Hilary Whitehall answers your burning parenting questions

0:00Do you know what gets me through February? Wine? Yes, wine, but also booking a holiday. The minute I know something's in the diary, my whole mood lifts. Oh, same. It's that little boost that helps you survive the freezing school runs and bitter Saturday footy mornings. Which is why we're thrilled to have Jet 2 Holidays as our sponsor. Because nothing beats that just booked feeling with Jet 2 Holidays. Exactly. A low deposit now, something lovely to look forward to later, and suddenly a soggy school run feels more manageable. We have a very special bonus episode for you today with the wonderful Hilary Whitetall.

0:35Between raising three kids and now being a grandmother of two, Hilary has truly seen it all. Plus, she's been a doula. So she's seen Parenting Journey right from the very first breath. Okay, Hilary, are you ready for some of our listeners' burning questions? I'm going to go for maternity ward chaos to ask you this one. Yes. Less advice, more what would you have done in this situation? Okay. I was listening to your recent episode about noise on the maternity ward, and with my last baby, I didn't even make it to the ward. Literally, just as I gave birth, the ceiling collapsed from the room above.

1:07We were trapped in the labour room for five hours while they cleaned up all the poo. How would you have stayed calm as a doula? What? Oh, my gosh. I was just like, am I reading this properly? The ceiling collapsed from the room above. How would you have reacted? I would have. I'm quite good in a crisis, I think. I mean, I would have probably resorted to humour. Hand her a gin. Yeah, hand her a gin and say it's all fine. You know, the thing is you've had your baby. Yeah. That's the most important thing. That's what we need to focus on. You've had a nice, healthy baby. Isn't it exciting? Yeah. And we'll just have to wait until they get their act together on the hospital front, on the building front.

1:44So you just remain calm, used humour, diffuse the situation. Absolutely. I think that's a brilliant thing to do in everyday life yes stay calm have humour yeah come at the problem with a you know you haven't got a solution because you can't clear up the mess so you just have to put up with it yeah that sounds horrific can you imagine oh my god imagine like if you have a quick birth and you're like literally traumatised and it's like oh sorry yes there's a lot of rubble yes and you'll be stressing about the dust with your baby thinking oh my god is there asbestos like what's going on yeah I'm not quite sure why they didn't take them out of the room where the ceiling hit.

2:19But anyway. This is teenage boys eating everything. I've got two teenage boys and they literally don't stop eating. They found all my secret sweet and biscuit hiding spots. So now not even my treats are safe. Can I evict them? Put them in the laundry basket because they're not going to find them there. I've got a key. My snacks are on a locking key. Are you kidding? I'm not kidding. I mean, they will go through them and so does my husband. Yeah. And then when I need them, for like actual lunch or whatever. Yeah, yeah. They're not there. And I'm like, where have they all gone? And I'm like, below.

2:55And then I find all the wrappers. And I'm like, no, no, no. So I lock it. Where do they take, like the wrappers that you'll find in their bedroom, like secret? Just everywhere. Oh, God. Do you know, Jack and Barney still walk into my house and the first thing they do is open the fridge. Oh, my God. Jack then says, why is there never anything in this fridge that I want to eat? He finds things to eat. And I go, funnily enough, because it's my fridge. yeah exactly not your fridge and you don't live here yes but he will always find something to eat yes I still do that with my parents though I know where my mum's sweet drawer is and I tell you what if there's reason chocolate cheese in there I'm having them but I'll open their fridge yeah and I don't know it's not necessarily that I'm hungry I just want to have a little look and see what they've got you know my brother does that my brother will come into my mum's house and just open the fridge but my mum's like oh George what would you like whereas if I did it on my sister my mum's like get out my mum used to have little pickers wear bigger knickers written on the fridge a moment on the lips a lifetime on the hips she was a weight watchers girly so i'd go to the fridge and be like oh yeah we'd go to the market on a saturday and you buy like 20 kit kats that were like white for a pound they didn't taste like chocolate because they were like 10 years out of date and we'd have all these awful chocolates in the fridge and my mom used to have these like gourmet weight watchers curries and microwavable meals these delicious things and we'd just have like waffles and beans for our dinner yeah yeah when we'd have this amazing gourmet thing but yeah she used to have all these things written on the fridge and you just think that era that generation of growing up it's like you would never write that on your fridge now because that's that you wouldn't want your kids to see that having a daughter as well i'd be like oh god you don't want her to see my mother was on a permanent diet yeah and actually i probably have been slightly guilty of that and i thank god molly is very sensible i mean i did teach all mine to cook that would be my other advice is teach them to cook so that they can be self-sufficient they're all far better cooks than i am now oh really yeah that's good do they cook when they come around to you they will cook and we go to them and they're much more adventurous than i am so i have another one for you yes okay help it says at the beginning help yeah february half term's coming up how do i survive a week off with the kids i'm already dreading the six weeks in the summer.

