Good and tug. Good.
And tug Gates. Yeah, listen, we haven't.
Done this in ages. We haven't, have we?
We haven't. What's this, Episode 33?
Yeah, we're back, 33. We're back and.
We're not because. We had George Gould didn't.
We yeah, we had George Gould. What did we do before that?
I can't remember. It's all white paper, wasn't it?
Mate, I'll be honest, I mean, you've said it before, I'm kind
of glad to see the back of the white paper, just for a little.
Bit for a little bit. It's been draining.
Yeah, and again, because we're still trying to muddle through
and understand it, Yeah, Rachel is still killing it.
Yeah, absolutely. She understands it.
I've been trying to signpost people here on the Facebook
group. We've got a Facebook group now.
By the way, guys, it's free. Join there.
I know the Discord is sometimes a little bit like, what's
Discord? Yeah, Facebook's nice and easy
click. They're in happy days.
But yeah, Rachel's been doing a lot, so I'm trying to signpost.
Send the lights. Yep, send the lights.
Exactly. They asked me a question and I'm
like, I don't fucking know, Rachel.
Yeah, every day. She's she's just a phenomenal
font of knowledge. She is, yeah.
Yeah, she's finger on the pulse. And all that.
Absolutely. Last week was obviously the the
episode with Mish. Yep, which has gone down very,
very well. Yeah, it was a bit impromptu to
be on what you can tell because we just sat in the fucking
lounge. But yeah, it was nice.
It was, it was kind of conversations we haven't had
properly even on the different stuff like our relationship and
things like that, Like we, we just wouldn't talk about it on a
day-to-day. Basis when you keep it opposed,
yeah, yeah, do you. Remember that time they slept on
the floor? You just wouldn't.
So it was kind of cool to get that stuff out.
And I think what what was nice is other people have gone again,
a little bit like when me and you talk, people have gone.
Oh my God, good. It's not only us.
It's not just you. No, no, no.
Well, I'm just sleeping on the sofa.
Yeah, yeah. That's, that's normal.
There's like there's the relationships that that kind of
breakdown entirely or are you lucky enough to scrape through?
You know it. It wasn't necessarily you.
You got through a piece of piss, no.
It could have been, it's it's hard, like I'm not going to go
into too much details, but obviously those closest to me
know that Selena and my relationship broke down in
August last year. Sure.
So we've just been kind of Co parenting and muddling through
it. So it does happen, doesn't it?
So yeah, yeah, it's one of those.
Yeah, you said, didn't you? Like we've become one of the
statistics. Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
absolutely. Yeah, it's, it's, it's rough in
it. It's awful.
It's tough in it. Like with you, I'm not going to
talk too much about it, but like, if you've got a family
unit and it's a struggle. Yeah.
Because it's a struggle anyway, because you've got your, you
know, you've got your kid with all these other needs, the
stress that puts on the relationship and then just just
poof like that. It's just burns.
And then you didn't see that coming.
And all of a sudden you're then trying to rethink.
OK, back in your head and everything else.
What do we do now? Right, I've now got to find a
new direction. And this is it.
Yeah. And then put arrangements in
place for obviously Lydia, for for both of us to carry on Co
parenting effectively. So yeah, yeah, just a a new
journey, a new new way of looking at things.
But yeah, down the line, I'm sure there's plenty of parents.
I can relate to that as well. We'll be able to cover both
angles now. Yeah, Which is more content,
more content. Something good would come out.
Come on, let's go, let's go. Yeah, So yes, I'm back this
week. So obviously you had the
pleasure of a better looking Co host last week.
So. We did have a, we did have a
comment today actually, someone said, are you not doing the
podcasts with the other man anymore?
He's back today, actually, he's. Loved to be known as the other
Man. Why?
I can't tell why we didn't do one last week.
I think life just got in the way and and we had that, we had that
that podcast, we admission the bag.
So we just took a break off, didn't we?
Yeah, absolutely. But I'm glad to have you back,
Sir. Thank you very much.
Good to be back. Good to be back.
Part of the autism diecast again.
Yeah, exactly. Well, it is called the diecast.
To be fair, anything happened with you the last couple of
weeks? Oh, goodness me, it's just been
full on at work. Yeah, yeah.
