Full Transcript
Okay, okay, get let’s get to it. Let’s get to it, Kakapupi. Ready? All right, here we go. You ready, Haven?
SPEAKER_01:
I’m fucking ready.
Gavin:
And this is gator arcs. So we got to get away last week on spring break. And we spent money that we didn’t have. But, you know, that is the American way. And we were at a uh an all-inclusive hotel. And I just walked around lecturing my kids about how we were exploiting the people and the environment the entire time. And my 11-year-old actually turns to me and she’s like, Dad. You chose this vacation for us. And I was like, I know, but we don’t have to like it. Wow. And there we are, like heaps of food, of course. And uh my kids are still just eating pancakes and bacon the entire time. Now, I know we going into this, I was like, one of the reasons I chose this was I didn’t feel like choosing battles, or I didn’t choose feel like having battles. And I’m like, you can eat whatever the hell you want. You can eat ice cream all day long, that’s all I care about. Except for the fact that I still want you to have uh like regular bowel movements and I want you to be able to eat a fucking vegetable, right? And um, and there we are though, still having food battles with my middle schooler, where I’m like, don’t you want to live a little? Don’t you want to eat something different besides pancakes and bacon? And but why would anybody want to eat pancakes and bacon? But then she said to me, Dad, this is like the middle school. If I don’t want to eat what they have, like fish sticks and salad, we have options. I’m like, oh, interesting that you have what are the other options? Hamburgers, chicken nuggets, and pizza. Yeah, always. I’m like, how am I supposed to teach my kids any good eating habits when their default at the school is hamburgers, chicken nuggets, and pizza? I love hamburgers, cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets, and pizza like the next guy, but I also know that we cannot live on that. And that’s the problem with our entire country, is that all that’s all we eat, and we don’t teach our kids any actual eating habits.
David:
Listen, this is my problem with daycare too. As I’ve said many, many times, like I am constantly putting good food in the daycare, and every day he’s like, I had six chocolate donuts today because it was Stevie’s birthday. I was like, fuck Stevie, fuck Stevie and their birthday.
Gavin:
Yep.
David:
Yeah.
Gavin:
It’s it’s it’s so and we are so preoccupied with raising good eaters, and we go to all the top ten lists of how you raise a good eater, then ultimately our entire society is against us actually raising good eaters. And it is infuriating because I mean, we adults are I mean, as Americans, we’re pretty bad eaters as it is, and um uh it’s just it’s an uphill battle, but um, but I’m gonna keep waging it. Let me tell you what. Along those lines, then it does remind me of um all of the top ten ways. I mean, I wrote them when I was blogging a few years ago, um, talking about the top ten ways to like raise good eaters and whatnot. And I did have some pretty good um successes. And uh in the grand scheme of things, we don’t have tears at the table unless I put fish on the table. And then my kids have decided that they don’t like fish even though they used to eat it. But I am so tired. I wonder if we’re getting out of the era of top ten ways to do this, that, and the other.
David:
I mean Gavin, you realize that we have a top three list on this podcast, right? Like we are we are part of the problem.
Gavin:
It’s not advice uh kind of.
David:
If anybody’s listening to this podcast for advice, I’m so sorry. Please don’t. We are nothing but hypocrites. Hypocrites and liars and disgusting.
Gavin:
Yeah, that’s what it is. But you know, it is it is exasperating that we um we try to get all of the information as as quickly as we can and all the latest research and whatnot that is always in top 10 form. And um, it’s the only way we have any attention span to be able to absorb anything, but it is exhausting because parenting, every generation of parents, meaning like every two years we have a new batch of new people giving new advice, and um there’s gotta be a stop to that.
David:
But I mean, but isn’t there isn’t the point that like I don’t have time to spend a week reading this book? I literally and even these top ten articles you’re talking about, do you re ever read anything under the bold? No, no. The bold is number one, feed them grapes. And then if my brain goes, I don’t want to do that, I just move on to the next thing, and maybe I’ll read the next thing. But like, it is it’s like recipes, it’s like just fucking tell me the things. But I think it’s time, right? And also, people are in the like, why won’t my kid go to bed? Just give me the 10 reasons that I can try really quick. I don’t have time to read a whole book.
Gavin:
But but it and it I I agree. So I’m introducing this segment, like panning it, but at the same time, it is frustrating because that’s all we can do. Um, but you know, I think I’ve probably already mentioned the one book, the only book that I think anybody needs to read, honestly, as a parent, is bringing up baby. And it is about how the French are the French French parenting is an awful lot of like kids should be seen and never heard, and they don’t actually engage with their kids quite as much as we do. But they’re also like limits, limits, limits. Just draw these limits, boom, done. And there isn’t any it’s it’s it’s very simple, but it’s very hard. And you have to stay consistent in the streets. But that’s the hard part, right?
David:
Is that like after like night 57 of crying because I want chicken nuggets for breakfast? At some point, any adult fucking breaks. It’s just not possible.
Gavin:
But in that book, the French are like, oh no, no, no, no. We lock them in their room and we take a sleeping pill, and everything’s fine the next day.
