Refill with Reka | A place where Moms Thrive

Empowering Parenthood through Nomadic Living and Homeschooling

• Reka Leftridge

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Ever wish you could break the mold and take life on the road? Our guest, Nia Wiley, did just that. This trailblazing mama of three and her husband swapped their conventional life for a home-on-wheels and haven't looked back. They kicked off their nomadic lifestyle in November 2021 after being inspired by another black family living full-time in an RV. Nia’s intriguing journey provides a fresh perspective on embracing change and living life on your own terms.

The Wiley family’s RV lifestyle goes beyond the freedom of the open road. Nia shares her experiences homeschooling her kids during their travels and the unique challenges it brings. She emphasizes the importance of parents being involved in children's education and how it opens doors to unexpected lessons on diversity, handling disagreements, and fostering healthy relationships. We also delve into Nia's fears, the trauma of secondary PTSD, and how she channels these experiences into creating a safe and nurturing environment for her kids.

Nia’s story is not just about a unique lifestyle; it’s about empowerment and self-awareness. She shares her journey to self-freedom and the founding of her life coaching business. We discuss the power of visioning and how we can create the lifestyle we desire by walking in our zone of genius. As we conclude, Nia reflects on creating a healing legacy, which involves letting go of unhelpful emotions and fostering an environment of patience, love, and self-control for our children. Tune in and prepare for a conversation that's equal parts inspiring, insightful, and filled with invaluable life lessons.

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Speaker 1:

What's better than a regular happy hour? How about an ultimate happy hour for moms? Martini Mama's podcast is a weekly hangout for modern mamas to discuss mamahood, work-life balance, blended families and self-care. So whether you're looking for advice, community or a new bestie, you are in the right place. Cheers.

Speaker 2:

Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Martini Mama's podcast. For the last couple of weeks, I've been bringing these hitters through, do you understand? And today we have another one. We have Nia Wiley, our RV mama, who is trailblazing these roles with her kids and her husband and just doing something totally different, and so we're gonna bring her in. Figure out, how did she get to this new lifestyle? Cause it is a lifestyle and how is it? Okay, hey, nia, hey, how are you guys? Hello everybody. So, yes, I am.

Speaker 1:

Nia Wiley.

Speaker 2:

I am currently living full-time in RV with three small children. My kids are ages five, seven and then my oldest just turned 12, like a week ago. Okay, so we like to do like a vibe check, mom, vibe check on a couple of things. All right, so I hope you are up on your TV shows, bitch mom, would you be? Would you be Tasha Mack from the gang? Would you be Rochelle from Everybody Hates Chris? Or would you be Rainbow from Black-ish? Rainbow from Black-ish, for sure.

Speaker 1:

Why.

Speaker 2:

Because I feel like she, she, I feel like she conversed very well with her kids. I think, tasha Mack, I think you can be overbearing to a point where your kids cannot critically think. So I definitely don't vibe with Tasha Mack. And then I don't vibe with Rochelle, because I really do try gentle parenting with my kids and I try to definitely they talk. I don't wanna say they talk back, but I let them converse with me and I don't shut them down, and so I think that I would go. Rainbow for sure. Okay, I don't think I knew that was her name, though Most people don't know. Will we catch you hanging out with Moesha, or would we catch you hanging out with the twins from Sister, sister, the twins.

Speaker 1:

Why.

Speaker 2:

So I just felt like there, the way that they went through school was fun. They had just two totally different personalities, right? So what what? It would be just like a nice fun trio to just put me in the middle and, interestingly enough, one of my good friends, she, always thinks that I like Tia. Oh sh, All right.

Speaker 1:

And here's my last question.

Speaker 2:

Nile ladders or Jolly Ranchers, I'm gonna go. Jolly Ranchers, oh Chia, I love me some. I love me some. Nile ladders now, the cherry, the apple, like my mouth watering now. Then they had to flip it up and give you that pineapple. That pineapple was like the summertime one.

Speaker 1:

Lord.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, I think I like.

Speaker 1:

Jolly Ranchers. Well, these kids don't even know about a Nile ladder nowadays.

Speaker 2:

Now I gotta go get a pet, because they got to know. But I said Jolly Ranchers because they last longer. But that shoe, that's probably why I got all these cabinets. And okay, like, this is like. And so we set out November of 2021. And we, you know, I tell my husband we had initially planned, like most people, I retired, I'm gonna get a class D. You know, that's the one we all know that you drive. We were like we're gonna retire and get us one and we gonna hit the road. And then it was what year was it? It was 2021.

