Should I Do Fertility Testing? Listener Q&A – Ep. 328

Laura

Welcome to Big Fat Positive with Shanna and Laura. This week, we have our weekly check-ins. We have our special segment, Check in the Inbox Part 2, where we dive into questions you sent us, both big and small, and maybe even pick a listener's baby names. And we close with our BFPs and BFNs. Let's get started. Hi, everyone. Welcome to the show. This is episode 328, and I'm here with Shanna on the line. Hello, Shanna. What? What? Hello.

Shanna

I don't know where that came from.

Laura

Hey, at least it wasn't. What's that?

Shanna

Oh, yeah, exactly. Hello.

Laura

Hello, I do want to know what's up and you can't do it with a straight face. What is going on in your life shot and get me out of this loop of a terrible joke about a ad that played what like 25 years ago?

Shanna

Yes. Yes. Okay. Moving on from that, the big news in our house this week is that L has decided to run for student council at school.

Laura

Ooh, a girl after my own heart. This is reminding me of my youth. Shanna, were you ever a running for student office type?

Shanna

Absolutely. I ran every year in high school. I don't know that... I don't know that my junior high and elementary had student council. I don't know. But my memories are from high school. I ran pretty much every year. I did not always win. Some of my campaigns were ridiculous. I did win the year that no one was running against me. So I came A student body publicity manager. And that was really fun.

Laura

Excuse me. Go back. Student body publicity manager? That was a role?

Shanna

Yes. Yes, it was. I was in charge of, I don't know, posters and like reading updates in the morning announcements. And my favorite task was my friend Karine and I, she was the senior class publicity manager. We would go out and change the marquee outside of the school, you know, back when all marquees had like individual plastic letters that you had to suction to a tall pole and plop up one by one up on the marquee. So we spent a lot of time changing messages on marquees while dudes drove by and honked at us grotesquely.

Laura

Yeah, yeah, that sounds like the experience of a high school girl. I'm jealous of the marquee changing thing though. I remember so clearly just the deep desire to be in charge of that and not knowing who got to do that, you know?

Shanna

Oh, oh, Laura, I wish you could have been there with me. It would have been good times.

Laura

But I agree. I don't think my elementary school had a student council, if I recall. I remember it starting in middle school, which is where I started running in earnest. And when I mean it in earnest, I mean very earnestly. I had very earnest platforms. I was going to change the school for the better. Yeah.

Shanna

Yeah. I believe it did. What position did you hold?

Laura

Well, in seventh grade, I made an unsuccessful bid for, I think, secretary. Like, I think I wanted to be the secretary of the student council because everything else seemed like a seventh grader wasn't qualified, you know, I need more life experience. But in eighth grade, I am proud to say that I ran for student body president and I won. And honestly, I was shocked to be fully honest. I did not think I win. I was not that popular. I didn't think, but apparently I won student body president and yeah, I took the role very seriously.

Shanna

We had good policies, you know? They speak for themselves. That's awesome, Laura. I imagine you were a terrific student body president.

Laura

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I have no recollection of what we actually did other than go to student council meetings and I just got to feel powerful and in charge.

Shanna

Awesome. Awesome. You mentioning running for secretary brought back a memory. One of the times I did run in high school was for like junior class secretary or something. And I was running against one of my best friends, Melissa, you know, Melissa. Oh yeah, I know Melissa. I don't know how or why this happened, but we were both running and we were the only two people running. And I remember being in Spanish class with her one day and the Spanish teacher overheard us talking about it and she goes, you're running for secretary and you're running for secretary? And we're like, yeah, she goes, one of you is going to lose.

Laura

She's been watching a lot of telenovelas. She's like, drama.

Shanna

So much drama. And Melissa and I looked at each other. We were like, yeah. And we kind of shrugged. And we were like, you know, we're mature enough. Our friendship can handle it. And it did. I lost. And I was very gracious. And Melissa won. She was a great secretary.

Laura

And she ended up being a bridesmaid in your wedding and everything is fine.

Shanna

Yes. Exactly.

Laura

Wow. Wow. Okay. So what is L running for? Is there like a title or is it just to be on the student council?

