Rob Beckett and Josh Widdicombe's Parenting Hell - Now That's What I Call Parenting Hell - Volume 2

Episode Date: April 19, 2022

'Now That's What I Call Parenting Hell - Volume 2'While we're on a very short record break over Easter here's a hand crafted selection of the finest tales and advice from the Parenting Hell podcast archives. Each one a guaranteed banger... TRACK LISTING:1. Chris Ramsey tells us the tale of how his son Robin lost his front teeth in an accident (Series 1 Episode 19)2. Rosie Ramsey gives us her side of that very same story. They might not completely align!(Series 1 Episode 23)3. Russell Kane shares how he got his daughters sleep pattern working VERY early in the scheme of things (Series 1 Episode 21)4. Jen Brister regales us with some of the perils of being one of two mums to twin 5 year old boys (Series 1 Episode 31)5. Dara O' Briain laments a few parenting woes and techniques he picked up from his parents, for better or worse... (Series 1 Episode 27)6. Isy Suttie shares and partner Elis James' bedtime / morning schedule. At least one of them deserves a medal... (Series 1 Episode 10)7. And Elis gets his side of the same arrangement across to the guys. And they all grieve for the loss of the weekend as parents... (Series 1 Episode 33)See you on Friday for another compilation show and we're back next week for service as normal (including an epic Disney / Florida catch-up from Rob) Enjoy!If you want to get in touch with the show here's how:EMAIL: [e-mail]: @parenting_hellINSTAGRAM: @parentinghellA 'Keep It Light Media' Production Sales, advertising, and general enquiries: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, I'm Rob Beckett. And I'm Josh Willicombe. Welcome to Parenting Hell, the show in which Josh and I discuss what it's really like to be a parent, which I would say can be a little tricky. So, to make ourselves, and hopefully you, feel better about the trials and tribulations of modern day parenting, each week we'll be chatting to a famous parent about how they're coping. Or hopefully how they're not coping. And we'll also be hearing from you, the listener, with your tips, advice and, of course, tales of parenting woe.

Because, let's be honest, there are plenty of times when none of us know what we're doing. Hello, you're listening to Now, That's What I Call Parents in Hell, Volume 2. Am I right in saying, so Robin's lost, he lost his front teeth, didn't he? Oh, God, yeah. So, basically, he had one of them, you know the balance bikes where there's no pedals,

they just run. They're basically running on a bike. He had one of them from, you know, as old as you're allowed one, I think it no pedals they just run yeah they're basically running on a bike he had one of them from you know as old as you allowed one i think it was two just before two you allowed them and he had one and he was he was amazing on it but he was amazing at the point of he didn't understand fear like he got so good on this and he was just like and it was like everyone used to say my god he's fantastic on that and it's a real bone of contention right so there's this place in south shields called the amphitheater it's it's an open air performance space down on the sea front that they do like little festivals there this summer and it's got an under like an under walkway bit that's covered over now the floor of that is tiled right but there's sort of

sand everywhere because it's you know it's windy it's the north so he's coming down this hill that's paved and then it goes under the tiled floor bit and turns to the right okay and what did it he's only little and i'm running alongside him on this bike and my heart's in me heart's in me throat it's it's terrifying right and rosie's just sitting watching me and he went down and i went right i don't think we should do this again he went one more i went right one more he did three times three's a magic number i let him do three i went there we go that's it and he started crying he went i want to do it again and rosie went let him do it again and i said the words no he nearly fell it's dangerous and she said and she said do it again go on just let him do it again and we did it again and on that one he's got too much sand on his wheel he

slipped and his face hit the deck and he, both his front teeth, he snapped his two front teeth in half. And it was the worst, one of the worst moments of my life. Like without a doubt, like he just hit the deck and he lifted his face up and it was just blood all over his face and two bits of his teeth were missing. And Rosie handled it like a champ.

And I was flapping. Like, Oh, what are you doing? Oh my God. Of course you are. god rosie his teeth his pork his teeth oh god she was like calm down go and get the car and i ran like i've never ran to the car park got the car literally screeched around the corner the jump in the car we drove

off she was like calm you're driving down and we're going to crash on the way to the hospital you idiot so we got we drove up there to the hospital we had a look at it went at the dentist the day after they sort of filled them in but then all these gums were like they went a bit black and all these gums were really lumpy and stuff so it was basically infected and he got them taken out wow it was and does it affect him in any way absolutely not they're just so resilient and he's i don't know where he gets it from i'm a wimp and he is literally the one of the hardest people i've ever met in my life he's like nails it's it's unbelievable does rosie does rosie refute that story then and or is it is it a given that she said one more time and you and you stopped all the years all

the years i've known you and you don't believe me well what is this i'm not saying it does she does she i'm on your side here but if we get Rosie on the podcast will she say it differently or is it a given in the family? She's busy she can't come on your podcast do not contact her we're going to bring her out now like I'm surprise surprise I feel like Keir Starmer, let me just clarify the point here

if we had Rosie on the show would she say that she said go again and you said it's dangerous would she agree she will uh she will agree but she will then probably put forward the point that i should have just caught him like i did the previous three times fair enough so i mean we've had that argument a lot but what was what was interesting about what happened was um what you take we took him to newcastle, to the RVI hospital, to get the teeth taken out, right? And it was so strange.

