Hello Sir, hello again #22. 22 Let's keep it going.
Yeah, it's nice to see you twice in under a week.
I know we've done that way. Yeah, we've done OK.
Haven't. We.
Makes a nice change. I know.
But yeah, I mean, do you know what I find?
Because we did that one, when you stop doing it for a bit,
life gets on top here. Then when we did that one, I was
like, Oh yeah, I've missed that. It's a release.
Isn't it? Yeah, yeah.
So then when you were when, when you said are you good for
Wednesday? I was like, yeah, good for
Wednesday. So yeah, mate, back into the
swing of it. I think we were going to talk a
bit about Paul Skols to start with.
I I think so. What an absolute fucking legend.
You know what, like we, we've been doing this now for like
since May, but it, it, it still gets me every time.
Like a dad comes out and just puts it on the table, says it as
it is. And yeah, what what what Paul's
goals did Just. Yeah, I just listened to it all
and heard him speak. And then like when people come
up to us and go, oh, what you guys say resonates with me.
I heard Paul speak and I was like, what you're saying now
absolutely resonates with me. And yeah, just seeing him, that
one clip, I think you sent it to me about talking about the
future in the sense of like, what happens when.
Yeah, you know, we're too old to to look after our kids or, you
know, we're no longer here. And just hearing him kind of.
And you could see the emotion in his face when he was talking
about it. He doesn't talk about it much
publicly, at least. That's kind of one of the first
time I'd seen him, really. Yeah, I think he's, he's like,
he's touched upon it and there's been a few kind of things where
I think his son Aiden's been mentioned and there's, you know,
maybe sort of 1015 minutes spent on it, but this looked like it
was a proper off the cuff coming.
And he was around people he knew.
He knew it well, yeah, absolutely.
He's around his mates, isn't he? That he knows really well and.
You know, I watched that and it reflected very much on like, it
might not be the case, but it felt like that was the first
time he'd had that conversation with them.
I don't know it was, but it just felt very real and organic and
it, it very much reflected for me.
That's what we've said before, like when one of my mates would
just go, hey, how's Thomas doing mate?
Like just in a just kind of putting the feelers out there,
not really knowing what to say. It felt a bit like that.
Yeah, I, I think we kind of seen it from Paul's point of view.
We've obviously, you know, we've got the same lens looking at the
future and our experiences with our, our kids is kind of when he
was talking about it. You can see and we've I've had
it, I know you've had it where you start opening up a little
bit and you get your mates. And I think in this case it was
kind of Roy Keane, wasn't it? I completely understand where it
was coming from, where he kind of said, mate, take it one day
at a time. Don't, don't, don't focus too
much. Take it one day at a time.
And it's we both like messages are at the same time going.
He he just said that. What Roy Keane said.
Yeah. And totally get it.
And I've had it, you've had it you.
We've had friends, family say that to us.
But we do take it one day at a time.
We live in, you know, we live in the moment as best we possibly
can. But that Pandora's box is open.
Yeah. And you can live back.
You can live one day at a time. But which we do as you're
getting older, Yeah. You start looking at the future.
And, you know, you can't just bury that and just go, oh, yeah,
That's right. I'll ignore that.
But yeah. The one day at a time stuff is
is the stuff we deal with day-to-day.
That's the that's. The meltdowns, that's, yeah,
that's. The one day at a time stuff that
we're doing, but that thing in the distance, you can't put it
away. It's it's and you have to have
it as a thought because you're trying to prepare, you're trying
to prepare your kids, but it's financially.
Or would it? If you lived one day at a time
and just ignored that, you'd be you'd be doing it wrong.
Yeah, things would be different. You'd you'd then put so much
pressure on yourself when you know things happen, you cancer,
you get old or other ailments start to happen and you haven't
focused on it or, or had that conversation in your head.
Like fuck, I do need to plan for the future, whatever that looks
like, whether it's trusts or putting things into place.
Or even if it's just, it gives you the impetus it does does
with us, it's given us the impetus a bit more to really get
its communication going because it's that thing where if if I
didn't have that worry or concern at some point down down
the line, I just that obviously fair attitude.
Yeah. It'll work itself out exactly.
So I do think it, at least for me anyway, it, it drives me to,
to push those kind of things. But it was a hell of a
conversation and it is. I think in it again, it shows
that no matter what background you're from, financially,
celebrity, whatever, when it comes to parenting an autistic
kid, we are all in the same boat.
Yes, some of us are more financially better off than
others, but the emotional side of it, like we're all going
through the same shit. Yeah, absolutely.
And I think we've touched on it before.
You can, you can be a, you know, you can be like us, just, you
know, a couple of working class lads from Shropshire.
You can be, you know, high city banker or, you know, whatever
the case may be, at the end of the day, it's same worries.
Yeah. It's exactly the same fears
you're you're doing, you know, the same dreams that you had for
your kid. It just, it's a, it's a shit
levelling off, isn't it? It just levels everything off.
Where did? You see the podcast Steve did
afterwards? Yes, that was, that was
interesting. That's what really, really
surprised me is because he was so blown away.
I mean, he's basically become a, he's become an advocate and he
has been an advocate anyway. But I think he he was so blown
away by the response and the effect that he was having on
other people. And that's quite that's that's a
lot because again, you know, we don't know Paul skulls, but he
always strikes me as somebody that was, I think even he says
it himself. And he's the the lies he played
with just said, you know, you've always kept yourself to
yourself. You're quite reserved.
Yeah, whatever chap about that, you know, you don't, but I think
that's why it's hitting just coming out and just saying I'm
I'm I'm going to do this. I'm going to make a decision now
that, you know, essentially I'm kind of stopping work or, you
know, the punditry side of things to to focus on on Aidan.
You know, it hits home with a lot of us and goes do you know
what? Yeah, shit.
Yeah. Did you see a lot of the
comments that he did? He did a post I think yesterday
or yesterday. It was just like a lot of the
comments, yeah, that had come through and it was people
weren't asking for anything. They were just saying thank you.
Yeah, just thank you for speaking it and raising it and.
That's what's blowing him away the most like is.
Yeah, well, you get a public figure like that who comes out
and says, you know, I'm going through this as well.
You just go at last. And the other thing is these are
just our kids. So when you're in it, you, you
forget because it's just a kid. And it's almost like for him, it
was like, I was just talking about my son.
He's my son. I just love him like anyone else
loves their son. I was just talking about my son.
And I just can't believe how many people it helped.
So it's that, it's just that like that shock.
It's but it was cool people relate to it.
I hope it's given him like, not that he's, you know, only
stressed that he needs to go out and share his story with
everybody. He's already done it.
But I think he can help a lot of people.
I think he could. I really think he he's, it's up
to him whether he wants to. Or not.
No, no, absolutely. But even even he doesn't have to
go out there to rallies and everything else like that and,
you know, do what we do wear, you know, T-shirts and
everything else. Just just going.
Yeah. Or just not hiding it.
Yeah. I think is a big thing.
It's just going, yeah. My, my, my child's autistic.
These are the struggles we go through.
Yeah. This is what I'm worried about
the future. And he has had some struggles.
I mean, if some of the, you know, some of the stories they,
the struggles they had with Aiden early on.
I think he was he was mentioned like wearing long sleeve hair
football shirts to cover up there was a.
Time when they were driving and like for no rhyme or reason that
that they could discover, he'd like jumped in the front of the
car and was pulling his wifes hair and while he's driving and
now apparently he's like super chill.
But again, lots of people have said I've got an autistic child.
I had to change my car. I had to get a people carrier.
So there was a barrier between, you know, whoever was in the
front driving spare set of seats that were free and then they
were sat at the back just to stop that.
And again, it's something people go shit, man.
I thought it was just crazy. But it's a thing, isn't it?
It's an actual absolutely an actual thing.
So, you know, from from my point of view, yeah.
I just thought it was fantastic to to hear somebody that you
looked up to just go. It's people learning about it as
well because a lot of people won't listen to me and you
completely. Understandable.
No. No.
Absolutely. When you hear Paul Skulls talk
about it, they all, they all love him and they all follow
him. And to hear him talk about that
some, I mean, I bet a lot of people that have, especially men
and dads, because we've talked about it before that are
potentially kind of ignoring the the topic or just kind of push
to the wayside a little bit or just hope for the best.
They might have heard him openly speak about it and go OK, it's
OK that my kids are autistic. It's it's you know, we're
talking about it now, but how many people, you know, at work
in the pub go into a match on a Saturday just going, oh, did you
see overlap? Did you see Paul talking about
it? It, you know, and even people
that are affected by autism, no have no, nobody in their family
that's autistic will just go right.
Oh wow, I didn't realise it was that it was that difficult.
Podcast they were like genuine they they're genuinely asking
they genuinely cared. You could just tell and and
they, I'm assuming don't have any kind of interaction with
people with autism and they were really interested to kind of
find out what his day-to-day is like and what he's you know what
what he's kind of routine well, Aiden's routine well, it's his
routine as well as. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Well, this is it. It becomes your routine.
It is your routine. Yeah, absolutely.
So it's going to be a bit of a, you know, a bit of change there,
but I wish him all the success. And yeah, just again, great that
he's talked about it and opened it up and it's, it is good.
It's create a fantastic talking opportunity.
And again, it might, it might inspire, like you said, other
people to come out and just just say, yeah, I've got, I've got
similar sort of struggles, in fact.
He was on with Paddy McGuinness, wasn't he?
For that second, yeah. Yeah, Paddy Paddy's well versed
in in life like that, so of course he is.
It's good that there's he's got a couple of mates that are going
down the same Rd as him. Actually, we've got loads of
stuff we're going to talk about, but how's you?
You did a post the other day asking for help.
Yeah, yeah, just this not being potty trained.
Yeah, I know she's like 4. She's 4, isn't she?
Four. Yeah, 4 1/2 now.
And I think we're in the largest size pull ups that supermarket
stock, you know that size 9. But we're just night, night time
or getting towards the evening. It's just constant trying to put
her hands in the nappy and, and pulling at it.
And we don't know if this is causing her to kind of not sleep
properly anymore. So yeah, put a, put a post out
and yeah, jeez, man, loads and loads of amazing messages have
come back and I need to get through them all And, and just
kind of thank people. I was kind of, yeah, speaking to
Selena, kind of going through some of them.
