Lifestyle Expert Samantha Ettus on Finding Work-Life Balance as a Mom

Samantha Ettus  0:00

You know, we tend to feel guilty when we go out with friends or go out with our partner or you know, go to work. But these are the things that actually make us better at being a good parent or a good sister or a good friend or the you know, wife. These are the things that make us happier and more fulfilled. And when we’re happier, more fulfilled, we naturally do all of those other jobs better. We become better friends, better sisters, better wives when we’re feeling happier and more fulfilled and that makes us better parents to our children.

Debbie Reber  0:29

Welcome to the Tilt Parenting podcast, a podcast featuring interviews and conversations aimed at inspiring, informing and supporting parents raising differently wired kids. I’m your host Debbie Reber and today I am happy to be bringing to the show author and media personality Samantha Ettus, who is right smack in the middle of a very busy book tour for her new book, The Pie Life: A Guilt Free Recipe for Success and Satisfaction. I really wanted to bring Sam on the show because I don’t think we as parents have differently wired kids spend enough time thinking about ourselves and what we need to keep ourselves feeling inspired and fulfilled. And that’s what her book is all about. As you’ll hear Samantha is also a big advocate for women and girls and has spent many years in the trenches doing work to support working moms in all areas of their lives. But before we get to the interview, I have a quick message for new listeners to the Tilt Podcast. Well more of an invitation to subscribe to us on iTunes or Stitcher or pod bean or player FM. We release new episodes every week. It’s hard to believe this is our 29th episode today. And we have so many powerful interviews coming up including one with Eye to Eye founder David Flink, an episode specifically on girls on the spectrum and a really powerful episode on managing relationships with our own parents and in-laws as we do our best to parent our unique kids. Okay, so rhere’s my pitch. We hope you subscribe. And as always, thanks for listening to the tilled parenting podcast. To learn more about tilt visit WWW dot til parenting.com Hey, everyone, Debbie Reber here with the Tilt Parenting podcast. And today I’m speaking with a super inspiring woman, mother, author, speaker and media personality. Samantha Ettus. Welcome to the show, Samantha.

Samantha Ettus  2:23

Hi, Debbie. Thanks so much for having me.

Debbie Reber  2:25

Well, and of course I know you as Sam, you and I go way back. And I was trying to think about how long we’ve known each other. It must have been 1998 or 99. When we were both working on the Nickelodeon preschool show Blue’s Clues. And watching you from afar, your career take off, it’s been really cool to watch.

Samantha Ettus  2:45

That’s how I feel about you.

Debbie Reber  2:56

And I’m excited to have you on the show today, because you have a brand new book out, I think the Tilt audience will find super interesting. It’s called The Pie Life: A Guilt Free Recipe for Success and Satisfaction. So I first of all want to congratulate you on the book. I know it’s generating a lot of buzz you’ve already been on. You’ve been doing the morning show circuit that Today Show, Good Morning America, among others. And I appreciate you making time to swing by our modest little podcast here and to share your goodness. So thank you.

Samantha Ettus  3:17

Thank you know, I have so much respect for what you’re doing. And I love your show. And I’m so excited. Yeah, thank you.

Debbie Reber  3:22

Before we talk about the book, could you tell us just a bit about yourself and your family kind of put us put it in context?

Samantha Ettus  3:30

Sure. I am a mom of three kids, Ella who’s 10, Ruby, who’s nine. I have to keep practicing because she just turned nine on Sunday and Rowan in who is six, my baby boy, and I’m married. And I live in California, used to live in New York, grew up in New York, we moved five years ago with no friends and no family. And those stories are in the book all those stories of my failed first dates with other women.

Debbie Reber  3:58

We’ve all been there. Yeah, exactly. And that’s me. I know you have a lot of different areas of passion, too, that you’re working on and have a big impact. I know gender stereotypes and kids, which is what your TEDx talk is about. I just watched, fantastic book called The Secret to Unlocking a Child’s Potential, that’s something you’re passionate about. I know for many years, you’ve been very focused on supporting and lifting up moms, specifically working moms. And I was hoping you could just tell us why. Why do you feel so drawn to that work? And what change do you hope to make in the world through that work?

