MOMENT | “I Didn’t Know Who I Was After My Baby” with Michelle Kennedy on Matrescence

0:07Zoe Blaskey:Hi everyone, it is your host Zoe here. Welcome, welcome. It's Monday, which means it is Mother Kind Moment Day, your little shot of inspiration, of support and validation to set you up for the week. Today is with the incredible Michelle Kennedy, founder of Peanut, who have just launched an incredible campaign to make matrescence mainstream. I would really encourage you to Google make matrescence mainstream, look at that campaign. I was very proud to be a part of it. So in this little shot of inspiration today, I asked Michelle about her matrescence and I think what she has to say might just surprise you.

0:50Zoe Blaskey:I think it will validate how you feel and I really hope that you take from this that however your matrescence experience is you are not alone here it is

1:09Zoe Blaskey:how did your identity change as you've been through your two matrescence experiences because you said that we're trying to figure out who we are you strike me as someone who who knows quite clearly who you are that you know your values and how did is that true and how did you get to that place? I think I do now.

1:26Michelle Kennedy:I don't know if I knew who I was. Certainly I didn't after Finn. Yeah. And I found that really hard. I didn't know Michelle, the mom at all there. I knew who I was at work. I knew who I was as a friend, as a daughter, but I definitely found Michelle, the mom, that was still some work in progress. I didn't really know that part. And obviously, as I started to develop not just my career, but the concept of building something that became clearer. I was going to do this new adventure and Finn was going to be very intrinsically linked. And that was really exciting. And so that became a bit clearer.

2:04Michelle Kennedy:I think by the time I had Nula, which was many, many years later, it's quite, you know, six years. Yeah, I've got four years. And when I had new, by then I definitely did feel clearer. And I think that's in no small part because, of course, my business was focused on supporting these women and these moms at these key life moments. So I was living and breathing the product and using the product because I had Nula and we went into lockdown. And I had this little baby at home who couldn't leave the house, who couldn't go to the, you know, the monkey music. Yeah, I was the same. Exactly the same. And it's really frightening.

2:41Michelle Kennedy:You're like, well, everything I knew has gone out the window and I'm learning all over again. I now am very clear who I am and the journey I've taken. And it's not for everyone. And I would say that motherhood is absolutely the best chapter in my book, but it's not the only chapter. And that has taken me quite a while to really come to understand that. I am multifaceted. As women, we are multifaceted. And that's a great thing. And you can choose your favorite chapter of your book but it doesn't have to be you know you're not just one chapter

3:20Zoe Blaskey:and now a quick word from our sponsors

3:27Zoe Blaskey:and i'm wondering building peanut you know two children yeah holding huge community with with all the mothers you support you know i know you support lots of other female entrepreneurs you You hold a lot of things. How do you get comfortable with the trade-offs that you have to make?

3:47Michelle Kennedy:That's really hard. There's a piece in the book and I really like it because it's from one of the experts. And for me, it really has helped me think about how I approach things, which is you go to the faucet and you fill your glass and then you pour a little bit of that water into every glass that needs the water. And then when yours is empty, you go back and you do it again, fill it back up and fill all the glasses. And actually what you should do is leave the tap on and let your glass overflow and fill into the other glasses below so that yours is always topped up. Well, that's much easier said than done.

4:25Michelle Kennedy:I know that. But actually, if you try and keep that in your mind's eye of actually, I can't be all the things unless I'm doing some of the bare minimum for myself. And some of that's unavoidable. You know, we were just discussing, you know, you, you want to have a night's sleep and a little person appears in your bed and at 3am and that's it, you're awake until morning. But sometimes there are things that I want to do for me that I feel braver to say that I think historically I would have thought people think I'm selfish or think people think that I'm a bad mommy. And now I feel like it's the most important thing I could do.

5:04Michelle Kennedy:So that means that if I need to go and have a shower and close the door and the rule is no one goes into the room while mummy's in the shower, I need that. I need 20 minutes. Sing in the shower, feel happy again, whatever it is, do my face routine, whatever it is, I need that. And we all have to respect that. And that's the way I can do all of the things. And some of the things won't get done and that's okay too.

5:29Zoe Blaskey:What other things like that are your non-negotiables? Non-negotiables.

5:34Michelle Kennedy:Okay. In the morning, this is a bit weird. It's almost like a ritual, but in the morning, the kids go down and I get ready. So I have to shower. Yeah. They wake up at, you know, six, go and get myself ready. And then I go down and do breakfast and do everything. But I have to have had that 20 minutes just to get myself together. I understand if you're listening to this and you've got a baby and you've got a toddler that goes out the window this is when they're a bit older and you get this luxury and it is a luxury that I don't take for granted it's a huge huge luxury but if you are in that early stage and that infant stage I promise you a shower is the most humanizing thing that can happen and if there is anyone who can hold the baby hold the toddler for 20 minutes while you shower at any time of the day it is humanizing and you will come to treasure it so I treasure my showers and I really really really love to have my Starbucks or other coffee I drink really bad coffee sweetened coffee and I like to have that moment after I've taken the kids to school and just have 10 minutes where I'm just drinking that I do my emails and those are kind of like protected times and then everything else is light to the wall.

6:51Michelle Kennedy:You get no choice. Chaos. Just survival. What evenings look like for you? Mad. You know, also we're at that point now where it's someone's got football practice.

7:02Zoe Blaskey:Ours is like a crazy ninja skill. It is. Yeah, totally.

7:10Michelle Kennedy:Same. And so we've always got, you know, someone's moving around somewhere to do something, some kind of club. I still keep the non-negotiable to the extent that I can that I did when Finn was little. It took me so long to get it that I don't give it up. I like to put my kids to bed and I want to be offline for that hour while I put them to bed. And it took me a very long time when I went back to work when Finn was five months old. For the first two months of that, I missed bedtimes because I was working and I felt I couldn't say it. And it made me resentful and it made me bitter. And it made me set a really bad example for every other woman in that organization who thought that's what they had to do to succeed.

7:55Michelle Kennedy:And it took me a really long time to go in and say, you can call me. Don't call me between six and seven. Yeah.

8:02Zoe Blaskey:Or I won't answer.

8:04Michelle Kennedy:Exactly. I'm your, all yours, 7.30 onwards call me all night don't care he'll be awake anyway but that time I'm putting him to bed and I want to be with him yep and wherever possible I keep that even now

8:21Zoe Blaskey:what an incredible episode I hope you loved it too if you've got this far then I am guessing that you did so make sure that you share it with a friend and subscribe so you never miss an episode and I will see you Thursday for more. See you next time.