Some people recommended a certain type of night time kind
of nappy pull up, which we've got lots of people recommending
certain sheets that we can put on the bed that we've we've got
some great suggestions, kind of layering kind of these
waterproof sheets, normal sheet, waterproof sheets, normal
sheets. So yeah, we can just pull one
layer off and then kind of, you know, let her sleep.
But yeah, so many things there that we're going to go through.
I think we've had an expert in and kind of potty training and
continents. Yeah, send, send a message.
So what's? The name.
Called, yeah, give her a shout out but she she's come out with
some some kind of advice from kind of a holistic point of view
as well in tackling it so. And this is great, you know, not
just for us, but we've, we've put questions out before from,
you know, people in the community that are asking for
advice and yeah, we can tap into it now and, and get all that
stuff so. Great Instagram name Continents
consultant Continents consultant trainer.
Go check her out on. Instagram she yeah, absolutely.
So thank you very much for that message.
But again, every single I didn't think I was going to get many
because I was just I was heading to the gym.
It was like 10 PMI just put that out there and I got out of the
gym and I was like, clearly people don't sleep with autistic
kids. I'm fully aware, but.
It's one of those. It's one of those subjects that
I think I want to say most, but a lot of parents go through
because again, it's a communication piece.
It's a it's, it's one of those things where you just trying to
communicate effectively. I mean, we're at a point where
Pex cards were barely, you're barely there really kind of at
her age. Yeah, it's very hit and miss.
I've said to you like so she'll use it and then three months
later she'll. And I know one of the things
that they that they recommended early on, I mean, this is like,
I think Thomas was maybe 2. And they were trying to explain
to us, you know, you put this by the toilet and these are the
pictures you put there. And they're like a little
instructional on what you do on the toilet.
You let you sit up and you sit down.
I'm looking at it thinking he he he doesn't know what basic pecs
are yet. How is he going to read that and
go sort OK, I need to seat up. Cool.
This is great to have in the toilet wall and then go through
this whole. Instruction like IKEA
instruction manual? Yeah.
So I was, I was thinking like, and he was 2:00-ish.
Well, he couldn't do that now. He couldn't read that and
understand what it means. No, I got to the stage where I
thought, am I just going to put YouTube videos on 24/7 of just,
yeah, lock everything out here. It's constant.
All you're watching at the moment is potty training until
it sinks in. But yeah, it's, well, that's
funnily enough, because then we had the same issue.
Last night, Well, yeah, we've got a WhatsApp group for the
dads that have been on the show. And then we were talking about,
yeah, what I had asked. And then lo and behold, there
must have been something in the water, mate, or something in the
poo, because, yeah, you put a video clip in there.
It sounded like. Yeah, I mean, it should have
been a Halloween clip from what you described as.
So I came up so basically so so Thomas goes to bed at 7:00 like
on the dots 7:00 and I was I was on on a call with a customer
downstairs. I was like clock watching and
and he he said, you know, you're right for time.
And I said, yeah, just 7:00 my son goes to bed.
So when he he was like, yeah, yeah, no problem.
So we just got to seven and I leg it up the stairs to like,
make sure I can cat, you know, see Thomas before he goes to
bed. And I get up there and he's in
the bath whistling. I'm like, what's going on?
Like, why is he still in the bath?
And then I turn and look in his bedroom and Mish is there with
rubber gloves on and she just looks at me and she's like,
yeah, he's shit. He spreads shit everywhere.
And I was like, what? And he's not done this for a
while. So I was like, what is going on?
So he'd like he'd taken his nappy off, got his hand in
there, Obviously then he was in a mess.
So he's like trying to spread it everywhere.
It was on the hand rails of his bed.
It was everywhere he went in other rooms in the house, sat on
window sills without a nappy on. So just his bare arse sitting on
a white window sill. So yeah, it was just a case of
Misha. Basically while I was downstairs
on this work called Misha was doing this detective work, which
probably isn't much detective work.
You just got to sniff it out, I suppose.
But yeah, I just, I just did the video because I couldn't believe
it. You asked about that yesterday
and then that happened. But the fact that all of the
lads in the chat all add some kind of advice means they've all
been through. It yeah, yeah, I think it's a
common theme, isn't it? And and that smell, that's not
something a spice pumpkin candle's not going to get rid
of, is it? It's it's it's generally
lingers. We'll have to speak to this, the
continent consultant, the continent consultant just
because I think it does need a specialist's eye because I'm
there's probably something you could say.
I mean that I'm guessing she would ask questions.
Are they doing this? Are they doing that?
Because those are probably like the tell tale signs that they
might be ready. Who might get her on as a guest?
That's actually a really good idea.
If she's up for it. That's actually a great shape.
Yeah. Let's message you after this
because I think that would be invaluable.
A bit like when Jess came on, you know, it's.
Just yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that'd be brilliant
because I definitely Thomas is. Thomas is 6.
He's in size 8 nines. Yeah.
And we, we got the the, the school centre ones that you can
get. On the NHS.
In the NHS, Jesus age Christ. Yeah.
Is it as good as their printer paper which is just a a thin?
Piece of crazy. I just, I just, I was just
digging around. In the end it was just so like
just such a huge thing. And he's used to pull ups, so
now a normal nappy. Like I even I don't like putting
them on him or I just like, why have we got nappies?
Yeah, it's pull ups. It's easier.
And we put this nappy on him just to test out.
You're like 3 nappies, this is going to be great.
And we put it on him and he was like, what the fuck is this?
He was looking at us like, are you serious?
Zuma wrestler style. It looked honestly it was, it
was nuts and he didn't like it because where you because you
don't have the the elastic that you have in pull ups.
It's just the tabs, isn't it? Yeah, no rubs.
And they get, yeah, and they're quite tight on the sides, aren't
they? And he was like, Nah, not
having, it's not after years of having a pull up.
I mean, it was so big, I ended up sticking on my head and it
looked like a bonnet. Oh my God, it was huge and I've
got a big head. So yeah, I think if we could get
her on, that'd be really. Good.
Yeah, I think so. I think we'll probably get quite
a lot of questions from the Oh my God community as well.
Yeah, there'll be loads yeah, I think there'll be loads.
A lot of overlap I would hope as well. 100% yeah, very, very
interesting. But I think kind of following on
from that, that kind of pool scolds thing, it's kind of
raised a few questions, hasn't it?
And I think we, you know, it might be a good time to revisit
some of the stuff that maybe we discussed in the in the very
first episode and, you know. Kind of way back then.
Jeez, maybe kind of seven months on how we well, less than that
is it six months on how we may have taken a different view to
things, but. That's a really good shape.
Yeah, so I mean like I guess the the first one would be how has
been a dad to an autistic child changed you personally?
Oh, these are good. A lot of these questions.
They make you think, don't they? Yeah, it's made me I'm less
judge mental and I'm more patient.
My patience is probably the big thing.
Yeah, I think very easy to be judge mental even when you look
at other people's kids and I I kind of get it why people do
that now, even with with me and Thomas.
But yeah, I I would have looked at I would have looked at
another kid having a meltdown and then like, get a grip of
your kid just through ignorance, just flatter ignorance.
So, yeah, patience is probably the big one.
And, you know, being less judge mental of others.
What about you? I think from my point of view,
it's probably looking back now, it's probably revealed that I'm
stronger than I thought I was. That's.
Great. Yeah.
You know, because you don't realise and that going back to
shit, but how much shit you're capable of dealing with and
handling it and then realising that you can carry on.
Yeah, I think that's probably one of the key things there.
Definitely more compassionate. And I think you've just kind of
touched upon that in in terms of in the past, if I, if I wouldn't
even like batter an island and think, oh, there may be an
additional need there. I'll probably just like, I'll
sort your kid out and you're a bit of a shit hair and what you
let them get away with that for. Do you know what I mean?
Yeah, it's not necessarily that you're being that you don't care
or you've been dispassionate of of people's struggles, but I was
just so ignorant of it. It, I, it wasn't even on my
radar, even when it comes to, you know, you know, government
policy and stuff like that. Like now I understand, and it's
not just because of Thomas, but I understand how important these
policies that that protect send families and said kids is.
Again, it's not that I wouldn't have wanted anybody to get the
support. I was just ignorant to the
amount of support that was needed.
And Thomas's needs are far less than as profound as his autism
is. There are people going through
way more. In fact, I saw a video today of
somebody referring to their child as autistic as severe
autism and profound severe autism and his his hands and
arms were all bandaged up and he had a helmet on because all he
does is self harm. And I'm like, OK, that's severe.
That's severe autism. Thomas doesn't have severe.
Autism I I spoke to Selena yesterday.
I had a moment of that like Lydia's been quite difficult
taking her back to school this week.
I think that the kind of transition from the first term
to then having half term often going back to school.
I remember just saying to Selena, like, oh, actually it
was so kind of not upsetting a bit, but kind of seeing her have
these meltdowns, refusing to go in, throwing herself on the
floor. And I was just thinking, oh,
God, why this is so difficult, you know?
And then a car pulled up next to me.
It was a like a van. And then they pulled out a
wheelchair from the back of the van.
And I was like, like, gave myself a bit of a shake and, you
know, give your head a wobble. Gives you the reset.
Yeah, just like just get on with it, Yeah, sort of thing.
So yeah, those are probably the things that that that kind of
changed I think over since we've been doing this podcast in terms
of, again, we've discussed this. What expectations did you have
to let go of? And.
All of them, yeah. I'm joking, but.
Yeah, yeah. Well, it's the truth, isn't it?
Yeah, let go of everything. Yeah, yeah, totally let go of
everything. The thing is, you, you, you,
you, you let go of all your expectations for self
preservation, but then you do kind of start to go.
Hang on a minute. Yeah, No, hang on a minute.
OK, You might not be able to do this, but he's, he's pretty damn
well going to do this. So it's, yeah, just again, it's
like a hard reset, isn't it? Yeah, it's kind of I must
rewired my sense of time in the sense of, you know, going back
to the the previous thing with Paul's goals is element of kind
of living day-to-day as as best you possibly can rather than
making too many future plans. Apart from the obvious one.