Shanna

She came home from school and said, mom, I want to run for vice president of student council. And I was like, oh, awesome. I did not know there was a student council. No one has told me about this process, the situation. Okay, cool. So I had to reach out to her teacher and be like, hey, Elle wants to run for vice president of student council. Can you give me any information? And the teacher wrote back and said, well, the student council is for third to fifth graders. And fifth graders usually hold the vice president and president positions. And we've already voted on those positions. They're filled.

Shanna

She's like, but what the third graders can run for is representative. So each class elects a representative to go to the meetings, etc. So I explained this to Al and she took it well. She was okay shifting from vice president to representative. And she had to fill out an application to do so, like answer questions, like why she wanted to be on student council, why she would be a good candidate. And I looked at this application and I had two reactions. One, I was really proud of her because I also did student council and I think it's a great thing. to my stomach dropped because I knew that this was going to be a process. I was going to have to manage very closely and I'm exhausted.

Laura

You are suddenly running for student council representative.

Shanna

Of third grade. Yes, exactly. That's how I felt. So it was definitely a process. It was difficult to get her to answer these questions. She would get frustrated and not know what to say. Get emotional and we had to take a break and come back to the next day. But we got the application in and she was officially on the ballot.

Laura

Whoa. Okay. So what's the process like? What's the timeline?

Shanna

So she turned in this application on Thursday. And on Monday, she needed to have a campaign poster, a speech, and a one-minute video showing how she exemplifies leadership on school and outside of school.

Laura

That's a lot of work for a weekend.

Shanna

Yes. And guess when we started all of this work?

Laura

Friday, right after school. So you would have all weekend to get it done.

Shanna

Oh yeah, you know me so well. Sunday at 3pm, I was like, oh shit, we've got a lot to do.

Laura

All right. So this is adorable. So I was going to ask what her slogan was, but obviously we can't use it because it rhymes with her name and is very clever. So but what I'm looking at is a very cool. She's got like a rocket ship. This is vote on it. She's vote L for student council rep. And it's this is so cute. So colorful. I like the color scheme. You got purples and greens and blues. Amazing. Was she happy with it?

Shanna

Oh yes, she loved it. She thought it was awesome. So while she was working on coloring in the poster, I was also helping her write her speech and making this video. And somehow we pulled it all together. And after it was all done, she started practicing her speech. And you know, I'm never sure how much to try to help and coach with that kind of thing. You know because sometimes you know you get like some attitude or backfire or insecurity like no I don't don't help me but you know I consider myself a pretty decent public speaker and I've got some skills and knowledge to pass on so I was trying little by little to sprinkle in some suggestions like she read it the first time I was like that's amazing try it again and just look up at the audience a little bit more. Let's try to make eye contact. And she did it again. And she like took that information and improved her speech.

Laura

So is this speech what you record for the one minute video? No, ma'am.

Shanna

This speech is what she presents to the class in public speaking form. Got it. And then she shows her video on the screen behind her in class. So we filmed her talking about how she's a leader outside of school. She's a big sister. You know, she does softball and theater, which shows her commitment and et cetera, et cetera. And I whipped together a rough cut edit on the computer and Steve like polished it and sent it off to the teacher. I'm just like, what is, what is elementary school these days? I can't even.

Laura

So funny. My vision of Steve, quote unquote, polishing it up is like just adding so many effects, you know? Well, It just, you know, because it's like, oh yeah, just give it to my dad who happens to be extremely skilled at video editing and like after effects and we get it and she's got like rotoscoping.

Shanna

Yeah, like the fanciest transitions. He did do some cool stuff with like flying photos in and stuff like that. That is cool. It was really cute.

Laura

Although in LA, you know that other parents have the same skills.

Shanna

I know, I know. True, true. It's more of an even playing field here for sure.

Laura

But what a great opportunity to learn all these different skills and to sort of make it seem like she wants to do it herself, right? Like you're not forcing her. She doesn't have to run, but it's a great opportunity to just focus on making marketing materials and learning how to give a speech and all that stuff. That's so cool.

