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What Fresh Hell: Parenting, Relationships, and Making Life Better, with Two Funny Moms

When you’re a parent, every day brings a “fresh hell” to deal with. In other words, there’s always something. Think of us as your funny mom friends who are here to remind you: you’re not alone, and it won’t always be this hard.
We’re Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables, both busy moms of three kids, but with completely different parenting styles. Margaret is a laid-back to the max; Amy never met a spreadsheet or an organizational system she didn’t like.
In each episode of “What Fresh Hell” we offer lots of laughs, but also practical advice, parenting strategies, and tips to empower you in your role as a mom. We explore self-help techniques, as well as ways to prioritize your own needs, combat stress, and despite the invisible workload we all deal with, find joy amidst the chaos of motherhood.
If you’ve ever wondered “why is my kid…” then one of us has probably been there, and we’re here to tell you what we’ve learned along the way.
We unpack the behaviors and developmental stages of toddlers, tweens, and teenagers, providing insights into their actions and equipping you with effective parenting strategies.
We offer our best parenting tips and skills we’ve learned. We debate the techniques and studies that are everywhere for parents these days, and get to the bottom of what works best to raise happy, healthy, fairly well-behaved kids, while fostering a positive parent-child relationship.
If you’re the default parent in your household, whether you’re a busy mom juggling multiple pickups and dropoffs, or a first-time parent seeking guidance, this podcast is your trusted resource. Join our community of supportive mom friends laughing in the face of motherhood!
whatfreshhellpodcast.com

Copyright: Copyright © 2016-2023 What Fresh Hell, LLC

Latest Episodes:

What We Call "People Pleasing" Might Really Be Something Else Feb 26, 2025

Show notes

"People pleaser" is usually both a gendered and pejorative term. Some people really do love taking on the lion's share of work in a given situation. Some people do it but are secretly resentful that they always have to spearhead endless event planning, committees, and get togethers. Here's what "people pleasing" really means and how to unwind yourself from it if it's getting to be too much.

Amy and Margaret discuss:

The actual definition of people pleasing versus how it's commonly used
Demand sensitivity and how it relates to people-pleasing
How to differentiate between people-pleasing and altruism

Here are links to some of the resources mentioned in the episode:

Gary Trosclair for The Healthy Compulsive Project: What, Exactly, Do They Want From You? How The Demand Sensitivity Lens Mucks Up Our Lives
Nick North on YouTube: How We Avoid Stupid Fights - the Number System
Reddit: The Term "People Pleaser"
Allyson Chiu for the Washington Post: How to Know If You're a People-Pleaser and What to Do About It

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, gender roles, gender equity, gender stereotypes

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

HAPPY TO HELP free audiobook preview from libro.fm! Feb 25, 2025

Show notes

The audiobook reviews of HAPPY TO HELP (written and read by our own Amy Wilson!) are in, and they're amazing. Libro.fm has chosen Happy to Help as a "Bookseller Pick," and this week they're giving What Fresh Hell listeners a free audiobook chapter! It's Amy's favorite essay in HAPPY TO HELP, and in the intro she explains why.

Libro.fm's review comes from a bookseller at Alexandria on Main in Elkins, WV:

“Did we just become best friends? I mean, seriously Amy, you absolutely nailed type A extrovert motherhood. I usually shy away from memoirs and from essay collections…and I’m thrilled to have made myself start your book. Once I did, you could not have pulled my attention away! MUST READ THIS BOOK!”

And Candace Smith's review for Booklist says: "The author shines as a reader and her performance adds so much to the text. The essays become private conversations with the listener that spark both laughter and tears."

Enjoy what you hear? Get HAPPY TO HELP at libro.fm, on Bookshop, or wherever you buy books!

libro.fm: https://www.libro.fm/audiobooks/9781958506813-happy-to-help?srsltid=AfmBOorRT_lc3J0m1tRLPhvdebMqud1h-mW_l_n5Y1sUoWUxWTA-y8TA

Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/12099/9781958506790

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

DEEP DIVE: When It's Okay To Be Emotional In Front of Our Kids Feb 24, 2025

Show notes

This month's Deep Dive series is about parenting through uncertainty. Listen to all of the episodes in the series with this Spotify playlist.

Is it okay for us to be emotional in front of our kids?