I suppose the focus now is more about being purpose driven
rather than success driven. It's like, you know, there's
we've got to follow this, we've got to do what we can for for
Lydia and and obviously yourself with Thomas.
That's kind of the big thing there.
And it's like you said, those small, those small, tiny,
insignificant things that are wins.
They're kind of breakthrough moments now, aren't they?
For us as opposed to, you know, in the past, I would have been
more focused on what successes were happening in my, my job or
career. Those were the big things, but
they just kind of moved to the background.
It's more about, yeah, Oh my God, this, this little thing
happened. Or she brought me a card for the
first time to show me she wanted a biscuit.
Those and they're kind of the the big things that I kind of
attach myself to and yeah, it's and deal with.
It's fun because like, oh, and I'll say this now so I don't
forget, but a good example of these like little things is so
Thomas didn't go to school today because he had like a he's got
like a style or something in his eye.
And again, this brings up that whole issue that it's not just
OK, have a day off. It's like shit, just gone back
after the half term and he's gone back for a day and now he's
having a day off and he won't know why he's having a day off
because we can't say, listen mate, you've got a poorly eye.
You can't go to school. So he won't know why he's had
today off. So it was all a little bit, it's
all a bit janky. And then today Mish went to take
him to ALDI. She had to do a bit of a shop
and she wasn't expecting to have him have him with her.
Went to ALDI and he kicked off like just lost his shit in the
car park and she didn't have his AAC device so she wrote down
home or shops and I didn't actually I didn't pick this up
with her before but what she sent me back, she gave him the
phone and he went onto the notes and typed Nah snack.
Oh. So no, I don't think the Nah was
like, Nah man, I'm on a snack. So it was like NAAA.
And then he'd spelt out snack and she went, OK, she had some
of those fruit Winder things and she gave him one of them
completely fine. Oh my God, you're fine.
And I think I think I might have touched on this before, that
there's such a lack of control that they have over their own
lives that sometimes just a little bit of control.
And you're not giving in as a parent.
You're not you're not relinquishing all your control,
but you just let them have that little thing that they want.
And he was like, I want a snack. And she gave him a fruit wine.
And he was like, cool, do what you want, eh?
So she managed to carry on doing what she wanted.
But yeah, it's those little things like that that that like
snack massive people go like fucking what your kid wrote
snack on a why is that good? But yeah, those those little
ones are huge. Anyway, completely off on a
tangent. I just didn't want to forget
about it because Mitch told me this.
Morning. No, that's good, man.
That's good in terms of I guess we're.
It's like AQ and A, but we're giving each other the question.
But this, this is I guess we've, we've kind of found ourselves in
this position now. But what does being an advocate
for your child mean to you? It's just weird, isn't?
It it is weird. It's really weird.
It's not something I would have thought of, no, with with having
Lydia and then finding out she was autistic, it's not no.
It's not something again. Paul's goals, Paul's goals.
He, he wouldn't, I don't think, well speak for him.
I wouldn't have thought he would consider himself an advocate for
autism, even with as much as he shared it.
But I think he's kind of discovered just after opening up
through a 2030 minute conversation, he wasn't even
planning on having the feedback he's got from that.
He's an advocate. He's an advocate for his son and
and other people's children. So yeah, it's yeah, it's a weird
one. A friend of mine said, really
good friend of mine said it kind of, he was taking the piss, but
he was like, oh, shut up, just because you're famous now.
I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm famous in this teeny, teeny
tiny niche. Like there's a few people that
might recognise me and the only reason they will is because
they've got a child with additional needs.
If I walk down the street, no one bats an eyelid.
If I'm in send soft play I may get the odd look.
I've had one person stop me in the last, was it 6 months?
And it was, I was sitting in Starbucks having a coffee and I
have the Airpods in, I have a laptop and this guy.
So, you know, people just normally walk up to you do they
sitting there? And he walks over and he's like,
I put Earpods in so I couldn't hear.
And he just kind of looks at me and like, right.
And I'm like, yeah, yeah, you. And he's like, yeah, yeah.
And then he didn't go anywhere. And I was like, are you OK,
mate? If they're not.
He was like, yeah, have you got a podcast?
And I was like this weird. Say it louder.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. If I ever went to like Brazil
and somebody went, oh, you've got a podcast, that'd be that'd
be crazy. Yeah, I think I've only
happened, it's happened to me once in Shrewsbury.
That was on a night out. I forgot to tell you that.
Oh, what about about two months ago, I was walking out of a bar
and there was a guy having a a smoke outside.
And I just what the same sort of thing is.
You're right, Andy. No way.
I looked at it going How do I know you?
I couldn't work out how he knew me or I, I didn't recognise him
so I was like puzzled. But then.
But you were assuming it's from something.
Yeah, yeah. And then he goes, yeah, I've,
I'll listen to your, to your podcast.
My my brother's got 2 autistic kids and I just had a 5 minute
conversation. He listens to it.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So.
So yeah, that was nice. That was surreal.
But. That's nice that he's like,
again, he's he's watching the podcast because of his niece and
nephew. You know, that's that's quite
cool. Yeah, I think the other thing
about being an advocate or or doing this, and again, it's just
if I go down to the real like grit of it, it's just making
sure that even though Lydia's non verbal is that her voice is
heard. And I think that's the that's
the only other thing is like she can't at the moment speak for
herself in simple terms being an advocate.
We speak on their behalf and hope that we can, we can kind of
give, give them what they need and, and you know, dare I say
sometimes try and influence policy or put pressure, you
know, by, by being part of various charities and, and
hooking up with other parents and and so forth.
So I think that's kind of the the real advocate side of
things, isn't it? Yeah, we haven't actually talked
about it, White paper being put back till next year, have we?
No, I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
I, I just possibly think that maybe they, they pushed it back
out. You know, it's supposed to be
the summer, wasn't it? Then they pushed it back to, was
it November this month, October, November and then they've
shelled it until next year. But is that because, you know,
things like the rally that we went to and the various
charities and everyone's going, this stinks.
The thing is, something does need to change.
It there is a reform this need. It's just the way they were
going to do it. Didn't look very good.
Yeah, yeah, I totally agree. Again, kind of things like
routines, you know, we've touched about this a bit quite a
quite a few times, but. What's your routine right now?
Because I'm this is quite good because like obviously the we,
we first kind of had a conversation Acosta, didn't we,
at Birmingham Airport fucking midnight.
But what, what is, has your routine changed?
Because the thing, the reason I ask that is because your routine
changes kind of incrementally. Yeah, that's that's a fairpoint.
Yeah, it's not one big shift. Is it?
Yeah. I mean, if I, I don't if if you
were to look back and go, well, this is what we used to do.
Oh, shit. Oh, actually, it's changed quite
a lot. Do you know what that's a
fairpoint? Because I think in the early
days we were trying so many different things to try and form
a routine, you know, like, oh, this doesn't work or try
something else because you're getting so much again,
information, you're getting advice from different parents
that have worked for them. And you're right, I'll try that.
And some of it does work. Some of it doesn't think, oh,
that didn't work. Back to the drawing board.
I think now we probably are in a bit of a routine in the sense
that especially now she's at, at at school, it's very much kind
of right. We try and get into bed at a
certain time and you know, prior to half term it was proving more
successful than unsuccessful. When we woke up in the morning
we had the picture board with, you know, whose car we were
going, was it mummy's car, Daddy's car, a picture of a
teacher, also a picture of the school and everything else like
that. So we were starting to do that.
They'd be downstairs, it would be a bottle breakfast and then
yeah, out and then obviously come back.
Lydia's routine was that she wanted to go straight in the
garden to derate, you know, to, to kind of just explore and
everything else like that and unwind.
So yeah, I kind of we maybe not through deliberately trying to
have a routine. I think we've just naturally
just fallen into a routine, which again, after trying to
deliberately create routines that didn't work, we've seemed
to have found a like a nice happy medium that that does
work, yeah. Do you reckon that obviously,
because I mean, you guys would like be desperate as far as
sleep was concerned, Might you like it was just rough.
Do you think because you were getting so much information from
so many different directions of, you know, people trying to help,
do you think that maybe you didn't give a single you?
You didn't give a single thing enough of a try.
Say enough you. Know what you mean?
Yeah, but because you know, long enough, yeah.
That doesn't work, but then let's try that thing yeah,
because you guys have just. I think, I think that I think
that's a fairpoint. There's a there's an element of
desperation. Yeah.
I would real desperation and like when you've had best part
of four years, like doing shifts and swapping over at like 2:00
in the morning and then going, doing a full day's work and
everyone being tired and everything else like that.
I think you just want to find that elixir that does work.
So I've said to you in the past, like we, we, we spent so much
money trying different things or yeah, snake oil salesman and all
that sort of stuff. I'll try this.
It's it works for autistic children.
It helps them with this and you do just try everything.
So there may be an element that we may have gave, given things
maybe a couple of weeks and just gone, fucking hell, this doesn't
work. Two weeks is a long time.
Yeah, Well, not all of it. Some of it was less, but I think
certain things, certain things that cost a lot of money.
Yeah, Yeah. We gave longer to try, but.
And the problem was you'd, you'd, there was no pattern.
And I've said this before, like you'd think you'd had a Eureka
moment, a breakthrough, and you'd go, oh, yes, this is it.
Yeah, We've had two nights. Yeah, we know what it was.
Yeah, it was this. Yeah, third night, back to
square 1 and the night after and the night after, the night
after, and you keep sticking with it and going.
No rhyme or reasons. What's changed?
Why, why isn't this working? And then you just like, right,
OK, on to the next thing. We'll scratch that one off now.
We'll move. And dare I say there's probably
stuff that we've we did try and and and chopped off as being a
failure, that maybe she was too young.
If we tried it, you know, six months later, it could have
worked. But I think, yeah, it's hard.
You know, it's easier to look back now at that really, really
difficult time as being parents to, to Lydia and how how
incredible I look back now. Sometimes I think, how on earth
did we actually get get through that with some form of sanity
and look back now and realise, OK, things are easier now with
her, although we still say, oh, it's difficult.
And I said, oh, she's had a sleepless night.
But do you know what I remember kind of two years ago saying
Selena, Oh my God, if she'd just slept till 3:00 in the morning,
I'd be happy if I knew she went to sleep from 9:00 to 3:00 and I
had right, that's. Still not doing, isn't it?