Shanna

Yeah. Very, very cool opportunity.

Laura

OK, so wait, when's voting? When's the big day? I feel like because we're in the thick of the presidential election in the US right now, it feels even more impactful. Oh my gosh, when is voting? Is there early voting? Can people mail in their ballots? Yes, there's exit polls. There's a whole thing. How is she polling in Wisconsin?

Shanna

Great, they love her in the Midwest. Voting was right after the speeches and presentations. So when she came home from school, I was like, how did it go? Who else ran? What's going on? So she gave me the scoop. Six kids ran out of 26 in her class, some of her friends. Then she voted. I said, did you vote for yourself? And she said, no, that didn't seem quite right. So she voted for someone else, which I thought was really cute. And I'm like, well, who won? And she's like, we're not going to find out till Friday. And I'm like, ah. So I don't know.

Laura

You know what? Though 100%, that teacher could do the tally really quickly, but just doesn't want to because she doesn't want to ruin the rest of the week. Right?

Shanna

You're so right. Yeah. I was wondering why it would take so long. It's like it doesn't take long. 26.

Laura

That's amazing. I am crossing my fingers for her, but I think it's a good experience either way, you know?

Shanna

I agree. I totally agree. All right, that's it for us this week. I want to hear your check in.

Laura

Well, my check-in has to do with Augie and some developments I've noticed in him this week, specifically regarding his writing. So I've had mom anxiety about a lot of things in my journey as a parent. But one of the things that tends to recur is this worry that I am not doing enough direct instruction for my kids. Like, it tends to crop up when I'm scrolling through Instagram, say, just for example, not to really pin it on one particular thing, but let's just say you're scrolling through Instagram and you get fed some reels by some very attentive parents who set up some very elaborate lessons for their kids that look super fun and really just make learning to write and read so fun. And I look at those and I think, well, shit. I have done none of these things.

Shanna

Yes. And you've talked about before that he doesn't even really love that type of content, at least right now in his life, right? Like he's a little resistant to it. So that makes it even more like, why, why should you push it if he's just going to resist it?

Laura

Yeah, like you were talking about with L, how you were like so stoked that she was taking your direct instruction because it's a rare situation, right? Like we've talked about how L and Augie are two peas in a pod many times in the past. And I think this is probably something similar, right? Like they like to do their thing at their pace. And when I try to intervene and directly teach him something, he's like, no, thank you. And just ops out or has a meltdown or, you know, it's just not worth it. And I've also gotten criticism from like my mom being like, how come Augie doesn't really know his letters? I'm like, he knows his letters. He just, she's like, well, I asked him what this letter was and he told me the wrong one. I was like, he's fucking with you. Like he's intentionally telling you the wrong thing because he hates being put on the spot like that. And she's like, okay.

Shanna

Oh my gosh.

Laura

All right, so I sent you a series of photos.

Shanna

Okay, here we go. Magnus is on the photon. And we've got Augie here with the paper and the pen. Oh, those letters look very good, very well formed. I see a little bit more on this one. Magnus, I'm happy that you did not hurt mom again with a little ribbon in the middle. Oh my goodness. That is so cute. I love it. And his letters look great and he's doing brave spelling, which I really appreciate.

Laura

Yeah. So I just want to say that if we end up posting this, or I'll just describe it. So what he wrote was M-A-N-I-S, that stands for Magnus. I-M-A-N-I-S. A-H-P-Y, which is, I'm happy, T-H-T-A-T, that the letter U, the D-I, did not spelled correctly, N-O-T, H-R-T-M-M, that's not hurt, mama, A-G-E-N, again, and then there's a little certificate with an M. I just noticed that he put an M. Oh, for Magnus for Magnus in the little symbol. But and someone might look at this and be like, well, that's not spelled correctly at all. But it's totally age appropriate, like completely age appropriate. And what would really blew me away about this is he did not ask me once what letter goes next. He did this completely independently, which is so cool. And I was just like, oh my god, you know, like inside I'm dancing because this is what I've been waiting for, right?

Shanna

How much more meaningful and rewarding when that interest comes from inside of him? And he, you know, he's going to be more receptive to all of it. So I think that's super cool.