I had to kind of drop him at one door, and then he went in with the nurse and sort of put him under anaesthetic and pulled the teeth out. And we had to walk around this kind of one-way corridor. You kind of dropped him off, and then you walked around the other way, and then he came out at the other end like a conveyor belt, like dropping your luggage at the airport. Did you tie something around him so he'd recognize him when he came around i cling filmed him like when people do

come around right and honestly right we got around we're so worried i think i was probably crying i'm a disgrace but we're walking around And he came out and he was sitting eating, both front teeth gone, sitting eating jelly on the nurse's knee. And she was like, I can't believe it. She was like, literally, we'll put a tiny bit of the gas to just to check. Did they even do the gas?

I can't remember, but they didn't have to properly put him asleep. They just did it. And it was out and there's other kids screaming. And he was just sitting there eating a little tub of jelly, just buzzing. And he was, honestly, we hadn't realized. But he was a different kid once I little tub of jelly just buzzing and he was honestly we hadn't realized but he was a different kid once i got them taken out he was all good

we we need to ask you rosie about because we asked chris and he gave us his account of um the day robin lost his front teeth oh bet he did i bet he did give you his wrong account of the day that Robin lost his teeth. What did he say? Just that you really went to pieces and he was heroic. No, he did say you were heroic and he went to pieces, but it was the discussion before the bike ride, wasn't it, I think, Josh? He said that once the accident had happened,

you absolutely owned the situation and he was a mess but you said that it was your decision for Robin to have one more go I knew he'd say that I knew he'd say that

we I can't did he fully blame me yes I think yes he said he also

he said he even warned you because he went he was going taking Robin on a bike down a slope and he went down a couple of times and he nearly fell off and then Chris caught him and then he said let's not do this anymore and then you said give him one last go and Chris said that he said no I don't think we

should and you said do it and then that's when the teeth accident happened is that not correct in my defense it well it kind of right? Because that did kind of happen. But in my defence, he was the one who was taking him down the hill. I couldn't see because I was at the bottom, probably on my phone, not going to lie. He was the one who was doing it and taking him down. So he knew how fast he was going. He could assess the danger of the situation more than i could yes so and i'm sorry but how spineless have you got to be for me to

just go no do it one more time yeah and him to go all right even if you know it's dangerous that you're so scared to say no to you he acts like he's terrified of us i swear to god like if that so and you know what's annoyed me about that i'm gonna have to have a word with him because when we wrote the book that went in the book and we decided to take 50 50 responsibility for that and i can't believe he's just chucked me under the bus like this on a podcast so well yeah we'll be having a word okay well that i thought that would be resolved but it sounds like it's just been opened up again you've caused you've caused something here we've got to do a podcast later on you should have you got a feature on Okay, well, I thought that would be resolved, but it sounds like it's just been opened up again. You've caused some a year.

We've got to do a podcast later on. If you've got a feature on your podcast, you should do like a Prime Minister's Questions where someone has to take the hot seat and just get pelted, thrown at them with backup documents. I'm actually after a new feature, so that might work. We might do something like that.

Is Robin aware now, so he's kind of four, do you think, is he aware that you're doing a podcast in which he gets talked about? Like, does he understand stuff like the fact that you're on Instagram and stuff like that? Nah, he doesn't really know. Although he started when I was doing an advert the other day and I had my camera out and he gets really excited.

He's like, are you filming, man? And I'm like, yeah. So he got the stuff out of the box and he was like, film this. And I went you filming, man? And I'm like, yeah. So he got the stuff out of the box and he was like, film this. And I went, all right. And he went, hi, everyone. And he started doing like a vlog. And I was thinking, oh God, he's been watching us too much.

But no, we don't really, he knows that we do a podcast and he knows that daddy goes on stage and makes people laugh. other than that he's got no idea like chris was on the one show last week like i said and we were watching it and he's just not faced at all yeah like he was just playing with his toys just like oh there's my dad on telly like can you imagine being a kid and your dad was on telly like it would have blown our minds watching might have been absolutely gutted you're mortified enough but there's gonna come a point i suppose where because you're mortified about your parents

when you're a kid when you get to a certain age what about 10 or something like that maybe a bit later so he'll start by getting excited about the one show and then in 10 years it'll be like oh no my dad's on the one show yeah not again what's he gonna say well i think yeah allison hammond's son's a teenager and when we were doing the podcast with her he could sort of overhear things that she was saying and he was coming in don't say that mom and sort of dictating the terms so you're in the face of a situation where you're trying to do a podcast and robin will walk in and go you're not saying that so you're set up russ you're you live up you're up north now in manchester aren't you is that

right so it's your wife you your wife lindsey and then your daughter minna yeah and how old is minna now four good age horrible in it and that's the worst oh mate it's the worst if there was a statue of minna in the garden i'd be tearing it down due to a fascist but it's straight you tell me stories about minna like where she always went to bed at the right times and very structured scheduled. And she was a good sleeper and stuff like that. And then you tell me stories about like on train, she'd just strip off naked and there's nothing you could do.