Speaker 2:

It was probably like March, april, and I saw a lady I follow and have been following. She travels because I love travel. She moved into a smaller camper with her son and husband and then she's black. So I was like, well, wait a minute here, wait, what are we really out here doing in these streets? So after I saw her, it just, it really was like a sea got planted, like, hey, there is something more to living than just the way that I'm currently living, which is in this house, going to work every day. I was already homeschooling my children.

Speaker 2:

We started actually 2019, a year before COVID and I was like, well, we already homeschool. I mean, what is it to really travel full time? Like, what is that like? And it just so happened that I wanna say it was April it was either April or May of that exact same year.

Speaker 2:

Like a month after I saw her that, I was like let me just look it up. So I went into Instagram. You know how we go on Instagram. We go to the search and I went to RV family Cause I was like, well, okay, what is going on? And a whole RV full time RV family summit popped up. And it was just so happened it was taking place the next week, it was virtual and I bought a ticket and so for the entire week it was just all day long, full time families that were being interviewed and shared. And so I was like this is like a real thing, like these are real whole families out here living in these campers on the road. When you brought this idea to your husband, yeah, cause you know that's what we do we will come off the wall with some stuff, right?

Speaker 1:

What did you?

Speaker 2:

say you know what? My husband has always been really a really big supporter of any crazy, asinine idea I have come up with. He is really laid back. So he was just like, yeah, that's sound cool. And you know. You know, this is what I told him might be. A fault is because he just goes with the flow and sometimes I think that people get so accustomed to people just being talkers that they come with these ideas but they never really you know, there's no action. But, baby, not me. If I say I'm gonna do something, I'm gonna do it. If I say I want something, I'm gonna get it. So he should have known, like, if she's saying this, I should really give a full, honest, like review of what she's saying. Cause, baby, all this I have about a camper. You was like I'm not playing, we not running, I'm gonna go out, we going to buy this camper and we about to hit this road.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely, where was the first place? You went? Charleston, south Carolina. I took a travel nurse assignment there. We were there for five months.

Speaker 2:

It wasn't a just fly off the whim, because I actually at the time was working as a nurse practitioner. I work in the NICU. I've been a NICU and nursing for 15 years. So naturally I cannot work as a nurse bouncing around as a practitioner. So I was like, well, the easiest way for me to sustain my income would just be travel nursing. You know, at the time you everybody heard with COVID you're being paid really, really well. That was great for adult world. It was not the same for the NICU world. Let me just be very honest about that. So when we first hit the road we were like my plan would be to work and do travel nursing. We could stay in one place and then my husband has a financial planning business, so then he could work his business before we got on the road, though he did work in telecommunications, so he had a job that he quit to just work his own business. We've been on the road 20 months and probably half of that more than half of that have not worked in travel nursing for many different reasons.

Speaker 2:

Give me a top one. My number one reason was, or is it's family over everything for me. And I went to travel nursing from a position that I was working as a practitioner, 24 hours shift, so six to seven days a month, to working 12. And then I was working straight night, so I would work nights and then I would come home and sleep. I'm like this is the life that I'm trying to escape from. I want to be, have more freedom, more flexibility, be with my kids. And then it became so saturated in the travel nursing field that it wasn't as easy to bounce from one contract to the next. I was already burned out when we hit the road, which is probably one of the biggest reasons. I was like I need something different because the way I've been going in the current house of the American dream, I was exhausted. I was exhausted, but the thing is we all are right, I know that feeling of being burned out, even during COVID, and you're trying to do everything.

Speaker 2:

And then you come out of COVID and you're still trying to do remote work because it felt good to have a flexibility. But, just like man, you still feel like a slave to the job.

Speaker 1:

And you do get.

Speaker 2:

It's this sense of like. I just want the freedom For me, that's what it's always been. And when you say family over everything, that's kind of one of the main reasons why I retired. It was because it was like I'm gonna choose my family before I choose this. You're almost got me twisted to think that I was.

Speaker 2:

Say what? No, not my babies. You know, yes, man, it's a hard decision, though it's not easy. In the older I've gotten, and especially in these last few years, I've just learned to appreciate it. And people ask me all the time like, how is it with your kids? And we just had my husband. I just told our oldest son this the other night. We said you know, we planned you. You were not an accident, it was. We said we want to have a child and we plan to have you.

Speaker 2:

And I tell families all the time I only get 18 summers with my babies. Well, you put it like that, mia 18. So he just turned 12. I tell him all the time like I only got six more summers with you and I need to maximize my time with you because I asked God to bless me with you. I asked, I asked for you. So if he gave you to me, then it's my responsibility to be here.

