The Unplanned Podcast with Matt & Abby - Rachael & Tom on Rejecting Birth Control, PCOS & Losing my Parents

Episode Date: January 1, 2025

Rachael and Tom share their journey of overcoming PCOS through alternative healing, welcoming their second child, and navigating profound loss, including the tragic death of a young family member. They also discuss naming their daughters, experiencing pregnancy rage, and why they’ve opened their home to feed hundreds of college students each week. This episode is sponsored by Rocket Money. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions by going to https://RocketMoney.com/unplanned Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get groceries delivered across the GTA from real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. I dealt with pregnancy rage this time around. Anything that anyone almost did at that point gave me the ick. I might have had that. Your bodies, it's truly amazing, are never the same two days in a row.

Whether you're on a 28, 32, 34 day cycle, throughout that time, your body's asking for different things. My father died four years ago, and this is coming up on one year, my mom. They taught me great love, and my kids aren't gonna feel it. A lot of women think it's really cool to miss their cycle. I felt that way, and then the time came

where I did have to worry about it, and it flipped my world upside down. This past week, we had the opportunity to sit down with Rachel and Tom Sullivan, who at one point thought they weren't going to be able to have kids. After missing multiple periods in a row, Rachel was diagnosed with PCOS, but what her and Tom discovered is they were able

to help heal her body through nutrition. Since then, her and her husband Tom have gone on to have two beautiful babies, but while their family's been growing, Tom lost both his parents. In today's episode, we talk about PCOS, pregnancy rage, and how sometimes even men can struggle with postpartum depression. Welcome back to the Unplanned Podcast, people. We have two very special guests today, Rachel and Tom Sullivan. Can we just give it up? Can we just give it up? Okay, Matt looked at the camera and threw two out and I was like, they're like this way or this way,

but now I'm seeing what's going on. I love it. Thank you for being here. You have a beautiful family. Like right before this, you guys were like feeding kids, reading your children books and just like, I can tell you're in the thick of the like newborn stage, but then you also have a toddler. How are you guys surviving right now?

Are we surviving? No. Yeah, you travel with them. One day at a time. Yeah, traveling. That was her seventh flight. Yeah, she is a, she's a travel, I was a flight attendant. So she's got, I gotta make sure she's getting her miles in.

You know what I mean? Yeah. So she's got I gotta make sure she's getting her miles in I would say we're three months in with Rosie. We have the two and a half year old you guys know how this goes I think we are rediscovering ourselves our love for each other our new love for Right. Yeah, you guys get it. Oh dude, we were We're out the other side. I wish someone had told me, hey, by the way, just get your kid a seat on the plane, or fly southwest, or you can just bring on the car seat,

or bring the Duna on, and no one's going to say anything. Because we started using our Duna to help with flights. Oh my gosh, our one-year-old falls asleep on the plane now. Because the bus would just pass out. He never would fall asleep. He would try to crawl everywhere. I mean, he'll sleep for 40 minutes max, but that's way better than what we were getting before.

I wish somebody, we started like, what do we got to do with the newborn? And you start going through all this stuff, right? Unpacking, getting the pumps ready. Nobody warned me that your two-year-old might have a breakdown. Oh, Tom's saying, so like, oh yeah, the biggest difference with like one to two for us,

it wasn't, you know, like preparing for the newborn in the family was sudden. And I think, I hear online all the time, it's like, oh, what's easier, like zero to one or one to two. And I feel like zero to one has its own challenges because everything's new. But you're so, you're like reading every book. You're asking for all the advice.

When number two came, we're like, we do know what. We know what we're doing. You know, we're like, we're seasoned in this at this point. But number two threw us for a loophole because we didn't expect how our toddler would handle it all. I think it all depends on like the age of your kid. She was at the point where she had just was discovering the world for the first time, I feel like.

Truly understanding. Truly understanding it. Like things she wanted to do in the day, when she wanted to go to bed, if she wanted to get out, if she wanted to stay in bed and play, like she was getting it. She was at that point. And then we brought home a baby. And then we brought home Rosie. And her world was flipped upside down.

And that was like... killed me it killed time They put me like in a truly mental Tough spot cuz I was like my little girl you're feeling it and you don't know you don't know why and you're trying to process a lot of emotions and There was a good like two months there where it like it really destroyed. Yeah You were, yeah, you had a bit of a. Well, and you were taking care of baby. I think what was, what did we,

like postpartum depression, it's like one in eight males can have it. Which like I didn't know was a thing. Neither of us knew it was a thing. And Tom had mentioned on his like Instagram story, he's like, it's been really tough for me going through all the things and so many women were like, my husband is dealing with this and it's not talked about ever and this is something I wish was more vocalized. I didn't

know it was a thing either. Wait, this is the first time I'm hearing that too. Yeah, no, it's a thing. Well, you probably felt silly to say anything because it's like, okay, my wife just freaking pushed a baby out of her vagina. And here I am complaining. She has a baby on her boob every three hours is changing out her path. Exactly. Exactly.

So then you're just like, Tom, shut up. Like, what am I? Yeah. What am I, heart's being torn for my daughter? My two year old. Yeah. Yeah she took it rough, like really, really rough. Nobody's gonna wanna hear this.

At seven days Sutton slept through the night every night of her life. No it was like day 11. Day 11, she slept through the night every day of her life. Really? Until we brought home a newborn. And she has not slept now in three months. Yeah, no, it's not.

You're kidding. So it affected her that much. Yeah, no. So like, right, like we were good the first two weeks. I was like, holy shit, we have two babies who are like sleepers. Like I don't know what we've done in this lifetime to get this moment. And then, you know, her anxiety started like hitting up and she would get like night terrors and start screaming in the middle of the night. And then she learned how to climb out of her crib. And we knew that

she hadn't like could explore it before, but it was nothing she like ever tried to do. And it was like two nights in a row of trying, we're like, well, you got to move you to the big girl bed now. And then trying to transition a big girl bed for a toddler while also three weeks in with a newborn who were up all night. Like it was just so much going on at one time. Were you in the big bed yet? Okay. Well, our kid can't climb out because we put the tent on top of it. No, I meant you personally.

For myself? No, I'm kidding. I'm just kidding. Yeah, I transitioned the big girl bed. If I knew about the tent, we would have done the tent. We got to the tent. The tents are amazing. The tents are amazing because he doesn't try to climb out.

No, it makes sleep, like even because we all travel and go see family, we have family all over, like my parents are- We get made fun of for the tents though. Oh, people think it's so weird, but it's the best thing ever. It's the one extra. I've seen them. I've never done them. No, they're so good.

But then he doesn't think to climb out because he's in a tent. And they feel safe and feel like they're at home. It's the same environment everywhere they go. Everywhere they go, they're in the same exact environment. So that makes them feel so safe, so comfortable. And we don't have issues with them sleeping with me. We're going to have an issue when we transition though. Oh yeah. I'm scared.

Obviously, there's a million different techniques. We're big on, she slept anywhere we brought her. Yeah. In any position. Yeah. But now we're paying for some of the, so. Yeah. It's the opposite.

You know how it is. Everything. I think that is the thing of parenting. It's like can you be respectful for what they do? Yeah. Can you look at what you do? Can we like get better at it? I think that's one of like the beauties of the internet. Like people talk trash social media and some of the things that bring it. I think one of the best things it does is like I'm scared as shit. And I can find people that are going through it.

Yeah. Or, and if you have an open mind, like I don't do it their way. Should I, should I think about that? Yeah. That's how I found out about the tisth in the first place was actually social media. I was like, Matt, we have a tisth. Okay.

You're like, TikTok shot, bye. Yeah. We were so confident and great. And then like we tried to put it down for an app one time without it on Sunday. No sleep was had. So I was like, well, this is where we're gonna pay for it. It was really bad. Yeah, he was in a room that had all the curtains closed, like everything was normal for like a normal

human being to sleep, but I mean, not to say that kid's not a normal human being. He was like literally WWE-ing all through the pack and play. He's just not used to sleeping without it being pitch black. So he just would not go to bed until we got this. And then he was like, I can climb out of here. Yeah, until we got the sleep tent and then boom, lights out.

How is one to two for you guys, just even like personally? Cause everyone talks about like the, now you're still at least one on one, like you're not outnumbered. Okay, I feel like this, I feel like, I might get hate for saying this, but I love one, I love two, I love those ages so much. Newborn stage, not my thing.

It's just so hard. And I think part of what made it so hard though, Tom, was I didn't know there was light at the end of the tunnel. I thought that my life was gonna be sleepless nights, being depressed, like going crazy. Cause it's just like, you are giving so much to your child to keep them alive and take care of them and love on them. And you're trying so hard just to be the best parent

you possibly can be. But like, it's just hard. There's just like no, there's not like really an easy answer I think to get through that. It's just really, really hard. And that's why I feel so much for single parents who do that by themselves. I don't know, they're like, they are super humans, dude.

I don't know how they do that. Cause we, like, I have a supportive partner and it was still so hard. Like I don't, I don't know how single parents do it. I think obviously like we had different issues though. Like because Griffin was so young when Augie was born, he was only 13 months. Yeah.

I feel like he- Oh, that's back to back. Yeah. Whoa. I feel like we had different sets of issues. I super-jumped into it. Two sections, so. I'm a dumbass. Well, so basically I feel like we had different issues.

You know, like it was, we had essentially two babies, not like a toddler and a baby. But then Griffin like mentally knew no different. Like he was just like, yeah. There's that guy. Yeah, because his world, like we were saying, like her world had just started to realize what was happening.

I think we were six months away, six months earlier. Yeah, we say the window, we're like, either we should have, I mean, whatever, we're in it. But I feel like there's little things. Number two, I will do the bed transition with Rosie if we get to number three. Like I will make sure, the moment I find out right now, I'm like we are transitioning to the big girl bed.

Oh, before, yeah that's bad timing. But you couldn't have predicted that. Yeah, no, couldn't predict it. So it was just hard with like her anxiety. Yeah. Separation anxiety. Separation anxiety, big time, yeah. Sad, that's tough.