Oh yeah, yeah, you gave. You had a bit of a.
Mental week, it's been full on. So yeah, a lot to get through
and yeah, got a bit of annual leave coming up, but obviously
whenever you go and you leave, work just ramps up right before
it. And then, yeah, you've got to do
your out of office, get all the bits and bobs in there for
everybody else to handle whilst you're away in that list.
It's just getting bigger and bigger.
So yeah, yeah. And Lydia's all just Lydia in.
Lydia is Lydia ING at the moment, Yeah, absolutely.
So yeah, still doing what she does best.
Still going well at school, which is good.
So yeah, awesome. Still going well.
And Thomas? Yeah, fine mate, absolutely
fine. Obviously half term at the
minute he's he's chilling at home.
Actually today he's just, we thought we kind of thought he
said at the weekend. We actually, we intentionally
tried to stay at home Saturday and Sunday in because we were
like he's going to want to go out Monday, today's Monday and
he hasn't bothered again. It's like I was staying.
So now, miss, she's like, no, I want to leave last night,
please. But you know, he's got a few
more days and he's two weeks, isn't it, that he's done?
Two weeks, yeah. Two weeks, yeah.
Bank holiday Friday as well. Is, yeah.
Friday. Monday.
Good Friday I. Forget every year, it's a long
weekend, hell of a long weekend. So we had and this is something
I'd never really thought about. Well, I thought about it, but I
didn't know about is there was a petition going around and
somebody messaged about it. So they sent a petition in this
week and, and when I read it, I was like, this can't, this can't
be right now. Loads of loads of people
listening to this. They're going to be like, yeah,
that's absolutely right. I looked it up.
And it's so when Thomas is going to turn 18 and Lydia turns 18,
we basically stop being parents in the eyes of the law.
And you have to apply to the court and pay for permission to
keep doing what you've been doing their entire life.
So. Is that because they're 18?
They're officially adults, yeah. So it it makes sense.
So, Lydia. Can go out drink yeah and.
Now you could be like, no you can't.
No, you can't. You're staying here.
And I didn't. I always, I always kind of
considered like what happens? But I never considered that you
they're an adult. Yeah, you will.
You'll have to I. Suppose it's not coming our
radar because our kids are relatively young still so we're
in in classic autism parents. Yeah, we look to the future, but
we're very much trying to take day as it comes, week as it
comes. We're not kind of thinking
what's happening in kind of 10/12/13 years time, are we so.
No, I've never had anyone mention it.
I've never had anybody that has gone through I.
Didn't realise you could pay just to carry on, yeah.
Yeah, it's called deputyship. OK.
You apply for it. So you apply to something called
a Court of Protection. There are two types, one's for
money and one's for welfare. OK, it costs £421.00 to apply.
OK, so when our kids are 18, that'll probably be about 4 1/2
grand. Yeah, that's a good point with.
Inflation's going, yeah. Yeah, and it takes four months.
And during that social services, they get told that you've
applied and that they they can then oppose it.
And they could say, no, actually we think someone else should
make those decisions about your child.
And OK, I mean, I'm sure they don't in most cases, Yeah.
But yeah, it's just the thing I'd never.
It's just a hurdle I'd never considered.
So this is like, I don't know, this is America.
It's like power of attorney, you're you're in charge of their
well-being and how their finances are.
Yeah. So they don't, I don't know, get
taken advantage of or things like this take place.
I mean I get I get why it exists but actually the idea of paying
420 odd quid for it then again is that oh each one of them
costs £421.00 so there's 2 so 1's for money and the other
one's for welfare and health decisions.
So you're looking at best part of a grant.
So yeah, you're paying like like £850.
OK, and that gives you the control.
Yeah, And if you don't apply for it, you've got no legal
standing, so you can't touch bank accounts.
Hospitals won't listen to you. Yeah, wow.
I know. And this, this petition
essentially I think is around like doing something about that,
whether it's to do with reducing the funds.
I didn't actually look that much into the petition itself.
I just saw the headline and I was like, Nah.
So that can't be true. Yeah.
And I don't know how I feel about it.
I, I, I like that they're recognised as just being an
adult, not an autistic adult or, you know, an adult with
additional needs. I like that they're, you're 18,
you're an adult now. I like that.