Speaker 2:

And yes, it takes sacrifice. And do I want to sometimes be like dang? I can't imagine them being gone all day in school. Yes, but I want them, I want to be with them. Now, do the kids get a choice? Do they have they said no, we really want to go back to school. Only my daughter, only my daughter and she. Before we ever sold our house or any of that, she went to just like a little mommy's morning out when she was three, four, so she has never been in public school, but she sees YouTube things and TV. When she watches, you know that girl Lele, she just has in her mind what school is and I'm like baby, that's TV.

Speaker 1:

And then we got to go out and have fun.

Speaker 2:

Like honey, you're not a character. That's what I told her. I was like well, why do you want to? Now, you know, we asked why do you want to go to school, reese? She's like well, I want to go make brand. I was like baby, but you can't talk to me except there's 20 minute lunch and Reese's, so we end this RV life. How do you keep the data going?

Speaker 2:

You know, girl, at least you can be around me Like my daughter, be like right here still to me, like, hey, my girl, move over. Yes, that's exactly how our kids are. And people were like, how is it? I'm like y'all, we had a 4,000 square foot house. We sold six bedrooms and it was the same exact way. It was the same exact way. They literally were still all up under us. So it's no different in this 300 square feet I mean in our 300 square feet now versus that house.

Speaker 2:

How do you maintain the intimacy in y'all's relationship? Because you need it. Let's just be honest. Yes, you need it Absolutely. You might not be trying to have no babies, but you're like, look, no, no, you're right, you have to be intentional, but it's no different than when we live in our house. We had to be intentional. You have to plan for it, you have to schedule it. We are really open. I think if you meet our kids, people would never know that they're homeschooled because they will converse with you like adults. And we talked to them about OK, mommy and daddy need a long time. We would like an interrupted time. You're old enough to go fix a sandwich. It doesn't require me. So we just communicate that with them. I think the other day we had our door closed and they're so used to it being open. They just opened the door and we were like no, no, no.

Speaker 1:

That's not how that works.

Speaker 2:

The door is closed. You didn't get off or a knock Like they just opened the door.

Speaker 1:

We were like no, and we were just like we were not doing anything.

Speaker 2:

But the point was, you don't just open a closed door. I just think they can smell it. You're right, what's happening? Square footage, I think that they can like these kids Child, let me tell you right. So you know kind of the same thing. It's the summertime, Everybody is in a room doing a thing. Ava goes to daycare because we like, look, you need to be around some little people, Right.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Because she's too so her needs still need to be met. Man, when I tell you that this Joker we be trying to sneak away and it's just always a I knew you in a moment and you like go away, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:

My husband.

Speaker 2:

He's like just ignore him. I was like sweet, can't do that to us. How do they do that to us? I'm like they ain't gonna go away, bro. You have to acknowledge they're there, cause they're not gonna stop you trying to bury my face in the pillow and like, no, just go away. No, oh, so do you? Do you ever like get to a state and then say, okay, I'm going to drop y'all off here, y'all going to do some activities here, and then we going to come back and do our own thing? Do y'all ever do that? We have not done that, but I would not be opposed to it.

Speaker 2:

So when we're home, sometimes like we're, we're, we're, we're going north, but we're about to make a U turn and head back to South Carolina. So when we track down home, we definitely say what, grab my home this weekend, what we want to go on some dates. Because we're home, there is no reason not to. Now I will tell you for the most time our kids never asked to go anywhere. They've never asked. They've never been like that, even when we lived in, when we moved from Virginia back home. They've never said like, can I go to the night? They went. They've never asked. They've not ever done so because they're used to being up our minds, so that's not different.

Speaker 2:

But I think, before we hit the road this summer, like my daughter did, like a two day cheer camp, what was the deciding factor for you to homeschool? I was actually very heavily involved in my son's PTO and if you have kids, I'm telling you I know it feels like such a big inconvenience, but please be involved in their schools, because I was on the PTO and I would go in and do volunteer and just so, just to be a fly on the wall, because essentially that's what you are Is when you're there you're seeing things maybe take place that happen all the time. Teachers are not always fine, they're not and they're not necessarily treating your kids like you would Some maybe, but it's not like that all the time. And I was surprised because I'm like dang, I'm not covering up and we're here, so I can imagine what it's like when I'm not here, right, right. So I was always. I would always sign up and be a class mom. I didn't know the future.

