Full Timers Club

Nobody tells you that the newborn experience you had with your first child will look nothing like the one that comes next. Different baby, different season of life, different version of you and sometimes, a completely different world.

This week it is just the two of us, and we are getting honest about our newborn journeys. We talk about what it was like bringing a baby home during COVID, the isolation, the fear, the strange quiet of a world that had stopped and how that experience shaped everything that came after.

We also get into what subsequent newborns actually look like. The way your confidence shifts. The things you stop worrying about. And the guilt of not having the same presence with your second that you gave your first.

Because no two newborn journeys are the same. And the more honest we are about that, the less alone every new mum feels.

You can love your child more than you have ever loved anything in your entire life and find it really, really hard at the same time. You can not want to be apart from your baby for a single second and also be desperately counting down to bedtime.

This week we are introducing two words that most mothers have never heard but that we think are going to completely change the way you see yourself.

The first is matrescence which is the psychological, neurological and identity transformation of becoming a mother. A shift so significant that your brain physically rewires itself and yet somehow we have no language for it, no support for it and are given six weeks before the world expects us to carry on as normal.

The second is maternal ambivalence. The simultaneous experience of contradictory feelings that come with motherhood; the love and the rage, the devotion and the resentment, the desperate need for a break and the inability to stop thinking about your kids the moment you get one.

We also get into why these feelings are so buried in shame and why a culture that tells us to "treasure every moment" makes it so much harder.

Two things can be true. And this episode is your permission slip to feel all of them.

We are not tech people. We are not AI experts. We are two full time working mums who stumbled onto a few things that have genuinely changed how we manage our lives and we could not keep them to ourselves.

This week it is just the two of us, and we are getting practical. From managing the mental load to planning holidays, drafting the emails you have been putting off and building routines that actually stick, we are walking through the AI tools and tricks that have quietly become part of how we run our families and our work lives.

No jargon. No tech talk. Just honest, real life hacks from two busy women who need more hours in the day.

There has never been more parenting advice, more research or more content available to us than right now. And yet parents feel more lost, more overwhelmed and more judged than ever before.

We are back with Gen Muir this week and we are asking the question nobody really wants to answer. Are we actually set up to fail?

We get into why the information overload is quietly eroding our instincts, what good enough parenting actually means and looks like in real life, and the question that all parents need to hear, what do our children actually remember? Because it turns out the answer is not what most of us are spending our energy on.

This is the permission slip modern parents desperately need. And Gen is exactly the person to give it.

For more on Gen Muir, check out her page: connectedparenting.com.au

And more about her new book here: https://www.highlowbuffalo.com.au/products/why-kids-need-boundaries

Quick heads up - this one gets spicy so pop your headphones in if little ears are around.

We need to talk about romantasy. The dragons, the fae courts, the slow burn romance and yes, the spice. Because what started as a BookTok trend has quietly become a $600 million publishing phenomenon, and the people driving it? Tired, high-responsibility women. Mums. Us.

This week Ellie finally converts Pen to ACOTAR (A Court of Thorns and Roses) and we get into why this genre has become so much more than a guilty pleasure for so many mothers. We talk about losing yourself after having kids, what it means to rediscover desire on your own terms, and why picking up one of these books can feel less like escapism and more like coming home to a version of yourself you thought you had quietly filed away.

Diapers by day. Fae drama by night. Welcome to The Full Timers Club.

Communication is something most of us take for granted. But for so many children and families, being understood, and understanding the world around them, requires tools, support and a whole lot of patience.

This week we sit down with Jenn Winstone, Speech Therapist and co-founder of MyComms, for a conversation every parent needs to hear. We talk about why communication doesn't come easily for everyone, what it looks like when a child cannot express what they need, and how MyComms is making personalised communication tools accessible to every family, not just those with the resources to seek them out.

And the one thing Jenn said that has genuinely stayed with us, you can never over support a child with extra communication tools.

Resources:

https://commspec.co

https://www.instagram.com/mycomms.au?stkn=cWVzeHhpd2p1MXVy

We have all been there; the moment your child loses it and somewhere in the chaos, you lose it too.

In this episode, we sit down with Gen Muir - Parent Educator - for one of the most honest conversations we have had on the podcast.

We get into what is actually happening in a child's brain during a meltdown, why our kids' big feelings so often trigger our own, and what mum rage really is and where it comes from. We also talk about how to come back from a blowout and what to say to yourself when the guilt spiral hits afterwards.

This one is for every parent who has ever wondered if they are getting it wrong. 🤍

Resources:

https://www.connectedparenting.com.au/

https://www.instagram.com/connectedparentingau/?hl=en

https://www.highlowbuffalo.com.au/

Can you believe we are already halfway through 2026? 🤯

This week it's just the two of us. No guests, no agenda. Just an honest and open check in on how the first six months of the year have actually gone. The highs, the lows and everything in between.

We revisit our words of the year, get real about where we have shown up and where we have fallen short, and talk about the moments that have quietly shaped us more than we expected.

And then we look ahead, because there is still so much road ahead and we are absolutely not coasting to December.

This episode is your permission slip to pause, reflect and reset. ☕🎙️

Returning to work after having a baby is one of the most emotionally complex things a mother will ever do. And yet somehow, we’re expected to just get on with it. 🤍

This week we sit down with Lou Wilson from The Village for a conversation that is long overdue. We talk about what it really feels like to walk back into the workplace as a mum. The guilt, the identity shift, the juggle that never quite feels balanced.

We get into what career ambition looks like when you’re also someone’s everything at home. And we discuss what really needs to change with parental leave for there to be a noticeable shift.

This is the conversation working mums and dads deserve to have.

Nobody tells you that postpartum recovery isn’t linear. That it isn’t quick. And that what you see online is almost never the full picture.

We sat down with Tamara Gerdis from Physio Down Under and she is here to bust every myth you’ve ever been told about bouncing back after a baby.

We talk about what’s actually happening in your body after birth, what recovery really looks like, what the red flags are that you shouldn’t ignore, and why the pressure to “get your body back” is one of the most damaging narratives in motherhood.

Spoiler alert! You didn’t lose your body. You grew a human in it. This is a must listen.