Laura

Yeah. So I just wanted to check in on that because I feel like if, you know, it's such a long game. And so many times I've second guessed myself and been like, maybe I should just be going back to like forcing him to learn this stuff. But it's really nice to see that at least in his case, it's totally working out. So I'm very proud of him.

Shanna

I'm very proud of him too. And you know, I'm thinking back to what you were saying about like the videos you see on Instagram or whatever about these like elaborate like. plans and activities and stuff. And I feel like if anyone has videoed any great idea or plan I've come up with with my kids, it could come across in like a snippet as being like, oh, wow, she does like great things with her kids. In reality, like the enthusiasm wanes very fast. Like not much actually really sticks. Even if you listen to this podcast, you know, how the time I'm like oh my gosh I have this amazing new reward system where I've got this new idea and blah blah blah and we do it for a little while and then it kind of just peters out and it doesn't really like there's a there's a other side to that perfectly executed little activity that's kind of reality you know.

Laura

Yeah, definitely. I totally agree. But yeah, so I now have this certificate for Magnus. Magnus did not seem to care. I must admit, he seemed uninterested in the certificate.

Shanna

Uncool, Magnus. Uncool. He's like, where's my ribbon? Where's my trophy? I think he just wants more, you know? you're conditioning him to want greater and greater rewards, but that's okay, because there's copy on all of those things, and maybe Augie can write it, so there you go.

Laura

Yeah, you know, I think the problem with Magnus is that he is too reliant on extrinsic rewards. I never got this intrinsic reward system in him, you know? So, yeah, man, he, I really messed up raising Magnus. That's why I'm doing better with Augie and Sebastian. You learned from your mistakes. Good job. I also love that he got a certificate for hurting me. Just not again. You know, good job, Magnus. Nice a lot.

Shanna

Magnus draws blood and gets a certificate. Oh, to be a cat.

Laura

Yes. OK. They can do no wrong. But I do think that's it for my check in. Shall we move on to our special segment?

Shanna

Oh, yes.

Laura

Oh yeah, I have lots of thoughts. As people probably know, I'm a bit of a zealot when it comes to body, not even body positivity, body neutrality, but also like fat positivity and not being sucked into diet culture. So I have so many thoughts about this and I'm going to try not to go on a big rant, but like practically there's a couple of things I can suggest. One is unfollow anyone who makes you feel bad like or mute them if I don't know how the muting works, but like literally you just don't need that in your life. If it's making you feel bad, stop. full stop, shit, you can do that with us. I give you permission. If for some reason I really hope we're not making you feel bad, but if anyone who's making you feel bad, you do not need that noise in your life. Social media is not real life, and you do not need that. So just be really liberal with the block button.

Shanna

Ooh, okay. Okay, let's see Jade Beale photography. Oh, I love these photos. Gorgeous maternity photos of a mom holding the babies she already has. Awesome shots of older women. This feed is definitely a celebration of ages, stages and bodies. I love it. Great suggestion.

Laura

And here's the thing. Once you start curating your feed to show you things that make you feel good about yourself. The algorithm figures that out and stops showing you that other shit.

Shanna

Yes, exactly.

Laura

That's my main recommendation. Sean, did you have any advice?

Shanna

Yes. Here's my advice. Open up TikTok. go to the search bar and type in funny pregnancy tiktoks and watch some of those because there's some creators doing some really funny stuff. I'm looking at one now. This tiktok is so Funny this person has their big third trimester belly out and then like the lower half their body like wearing a dress and then like at the top half their body looks like a hat and they're dancing around and so it looks like the belly is the face and they're dancing. It's just hilarious and you know me. I love comedy. I love laughing and I feel like if we can fill our social media feeds with things that don't take this type of stuff so seriously, We can also take ourselves not so seriously and laugh a little bit and feel better about ourselves. We don't need to follow.

Laura

Yeah.

Shanna

Absolutely.

Laura

Okay, Shanna, we have another question. This one's actually just for you. This is a serious one. It's from Carolyn on Insta. She says, I need to know what level of best fiends are you on, Shanna?