Julie, one of our podcast listeners, asked this question in our Facebook group:

Is it good for kiddos to see their moms have emotions? And how can we talk through our emotions with our kids? My grandmother lost her husband when my dad was 11 years old. She had four kids, no job. She had to take care of everything. Once I asked her how she coped with all of that, and she said she just held it together, always, except when she cried in the shower at night. At first, I thought, wow, how strong of her. Now that I have kids, I kind of wonder: is shower crying always good? Never good? Sometimes good?

Shower crying is definitely better than swallowing emotions entirely. And there are times when our emotions, and/or the situations causing them, are too unsettling for our kids to handle. Sometimes it's good for kids to see our emotions, but we shouldn't be asking kids to hold them for us.

But studies show that children whose mothers express emotions like sadness or loneliness in their presence are more emotionally literate as they grow. By serving as “emotional coaches” for our kids, and modeling how we process difficult moments in our own lives, we can raise kids more able to handle such moments themselves.

In this episode we discuss when it’s okay to be emotional in front of our kids, why suppressing our emotions entirely might not work as well as we think it does, and when shower cries are most certainly called for. Good news: we don't have to fear that showing our vulnerability is a bad thing.

Our listener Jennifer summed it up best: "I don’t hide the most intense parts of being human from the very people I’m trying to help on their journey as humans.”

Here are links to some of the writing on the topic that we discuss in this episode:

John Lamble for The Conversation: Should you hide negative emotions from children?
Gottman Institute: Parental Meta-Emotion Philosophy and the Emotional Life of Families
Bonnie Le for Personality and Social Psychology: The Costs of Suppressing Negative Emotions and Amplifying Positive Emotions During Parental Caregiving
Judy Dunn and Jane Brown for Developmental Psychology: Family Talk About Feeling States and Children's Later Understanding Of Others' Emotions
Woody Harrelson explains how to handle unpleasant emotions on Cheers
"Turn it Off" from The Book of Mormon
Toilet-Training Toddler Declares, 'I Didn't Poop, I Peed!'

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, stress, news, current events, world affairs, emotions, kids emotions, parent emotions, uncertainty

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fresh Take: Renee Reina, "The Mom Room" Feb 21, 2025

Show notes

How do social media influencers themselves manage their expectations around parenting and their consumption of parenting content online? Renee Reina, creator and host of the "Mom Room" podcast, discusses how her ADHD diagnosis, her PhD in psychology, and her social media presence all shape her parenting.

Renee, Amy, and Margaret discuss:

How parenting norms have changed since they were children
How Renee's ADHD diagnosis has impacted her work and her parenting
How Renee manages her consumption of social media as a content creator herself

Renee Reina is the creator and host of The Mom Room. She also has a wildly popular Instagram following and a PhD in psychology.

Here's where you can find Renee:

@thereneereina & @themomroom on IG
Listen to The Mom Room podcast

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, brain development, kids anxiety, anxiety, worry, stress, ADHD, moms with ADHD, kids with ADHD, ADHD diagnosis, social media content, content creator, social media influencer

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We Settle Your Arguments (Part 2) Feb 19, 2025

Show notes

Did you know? Happy to Help is available on Audible- with Amy doing the narration!

Should you brush your teeth with hot or cold water? Do you cut sandwiches horizontally or diagonally? How tightly should you screw on jar lids?

We asked our listeners for their most longstanding, totally low-stakes disagreements with their spouse or parenting partner. And there were just too many juicy arguments for one episode! Here's part two of our final rulings on important topics.

Join our Facebook group and be part of our next episode!

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips,

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

DEEP DIVE: Changing the Stories We Tell Ourselves Feb 17, 2025

Show notes

This Deep Dive series is about reflecting on our trajectories as mothers - looking back, reflecting on where we are now, and thinking about the future. Listen to the whole playlist on Spotify.

We are the protagonist in our own story, but what happens when we become the antagonist in stories we weren't even aware of? Or when we assign antagonist roles to unsuspecting partners or kids? Amy and Margaret discuss why we as humans need to tell ourselves stories, when the stories we tell ourselves might stop serving us, and how we can change the stories we tell ourselves.