We said last night night she crawled, well we put her in bed with us because we're in a new environment, she wants to sleep in a pack and play. But last night I was like, man, I'm gonna miss these moments where she is so tiny and where she won't wanna crawl in the bed with us anymore. So I'm trying to take advantage of those times

and not see it as, oh my God, my kids might like, I'm sleepless nights, whatever. All my space is gone. Like I'm really just trying to. Yeah. When she runs in the room now at night, there's a little smirk on my face. I'm like, okay, I got a breastfeed. I'm like Rosie. Yeah. Cause she's still up every, she's like clockwork every three hours wanting to be on the tee. This is like the epitome of like, to sum it up, it was day two when she was in her playroom and went in the corner. Oh yeah.

Day two. It was like day two of being home. We have a playroom and she plays in there a lot, like on her own and she'll be like, like kind of pushes off like she's very independent. And then all of a sudden the next time, every time she needs to play since Rosie got home was pulling us in there or with her, like we needed to be there. And all of a sudden she went in the corner,

put her head down and would not look up at us. It was like this so, and I would never see. A pouty face that I've never seen on her. And we're like, we're trying to FaceTime people. We're trying to, and she like won't look up. FaceTime her friends, FaceTime her family. For an hour. Yeah, for an hour and for a whole hour she. trying to and she like her friends FaceTime our family like like for yeah

for an hour and for a whole hour she like as parents like the like put yourself in that moment yeah and it was like whatever we did grabs presented I was like do you want to play with like she'd be like I'd be like do you want to eat this do you want to call this person she's like I'm okay the saddest thing I've ever experienced, like that was tough. And you had a baby too. And I had this baby who I'm like, don't do this to me.

I'm like, I feel wrecked because this baby's on me 24 seven and now I feel like my love's being divided and I don't want her to think that I don't love her, even though I know they don't think that, but yeah. What I'm hearing, I mean, here's the thing, new baby, it's a transition for every member of the house, right? Like dad, mom, and then- Date nights. Our intimacy, the love we have for each other.

We really believe we have to love each other so they see what it is. So even getting that back and rekindled, it's a lot. Pregnancy was, I don't know how your pregnancy was. Did you deal, so like I dealt with pregnancy rage this time around. Dude I, when I was reading up about you guys I was like man, I might need, I might have had that. It was, baby number one was like,

pregnancy with Sutton was rainbows and butterflies and I just like felt sexy, my sex drive was like, pregnancy with Sutton was rainbows and butterflies and I just like felt sexy. My sex drive was great. Like everything I was doing, I was succeeding and excelling in. I felt beautiful. I had so much confidence. And then pregnancy number two, it was like anything Tom did

but like gave me the ick, like bugged me. It was like anything that anyone almost did at that point. I took it most out on you. I felt bad for that, but I would intentionally, he would ask me something like, what do you want for breakfast? And I would be pissed as if, now Tom makes three meals a day,

because he's cooked, that's the way it is. You know what I mean? And so I would just get mad if he like cooked my egg wrong. Or just like things that you should be grateful for. Right, like I was just so ungrateful or I would do things that I know would piss him off. Like if he would ask me to do something, like I know in my head it would make him mad

and I would like intentionally wanna like do it. It was just like, I hated it. I cried, I mean I cried like, I cried every other day about it. And I was like, I hate this. There's like mean I cried like oh I cried every other day about it And I was like I hate this there's like a demon in me. I need to get this out like this baby needs to come out We found out when we were pregnant We found out Rachel was pregnant when we found out my mom got sick And we lost my mom like right into the beginning so there was just also just a lot of

There's just yeah, there's a lot of variables. There's just a lot of variables. Yeah, there's a lot of variables. And I think that tore into it. It's been a tough little bit. Also sprinkled with the most joy ever. But it all kind of colors that season in a different way. And you guys are still prioritizing each other. And you still clearly love each other. And your kids so much.

I want to know more about this egg though. Were you intentionally doing the egg cooking wrong? What was going on? I like an over hard egg and if it has any runny, I get like, you know what you- Oh you want it over hard, you want no yolk running off? Yes, and the yolk like fricks me out. Without the yolk being cracked.

And what's your technique? What's your technique to make this happen, Tom? How do you get it right every time? Just do it very carefully. That's sweet. I have a lot of techniques, but you don't want to overdo it because then it gets bad. So there's that right when it turns and I probably forgot right when there was a little run.

Honestly, it was the most... It could be anything. Right when Rosie came out of me. It goes back to like she's carrying the baby, her hormone. Listen, we have a book on hormones and women's health. I know her body is going through crazy shit that me and you will never understand. 100%.

However, there is that difficulty of like, I'm getting beat up, I don't wanna take it out on you. I do need somewhere to go to also get that out. And I'm very extremely grateful for her. It would be like the next day that she'd be like, I, that came out of nowhere. Yeah. And to me, I was like, oh, thank God.

Like I'm not just being a bad husband. Oh. No, and he was being like the above and beyond. And I was just, everything just like made me mad. I can totally relate. Cause I remember even at the time I was just, everything just like made me mad. I can totally relate, because I remember even at the time I was like, can I control this? Because like I feel like I can,

but I also feel like another way is like I can't. Like where I was like, am I, is this hormones or am I just literally mean? And then it wasn't until we were like, where when was it that we had that like first conversation postpartum, I was like, I feel really good. I feel good again.

I feel like I can see sunshine again. Like, and I wasn't even like aware of like all those, I was like, I love you. Like, and it took like a minute, like it took a while. Like it wasn't even like, it was like postpartum too. Like that carried out and was actually even worse postpartum, I feel like. Yeah, actually it was definitely worse postpartum.

And then it was like, I would take three months, and I'm like, how are you actually, man? No, totally, I feel like we wanna talk about that. And I didn't have the contrast of like a sunshine and rainbows pregnancy. I think physically both pregnancies, I felt pretty good, and I was really grateful for that. But mentally, no.

Yeah. We talk about it, we kinda talk, that's a big part of why the second book came. It's not like your ten girlfriends are going through it at the same time. And even if you have one or two, like you're not on the same day. Yeah. And you can you can look back and try to recall it, but like you are on an island going through pregnancy a lot of the times. Like if you really think about that, like you

can ask people, hey did you have this? And they're trying to backtrack and we're writing a book about pregnancy and she's like calling every friend because she's like, when we started, she wasn't pregnant. So she actually wrote the book while pregnant, but when she wasn't, she's like, I don't remember week 13.

Yeah. And I also didn't want, like I said, my first experience was so great that I didn't want that to be the only perspective of the book because I did have it really good. Not that I'm saying I'm thankful for my second pregnancy being different, but I really am because it really brought

a whole different perspective to the book. I've had it both ways. I've had the beautiful pregnancy where I wanna be pregnant again, and I've had the rough pregnancy where I was like, I could wait five to 10 years before I touch that. And I guess to your point the reason I brought that up was we had to mentally reflect a lot and it sounds like you

actually did that in real time like as you're sitting there saying Matt are you okay? Yeah are you alright? Like we've talked about it a lot actually. I know like I love how you referred to pregnancy as being on an island because that must be so hard to be going through the most difficult thing most women probably up to that point have gone through like growing a child is a very, very big deal. And so going through that alone, no one really understands truly what you're going through unless they're pregnant at the same time in the same stage. So that must feel really isolating. And then Tom, to your point, being the caregiver for someone that's going through unless they're pregnant at the same time in the same stage. So that must feel really isolating.

And then Tom, to your point, being the caregiver for someone that's going through that isolating event must also be isolating because you're like, I'm taking care of this person that I love very, very much that's doing this incredible thing for our family, growing this child. But then it must have been hard for you when, yeah, like you said, when you felt like you didn't know what to do when you were stressed and you were trying your hardest but things weren't going the way you had planned. Yeah. And I think it's cool that you're willing to open up about some of the struggles too,

even though you clearly love your family so much and are so grateful for it. But I think that because people going through it can feel like, oh man, everyone's doing pregnancy and they seem to be thriving and loving their life and I'm actually kind of having a hard time right now. And I'm not feeling the opposite or what. Yeah. And it's really cool that you're willing to be vulnerable that way to share, you know, we love it

and we wouldn't have it any other way, but it was not always easy. It was rough. It was rough. Yeah, and like your journey to pregnancy, you opened up about having PCOS. Obviously that's a big part of your guys' story. Was there ever a concern that like fertility might be something that was difficult for the two of you? We found out I had PCOS because

we were starting on like our whole fertility journey. Oh yeah so I always thought we were like the couple who we weren't not not trying, right? So we didn't use birth control. And I thought like a baby would just happen. And we were, I mean. We were active. We were active enough, I'm like, okay.

Why aren't you just chill? How could she not accidentally have? How active we talk? Matthew. Prepare numbers later. Sorry, we should bet you guys. Sorry about that. But, you know, it got to the point where I'm now, you know had PCOS because there was a girl on social media at the time posting about it.

I had never heard of it before. And I had a lot of the same symptoms that she had, one, the most, biggest being an irregular cycle. So I feel like a lot of women think it's really cool to miss their cycle. And it's like, oh my God, I don't have my period. This is a blessing. And I felt that way Oh my God, I don't have my period. Like this is a blessing. And I felt that way for a little bit where I was like three months, I don't have my period. I don't have to worry about it.

And then the time came where like I, I did have to worry about it and it flipped my world upside down. It's something that you like don't want until you don't have it. And then you're like, I want this so deeply and badly. So yeah, I was missing my cycle. I went and got checked out and they do a list of criteria that like your body, like cysts, your hormone levels maybe being off. And so I qualified for two out of the three things

on this criteria list. So I was diagnosed with PCOS and they had recommended me going on birth control to regulate my cycle. And I did not want to do that because we were trying to have a child. So we took a holistic approach. Thank you to Rocket Money

for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. Do you have unwanted subscriptions that you cannot get rid of? I've been there and it is so annoying, but thankfully Rocket Money can handle that for you. Well, Matt, have you ever thought about the fact that many people have subscriptions that are probably unwanted,

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grow your savings. It's pretty great. We actually use it. We've been using it now for over a year. It's helped us save a lot of money on unwanted subscriptions, as well as things like lowering our security bill. We pay like a monthly bill for our security system and Rocket Money called and negotiated it for us so that

we only pay $29.99 now. We used to pay like double that. So thank you. Thank you Rocket Money. There's a lot of great user-friendly features on Rocket Money that help you easily create a personalized budget or get alerts if bills increase. They also have like a new goals feature that can automatically help you save money, but you don't even have to think about it.