Shanna

I need to know too, Carolyn. So all right, well, I need to open the app. So give me a mo.

Laura

So this is not an ad, I should say. For a while we were running Best Fiends ads and we are no longer running them. And I had to stop playing because I think I played a lot during my first trimester with Sebastian and now it makes me feel sick. So yeah, which is I think what happened with you in Candy Crush, right?

Shanna

Yes. And I abandoned Candy Crush, and then I discovered Best Fiends because we were doing ads for them. And it was the perfect substitution for that game. And it didn't make me nauseous. And I still play it. It's like a fun, just kind of mindless activity. I often do it when I listen to audiobooks or podcasts. OK, let's see. I am on level 3,955. Wow. I wonder what it goes up to.

Laura

Do you think if you reach the end of best fiends, we could convince them to sponsor us again?

Shanna

Maybe. Yeah. Yeah. I think so. And I definitely think our podcast will be going strong by the time I'm at the end of this game. Gosh, my big great accomplishment in life.

Laura

I'm proud of you, Shanna.

Shanna

Well, thank you. Thank you. Alrighty, let's move on. Let's move on. Our next question is from Rosie, who sent in a voice memo. So let's take a listen.

Speaker 1

Hi, Shanna and Laura. My name is Rosie and I am the mother of a beautiful 11-month-old baby boy. I

Shanna

Thank you, Rosie, for sending that question in. Laura, I am going to turn this one over to you.

Laura

Yeah. So first of all, Rosie, I'm so sorry that we're in the same club. It sucks. Grief is really interesting. I'm fortunate or unfortunate, depending on how you look at it, to have a couple different approaches to grief. I had the really, really unfortunate and violent murder of my friend when I was newly pregnant with Augie and then I talked about how I had to go to his the murder trial last summer and how that brought up all kinds of feelings again just like you bring up like when there's new news articles or stuff that brings it up. But you know, it's interesting when you mention how the publicity around it brought the feelings back up. I get that because I had the same exact situation because my friend's murder was actually quite well publicized and kind of a sensational thing. I made a freaking podcast about it. You know what I mean? Like it was all over.

Shanna

Oh yeah, I love that movie.

Laura

Yeah, so it just went back on streaming and my kids wanted to watch it again and I caught the very end of it again where joy is helping anxiety and there's like anxiety is worried. I can't remember exactly what anxiety is worried about something like she's starting to really project into the future. Like if we get this if we do this then we're gonna be embarrassed forever and then we're gonna die alone and all this stuff and joy says to anxiety okay but is any of that happening right now and anxiety is like no she's like okay let's go sit in your comfy chair let's have a cup of tea she's She's like, what is something that's going on right now that we can address? And anxiety goes, oh, we have a test tomorrow. I was like, yes, let's focus on that. Use your anxiety for that. And I feel like that's the type of thing I tend to do. I start projecting.

Shanna

Yeah. That's wonderful advice. And I'm so sorry to both of you that you have experienced this kind of loss. And my heart goes out to you.

Laura

Thank you. And I just want to add to that something my therapist told me was your experience of parenthood is going to be a little different than everyone else's because of this experience, right? Everyone gets to experience their lives in different ways. And this is one of those experiences that is going to just affect the way you parent. And there's no shame or guilt about that. And it's okay to recognize that and be like, okay, I may parent a little differently because of this. And being okay with that is another thing she taught me to work towards. So I hope that helps. I hope that helps you a little bit. I'm sorry, Rosie, about your friend. And I hope you are hanging in there with your little one. OK, so I promise that's the biggest, heaviest topic we're talking about on this episode. But I really do appreciate that question.

Shanna

Yay, congrats.

Laura

So her question is Penelope and Levi or Duncan and Clover. And I'm assuming that these aren't their names. We're choosing not like the colors of the nursery walls or something. Okay, so Penelope and Levi as a pair or Duncan and Clover as a pair. Sean, did you have a preference there?