But it was just like one day she'd fall asleep at 7:00, then
she'd be up at 11:00 PM and then she'd stay awake till half five
in the morning, by which time she'd fall asleep.
And I'm like, well, you can't plan.
One of us then has to go. You know, one, we were both
getting ready to go to work or Celine's getting ready to go to
work and or she was working, you know, shifts sometimes as well,
which are evening shifts within the NHS.
It's just like there was absolutely nothing we could have
done and it was such a difficult time.
But yeah, it's you kind of look back on it with some rose tinted
glasses. So yeah, it's it was, it was
hard, but yeah, I think it's. Funny how we adjust, isn't it?
Yeah, you could. Hey, at the time you're going
through something which is just horrendous.
And that is one day at a time. Yeah, absolutely cool.
You look back and you go car, that was rough, Yeah.
We think actually it was a lot more than rough, yeah.
Because at the time you're at breaking point.
Yeah, and I think that goes back to like the first thing, like
what have you learnt of being an autistic dad or you know, to to
a child like that? Is that strength, isn't it?
Yeah. Is that strength you forget like
how strong you actually are as a person, just like sometimes you
just look back and it go, jeez, man, I didn't realise I was
capable of doing that. And yeah, because it's not
really like that. People say, oh, this old kind of
thing that always comes out or you were chosen to be a, you
know, a parent for this autistic child because.
Thanks. Yeah, no, didn't, didn't choose.
It was on the list of options on the menu that I was looking at
and perusing at. It's just like this is what I've
been Lombard with, if I'm being quite blunt.
Yeah, I've either got to step up and and find a way of dealing
with it, or I might just walk out the fucking door and and not
have anything to do with this child.
Paul Skoll said something that, again, was interesting.
It's a bit like that. He he was kind of taken aback by
people saying you're so brave to speak.
And he was like, what? Like just what?
What do you mean brave? Like I'm just talking about my
kid. But that's because for some
people it's it's not something they find easy to do.
And I think you find it easier the more the more you kind of
get people around you talking about it.
You, you said to me a couple of episodes ago, like I think we
had a guest on, you said, I can see how you've changed from
episode to where we are now. And, and all I can put that down
to is immersing myself in this, this whole autism thing that I
didn't choose and just being able to talk about it.
And it goes about me and you having the we joke about it.
We say it's our therapy, It's our fucking therapy because you
get it. And when you speak to me, I get
it. And it's just having somebody
that totally understands and is not being kind of, oh shit, what
do I say here? You know, the fact that we go,
oh, this happened. It was a fucking nightmare at
the time, but we're barely laughing about it now.
You, you went on. I've got to mention this.
You were on LBC? Oh, with Nick, Nick Ferrari.
Nick Ferrari and he said, I've been on the Instagram page.
You mentioned dark. Oh yeah, What's that about?
And we're like, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of dark humour
about being a parent to a sane kid.
Otherwise you've got to let it out.
And sometimes, like the typical British way sometimes is it's
it's always been like that. It's just, well, we're not going
to sit here and cry about it. You know, we've done that
already. We just get through it by going,
oh, fucking hell, that was hilarious, wasn't it?
Oh, I can't believe they did that.
But. And they share it with somebody
else and they start laughing as well and go, yeah, I relate to
that. That makes sense.
That's why I like dropping that video in the in the in the group
chat last night when Thomas it's just like one of the other lads
might have had a similar situation that they were feeling
a bit, you know, fucking hell again.
So I think sometimes just to, I mean, I could laugh about it
because I wasn't the one who's cleaning.
It up, Yeah. I mean, if we asked Mish.
So if we asked Mish, how funny would she?
Say not funny at all. She's taking.
Her rubber gloves off going yeah, it's fucking hilarious, ha
ha ha. Yeah, there was a little bit of
cleaning up deal after, but it wasn't rubber gloves type work,
you know? Yeah, no, that's fair enough.
I mean things like, alright, how do you handle meltdowns or
shutdowns? Do you know what, mate?
And this is a this is a gun. I fucking harp on about it all
the time, but he's not at a meltdown in a long time.
Not something that I could fairly call a meltdown.
I'd be giving meltdowns in this service if I said that he'd had
one recently. He's.
Not at something that's lasted kind of 15 minutes for an hour.
The. Blood vessels in his face used
to pop like he used to. Like really go for it.
I can't remember the last time he had one.
Like genuinely, I can't remember the last time.
The most I'll do now is I think, what was it?
What happened the other day I got in?
Oh, he'd had quite a long day. Normally his kind of daily
routine would be that he'll do stuff in the day, get back
around 4:00 and he's got a few hours till bed.
Whatever it was he'd been doing, it was quite close to bedtime.
And we are like strict on bedtime.
Pretty strict on bedtime just Cos it.
Routine. Just routine his brain no and I
went come on then mate, you ready for sleeps?
And he just did. Like a classic tantrum.
Like, did he go? Nah, Nah, bruv snack.
He just, it was a classic tantrum.
I mean, if I was to say what's a classic tantrum, how would you
explain it? How would you describe a classic
tantrum? I'd just be kicking off.
No, I don't want to do this. You know the classic 10 more
minutes. Classic if it's a meltdown in a
supermarket lying down on their front, right, He did that.
He was sitting there on his on his AAC device just doing some
spelling. And I was like, come on, mate,
you ready for sleeps? And he just looked at me and
just went flat down on the on the kitchen floor and was just
like, Nah, slamming his hands down.
And I'm looking at him like, get up like that is the worst he's
done in months. And it wasn't a time, It wasn't
a meltdown. It was just a little, it was a
hissy fit essentially. So so mate, I don't actually
have to deal with them that much anymore.
Yeah, we're starting to notice them a few more this week with
little. Yeah, I've kind of like touched
upon it like that transition about returning to school.
Yeah, because she's she's done one term and then we have a week
off. And you made a very good point.
Like before we start recording, it's like, well, that's what she
has got to base it on. She doesn't realise that you go
back to school. That's what she might have just
gone. Hey, this is a great 5 weeks.
As far as she's concerned, well, we're back here.
For some reason you put her in a weird little uniform and sent
her to this place for five weeks and then on that first day of
half term holidays, she was like, oh, well, we that's done.
All right, That was quite fun. Quite enjoyed that she had no
fucking clue that a week later she was going to be going back
and how would she know? No, no, she wouldn't know, would
she? Because she's got nothing to
base it upon. Exactly.
So that's where you can you can understand the kicking out and
Thomas did exactly the same. Thing I think as as a we've,
we've kind of progressed through meltdowns is, yeah, I've just
realised it's literally just staying calm, isn't it?
It's staying calm, steady, that kind of lower your voice, give
her space, show that she's safe. And it's not about, I guess,
reasoning with her when she's in that kind of, you know, it's
difficult to reason with her when she's non verbal.
But it's just reassurance, isn't it?
It's reassurance. And the difference is two years
ago I may have been a bit more concerned about shit, what the
people around me thinking. Yeah, yeah.
Oh no, they're looking at me, aren't they?
They're staring what they're saying to each other.
And I'd just be in a bit of OverDrive doing like, well,
what's going on? No.
And then then I wouldn't do the right thing.
I'd just be like, right, stop this now you need to get out of
this, you know, whereas now I'm just very much like, stare.
Do what you want to stare the. Progression I've gone through
from how I've dealt with it, even when he was tiny, like, and
I've kind of said this before and, and, you know, it's
upsetting, but like, even when he was really little and there
was no way of getting through to him, I'd lose my temper and
just, like, scream at him, yeah. As frustration.
Isn't it just? Pure frustration.
I felt awful about it after. I would just scream at him.
And what's interesting is it made no difference because that
social connection isn't even there enough for me to to.
Get through by screaming. Through like scare him
essentially like a parent, you know, scares their kids to do it
as they're told. It didn't it didn't make a
single bit of difference. I look back now and I think I'm
screaming at him and he's just like same level of meltdown.
He's like mum what? What could?
You do. That's going to do heightening
your own statement. 100% and that's, that's kind of
progressively gone through to, you know, telling off and all
that you know, to now if it, if it, if it did happen tonight,
for example, it would be pressure points.
Yeah. I mean, like that's how you
learn as a parent. It would be, you know, he really
likes it when you go real firm on his arms and his legs and
just work it all the way around. That's that's the kind of thing
we need to calm and down. But like you would like the
typical kid if I did that to my 18 year old.
It's OK mate, it's good. Get your pressure points.
Everything's fine. So it's.
Different, but that again, that's it's good to talk about
that because that's part of the, the transition, the journey that
I think we've been on as dads is, you know, we look back now
we go, Oh yeah, we were doing all the things that people say,
oh, you don't want to be doing that.
And you just have to sometimes you just got to go through it
and yeah, you just go, oh, you know, it doesn't work.
I'm just getting myself worked up.
And interestingly, your skin becomes a lot thicker when
you're out and about and these things happen, so.
If you think about like how you deal with it, the way you're
dealing with it is, is compassionately, yeah.
And you take it into other parts of your life as well.
You're sharing. All you're sharing is pure love
and compassion in the, in the, in that moment, you're kind of
you're like, you're with them in it, but you're just like
essentially they don't know what you're saying.
Yes, probably don't know what you're saying.
Thomas certainly doesn't. But you just like, it's OK, I'm
here, it's fine. And you just help them ride it
out. Ride it out.
Yeah, yeah. What's been your hardest battle
for support or diagnosis? Is it things like battling the
system or delays or it was? Early on, I think.
Yeah. It was kind of the the system
has actually worked relatively well.
I think in Shropshire. Yeah, Shropshire, Exactly.
Not again, you know, personally, yes.
Exactly. And we know there's people that
we've spoken to in Shropshire that haven't had the same
experience, no. For me, for us, it's worked
relatively well. It was just the time that was
the issue. So the, the things were in
place, but the, the time and the fact that we had to like force
him into a mainstream nursery, knowing he'd struggle leaving
him there, knowing he's going to be having a hard time not
understanding why we've left him.
We had to do that. Everybody involved knew it
wasn't going to work, but we had to do that as a, as a proof, as
a box ticket exercise essentially that that's the bit
that really that's where most of the tears were sat in me and
Mitch just sat in the car. When you know this is going to
fail literally from the start, but you've still got to put your
child through it, Yeah. Yeah, that was the rough.