It can help you pay off your credit card don't even have to think about it. It can help you pay off your credit card debt, put away money for a house if that's a goal you have, or just build your savings. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of $500 million in cancelled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year when using all of the app's premium features. So cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals fast with Rocket Money. Go to rocketmoney.com slash unplanned today. That's rocketmoney.com slash unplanned rocketmoney.com slash unplanned. Normally someone with PCOS, like normally you try for like a year and then if

there's complications you come back and then we take the next step. Okay. And then it was for someone with PCOS, it's take six months and if it's not happening, then come back and we'll take the next steps. And so we just, we went to the point where I didn't want to do birth control. So we took the holistic approach and we saw that food could impact the body and restore your cycle and balance your hormones. And I love cooking. And Tom loves cooking. and restore your cycle and balance your hormones. And I love cooking. And Tom loves cooking. So yeah, we did a deep dive.

And because of social media, a lot of experts reached out and we got in touch with a lot of great people. And like our body, me and you are swimming pools without a filter. If we don't work out, if we don't really treat it, it doesn't get filtered out. Your bodies, it's truly amazing, are never the same two days in a filter. If we don't work out, if we don't really treat it, it doesn't get filtered out. Your bodies, it's truly amazing are never the same two days in a row. There's

always a level rising, lowering your egg moving, you have four cycles in between your period. So you, you menstruate, you go through your little teal, your follicular, your ovulation. Look at Tom, he's like, he's in much more of a period than most women. Yeah, like I can, I can get, I can geek out on it, but the long and short is whether you're on a 28, 32, 34 day cycle from period end to period begin, throughout that time,

you should be doing different things for your body. Cause your body's asking for different things. It's the reason why if you join Orange Theory and you do it every single day after six months, you might be good at it, but there's gonna be a 10 day period in there where you're, you're getting your ass kicked. Yeah. Cause your body's kind of probably saying like, maybe do yoga, maybe. Yeah.

Like still work out, but like do that. So we got into that and your body's asking for certain foods. So I started implementing those foods based off her cycle of what her body's asking. And it's, it's, and we have thousands and thousands of people that reach out and it's always three months. Because three months is the time to flush out a lot of the hormones, a lot of the gut health problems, et cetera. So in three months, she had like nine symptoms, hormonal acne. Yeah, I had like my, I had really bad like hormonal acne.

When her period came, it was go get the supers and put the towels down. I was like I needed a towel and the bad heavy flow. Oh, you got your period after three months. Oh, no, before, sorry. Before that, before that. So symptoms we're talking about that I had beforehand. It was like I had really bad hormonal acne. My period flow was super, super heavy.

I had migraines. This is before you started, okay, wow. This is before all of that. This was just like the symptoms that sometimes people don't connect, but it could be a hormone problem. When you got your period, but sometimes you would skip it for.

Yes. Okay, so you would still get it sometimes. Yeah, I would get it like, I would get it and then it'd go away for three months, then I'd get it. So after changing the diet for three months, she was on a 28 day cycle. Like 28 day cycle, like that.

Which I had never experienced in my life. For over a year we tracked up. That is incredible. And then we got pregnant. And then we got pregnant. Wait, that's amazing actually to hear because I feel like sometimes I'm like, well, I mean, like if a doctor were to tell me

to do birth control, I'd be like, okay, well, if that's what I gotta do, Like I wouldn't ever think twice. So that's really cool that you guys were like, no, like you had the, I don't know, the motivation to do all of that research on your own, to be like, there's a different way we could go about this. I'm gonna say something that every person watching this right now is thinking, Tom, you're an amazing husband.

That's sweet. You're doing such a good job. No, but you can accept, like, yeah, I don't know, you're just clearly doing such a good job. And you spouting out those facts about women's health and women's bodies that you just knew so well. It's like you've talked about it a million times. You know your wife and you know women so well.

And it's really cool to see you step up to the plate and be that leader for your family. So that's really cool. Ultimate girl dad. That's what I was thinking too. I was like, of course you have to have daughters. You were supposed to be a girl dad. I will be the first to tell you that if I didn't meet this girl,

I would work the corporate life till I was retired. I did not have an emotional bone in my body. I don't think I would cry for three years in a row. And I met her and she actually made me comfortable feeling the person I am. I probably cry as much as you, if not more these days. I wanna travel and enjoy life. I'd actually take it in.

So yeah, there's, there is. There's a yin and a yang for sure. That's so sweet. But she gave me like an actual life I wanna live and not one that was told what I had to do if that makes sense. Wow. Right. That's beautiful. Those are so perfect. That's so beautiful. I'm inspired. Sweet. That's so cute.

She did man. I just wanted to work and get retired and do the corporate thing and that would have sucked. and do the corporate thing and that would have sucked. I love that. What was your satisfaction in the corporate world versus your satisfaction now with your life? Like out of 10, if you could rank it. I don't even know how I could rank it. I always just wanted, like we cook for the college meals, we do this, like I've always had the like helping bone

in my body, I think that's being the oldest of 17 little cousins and like big families. But I also like, like my grandpa was a plumber, like they're like there, my dad went to the Marines to get his college and they didn't pay for it and he worked through it. And like, there's just a lot of motivation that always made me want to be corporate to probably be able to afford to do the dreams I had and that's the path I was told you had to do it. Yeah And now we learned a different path and I think we're we're doing our best to do

things And you started sharing some of your recipes but without Rachel knowing Because you got recommended the page and that's how you found it. I got recommended, yeah. I feel like it's almost like this page was made for me. It's true. It's gotten so good. Is this my house?

Why is someone in my house posting videos on Instagram? Listen, I barely had Instagram. It was just to like her stuff. So she was a flight attendant. She would blog and she's always had a creative writing style. Yeah, so I went to college for communication and creative writing. And so that was like my bread and butter. Not that I necessarily wanted to be an author, but I knew I really wanted to be in the creative space. And so when I was a flight attendant, that was kind of when blogs were starting and all that was happening. So I had a few different blogs where I would talk about all my travels and I would document,

they were my little diary memoirs. And then Instagram happened and I kind of saw people were getting paid and making a lifestyle out of it. And I was like, well, maybe if I just like keep this up one day, it'll amount to something. Six years later, still nothing was happening. And then COVID happened and I lost my job or I was furloughed. And then I... And no one was flying. Say what? Yeah, no one was flying.

No one was flying, things weren't happening. And so, you know we were spending more time at home together and well this is also we found out the PCOS right at all of this happened like right when the PCOS this was happening so Tom starts you know cooking for me and I know I know we're gonna have to document it and like I I can get I don't love being analytical but I am very like Historical driven. Yeah, like like let me look back at what we did and what work I didn't and I'm like I need to write all this shit down somewhere Yeah

and I need like pictures of the food and when we did it and when her cycle was and what phase were going for and What the LH level or what we're trying to affect and And I had Pinterest boards, I had Safari saved, I had notes, I have handwritten notes. And in my head I was like, Instagram I can literally take the picture and be like, this is for the Luteal phase. For these reasons, here's the recipe. And that was it.

Now the reason I tell you the backstory of the social media is because Tom later on tells me that he did this and didn't want to tell me about it because I would try to make it pretty and I would try to make it aesthetic and I was trying to make it a thing. I was like all I could think about was if she knows about this she's gonna pull out her camera and take a picture of the food I'm gonna have to wait till it's edited and now I'm making three meals a day. And I'm like, and I'm going to be annoyed with her because I'm going to be trying to just get the data. Just get the food out and everything. I'm like, wait, the lighting, wait, let me get

a prop. So I kept it a secret. I did not want her to know it until I was a little further in. But yeah, I saw on Instagram, it was like, you know how it shows you the people you may know section or whatever. So it said, meal she eats. And then it said Tom Sullivan. And I was like, I was so, I didn't know any social media. I had no social media.

Oh, you're like, who is she? I was like, who is this shit? And I click on it and it was like, the first recipe was like a miso soup that he had cooked like the week before. And it was the recipe inside of it. And then it was like, hashtag PCOS, hashtag. There was like 14 hashtags on there. I was like, there are millions of people on this.

She's not going to find it. I had like 12 followers and they're like the food pages that follow you back. And I thought it was so cute. And so I approached him on it and I was like, what are you doing? He's like, I didn't want you to make it like this pretty thing. I just needed to do this. And then I had made a TikTok about it. And I was like, I found out my husband had a secret Instagram account and that I had been going through this hormone imbalance and that he was cooking the food and this was his way to document it. And then Rachel Ray, it blew up. And the TikTok that I made blew up.

So this is where I'm an idiot keeping it to myself. No, I mean honestly like- Because then it blows up. So the video went wild and then USA Today did like a story on us. And that took off. And then Rachel Ray reached out and said she had seen the story on USA Today and wanted us on the show. And that was like, it was crazy. Because you know, I like grew, we grew up watching Rachel Ray reached out and said she had seen the story on USA Today and wanted us on the show and that was like it was crazy because you know, I like grew we grew up watching Rachel Ray You know, I never had formal training yeah, it was Tom's Tom's vibe like never formal training home cook

and we went on her show and by the way, it's so funny because We thought like Oh being on like Rachel Ray, like maybe like we would get like a crazy following from it or whatnot. I think we got like 20 followers from like being on Rachel Ray. It was because when it hit like meme pages

or whatever the video, then we would like gain the following. But I think everyone always thinks like, oh you guys are on like, you're on TV, like a following will come from it. And I'm almost like off mainstream media. I feel like it really doesn't do anything anymore because people wanna talk to real humans and not like.

I think there's a huge shift right now in our culture and our society all over the world where people like the relatability of social media because you actually connect with like real humans. Now, obviously it's still, you know, there's like a screen between you, but that's why I love something like this, like a podcast. We're actually having a real humans. Now obviously it's still, you know, there's like a screen between you, but that's why I love something like this, like a podcast. We're actually having a real conversation.