Shanna

Oh, I love a name question. This is so fun. And these are such good choices. Well, I'm partial to naturey names. Clover is such a pretty cute little plant. I love Clover so much. My middle name is a nature name. Rose and my girls both have nature names for middle names. So I really love Clover. And I do not hear that very often. So I'm also partial to more unique, less heard names. So I'm loving that. And I think it goes great with Duncan. Not that I don't love Penelope and Levi, but I am really leaning towards Duncan and Clover. What about you, Laura? Thoughts?

Laura

Well, I have a personal connection to the name Clover because it was my grandfather's name and it is my mother's middle name, Susan Clover Winter.

Shanna

Your grandfather's first name was Clover?

Laura

Yep. And then my mom is Susan Clover Winter. Oh my gosh. It's her middle name.

Shanna

That's cool.

Laura

It is cool. I always loved it. Like it was definitely kind of on our list too. And it seems it's kind of merged more towards being a female name. So that's I think why it didn't really end up on our short lists. But I've always loved the name Clover. I will say my mom always did not like it. But that might be because she and her father did not. the best relationship, so like she always felt a little resentful for being saddled with it. I thought it was the coolest. I think my mom has like a fucking cool name. Susan Clover Winter, like come on.

Shanna

That is, yeah, that is chef's kiss of names.

Laura

And I love the way Duncan feels when you say it. It just feels solid. So I am also going to vote Duncan and Clover. However, if you have changed your mind and decided Penelope and Levi, I think those are awesome names too. I really think you can't go wrong with any of these. So, you know, flip a coin or have them come out and you come up with completely different names like I did.

Shanna

Yes, exactly.

Laura

And then just start a podcast and call them Penelope and Levi.

Shanna

There you go. They can be the podcast names for your kids. Well, you have some naming talent because these are all great choices. So whatever you go with is going to be fabulous.

Laura

Yes. But please let us know. I would die for a picture of Penelope and Levi or Duncan and Clover or whoever and whoever when they come out. So keep us in mind.

Shanna

Indeed.

Laura

All right, Sean, our next question is from Cecile. Cecile says, I'm nearly 34 years old, and I've been thinking about trying to conceive, but I'm in a really good place in my career. Would you recommend getting a fertility and hormones test? And so I think what Cecile is saying is that, you know, she's thinking about trying to conceive, but also she doesn't want to mess up her career by having a baby right in the middle of it, which fair enough, not always going to mess up your career, but it is a difficulty. So I think she's curious if taking one of these fertility tests might give her some insight about whether or not she should wait, right?

Shanna

Oh, interesting question. Okay, well, I was about 34 when I decided to start trying to conceive. And I remember going to my OBGYN specifically because I was like, I want to try to conceive. And I'm curious like what I got going on down there. And she did an ultrasound and was able to I guess, tell by looking at my ovaries that I had a lot of eggs in my reserves and gave me a lot of confidence about trying to conceive. And I was like, great. Turns out I had a hell of a time getting pregnant. So that test didn't really tell me too much. Once I started struggling to conceive, then I went on and got more extensive testing. And that's more like blood work during certain times of your cycle to test your FSH levels. And it can tell you so much about your fertility and like how many. eggs you have left, how viable they are, et cetera.

Laura

Yeah, I feel like maybe the only harm could be if it gives you a false reassurance. Like it kind of gave you a false reassurance, right? Yeah. So you want to take everything with a grain of salt. I think that you could go and the one upside would be like if you had gone and they were like, ooh, you do not have a lot of eggs left. You might have jumped straight to maybe IVF. Like, do you wish that if you had known how long it would take, do you wish that maybe at 34 you had just gone straight to IVF?

Shanna

I mean, it's so hard to answer that question because that would mean I would have different children that I have now. It's also complicated. It's kind of like I'm at peace with things working out the way that they did work out. So I'm OK with it. But if wanting to focus on your career right now and also preserving your fertility is extremely important to you, then I would say probably the best thing to do at this point is to have some eggs frozen or embryos if you're with a partner. And, you know, have those transferred when you are ready to have a child.