Samantha Ettus  4:34

Well, I am you know, really, really supportive of women and girls and strengthening women and girls and getting more equality in the workplace and getting more quality at home. And I feel so strongly that if we don’t find ways for women to stay in the workforce, it makes it really hard for the people that come behind them. It makes it hard for our kids to have, you know the role models of women who are really doing things in the world and sharing their good is what the world and so I feel really passionately about this, especially now that I’m a mom of two daughters and a son, I’ve raised them pretty much gender neutral in the sense of not assuming, you know, my girls would want a specific color that my son would only want to play with cars or anything like that. So we have kind of a grand petri dish in our own home in terms of how that evolves. And I just feel so strongly that, you know, women can do and be anything, and I want my girls to be raised in an environment where, you know, people don’t just always come up to them and tell them how pretty or cute they are. But they also compliment them on their intelligence and their strength. One of the reasons I’m so passionate about working moms, is because we sort of have been selling this myth to women. And we feel like in our generation of feminism is about choice, and you have a choice of whether to stay home or have kids 90% of women who stay home with kids eventually want to go back to work and weigh more than half of them can’t ever find positions again. And it’s so important for women to keep a foot in the door so that they have options later on. I’m not even going to talk about the financial aspects of that. And the financial security, you know, if there’s a failed marriage, or a sudden death or anything like that, but just for personal satisfaction, it’s so important.

Debbie Reber  6:16

Well, that’s a nice lead into your book, The Pie Life. So can you tell us in general terms, what the book’s about and who you’ve written it for?

Samantha Ettus  6:25

The book is really about how to thrive professionally and personally, for women. And I think that any woman would benefit from the book. I’ve had young women read it, who tell me it’s given them a new direction in terms of feeling like they can manage a lot of things in their future and gives them inspiration. And then I’ve had women or stay at home moms read it, and they feel inspired to live a larger life and, and maybe get back to the workforce and do all these things that they maybe weren’t giving themselves permission to do and enjoy. And then it’s for professional women on a lot of the just tactics and strategies for how to live a thriving life and to drop the guilt and the quest for perfection, and start living a really full enjoyable life.

Debbie Reber  7:08

That’s awesome. It’s something I think so many moms and especially moms in the differently wired community, we don’t spend a lot of time focusing on ourselves. So I love the goal that you have for the book. That’s fantastic. 

Samantha Ettus  7:20

Yeah, and I think it’s so it’s so sad to me, I we’ve gotten to this point, where we think that as women, there’s kind of only two dimensions to life, we talked about motherhood, and we’ve talked about work, but we tend not to talk about the other things and friends in our community and our relationship, our hobbies, our health. And when you look at all of these women, I’ve worked with 1000s of women, and in this book, I interviewed over 100 women. And what I’ve noticed is that the patterns of the most fulfilled and happiest ones, are those that are involved in multiple slices of their life, not just one or two. So it’s so important that we give ourselves permission to go on that weekly, date night and moms night out and, you know, pay attention to letting ourselves exercise and do all these things that lead to a full life. And I mean, especially in this special needs community where you’re working so hard, and the parenting front, it’s so important to have those releases.

Debbie Reber  8:17

Yes, I can attest to that. Personally, we are vigilant about our weekly date nights, can you? So you mentioned different slices of life in your books called the pie life? Can you tell us what the seven slices are like? Tell us more about that approach in your book?

Samantha Ettus  8:34

Well, so let me sort of share with you why I created this way of looking at work in life, I looked at what we have now. And there’s kind of three frameworks we’ve been given by the media and that have been passed down to us about talking about working life. One is work life balance, which we’re set up to fail at, because if you have a thriving career, it’s impossible to spend equal time at work and at home. So you’re failing at that. And then we talk about, you know, having it all and nobody has it all, we can’t point to anyone. And then we talk about juggling, and anyone who’s ever tried to have a conference call with a baby or a pet in the room knows how hard that is. So we’re basically set up to fail in all of these areas. And so I came up with this new framework for looking at work in life, which is a pie and to live a really fulfilling life, you should be involved in six or seven slices, it doesn’t mean that the slices will always be the same size right now, hobbies might be a sliver and parenting might be 40% of your pie. And that’s okay. The idea is not to beat yourself up based on how much time you’re allocating for each slice. Instead, it’s to say I’m probably pretty rational about how I’ve been allocating my time. And instead, I’m going to evaluate my success based on how I’m achieving my goals for each slice. And the book outlines really clearly how you can, what kind of goals to make and how you can set them and go about making them and achieving them.