Like we're not, we're not like filtering this like they would on a TV show like Rachel Ray, not to, not to knock Rachel Ray, because what she's done is incredible. But I think- Rachel, if you still want to send me to your Italy home, we won't miss it anytime. You got to meet her. That's so cool. No, we didn't get to meet her. Because it was COVID. It was June. That's so cool. No, we didn't get to meet her because it was COVID. It was Zoom. We were supposed to. We did get to chat with her. I don't even remember. I forgot to embrace her. Wait, it was a Zoom? Yeah. I know. She had us back on twice. You know that we never do.

Yeah, we were on it twice and each time was a Zoom. A rule for our shows, we only do in-person interviews because I feel like with the Zoom call or something, it's just not the same. I wish I could have like hugged her. I know. And she's so funny and like, whatever, it's okay. Yeah, that's still pretty dope though, that's cool. A third time. Is she back in doing live shows?

I don't know, Rachel, what are you doing? Me too, Rachel. Call me. You're great. Are you using her cooking pans? I know she has like some pretty good cooking pans. Yeah, she does. When we were registering, like on our registry, when we got married, I remember there was like a Rachel Ray set pants. When we were registering like on our registry

when we got married, I remember there was like a Rachel Ray set. I was like, I, like Abby told me she was like, this is good. She is like famous and she makes pants. And I'm like, all right, we could, I don't think we even registered for those, did we? We did like a different.

We got the cheapest ones, yeah. They're like, well. But yeah, so that's, that's how that account started. That's so cool. And then it turned into a book. At what point did you find out you were pregnant with Sutton? Into that, like a comp being made or just like. Like your journey with the holistic foods.

Like two, so we did a year of like. 13 or 14 months after, right? Yeah, like 13, 14. So three months, her body gets on that 28 day cycle and we track that for, and I think at month 13, at month 13 we really started trying. Yeah, and then it was like about six months after that. Because now we knew the days she would get pregnant,

so we avoided those days. We just wanted to make sure I was like, I wanna, what we were doing at that point, it was, my thought process wasn't like the pregnancy itself, it was I wanna to heal my body and I want to see if this works. And I don't want, like not that I don't want to get pregnant right away, but I really just wanted

to heal my body at that point. So we did it for a whole year to see if it was, if I really was balancing my hormones, if it wasn't just a fluke, you know what I mean? And so yeah, after like the year mark, we were like, all right, let's like full set and try this. And it was about under six months. Wow.

When I was trying to figure out fun questions to ask you guys, I was like, I need to do a deep dive on their Instagram to see if there's a funny old memory that I could bring up or get the story behind it. Because I think when you find an old photo of a couple that has has a funny story to it It's always like it's always hilarious And there's a photo that stuck out to me that I made me I just died laughing. I had to show Abby I was like, what is the what is the story? I'll send you a print. Oh my god! Do you have a picture with you? Do you have a print with you?

That was our... so every week of, you know, it was... this was... I knew it. I knew it was going to be that one too. So the first... so Sutton obviously finding out we were pregnant was an emotional roller coaster. Yeah. We both, and I'm sure you guys do too, we have a lot of people we know that didn't get to the end of the pregnancy.

Miscarriages happen in silence all the time and that was always PCOS that heightens it. And going into that pregnancy we said we are not taking a single week of this for granted. We don't want to get through it. Yeah. We want toens it. And going into that pregnancy, we said we are not taking a single week of this for granted. Like we don't wanna get through it. Yeah, we wanna enjoy it. We wanna embrace this whole thing. Yeah. So one day. It was, and there's a write up in the book,

but it was, I was the size of a fig and our neighbor had a fig tree. And Tom, he's just so funny and always has like the best ideas. He was like, oh, we should like make a fig recipe because the baby's the size of a fig today and I'll go pick some figs off like the fig tree and we'll like make a pizza and it was kind of like this no big thing and he like made a little meal for me and I thought it was cute so I documented it and I was like came in the

room I'm like honey what do we got and he's like oh we have a fig pizza the baby's the size of a fig today. And it was like, it was really fun for us and it was our fun, like intentional time every week to like remember the pregnancy and spend that time together and you know, share our love. And we did that the entirety of the pregnancy. And that's what the second book is. It's Honey, What Do We Got?

I love that. And yeah, and it started with a little thing. Being in the tension a little bit because you guys know how it is. It's like you find out you're pregnant there's like doctor's appointments. Yeah. Non-stop. Yeah. And then it slows down for a really long time. Yeah that's true. And then it kicks back up and then and then there's the the the fear the anxiety there is everything ready. Are the rooms ready? Do we gotta paint? Do we gotta whatever? And I think reflecting on that,

that helped us so much to us, what's a great way to get to know somebody? What's a great way to stop? What's a great way to reflect? Like around a table, around food. So for us, that was just our way to make sure we clocked back in with each other. And when we bickered about a paint color or what crib, like, hey, we're just

going to eat and enjoy this. And then week 40, you are the size of a watermelon. And I had done every week like a photo and I would do like cute little color coordinations with the fruit and whatnot. We're like we gotta go big for 40. At this point now we had a following of people who are watching us every week showing like what recipe we're making and I was like I think I was like I'm gonna do like a a nakey watermelon shoe like I embrace them in body like I that's my favorite thing ever and Tom was like I'll join and I was like let's do this. You should have asked who took the photo.

Okay, wait. No, I'm kidding. No, who did take the photo? I actually want to know. It was on timer. So it was funny. No. So we are sprinting.

That's too professional. Wait, wait. We are sprinting and tapping the button. Then picking up the watermelon. Because I didn't have a little flicker or anything. So I'd be like, okay, it's going. And I would make sure Tom was in frame. I was a little unruly back and forth.

And it was in our kitchen and we put up a little white sheet, but it would be like all white and all black. And I was like, I'm going to go ahead and do this. And I was like, I'm going to go ahead and do this. And I was like, I'm going to go ahead and do this. And I was like, I'm going to go ahead and do this. And I was like, I'm it's going. And I would make sure Tom was in frame. I was the one running back and forth. And it was in our kitchen and we put up a little white sheet, but we have like all windows in our kitchen. So Tom would be like, the neighbors walking past. And I'd be like, it's okay.

Wait, why do I feel like that's such a good couple's bonding activity? It's like, you know what, babe, let's go do a photo shoot. Just us with the camera. It was so much fun. And take nude photos with some fruit. It was so much fun. Take nude photos with some fruit. Might as well.

There's cantaloupes, there's plants, there's a lot of fruits as you go through. That's so fun. And that was week 40. I never saw week 40. When did you? I had that at 39. Okay. Yeah. Were you induced or? I was induced and? I had both at 39. Okay.

Yeah. Were you induced or? I was induced and then I had a scheduled C-section. So I do those both at 39. But I'm like week 40 seems intense. I always get to the point where I'm not ready for the baby to come yet because I'm not ready for my life to change.

I'm really bad with change. Like really, really bad with change. And I remember writing in the book, like week 37, 38, I'm like, I'm still not emotionally ready for this moment to happen. Then I remember week 40, I was like, get this thing out of me. Like, okay, we're ready. It's nature. You're literally like, labored birth sounds better than staying like this.

I'm like, I just need this thing out, like emotionally, physically, mentally, all of the things. I'm terrible. At that point, I'm like, I just want to meet you. emotionally, physically, mentally, all of the things. And I just want to meet at that point. I'm like, I just want to meet you. I want to meet you. I want to hold you. I want to love on you. Yeah, that's so true. Yeah, I literally remember people saying like,

you won't be worried. Like trust me, like by the time you like, sure there's like, you know, like nerves, but it's a normal, like it's not like a, like as intense as if you were like, just to be sprung on you. You're like, something happens. We're like, this sounds like a better option.

This sounds like we should just go and do this right now. So obviously, I totally understand you guys wanting to send it with that photo just because you're like, I want to celebrate this. I want to enjoy this pregnancy. You just never know. You just don't know what could happen. So you just want to enjoy every bit of the pregnancy and Just like live your life. What like what did you guys have any funny comments from like family or your parents? I got the text. Oh, what is it?

Screenshot text. I play college football like my teammates were like, hey, bro So you're on Instagram My parents they don't I mean everything I do at this point they's like, you got an OnlyFans? Like, what's going on? Yeah. My parents, they don't, I mean, everything I do at this point, they're like, oh, that's Rachel. They don't care. That's Rachel. I would concur with that. Yeah, I just got to, you know, it got put in all the guy group

texts. That's hilarious. You guys are fun. Did they gang up on you, or were they just teasing? I am the biggest of most of them. So. Yeah. They're like, well, we can't really say.

Honestly, I think they know how much me and Rachel have fun. Yeah. And I think my close friends know how much that's important for me. I don't feel like there's ever teasing as weird as that sounds. I don't have a lot of guy, as much as I lock a room in sports, we don't have a lot of like guy like as much as like I locker room and sports like we don't have a lot of the be tough but like My friends are like love your wife friends. That's awesome. So like, you know, I think it was fun That's good. I it was it was hard for me to press send on that but Here we go, it looks artistic

It was art It seems like you guys have like really good community though, like where have you guys tapped into that community and found those friends? Cause if, I don't know, just to have like, even people check in on you, right? Like, and be like, ah, that's a funny photo. Like it seems like you have good relationships

and that's like a sign of a healthy person, like a healthy life. Like how did you guys find that community? I mean, I have like the same group of 10 friends since third grade. My core best friends were also kindergarten first and we've all done, we all went to different grades like high school and college and so on, but I've always stayed close to those younger ones. I mean, finding friends later on in life. It's hard those

I feel like those early ones you go through life together They see you they see you through every step of the way And so I feel like there's always like a really special bond with those people but even beyond that we moved from Chicago to Raleigh and We didn't know anybody out there except for I had a family friend and we didn't know anybody out there except for, I had a family friend who brought us in and was like, whatever you guys need from us and we're here to support you

and we wanna welcome you to our community and they've really taken us in and that's become our core group, Mike and Judy, we love you. And did you meet them because they were your neighbors? Were they at a certain club you guys would attend? My family has a lake house. Did your family have a lake house? I feel like it's a Midwest thing.