So what kind of child is she? Like, how is it? I always say to people, even a serial killer is peaceful when they're asleep. You can walk into Ted Monday's bedroom at 3am and go, what's the fuss about? But you wouldn't want to be there at 8am when you woke up so i have and then it's particularly

men that love to hear about this i i've nailed sleep and i say i even though lindsey and i did it together i i was sort of the the the one that came up with the plan who said what we're going to do what we do to get our daughter to sleep through the night. So I will admit we've got sleep. And I know a lot of people don't like to hear that, but blokes do. They like to perv in on my full night's sleep and hear how I did it.

This is not normally going silent. It's like, oh, just tell me again, Russ. Just tell me again about your umbrella. What was that, eight hours for three weeks straight? Stop it, stop it. A bit more slowly, would you? So I'll tell you how I achieved that in a minute, because men love to hear I did it using nerdy charts.

But it's when the eyes flick open, that is when the hell begins. But that also proves that regardless of the temperament of your child, whether you've got one of the laid back ones dribbling on its bricks as it amuses itself, or whether you've got a holy water sizzling on the forehead bastard like I have. I do truly believe if you want to, and there's no reason why you have to, there's no pressure to get your child through the night. But if it's something you both desperately want as a couple, it can be achieved. What was your method, Russell?

The benefit I've got is I'm the last one out of all my friends to have kids, right? So the downside is I'm going to be on a ventilator when she's on sports day. 100 metres, go on, you can run it for daddy. Do you remember the war? No, but the plus side is I was able to watch all my groups of friends and what went wrong most often apart from all the usual childhood illnesses was arguments about sleep kids in the bed sex life going down the drain relationship going down the drain where the child's on on the throne ruling the house as soon as it was born so i i was thinking to myself do you know what i don't

want that to happen to me plus my mum was mum was a childminder and a nanny, so she's a bit like badass with routine and sleep. So me and Lindsay were bobbing around in the pool on one of those all-inclusive holidays, and we're like, should we go for it? Should we start training for your baby? And I was like, before we do, before that Marvellon pill packet goes in the bin, we are going to be in agreement on sleep.

And that's the mistake most companies make. Once they've got a screaming satanic object in front of them, that's when, should we have the chat now? The time to have the chat is before fertilisation. You need to agree about sleep in advance. It's really, really important. It doesn't matter if you both want to be bed-sharing hippies, baby hanging off the boob and all that and you're both in the bed together and you don't you're going to do

attachment and go be up all night and be baby led that's fine no judgment from me and you shouldn't be judged by anyone the problem is when you've got one person on one method and one on the other if you've got you know a mum saying i do want the baby hanging off my boob while our marriage dies and you wank in the spare room. That's an issue. Have you been listening in to my house? Because I always think everyone's putting pressure on women. A breast is best. You need to do attachment.

No, what's best is a really buzzingly happy, mentally stable household where the children are being raised in a positive environment if that means slamming formula into its mouth on day one so be it yeah do you um i mean obviously the you need to decide this before you get pregnant is of use to about two percent of our listeners it should be a filter on tinder early doors isn't it but to be fair russ for the people who see what age was Amina sleeping through the night? So we did eight hours by eight weeks

and 12 hours at 12 weeks. Those were my targets. Those were your targets? Oh, God, it's like the Wolf of Wall Street. I love it. Eight hours at eight weeks and 12 hours at 12 weeks.

Tell us how. A little bit of baby trivia, which anyone now who's had a kid will know but maybe never realized it before most babies are born chronologically speaking like daytime nighttime speaking back to front so you anyone who's been uh lived with a pregnant woman will know baby doesn't do much all day sit down 8 p.m watch a bit of britain's got talent or whatever baby starts kicking yeah every time and then kicks are all through the

night i've had a rubbish night sleep and then it sleeps all day the reason for this is as far as the stuff i've read is um of course of course when you're walking around all day if you if a woman's pregnant she's rocking the baby effectively and when she's laying down the baby's not being rocked some babies fall asleep and they're rocked right so they think that's why so many babies are born awake at night asleep during that and where you're so knackered you just follow that pattern and you end up two three four five years of screaming baby all night asleep all day so contrary to what some people think about being some sort of sleep fascist and forcing a baby to sleep through the night it's quite the opposite you know my daughter was never allowed to cry or self-soothe or any of that nonsense that people hear we just worked