Speaker 2:

But when it was time for my son because he's the only one in school in school at the time to go from second to third grade. Just from my being that fly on the wall, I was like everybody here that I think is going to work well with his personality. So I asked his second grade teacher. I asked his first grade teacher like hey, is it just me or you know him? Who do you feel like would be a good fit? And when they were like I tell my husband, okay, yeah, I looked at doing you know a whole different school, but then. But then with my 24 hour shifts and my husband's job, we would be responsible for getting him there and picking him up and the village is quite tiny for us, so we didn't have anybody we can rely on.

Speaker 2:

You know, like I told you about my husband, he kind of go with the flow, but I actually watched a video about the increase in black families homeschooling with him. It was like a PBS thing 16, there's so many. And at the end he asked me like okay, so you think we can do it? And I was like, well, that's a single mom in this video. I don't see why we can't. And she can. And it was easy. It was like okay, and then we just knew once that school year ended, when it was time for dirt grade. He wouldn't go back and it just, that's just. It was just that fast of how it started. We have to be more, especially in this day and age where they're trying to rewrite history for our students. There was a time where I had to even go up to the school. They were doing like black history and one of the teachers.

Speaker 2:

They were talking about slaves and they were talking about the transit, you know. Whatever the case, there was a very derogatory statement made so much so it bothered him and he came home and he talked to me. I got up on that email so quick. I put that little, that communication journalism master's degree, to work, honey. I was up in that way just to have that conversation. But you're right, when you are the fly on the wall, you see how those some teachers I'm just going to say some.

Speaker 2:

Yes, because there's some amazing ones. There's some amazing ones Shout out and I know a lot of amazing teachers out there. There are some ones out there that I've had to check once or twice.

Speaker 2:

So you do have to be very much so engaged in your child's education. A lot of black moms are starting to homeschool and I just wanted to know your reason. Yes, you know the numbers are really large If you just look back. I think when we started, that was 2019, there had been a large I want to say like 34% increase at that time. And I have another homeschool mom who I recently talked to and she was like we're up well over 50% now that we're taking our kids back because we already know statistics show us that they're just the clean, significantly higher than non black counterparts.

Speaker 2:

We just went to Kentucky and we've never been to Kentucky and the people just were not friendly and I made a post about it because I was like being black in America is so traumatic every day. And I tell my husband I'm not gonna put my kids in public school and them deal with that. I'm just not gonna do it. And if that means our house is smaller, then that's what it is. If that means I don't get my nails done like I used to, then that's what it is. And I told him that if, supers, I don't have to work full time for somebody else, I won't because I don't want to put more on them than they have to have.

Speaker 2:

There's this misconception that we have to expose our kids to this nonsense just for them to build thick skin, and I've always been opposed to that right Like whoa whoa, especially our black boys, because I have two boys and I have two girls and I had the boys first, the girls later you know, and so I think it's very important to teach the boys the value of themselves first.

Speaker 1:

They're worth because in Texas.

Speaker 2:

they are truly the minority here, even though I know that we're the global majority in Texas. In the school system they're the minority. So you know it is Hispanic, mexican, latino, I mean, it's just here and they have to have enough confidence to walk sometimes in those rooms. You know, and you know what your child is going through until years past. Let me just say this my son me and him was having a little bonding moment.

Speaker 1:

He wanted me to braid his hair.

Speaker 2:

He's been dying to get his hair braided right, Because he's growing it out and I'm like cool, so I braid his hair. He puts on a movie because he loves movies, but he puts on karate kid, right, he goes, he was born in Japan, he was my first kid born in Japan and he's like and they're there in China, but he's like, you know, this movie reminds me of us because I was a single mom at the time.

Speaker 2:

And I'm like really, and it was despite scene in a movie where he is, just like you know, getting bullied, and he was just like oh this thing really gets me. I just want to wait for him to, just beat him up, and I was like set it in a way like does that remind you of a moment in your childhood? Is that why this one part?

Speaker 1:

of that Trigger yeah.

Speaker 2:

And he was like it does. And I was like, really, I was like you never said anything. He's like yep, I can remember that boy punched me in my stomach too. He's like not today because I knock him out, but in that moment I was just like well, why didn't you say anything? Then? Did you think it was because it was like mom was going to fight my battles? And he was like sort of, and I am no, I'm just kidding, right.

Speaker 2:

Right and well right, and I think, I think, he was like in that, like third or fourth grade when we got here. But yeah, and that moment you know you want to drop a tear because you're just like, oh, baby, but for him he had to build that resilience, mm, hmm.