David:
And you know what? The French there’s there’s a lot to unpack there. Um There is just taking sleeping pills. There is wait, can I tell you? Did I ever tell this story where I have a friend who is uh born and raised in Sweden and then she came here when she was a young child, and she was telling us about how um Didn’t I tell the story already? How when she was a kid, they lived in like an apartment building where there’s like a big courtyard in the middle. And she’s like, when I was crying all night, my mom would put me in like the like a like a stroller and wheel me out to the courtyard and then go back upstairs and go to sleep and leave me outside. And she’s like, it’s common for people to leave their kids outside while they go in, and I was like, that’s not true. And then I went to Iceland that year, and I went and we were walking down the street, and there was this big cafe where people were having dinner, and there was like six fucking strollers outside. And my first thought was like, Oh, it’s funny, because like Emma was talking about that, but that’s not really real. I walk up, there are babies in those strollers. They fall on, we’re like, I’m gonna go have a dinner, baby. I’m just gonna leave you outside in a stroller. But like, it’s clearly a cultural thing where like everyone’s fine and we’re good. But it like it blew my mind. I was like, people fucking just leave their babies outside. Genius. Three free babies in Iceland for those who are listening. Um, so I had this experience that I I hope I can teach myself from it. Where we were um, it was raining outside, and I like to open the sliding door and like us just sit by the door and like watch the rain come outside because I’m I’m I’m upset there’s rain. And my son was like, I want to walk out there. And my first thought was like, No, stop, no, just stay in here. Because I was like, You’re gonna get wet and whatever the ginger clothes and blah blah blah blah. And he kept saying, But I want to go out there, and I and I just had this moment when David, let him go. Yes, fucking rain. Because I thought about myself as a kid, I was like, I would want to go outside on the the deck and just like stomp around in the rain and have it rain on me. And I just had this moment of like let your kid just get messy in a thing, it really is not that big a deal to me, but my brain just kept saying, Can we just keep it under control so I don’t have to do this? And I’m so glad I allowed myself to just break myself from this like these binds that I give myself where I’m I’m trying to keep everything easy. But yeah, I was like, let this little moment of small magic come into this child’s life. So I’m gonna try to get better at that whenever they ask for something that would inconvenience me slightly, that I uh think about like, would this be enjoyable and maybe magical for them and allow that to happen?
Gavin:
It’s a universal metaphor that we all need to be able to let our kids jump in puddles. Because in the grand scheme of things, maybe on your if you’re setting out and you’re gonna spend four hours out walking around, yes, you probably don’t want to get wet at the very beginning. But we it’s it’s a perfect metaphor that we all need to be able to jump in more puddles now. Absolutely.
David:
So this week’s our top three is my list, and it was my top three favorite quotes. No, they don’t have to be parenting, they’re just the quotes that kind of live rent-free in your head. So I will start. So uh number three for me is a quote from the three musketeers, and it’s You’ll soon learn, D’Artagnan, that life isn’t so black and white. And I don’t know what about this stuck with me, but just the idea of like everything in life is so much more complicated and textured than you think. There is just nothing black and white in life, um, except the literal colors. So that’s my uh third favorite quote. Number two, now this is a really long one, and I will read it, but it it it for whatever reason lived in my head. It’s from Roseanne. Yes, Roseanne, the TV show. Now, yes, I get she’s problematic. Let’s just ignore all of that. This was my favorite accent from going up. And the idea is that their goal as parents uh was to improve the lives of their children by 50% over their own. And that has stuck with me, and I think about that quote every day. I’m gonna read the full quote because I think it’s beautiful. This is from the last episode of the show. Um and it is this. Dan and I always felt that it was our responsibility as parents to improve the lives of our children by 50% over our own. And we did. We didn’t hit our children as we were hit. We didn’t demand their unquestioning silence. We didn’t teach our daughters to sacrifice more than our sons. As a modern wife, I walked a tight rope between tradition and progress, and usually I failed by one outsider’s standards or another. But I figured out that neither winning nor losing count for women like they do for men. We women are the ones who transform everything we touch, and nothing on earth is higher than that. And so I just love that quote. It is one of the best last episodes of any show I’ve ever watched, and that is a a quote from it. So that’s number two. Uh number one, my favorite quote, I think about it easily every day, is from my friend Liz, who I don’t know if she listens to the podcast. I went to college with her very good friend. And we went to I came to her house one day and they her and her roommates had ordered pizza. And when I got there, the pizza had also got there and she paid for it. And my f my first question was like, Well, are you gonna get you know your roommate’s portion of the the pizza money? And her quote was or the thing she said to me was David, sometimes you just pay for the pizza. And the thought of just like, yeah, instead of nickel and diming, sometimes you just are generous. Sometimes you just buy it and you don’t ask anybody for anything, and you just do it. And I try to this sounds so silly, but I try to build my life on that, of the idea of like the kind good things you do, or the things that you can easily do, you just do. You don’t ask anybody’s permission, you don’t ask for it back, you just pay for the pizza. So, number one, sometimes you just pay for the pizza. I love that. That’s well done.
Gavin:
Okay, so I’m so glad that you brought sincerity to this. And you’re slipping into that trap. I need to do that. That you don’t just get to be the funny guy this time. Um, because basically mine are sincere too, basically. But the things that pop out in my mind for sure are um I’m I’m sorry, I’m gonna make it a top three and a half on the top uh for number three and a half. Al Franken has this fantastic quote about politics, and he says, Republicans love their country the way four-year-olds love their parents, Democrats love their country the way adults love their parents.
David:
Beautiful.
Gavin:
And I think that is a great way of saying we have to accept the flaws and the warts and the yelling and the screaming and still love our parents, and that’s a mature way of looking at it. So I love that one. I was lucky enough to work with Mike Nichols, um the famed director, who probably nobody on this podcast knows. But he was a really famous movie director and Broadway director, and he uh directed me in Spamalot. Not that he really I was a replacement, so whatever, he didn’t know who I was, but I love that he said my number two quote is there are only three kinds of scenes seductions, fights, and negotiations. And he had a very direct, simple way of directing actors, and it was enough of the backstory, enough of this, that, and the other. Just like keep it simple. It’s a seduction, it’s a fight, or a negotiation. Boom, move on. Uh I uh of course I love my favorite tweet of all time. Number one is some person who said, and I’m sure it was a younger person who didn’t have kids, said, Parenting looks so hard. You have to traumatize your kids just enough to make sure they’re funny.
David:
I think that is so true. We talked about that in episode one, I remember with Craig. Yeah. Yeah.