No. Well, I have a family in Chicago. Quincy is not Chicago. Yeah. I know Quincy. I feel a lot of people in Chicago like have go to like lake houses or have lake houses My dad won one in a divorce. So But yeah, so our lake house it's a community of

Like ten houses there and everyone is related except for us. My dad was partners with one of the guys who had brought property. Her dad was a police officer. Yeah. So his partner. So his partner on the force had bought property there and was like, hey, my whole family's buying into this land. You should come join. So he did. And that is like my second family, all of the people who live there. That's so cool. And so it was one of the daughters of one of the family members who had moved out to Raleigh. And so she already was like my cousin, like, you know, your fake cousins,

you all have those, right? Like people you call family. And so it was nice having like her to lean on and have that. And then she just opened us up into her community, which was really great. Wow. That's so cool.

And are you guys big lay people? Do you water ski? Jet ski? Do you guys have a boat? If you have a boat that's pretty sick. We did have a boat. You got rid of the boat. I'm like Michigan we had a boat. Yeah we did when we lived in Chicago. Did you sell it? Did you crash it? Wait this is actually funny. So her oldest brother. I'm one of five. Me and him got real close. Okay. And before we got married, I always wanted a boat

and he always wanted a boat and we were like at a Christmas party or something. We're like, I'm talking to Pat, her brother, and he's like, Tom, let's just get the boat together. I was like, dude, he's like, no, do it before you guys get married in case anything happens. Oh shit.

Oh shit. Oh, shit. So they owned something together before we owned something together. I'm like, okay, cool, guys, leave me out of this one. Great. Did you tell your wife? You're big water sports. Love sports. I don't, okay, actually, I hate watching sports.

I think it's boring. I like playing sports. I played sports in the football, baseball, basketball, hockey. I don't like watching sports. It's just more fun. I will love coaching them. I love the analytics of them. I like picking them up. Me and Rachel have 35 hobbies.

One week you'll catch us fishing. I was going to say, I'm like, I'm not an athlete. Like I was a bench warmer. But have you like gotten into sports now because Tom's into sports? Sutton can take that realm. No, he tries to beat me. No, okay, we've like golf. I'll take her to go shoot around like basketball and it turns into me grabbing all of her rebounds as she throws it from half court. I mean I try, I'll appease Tom for a little bit and be like, okay, can we do something else now? But we did, no, we enjoy golf together though.

We do golf together. The first time you taught me. And I don't love golf, so that's kind of funny. Well, when you taught me how to golf and he, wait, what'd you say? We're at the driving range. Okay, do you guys do any sports together? Not really, it's not really tubing.

If you consider tubing behind the boat. You told me how to snowboard. Abbie loves tubing. Tubing is a sport. I love tubing. She's a queen. Tubing is a sport. I love tubing. She's a queen. Like you're a workout. Abby's jacked.

So like, yeah, you've got the lats. You're a workout. Are you doing the barrel rolls in the tube? Are you getting whipped? I will get whipped. She can hold on. Like there's nothing you'll do to get her to let go. I will stay on that tube.

I can see you in that. I saw when you guys did the workout class earlier. And that's going to chip all my teeth. I know. And she can beat me to pushups. We did a pushup competition. I saw when you guys did the workout class Guess push-ups I did in this competition. Yes. Just guess just start a crazy number. She did 108 she beat me guess how many she did I did a hundred and eight and she did more so we were so she Would go oh like pyramid. Yes, so we were taking like I was breaking out She was doing push-ups and vice versa So 120 I think it was either 117 or God guys. She is so She is humble though because she'll be like, I don't know if I can do like a pull-up right?

I'm like babe you can do like when she does a pull-up she like like it's like I it's like, I'm like, dude, you could do 50. I'm like, you know, so I don't do shit. That's too easy. So anyway, what are we talking about? He taught me to snowboard together. We snowboard. That's fun. Heels and toes. Yeah. We played pickleball just like a couple of weeks ago. Yeah. You're getting better. You're getting better. You're doing great. No, not really. Me with a tennis racket is scary. Hi a pickleball racket. Any of the above. No, I feel, I always say I feel like a giant trying to get a ping pong ball. Like I just feel so clumsy. Since like with the two now, do you guys have any like super intentional time?

I, cause I, we both have discovered our time apart. Like my one on one time with me alone and friend, and her having her time is important. Yes. Oh yeah. But like have you guys done, like we, because if you're not doing sports together, I know you do a lot, I know you do your workout classes.

Yeah. Super admirable, like you jumping in because it's part of her life. Are there things that like dinner or night out or? Oh yeah. We have, we like, our general rule is one date at a week, but sometimes, you know, life. But we just recently did like a birthday trip to Vegas.

It was like, it was probably a total like 36 hours or something, but it was like so fun. Isn't that funny, like 36 hours with two is like a week and a half. It felt so long. And you're not away from the kids very long. So you don't like, you don't, cause if you're gone with your kids for more than two days,

you go crazy. You're like, I need to be with my babies, right? But just a really short trip, dude, you know what the best part was of this whole trip? He chose, oh, sorry. Oh no, you're good. The best part was the drive there. Five hours and we just got to talk.

Just me and her, no phones, no audio book, no podcast. We're big road trip fans. It was amazing. That's why he chose to do a road trip. He's like the flight is really short but we could just road trip so we could actually just drive which was the whole point of the trip was like to connect. Yeah. And so that was really fun. And then second best part, the freaking spa dude. We never would have liked that before kids. We would have wanted to hike, do something like jump from that little thing at the top of the, in Vegas. What's the thing that you can bungee jump from?

There's a space needle. We would have wanted to do those things. Now we're like, this spa sounds wonderful. But are you guys good about date nights? Yeah, we do one every Thursday. That's amazing. Oh, I love that. And it was one of those, I love that. Yeah. And what's your-

And it was one of those things I remember with Sutton. It took us eight months before we went out alone. And I didn't even realize. I remember always, not judging, but I was like, I don't ever want to be that parent who never has quality time together after a kid's born. And then I remember Sutton eight months went by and I was like, I get it now. It's so much you don't understand until you understand.

And I knew like number two, we both said like we wanna be way more intentional about that and so we have been. That's awesome. What are like typical, do you do dinner a lot? Yeah, we love dinner. Yeah. We're foodies.

Yeah, we're like, pick a spot that we like an appetizer and if we wanna order the next thing, we'll order, otherwise we'll walk in somewhere else. If. And if we want to order the next thing, we'll order it. Otherwise we'll walk in somewhere else. If not, we'll have to like the next morning. Oh, that'd be fun. When we grew up in, like our engagements and our dating, we were living in Chicago where it's like, walk out the door, pick a direction, walk,

and you'll find 10 new spots. Wow. So we're big in that. Yeah, we're foodies, we travel to eat. That's fun. And who plans out the date nights? I feel like it's very, we're not like a, yeah. I'm not like, you do this week,

I'll do the next week type person. We're pretty much like, all right, we have the night, like let's go here and then we'll figure out what we wanna do after. And it's usually, we're very go with the flow people. So we'll like call up a friend, see if anyone's doing anything, meet someone at a bar or restaurant, hop around.

Somebody might have things going on, might be live music. We love live shows. Somebody might have things going on, might be live music. Live music, we love live music. Fine, I love that. I feel like that's one of those important things you can do to take care of your marriage. Like if you wanna be good parents, good leaders for your kids, you gotta be,

you know, you've gotta be unified as one, right? Like there's a, I think Abraham Lincoln, like one of his speeches back in the 1800s, he said like a house divided amongst itself won't stand or will fall. There's a lot of truth to that. Like you need to be unified. I think you can't plan intentional time, right?

Like you can't plan, like right now we're gonna have 10 minutes of heart to heart and get to know each other. One of my favorite quotes is, if you want 10 minutes quality time spend three hours, right? Like you're never gonna find it. That's just like dagger to the heart right there. That's so good And with two and as our families hopefully I believe you guys want your family to grow more or not We definitely do. Yeah, the time is gonna get tighter Yeah, and what felt like a day, like what we could accomplish in a day, it feels like what two we can accomplish

in like three days now, right? So that whole idea of three hours to get 10 minutes, if you're rushing your date night, if you're rushing to have a meal, because you need the box checked, you're not gonna get the intentional time. And that, to me, I think that's why we are go with the flow, where it's like, tonight's date night,

we'll order the damn pizza and eat in the car. And if one of us is like, you know what? Bowling sounds fun. Maybe we'll run and go bowling. Maybe we'll sit under the stars. Maybe we'll go to the Dorothea Dix Park and sit under the art show. But it's very much to just find that intentional time.

And this is something I think we're learning through. We're trying to figure out how to do it with our children as well. And that's, right now Rosie's still breastfeeding, right? Tied to mom. Sutton is starting to tie to me. Yeah, big, it's everything is dad right now. It's, you know, we're in the car seat.

No, I want data. So we're very intentional. Sutton loves getting her nails done. So she's starting to take. So yeah, so now it's, and yeah, now I'm taking Sutton to get her little nails done and trying to do more of like intentional one on one time. I feel like we used to do everything as like a unit.

And not that it doesn't work, but I feel like Sutton definitely needs that. That's interesting. I feel like we don't really separate the kids very much. They're kind of usually always like, yeah, we probably should do one on one time with each of them. Yeah. I think especially as they get older too, like now that Griffin can talk, he can speak like they're very short sentences or like three word sentences, but still he's able to communicate with us. And I think, yeah, having one-on-one time. Well actually-

This morning he said he always, he does look out for Augie. And like he said to us, like he tells, Augie can go down the stairs by himself. He knows to turn around and like scoot down. But he said, come on Augie, cause he wasn't coming down the stairs cause we were like, we're gonna have breakfast. And he's like, mon Augie, mon Augie. coming down the stairs because we were like, we're gonna have breakfast. He's like, mon, Augie, mon, Augie.

And I'm like, he'll come down eventually. And then when Augie finally made his way to the stairs, Griffin goes, turn around, turn around. So then we're like, sounds the same way. She's like, whoa, you need, and then she like sticks the passie in her mouth. I'm like, she doesn't need that right now. She's like, her crying, her crying.

And I'm like, she's fine. She's like, she not fine. Well, something that I think is- We started to look out for each other. I know, it's so cute. Well, something that I think is absolutely beautiful about your story is you guys didn't just give your kids names because they sounded cool.