initially when she was tight once she'd regained her birth weight towards keeping her awake during the day which is much much easier so you're just stretching we're talking about when they're really tiny just like a game on the kick mat a mobile and inviting the nannies over when they're due for their scheduled naps. So babies need 16 hours sleep. Babies need 16 hours sleep. So why wouldn't you squeeze 10, 12 hours of that sleep into a nighttime and have the four hours naps throughout the day? So whenever she was due for a nap, that's when I'd let my mum in,

start rocking her. So if she falls asleep, fine. Otherwise, I'd be getting like a vein in the side of my schedule head going, you should be awake by now. So it's not about getting them to sleep. It's about keeping them up. Indeed, initially. And then what you'll see is you can gradually stretch the periods at night

and people are like, you should never wake a sleeping baby. You should never fuck off out my house. What I would do is if Mina was due for it, I don't remember what the timings are now. It seems like a lifetime ago. So she's supposed to have 90 minutes morning nap from 10 to 11.30. 11.31, I'm unswaddling that child. Getting her ready, fed on time,

awake on the kick mat. We were using like a cold flannel on her feet, anything to keep her stimulated and awake. And our friends were like, that'll never work. You're a Japanese prisoner of war torture. Have you thought about working in Guantanamo Bay, Russell? Sometimes I just scream in her face.

Just play loud heavy metal for six hours. It was all done with games. I know, I got invested. But it was our friends, every single one, of course, they're supposed to get up at 4am. You should be on pull-up at 4am. Play the game.

And that's the other bollocks that winds me up, is that babies wake at 5am. There's nothing you can do. It's absolute dog shit. If you get on a plane to Australia, your baby doesn't magically know that sunrise has changed. It's because people's definition of what they call a blackout curtain is pathetic.

It winds me up. People are like, I've got the blackout, just like it said. And you go in and you could kill a vampire within seconds in that room at 6pm. You shouldn't be able to walk across a blacked out room at midday. It should look like in Spanish and Italian, people do proper blackout shutters and stuff. So we did. So instead of doing a 7am tom to 7 p.m date what use is that to a stand-up if because i want to be involved as a dad i said to lindsey let's do

nine till nine till she goes to school and we get a bit of an evening and we don't and we get a lay-in as well so that's what my daughter sleeps she sleeps from 9 9 p.m to 9 a.m blimey jen can you explain to us and the listeners listeners your setup at home with your kids and stuff? Yes, I can. I am sharing my home with my ever-patient girlfriend and our two five-year-old twin boys. And it's fun times all around. Oh, five-year-old twin. Sorry, because it's actually your life. But I shuddered. I'm sorry. Straight in withuddered. I'm sorry.

Straight in with the empathy there. I love it. I did a live version. You know when you read an interview, someone goes, no fucking hell, five-year-old twin boys, three dishes having a shocker.

That butt, sorry for saying that out loud. No, it's all right. I'm living it. I know it. I feel it. And how's it been then? So have you been homeschooled

with five-year-olds oh god yeah oh my god yeah i have and i am shit at it i am so shit at it it's just that they don't respect you your kids i mean not your kids my kids they don't seem to respect parents when they're homeschooling i've spoken to a few parents and they're like oh fuck it i gave up after two days um just trying to teach them stuff because you've got to teach them how to read. Everyone's going, oh, five. You don't have to do anything, mate. Just wait until they're 10.

They can't turn up at 10 and go, sorry, mate, still can't read because my parents didn't bother homeschooling me when I was five. So you've got to teach them things like phonics, jolly, phonics. I mean, the jolly bit fucked off a while ago, I tell you. It's just a horror show. And they don't, like, honestly, if I'm trying to tell them to do anything, they're like, I don't want to do that. And anyway, you smell of poo. And it's like.

Oh, they love you smell of poo. They love saying that. Do you think the fact you smell of poo is a problem though, Jen? Maybe that's why you're struggling to home school. You didn't smell of poo. To be fair, I've seen your stand up, Jen. And there is a routine about you actually smelling of poo. So I think they may be accurate in that.

Well, and whose poo is it? It's not my poo. i'm not like just slinging my poo around the house it's their bloody poo they are so obsessed with their bumholes at the moment i made the mistake of saying bumhole to them and close like we don't say bumhole we just say bottom and i went was too late so bumholes out yeah and that's a great word though isn't it? You forget how funny bumhole is. Could you use that to teach them all the different sounds and you could say

and then it'd be a great chance to teach them about the letter O wouldn't it? You go Oh yeah because my daughter's starting

school in September and I'm already I don't understand this phonics thing where you learn the alphabet like A, B, C, D but you for anyone who didn't know what it was that's the English one I don't understand this phonics thing where you learn the alphabet, like A, B, C, D, and E, but for anyone that didn't know what it was,

that's the English one. I'm working on the Greek. But you learn all those sounds for A, B, C, but it's actually A, B, C. Is that right? Well, yeah, but it's also more complicated than that. So you're learning sounds when you, like, say you've got I, got i g h together then they have to learn that that is that sound is i or if there's an o and a and a w together that can be ow or you know they've got to learn it like that or if you if there's an e at the end like like actually bumhole is a very good example now we've got let's explore the bumhole let's

explore bumhole because there's a magic E at the end of hole. So the O, instead of being an R, becomes an O. So it's not hole, it's, what is it, kids? Hole. That's right. It's bum hole. So we're all learning something. We had magic E when I was growing up. Did you used to watch the look and read BBC TV shows at school?