5:06Any tips for keeping my cool and not losing the plot? I think activity. Yeah. I mean, certainly if you've got, you will appreciate this. If you've got boys, they have to be outside. They have to be run like dogs. Absolutely. Like greyhounds. Twice the day. Yeah, a lot of sport, a lot of outside, even in February. You wrap them up in a coat and a scarf and out you go. It's good for you as well, isn't it? It's very good. Yeah, yeah, exactly. We always used to do creative stuff as well. So we would do things. I said, right, we're going to make some police warrant cards today. We're going to be secret agents.

5:40I love those police warrant cards. I'm totally going to do that. Love a sticker. You see, love to do things with stickers as well. Yeah. Creating things with stickers, paint, crayons, all of that. Did you never think, because I'm thinking some people would go, that's great going out, but, you know, it might be a little bit tricky if you've got like a baby and toddlers and stuff. They might think, not that. The kids might not be into crafts as such. or there are a lot of parents like myself i'm guilty of this if somebody said to me why don't you get the paints out for the kids i'd be like absolutely not because we've talked about the sharpies that's my daughter my sons would get all the paints out drop it spill it put it on the carpet and i'd be like why are we doing this i hate crafts you need like a big um you know the old um decorating plastic sheet yeah you tape it down with masking tape and do it on there I used to be amazing in lockdown, the activities I did with the kids.

6:31See, what's also a good thing to do, and I did this with my kids, especially during lockdown, is if you get a bucket of water, just a jug of water and a paintbrush, and they can just paint, but it's just water. Water, yeah. It just comes out on the wall and for hours my kids would just be there with water. Because it was so hot in lockdown, it just dried quickly, didn't it? Yeah, it was really like, oh, keep going. What would you say is your proudest moment as a mother? I tell you what I'm proud of with all my children, and that is I know that I can take them literally anywhere and they will behave.

7:02It's not about behaving. It's just that they are, generally speaking, good people. One of the tenets that we had, both Michael and I, very important, is that you treat everybody equally. So the guy that empties your bin is as important as the king. Everybody is playing their part. Everyone is doing their job. And you treat people as you would wish to be treated yourself. And my children are very socially adept at making everybody feel included and valued. And that's what I'm most proud of is that they're just nice people. I hope my kids like that. That's beautiful. That's really important. That's very important to have.

7:36Absolutely. Well done. Well, that's kudos to you and Michael for installing that in your... Chocolate. Woo! Chocolate. What are you doing? Just getting into the holiday spirit. But it's February. it might be February but I've already booked my family summer holiday with Jet 2 holidays so I'm officially in full holiday mode kids what advice would you give to mums that we call in the trenches that are exhausted it feels endless there isn't that light at the end of the tunnel sometimes and they have they probably listen to you going I wish somebody would ring me at 2am and say get a cup of tea you are okay wait wait your bloody partner up yeah but what advice would you give to those people?

8:16I would say it's worth it. It's the most important job you will ever have is bringing up the next generation, the next new humans. That is the most important job you can ever do. It is worth it. Take a deep breath. Relax. Ring Hillary. Take a moment. Yeah, take a moment. Think right. And I guess just take it each day as it comes. Every day is different. The problems that you have are going to be different. You just have to try and embrace it and think, you know what? I'm doing the best I can here. And know that you're doing a great job. You are doing a great job. Pat yourself on the back and say, you know what?

8:55I'm still here. Yeah. And it does get better. It does. It gets different. Yes. It does get easier. It does. I remember thinking with my first in the first three months thinking, what have I done? Yeah. This is so hard. This is my life now. when's it going to sleep and then I can go out and meet my friends like I used to so Jack has a friend she's just had a baby she's you know a little bit older mummy having her first baby she's had a wonderful career in comedy and continues to she's she works a lot you know she's just done some big heavy hitting programs in comedy and she had this baby and you know she's a professional older professional mum and it was like what have I done I used to record voice notes on my phone and send them to her and I'd say, okay, I want you to listen to this when it's 3am.

