dna and all the paperwork so a month's worth of paperwork has been done i haven't okay has it okay you've not signed anything yet right okay so it's been done we've not had to do anything because there's so much is it the hfea which is probably like human fertilization i don't know what it stands for but it's it basically means everything gets done really safely and there's like a lot of logistics and legal stuff around it so then and And then the next step is meeting a few surrogates.

51:00And in a dream scenario, like we could have an embryo transfer in June and then actually have a healthy baby by March, April of next year. Oh my gosh. Shit. Yeah, that's pretty scary. That's pretty scary. I'm petrified. I will never be fully at peace with it. I just, I don't think I ever will be. It will probably all evaporate when I meet this. baby I think it's hard because I now feel really excited by it and I had when I went out to this um black time when you were away my friend was asking me questions about it and I feel like whenever I've spoken about the surrogacy journey up until this point it's felt really emotional sad and I've cried and now I'm excited I for some reason feel like my tone is coming across jovial And I don't want that ever to be misinterpreted as like I'm undermining what this whole process means.

51:59But I'm like slightly struggling because I feel like, oh, God, am I allowed to talk about this in like a really matter of fact way? Like I feel a bit like uncomfortable about it that I that I'm saying, oh, yes, we might actually have an embryo transfer in June so that we have a baby in March and April, which would work because Leo will be on his Easter holidays. And I know that that sounds just like really practical and removes all of like what nature intended this experience to be about from this experience. But then again, it's like, should I feel guilty for being, for speaking in this way? Like, can I, can I be like, guys, we would like to have a June transfer so that we then have a baby in March and April because I just want it to happen as soon as possible.

52:40Yeah. We've been grounded by the events of the last however many years for too long. We, we, we know the context. we know we know the situation our delivery now is this is what we're doing okay this is what we're doing this is what we're hoping for we're allowed to be like hopeful to be honest like i even have friends that have because another thing that people will always ask about like whether we're going to choose the sex or not because it's this weird position that we're in um and we've decided like we're not going to go down that route because we want it to be a surprise but like so when people have asked i am like gosh that's quite a personal question but also like i have friends who actually have gone to countries outside of the uk in europe because they've already got like three or four boys so that they can do the idea of embryo freezing process and put a girl back in because you're allowed to do it in portugal or i don't think that's what we're going to be doing no i think like we want to try and leave like the one thing i guess is like up to chance as being down to chance yeah yeah so like that's the one thing for us that feels like it might be a surprise which is quite nice i feel i feel actually for the first time i feel really confident that this is going to be achievable for us given the length of time that it's taken to get like now i'm like we're moving i'm like this could happen quite quickly and then like we might be pregnant so i guess the next step is to is to is to meet is to meet a few surrogates and to make sure that we're both happy and we can update you guys when that happens meet them virtually yeah oh god i'm so nervous bless him well how can you possibly like come to a decision in your mind where you're like yeah i've just met you five minutes ago i trust you to build my baby well let's get to that that's a that is a minefield you've got very strong opinions about this so do i i think let's let's wait until we get to the next step and then we can talk about our experiences of it um we have a listener question i wanted to ask as you've mentioned a lot how you and ryan nearly went separate ways because you got so poorly mentally and physically how did you keep it going when there were lots of very low moments for a long period of time and grab that spark back as there must have been so many emotions from both anger hurt frustration drained doubt but still love it's actually a really good question because we've not addressed it a lot and feel as though now we've created enough distance from like the real bad times that it feels like we're comfortable enough to talk about that period because it was really bad and like sometimes when you're going through something traumatic like you have to well and truly move away from it before you can even venture there or you'll rest like damaging the relationship I think that was like one of the hardest parts about going through this trauma together and both of us having really poor mental health was that like we couldn't actually lean on each other because there was no one that was in a good place to pick the other one out of the bad place and so the communication was non-existent and we kind of were like I'd say like on our own separate journeys to getting better which is really rare I think and I'd like to hope that like most people don't have to both have depression and anxiety and generalized anxiety disorder and all these horrible things in tandem but I suppose childbirth can bring that on because men get postnatal depression too what helped us time time is the first thing and a strong sense of loyalty loyalty to you loyalty to the family unit loyalty to the new role of like i'm a dad so i ain't going to turn my back on you i'm here i'm your partner we're parents loyalty to that whole thing but time time like time it's like seasons it's like clouds it shifts it moves so if you stick it out and you're persistent with it don't give into it things do clear the skies the water clears i actually saw something yesterday i think it was is her name anna williamson she did a this video where she was running a glass and it was like a glass full of coca-cola and she ran it under a tap and it's very very dark at the beginning and then like gradually but it takes ages over time as the existing water because you don't just pour out the fat water and then fill up with the clean water like the existing water is in there four or five minutes but in reality like five days weeks months like sometimes five years until the water got fully clear like all of that was cleaned out um so having a huge amount of patience and just like clinging on i think to of the tiny hopeful moments that you do have together we were quite lucky because we had really solid foundations so we'd been together for six years seven years eight years six years before we decided to have kids so um there were those kind of positive memories that we had before like we knew that we loved each other not in trauma i think i think the answer is just time and loyalty it's that simple like everyone was very like supportive of the fact that you were so brilliant and loyal throughout everything we've been through that they were like well it's also okay not to be okay and to to leave i was like wow that's quite stark like that some people don't make it through sometimes relationships don't survive probably most of them don't.