And I like that you don't just automatically get to make
decisions for them. I like that because it seems an
individual. Yeah.
So there's a process you have to go through which I get makes
sense, that's important. And I suppose it's a stop.
Abuse, essentially. Yeah, abuse of the system or
people taking advantage, especially if there's money
concerned and there's there's kind of pit payments and
everything else going into their accounts that somebody's not
just kind of piggybacking on the back of that and just abusing it
and taking their their finances. Yeah.
Oh, here we go. Here's the petition.
So petitions. It's on the parliamentary
website. If capacity assessment between
16 and 18 confirms your child permanently lacks capacity,
parental responsibility should just carry on.
No court, no 421 LB and no four month wait.
You just carry on doing what you're doing.
Government's response said we need the court process to
protect vulnerable adults, which is kind of what you were saying
then, yeah. Well, they would be vulnerable
adults. Absolutely would be, yeah.
I think that the financial side is a bit and and the waiting
around. So that that must mean that
there's a four month gap. When what they are.
When they are adults, when they're they're adults And can
you apply before they're 18 maybe, I don't know.
That's really interesting. Very interesting.
So yeah, I just thought that was.
EHCPS carry on until they're into their 20s I believe.
Yes, yes they do. The parent who's been of a No,
it doesn't say. Yeah, I'll have to look at that.
But yeah, I just thought that was quite an interesting little.
Yeah. But maybe some parents that have
gone through that can give us a bit of insight.
Actually, yeah. When?
We, I'm going to split these up into reels and everything else
like that. So it'd be interesting to get
some some other parents insight into that.
Yeah, I'm just going off some like cursory digging I just did.
But yeah, Mad 1 isn't it? How's the How's that marathon
running going? Yeah, yeah.
I'm really looking forward to it.
Really, really looking. Forward started that.
I thought you were being serious.
No, absolutely not. Absolutely not.
I'm just it's only this week that I can stand up straight and
not hurt, so my back's been in bits.
But again, that doesn't mean just this week you've just
started feeling better, so that means you should go for a run.
You probably. Yeah, I'm really, I'm really
conscious of not kind of just slipping the trainers on and
going for one and buggering it up for another couple of weeks
because we've got what, 3 1/2 weeks until until the marathon?
And the furthest I've run so far is about 5K.
And then and then Sean messages and goes, how's the running
going, lads? Yeah, it's going great, Sean.
It's. Going great, it's going really.
I had to look at the London Marathon thing and I think
you've got about 6 hours before the roads open again.
Is it? Or something along those lines
there so. You've got to get it done.
Or are you? Going to run over, yeah, pretty
much, which is which is good kind of motivation to carry on
running if you've got like a London cabbie behind you, yeah,
going at it, but. Six hours, yeah, yeah, OK, it's.
Something like 6 or 7 hours. So I I, it's going to be such a
mixture of like, I had a look, I said a ChatGPT.
I've done no bloody training for this because of XYZ.
Yeah. Can I still do it?
And it's like, yeah, you can still do.
It is always a little bit agreeable.
You'll be fine. It's it's you'll be no worries
whatsoever. But I think you were just saying
do something like you, you from the the get go, run 4 minutes,
walk one minute, run 4 minutes, walk one minute.
Keep that consistent throughout the whole thing.
So yeah, that's, that's going to be my plan.
It's just literally something to start.
I'm going to run, stop, walk, run, stop, walk and just keep
that going and hope that I can make it across.
Chat would have got that from somewhere.
It must have worked for somebody at some point.
So yeah, maybe it was from Paula Rackriff.
Maybe. Maybe that's what she was doing.
Run, have a poo. Run I.
Forgot about. That oh, I.
Shouldn't laugh. No, but.
She's still carried on running. She did, and she'd bloody smash
it. Yeah, but how are you looking
forward to it? I'm not a training going.
Yeah. Yeah, try and do the mate I'm
doing. I'm doing three runs a week.
Yeah, 25KS and A10 Ki. Say A10 Ki did 3K on Saturday.
I tried to do a 10 and I got pins and needles in my left
foot, I think. I think it was something after I
was like, Oh no, I'm injured, I'm injured.
And I tried to ChatGPT. I was like pins enough.
Like I've always run like I've got pins and needles in my foot
and it was like, you probably just tied your laces too tight.