That's honestly what we did. We were just like, oh, this is like, Griffin sounds sick. We're just gonna name our- That does sound sick. Honestly- That's a really good name. Their middle names are meaningful. Their middle names are meaningful, but it's like, you know what, Griffin sounds freaking dope. Let're just gonna name our. It does sound sick. Honestly. That's a really good name. Their middle names are meaningful. Their middle names are meaningful, but it's like, you know what, Griffin sounds freaking dope.

Let's name our kid Griffin. Augie, okay, August is his full name. We're like, that sounds so cool. But like with you guys, you were very intentional with like the story behind your daughter's names. Could you guys like elaborate on that a little bit for anybody that might not know? Like we said, I went to school for creative writing.

I just love storytelling. It's my favorite thing ever. You want meaning in everything and that's awesome. What do you say? You like to have meaning in everything. I know, it's the writer in me. But so Sutton, I never was a person who had like a list in my phone of like baby names.

And when we were dating, I was in North Carolina and Tom was in Carbondale. Carbondale. I was kicking off my mom grew up around there. The fact that you haven't brought her to the wineries. They have wineries there that will blow away Napa. But they're a lot cheaper too. In Carbondale? Heron specifically. My mom, so my entire side of the family grew up in Southern Illinois. Blue Sky, Russell Hill, killer. Crazy. He's friends with a coach of Q&D in Quincy. What? You're friends with the Q&D coach? Jack Cornell, we were teammates. What? Which I know, that's a big family in Quincy. Okay, for people that are confused,

Abby grew up in a really tiny town in Illinois called Quincy, Illinois. It's like five hours from Chicago and it's right across the river from Hannibal, Missouri. It's really more Missouri than Illinois. And in Hannibal, everybody knows Hannibal because of Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, you know, all that. Anyway, sorry.

Small world. That's crazy. Okay, crazy. Yeah, so he was on there and I was in North Carolina and We would meet halfway like once every couple of months or whatever is whatever we could do But you know back when it's dating and fun where you drive for seven hours or six hours I have one night together. It was five hours and 40 minutes to be exact And there was five hours and 40 minutes from both of us was a restaurant called Sutton's

And there was five hours and 40 minutes from both of us was a restaurant called Sutton's in Lexington, Kentucky It was five hours and 40 minutes for both of you Yeah, so each of us drove that amount we would meet there. So we had met at this restaurant It was so cute. The owner. Yeah Sorry No, go ahead His daughter was named Sutton or the owner's daughter You know those places you go to eat and they just make you feel at home. He's an older man, he owns it. Not older but just he had white hair that's why I thought of it.

Yeah yeah. But he would check on every table. And would be very not like I'm the owner just check on you. And then we were small talking and he's like oh I actually I started this and. I was like yeah where's the name Sutton come from? He's like oh it's my daughter's name and I had like never thought of. He's at this Italian place and he's like, which is a terrible name for Italian place, I guess. I just got chills. Like when you guys said that this old man named his restaurant after his daughter.

Yeah. And I fell in love. I was always like, well, if we ever get married one day and you have a kid, I feel like Sutton would just be our story. Yeah. I mean, those little road trips got us through well over a year of long distance dating. And it was pretty typically there. Yeah. Those little road trips got us through like well over a year of long distance dating

and it was pretty typically there. Yeah. Yeah. That's so special. So that was where Sutton's name came about. So then Rosie, I'm like, okay, Sutton has this baller name. I'm like, you know, not competing with it,

but I do like a name that has a story and I could not think of anything. I mean, I was 37 weeks pregnant and still we did not have a name for this child. We thought she was going into labor at 30. It was like 30. It was probably 37 weeks. That was when it probably was. We were sitting watching a movie like this. Or it was early. So it was like 35. She did one of these and held up her pants and it was soaked. But Sutton was laying there earlier. We don't know. We still don't know. Should I say it's a

mystery? But there was a puddle of water and I was like, Tom, I think my water broke. I was like, you need to smell it. We need to Google what's happening. We called the OB. This was number two. So, you know, my nose is in there. You're a little more chill. You're also a little more chill. Yeah. And then it was like, you know, if any more leakage happens, like you need to get to the hospital. We were not at home and we had to make a drive back. So they told us like monitor and drive back. On the drive, we're like, we don't have a name.

We don't have a name. And not a starting point. Yeah, I had nothing. And I knew I wanted to do something with an ode to Tom's mom because she had passed while we were when I found out I was pregnant like within the same two weeks of each other and So I asked his sister what her favorite flower was she was obsessed with flowers You asked that like right before right before we were with my sister. Yeah at like a little vacation So that the conversation was happening

when we, as we thought this. And I was like, you know, what was Lenore's favorite flower? And she told me a rose. And rose hadn't like, it didn't do it for me all the way. But then- Anyone with the baby named Rose, you're good. No, you're good.

It just didn't do it for us. It was like I needed a little something more to it. And it was like I needed a little something more to it. And it was like two weeks later I saw someone with the name Rosie. And I was like, I love Rosie. Like that to me is darling. Not that Rose isn't. They are both darling. But it just had more connection to me. Do you know the middle name? What?

You can do the middle name. My mom's name's Lenore, so her middle name's Noor, so it's Rosie Noor. Oh. That's so sweet. So she has a very beautiful name. Oh, that's so sweet. And it means a lot.

And yeah, both of our children have these cute names, now the third one I'm like, we might as well just do a cool name that we like now. Break the pressure. Yeah, that's so sweet. I love that story. Yeah, I'm so, I'm so, so sorry for what you guys have been through. I mean, yeah, I mean, I mean, there's just like nothing to really say there. I just, I just think it's so cool that you obviously are remembering your mom with your daughter's name. And that's actually,

it's crazy that you say that you guys said that because we actually did a similar thing with our son Griffin. His middle name is Abby's grandpa's middle name and we lost him three years ago. And so him carrying that on too is like really special to our family. I love that. Yeah.

A lot of people know about my mom. My father died four years ago in October. And this is coming up on people know about my mom. My father died four years ago in October So and and this is coming up on one year my mom so raising uh, just death in general, but like having kids and not having their grandparents or great grandparents or There there is There is like a crazy emotional thing there because you're You guys picked it because I assumed there was great love. Yeah, oh yeah. Right. And you want to honor that great love and there is something in my mind that happens a lot thinking about my mom and dad not knowing them is they taught me great love and

my kids aren't going to feel it. They're not gonna get that from them. But I know they'll get it from us. And I know how important that, my parents' love is what made me me. And is gonna charge me to be a great father. So I think names, when you do things like that and you have people that drive you to be better to, as parents, to honor your kids. And one day tell her, if I'm like,

hey, let me tell you about your mental name. And that should give you butterflies, because your kid's gonna feel it. You know what I mean? So I get why it holds up. Man, you're gonna make me cry, Tom. I'm like, feeling it there. Let's go in a new direction now.

He's gonna die. Dang it, man. He's very well spoken. I don't have mascara on, but it's gonna start dripping somehow. I don't know. But that's a really cool point that you bring up that like, even though they're not here to love all your kids that like, in a way their love is like what's charging you, so they get to feel their love.

Yeah. That's really special. It's the best motivation in the world too. It's hard but it is good. How are you so wise? Like did you just have like a, did you have like a really incredible father or grandpa? Like how are you so, I feel like you have a lot of wisdom and maturity. I have an amazing father. True, I, my dad, my dad is, you know, some of his phrases

like just popped in my mind like, Tom, like, you're gonna meet people different than you and you got to love it because if everyone was like you, this world would suck. And he did global sales. So he was, you know, everybody. He would take it off his shirt for anybody. I mean, there was nobody that wasn't his friend. And he was a reader and a thinker. And me and him, we clicked so well that every time we'd sit, it felt like our brain was in the same place. That's awesome.

I had a grandpa that worked his ass off. He was an alcoholic and almost cost our family everything. And when the grandkids started coming, got healthy, and he was the best grandpa we'll ever know. That's beautiful. Just had a lot, yeah, family. And honestly, sadly, starting sophomore year of college, a lot of family that died.

And when that starts to happen, you start to really like stop thinking that life will last till you're 80. And you start embracing a lot more. And it sucks, because there's a lot of people in my life I wish were still here, but like a lot of stuff doesn't bug me. Right?

Yeah. Little things do not get out of my mind. Probably gonna be a problem at some point a lot of stuff doesn't bug me. Right? Yeah. Little things do not get out of my mind. Probably gonna be a problem at some point with our kids. Rachel, why do you think Tom has so much wisdom? I feel like you've been through a lifetime that a person shouldn't have to go through. That's fine. But it's great because she's the yin to my yang because I'm not well spoken like him.

But I'm a great writer and I'm very creative and we pair so well in that sense. So it's so fun like making TikToks and things. I love to, he's my main character. You are my muse. I really, I think your relationship's beautiful and I admire just the love that you guys have for one another. And I admire, yeah, I admire your wisdom, Tom.

And I think I admire that because I feel like I just recently realized that I've been operating as a husband and father, but without the wisdom that I should have. I was lucky, I have a lot of mentors that are 50, 60, even 70. Like I have, I am very intentional at saying like, I don't know a lot.

And I would say intellectually I can I can stand up and I read and blah blah but I don't know shit and I think the more you say like I don't know a damn thing what do you know what have you learned in your life yeah shut up and listen yeah you know what I mean and it could be taking it and saying, I appreciate that, but I'm gonna question that one. Right, like trust but verify. I have good mentors, I really always have. That's a big one for me.

And even like, I look back, sophomore year of high school is when people, my three-year-old cousin got hit by a drunk driver on Christmas Eve. That's what we woke up to. And it destroyed my family systematically, people dying and taking their lives from then forward. Gene Nolan, Larry Tucker, Pat Hennessy, were people at my high school that were older

and wrapped their arms around me. Said, Tom, like we're here. And I let them, and I listened, like they got me through that, period. You know, so I like I wish I could I could tell you more but like I trust a lot of people in my life and I take my rails down and I shut my mouth and I listen when I need to. I would tell anybody just listen. Like find good people and listen. And get rid of, like we're parents now,

like the ones that drag you down, the energy suckers, the ones who make you question, your marriage, question your parenthood, like seal your walls. When that incident happened, when that drunk driver hit the three-year-old family member Ashley Ashley or actually was your family member Ashley was my three-year-old cousin. Yeah I'm so sorry

When when that happened? You said these these other these mentors came around you and surrounded you with love That was people at your high school older older students that heard about what happened That was my basketball coach the the principal, the school, and the counselor. They're also, I went to a private school. I drove six because of sports. I drove 60 minutes away to get to the school that academically and athletically would put me where I wanted to get, which was getting into the pros, football or basketball. And that school was great academically and it was great athletically. So they were people I chose to go to that school because they were there.