I think for me it's I didn't realise this, I was just kind of
thinking about it the other day. This is a cathartic episode.
This is a. Really.
Yeah, this is. I think this is a.
Fucking cathartic one this is. Sorry, in the early days, you
know, all the paperwork that you had from kind of applying for
this, applying for that, liaising with, I don't know,
speech therapy, doing the EHCP application.
It was just repeating Lydia's story again and again and again
to different people. I'm going to see the paediatric
consultant, right? Let's repeat the entire story
again. I'm going to go see a nursery.
I have to repeat the entire story again.
It's that just constant hammering early on going.
I have to say this so many times that my child is different and
this is where what I'm concerned and just constantly having to do
that. So I think it's it's, it's just
repeating it. The EHC Patience and persistence
as well. Yeah, and the EHCP and like
DLADLA is probably the worst. EHCP was a lot of, you know,
describing your kids situation, how they are and how they're
not, but the DLA was. Yeah, DLA was a lot of just,
yeah, just hammering home how how fucking hard life is going
to be. Yeah, and and I, we, the first
time we filled in it, it was rejected because essentially
we'd, we didn't want to describe subconsciously, we didn't want
to say how bad it was. Well, we were then we were then
doing him a disservice because we weren't getting him the
support he deserves because we didn't want to admit how shit
things were. So we ended up going to this a
4U. Yeah, I've heard of them.
Yeah. Yeah, we.
Went to a 4U and and the lady there, she was lovely.
It's a, it's a charity where they, they kind of help you fill
in the HCPS and DLAS. And she was like, listen, like
you've described to me what your days are like and this is what
you've put on this form. They don't match.
It was like, you need to fill this in like it's your worst
day, like your kids worst day. And it's kind of getting those
little bits of advice early on when it comes to support that
you deserve the support. Like there's also this guilt
around, like I'm getting money out of the system because it's
like. It's, it's difficult like, you
know, if you're one of those, like you've paid into the system
all your life, but you just, I don't know why it is, though.
Is it because there's been so many stigma?
Isn't. It yeah, is it the stigmas
because there used to be so many programmes about or benefits
cheats and you're not deserving of this, but you're claiming it
the old osser and it's yeah and it's having to admit a change of
thinking like now this is what I've paid into the system for
for the past 25 this is exactly what I've paid into the.
System for if this happens, it's when we pay into the system,
it's an insurance policy. Essentially you're paying into
an insurance policy in case the shit, it's the fan.
And when you have a kid with additional needs, the shit has
hit the fan. So yeah.
Or the Bannister or the window sill or everywhere else.
Yeah. And in terms of kind of that
that kind of you touched upon it there that the applying for
stuff, but then the time difference in Oh yeah, we'll get
back to you in six months or, you know, for the assessment for
for autism, unfortunately there's a nine month delay and
you know, it'd be like, how do you stay calm?
Yeah, because like me. When that happens, because you
still got to carry on, haven't. You, you've got to crack on,
yeah. That's difficult.
I can't. Do you know what?
I can't even remember how we did it, but you just have to do it.
It's a bit like when people say, like you said earlier, like when
people say, oh, you must have been chosen to have this kid.
Like now I just don't have any choice.
I've just got to get through it. I.
Suppose you don't have any choice.
If there's a delay, do. You, no, exactly.
You just you just got to you just got to wait and and hope
that and I'm always guilty of this.
It it like Mitch will say, listen, we haven't heard back
from such and such like you need to chase it up.
I always have a way too much faith in the system.
I'm always like, listen, everyone's doing their job,
it'll come. And then you make a phone call,
whether it's to do with a referral for, you know, from the
NHS and we'll ring up and go, oh, they haven't put the
referral through me like. We've had that, yeah.
It's been like, you might have left it like 3 months past when
they should have, you know? So I'm, I'm terrible for that.
Yeah. And I think the other thing that
you've got to remember as well is progress with your kid
doesn't always happen in an educational setting.
It happens at home as well. So even if you are waiting for
our contact with, I don't know, speech therapy or whatever the
case may be, it's like everything that happens
day-to-day, there's still progress taking place.
Like you, you made a really good point.
Like before you got the AAC device, you, you saw what was
happening with, with Thomas and you went out and then go, right.
You know, it's a summer holiday. He's making progress.
We need to act now. Yeah, why we're waiting.
And and you did and it's paid dividends.
Oh God, yeah. So I think that's a really
important thing to to kind of bear in mind as well.
How do you involve your child's voice in decisions even if
they're non verbal? How do you what say that?
Again, involve your child voice in decisions.
OK, well, I said, do you know what?
Again, like the world revolves around our kids a lot of the
time, doesn't it? Doesn't, it's not like.
And again, I mean, that question is probably more aimed at older
kids. But for Thomas, any choices
aren't like, listen, where should we all go today?
It's like, where do you want to go today?
Because ultimately everything's about him.
If he's there, everything's about him.
Even if you've got to go do a food shop and it'll be the same
for you guys. If you anything you've got to do
in a day, if if they're with you, you need to incorporate
something into that journey of the day where they get to do
something they want. We rarely give him choices on
location just Cos normally he'll pick the one.
You don't think you might plan a day to the beach and you're like
beach or Nana's, which is 30 seconds up the road and he's
like, let's go Nana's and you're like, we literally just parked
the car for the beach. No, that's a fairpoint.
Yeah, everything is does revolve about around them, doesn't it?
It literally does. That's something we all take for
granted as well. Sometimes I think it's only when
other people kind of have a conversation, say, what's your
daily routine like? What do you guys normally do at
the weekend? A lot of people when when you
ask, say what you're going to do for the weekend, your answer a
lot of the time is probably going to be everything to do
with your kid. And some people might, you know,
with typical kids would be like, oh, oh, you literally don't get
to do anything for yourself. Yeah.
And even if you do your kids with you because other people
can't have them for you. Yeah, and if you do something
without the kid, it's like a military operation that takes a
month into planning to actually find some sort of childcare and.
And you still don't stop thinking about your kid.
No, no, no. You're.
Messaging the person that's got them going.
Everything all right? What's going on?
Everything fine? Are they asleep yet?
They're still awake. Why are they still awake?
I think sooner myself. We managed to go out for a
Sunday lunch a couple of weeks ago.
Yeah, and it took about, you know, it was, it was slightly
off the cuff and just like getting in touch with various
people. Can you just look after Lydia
for a couple of hours and and Celine's son Will looked after
him. And I think we just sat down,
just ordered the food. And then he takes going, oh, you
need to come home. She's kicking off.
So it's. Just how old is he?
Coming up to 16, very close to 16.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, we were only kind of 500
metres up the road, so wasn't too far away.
I was just like, Bah, that's difficult.
And The thing is even like a couple of hours that that would
actually, that would be huge. Like for some people, they just,
that's all they need. I just need a little bit of time
away just to kind of reset again.
Keep saying reset, but yeah, sometimes that's all it takes.
But then you couldn't even have that before.
Yeah, I mean, we did. We did stay in and finish.
We finished a. Meltdown.
A meltdown. Deal with it.
Yeah, dinner. The frustrating thing is like,
we we finished the food, got there.
Then he takes back in just as we're about to walk through the
door because don't worry, she's fallen asleep.
I was like, OK. Did you go back out and have a
dessert? No, no, we just made use of the
quiet, which meant tidying up and everything along those lines
there. This is a good one, obviously.
What's your child's special interests and how do you join in
with it? Spelling, in case anybody
doesn't know, that's literally all he does now it used to be it
was traffic signs and now it's spelling everything insight,
which obviously I think's amazing.
So yeah, I mean a lot. I say it's got the iPad 8.
I'll say listen mate, do you want to do some spelling mate?
It's just no, I keep having to tell myself like it's not that
long ago. We, we, we spell car 8 and like
now I can go up to him and go, hi, mate, do you want to do some
spelling? And he then spells spelling and
then I'm like, OK, mate, can you spell elephant?
And he's like and just types it out and you're just like, how is
this happening so quick? So you're just kind of asking
quick, like asking spell this, spell that what he'll do is.
You'll say you'll say, can you spell this?
And he'll do it. And then if you don't say
another word, it'll like give you a little give me another
one. Like there's like a dopey, I
think you must be getting like I imagine, right.
If if you get all the way to 6, for example, and and the only
dopamine you'll get in is from yourself.
When you get to a point where you can interact, where somebody
can ask you a question and you get it right.
Like that must be so nice because our kids, the babies,
like we're gradually toddlers. They get that, they get that
over time, whether it's learning to count to 10 or gradually they
get, they get that. But then suddenly Thomas is at
like 6 and he's like, oh, this is nice.
Like I'm getting a little dopamine reward in the head.
Asked me to spell this. I'll go like spell daddy.
And he's like, that's easy. Give me another one.
And you're like. Hey, and it's nice because he's
actually, he's interacting as well, isn't he?
Yeah, yeah, he's getting joy from from interacting with you
and Mish as part of this now dopamine hit of you asking him
to spell this. So rather than him just being by
himself and it's now right. Oh great, I can share this with
somebody else. And it's it's, it must be so
nice to. It's that it's that way in.
What about? What about you?
Lydia doesn't have. Special interest.
So I think the only way we can't
do that is that interactive play, isn't it?
It's just immersing myself in, in, you know, in her world.
You know, sometimes she'll come over and just put her hands out.
We know that she just wants to hold her, hold her hands and
she'll lean back as far as she. Can pull her back in.
And, and she loves that sort of thing.
So it's stuff like that. She likes physical stuff.
She's rough and tumble, you know, like I'll throw her up in
the air onto the bed and, you know, she'll just land flat.
Think it's hilarious and. Do you ever guess when you start
doing these games you then we should never start it because
you have to keep doing it over and over and over and over and.
Over. Yeah, there are times where I
go, oh, God, this is going to go on for a while, isn't it?
So. And.
And it's like, you know, we said last week and it once someone, a
kid brings you a pair of shoes, you've got to just yeah, you
know, these moments are special. So we just kind of carry on
because I'll probably get to a stage where I won't be able to
pick her up and shock her and I'll miss that.