Debbie Reber  9:56

That’s great. I love that. So I was looking through your book Look, and you have a chapter in there that is called Intentional Parenting, which I loved. And I love the word intention in front of anything, because I really believe in living an intentional life and how we kind of show up day to day. So can you tell us a little bit about your definition for intentional parenting and what that chapter is about?

Samantha Ettus  10:17

Yeah, so I think that, you know, when our kids were younger, my husband used to call my method of parenting, exhaustive parenting, but, but it’s really about, you know, an empathetic approach to parenting. It’s not, you know, very discipline heavy at all, it’s much more about really responding to your child’s needs and seeing them for who they are. And that does take more time. And it is more exhausting to when your children are crying to say, You know what, they’re probably crying for a reason. They don’t have a full vocabulary, yet. There’s something that’s really bothering them. And so instead of saying, Oh, they’re my kid is having a tantrum, whatever that means. How would we feel if you know, every time we were upset, our partner said to us, oh, gosh, you’re crying again, you know, just snap out of it. That makes us feel worse. But in parenting, we tend to do that. So a lot of intentional parenting is thinking about, you know, using empathy, but also thinking about what kind of family you want to have, what kind of child you want to raise, you want to raise an empathetic person do want to raise a child who feels really connected to their family and trust their parents, you know, I always say like, I was born with a large empathy gene, which is my Achilles heel, because it’s really hard for me to be in an airport or at Disneyland or an aquarium and watch how people treat their kids. My heart breaks a few times every hour watching it. And, you know, some might say that’s judgmental, but it really is so sad to me, when we don’t respond to kids as people and see that they’re probably crying for a reason, or they’re probably acting out because something’s really troubling them inside of they might not have the vocabulary to share what that is,

Debbie Reber  11:55

Right. So one of the things and we touched upon this a minute ago, but one of the things I am a huge advocate for any big practitioner of is self-care, I talked about my date nights, I’m also really good about, I just take care of myself, let’s just put it that way I get up for my runs, I do what I need to do. Because I know that when I don’t, I can show up for Asher and I can make pretty much everyone in my house miserable. But again, for a lot of us, you know, especially raising differently wired kids, we can often feel like our lives don’t belong to us. We were running around to therapy appointments, are we having extra meetings at school? Or were we just feel like we have to constantly be doing so much more to help our child stay regulated? And so self-care goes out the window? Do you have advice for moms, you know, who are feeling that way? Or any self-care tips you can share?

Samantha Ettus  12:49

Yeah, I mean, what you just shared and my experience in working with parents of differently wired kids is it’s so much more critical even, that they’re the ones that are letting themselves have the date night or the night out with friends, it’s even more pivotal. Because if you’re not feeling like you have an outlet and adult outlet, it’s really hard to be the best parent you want to be. And so being a part of all these places, and taking care of your own, you know, we tend to feel guilty when we go out with friends or go out with our partner or, you know, go to work. But these are the things that actually make us better at being a good parent, or a good sister, or a good friend or a good you know, wife, these are the things that make us happier and more fulfilled. And when we’re happier, more fulfilled, we naturally do all of those other jobs better, we become better friends, that our sisters better wives when we’re feeling happy and more fulfilled. And that makes us better parents to our children.

Debbie Reber  13:42

I’m just thinking that I like those self-care, things don’t have to be that big. You know, I think we’ve talked about this idea of balance and that this elusive, you know, search for balance. And I know that that is not what you’re saying, that we’re looking for this like Zen-like approach. But there are little ways then to build self-care. It could be just going out for a coffee with a friend or, for me, taking a 15 minute nap is so indulgent and so necessary. And that’s something I do but so, you know, you’re not saying we need to kind of have all these kind of big experiences, but it can be small little things that are just for us.