Gavin:
I know I I’m bringing that up. Um, and then my half favorite here is just that um uh and it’s not a quote. I’m I’m diverting just in the sense of, and it’s sort of a something great, but don’t know it’s don’t worry, it’s not my something great. In my notes, I keep a running list of funny quotes that my kids say, and you can see it goes back to 2015, and I have quotes after quote after quote, and occasionally we go back and read them, and it’s fucking hilarious. So, um, that is my quote, is not a quote, but just something we do to keep quotes, because it is so worth the effort of pulling out your phone, neglecting your kid for a little while, writing down something funny, and you’ll be able to revisit it later.
David:
Gavin Lodge neglecting his kid since 2016. Alright, so our next guest is one of the few women I have seen naked on multiple occasions. She is a Broadway performer, she is a voice actress, she is a mom, she’s an artist, and she is known for having one of the best voices on Broadway. I am lucky to call her one of my best friends and by far the greatest escape room partner one could ever have. Please welcome Haven Burton.
SPEAKER_01:
I’m literally speechless from that last statement. That made my day.
David:
So, those of you who don’t know, I am an escape room addict. I don’t know what it is. I don’t know if it’s calling on like the boy adventure part of it. I don’t know what it is, but something about escape rooms makes me happier than a lot of things. And Haven and I and her husband Denny have all kind of we just all fell in love with escape room. We all love each other, but we fell in love with escape rooms together. So we are like this incredible team and we do them all the time, and we have a 100% success rate.
SPEAKER_00:
We sure do. We sure do.
David:
Um, welcome, Haven. I would like everyone out there who is not watching this via video feed to know that your name is Kaka Poopy at the bottom of the screen. Kaka Poopy. Who’s not?
SPEAKER_01:
Well, it’s just the way I was feeling this morning, you know. I tried. Kaka Poopy.
Gavin:
Not even gonna blame it on your kids.
SPEAKER_01:
Not even blaming it on my kids. Although I was having doomsday fears this morning when I wake up. You know, typical, like, you know, is the world ending anxiety in the morning, as we all do. And um, Casmian, my middle child had crawled into bed with us. It’s like his, it’s a it’s our thing right now. Like he sleeps with us, comes in at like three o’clock in the morning, and then snuggles. He’s very sweet. He woke up this morning also with doomsday. Oh, oh no. Asking me about the zombie apocalypse and um would we be okay? And then my first reaction was, yeah. You know, my my mine and Denny’s reaction was like, yeah, we’re fine. We have like a crank radio. We’re good.
David:
We have a Costco box of band aids. We’re okay. We got it, guys. Also, we’ve watched The Last of Us. I’ve watched The Last of Us, so I know what to do now. And Walking Dead, I know what to do. I know how to pillage for antibiotics.
SPEAKER_01:
What is your zombie apocalypse plan?
David:
I I my I’m gonna go right towards the first zombie and let them bite me. What is the what is the negative to being a zombie? You are amongst friends, you live forever, you don’t have to worry about anything. You look skinnier than you’ve ever looked in your entire life. That’s true. You look so cute and close. I would walk right up to the first zombie and be like, come on, come at me. Also, talk about not giving a fuck.
Gavin:
I mean, wouldn’t that be great to be unhimmed? You would be unhimmed. Your mortgage payments disappear in a moment. So many worries are just gone. And you do basically live forever, like you said, looking as your best self. I mean, literally, I just I don’t know what I don’t think.
David:
Um, okay, so before we get into the obvious parenting part of this, which is what what you’re here for, other than just for us to Kiki, um, I want to give you a little everyone out there, a little backstory who doesn’t know Haven, which is impossible. Everyone knows who Haven Burton is. But if you don’t, Haven was and is a Broadway performer, and that’s how we all know her. Um, you made your Broadway debut in Rent, correct? I did. Oh my god, oh my god. That was a good thing. Oh my god, my God, my god, my god. Our age and our post-late mid to 30s. It rent was it. Rent was it, and you played Maureen, correct?
SPEAKER_01:
I did for yeah, like I was I I made my debut as Mrs. Cohen and then went under contract for Maureen for, you know, multiple periods of time. Amazing.
David:
I mean, what a dream show in a dream like what was that like?
SPEAKER_01:
It was really great. I mean, I actually my professional debut was the national tour of rent. So I was on the second national tour of rent, which in 1999 was also really, really huge because it was like I thought about that the other day. I was like, wow, I had no idea like how big of a tour, like how big of a deal it was to be on the rent tour. And I was a hot mess when I was a kid because I was 19 and no one was like, hey, when you were a kid? Yeah. Well, well, always. I’m always a mess.
Gavin:
But it’s true, being 19, you’re in a star, you’re starring in a show, you’re on a national tour. In a rock musical, the highest ticket in the world. This is sex, drugs, and lots and in Des Moines.
David:
And wow. Sex and Drugs in Des Moines. That’s the name of your autobiography.
SPEAKER_01:
We were in Des Moines. No, I think that I actually started in Columbus, Ohio.
David:
Oh god.
SPEAKER_01:
I think that was my first beautiful city. I think that was my first uh city.
David:
But like like rent was a big deal to the world, but let’s be honest, your biggest credit for Gave an hour is legally blonde musical. And if anyone has listened to this show for more than an episode, they know that it is by far near and dear to our hearts. So near and dear. You were Margot, correct? You you came in as Margot and you understood.
Gavin:
I pretend to love it. I do love it, but I do. Which one is Marg? Yeah. Annalian. Oh, okay, guys.
SPEAKER_00:
She starts the show. Yeah, yeah. Dear Elle, he’s a lucky guy. I’m like gonna cry.
Gavin:
Nice, nice.
SPEAKER_00:
I’ve got tears coming out of him, I know.
David:
Oh god, I love it. Oh, and so funny. And there is a there is a uh a sneaky video of you on YouTube doing various parts of when you would go on, and it is so amazing. I’m watching it now. And I’m so obsessed with it, I’m so mad at myself that I can’t build a time machine and go back to when you would go on as L and watch it because I was such a fan, but I was not as much of a fan then as I am now. Like going back, I’m like, oh yeah, this show was fucking. Yep, yep, yep, yep.