9:42Okay. You're doing an amazing job. Oh my God, you're amazing. You are fantastic. I know it's lonely. I know it's dark. It's cold. He's amazing. You're amazing. If you're that desperate, wake your husband up and say, I need some help. I know he's got a job to go to, but wake him up because he'll want to come and help. Make yourself a cup of tea, deep breath. You're doing okay. Oh, that's wonderful. Can we just clip that? Because I'm going to play it. My daughter was up three times last night, one of which vomiting. Oh, no. I want to hear that. But that's all you need. But you should do that. Waterproof sheet over the sheet.

10:19Yeah. You should have like your own Spotify playlist, just positive affirmations to new mothers, because we all need to hear it. My mother always said to me, you just have to be a good enough mother. A good enough mother. That's what you should aim for. You can't be the best mother because there's no such thing. Just be a good enough mother. Get guilt out of the whole equation. Amen. Literally amen to that. We get it all the time. We're constantly bombarded with you're not good enough, you're not doing well enough. And it's just, you know, that's why we constantly feel the guilt. Most mothers are doing an amazing job.

10:55They are. Absolutely. I would say all mothers just by dint of being a mother. But yeah. Yes, exactly. That's like the best advice. I think we've heard on the podcast as well as Davina saying like, you know, love your kids. And literally everything you've just said, we're like, yeah, amen to that. The only person that I was getting my advice from was through like magazines was Beyonce. Oh, nice. I don't know her, but she was like, everything's amazing. Yeah. Everything's amazing. I was like, this is not amazing. This is vile at times. Do you have to remember that Beyonce probably had a lot of help and a lot of money to throw at the problems.

11:29Yeah. And I think she also asked her hospital to redecorate as well. there you go most probably and book the whole thing out exactly I would also say with breastfeeding as well again we need to take the guilt out of breastfeeding yes we all know that breast is best we know that what we need to also be told though is that you need a baby that is flourishing and if for whatever reason you're not producing enough milk even though you keep putting the baby to the breast and it's just not happening or in some cases as Claire Byam Cook will tell you some babies just can't suck. They will never get that milk out of a breast.

12:05Now you can pump, that's great. But for whatever reason, if women end up bottle feeding, don't guilt trip them. Absolutely. You know, we're doing our best. Yeah. Our very best. And we do not need a layer of massive guilt from other people. I'm just going to give you a round of applause for that because that's spot on. Yes. Absolutely. One other thing, never let the sun go down on an argument even with your two-year-old. I never do that. Always make up. I always do even with my husband even when I'm I'm like let's just sort this out let's have a cuddle and a kiss yes I love you and I'm like no no we're not doing that but I am sorry and maybe you're sorry too we're both sorry let's draw a line and especially with the kids as well my kids never go to bed on a bad vibe ever as soon as I wake all three of them up on a morning I always like cuddle kiss every morning tell them you love them yeah love you so much cuddle and a kiss and they're at that you know it's like oh stop it but this morning i dropped my nine-year-old off at school and he's like we've been talking about this earlier there can you call me mum in front of my friends and as i dropped him off he looked he just turned and looked at me he's like i love you mummy oh my god and my eyes just filled with tears i'm not an emotional person at all but i was like that is means everything to me i've been up three times last night changing bed sheets and stuff and it's like yeah yeah that's what you know that's validation from the person that i need it from isn't it so and when your children are adults and with children of their own they still need you as their parent and they appreciate don't you appreciate your parents more after you have so much more respect for my mom yeah i'm a mother and she was a single mother my dad left when three of you yeah when she's three kids respect no job like nothing and i'm like mom how did you do it she's like we just did we just did I had to she said I had two choices I could either crumble and deteriorate or just get on with it and she did and I've got so much respect for her it's incredible when you say now off the back of what we talk about and everything it's like single mum of three kids under six on her own no money no money years back where it's not as easily accessible just to borrow money from the bank or you know what doesn't kill you makes you stronger absolutely and it seriously does and that 3am advice to mothers is do you know what you're doing a great job and look at you you didn't think you could and you can you did this girl can this girl can we are more powerful than we think than we know and Hilary you are an absolute superhero in your own right bless you so much for coming on this podcast it's been a delight to have you here I've loved hearing your advice your stories everything absolute joy thank you

14:50massive thanks to jet two holidays for sponsoring today's chaos if you want something joyful to look forward to book now for this summer there are millions of free child place holidays and it all starts with a low 60 pound per person deposit so you can spread the cost before the summer go on grab your sun loungers early before another parent gets there first