So it'd be like Badger Girl or Geordie Racer or something. No, I'm like 10 years older than you. so it'd be like Badger Girl or Geordie Racer or something. No, I'm like 10 years older than you, so I don't know. Badger Girl sounds like a TikTok star. She just documents the badgers in her garden, which is not a euphemism. Well, I struggled with reading, spoiler alert, as a kid,

to go to learning support, and we used to read the Biff, Chip and Kipper books. My kids are reading those. Yeah. All I remember was they went, okay, you're going to go for private one-on-one readings. You know, I'm dyslexic, so I struggled with the reading. And the book was just bigger.

It wasn't an easier book or specialised. It was just the same book with one person just pointing at the word. That's an optician's I needed. Obviously, they're twins, Jen, but how different are they as people in their reaction to it? Do you teach them together or are they kind of... Oh, they're completely different in every... They don't look at... Because they're fraternal twins because it was IVF. So, well, obviously, it wasn't a natural conception.

And if it was from a same-sex couple, Jen, that would be the first question I'd ask, to be honest, when it did happen. Just a lot of friction, Rob. Just a lot of friction. First things first, how does that happen? Let's keep rubbing until we start a fire. So what's the difference?

Because I'm a bit ignorant to this. so what's the difference from an ivf twins as opposed to sort of natural twins as it were sorry if that's the wrong terminology well no it's completely it's completely the the right terminology if you're having a sort of natural conception and you're having sex uh and you that's how you conceive uh if you're doing it uh with ivf what you do is you have you spend thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of pounds and cross your fingers that something fucking happens um but it's you go it's a clinic and then you're you we we bought we bought sperm from the internet but you don't actually you don't physically do that right you

don't it doesn't arrive like Amazon. You must get Amazon Prime. You know, you've got to keep it fresh. Do you know what? It's not that different, actually. Really? No, no. I know you're going, I'll come in. What do you do?

Log on and then just buy some sperm. Yeah. Really? Really? How much? How much is it? Oh, litres of it. No, it is litres.

It's been a long lockdown. Listen, we needed as much as we could get. No, there are lots of different sperm banks and it's depending on which sperm bank you go to but basically they have an online i suppose i want to say magazine that's not brochure something and you can pick they have like star ratings trust pilot they kind of do i mean in as much as you can see how popular that sperm is i mean i'd get one off i'd get one off checker trade so i've got somebody's andy in the house i've got to try i've got enough sort of gobby talking people in our family we need yeah but you you'd get mixed

messages really i've got i've got three off this stoner the first one was an absolute dream but the last two if i'm honest are a pair of quits. It's 50-50. So what did you know about your sperm? So what you don't get, you have no idea what your donor looks like. So what you will get is information. And again, this really depends on the sperm bank, how much information they give you. So we went to the European sperm bank specifically because you get the most information about the donor. sperm bank specifically because you get the most information about the donor so right yeah and you get sort of information about their parents sort of uh health you know if there's any i don't know

like dementia or cancer or anything like that in the family so i think you go back like the parents and then the grandparents and then you can what they look like what they do for a living interests all that sort of stuff and then you get a photograph of them as a baby so you can kind of get an idea so I mean we were a bit cruel because there was a couple of babies that were completely boss-eyed and we were like oh come on swerve that if you're paying for it you're allowed to choose as far as I'm concerned I mean the irony is one of ours is boss-eyed now so that was that was calmer there we go um i mean like you can spend weeks and months deciding and then in the end it's kind of i don't know if other people agree with me but it's kind of moot really because what you want is a baby whatever you end up with you're

not going to be like oh i wish we'd gone for you know jeff he was of course yeah love yeah nicer eyes you're going to be like oh this is my baby so um yeah I can't even I can't even tell you how we chose our sperm donor I think we just went oh fuck it him you know I think it was like that and and is it sort of with is it just some with IVF you sometimes it's more chance of twins it's not like an option you pick like twins are in the family again uh it is an option we picked because you can choose i don't know if you can still do this i'm not sure but you can put two high levels by level by one get one free eat out to help out well done

so that's that's an option is it yeah well it depends how many you get right so you you get you get to it depends how many embryos you get so you once you go through the process of IVF right and then you end up with however many embryos you do and then we went through one round of IVF and it was no we'd been through two rounds of IVF and it'd been unsuccessful and we were like oh fuck this is costing a fortune so the third round Chloe Chloe's like, I'm going to stick two embryos in. And I was like, ugh.