SPEAKER_01:
You know what? I feel the same way. Like when I joined the show, I was like, oh, it’s like a big pink musical, it’s legally blonde. Like I didn’t, I, you know, didn’t take it that seriously either, you know? And then I went to go see it uh when I when I booked it, and I was like, oh, this is really fun. This is really, really, really fun. And then I was doing it and I was like, I have no idea how to do this kind of musical theater. Because I was not a musical theater kid. I’d never done a musical before. I did like rock, sure, great. I thought I was gonna be a recording artist and that I was gonna do like background vocals and stuff like that and do concerts. Like I thought that was what my career was gonna look like. So musical theater was such a big surprise to me. And then doing something that’s as musical theater y as legally blonde, I was like, I don’t know how to do that.
Gavin:
That’s as empty as you get. Did you look down upon it? Yes. I mean, did you look down on musical theater?
SPEAKER_01:
Or it’s just No, no, I didn’t look down on it at all. It’s just that I grew up in LA, and there’s just not the culture is different there. It’s all film. The entertainment industry is not theater promoting at all. It is, you know, concerts, you know, like recording artists, film and television. So that’s what I grew up thinking that I was going to be doing. And then when I got a musical, I was like, oh, a rock musical. Okay. Well, I love acting, but my acting was very um like it was definitely more it’s definitely more like film and TV style and less presentational. So doing popping from something like rent where I could get away with a little bit more of that. And I did go to college. So like in between um in between clown college in. I went to clown. Actually, I took clowning classes, yes. Yes. Our graduation. Instead of caps, we just got little fuzzy noses and spinning bow ties and squirting flowers. Um it was a messy graduation. No, I went to NYU and I studied experimental theater. Oh, again, subdued, like not presentational.
David:
Wow. And then you book Legally Blonde, which is as presentational as you get. Yes. While also, but again, again, we’re gonna have a separate fangirl podcast about legally blonde. Oh my god, it’s so good. What is at the heart of that show is that you get all the pink and all the fuzzy and all the all the all the kind of sacchar sweetness of it, but then there is this backbone of truth, and like that moment when I I I’ve directed the show before, and I always choke up when I do this scene, but the scene where he proposes at the end right before graduation, and she brings him up and is kind to him at that moment where she had all every right to spit in his face, is like it’s giving me chill bumps right now. There’s so many of those little moments throughout the show that like keep it going. Anyway, I don’t want to fangirl too long, but we’re gonna have a separate, total, totally separate moment. Might as well talk about that. We have nothing but time.
SPEAKER_01:
So did I look down on it? No, I did not look down on it. I was at that moment, I was still building my appreciation and my knowledge of the catalog of musical theater in general. So it was like I didn’t grow up a musical theater kid. So it was like I cut my teeth on Broadway, basically.
David:
So you’ve done many shows. You’ve done Shrek with me, you did Violet, you did Kiki Boots. Um, you and I met and fell in love doing Shrek. And also you met your husband. Um yeah, we did.
SPEAKER_01:
Oh yeah, we did. And over ukulele’s, I believe.
David:
Oh yes, over ukulele’s. But you met your husband, Denny, who’s currently in Chicago on Broadway. Um when we were doing Shrek. Um, you also do voiceover work, you’ve worked for Pokemon and a bunch, you’ve done a bunch of national commercials. But let’s talk about kids. You have three kids. You and I met prior to you having any children that you fucking know of.
SPEAKER_01:
You know what I love too is when people meet me in the business, because it’s like post-pandemic and everyone’s like, Where is where’s everybody been? You know, like we’ve all been living under rocks, and I’m still just emerging. They’re like, How how many kids do you have now?
David:
And you have to count them, too, without it.
SPEAKER_01:
And I’m like, five thousand children. I have five thousand. No, I have three. I like to confuse people right off the bat.
Gavin:
You uh took that leap from two to three, which I feel like is a really big decision to make.
SPEAKER_01:
The only decision we made in that was Denny agreeing to drink, uh to drink, what is it, jalapeno margaritas with me at three o’clock in the morning.
David:
So, this is how street people do it. We have to write a check for like a hundred thousand dollars. You guys just have jalapeno marks.
SPEAKER_01:
So I saw a comedian talking about that. They were like, it is too easy to make a baby for some people. And yet here we go, a croissant takes three days to make. A croissant takes three days.
David:
Yeah, yeah. Your kids all have a variety of special needs, which is partially why I wanted to talk to you about like parent other parents out there, gay parents, straight parents, will have kids with special needs. So talk to us about like what special needs your kids have and like when you discovered that.
SPEAKER_01:
How long is this podcast?
David:
Um well, we have about another 20 minutes left for your interview.
SPEAKER_01:
So Okay, uh long story short, and since this is comedic, I’ll just keep it pretty light. Um Hudson, my oldest, was diagnosed when he was five and a half with uh autism spectrum disorder. So um he’s on the autism spectrum. In addition to that, and with many people with autism that that are autistic, there are other diagnoses that accompany that, like OCD, usually like a general anxiety disorder. Um he also has uh, you know, symptoms of ADHD as well. So uh we found that out when he was five and a half, we had him privately evaluated, which cost a fortune. Um and it was because he was having some issues in school that just didn’t add up. So instead of figuring all that out, we had just had Caspi in my second, and um we were already thinking about moving to New Jersey, about making the you know, breaking time breaking up with our our boyfriend New York City and going to New Jersey for greener pastures. And so we did that. We kept Hudson out of kindergarten um that year, and then we put him into first grade here and got him an uh IEP, which is an individualized education plan, um, which is basically for any person that has any kind of access needs, whether it is physical, um, intellectual, learning, cognitive, whatever it may be, um, you can have access uh supports in your classroom, and it’s just basically like a legal document saying my child gets this in their classroom or is in this specific type of classroom. So that helped me start on my journey of advocacy for him and just learning about what our rights are as parents, which whether you have typical developing children or non-typical developing children, understanding some of your rights in the school system is super important and also very overwhelming at the same time. So it it was a hard learning curve, but luckily we were paired up with some people that are professional advocates for a living and they dedicate their lives to helping parents navigate the systems. Um and we we ended up doing pretty good, and he’s been in in school at our our local elementary school ever since and doing really well. Um he’s in a general education classroom with uh supports and through his IEP and you know, things are things are tough for kids on the spectrum, you know, a lot of the time. And he he definitely has challenges socially, especially. Um but other than that, I mean he’s just an awesome kid. And then we have Caspian, who uh is five and a half now, typical developing, um, very loud, has only one level of volume. David, you’ve met it.