Laura

Yeah, I'd say if you can afford it, you're sure you want to have kids and especially if you have a partner that you think you want to have kids with. If you can free some embryos, I don't see the downside in that, honestly, other than, you know, that it's hard on your body from what I've learned from you and all my friends who've gone through it. But then you have them available for the future because you'd you know it'd be really hard to get a couple years down the line decide to start to see and then realize that you know your eggs are not working out right so i actually have a friend who did that who. in her mid thirties froze some embryos with her not yet husband because they knew they want to have kids. She was having issues with fibroids. She wasn't sure if it would get resolved and she was like, look, I don't know how long this is going to take.

Shanna

We know how you like to follow rules.

Laura

Yeah. Yes, exactly. I mean, I took that as gospel, Shanna. I remember. Seeing him, I was like, you told me. He's like, you're right. I told you. But yeah, I mean, good luck with that. It's so hard. It's so hard to know what to do. And even when you do everything quote unquote right, it sometimes doesn't work out. And then there's annoying people like me who get pregnant right away. Yeah, it's just you don't know until you start trying, but maybe those tests can help. I don't know. I'd be curious if anyone out there has taken those tests and subsequently made decisions based on them because I've heard that mixed things. They're not always that accurate. So, yeah, listeners, let us know.

Shanna

Yeah, right in. And thank you, everyone, for sending in your thoughtful questions to us. We always love hearing from you and having the chance to answer. But I think that's it for this segment.

Laura

Yes, it is. Let's move on to our BFPs and BFNs.

Shanna

All right.

Laura

Okay, so we close every episode with a Big Fat Positive or a big fat negative from the week and Shanna, you're up. BFP or BFN?

Shanna

I have a BFP. Yay. Yay. This is a product that has come into my life. It's for me personally. It honestly has nothing to do with parenting. It just has to do with being a human person who wears shoes, but I'm excited about it and I want to share.

Laura

Okay, tell me about it.

Shanna

I have discovered flat socks.

Laura

Say what now?

Shanna

flat socks. Okay. So, you know, I went back to the office, so I'm wearing shoes that are not flip flops, more or less, you know, like a little bit more structure to them, a little bit more dressy. And I don't like wearing shoes without socks. Just a thing of mine.

Laura

I think you're not alone, by the way. I think that's a pretty common experience.

Shanna

Okay, good.

Laura

Okay, good. I think most people who don't live in Southern California are like, Yeah, what's the alternative? I didn't know that there was an alternative. We just live in our sandals all the time unless we're having to go into an office.

Shanna

Yes, yes, yes. So I got these tiny little socks from Amazon or Target or something. You know, they're like little, little tiny no-show socks that supposedly grip your heel and don't show through your shoes. And I was not happy with those. First of all, they do show. Like you see the material creeping up. It does not look tailored. I don't like that. They don't stay on, et cetera. And I was like, all I really need is a surface on the bottom of my shoe that's not the shoe. So I've googled flat socks. And lo and behold, people make freaking flat socks. It's just like an insert, basically, that you put in your shoe. That's like soft and cushy. Take it out. You wash it. You don't see a sock. There's no sock falling down. There's no sock problems. It's just a flat sock.

Laura

I need a visual. I don't understand at all.

Shanna

I will send you one, but in the meantime, imagine like a Dr. Scholl's shoe insert that you put in for, what do you put those in for? Support, right? This has no support. It's just like a flat piece of material with a little grip on the bottom that you put in your shoe. And it doesn't bunch up? No, it's very grippy on the bottom. Oh, okay. I'll send you the info.

Laura

I'm inquiring about this as though I have a reason to wear real shoes. You know, like, I don't. But I am fascinated by this.

Shanna

Well, maybe you will one day, Laura.

Laura

A girl can dream.

Shanna

Fascinating.

Laura

It's a shoe liner. Okay. So these have been working out for you.

Shanna

Yes. I love them. I can even wear them with my sneakers, you know, not necessarily my running or walking shoes, but my more stylish sneakers if I don't want any socks to show. But from what I'm learning is like socks are now trending. I'm just like, I'm conflicted by all of it. But for the moment, flat socks are my goat. So I had to share.