58:37Sometimes it is better to separate. Sure. I'm really grateful that we didn't give up. Are you?

58:49You're not off the hook. Yeah, I'm joking. Yeah, of course. We have a son in the middle. I'm not going to let him lose out on us as a family because of us not being able to be reconciled and in a place where we're happy. So I think that's like bedded into your moral, that's your moral compass. I have a friend that's actually going through a really tough time at the moment when it comes to her career, financially, home life, relationship, and she's got kids. And my advice to her is to step away from that unit for like a little bit. and I know it's not easy for people but even if it is an hour or a couple of hours or like if you can take a day off from work and step away and just talk to somebody that you really really trust people find it really hard to talk to their friends about relationships or and especially hard to talk to their family members about relationships because they don't want to burden them but they also don't want to sway their opinion too much in case they figure out and they go back so there's like a fine line people like oh I can't unload everything and tell my full truth about how awful this person is being to me even if it's like you know really bad because they think that they know they want to make it work and I think it's important for people to know that like your really good friends can handle listening to the worst things and then also um like respect your decision to to work through it so I would just say share like share with the people that you trust the most um i find it really hard to come back to this question because i feel like it's just too generalized and like if i don't have enough context on these people i don't know how deep into the relationship i don't know if there's kids involved i don't know if they've been like foul play on either side you know i mean like yeah for me to really commit and give something that i really believe in and hopefully would be helpful to someone i need to i need something more than this so i'm going to give you a slightly vanilla response and just say time is a great healer and if your sense of loyalty to that person is strong enough you can overcome pretty much anything that comes your way nice but i'm not a relationship expert as well so that's also worth that's also worth saying our our situation was very different to maybe theirs and i think you know the reason that we decided to um remain loyal is because we have a little precious nugget in the middle.

1:01:14Yeah, it's true. Well, thank you guys so much for listening. I hope you've taken something juicy away from this episode. I actually really enjoyed having this conversation with you. I feel like I've always learned so much. And if you guys enjoyed it, then please do share it with someone that you think might like it too. It would mean so much to us. Oh, Ryan, come on. You're so nice at the sign-off. You know, Sam literally just reads out his entire... He's got a whole fucking spiel. So actually, let's just end it like this and be like, we're, right, you know we're really crap at sign-offs. You're not, you're great at sign-offs.

1:01:48I'm not, because I don't get anything back from you. Sam just sits and looks at the iPad and reads off this massive spiel, so go on. That's why they've got so many followers. All right, here we go, outro. Mention the email address, hsss.srproductions.co.uk. If you wouldn't mind, actually, a message from me to the men. If there's anything that you'd like me to speak about on this podcast, by the way, use me as your guinea pig, because I'm very open and willing to crack into most conversations, if not all of them. That's actually really true. A lot of men feel like they can't get answers out of their partners, so use Ryan as the mouthpiece.

1:02:18Let me remind you one more time, folks. H-triple-S at srproductions.co.uk. And make sure to follow us and subscribe to us wherever you listen. Yeah, great. Thanks. Also, online is where we're really good at interacting. It's kind of our day job. So if you pop a comment under any of the Instagram clips or under YouTube, then we will personally get back to you. Yeah, for sure. Thanks very much. Love you. Love you.

1:02:51Hi,

1:02:57it's Hannah from Giggly Squad. Bottomless laps for$9.99 are back at Buffalo Wild Wings. So you can mix and match favorites like modsticks, fried pickles, onion rings hatch queso and chips and salsa it's perfect for a girls night a double date or just a full-on yapping session order your apps and keep them coming while you spiral on the same gossip from every possible angle so grab your besties or your frenemies and head to buffalo wild wings to get bottomless apps for$9.99 while you still can