David:
Can confirm. Can confirm.
SPEAKER_01:
We had a friend over the other day, and Caspian was like, Hey, can you and she was like, Hi. And he was he was so taken aback. And I was like, Yeah, that’s how loud you are, dude. Very loud. Tone it down. Very loud. And then um we had Nova three years ago, almost four years ago. She’s turning four this summer. Um, and while we were pregnant, first of all, pregnancy was big surprise.
David:
Jalapeno margaritas at three in the morning.
SPEAKER_01:
Jalapeno margaritas, three in the morning. Caspian was not even two yet, so we were I was not considering doing that, and then got pregnant and called my best friend and cried for an hour and a half. And then um Yeah. Uh we got her diagnosis uh while I was pregnant. Um so Nova has trisomy 21, which is also known as Down syndrome. Um, she also had two uh measurable heart defects, two holes in her heart.
SPEAKER_03:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
Um and we were navigating that and monitoring it during the pregnancy and during the the growth. Um and then we were meeting with her cardiologist uh a couple weeks before she was gonna be born, and uh he was scanning me for like 45 minutes and could not find the holes anymore. Which there’s no medical explanation for um holes that large to suddenly disappear. So she’s just my little miracle.
David:
Yeah. But also I remember in utero, you us talking about like, well, when she’s born, she’s gonna have to have open heart surgery. And there was like, you were preparing for this like common but huge surgery to happen on your infant daughter. And then I remember you being like, Yeah, there’s no holes anymore. And I was like, What are you fucking talking about?
SPEAKER_01:
I mean, he he said our cardiologist was also my favorite doctor on our team, so I was like, Oh, yay, she’s healed. We don’t get you anymore. It made me so sad because he was really cool.
Gavin:
You know, I can immediately hear um such uh I mean such strength and such joy and pride from you about your children. And I I would imagine that um you’ve gone through, I’m sure you’ve been through a plenty of roller coasters, and an awful lot of people probably say, Oh, I’m so sorry. And yet I bet you’re like, fuck it. Like, what is normal in this world?
David:
Nobody on this podcast, that’s what I am.
Gavin:
Nobody on this podcast. And so I am curious though, how have you uh as an advocate, how do you coach other people to be like, listen, we are all miracles to even be here. Let’s enjoy life while we’re here. What’s what’s your secret?
SPEAKER_01:
Well, my secret is wine.
David:
And that that’s a cheap bottle of Kirkland rosy.
SPEAKER_01:
We shared a frose the other time.
David:
We went to this amazing restaurant, and was it Moonfield? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they had they had one of the specialty drinks was a Frose. And this is my entire thought process. I saw it and I went, ooh, and then I went, no, David, that’s embarrassing to order. You can’t order that. So I ordered like a whiskey drink, and then when it was like time for us to like order two, our second drink, I was like feeling a little braver, and I was like, I’ll have the frosé. And Haven was like, I’ll have the rose too. And we had this like little naughty, like, are you gonna do Frosé? We’re doing Frosé. So fucking good. So delicious.
Gavin:
My children were so little when Froses were, I don’t know, invented. I feel like it was they came onto the scene, what, five, six years ago or so? And so I just kind of missed out. And but from a distance, I thought, oh my god, that is fucking genius! I want Frosé, and now they’re not cool. It’s like I’m I want to wear crocs, except Crocs are cool again, I guess. But I’m so after not when you wear them, Gavin. Not at all. Not at all. But after I’m so after the fact. So I am proud to say, bring on the frosé. Bring on the frosé. Bring it fucking on. And put a shot of vodka in there too, maybe. Throw it in.
SPEAKER_01:
Although it can be a little sweet, I’m gonna be honest. Because in order to get that, like, I I don’t know, it can be a little sweet. Sometimes I’m like, just give me the rose.
Gavin:
Citrus vodka in the frosé. There you go.
SPEAKER_01:
That’s better. Give it a little. But to answer your question, how do I keep it positive? I mean, Denny and I are kind of like silver lining people anyway. Meow, meow, meow.
SPEAKER_00:
Positive.
SPEAKER_01:
Um and the thing is, is I I think that, you know, I’m there’s nothing special about me, right, as a parent. It’s not like I was built to parent the children that I am. I mean, in some ways I believe that, or like, or I believe like our children choose us, but it’s not because I’m the perfect person to handle this. It was just what we were given. Um what we did is we had an opportunity to really just see our kids for who they are and not for this list of disabilities that we’d been handed. And that’s some of the things I actually had a challenging doctor’s appointment because Nova’s having some uh possible like um uh fluid in her ear, so we might have to do uh what are they called? Tubes.
SPEAKER_03:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
And the way that the doctor was talking to me, she just continually said, Well, you know, we know that this is possible with Down syndrome. Well, you know, with Down syndrome, this and this and that. And I was like, oh, does she have Down syndrome? I didn’t totally just like gas. But what are you fucking saying? What? What? I thought she was just good at hugs. I didn’t know. And I was like, I cried that night. And yes, I was starting my period, but also I was like, I guess sometimes I just forget. I know d I know Nova has Down syndrome. I know that there is gonna be challenges, I know that there are some delays, especially when I see her like stacked up against some peers. But it almost doesn’t fucking matter because she’s just such a light. Like you’ve, David, you’ve met her, like she gives the best hugs, she’s like, she’s so she’s so sweet and she’s very intuitive to the way that people are feeling. So I see all of Nova’s really special gifts that she’s been given instead of her just being like this disability, right? And so it just disappears after a while. Like you stop seeing the disabilities in your kids, it just disappears. And you’re gonna be able to do that.