Samantha Ettus  14:22

100%. I mean, even going for a walk with a friend, or, you know, going out and just having you know, let yourself go for a manicure or go for a run or whatever it is that makes you feel good. It’s so important to have that time and we’ve gotten to a place with parenting where we equate good parenting with face time. And I mean, we’ve all seen so many people who spend every moment with their kids who aren’t good parents.

Debbie Reber  14:50

Yeah, that’s so true. If we’re not truly showing up for our kids and the facetime doesn’t really matter. I’d love to switch gears a little bit and talk about some practical issues there. is a big challenge for working moms. Because a lot of the school meetings like maybe for their child’s IEP at school, or maybe they’re getting called for unexpected early pickups, like, hello, raising my hand here, I used to all the time get that call when Asher was in school, like, Hello, can you come get your child. And so you know, I’m self-employed. So other than that being an inconvenience and having to kind of move things around, I could make it work. But there’s so many working moms who can’t just drop work and duck out regularly for those kinds of situations. So I’m not expecting you to solve this problem. But I’m wondering, do you have any thoughts on how moms in these types of scenarios can make it work?

Samantha Ettus  15:41

I think this is one of the most painful questions I get and I’ve had this on my radio show also, because I wish I had a solution for it. And our system is set up so poorly to handle, you know, differently wired kids, and it breaks my heart. And I and it’s also just so unfair to the families, you know that the only thing I would say is I always say there are no bad industries that are just bad bosses. And for everyone, but especially for this community, it’s so essential to be working for a boss that values their own personal life, or else there’s no chance they’re ever going to value yours. So that’s one critical piece of it. And also, you know, part of it is realizing it’s like I have this thing called the maintenance years of, you know, when your child is under age six, those are the times to just stay in the game in some way. And then leapfrog later, and for this community may be those years or longer. But that most important thing is just staying in the game, keeping your foot in the door in some way so that you have options when you are not so time starved, and in demand by your children.

Debbie Reber  16:46

That’s a good answer. And again, I didn’t expect you to have the solution, I would have been psyched if you did, but it is a real challenge. And it’s a big equity issue too. I mean, it’s really challenging for parents who don’t have the option or who are in a job where it’s just not possible for them to leave and then their kids don’t get the kind of support or advocacy that they deserve in school. So it is a tricky one. Yeah, I also know from experience and from many moms that I’m in communication with that more often than not, it tends to be us the moms who are managing the details of a differently wired child’s life. So we’re often the ones talking to the therapist, because we’re often taking them to the therapist, we’re taking the notes, we’re reading the books, we’re kind of leaving books on our husbands or partners bedside table marked or highlighted areas saying Please, can you read this? We’re fielding the emails and the phone calls. And we often feel like we have all the information and sometimes feel like we’re trying to get our partner up to speed. And okay,

Samantha Ettus  17:46

This is one of my favorite questions. I love this question. So you know, you know, there’s a chapter in my book called The Partner Shift. And I think that what you’re describing is honestly typical of so many moms, and especially in a situation where you’re taking your child’s therapy and doctors and you do have this proprietary information. And so one of the most essential things is to engage your partner at different levels. So it’s not just you reporting back, because it’s really hard for them to feel engaged at that point. But it’s so important that if you can engage them in the doctor’s appointments, and going to some of the doctor’s appointments, so that it’s not always due after the fact saying, Here’s what happened or the more you go on and on without engaging your partner, the harder it is for them ever to play catch up. Mm hmm. And this goes for, you know, it’s sort of similar to the advice I give in the book about the baby years, it’s like, if you are not engaging your partner right away and giving them opportunities, maybe you know, what you have, your mom needs you at that exact time of the next therapy or doctor’s appointment. So you find excuses for your partner to have to attend some of these things alone without you. Because if you don’t engage your partner early on, it’s really hard for them to ever, ever get engaged.

Debbie Reber  19:00

That’s so interesting. I never thought of it that way. But there is like a chasm that begins and I think we also can kind of become a little. I don’t know if self-righteous is the word but we start kind of like that, well, we’re the expert here. And it really can cause a serious divide.