Speaker 2:

So, I think you know, sometimes it's that protection, but you just don't know. Yeah, you don't. And I mean it's even like I was telling my husband when we were in Kentucky. You know, my kid don't know, they've not been exposed, so they still feel like everybody's so friendly, right. And so I tell my husband and my older son didn't come initially with us to the pool and they came when we were getting out. So I was like y'all should have, y'all wish you would have been there. And he was like why? I was like because you could just feel like if we were in the 60s everybody would have got out of the pool. I was like. I was like I feel like River, which is my youngest, the five-year-old. I was like I swear.

Speaker 2:

I heard him ask a little boy, do you want to play? And he said no, right. And you know, the mom in me is like I'm just going to sit here and I have older kids but they don't know what it feels like to be denied. We listen, we my husband drove by because we're at a campground now in Indiana and we drove around and came through the other night and there was two little boys on the golf course and they're like hi, and my husband was like what's up, little homie? And he said maybe he didn't say that, he said he spoke. Whatever he said. He didn't say little homie, but he was like what's up? And then, as we kept going, the little boy was like he's black. They don't know, that was last night. They don't know if it's a lack of exposure for them or the lack of exposure for our kids, but on both sides I think it's needed, you know. And so how do you, how do you make those teaching moments for your kids? Because you are traveling the world, meeting different peoples that you know it's like a as a mom, it's like you become mama bear and it's this safety net you want to put around, absolutely, absolutely. But a little bit you got to be like, ok, I got to let your wings spread a little bit, you got to Right.

Speaker 2:

So in the moment of being at the pool, I saw my daughter try to interact with a couple of little girls and they would kind of go off and ultimately she would be by herself and they and some of the husbands. I was like I became their playmate. So they just like, talked and played with me. But it was later that night the three of us were out and and then I said, what did you guys think about the pool today? And they were like it was great, it was fun. And I was like yeah. And they were like yeah, and I was like, well, did you guys feel like you guys met any friends or made you know any play? Tell you when anybody. And they were like yeah, that one girl was my friend and I was thinking to myself as the parent looking. That's not what it was at all.

Speaker 2:

But I have a really hard time making them valuable teaching moment because I try really hard to not impose what I think really on them. Yes, and I told my husband that last night. I'm trying not to get emotional about it, but I told my husband that last night I was like we don't teach our kids not to like other people because of their color of their skin at all. Right, but they're also not being deprived of it, even though they don't go to school. We've done. Our co-op was predominantly black, but we have done things with them where it doesn't matter. It's not a vast majority of any one type of thing, so they don't know my little son. He won't go up to any child and say you want to be my friend? He doesn't care, he just doesn't care. And I feel like that's because, for the most part, unless you are pushing something on a child, they don't.

Speaker 1:

They don't know, they don't know, they don't know, they just know good people.

Speaker 2:

So I try to. I think what I talk to them more about is just being good people, yes, and treating people how they want to be treated. We talk a lot about God, the Bible, the Ten Commandments. I'm like you. Treat people like you want to be treated, even when I'm talking to them about just sibling fighting. It's treat people like you want to be treated. What you want her to do as you that? Part of it.

Speaker 1:

It's easy, right I?

Speaker 2:

feel like that's so easy. So when they are interacting with other people in these campgrounds where it's just probably us, the only Black family, like you say, I just kind of let it play out and for the most part they have had great interactions with people. So they don't get that people are not speaking to them, they don't. They've gone to plenty of other campers and they'll give my kids oh, you want to do in a juice? So they've met. Enough that the bad don't matter. But you know what I mean. Yes, it's enough that the bad don't matter and I just can tell them everybody's not good and that's kind of what we tell them. Everybody's not good, everybody is not kind, and we don't relate it to anyone race, because that could be Black, that could be Asian, that could be Asian, right, that could be anything, yes. And we tell them you know, I'm like you just have to.

Speaker 2:

I was on my husband's last night. I pray for discernment, to know the difference, and I want them to learn to pray, to know when someone is not good for you and when someone is great for you, regardless of what they look like, and I just hope that they carry that for their whole lives. How long have you been married? 10 years, oh my goodness. And do y'all have, like y'all little spats? Of course We've been together 23 years. Chah, let me fall off this sleep force. So three, I mean. And Mary, pretend, how do you handle that? Because for me it's not that we try to keep it from the kids, because we want the kids to know that we're human right.

Speaker 1:

We not around here breaking the gap?