Double dropping. Is that being at a festival? I'm not feeling it. I'm not feeling it. Come on, splurge on in a minute. I'm doing two. And if you'd just waited an hour, that one would have been fine.

We've got two now. And I'd be like, gurning your tits. I'd be like, oh, I wish I'd just stuck to one. So, yeah, that's basically what happened. Yeah. Are you a good cop or a bad cop as a dad, Dara? What's your kind of role? Shouting?

Can I have shouting as one of the things there? Turns out, much more of a shouter than I thought I'd be. Oh, really? Yeah. things there turns out much more of a shouter than i thought i'd be much really yeah much more of a blindly furious uh person than i presumed i would be yeah no no it's it's a surprise to me as well and to them a lot of the time just how what i oh i have told you to hold the fork correctly to kind of you know know, just, yeah. Have you had a moment in particular, Dara?

No, no, no. Just, you know, they just don't, you know, they don't listen. It is. It turns out, no, I'm very impatient about things not being done the way they should be done. No, it's awful. Honestly, it's a thing that I should probably

have a talk about because it's like, oh, for God's sake. But they will. I've also had kids whom I utterly adore and they're wonderful creatures. But it is like it's a type of love you have for your kids is the love, both the love at the start of the relationship of a romantic relationship. In other words, I cannot wait to see you. Everything about you is beautiful. You light up my life.

You're amazing. you're fabulous and the end of a relationship you know exactly the stuff that makes me more angry than any other human being and it's the two of those together oh that's a perfect description Dara have you had a moment in particular where you sort of lost it with the kids it was Shafi Korsandi had a moment where she flipped out over some milk tray and it was called the milk tray moment within the family um have you ever had a moment where you flipped out and it's been reminded um they've not been brought back because i'm mortified when they bring the back up and i get angry again uh no i told you yeah the just the stubbornness of it the cheer there has been yeah there's been there's been certain topics on which i guess very kind of yeah they that i've said this to a million times could you

not do that this way um you know it's been like you know get your feet off the table we are eating you know that kind of stuff like how often do we have to say that to you that was the thing when i was a kid it was like elbows off the table was the thing and now i'm enforcing feet off the table and you're like how much have standards dropped in the 20 years since i was a kid this was elbow it's a no it's feet i had a um conversation at tea time today my daughter's arm whose arm was just draped into the middle of the table. And I went, take your arm off the table.

She said, why? And we were like, just move like slightly further down. It won't put in on you. Why? She said. And I was like, as I'm trying to give out to her,

I have a routine about how stupid the whole elbows on the table was. Why was that a thing? And to me, I like whatever the, and I had a whole routine dissing the elbows on the table thing.

And here I am, gone total full circle on this. So do you think you're like your parents? Are you parenting in the way your parents parented? That's a sentence I could have said better, surely. Yeah. I mean, by all means, edit and do it again if you want to. You should hear how your dad said that first time around the door. Running for the family.

Do I? Yes and no. I mean, they are the model for certain things, but I'm probably that irritating. Why don't we think about this kind of thing? No, just tell me the answer. In that I do, but I'm not sure actually, because I don't know if I think,

I've forgotten so much of my childhood. I had this, it was a lovely time, but it wasn't a thing that I remember really vividly. Do people remember their own childhoods really vividly? Is that a thing? No, I remember like the TV and the computer games more than I remember the actual experience of being a child, if that makes sense. It makes perfect sense. I think there's a lot spoken, whereas I remember everything from 16 on vividly because it was like at 16, I got to choose everything from here on in. So therefore, 16 was me. That was, you know, and everything up to that was the containment of me.

So, no, I don't remember specifically how it was in that regard. I don't. My father had a thing where he had a no raised voice thing, which've completely fucking adored the uh which was the uh he had a thing because my father was a trade union negotiator and he said don't make me use my trade union voice was a phrase that he said and we oh trade union face or trade union voice one of the two either way we never got to see this mythical trade union face that he had this work face a stern stern as possible face that he could think it happened but the good thing about that face is it stops at quarter past five on a friday yeah not

and so is everything else when it stops everything stops that's the that was the thing that's how it worked i asked him years later he said no sure there's no there was no there was no he just came up with this bluff you know don't you do not want you the whole way through that there is a there's another thing and that happened to be what he said you know don't make me use my work face my serious face yeah don't make me use my junglers christmas week that would be our our burden there's two endos in a free stag news listen to me roar look you're seeing my stargazing face you don't

see my mockery face what's your setup is he just for our listeners what's the setup at home so the setup is we're in a flat we're in a split level maisonette we were literally about to start looking for a house um so we don't have a garden yeah we had a bed delivered from ikea the day before lockdown started um which is in the dining room in about i'd say 12 different boxes you can't even walk to the printer or open the window oh no you're there with ellis your partner and your two children what ages are your children so they're 5 and 15 months oh that is that's that's tough you know what right the five-year-old was always such a good sleeper and we were so