In this episode, Amy and Margaret discuss:

why our brains are willing to ignore what doesn't fit our preconceived narratives
the concept of cognitive mediation, which is how stories are created
"taking things less personally" and the better approach to avoid feeling wounded by others' stories
how to rediscover the agency we have over the stories we tell ourselves

Here are links to the resources mentioned in the episode:

Esther Perel: How the Stories We Tell Ourselves Can Make or Break Us
Kyle Benson for The Gottman Institute: There Are Two Views to Every Conflict and Both Are Valid
Carl Alviani for Medium: The Science Behind Storytelling
Kendall Haven: Your Brain on Story

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, brain development, mom brain

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fresh Take: Ashley Graber and Maria Evans on Raising Calm Kids Feb 14, 2025

Show notes

Anxiety is diagnosed much more frequently than it used to be; that goes for our kids as well. Our parental instincts are usually to reassure them, but as it turns out, that actually isn't the solution to making them worry less.

Ashley Graber and Maria Evans, child and family psychotherapists and authors of the new book RAISING CALM KIDS IN A WORLD OF WORRY, explain how to have tough conversations with your child, and how to teach your child coping skills for their anxiety.

In this episode Ashley, Maria, and Margaret discuss:

Why kids are more anxious these days
The S.A.F.E.R parenting method
How to talk to your children about their worries

Here's where you can find Ashley and Maria:

www.ashleygrabertherapy.com/books-and-media
www.mariaevanstherapy.com/book
@ashleygraber1 and @mariaevanstherapy on IG
Buy RAISING CALM KIDS: https://bookshop.org/a/12099/9780143137795

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, brain development, kids anxiety, anxiety, worry, stress

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We Settle Your Arguments (Part 1) Feb 12, 2025

Show notes

Did you know? Happy to Help is available on Audible- with Amy doing the narration!

Should ketchup be refrigerated? Is dryer-lint cleaning a before or after job? We asked our listeners for their most longstanding, totally low-stakes disagreements with their spouse or parenting partner.

In this episode, we render judgments. People, we're calling balls and strikes. Our determinations are final. Join our Facebook group and be part of our next episode!

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips,

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

DEEP DIVE: Is This a Midlife Crisis? Feb 10, 2025

Show notes

This Deep Dive series is about reflecting on our trajectories as mothers - looking back, reflecting on where we are now, and thinking about the future. Listen to the whole playlist on Spotify.

What does it mean to have a midlife crisis? What exactly counts as "midlife," and (yikes) are we already in it? Can we avoid the disenchantment and the rash decision-making that stereotypically accompany such times in our lives?

A listener in our Facebook group asked:

"Who has been thru their midlife crisis and how did you deal? Turning 40 next week has me feeling like I've wasted my life. Can I get over the what-ifs?"

In this episode Amy and Margaret discuss:

How American culture has changed its views on aging
Why women and men experience midlife crises differently
Why the age of your children might be the thing triggering your crisis

Here are links to some of the resources discussed in the episode:

Howard P. Chudacoff: How old are you? Age consciousness in American culture
Laurence Steinberg: Crossing Paths: How Your Child's Adolescence Triggers Your Own Crisis
Mark Jackson: Life begins at 40: the demographic and cultural roots of the midlife crisis

Sign up for the What Fresh Hell newsletter! Once a month you’ll get our favorite recent episodes, plus links to other things to read and watch and listen to, and upcoming special events:

http://eepurl.com/h8ze3z

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, brain development, mom brain

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fresh Take: Neha Ruch, "The Power Pause" Feb 07, 2025

Show notes

So many women feel that when they leave the workforce to become a stay-at-home parent, "Mom" becomes their primary and only identity. But Neha Ruch, author of the new book THE POWER PAUSE, reframes the shift from paid work to stay-at-home parenting—and sometimes back to the workforce— in a way that expands identity and possibilities for women going through these transitions.

Neha, Amy, and Margaret discuss:

Why the period of "stay at home momness" can be a great challenge to identity
How the Power Pause stands in contrast to the way moms are seen when they stop working
Practical tips for resigning strategically when leaving the workforce
How to grow and learn during a power pause—and why it's not really a resume gap

Here's where you can find Neha:

https://www.motheruntitled.com
@motheruntitled on Instagram
Buy THE POWER PAUSE: https://bookshop.org/a/12099/9780593716182

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website:

https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/

What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Margaret Ables and Amy Wilson.

mom friends, funny moms, parenting advice, parenting experts, parenting tips, mothers, families, parenting skills, parenting strategies, parenting styles, busy moms, self-help for moms, manage kid’s behavior, teenager, tween, child development, family activities, family fun, parent child relationship, decluttering, kid-friendly, invisible workload, default parent, parental stress, kids stress, brain development, mom brain, the power pause, redefining motherhood

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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