So when they saw that it was breaking me, like they knew, you know what I mean? Like drinking came out of nowhere, like playing with like experimenting with people that do drugs and hanging out with them. Because it's like what you know, they saw it.. Yeah, well when you're at that level of point, it's like nothing matters anymore probably. No, I wanted to figure out why this happened and how to hide it. It's my first time dealing with pain. And what did they do that helped you?

Just there. And being there, was it just at school? Was it outside of school too, checking up on you? Pat Hennessy was like, Tom, he gave me a rock to hold in my pocket. He's like, you're a rock, you keep everything emotional inside and you smile.

You make everyone else happy. One day, you will be in big trouble if you don't take that rock out of your pocket and let your emotions out. Like, truly. That was his. Gene Nolan just sat me down all the time. He knew my family personally.

He was like, how's your parents doing? How's Uncle Mike doing? Have you seen Bridget and the kids? Like, he knew my family. So he just embraced me like you would do for someone you love. And did you feel like with having these mentors surround you and be there for you,

were you, did you like then feel the need like since you were supported to be there for members of your family or at the time as a child, were you just like, you know, like how did you navigate? I was always the I'll do whatever you ask. Yeah. I was always I had the I was the oldest of a lot of little cousins who I love and our family was like this for that accident. I didn't like up till sophomore year high school My weekends were like going to one of the Ants house so all the aunts and uncles can go out to have dinner And I stay with all the kids. That's awesome. You know so like Yeah, I

So that's how I grew and that's how my dad was You know like yeah, like we and I'm trying to like be better because it drove my dad into a depression And there's a lot of layers to that. Yeah, including him losing his siblings And but like I I'm trying to be more cognizant of like I definitely can't take care of myself I have to take care of myself to take care of others Right, like I can't always just say yes if I just get worn down and all of a sudden I'm at a wall and I can't go forward. So I'm still learning a lot of that.

You're helping me, obviously. I mean, I hate topics like this because they're so sad and so dark. But I guess the hope I have in talking about this is that someone could hear this right now that is going through something like that or might be about to go through something like that. What should they know?

Like what should they? I'll tell you some universal things here. If you know somebody that lost somebody, doesn't matter if it was 10 years ago, five years ago, three years, three years three months Like they need to they need to be asked about it. Yeah And just straight up ask them. Yeah, I mean my dad just hit four years We get asked about my mom a lot like and that's not a it's just like my dad feels like it was yesterday

I'm still processing my dad very much The holidays are coming Like if you know people that lost somebody and you know it's in them, just ask. Throw an olive. You can't force it. You can't grill it. There's nothing worse than a fake compliment. Somebody tells you they like your shoes and you're like, oh man, it could pick you up. if they said it because it's superficial you know the difference Yeah, right like given honest like hey are you missing dad? Mm-hmm, or have you thought about him and I'm thinking like a tax Oh my god attacks like I'm thinking of Uncle Tom or thinking your dad Yeah, we'll get that a lot thinking about Christian about Tommy today, and it doesn't necessarily have to be like a question

I think about them in a doesn't necessarily have to be like a question. I think about it. To put them in a situation where they have to answer. I think about it a dozen times a day, every single day, my dad and my mom. So when somebody else says they are too, it is like illuminating. Yeah.

It's not sad. Yeah. It like, you know, cause I'll tell you, I'm like, oh my God. We have at our house, our TV screen, we have always a picture slideshow going at all times. And it's just photos that we've accumulated throughout the years, but a lot of them are of his parents

or people who are no longer with us. And it's fun to see those and Joe Sutton. And she'll look at a picture of your mom and be like, grandma. Like she was at the age where, you know, we don't know if she has that memory, but it's cool that we can show her who she is. Yeah.

And that's just a really special thing. One other thing too, like is somebody hearing this, the messages I get and things like, your crazy feelings and emotion, like other people have them. Like when you feel guilt or sad or upset or happy about weird shit, after somebody,

like other people have them too. Like having my daughter like Rosie recently and me being like, mom and dad don't get to meet you and it like really, my mom and dad don't get to meet you, like really like messing me up that like The highest joy the lowest low like meeting in the middle

Like the amount of times I question like should I be able to should I be allowed to feel like this? I think in parents in general There's a lot of like am I allowed to feel like this? So that's a that's a big one The question that i'm afraid to ask because of just like I cannot imagine what it would be like is kind of like what you saw from the perspective of the family members

that ended up taking their life because of what happened. And I guess the thing that freaks me out the most is what if that were to happen to someone that I know or like one of my close relatives right or or what if what if I were ever to experience the the horror story of what your family went through but in my own home and so I guess my question is if something like that happens what do you do to maintain your sanity like as as a parent, like if you're a parent that loses a child, what do you do so that you don't end up taking your own life?

I have, I got nothing. I'll be honest, everyone, I've seen a lot of people, everyone handles it differently. Everyone takes it out and, you know, I've read a lot of books on it, right? Cause I went through it. Like I vividly remember one of them saying like your family member might take it all out on your family because you will take it out on

the people that are closest to you because there is a subconscious that they will forgive you. Which is a weird, weird thing because they got angry, like there were people angry, right? Like and sometimes like it's easier to bring in the person and tell them all of your secrets and all of your pain That's a stranger because you can kick them to the curb Right, like it's harder to do that with family. So I I honestly I have no clue I've none. I have a lot of reflecting right now one of my biggest things is I've been given the advice like you're analyzing a lot, you know where your pain came from,

you know why your shortcomings are happening a little more often. I need you to start telling the story of your dad as much as you can and I need you to start thinking about the future and tomorrow and what you're gonna do rather than analyzing the past. And that was just in the last two weeks, three weeks. So that's kind of where my mind's at.

I wish I could give you more. I wish I could tell somebody that's going through it, like, hey, do this, because I don't want you to have to live through pain. And I have no clue what that is. And not that I have all the answers or anything. I almost feel like there's probably a lot of hope in community, probably.

Or like, even, and if you don't have community, like there's probably a lot of hope in community probably. Or like even, and if you don't have community, maybe like if you're going through something traumatic to go talk to a therapist, because that's probably the closest thing you can get to community without actually having community if you're in a new city and you don't know anybody, you know?

That's hard. Thank you for being open to sharing that. I know for a fact that's gonna help someone that's listening to this. So thank you. You wanna put your marriage on the line, go through it and you'll know if you got a good spouse. I mean, having kids, you gotta know you have a good spouse.

Yeah. Even making the decision, I don't care when you make it, you gotta have a good spouse. Because you get it, like even at two kids, like man, you gotta be able to lean on each other Yeah, you're so right. I mean there's a reason that so many marriages fail after After kids because you go. I mean that's a lot to go through as a couple all the ups and downs of that together and

Yeah, that's that's why I love your story because you guys are like making food and like, you know That's that's why I love your story because you guys are like making food and like, you know Doing doing good things in the world. Yeah, you talk a lot about having good mentors But I know that you guys are an awesome mentor as a couple to so many not just online But like to all the college students you served like think about the impact like on those people's like you're not just like Receiving wisdom from others you are sharing that so the impact like on those people's like you're not just like receiving wisdom from others you are sharing that so humbly and with so much service to others too so that's really cool share a little bit I know cuz I know we're probably you know probably but share a little bit about your like the way you

do with college students because it's yeah you can take a break from, speaking of your life. Well, okay, hey guys. College meals, I went to school out of state, so I didn't know anybody. I went to Appalachian State. And there is that feeling of the- Is that how you say that? Appalachian. Appalachian. I always said Appalachian.

It's not Appalachian, it's Appalachian. No, wait. No, I'm not. Wait, wait, wait, okay, set the record straight for everyone watching this right now. Well, now you're freaking me out. It's Appalachian. It's not Appalachian, it's Appalachian. No, I'm not. Wait, wait, wait. Okay, set the record straight for everyone watching this right now. Well, now you're freaking me out. It's Appalachian. Appalachian is the official way. It's Appalachian.

Okay, I like that. Are you sure? Yeah. 99% sure? Well, my accent might be doing a little weird thing to it, but it's Appalachian. Okay, what is your accent? Chicago accent.

Chicago. That makes sense. I think she picks up accents because the Chicago people are like, where is that coming from? No, because I grew up five hours from Chicago and I couldn't put a pin on where your accent was from, but Appalachian. Is that how they say it though when you're like in the area?

Because I feel like the locals probably know how to say it better than the people that aren't local. Yeah, well, I mean, I said Appalachian and then I went there and it's Appalachian. Okay, I like it. Sorry, it is Matt. I feel gaslit right now because I've said Appalachian my whole life. I'm trying to think if my teacher, my high- North Carolina is known for making names different

to tell who's from there. Beaufort, Beaufort. Yeah, I don't know. That's getting into it. So I believe her. Sorry, I'm just trying to think back. And she went to school there. All right, back to the-

Yes, yes, sorry. No, you're good. So 12 hours from home. So my third week of college or whatever it was it's Labor Day weekend and it's a state school so everyone kind of went back home and I was alone in the dorm and I was like I and I cannot be alone I'm really bad at that and so I called up that family friend that I had told you guys about

earlier and she said you can come on out to Raleigh and we'll be here for the weekend and we'll host you and I did that and for the next four years anytime there was like a holiday or I couldn't make it home or I just needed a home cooked meal or just to be with a family and be in a home and feel loved I would go over there they were my family my adopted family and be in a home and feel loved, I would go over there. They were my family, my adopted family, and that's what I always called them. And so that to me felt like a big reason, not why we started the college meals,

but I love that reasoning behind it because I always felt like I wish I could just be in someone's home, even if it was for 15 minutes, or have a home cooked meal from someone. in someone's home, even if it was for 15 minutes or have a home cooked meal from someone. But that family friend had a neighbor who is our college kid, Kevin. And at the time though, he was like eight when I met him.