David:
You just start seeing the asshole. Ruining our lives, no matter who. Also, I have met every one of your children on their first day in the world. I’ve come to the hospital for every one of them. And my favorite was when I came to um meet Nova, and she was born, and um I had been told her name was Jasper, and so I went and bought tree.
SPEAKER_01:
No, uh Juniper. Sorry, juniper. Why would I name my daughter Jasper?
David:
Juniper and this little juniper plant, and it was so cute, and we were like, oh, we’re gonna have this really cute plant, and it’s a juniper plant, and we’re gonna walk it, and we walked in, we’re like, here’s the juniper plant, and they’re like, we renamed her Nova. And I was like, Juniper, fucker, and I stormed out of the hospital.
SPEAKER_01:
Ah, you sure did. I also still have that juniper plant on my deck.
David:
Wait, can I tell you also something that that I learned in that day uh about parenting, which I think is it I think a lot of people struggle to understand, is we went, so I came to the hospital, I met um Nova, and then Nova was in the uh not ICU, what was she in the NICU, yeah. NICU. She was in the NICU, and so Danny and I went together to go over there because I don’t know why we were going over their feeder or something. And I so I met her and whatever, and then and the nurse was like, Oh, uh, Danny, do you want to like change your diaper? And he was like, Yeah, he’s like, I don’t really uh can you like show me I’m I’m not I’m and I my my brain I went, Danny, you have two fucking kids. How could you forget this? But now I realize like once a phase is over, you totally forget. Like when we started feet bottle feeding Hannah, we had already stopped bottle feeding Emmett. I was like, I don’t know how bottles work. And I was like, this was eight months, this was eight months ago. But I ri and so that experience with Danny, I was like, oh, like when you’re a parent and you’ve graduated to a new phase, your brain dumps that fucking information. Oh yeah, it’s a survival technique for sure.
SPEAKER_01:
You’re also doing it in a moment of full mental trauma, uh-huh, sleep deprivation, in front of an audience, people. Yeah, I was like, so you’re not like of course you dump it because you weren’t processing it to begin with the first two times.
David:
You were surviving.
SPEAKER_01:
We were just surviving and and you were sleepwalking the whole time.
David:
Yeah. So, Haven, let’s let’s move on to like the Gatriarch part of this, which is like, tell us, why are your kids fucking assholes?
SPEAKER_01:
Oh my god, where do we start?
David:
Yeah, where you just want to throw them out the window.
SPEAKER_01:
Where do I start? Um, well, have you ever seen those like old Mickey Mouse cartoons where they’re fire, like they’re fire God, I can’t even think about what a fire person is called.
Gavin:
Firefighter.
SPEAKER_01:
Fire person. Firefighter? You know those, and then and then the the fire is a cartoon character too, and then it’s like leaping from place to place and catching other things on fire, and they just can’t get it with the hose. That’s what my life is like with my children when my husband walks out of the door at 4:30 in the afternoon to go to work. They’re all like, We’ve been keeping it together at school all day, and now it’s time to rage. And they it’s like, I turn around, I’ll get, you know, somebody will be like, Mom, I need a sparkle water because my kids are bougie as fuck. And they’re like, I only drink sparkling water. And I’m like, well, then you’re gonna need to get a job. So we we I’m turning around to get like a sparkling water, and as I turn around, I hear like the cabinet door shut, and within a a matter of like a split second, they’ve dumped an entire bag, Costco size bag of like tortilla chips on the floor. Whole thing. The whole thing. And I’m like, and I’m trying to get my oldest to like come and help me out or like watch the kids, but he’s not because the TV’s on and he’s like watching baby Einstein or something totally washed out to the world around him. And that’s one of the reasons that my kids are assholes. Also, you just can’t they’re all negotiators, they’re all negotiators. It’s like we’re gonna do this, but you said that you promised that I could do this. I don’t promise you anything.
SPEAKER_03:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
Literally, never have I ever promised my children something, other than the fact that I would love them no matter what.
David:
Also, you guys are outnumbered. Like that’s like my brain knows that if we ever went from two to three, we officially like right now, one person per kid, and we’re covered. When the third kid, there’s always one ready to set fire to something.
Gavin:
It’s you’re it’s zone defense. David, just stay away from the jalapeno margaritas. Just remember that.
David:
Next time it’s just say zone defense on the Gatriox podcast. How dare you? How actually dare you?
Gavin:
So there you are at home with a bunch of tortilla chips on the floor and nobody helping. How do you keep from just dissolving into tears at that moment? Is it wine, or do you uh, or do you just say, oh, okay, well, that’s moving forward.
SPEAKER_01:
No, you know what? I think that there I’m trying to be okay, look. I’m trying to be more intentional with every moment that I have with my kid. And I mean like I’m really working on taking a step back, taking a deep breath, and saying, like, is this worth me getting really angry right now?
Gavin:
Are you able to say that in the moment? Because I want to believe it.
SPEAKER_01:
I’m trying to practice it. I’m trying to, like, and it is working. And it’s also like, is this really that big of a deal?
SPEAKER_03:
Right.
SPEAKER_01:
Do I really need to get upset? Or can I spin this? Because they’re little, right? So it’s usually my two little ones. It’s my big one is the one that’s injuring everyone all the time by accident. And and the little ones are just mischievous and curious. So it’s like, are they doing this because they want to piss me off, or are they doing this because they want to snack and they like the way the sound they like the sound that it made as it hit the floor?
Gavin:
And it’s fun to make a mess.
SPEAKER_01:
It’s fun to meet dirty, it’s fun to make a mess, right? And I’m always like, everything in its place or in its time. But you know, for this one, I’m like, oh, did you guys want a snack? Is that what this is? Can we pick this up? And then I I something else happened and the cat knocks. I don’t know. Something, it’s always a catastrophe. Yeah at that moment, everything happens at the same in the same like three minutes. And so I was like, you know what, fine, eat chips off the floor. And I walked away.