Samantha Ettus  19:16

Well, this is a you know, an analogy and just a story from my own personal life is that when I used to go away on business trips, I would leave my husband these very long color coded manifestos of what needed to happen when I was gone. And, you know, every single lunch box and what they were wearing and whatever. And one day my husband was like, do you know how much these make me feel like a buffoon? Like, this is not helpful. This is making me incapacitated. These are not difficult things you’re asking me to do. I can make a lunchbox. I don’t need a color-coded manifesto, because you’re going away. It’s kind of making it so I feel like I can’t do anything. And it’s just like at work. If someone was hovering over us every second telling us we’re doing it wrong or this isn’t right or here’s how you do it. You feel incapacitated or when we helicopter arc, they feel incapacitated. We do that with our partners so often. And then we have the, you know, kind of wherewithal to be like, by the way, or you know, you’re not involved. And it’s like, Who would want to be involved in that you completely, you know, deflated their sense of that they could be a part of it. And so I do think that we have more responsibility than we give ourselves in terms of getting our partners in the game. And that, if we’re blaming our partners, we also want to just make sure we’re not really also part of the problem.

Debbie Reber  20:31

Hmm, that’s such a good point. I’m just thinking when I, you know, I homeschool Asher and sometimes my husband is my quote, unquote, substitute teacher, which makes me very happy, because then I get a day out to do what I need to do. But I used to leave very detailed kind of schedules. And here’s what we do. And this is what you know. And the last couple of times, I’ve been like, you know, what, have your own school day, like, however you want to structure it, it’s fine. I

Samantha Ettus  20:57

Love that story. That’s awesome.

Debbie Reber  20:59

So Alright, so we’ve talked about this a little bit. And I just want to ask you, What can parents expect, especially parents who have differently wired kids like your book, the aim is to support women in having a full and healthy life, and especially mothers. And so could you just kind of paint a picture for our moms out there who are listening who are not feeling like they have a full and healthy life? Like, what can they expect that to look like right now, like, what’s a reasonable expectation for what that could look like, knowing they’re in the thick of it, you know, and they might be really, in those hard years.

Samantha Ettus  21:35

So he’s a really important thing. Part of having differently wired kids is that you do have a larger parenting time commitment than other parents. It’s just, it’s grueling during some of those years. And it’s so important that you also are planning out your time, so that you’re making time in the calendar for your leisure time. And when I say leisure, I’m not saying you’re going to sit around eating bon bons and watching TV all day. But I mean, it’s really important that you have a little bit of time every day, whether it’s a walk with a friend or with your partner, or whatever it might be for you going on a hike, you have to be putting that time into planning for those really essential things because it’s going to make you a better parent. But also that comes back to the slices of your pie. It’s really essential that you are looking at your pie and saying, Okay, today, this might be a sliver, my hobbies slice, right? I might not be golfing all day on Saturday. But I might be taking a guitar lesson once a month, because that makes me happy. So it’s about being realistic about what you can fit in today. And also realizing that these years go by really fast.

Debbie Reber  22:42

Yeah, the days are long, but the years are fast. Right?

Samantha Ettus  22:45

And the years are the years are short, and the days are long and the years are short.

Debbie Reber  22:50

Yeah, that sounds right. Yeah, it is really about being intentional to write, I used to have a chart that I would fill out. And I basically wrote down the things that I know make me happy, like one is listening to the soundtrack from Rent. One is that nap that I spoke of when might be a hot shower? And actually, rather than noticing when I did those things, planning those things. So saying, Okay, I need to at least do one thing from this list every day. And I know that. Yeah, so it doesn’t. I like that idea that it can be something small, but we do need to be intentional about making it happen. 

Samantha Ettus  23:30

And by the way, I want to go back to your date nights with Derin for one second, because I love the fact that you guys, I think it’s Sunday nights you go into it. Is that right?

Debbie Reber  23:37

Correct. Yes.