So we didn't really like know each other, but I would go over to their house for Easter. And then when we moved out to Raleigh, Tom saw him at the gym and he- And I think I had met him once. Yeah, you had met him like once in his life at that lake house. And I like literally like crept up to the picture.

I was like, that's Kevin, right? She's like, yes. I'm like, yes. And I was like, go talk to him. Like, don't be a weirdo. Like, go say hey. So I walked up and he's two weeks, three weeks into his freshman year of college at NC State,

which where we live, it's like in our backyard, it's throughout our whole community, state is. And COVID had just closed the dorms and the cafeterias. So he's finding an apartment. And learning how to cook on his own, all of the things. That just went back to like my college experience, like without like the cafeteria freshman year,

you got so many other things on your mind. It's just a big transition. We had been, the Rachel Ray Show, she gave us a year free of groceries so I could keep cooking for my wife. 280 bucks a week. I never spent more than 75, because I'm like, it's just the two of us.

It's so much extra money for just the two of us. So much, it was from Misfits. We'll give them a little shout out because they were awesome. Why not? We spent 75 bucks a week in college. This was also pre-COVID. So I would just add some extra stuff

and I would text them, hey, and of course the first one I'm showing off to them. We have surf and turf, literally grilled lobster. He's like, I'll be over. He came over for dinner and I was like, yeah, I'll be there. And the first few times that he came through, I would send little, I would take little videos and I'd send it to his mom because we were friends.

And I'd be like, Kevin's getting a meal, but like, don't worry about it. We're taking care of him. And at that point I had like 10 or so videos together. And so I made a compilation and I posted a TikTok and I was like, we adopted this college student named Kevin and he returns his Tupperware. And again, it hit. He returns his Tupperware. Yeah, and it went, it hit.

He would always come in with it washed, which I'm sure. It was so sweet. Yeah, I'm sure they instilled, I mean, they were great parents, so they totally instilled that in Kevin. But after that, the TikTok went viral about it and we had so many DMs of people being like,

I want someone to cook for me. And it was overwhelming the amount of people who were like, I wish that I could have a home cook for me or something like this. And so we'd talk like, what if we just like throw up on Instagram story that we're cooking, you know. Again, it was a holiday, it was like Labor Day weekend.

DM me if you have a college ID and you can get to Raleigh. I'll give you the address. And it wasn't like come hang out at our house. It was like come take some food and like kind of be on your merry way. Because like Kevin's first ten times we're always grabbing and go every now and then he would talk but College remember you're busier than ever like life is always a million miles an hour So it was very intentional of like you don't need to hang with us like just grab it and go Hang if you need to sit on the couch football be on. We always do them on Sundays. And yeah so we we had two three people show up to the first meal and Kevin and

his friend being one of them and then this girl named Krista and she sent us a letter afterwards it was a text and and it was saying how meaningful this was to her, and that she was in between jobs and didn't have time to grab some food that day, and it just like, it meant a lot. And that was kind of the moment, me and Tom were like, it really meant something to someone, right?

And we said, as long as we have the means to be able to do it, like the funds, because we can't afford to do able to do it, like the funds, because we can't afford to do this. So we're doing them every week. We'll keep cooking. So we just took Rachel Ray's groceries, and I was like, first one's spaghetti and meatballs. Like, I'll just order all the ground beef and all the ingredients.

And everything's cooked to the same way Rachel has to eat. So that's kind of like a deep-seated meaning with the gluten-free and everything. So I'm like, I'll just use Rachel Ray's. Well, we get like, we'll just use Rachel Ray's. Well, we do another one and there's like seven kids. Then there's 15, then there's 40. It just keeps crawling up. And now there's like hundreds signed up.

Oh my gosh. So then I'm like, and shh. You had to sign up at this point. Yeah, oh yeah, you had to sign up at this point. And it was the whole thing. Like, I'm working a full-time job. Like, this isn't social media went. Like, social media was how we got these students invited.

And we always felt like, because we were on Rachel Ray and Yahoo and there was a bunch of artists, like, at least they could send their parents, like, look, they were on this, you know what I mean? Like, some credibility. Just some credibility to it. Totally. Which was funny, because one person,

just the last meal, selfie was like, I gotta show this to my mom because I said I'm going to a TikTokker's house. I'm going to a TikTokker's house, she's like, what? That's so funny. So anyways, we got to meal like six and there's hundreds signed up. And I said, we can't afford,

we just can't afford this. So we opened a GoFundMe and I said, as long as this is filled, I will cook. I don't care what, I love that part of it for me. And that's part, truly that's a healing thing for me. It puts me just in a good place, the process. And it was, we opened the GoFundMe, it's filled in like an hour.

And then overfilled. So then it went to hundreds of students. So now, I mean, the signup list is thousands of students and it's not just like one who were in Raleigh. So the majority- The last meal had nine. Nine universities. Yeah. So it's like NC State, Duke, UNC- Which ruined your end party. 1,500 was the capacity for the place. It was filled in six minutes. We had somebody drive 10 hours from Ball State, Ohio to come to it with their friend. It's so cool because like yes the meal is like probably delicious and like but it just shows the thing that I remember really lacking. It's so funny that it was on Sundays

because in college I was so sad on Sundays because that's when my family would all have a meal at my grandma's house. And I would always tell my mom, I'm like, I'm sad on Sundays because we'd always be with grandma and our whole family together and now I'm just alone on Sundays and it just feels like not an event.

So that's so cool that you're not just providing that meal, you're providing community and a sense of home and that comfort that comes with it. Yeah. That's really- You hit it right on the head. Yeah. People ask us, they're like, well, why do they need food?

Everyone just needs community. Some of them need just a house to walk into, a break from their day. That's not our place. Our door's just open. I don't care why you're here. Like, just come. That's so cool.

There's a million reasons why people come and it's not for us to judge. And we work with the universities on the back end and let them know that we have them. And it's on those groups that, their students that need food, tell them to come. We don't need to know they're coming. Let them walk in with the rest of their students. Like, you know what I mean. We don't need to know they're coming. Let them walk

in with the rest of their students. Like you know what I mean? Yeah. The rest of your peers and. Yeah. But yeah, now it's now we used to do it like once every other week for the first. We did every week, then every other week, then Sutton came. And then Sutton came, then we did it monthly. And now we're kind of back to that like monthly routine. We just did our first one since Rosie for Thanksgiving. Yeah, that was super fun. That was so cool. You guys are so cool. That's crazy to be feeding hundreds of students

like at your own home. It's wild, it's at her home, right? Does that freak you out like with like privacy and stuff at all with like. No, it doesn't me. No. I'll never make a decision based off like what somebody bad could do, right?

Like I'm not too worried. Yeah, wow. If, I would tell you this, here, you're invited. You guys ever wanna come to a meal, you can help me cook, you can be a part of it, you can help serve and walk them through. You will see some of the most grateful people. The amount of people we have to

beg them to go grab more Tupperware and get more food. We're so frugal. We're like, please eat more, grab more. It's so nice you guys are doing this. We're like, no, like grab the food. That's so cool. Wait, what if like there was a non-for-profit that just fed people free food? Like what? There's like dozens of them. No, well I know, but like I feel like you have to pass certain criteria. Like what if it was like literally for anybody. Like you could be a billionaire or you could have not a penny to your name and you can just come here

and eat for free. Like wouldn't that be so cool? The bureaucracy behind it's tough. But I will also give a shout out, place at the table, Raleigh. It's pay as you can. More than 80% of the people don't pay a penny. Wow, I love that.

It's a massive kitchen, it's great food. It's great food. Every community should have a place like that and there are places that are making it happen. That's awesome. That gets me fired up. What you guys are doing gets me fired up. I just love to hear stories of people doing good things

just because, not because of any benefit to them, just because. That's awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for coming on our show. Thank you. This was so much fun. I really enjoyed talking to you. So thank you. This was great. Thanks for having us. And your kids are awesome. And I know you guys need to go, yeah, be parents and do all that. So we get But um, I guess if you've listened to this whole episode, please go like buy their book buy their books Show it wait. Yeah, can we show the book? Yeah, what's the official date that it's out so February 27 Wow

February 25th a 25th. February 25th. February 25th. It comes out. It's beautiful. Look at a little sneaky peek. It is beautiful. Wow, the photos are amazing.

Yeah, they're. Okay, the photos are amazing. Rachel is as honest as she was in this and writes extremely well and will make you feel like her arms are around you and make you feel like you are doing a great job. Like her writing in this, everyone looks at the photos and she organizes the photos too, that's her touch.

Yeah. But there's writing in there that walks you through pregnancy and there's advice from both of us, the topics we hit. Be intentional in this moment. Your life will change after this baby comes. So stop right now and talk about the things you love right now. And then get jacked up about the change.

That's the purpose of it. It would make an amazing gift. You find out a friend's pregnant. I know, right? It's so fun. Perfect. It starts at week eight, right? Yeah.

So that's usually right. That's like first all for sound. That was like our thought. That's such a perfect gift. Every week has three recipes. And it's so perfect too, cause you don't have to think. No one wants to meal plan. Like you could just be like, okay, well,

what are we having this week, babe? Some of them are so- What's our cute little thing? Yeah. To celebrate. Some, it's, there's some desserts. Like I showed you one of the mocktails is a cucumber. Delish. Mock a cucumber margarita.

Delicious. Mocktails, appetizers, Tom mixes fruit with meat, which doesn't sound good, but I promise it's delicious. I wish you guys were our neighbors. I would just come over to your house all the time and eat your food. Seriously, I want to invite them for dinner. I'd say, honey, what do you got? You busting through the door.

Honey, what do you got? Well, today, Matt, me and you are going to cook for Abby and Rachel. Let's go! Baby number three together we go! Oh my gosh. You guys, the book is beautiful and make an amazing gift or just something to have like on your bookshelf in your kitchen. It's so cute.

I'm so excited. Crafted with love. Yeah, you can tell so much thought and like genuine thought when it's that so pick it up February 25th. Yes well thank you both so much and yeah this is this is great so bye so bye