Speaker 2:

and doing all this other stuff. But if we disagree or something happened, you know it's like no, like I don't like that, like no, I don't agree. You know like we say those things, but in the next moment there's a hug, there's a kiss, there's a you know what I mean.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely Like. They see that that it's all love, it's not something that's very toxic, like none of that. How do you, how do you guys handle that for being such in a close space like you are? I'll start with. You have to have healthy disagreements in front of your kids because they need to know, you know, we are their number one teachers, regardless if we want to be or not, before they ever in a public school. So my therapist, you know, I've talked to her and I've told her you know things going on and she was like, yeah, but they, they learn from you, so they learn how your husband loves you, they learn how you love him and in their mind, that is what's the word that is going to formulate what they think relationships should look like. Right, and so we don't really have many disagreements. We, you know, we really, really don't like the small stuff become the big stuff.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think even now, with all of these years later, and then me, having started therapy a few years ago, I am learning at my to improve my emotional intelligence and my communication skills. You would think, out of 20 years, you're like, well, she ain't got it, because I didn't get it, I didn't need to have it Right. So now I'm trying to grow in different ways so that makes it easier to do the work. You just have to do the work and we just communicate. You know we communicate to our kids and I'll tell my daughter you know this is what it is and my son knows this is what it is.

Speaker 2:

But we still love each other and you don't always you're never gonna always just agree with the person you're with. You know that's just relationships period. Sometimes you just gotta take the walk you do. That's not marriage. And I'm like I sit back and society has just made these, these movies, the social media, it just makes marriage so unrealistic. And I tell my husband we were talking about this the other day. I was like people know now they can just get out of it and they just don't do the work. Yes, well, my husband told me that he'll be stalking me outside the bushes if I ever try to leave. I think at a certain point you just when you are best friends and there is a certain level of friendship there.

Speaker 2:

It makes it easier to have those conversations. I will tell you, our relationship deepened when we were away from each other for four years. He was clean and I was here, and this was during COVID, and I only had him for the weekend. So, like disagreement, like we had to hurry up to figure that thing out because I wouldn't be able to see him for a whole another week. You know, yes, yes, a phone and with tension is not a conversation, it is just taking things in, you know, and so we had to learn. But in that learning brought us really closer together because we learn.

Speaker 2:

Okay, I can say what I don't like. I don't have to walk on eggshells. I can say this and we're gonna be all right. I can find the time to say that this bothered me, but I also know how to come back and say I'm sorry. And I think we put a lot of emphasis on when we're wrong, just saying you're wrong and correcting it, like well like before, when I was my first year in marriage, I used to be like shut up, huh, you know Like I'm sorry.

Speaker 2:

And now I'm the first to say I could have said that better. I'm sorry, Yep, absolutely no, it wasn't you. This is what I was thinking, and then you asked that and it came out wrong. I apologize.

Speaker 2:

Or sometimes he had to take a ride and come back from fishing and he's like I really didn't put your feelings or take your feelings in my mind. Yes, well, you had to decide to go to therapy. Was that something that was I'm a mom and I need to do the work, or was it something in you that said it's time for me to go to therapy, like I need this? It was the second, it was the latter, it was I'm holding onto something. It was I already knew, it had acknowledged I had traumas from childhood and I need to work through these. It was I'm angry Ooh, yeah, I'm really angry. And it was showing up everywhere. I had no patience. I had no patience for my kids, I had no patience for my husband. I didn't have any patience for my colleagues. I had no patience for anybody. I was just angry and my therapist said you know, they all say so what brings you here? That's what brings you here. And I said, you know the cherry on top that I was like I have to get help now. I have to get help, I have to go.

Speaker 2:

It's time Was, I think I looked Moose Pass, george Floyd, and then it happened to Amad Arbri, which I don't know if anybody remember, that's the guy who was killed by a two white man. He was out running, yes, and at the time my husband and I were. We were running our neighborhood and we were training for a 5K and my husband, of course he would go out and run without me and I was devastated. It was devastating to me when that happened to him and I was like you can't run, not outside of our neighborhood, like we're not doing that Cause I was fearful of his safety. And that's what I tell people that don't understand, which I later learned that when we watch these videos of man being killed by police, it causes secondary PTSD, it causes a trauma that you don't have the experience but you still get the side effects as if it happened to you.

Speaker 2:

Right, right, so that's exactly how I started there. We had nothing to do with something that happened to me. It had everything to do with the world around me. Man, yeah, that's so true, cause I think about my two boys and you're right, I was just. We were talking about how we truly grew up in the little neighborhood that we're in now and that, like we specifically chose this spot because at the time, all the kids were in the neighborhood. You can see them playing outside and I wanted that. I wanted that for my kids. I wanted them to be able to drive their bikes. I wanted a healthy childhood memories.