Laura

If you want to pretend to be the youth, apparently you show your socks. But I mean, maybe we don't need to pretend. It's not like anyone should be like, ooh, who is that Gen Z queen showing her socks? No offense.

Shanna

Yeah, exactly. I don't know if we'll go down that road. We'll see.

Laura

Man, there really is a solution for everything. Yeah, that's what I'm learning.

Shanna

Yep, indeed. All right, Laura, what do you got for us, BFP or BFN?

Laura

I have a BFP too. Okay. Okay, so we have started prepping for spooky season over here. We got started a little early because I was straight up influenced on the internet to buy a gadget. Yeah. I bought some floating candles from, I think it was from Amazon. You can buy them literally everywhere. They're on TikTok shop. They're on Instagram shop. They're everywhere, but I found them on Amazon because Augie has become enamored. with Harry Potter, and he says he wants to be Harry Potter for Halloween. There's still a lot of time left, so I don't know if that's actually gonna happen if he's going to decide on the day of that he doesn't want to be Harry Potter. Who knows?

Shanna

By floating, do you mean floating in water or they look like they're floating in air?

Laura

They look like they're floating in air, a la Harry Potter. They're just hanging from fishing line. But it is a very convincing effect. I'm going to send you a video so you can see what they look like in the dark. I took this in the dark.

Shanna

Ooh, those are cool. They do look like they're floating. Very spooky. I need to get some of these. Were they hard to hang up?

Laura

No, they weren't difficult. So this particular brand, this is the one I got was Shy Mary, S-H-Y-M-E-R-Y. I did a lot of research because apparently some brands you have to like thread the fishing line yourself. This one was pre-threaded. All you had to do was put a AAA battery in each one and then they give you these little sticky things to put on the ceiling. The only difficulty was that we have really tall ceilings, humble brag. So it was hard to get up to the ceiling to get them on other than that. It was super easy So once we got we were gonna get a ladder, but to be honest we just got on the dining table and wrist our necks doing it that way But oh my gosh, they love these things and actually this one I got it was $35 for 24 of them right now. You can find different prices for them. I think it was cheaper when I bought it.

Shanna

Oh, fun.

Laura

This comes with a timer. So I think it's like six hours on, you know, and then it goes off until the next day at the same time. So it's really cool. It's just they go on every night on our porch and it's spooky. I like it. Yeah.

Shanna

Oh, I'm definitely going to get some. I think the girls would love that.

Laura

Yes, they will. One downside is there's one wand, so be prepared. One kid at a time. Great.

Shanna

Well, maybe we'll throw that wand away and they have to go make ones out of sticks.

Laura

Yes, and the adult is in charge of actually turning it on.

Shanna

Yes.

Laura

But anyway, that is it for my BFP, and I think that might be it for this episode.

Shanna

Yeah, I think it is. Listeners, thank you again for all your questions, and thank you for listening to our show. If you want to support our show, Tell a friend about this episode or one of your favorite episodes of the BFP Podcast. Make sure that you are subscribed or following on whatever app you're listening in. And finally, if you haven't had a chance yet, please go on over to Apple Podcasts. Leave us those five stars. Leave us a quick review saying a few things you love about the show. We might read it on an upcoming episode. All of that love from you all really, really helps support, and grow our show, and reach new people who can become part of our BFP community. So thank you so much for that. If you have any thoughts or feedback that you'd like to share about this episode or anything else, please reach out. Laura, where can everyone find us?

Laura

We are on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook at BFP Podcast. We have a website, bigfatpositivepodcast.com. And if you want to send us an email, you can always throw a voice memo in there. We love those. Just send them to contactthatbigfatpositivepodcast.com. And finally, if you want to join the coolest group of people on the internet, hands down, you gotta search Facebook for Big Fat Positive Community. It's a private group, so you gotta request to join and answer the two membership questions that tell us that you're not a robot. Once you do that, you'll be sent straight through to all the amazing, wonderful, supportive, hilarious conversations we're having in there.

Shanna

Our show is produced by Laura Birek, Shanna Micko, and Steve Yager. Thanks so much for listening, everyone. Have a Big Fat Positive Week. Bye! Bye!