Mutha Life

Is it just me or is the dream to flip the script on your doctor and ask THEM the personal questions? Well, cha ching. Today's the day for me. Not too long ago I started with a new doctor to work out the latest challenges and question marks around my Crohn's disease. She came highly recommended by my doc as THE woman to talk to about BEING a woman with Crohn's, especially around the hormonal roller coaster of having kids and post partum. But it wasn't until almost 17 million views of a procedure I did for this new doc, a capsule endoscopy, went viral that I really took the plunge and asked my doc out on a POD DATE. Dr. Puja Khanna is the Clinical Director of Women's Health of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Center at Cedars-Sinai. She's a research powerhouse who specializes in women with Inflammatory Bowel Diseases. AND she's got three kids of her own. The first half of the ep is the classic MUTHA LIFE fare you've come to know and love - then we get into all of the listener questions around gut health. Come hang. Let's talk about poop and butts.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @poojakhannamd

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

Today we are hanging out in the closet with Bennett Kaspar-Williams, the multi-threat. Lawyer, activist, writer, creative…and seahorse dad. If you don't know what a seahorse is, you're in the right place today to learn from source. Bennett is trans and was the gestational carrier for his son (get it? male seahorses are famously the gestational carriers). In talking to Bennett about his life - from Texas to Seattle to New York and LA, each chapter has provided stones for his life's foundation. We are going to cover so much ground in this one - from why our almost five year old boys are psychos right now (it's the LIMBIC LEAP PEOPLE), to why Labubus are actually a valuable contribution to society, to reframing what partnership in the parent era looks like (she whispers: just unload the dishwasher, people). Ultimately, this is a conversation about what happens when we keep interrogating and asking ourselves what we need to feel complete and happy.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @bennettonpurpose

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

This week we have Emily Tucker in the virtual closet all the way in beautiful Boulder, Colorado. Emily is the founder and face of Emily Tucker Design - an insanely talented firm building projects that would be right up my alley if my house wasn't a toy vomit factory. On this episode, I use Emily as my personal guru for all things - from understanding how interior designers actually work with clients to what she does in her own home to make her kids get along. We talked about what it means to be inspired by your parents' work and finding your own place in the world while taking that inspiration with you. We talked about division of labor, what she and her husband argue about, and how hard it can be when your kids are all....shocker, different people.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @emilytuckerdesign

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

This week in the closet we have celebrity trainer/founder of Bad Badger Treats, Charlie Curtis. You may know him as 'Perfect 10 Charlie' of Armchair Expert fame. Or maybe as the founder of Indoorphins, the online high intensity workout community. Orrrrr that guy who seems to live at the little league field. Maybe you don't know him at all and you're here because you just want to hear how someone who is actively involved in raising his two boys also manages to juggle his own fitness and professional goals. This is a sprawling chat - from being raised by a single mom in San Diego, to playing college football, to building a durable relationship with his wife based on shared history, respect and understanding - it's all here. AND we managed to answer a few listener questions that were submitted ahead of time. Let's goooooo.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @badbadgertreats @charcurtis

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

This week we get down and dischargey with the founder of Auggie, the parent platform so many of us want and need. Lily Walla's childhood story is one of contrasts - bouncing between her parents' apartments, sleeping on pull out beds and sharing tight spaces - all while going to one of the country's most elite private schools and running around with classmates with literal mansions to call home. Today, we find Lily the fully actualized person, in Brooklyn with her family. She's a million weeks pregnant and about to pop…all while at the helm of her second entrepreneurial venture.

This conversation covers so much both in parenting and in career - how confusingly devastating it can feel in the lead up to welcoming a new baby. The way taking on investors is both a blessing and a stressor when you're in the early stages of building. The importance of being able to be honest with yourself when the thoughts get a little too dark and working toward getting yourself help.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @joinauggie

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

Today we are hanging out with a movement guru of the highest order and getting extremely vulnerable about the road to healing and building resilience in the body and the mind. Come meet THE Jill Miller. We start in New Orleans and land here in LA. We cover experiencing her parents' divorce as a child and being uprooted more times than she can count on two hands…and the underlying impact all of that can have on the body and mind.

Jill is a pioneer in her field - taking all of the pieces of fitness, yoga, athletics, massage and pain management and putting them together to create an approach to movement that is both focused on healing and resilience. She is the author of best-selling books, has created multiple fitness formats that are taught worldwide, and has been featured everywhere from the New York Times to the Wall Street Journal, to Women's Health, GMA and Self Magazine. She's also a mom of two kids and was crazy enough to go into business with her husband.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

This week we are celebrating the 4th of July by spending time highlighting parenting while building a career in the military. The department of defense is the LARGEST employer in the United States which means millions of people and families are working through the unique experiences associated with this career path. Overseas deployments. Being separated from loved ones. Moving cities and countries often. Constantly being worried about the safety and well-being of those you love the most. To cover all of this and more we are hanging out in the virtual closet with retired Colonel Jeff McCausland. We follow Jeff from his childhood in West Central Illinois, working jobs after school and listening to the war stories of the grown men around him, to - instead of waiting for the draft to find him - going to West Point, where he would launch a 30 year career in the Army. From leading 750 soldiers in battle to being the Dean of the US Army War College - Jeff's is a story centered on service…all while working with his wife to make sure his kids were given the opportunity to have more/do better than he did.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

This week we are hanging out with E! The Rundown's Erin Lim Rhodes. In this episode we cover what happens when a focused and extremely driven person in a highly competitive field takes on parenthood. And, if that's not enough of a hook for you, we cover what it's like when parents separate later in life, the power of the placenta, finding her faith and her husband in a new church, how hobbies helped her through post partum depression, and the subtle joys of becoming a Disney adult.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @erinlimrhodes

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

Today we've got serial entrepeneur and sports obsessed former D1 Soccer Star, Stacy Bernstein, on the pod. She is the Co-Founder of All Better Company, a company re-imagining first aid in a way that's showing up for you and your kids AND doing it in a way that's also good for the planet. We follow Stacy from childhood in THE VALLEY, to her life as a D1 athlete, to working for the NHL, coaching, and starting out on her own. It's an episode that covers so many things I care deeply about - from how we talk to our kids about sex, to THE ART OF NOTICING. ENJOY! Share! Talk about it! TW: Child Sexual Abuse.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @getallbetter

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa

Whitney Port has been in the public eye for 20 years and she's cultivated an ability to both be vulnerable and share her life without it feeling exploitative. From her time on the Hills and the City, to her following years building her own mini media empire with her successful podcast and Youtube channel, watching Whitney grow and cultivate relationships has been a mainstay for so many people who grew up watching her. Today she's in the closet and we cover such a wide range of topics - from finding meaningful connection and friendship in new stages of life, figuring out the balance between what's best for YOU and what's best for everyone else around you. Her very public experience with infertility and the decision to try and expand her family via surrogacy, what it's like to be a member of the 'sandwich generation' and so much more. This is also a podcast first - we've had Whitney's sister, Paige, on the pod (Episode 12) and so that makes Whitney's episode our first-ever sibling episode…because you know what they say, no two people get the same two parents.

Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com

Instagram: @mutha.life @whitneyeveport

Produced by: Mutha Life

Music by: Ronen Landa