Speaker 2:

You know where all the friends come over, we buy pizza, they can go up to the pool and we do all of the things. And now that they're older, the teenagers, they're into gotta look buff and all of the things. But I couldn't imagine somebody doing something to my son and he's out just walking the dog, right, like they walk the dog, they run, you know, they take their shirt off, they've run up the street, run, you know, it's their thing, all right, yeah. And I used to be like just shut up, and then my husband be like they're boys, like they're gonna run and like they're gonna run to the pool and take their shirt off and then they're gonna run the neighborhood and then come back to the start, the corner and put their shirt back on. So you might as well be okay with it, but I say that to say it is scary to have your kids out there and not in your plan for your safety.

Speaker 2:

And you just don't wanna live here, right, right, that was just. It was that. And then it was just time to unpack everything that was burning me, that was I felt like holding me back, and I started a life coaching business last year is a means of trying to find that freedom that I talked about and helping other people. I've started lately wanting to focus on moms, because a lot of mom, what we do is we literally will fill everybody else's cup without feeling our own and I tell people all the time now you have to fill your cup and everybody else gets the overflow. Yeah, the overflow is for your kids, the overflow is for your husband.

Speaker 2:

But I told my husband a couple of years ago. I was like my cup is dry. I got nothing to give y'all. It's dry and I have got to get to a place where I'm feeling my own cup so that I can get poured into you guys, because I'm tired Like this is the reason why I started this platform just as a means for women to get a break out of their day to come here as some meaningful conversation to get filled up, to get poured into.

Speaker 2:

It's like, literally, come get your refill, come get your pour and go on about your day. Hence, it's a play on the martini mamas, because I think we enjoy a good cocktail Like the best of them is essential, but self-care is more essential. You know what I mean. We have to be able to pour in every aspect of our lives. Yes, every single one, every single one. And I told my husband listen, we've been together since I was 16, we met when I was 15. I was like, listen, I'm definitely not her. And where I'm going, I'm not trying to cook, I'm not trying to clean. Well, I'm trying to outsource these things because I want to do what I want to do. And it's not a basket of laundry, it's not Sunday dinner, it's not cleaning the toilet, it's just not what I want to do and it's okay for the mamas that want to do it.

Speaker 2:

I take nothing away from people who want to do it, but I want to cut my kids to bed. I want to read them a story. I want to go on walks. I want to take my son's. This is mommy and boy weekend. Honey, you take her. You and your daughter have a weekend. I want that for my family. I want that for me. That's what I desire, right, and so it's like trying now to build a life. That is just exactly what we desire, and I encourage other moms to do the same thing. I tell people there is nothing that you're going through, there's nothing that is happening in your life that, if you're not happy with it, you cannot change. It reminds me of the book Million Dollar Woman by Rachel Rogers, and she said the exact same thing.

Speaker 2:

I'm in the club, you in the club, I'm in the club Girl. I mean, it's like that book really. I did a couple of podcasts episodes on it. But when she talks about building a vision for your life and living it and it's like all of the things right, like you know, if you don't want to cook, then don't cook, but just imagine, like, if you're going to like, I think it's this misconception that we can afford it, right? I think it's this life, this, this lifestyle that we built in our head, that only celebrities can live, and it's not that only celebrities can live it. You can live that lifestyle. You just have to stay in your zone or genius, use your gifts, because they'll make way for you, yes, and walk in that.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

So I'm all about personal development and just making sure that people understand that you had purpose before the Pampers. I'm going to have to coin that thing. Yes, I love it, like for real, and so I am into that thing now of even my home Right. Yes, I get it. When you go to these Airbnb's, they got them set up and they're beautiful you want to get them?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, they are.

Speaker 2:

They live here, they're not living here In home I was like nope, I'm about to make my home an Airbnb. Yeah, we've literally been in this house for 10 years and I told my husband I was just like it's time for some updates, like I was in the military.

Speaker 2:

I was doing all of the things I was doing, like my house, I feel like, just like your wardrobe, don't, you know, represent you. Yes, sometimes we need to take time and do like an inventory of our home and make sure that our home represents us in a space that we're in now.

Speaker 1:

You feel me.

Speaker 2:

I feel you yes, you do. You have to because it's like you say, I have to close. I have closed right now and I don't. It's not Rachel Rogers book, I don't even know. I read so many things I can't remember what it was. But if you have a shirt that you love, baby 10 years ago, but it don't feel good Now, you don't love it, get rid of it. Marie Kondo, yes, get rid of it. And I feel like that in your space, they talk about how the energy moves within your space or that's not set up a certain way. Move it, switch it up. People are like I can't get rid of it.