kind of like we were like it's because we're so chilled such bullshit like i'm not chilled anyway i really pretend that i am but inside i'm like oh my god was that fish off and i've just cooked it i'm gonna give everyone food poisoning and everyone's gonna die like that is my internal monologue quite a lot of time like i'm like yeah i'm so chill i'm so chill like anyway um like it's just not true that anything rubbed off on her it was just her personality so with, like he is such a shit sleeper. Like the only thing that gets me through lockdown is the idea that if he was a newborn and we were in lockdown, it would be worse. You know, when you make yourself feel better by thinking,

well at least it's not like he used to wake up every 45 minutes every night and then wake up the day at like four so so finally he started sleeping through the night probably only about two or three months before lockdown began right yeah um so he sleeps through the night in inverted commas then wakes up normally at 4.30 for the day. Oh. And so what do you do with your time at that point? So the arrangement is, and this was never talked about, Ellis does every single morning and wakes me up at 8.30am.

And in return, I do all the cooking and cleaning and tidying that's an unspoken arrangement it just slowly came about and he was like but you know what I may as well do the morning tomorrow because I'm already tired and by the way that sea bass with with ginger was really nice and then slowly but surely i would like became really anal about doing a weekly shop which i've never done in my life like my mum's always been saying to me you should start you should start doing a weekly shop and planning meals darling i've been like no way i'll just take life as it comes and now because obviously you know no one wants to go in shops unless they have to and all that i am so anal about the weekly shop and i even ordered like two chocolate oranges last week

and then was like um you can only eat a quarter tonight because it's got elastis for like three quarters in what the same night hunched over the kitchen sink basically so i'm in charge of like the running of the house in the way like we were i guess sort of like you know in maybe our grandparents generation and obviously some women are in our generation but certainly not really any women i know um so it's like it it's quite weird i'm gonna say i don't know where rob is on this i would 100 take your your side of the deal what about you Rob yeah what do you think Rob in a minute I'll also give you a few details about what my job entails yeah just make sure well I think I can see I can see the logic but it's such an early start for 30am if

it was like they got up at sixish or whatever and then he dealt with the kids every morning but he's like getting up like he's doing a radio breakfast show it's like it's so hard and it's so what time what time is he going to bed then in the olden days ellis used to be the one going to bed at two even once we'd had kids yeah he really was wasn't he so he's totally changed like he's in bed with a light out by half 10 yeah and he's responded really well to lockdown as well. Like he's like, he doesn't care. He's just like, as long as I've got my history books. Genuinely doesn't care if he sees me or not.

He cares if he sees the kids, but he wants to see me a little bit, you know, like maybe 20 minutes a day, but that's it. You're too busy cooking and cleaning. Well, exactly. I do not like getting the chimney sweep out. be 20 minutes a day but that's it you know you're too busy cooking and cleaning well exactly i do not like i'm getting the chimney sweep out what i what i discovered was i was actually once i was up i was once i had a cup of coffee i was all right and then i would have this dip at about 6 15 i mean pretty much to the second which used, which used to match their bath time. So baths should be fun, but that was when I was at my most tired.

And what I found then was it was too late to have a tea or a coffee because that would keep me awake. So obviously I've got to go to bed so early. So they would just have a really grumpy bath every night. What time are you going to bed, Al? I would try and go to bed at around 10 as anyone who knows me you'll know this i i'm an extreme night owl and always had been even when betty was little i and stand-up used to keep me awake as well and even when i stopped doing as much stand-up i still

had a stand-up spotty clock but that has now finally been broken by lockdown so i tried to go to bed at about 10 but we'd i'd have this dip at about 6 15 and um it was too late to have a tear of coffee so betty'd splash me and instead of splashing her back i'd be like you want me what's your problem what is your problem so like groundhog day now i find this film incredibly poignant because every day was exactly the same and how does it feel now well they they went back to the child mind a bit i'm betting went back to school so when during his nap which was when i used to do all of my work i could fit an enormous amount into that nap oh you must have been so tired well i mean the really pathetic thing is that we were watching so then we get them to bed at about eight o'clock and then we'd have eaten and we were trying to watch normal people. The episodes are less than 30 minutes.

We were doing 10 minutes a night with the caveat that I had to be in the mood. 10 minutes! So what were you doing with your two hours to yourself? I'd stare a lot. I used to unwind better reading than watching telly for some reason and also i didn't want to go on my phone really after about quarter nine because because the screen used to keep me awake because being a night owl what i used to find is even when betty was very tired i mean even when betty was waking up very early when she was little

um i get this second wind in the evening, no matter how tired I am. So I've really got to try and avoid that because if I had two hours sleep at night, as soon as it gets to about eight o'clock, I actually feel all right. Whereas I felt sluggish all day. So I'm really trying to avoid getting that second wind or I'll end up watching a film or something

and go to bed too late. How was your first day of the childminder and back to school where you had the day to yourself? I felt like I'd won 50 million pounds. I just could not believe it. I just couldn't believe it.