Samantha Ettus  23:38

I remember from Facebook, I always admire it. So because at one point I thought of switching our Saturday night date night to Sunday just because of you guys. And then we went back to Saturday. But I do think having that in your calendar in advance. Like one of the best pieces of advice I ever got, which totally applies to this community is to hire a weekly sitter. And it wasn’t just hire weekly sitter on Saturdays, it was hire weekly sitter to start at 3pm. It’s a great idea to have this time before your date night to do some errands with your partner and get anything done, you wanted to get done. And you’ll feel like you really have time together. And also you’re getting stuff done. But your child won’t suffer because you have a babysitter at three o’clock instead of five o’clock. And it makes you feel like you have sort of an extra time away. But the other thing about a weekly sitter is that you’re not redoing the math every week and saying, oh, it’s not worth it that I have to pay for the sitter, I have to pay for dinner. And then you do the math and I’m so tired. It’s not worth it. But if you have the weekly sitter booked, you don’t want to cancel on them because you don’t want them to cancel on you in the future. So it kind of forces you to go on that weekly night out whether you’re single and you’re dating or you’re going out with your partner.

Debbie Reber  24:47

I know one of our quote unquote high class problems is like well, what should we do tonight? You know, sometimes we don’t really know what it was just go for a walk and you know, sit down and have a drink at a cafe or something. It doesn’t even have to be a big thing. And sometimes that

Samantha Ettus  25:01

way, I always say to people, it doesn’t even need to cost money, you could literally decide that you are going to try a new, you know, a new walk or a new, you know, sunset stroll every date night or you’re going to go to a new wine bar or you can even, you know, do something with your partner where you’re taking turns finding the best meals for under $30, whatever it is like there’s fun ways to do it.

Debbie Reber  25:24

Awesome. All right. Well, hopefully we’ll start a revolution of people doing date nights on Sunday nights, that would be great. And if Sunday nights are a great night, FYI, because mean, some restaurants aren’t open. But usually any place we want to go that is open we can get in because it’s just not the cool night to go out. So movies are better on Sunday nights. Yeah. All right. So before we go, tell us what’s the best way for people to get in touch with you if they want to check out your book.

Samantha Ettus  25:53

Well, they can buy The Pie Life, A Guilt Free Recipe for Success and Satisfaction on Amazon or at their local bookstore, Barnes and Noble. And they can find me at samanthaettus.com. You can also sign up for my weekly newsletter filled with tips and links to my favorite articles. And that is at samanthaettus.com.

Debbie Reber  26:15

Yes, and I get your newsletter. And I love reading your Sam Sense, and it’s great content. So I encourage listeners to check that out. It’s always got some insightful tidbit for me. And I actually thought of one last question before we hang up. How did you come up with the idea of the pie? Like how did that come up for you?

Samantha Ettus  26:36

Well, one of my favorite things about the metaphor of the pie is that the most delicious pies are not the store-bought perfect looking ones. Those are the ones that have no taste. The delicious pies are the ones that are gooey and running off the sides and really messy. And that’s how your life is supposed to be. And one of the things that really gets us held back is thinking our life has to be perfect. And nobody has a life we think they do. And so you can let go of that quest for perfection and expect that your life is going to be really full but really messy. It’s just a lot happier and easier to live.

Debbie Reber  27:09

I love that. That’s one of our slogans at Tilt is to help parents embrace their extraordinary, messy lives. Oh, I love it. It’s so great. And I love that and now I’m thinking of apple pie. So thank you for planting that seed for me. Um, Sam, I want to thank you so much for taking the time out of your book tour to stop by and share with us your insights. I know you’re on the road traveling, and I’m just really excited to bring this to the Tilt community. And thank you again for great insight and a lot of food for thought today.

Samantha Ettus  27:42

Debbie, thank you so much.

Debbie Reber  27:46

Thank you so much for tuning in to the Tilt Parenting podcast. To learn more about Samantha edits and her new book The Pie Life. Check out Samantha’s TEDx talk and find information on all the other resources mentioned in today’s show. Visit the show notes at tiltparenting.com/session 29. Before I go, if you like this episode and have two minutes to help us reach more people through our podcast, here are two easy peasy things you can do right now. Well, unless you’re not in front of a computer, you can do it later. Leave an honest review on iTunes. This helps the show gain more visibility in the iTunes universe or even easier. Rate our show by clicking on the stars at the top of the page. And secondly, share your favorite episode in your social media world, your Facebook page, parenting groups you hang out in online and more. We really want to make sure that parents who would benefit from these conversations know that we’re here. Thanks so much for helping us spread the word. And thanks again for listening. For more information on to parenting visit www.tiltparenting.com