So yeah, we do that. There are times where I get told
off by Selena. Why?
For doing that because she'll come out the shower, it'll be
bedtime and I'll initiate a game of just this sort of rough and
tumble classic. Yeah.
And she'll be like, yeah, she's not going to go to sleep now.
And I'll be like, well, I'm off to the gym, see you later.
So, yeah. But those are the kind of the
things we've we've, we've kind of Lydia just kind of throw
myself in there and just, you know, do staff things, you know,
tickle her and she'll just like run away and then sometimes come
back. You've uploaded some really
smiley photos of her recently. Yeah, yeah, she's, she's we went
through again. Looking back over the last
couple of years, I just, I just remembered I've got some, some
fires of her which I've kept, which are really made me feel
quite sad. Is that, you know, try and do a
typical thing of like take your daughter to the park.
And I'd go to the park and there'd be like all the other
families there with their kids. And I'd like put Lydia on a
swing. And it was at the time where she
made zero eye contact. And I just remember like pushing
her on the swing. I wouldn't even see a smile or
anything. And I just remember thinking to
myself and and saying to Selena, she just looks vacant, like
there's nobody home. I don't even know if she's
enjoying this. I'm just like going through the
motions like and then like, this is what you're supposed to be a
kid, isn't it? Take it to a park and I'll be
pushing on a swing and she'll just be like looking into the
distance, like deadpan face. She wouldn't like be interested
in a lot of the play equipment. She'll be more interested in
the, the playground bark, just picking it up, dropping it, you
know, putting it on the bottom of a slide rather than going on
the slide. And I'd, you know, we'd have
like 20 minutes there and then I'd go home and I'd just be
like, was this a fun experience or not?
And now she's like, she'll make eye contact, she'll like follow
you across the room. She'll come up to you, look at
your face, you know, straight in the eyes.
And, and she'll when she laughs, she looks at you.
So she's like. Completely different to what it
was a couple of years ago. But going back to the photos, my
my phone, for every nice photo I've got of her smiling,
staring, I must have had to press that shutter about 50
times to get that one photo of her looking at the camera all.
Autism parents will know that where you're just kicking
through. The camera, Oh, we got a good
one Yeah, we've finally got one. I'll delete the other 49 where
she's just like looking everywhere else.
I mean, we've got a school photos from.
Oh, what were they like, by the way?
Sevendale, you know, beautiful uniform, lovely background.
I think they, they sent us two photos and they were just a very
kind of looking like her eyes are somewhere else.
We just said, you know, we took a photo on the first day, which
she's got a lovely uniform on everything else like that, as
most parents do on their first day of school and out.
Yeah. Took 50 photos.
One of her staring nicely at the camera.
Yeah. We thought we'll just stick with
that. Yeah.
So, yeah, that's something that
that that comes up. But yeah, it's interesting.
I forgot about that looking back.
Yeah, yeah. We, we just the stuff like that,
we've. Got like the folder of all of
the, all of the videos and photos, like I always say to
people like get evidence. If you're early on in the, you
know, the diagnosis journey, get evidence, photos and videos of
stuff that your kids doing. And we've still got that folder
on our iPhones. So you go in there every now and
then and you look at the things that you were using as evidence
for the autism, and it's quite jarring.
Yeah. You're like God.
Like you think of where they are now and where they were where
like nothing of interest apart from spinning a a a a fidget
spinner, just staring and like the deadpan face.
Just like like life was bringing them 0 enjoyment.
Yeah, and it was rubbing on and rubbing off and you as yes as
well. Yeah.
Do you think why what we're doing wrong?
Like my my kid has 0 enjoyment in life.
It's. Probably that stage when you're
going through that limbo of trying to get your head round
it, accept it, and then surrounded by happy, glorious
kids, yeah, just loving life, parents, you know, who are
enjoying it. But then there's a part of me
sometimes I look at some parents and I just look at them going,
oh, you don't know how fucking lucky you are.
You're not really like I look at them.
I'd be a bit pissed off going your kids fucking also having a
great time interacting with you, coming back and going, oh, look
at this, look at this. And you're getting a little bit
annoyed going. I'm trying to have my coffee
here at soft play. Leave me alone.
Go over there and play with Cuthbert or whatever it is.
And I'd just be looking at them. Yeah, I should be looking at
them going, you know, I'd fucking give anything for Lydia
to to run up and go, Dad, look at this, look at this, come play
with me. And, you know, she'd just be
like in soft play, just sat there like.
Yeah, it's just it's mad. Found maybe a piece of dirt on
the floor and just be more interested in that than than
everything else that's. Around yeah Thomas took a while
to get into soft play yeah, very much like we'd just sit with you
when you're having a coffee he'd just sit there with his iPad and
just eat his food and. These were probably the times
where before we knew there were SEND groups.
Yeah, yeah, SEND events. It was just like you'd be
surrounded by neurotypical kids and they'll just hammer home
even more like how different your life is.
Going to I do love, I do love the send sessions where you
could just, you could just take noises to kids to make it just
random little like noises. Weirdly quiet as well.
There's not like loads of screaming, no.
It's just like, yeah, yeah. Or whistling or like what is
going on when you're looking at the parents and everyone's just
kind of. It's like being in the jungle,
you just get these random noises that sort of pop up, yeah.
Everyone's just looking at each other like.
Vinyl. But what I quite like about the
sessions now is no one batters an eyelid.
You just sit there and the parents are so chill.
Yeah, yeah. Because the kids have got to a
certain age and they're like, yeah, they're fucking autistic
or sad or whatever additional need.
And they're just like, yeah, we'll just take it on our
stride. Yeah, what's the worst that can
happen? You know, they're all good.
So they're just running around. I think those those kind of
those sense sessions like even at really early on would be like
Megavite. In fact, it was a bit like what
we were talking about, you know, last week.
But I imagine if I had something like that, people to be around
that got it really early on when it's really difficult.
Yeah, not necessarily because your kids are difficult, but
just because emotionally you're struggling.
Yeah. Being able to see people in it
when the kids are a few years older, like you say, just
chilling, vibing, and you'd be like, like, I would have liked
to have seen that. I'd have liked to have been
around. That probably would have helped
me a lot. Yeah.
Well, we've said many times in the early days, you, you think
you're in that bubble. You think you're the only one
that's got an autistic? Kid and it like you, you know
the first time we we probably met was that Birmingham Airport
and that Costa Coffee, you know, waiting for the flight to Paris
so we could do that half marathon.
We were having a it was like a four hour conversation, wasn't
it? We were like, shit you, you do
that you. And I was like, I thought I was
the only person going. And I was like, we would, we
mentioned poo a lot. But I said to you, oh, she does
this with poo. And you're like, Oh my God,
yeah, Thomas does that. And I was like, I I thought I
was the only one. I wasn't telling.
Anybody. It's not a conversation you're
going to have, is it? Yeah.
I can't tell my friends at work or, you know, people outside and
just go, Oh yeah, Lydia did this.
They'd be like, I just got worried about what the erection
was. And then you're just like, oh,
yeah, yeah, yeah, that's, that's normal.
Yeah. It's crazy, isn't it?
Crazy thinking about it like that.
But what has Thomas taught you about life or patience?
Do you know what? Life's too short.
That's probably what I've learnt about life.
Yeah. It's give me a rocket up my
arse. Appreciate life more.
Appreciate. Yeah.
Appreciate how short life is, because it is.
It's super short, like I think now.
And life gets shorter when you've got kids anyway.
Like, I used to remember even in my like, early 30s, and I had
Aiden then that he was typical and, like, time didn't seem to
be going that fast. But then since Thomas, like,
it's ramped up something silly. I feel like Christmas was like a
couple of months ago and it's nearly back around again.
And yeah, patience, you know, you can't not be patient when
you've got, you know, a kid with additional needs.
I think they're the. It's taught me that the real
patient isn't about waiting anymore.
It's, it's about accepting the pace of life that we've got at
the moment. And it's, yeah, it's, it's, it's
finding beauty in I guess the small moments and realising that
progress is, is measured differently.
It's kind of measured with love, with, you know, autistic kids.
It's slightly different. But yeah, it's, if I've said it
many times, like I said to Selena, like I can't believe
she's 4 1/2 and I just want to pause this bit and just, you
know, be happy. I'd, I'd pause it now and just
say, oh, just stay like this. But yeah, it's just gone so
quickly. I still don't know I I need I
need to like meet a six year old like I need to meet a typical 6
year old because I have no clue what time I should be doing if
it had it had even typical I haven't got a clue what I want
to have a conversation with a six year old and just see what.
Would that would that be a good thing or a bad thing?
Would it be beneficial for you to know what a typical?
I am so in love. With.
His autism, I'm I literally I wouldn't be doing a like to like
comparison of where I wish he was.
He wouldn't be that. I'm just like interested.
I just want to see if I can hold a conversation with a six year
old and where it would go like what we would talk about because
just purely out purely out of interest.
I think the more Thomas is finding his way, the less I
feel. Yeah, like longing or missing
out. Yeah.
Exactly, like I've I've said a million times, as long as he can
communicate effectively in a way that suits him, I'm OK.
If he never speaks a single word I genuinely don't give a shit.
I don't care which a lot of parents early on in the journey
would be like. What do you mean I I literally
don't care. And I I get that now.
I've like that, that acceptance thing.
Yeah, I'm fully accepted. What?
Lydia. You know, Lydia is her needs,
her autism, Everything else that's associated with it, I am.
So is it? Comfortable's not the right
word, but it's. It is what it is.
I'm not going to change it. There's no point me stressing
about it. Yeah, I'm content with it.
I don't sit there longing anymore.
That's not a lie. There might be the odd day where
I just go. Rough day.
Yeah, this has been a rough day. Or why me again?
Give my head a little wobble back in the game.
That sort of thing. There.
But yeah, I'm very much like this is Lydia.
This is who she is. Yeah, I'm, I'm happy with it.
Yeah. I'll, I'll, you know, you know,
I've said before, my my sister's got a, a daughter that's
literally 6 months older than than Lydia.
And in the family group, I've seen the pictures of her going
trick or treating, you know, dressed up.
Yeah. Again, we were going to take him
like pumpkin picking. Yeah.
But again, we were like, does Thomas want to get fucking?