David:
Yes, I mean listen, sometimes your kids have to eat chips off the floor. I feel like I’m hyper my my kryptonite as a parent is always like what this will set a precedent for. Because I I agree with you, like chips on the floor, like who fucking cares about chips on the floor? My brain first goes to the place, well, if I allow them to eat chips on the floor, then they’re always going to eat chips on the floor, and then I can’t prove and I’m like, David, just relax. Just let them eat chips off the floor like a dog. You’re so right.
SPEAKER_01:
And also, children are not consistent.
David:
No, yeah, they did this.
SPEAKER_01:
Once and they were like, oh, that was fun, but then I’m I make them tidy it up, and then guess what? We have to throw the chips away because they’re on the floor and they’re yunky. So then they’re like, Oh no, if I do that, then we have to throw the bag of chips away, and then we don’t have chips for lunch tomorrow. So done.
David:
So if it’s wrapping this kind of b special needs, which is it feels weird to harp on that, but I I know you’re uniquely qualified to like if if a parent out there is listening right now has a kid who’s just recently diagnosed with special needs or in utero has some sort of like what is your kind of top line general like advice for them? I know every need is different and everybody is different, but like what is your kind of general advice for somebody who just got that news?
SPEAKER_01:
You know, um it’s interesting because like I think the term special needs is like thrown around a lot and currently that phrase is really like exiting.
David:
Oh, what’s the new phrase? I don’t know. But that’s good advice. What is the verbiage? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
You know, no, and you wouldn’t unless you’re like really linked in, right? And um and it’s something that’s still the word special is so common in so many other facets of like special education. And it and this is like from a government standpoint, it’s like special education, special education department, special ed classes, all of those things. But there’s nothing special about my children’s needs, you know what I mean? Each child is special, but there’s nothing special about their needs. They have a disability, they need extra things, right? So, how do I see my kids? I just treat them the way that I would treat other children and each person, each one of us, right? The the the great thing about raising kids that have disabilities right now is that we’re looking kind of all at each other as though we all have a disability in some way, right? Like the the whole conversation and the the language that you’re we’re using with people of like really understanding who people are as learners. Oh, a lot of people are seeing all these diagnoses come out and they’re like, huh, that sounds like me as a kid. And maybe they were undiagnosed because we’re having conversations about it now. It’s like topical, and people are becoming more educated about just all of our differences and the way that we operate.
SPEAKER_03:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
So that’s how I I think that’s the best approach to looking at your kids is, you know, fighting tooth and nail for the things that they need. Um, not being afraid to stand up or make a, you know.
David:
Scene. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah. Not worried about causing a scene if you need to, if you’re getting too much pushback. And um, and also just, you know, there are lots of resources to learn about this and lots of people. It’s just that uh that can be very overwhelming at the beginning. But don’t be afraid to like just Google search how do I advocate for my child with special needs, you know, in my area. And you’ll come up with a bunch of resources. It’s just about starting the it’s just about starting the process.
Gavin:
Aaron Ross Powell You know, I want to go back to one thing real quickly that you had started at the you said at the beginning, which is that I learned to advocate, and now I am an advocate. Can you actually really quickly dispel what does that mean to does that the word is such such cabinet forgaven advocate?
David:
Oh my god. Such cabinet. As soon as you said it, I was like, oh man, here we go.
Gavin:
Almost said uh pardon me for an absolutely suitable for work moment of sincerity. But like, what does it mean that you you call yourself an advocate? What does that mean? Does that mean you’re out on the streets with signs every single day? Or does it just mean you’re attuned to or in costume though, too. What does it mean that you are an advocate?
SPEAKER_01:
Um, I think it’s defined differently for every single person. Um as an advocate for my children, I am their representation in every legal meeting that I have regarding their education and services that they receive through the government. So that’s their real like black and white cut and dry thing. If I need additional resources or I need somebody else from a legal standpoint, I have other advocates that have like law degrees that can come and help me with things. We have not had to deal with any of that. Um so advocacy from a professional term is usually that social workers that dedicate their lives to helping parents navigate the systems. As a parent advocate, I advocate for my own children and I also put myself out there on social media and in my community to help other parents navigate the beginning of the process. Or people know that I’m a safe place for them to come to to talk about, hey, you know, I know that you go through this with your children. You know, my kid is starting to have this stuff that’s going on in school. What do I do? If I, you know, I’ve called and I can kind of say, everything has to be in writing, you know. Let me send you some templates for some letters, because you have to you have to ask for things in a formal way. Otherwise, the systems that are built are they’re built so that you you get lost.
Gavin:
Oh, Jesus, that’s so frustrating. But then are you part of an official organization or anything? Or do literally people can just reach out on social media and say, hey, can you help me with this? That’s awesome.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that’s that’s really what it is. I don’t, I’m not a social worker, so I don’t work in any official capacity, but as an advocate for my children and other people in the community. But um, like I’m not an advocate for adults, right? Like uh advocacy looks different with adulthood, especially in like the autistic community. Like, people are gonna a lot of the times advocate for themselves or have their own advocates. So, you know, the community doesn’t need me as an advocate. I’m an ally versus an advocate. I advocate for my children and for my family and um help other families in my community navigate that. But for adults, you know, I’m an ally for those communities that already have those systems in place.
David:
You’re all also an advocate for floor chips, so that’s what I am.
SPEAKER_01:
An advocate for floor chips and frose.
David:
So we’re unfortunately we’re almost out of time, but but but the last thing, and I know I ask you this all the time, and I know you told the story a hundred times, but I think it’s important to constantly keep the story in the zeitgeist. And I need you to tell the story of when we were doing Shrek the musical on Broadway. She’s rolling her eyes because she’s told the story a thousand times, but it is so good. So let me set the scene and then you can tell us. Let me set the scene. So if you know, you don’t even need to know the show. There is a scene in the show right before Freak Flag where there is people, it’s a lot of uh uh fairy tale creatures, and it’s one of those scenes where it’s like line, different person line, different person line. It’s just back and forth and back and forth and back and forth. And it comes to the point where Haven normally says her line and it’s just silence. I’ll let you pick up the story there.