I didn't know what to do. When I used to get little moments to myself, I used to think, right, what am I going to do then? Am I going to read believe it. And I didn't know what to do. And I used to get, when I used to get little moments to myself, I used to think, right, what am I going to do then? Am I going to read a book or am I going to watch a film or am I going to text a friend or am I going to phone a friend or am I going to watch telly or am I going to read about telly so I'll know what to watch? So when I have got time to watch telly, I'll be watching the best telly

because we're going to waste time. What am I going to do? What am I going to do? And it just, the whole thing, the whole day just felt so long. It's like when you talk to people of our age who don't have children, their weekends,

two whole days. I find it mad that people have their weekends. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The thought of like just sitting and like enjoy, I used to enjoy a hangover. Yes. Yeah. That's a big thing.

I used to kind of thrive on watching the football on a hangover and making waffles and beans for breakfast on a hangover. Do you know what I mean? I find it funny. Yeah. If I was a bit useless because I was hungover I was like oh god sorry I'm hungover whereas now I'm like great mate great I'm ruining lives I've ruined my life

because I had four cans and now she's crying and I'm crying great also as well it's like you're paranoid the whole time like well I don't feel bad but when will I feel bad will I feel bad when it's at the worst part of the day? It's been, they're completely psychological now. Yeah.

Oh, you're one of those dads. Oh, you're a beer and moretti dad. Yeah, yeah. Kids are in bed, eight cans by the side of the sofa. Do you think Izzy was worried about you coming on this podcast, Ellis? No, I don't think so. I listen to it and it's quite funny hearing her talk about me when I'm not in the room.

Because for a kick-off, she does an absolutely terrible impression of a Welsh accent. And she wants 10 minutes to practice it. The thing she mentioned, which I had forgotten about, I listened to her one of these quite recently, was I was initially shielding, right? So I wasn't allowed out of the house at all. So I used to sit on the window, on the windowsill,

to try and get vitamin D like a cat. And I used to think this was a good aspect of my personality, but I have now revealed this and I don't think that it is anymore. I would say I've got an almost superhuman ability to adopt my situation, in this case, complete lockdown because of coronavirus, and then find it completely impossible to imagine an alternative. So I actually wasn't that unhappy. I was like, oh, well, I'm unable to leave the house.

That's my life now. That's my life now. And did you feel jealous of other people who weren't shielding and didn't have a child waking up at half four? If I had been a character in the TV show Lost, I would be the bloke who was quite happy to bed down for the night under the shattered wing of a stricken aeroplane. Oh, well.

This is my life now. I live under a wing. I mean, the problem with that aspect of my personality is that it means you almost never try to better your set of circumstances. Oh, well. So I wasn't particularly unhappy, if I'm honest. Obviously, I was worried for people who were, you know, vulnerable and that kind of stuff. And also, we don't have a garden. a garden so i but again in in that whole thing of feeling unable to imagine an alternative for the react for my situation izzy every day would go god i wish we had a garden i'd say why are you

complaining about it it's like we can't do anything about it it's like me complaining about my height and she'd say well we can we could buy another house. And I'd be like, I didn't start this conversation to look at solutions, actually. I don't want to talk about solutions now, actually. So if we'd had a garden, it would have been so much easier. How's, because you're obviously, I'm loathe to describe you as a professional Welshman, but you're certainly getting there. Yeah, yeah. Well, how does it feel bringing up your children in South East London?

It's weird in the sense that I spoke Welsh at home. I didn't speak English to my parents. Obviously, I can speak English. This isn't a struggle. But I went to a Welsh school and I spoke Welsh to my sisters and my mum and dad and my grandparents. So it is slightly weird. I do find it weird.

When I go into my daughter's primary school, all the stuff on the walls about leaves and frost, it always causes me to do a double take. Doesn't have enough L's in it. No. That one looks like I could read it. Hang on. Too easy, eh?

Way too easy. The fact that it's not in Welsh always causes me to go, oh. And that is a thing I found weirdest, I think. What about their accents? Well, I mean, I don't know if Izzy, I can't remember if Izzy mentioned this, but our childminder is from Peckham and is in her 50s, right? So she sounds like Rob, which means my daughter sounds like rob and that is that is endlessly entertaining to me is there a certain phrase or word that just gets you every time

what her childminder does is her childminder doesn't talk down to them so just talks to the children like she would to an adult but it meant that because because betty started speaking very early on so she was quite slow at walking, but she was very, very verbal. So she would speak like a little adult, like a little cockney adult. And she'd say, go and pick her up. And she'd drop her pens or something, or pencils. She'd go, oh, I've had a right nightmare. I remember looking at the snow and going, that is magical.

Look at that. She's a bit older now. She'll say things like, speaking of which. He turned round to me and said... Yeah, yeah. That's it for this special Best Of episode. We'll be back next week.