Speaker 2:

Yet I can't get rid of it. I don't know how you live in a camp. I couldn't get her. As a girl, I had to think to myself if my house caught on fire right now, what am I grabbing, right? What am I grabbing? It's not going to be the couch, it's not going to be the TV. You know what I'm saying, but where is it? How do you sell yourself stuff which we do have storage unit, which we need to get stuff out of there because we haven't used it any year, so I can't possibly be needing it? Very careful in how we do things around the house because, like you said, we are their first teachers and I was in the living room and I was like throwing this out. You know, we was pulling the couches out, we was cleaning baseboards, my son was painting the thing. You know. I'm teaching them also life skills, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Let's learn how to clean.

Speaker 2:

Let's learn how to be self-sufficient, so much so that you know, yes, god, god bless you. But, honey, you got to learn how to do some things for yourself. I say that to say they were like, oh my gosh, you can't get rid of that. For years I said stop, be okay with letting things go. We have to let some things go so that we can let the new come in. Yes, but it was like the anger, the trauma. You had to let it all go so that patience and love and self-control. You know what I mean, like all you know, when God talk about inhalations and he's talking about the fruits of the spirit, how they should fill us.

Speaker 1:

You know what I mean.

Speaker 2:

We got to be mindful that there are different things competing to fill us up. Yes, be mindful of those things. Do you want the anger? Do you want the patience? I, rather, have the patience. I want the love. I want all of those things and I challenge every mom under the sound of my voice right now Go look in the lations, look at the fruit of the spirit and really assess your personality, everything that you're going through, and which area do you need to work on and surrender it.

Speaker 2:

And when I say surrender it, I mean give it to God. I struggle with this. This is not of you. Cope me. Yes, that is the most freeing thing. When you let go of that self-control that's what it is. You're trying to be in control. When you let go of ego and being a parent and a mom, I just feel like you're a relationship with your kids deep in. Yes, you know what I mean. I don't want to be the reason why my kids feel like they can't come back home for Thanksgiving Not at all Enough. And I tell them my husband said this the other night and it's so funny because I had seen this meme a long time ago but I'm trying to get my kids a childhood that I want to get the healing so that I don't have to put my kids through where I didn't know I was going through. But I don't want them to have a childhood they don't have to heal from. So I'm doing the work, so they don't have to heal, and therefore I am now starting to create a legacy amongst my bloodline that doesn't need therapy, at least not from generational trauma being passed down to them. Well, this has been such an amazing conversation. Yes, we can keep going all day long, but I like, for real, I have to have you back. This was so good and refreshing. Thank you for having me. A couple of things we got to get out the door.

Speaker 2:

What is one lesson you had to learn in your journey of being a mom that your mother didn't teach you? I think one thing I would say that I had to learn that my mom did not teach me is that kids require so much more than food, shelter and clothes, so much more. You know your parents can tell you they love you, but in any relationship I have learned to teach my kids and I, you know, tell my husband love is an actionable word. So, as a mom, don't just say I love my kids. Make sure that they know and have conversation with them where you know that, like, okay, we've had conversation, they're sharing with me why, how they know, how do they know what do I do that makes you know I love you. So that's one thing I learned on my own was to really go to my kids and conversations that you know.

Speaker 2:

How do you think I'm doing as a mom? What do you think? What could I do better? What could I do differently as a mom? How can I show up better for you and it's okay for your kids? They may say now, listen, I didn't have my feelings hurt now, but it gave me, it gave us room for me to make changes, because that's important to me how my kids see me Me too, yeah, and a lot of parents get offended. You know my husband's talking about this. When we talk about our parents, it's so hard to go to them now as adults and tell them what we think they did wrong, because they're going to swear. You know well.

Speaker 2:

I did what I could Okay, I'm not saying you did. I can appreciate that, I understand Right. But you know, just make room for your kids to be open and honest with you, without repercussion, without attitude, without being offended, if you really genuinely want to have a relationship where they never want to leave, where they come home for Thanksgiving, yes when you ain't got to call and check up on them because they're calling you. So good.

Speaker 2:

Well, that is the end of today's show. I hope you enjoyed it. If we're not connected on Instagram, which is my favorite place to hang out, be sure to stop by and say hi at Martini Mama's podcast. Also, if you haven't done so, please follow Rape in Reviews. Higher ratings and higher reviews mean more dope moms can find us, and I keep bringing you fresh mom content that matters Until next Thursday. Be blessed.