SPEAKER_01:
I was on stage, I don’t know, how many performances in were we? Like how many months into the run were we? Yeah. Yeah, like we were we were pretty we were we were.
SPEAKER_03:
We were a little bit on, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah. Um, I don’t ever like to go to autopilot as a performer, but Saturday matinee is your Saturday matinee or maybe even a Sunday matinee, and I was a little spacey, and I was thinking to myself, do I know all of the lyrics to Total Eclipse of the Heart? And I started because I was like, I mean, we’ve sung this song how many times at like karaoke or on the radio, and I was like, I don’t even think I know the words. And so I was like, once upon a time I was falling in the now, I’m only falling. Uh, why is Brian Darcy James looking at me? And I was like, like it had that moment of I’m missing my line, and then I was like, maybe you could talking to him.
David:
And what is so brilliant about it is that from the other actor’s point of view, it was like da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And then it was silence, and then everyone kind of, you know, we all know whose mind it is. We’re we all look over at Haven, who is just gone. She’s somewhere else. And then when she comes to and we ask her, you might call me Vapid. Yeah, we were like, what happened? And she was like, I was trying to remember the lyrics to total eclipse of the heart. I have never connected with a human being more in my entire life. Because that happens. You don’t go, you don’t go on autopilot on Broadway, but there are times where your brain has is like, I need to kind of work this out while I’m on stage.
SPEAKER_01:
Oh, yeah. I mean, I don’t know about you, but like that happens to me quite a bit. I’m uh uh but the good part is that I wasn’t singing it out loud that time because that would have been impossible.
Gavin:
Yeah. If your line had just come out as once upon a time falling in love.
SPEAKER_01:
No, I’m only falling apart.
David:
Um, Haven, I am obsessed with you. We have to end our interview, but thank you so much for joining us on Gatriarchs and filling us in on your life, and we love you so much.
SPEAKER_01:
I love you so much.
Gavin:
Okay, so something great this week has been a really amazing tradition that my partner has started for the family. And he I I think he started it last summer when I happened to not be around. I don’t know. It was something that he just came up with as on his own, which is just going back through pictures in his phone and beaming them to the TV and retracing all of these family pictures from Since Forever, because what is the point of these 20 million pictures we all have a walk around with on our phones? And my kids live for it. Even my TikTok-obsessed daughter would rather look through funny videos and funny pictures. And um, and it’s been a really great way to, you know, go flip through photo albums, and we do it for maybe 20 minutes, I don’t know, every couple of nights, maybe once a week, sometimes not at all. But it has been um a really great way to bond as a family, to bring everybody together, and to revisit really fantastic memories. So it never would have occurred to me that yeah, to sit here and beam your phone to your TV, but do it and look through the old pictures.
David:
That’s sweet. Yeah. My my kids are obsessed with like we have a one-year baby book, their first year, and we printed, and everything else is just gonna be digital. And I love us going through here’s us at the hospital, here’s us, you know, yeah. Um, so this week I went to the grocery store um with my husband and my two kids, and uh, you know, we do the grocery store thing, we come back out, and we’re like loading our groceries back into the car, and we’re starting the process of putting the kids in. And there’s this woman getting out of her car, and my first thought was like a Trumper because she’s got this huge SUV, she’s a beefy gal, there’s just an energy there that I worry. And so she comes out and she sees Hannah, my daughter, who’s one, and she’s like, Oh, hi, and they’re having a little conversation, and so we’re all kind of having this like pleasant parking lot talk. And in the back of my mind, I’m just like, you know, blah blah blah. And at some point, we’re about to go, and she goes, Okay, I’ll I’ll see you later. Have a good day. And then she goes, Be good for your daddies, bye-bye. And it it hit me so hard because it was so meaningful because I know what she was doing. She was saying, I know your two dads, I’m going to purposely make it so casual, but I’m gonna say it out loud so you know that I know and that you’re in a safe space. Yeah, and it is so meaningful when strangers do that, and when what when they when they make it a deliberate attempt to say, I see that you’re a gay family, and I’m gonna say it, and then I’m gonna go into the grocery store and buy my tortilla chips or whatever. So, my something great is thank you, parking lot woman. Love you, parking lot and heard and lovely.
Gavin:
And that’s our show. If you have any comments, suggestions, or general compliments, you can email us at gatriarchspodcast at gmail.com.
David:
Or you can DM us on Instagram. We are at Gatriarchspodcast on the internet. David is at DavidFM VaughnEverywhere, and Gavin is at GavinLodge in his dreams.
Gavin:
Please leave us a glowing five-star review wherever you get your podcasts.
David:
Thanks, and we’ll see you next time on another episode of Gatriarchs.
SPEAKER_01:
So, my my 11-year-old now, when he was little, he he takes the biggest shits to the point where we used to have to cut them into pieces in order for them to be flushed. And I’m not even kidding. And wait, wait. When we had babysitters, I would have to say, okay, if he takes a noose, then you’re gonna have to take a butter knife and you are gonna have to wrap it in a plastic bag, and you are gonna have to cut his shit into pieces so that it will flush. Because I can’t tell, I can’t even count how many times our toilets were broken. When we moved into this new house and we added a bathroom, I was like, we need a toilet that can like flush a tennis ball.
David:
That has like a garbage disposal attached to it.
SPEAKER_01:
That’s what we need. We would take pictures of them and send them to each other because they you wouldn’t believe it that it was coming out of this teeny tiny little kid’s body. Yeah. It’s like an arm.
Gavin:
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
It was nuts.
Gavin:
I have never imagined this story ever. That’s a that’s unbelievable.
SPEAKER_01:
Cut up his shit because it was so massive.