Yeah, well, this is. This is you got to go and I
think actually I'm not that bothered about going if you
think a few years want to go. Those sort of pictures that
they'd come home, they'd sting a little bit.
You know, it's World Book Day. Yeah.
Everything else like this on, you know, So, you know, having
conversations and interacting with with me when she saw me
last. And I'd be like, oh, this is
like a reminder of what it could have been.
And it'll, you know, the live shit, isn't it very much now
it's like, oh, I know she's fantastic, She's fantastic
niece. She's she's bright.
I'm genuinely like, yeah, you do.
You do what you can and be as happy as you possibly can and
fulfil your dreams and everything else like that.
And there's no kind of sounds bad, but there's no bitterness
anymore or that kind of feeling. No, I used to get real butt.
Hurt. Yeah.
Seeing other kids doing well, I
mean, what a thing to be, yeah, to get shitty about.
I know it's really, I want everyone else to have feel what
I'm feeling. Yeah, especially with children
are involved. Oh, look at your look at your
kid developing so normally. Yeah.
What? What?
How else would you say? When you say it out loud like
that, it sounds bizarre. Yeah, it doesn't sound a
completely. Bizarre thing to do, Go.
Yeah. Oh, I wish.
Nobody else was. Yeah, I wish.
I wish you could could feel what it was like to have a disabled
child. Why would you want?
That it's it's absolutely ludicrous.
To say what can I rend this thing to say?
But it goes through your head. Yeah, it, it generally goes
whether we, you know, we can laugh about it now, dark humour,
we can laugh about it now and, and just talk about it.
But I wouldn't mention it a couple of years ago because I
sound like a right fucking Nutter.
Yeah, exactly. But it goes through your mind.
Yeah, oh 100% it does. And it's not because you want
someone else's kid to be disabled.
It's just you look at the other parent and how blissfully, you
know, going through life with their child and being a parent.
But yeah, you wouldn't. Want to open up all those
questions again? Why was it?
Why me was? It.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
And there isn't a reason why you it was just that's the card you
were dealt, mate. What?
What are you most proud of right now then, regarding Thomas?
I could just go to the easy E spelling, but that's that's not
something I'm proud of. I'm, I'm, I'm proud of how well
he just gets through life and situations like, you know, like
for, for Halloween, that Friday, they were like, you know, if you
want, you can dress your kid up. Yeah.
Like we, we weren't always able to do that easily.
It would almost be like a little token Halloween thing he'd be
wearing. But he'd still have his uniform
on because the idea of putting him in something different, like
most kids, you can dress them up, send them to school and they
can have a fun day at school dressed as something for
Halloween. More excited because they're
dressed up. Yeah, in a normal uniform, but.
It hasn't always been that easy because, you know, you don't
want to trigger something that A, they might just be logically
thinking, I'm going to school and I wear my school uniform or
B, you put them in something and they don't think they're going
and then you send them on the bus.
Yeah. So like the way he copes and
manages with situations, he's his ability considering where he
was from, which like was just that staring, spinning.
And I say this because I want people and I was fucking, I
thought about it, people probably telling me to shut up
when they're listening to this. But like, if your kid is just
doing this or just doing this, don't write him off.
Don't. Because that's what Thomas was
doing and now he's on a board spelling words and telling his
mum to piss off because he wants a snack.
Like, yeah. So I'm honestly, mate, it's
hard. I'm proud of everything.
What about you? I mean, it's got to be, it's got
to be school. Yeah, I, I she's been killing
it. Yeah, it's.
Because she's got into a routine and it's.
Seeing her, confidence grew. Oh, that's nice.
And that is, that is part of that, isn't it?
That's a nice one. It's it's seeing again what
you've just said there, my daughter being right, me going,
there's something wrong with her.
And I use the word wrong because I just want to speak freely.
And you know, people might go, oh, that's not the right thing.
I don't fucking care. It's me going, there's something
wrong with her. She's not like everybody, you
know, all the other kids that I've seen.
And it was, again, Lydia was this, if we started off like,
well, that's slightly unusual. And then she'd bring it, you
know, then we could be here and then here.
And then she'd just be bringing stuff right to her eye.
And it's just like, I'm being vacant, living in their own
world Now. I'm seeing this kid that's
confident. She's leading us into the
kitchen. She's I want this, you know, in
her, you know, her manner, coming home and just like, oh,
I'm home running through her play box and just grabbing other
noodles to dangle and stuff like this.
Things like, you know, always wanting to hold my hand when she
goes outside now. And that's nice.
You know, we'd count the steps that we go, you know, up to up
to the car. It's just seeing her confidence
getting amongst develop. Yeah.
And those little breakthroughs. Yeah.
Those little breakthroughs where she has a moment and she's like,
this is what I need to do, isn't it?
It's funny you hear when you say like picking things up and and
looking and like Thomas was very similar and a lot of kids are
like they're doing that because they don't realise there's any
other option, like interaction. It's not like I'm assuming, I
don't know, I'm not autistic and I've never been inside an
autistic person's brain. But for them to do that, it's
like they don't think there's any other option.
It's just, it's like that is the norm.
There's all these other people around me because it's a social
disorder. The social bit doesn't exist for
them at that stage that early on.
So it's not like it's an option. What a lonely place to be.
But they just think that that's that's life.
And then all of a sudden at some point you make that connection
and that bridge and they suddenly like, oh, oh, I can do
stuff. And that's why intensive
interaction gets pushed. So.
Hard. Yeah, absolutely.
It's finding those moments. It's like seeing things where
she carries to Selena for certain needs when it comes to
me for for others. So she's like, Oh yeah, mum
sorts this out. Yeah, yeah, Dad sorts this out.
Yeah, those, those are nice. So.
They're quite nice. Yeah, there's like a separation
between whether it's like like rough play with you.
Or yeah, yeah, exactly. Going back to the kind of
Halloween that we did again, these these sort of things, you
know, Apple and and Google Photos, they bring up memories,
don't they? And sometimes they're a reminder
of like how difficult things were.
We had a Lydia's first Halloween.
She was six months old. We just got this photo of her
dressed as a pumpkin. I'm just imagining her face as
well with her face just like that.
Yeah, little chubby cheeks and everything.
I just. And those photos when she's like
6 months old, I I kind of weirdly refer to them as pre
autism, even though she obviously I know of autism, but
it's like, yeah, before we knew there was anything up or, or
different about her. Yeah, they're kind of like quite
nostalgic now where I would have got a little bit upset then.
Like, you know, I can enjoy those photos again now because
I've kind of accepted what's, you know, what the future is for
it. But yeah, there's strange
looking back. I do.
I look at a lot of them, probably up to, I don't know,
maybe 14 months up to that point.
Yeah, he would like he would laugh.
And obviously I had a very different experience to miss.
You know, she was breastfeeding, she was spending all this time
and she was like, something is wrong with this kid.
Like she just, she knew something was off.
But for me it was yeah, I very much would look back to when he
was really little and he seemed typical to me, just seemed
typical. And obviously I'd had Aidan.
So I'd previously had a had a child and had a baby.
So yeah, I get what you mean with that.
I'd look back and it does feel like pre autism.
It'd feel like the autism kicked in at 14 months.
It's like you've given this period where they just go.
You can enjoy being a new parent.
Enjoy this moment because. Shit's going to hit the fan.
We'll give you 12 months and then we'll give you a lifetime
of pure fucking stress. Yeah, literally a lifetime.
Yeah, enjoy these moments. But yeah, I can.
I look back at them now and I kind of smile.
I've got like, obviously it was during COVID.
We've got like little photos where, I don't know, we finally
the pubs opened. I just got this like, Lydia's
first outing to a pub. I just sounded beer gone.
She's scrapped to me here. And you can just see a little
head. Yeah.
And like, there's a beaming picture of me having my first
draft here back in the pub. And there's little, you know,
little things like that or. Mad isn't it in the matter the
autism is there? Most likely yeah.
And absolutely no clue. There's no.
Clue thing just seems. Comes out later, doesn't it?
Yeah. And the the photos are a little
bit misleading sometimes because like I kind of mentioned before,
you always save that magical photo, you delete the rest where
so when you look back in memories.
You forget about the ones you fucked off.
Yeah, you just look like, Oh my God, everything looks perfect
before she was 12 months old. But obviously it wasn't, It
wasn't. You just kind of remember those,
those key moments there, which is, which is nice in a certain
degree. But again, we've we've we've
hammered on about this, but it's always going to keep coming up.
What worries you most about your child's future?
Nothing. There you go.
Nothing. Everything's fine.
Yeah. It's it's that.
It's that, it's that, it's that you know when we're gone.
Yeah, who will understand? It's yes, for me.
It's I'm, I'm less concerned about him ending up in a care
home. I I think I'm putting all my
cards on his like my son and, you know, Lexi's younger sister,
like being there for him, right? And, and they're awesome.
And I think that's kind of where I am of that.
I think that's yeah. I think I'm kind of relying on
family to to look after him. I think my fear is, but I should
be the one to do it. I want to be the one to help him
when he, when he needs something.
I want to be the one because that's my job.
I'm more like that. It's like this, this instinctual
and it's like, I might be fucking like 8590.
Like what problem am I going to solve apart from something
financial? I don't know what use I'm going
to be anyway. But I just, I, I don't want to
not be there. I can't.
That's literally all it is. I just, I just want to be there.
And yeah, we can't without them, you know, like to your point,
without them going just for us or you.
Just want the wall to be a kind and patient safe place, don't
you? By the time you get to yeah to
that. Age, I mean, I think the world
is getting better and this is the thing we only as far as a
framework, we only have, we're very much in the moment, aren't
we? We always have.
But if you go back 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, 50
years, it could always get better.
I I'm just hoping it's going to keep getting better and it
doesn't. Get worse at some point and with
autism rates on the increase, it's going to affect more people
and more people that are in positions of power.
Just statistically it's just going to, I mean, a Davey's,
he's got a kid who's autistic, hasn't he?
There's going to be other politicians.
I think someone in America asked, Can't remember who it
was, but I'm hoping it's going to get better.
Yeah, yeah, I think it's that isn't it?
That's the biggest fear and it's it's looking we touched about
it's it's doing as much as you possibly can to ensure you're
here as long as possible. Yeah.
It's like I don't want to be hit by a car in a year's time and
fucking that's it, I'm gone at 4344.
But that is something you can't do.
Anything about you, you can't do anything about or, you know,
having a lifestyle, which means that you're, you're limiting how
long you're going to be around for.
It's, it's, you know, you know, I'd love it if I made it to 85
and still, you know, have my, my mind intact and everything else
like that, that it could offer something.
We should do it. We should do an episode episode
on on kind of health and the the things actually move the needle.
I mean, muscle mass is one of the biggest predictors of
longevity over it has a more positive effect than smoking has
a negative effect, I think. I think.
I think the the negative effect of smoking on on mortality is
like 50%. The positive effect of training,
like doing strength training three times a week is like +350%
well on all 'cause mortality. So that's all causes of death.
Yeah. So it's like these, these are
the things that the VO2 Max and muscle mass, these are the
things that move the needle. So it's just like they say this.
For for mums, don't they as well as they get older, particularly
women, It's it's leg strength. And falling.
And yeah, absolutely. It's keep that bone mass
density, keep your muscles strong, That's it as possible as
long as you possibly can. That's it.
Yeah. Push these things away.
Because when you when you do strength training, it's not just
about your muscles. It tells the body to make your
bone doing density stronger as well.
This is it, yeah. And, and unfortunately at the
ages that we're talking about, like, you know, 70 plus, it's
the falls that kill. You.
Yep, I've had a fall broken hip. That's it.
Those are the things, and it's not necessarily the fall itself,
but it's the inability to recover from the falls.
And and then always leads to a little more complications or
there has to be an operation that leads to something else.
And really interesting as well. The thing with muscle mass, like
I'm actually doing the episode now, you guys, sorry.
I was like, oh, we should talk about it one day at the end.
I've got a lot of rut. The other one that we're through
was really interesting was muscle mass in for cancer
patients is huge difference because when people are going
through chemotherapy, they lose a lot of muscle mass.
Yes. So if you've got the muscle mass
to lose, right, if you haven't got much muscle mass and then
you go through chemo, that's when most people unfortunately
don't get through it because it works as a philtre as well for
the radiation, for the radiotherapy.
No, right. Anyway, that we'll deal on
another. There we go.
That's this will be a good episode when we we come to do
it. And I guess kind of final
question on this weird Q&A that we seem to have fallen.
It wasn't actually going to be AQ and A, was it?
No, but it seems it's quite good that it has.
We we we discussed the post goals thing.
We ended up like joint loads of notes which which is it being
good to look at? How do you look after your
mental health whilst thinking about long term futures?
No, you do that one first. I've been answering all of these
first. I think it gives you a chance I.
Think it's just grounding myself in 99% of things in the present
day. Yeah, I think I've kind of since
August, going back to the fitness, I've had a real focus
on some kind of training. Yeah, you've been.
I know we keep saying it. You've been absolutely kicking
the ass out of it. Yeah, yeah.
Just waiting for that kind of call from M&S to start.
I like training that shit man. You've been absolutely smashing
it. Yeah, well we do have this
bloody half marathon. I wish it was 1/2 marathon.
We have got this London Marathon to.
Shake that, Shawn. Yes, big Shawny boy.
Yeah, he's doing really well. Isn't he May he's killing it 5
Ki know it's 28 minutes keeps running.
I'm like, fucking stop it, Shawn, we mentioned.
Yeah. Sean, no more running.
No more running. Stop running please.
We could start again in April. May start again in May.
Yeah, we obviously we've got the obviously bit of a tangent.
We've got the the Christmas live recording.
Oh yeah, I'm monitoring for that.
It's only 18 tickets left. That's good, isn't it?
Yeah, It's because they're free, baby.
It's. Free.
Everyone has a freebie, but yeah sure message and goes yeah I
booked a hotel room. Should we go for a run on the
Saturday before I? Saw that?
As like. How nice is it though?
Because he's when when he first mentioned it about the marathon,
when he first mentioned doing the marathon, he was like, I'm
going to try this running thing. Oh, he's well.
Into and now he's just like. He's.
Just killing it. Yeah, he's absolutely killing
it. He's doing his kids the world of
good because he's going to live longer for it.
Yeah, as long as his art doesn't explode because he's training so
much. Hopefully not.
Hopefully not, but no, I think it's it's, it's yeah.
It's just grounding myself and accepting, you know, Lydia is
Lydia for who she is. Getting my head around that
doing something physical. I kind of mentioned now that
training and I've, I've said to you before, I I get it now.
Whilst during COVID, when gyms were shut down, why a lot of
people are going this is affecting my mental health.
All the gym rats. Well, at the time I was like,
oh, whatever. Yeah, you.
Want to look good in the mirror? You just want to look buff in
the mirror. Now I'm like, no, no, Once I've
had a really difficult shit day and I go at the end of the day
because I'm one of those. It's probably a good time to go
because if you're having a difficult shit day, you can.
Luckily the gym's like it's one of those 24/7, so I end up going
there like 10:00, half ten. Yeah, I've been kind of an hour,
hour and a half there, then go home.
But I've had a real shit day or something's affected me.
I go there. By the time I walk out I'm like,
yeah, I'm good again. Just like recalibrate and reset
everyone. Realise how much the thing that
you were feeling shit about it was almost made-up.
No, I think it just plays in your head and you just build it
up and build it up. So I think that's really good.
Doing something creative like this has really helped.
That is, you know, that is our kind of cathartic therapy
session, being able to discuss it, that that's kind of helped.
And yeah, just always again, hammering the point, those tiny
insignificant things to a lot of people celebrating them.
Yeah. Massively as major masters.
Roughly. Celebrate absolutely high
fiving, you know, dining out on it.
This is amazing and telling somebody gets it.
Yeah, not just like your your friend has got an irritable kid
always know associated. I love my mates to bits right?
But if if I said something positive that Thomas had just
done and they all, they all get it.
They they they watch the. That's amazing mate.
They get it. They go, oh man, that's really
cool. Really, they be thinking, yeah,
you know, they'd be just. They're doing the right thing.
They're doing the right thing, but.
You put it in like the group chat we've got or you put it on
like, you know that everybody's. Going, you get it in the dads,
in the dads group chat with somebody going like put little
video of Oh my, my kids just done this, yeah and you'll see
like genuine, like oh mate, that's fucking brilliant.
Yeah, awesome. Yeah, it's cool.
And you know, because they've lived it, it just means that a
little bit more, doesn't it? Yeah.
Because you know it's not, you know it's genuine.
It's genuine wherever it's coming from.
You know, they've lived it like. That they've lived it.
They understand why you're so buzzed about it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's have an interesting
episode. Yeah.
Just ended up being AQ and A yeah but I like that mate.
It's good. So Christmas live show, I still
ain't got a fucking clue how we're setting that up.
It's going to be mint but I'm thinking like our picture
search. Showed you yeah, the.
Table. The Joe Rogan 10 I've said it.
I've said Joe Rogan. Dickhead, I'll edit it out.
It's fine, that's all. Viewers.
Lost the yeah, the like just the table and we just, he'll come up
and just chat and, you know, come.
They can literally come up and tell their story and talk about
it. Just be cool.
We'll just roll the camera. Just keep it going.
We'll try and organise something
where there's a bit of structure to it.
Yeah, it'll be meant. We'll get the dads on and then
yeah, if anybody else wants to come up and have a bit of a
yeah, just a bit of a chin wag, we'll discuss something then.
Yeah, exactly. It'd be meant.
We can do AQ and a session, but we might just go you've got a
question. Yeah.
Come up, have a seat next to us. So we've got you on camera,
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, a bit of audience
participation. Yeah, we'll just fuck it.
We'll just, we'll just freewheel it along.
Yeah, like return. There's a real structure to
this. Also, we've got the marathon
coming up next year, London Marathon, after we mentioned if
everybody could give like 50 peer a pound, fucking loads came
in like it was. I mean, we're not near the
nowhere near the target yet, but.
I think we've broken, we've broken the 1000.
Pounds. Yeah, Yeah.
Do you know what I think it might be?
I might be wrong, so anyone can feel free to tell me.
Shut up. But I think when you ask to give
money for charity, people think it needs to be like a certain
amount or it's not going to be worth giving.
So when we mentioned like if everybody gave 5th P, yeah.
Would genuinely. Like, that would genuinely be
amazing because collectively it will it will smash the target.
Yeah. So just a friendly reminder, if
anybody can give us something, literally whatever you can, that
would be amazing because I'm starting training, Sean, the
runner app that you got me involved in that I'd started for
a bit and then I just kind of pied off.
I've put the marathon. You know the date in that?
Yeah. And it and it basically tells
you when you're going to train and my OCD has basically made it
so that I am going to start training on that day, but I
don't think it's until about the 16th of December.
Oh, we've got a better, but it's after the it's after the
Christmas special. Oh yeah, we go couple of days
after, so I am going to start then.
I will. I keep thinking I'm going to
record it and put it up on Instagram, but I'm not sure
anybody wants to see me breathing out my ass.
But maybe it's evidence that we are actually training.
I was thinking that maybe we we start doing that.
Yeah, until we hit our target and then we'll stop.
Ah, yes, yeah. That's a good show, actually.
Yeah, yeah. People seen us breathing out of
our asses. No, I think it'd be good.
I mean, it's, it's one of those and we know there's quite a few
other people in the group that are going to be down there as
well. So I'm looking forward to that.
We'll just, we'll just all run around together.
Yeah, absolutely. Do some selfies and shit.
I'm looking forward to seeing people dressed as chickens and
stuff. That's usually a London Marathon
thing, isn't it? Dressed as a chicken and.
Unfortunately, these are people that are going to be running
past us. I know, yeah, somebody carrying
a fridge will run past you and you'd be like, yeah.
Yeah, so I met that fridge guy. Yes, yeah, yes, absolutely.
What a bloke. Beast.
He's about my hype. Built like a brick shit house.
And he just does it. And he just.
Walks up huge mountains with a fridge on his back.
As you do as you do. Yeah, Thank you, guys.
Thank you mate. No problem.
And we will catch you all next week.
Next week we'll. Do it next week. #23 all.
Right. See you guys.
See you later. Take care.
Bye bye.