I was like, they were quite tight, simple as that.
I could just loosen my laces up, but I'm really like the
atmosphere is supposed to be like the atmosphere of Paris.
Half was amazing. That was really good.
Yeah, I. Imagine London is like it's.
Gonna be that times 10 exactly, yeah.
Times 10, yeah. I think once you get is it to
Tower Bridge? Yeah.
I think it just goes absolutely nuts there, isn't it?
So if I can make it to Tower Bridge, that would be good,
yeah. Right.
Even if you walk in. Yeah, they've just got this
image of the guy carrying that fridge freezer just overtaking
me. Yeah, yeah, That's pretty epic,
isn't it? Yeah, that's pretty epic.
Well, some firefighter and full equipment carrying everything
just lapping me that. Would be so demoralising.
Yeah, it's running past with a fridge freezer on his back.
Yeah, that's just me. Trying to encourage you.
Come on mate, you can do it. You can do it.
Fuck off. Or he just picks me up and just
carries on running and he. Puts you in the fridge freezer.
That'd be amazing. It'll be amazing.
But no, it's good. We're you know, the main thing
is that we're raising, we're raising what we know close to
7000, something like that in in funds for ambitious about
autism. So again, thank you very much to
everybody that has taken the time to to donate to us and and
wish as well. But yeah, I think the podcast
after we do the London Marathon, it'll be very interesting.
Yeah, it'd be interesting, yeah. It'd be interesting.
I can hopefully show you all the toenails that have fallen off 6
times. 6559 lbs. Brilliant.
Thank you very much. 390 of you. Yeah, it's absolutely superb.
Very generous, thank you, thank you, thank you.
And actually kind of, I think once we kind of hammered home
that the whole if it's 50P, if it's a quid, if it's £2,
whatever, that I think actually people start to understand it
wasn't about the amount. No.
Absolutely. Just loads more of those little
ones came in. Yeah, loads of those come in and
very quickly. Do you know what those those
people that were donating like like pound 2 lbs?
Yeah, it just added up so quickly and it took us over our
£5000 limit. Obviously, a couple of
individuals just dropped some very.
Crazy. They dropped some big numbers in
there. We're like internally grateful
for them, for those people as well.
But it's going to be good. It's going to be good.
It's. Going to be good.
I remember the Paris one they had like the Super Mario like
mushrooms. Didn't they like power boosts
and stuff like? That just tap those.
Yeah, tap them. That works.
Placebo, I'm sure. I don't think there's actually
anything about the cardboard mushroom.
No, I don't think there is anything about the cardboard
mushroom that does make you run faster.
But it seemed to work. It seemed to work.
I still can't get out of my head the I'd like with Paris
finishing that half marathon, us having a conversation going.
Could you imagine running that again?
Oh mate, And this is effectively what we've got to.
Do first thing I did when I ran over that finish line was go.
How do people do that twice? No.
Like how did you twice think of how bad our legs were and how
bad your toes were bleeding weren't?
They. Yeah, they they.
Were think how bad they'd be doing that twice.
I can't. I can't.
I just remember finishing sitting in a doorway eating all
the goodies that we were given and then I just couldn't get up.
I was walking around like I was standing up eating all that
stuff that the game was like loads of food and yoghurts and
all sorts of stuff just to get your energy and your carbs back
up. I was thinking, I feel all
right. I mean, I'm tired.
I feel all right. That's because I hadn't sat
down. I was walking around eating this
food. But then when we did stop, we
couldn't get up the stairs. Like couldn't get up the stairs,
couldn't get down the stairs. I fell asleep in the shower,
just sat in the shower, just in a big heap.
Just. Yeah, it's going to be double
that. And Sean, who's been absolutely
smashing it. I've got to be honest.
You all right? We talk about neurodivergence.
I have a feeling this might be a hyper focus for you.
You don't come across as ADHD or autistic but this does feel like
a hyper focus this guy and it's definitely gone in your favour
because he's killing it. Is he?
Has he already done half marathons?
He's he's smashing half marathons.
He's. Just doing half marathons around
the town just for fun. Yeah, just for fun.
Oh, I've got a spare an hour. And he wasn't a runner before.
Before 0 runner, I think this is this is like his proper.
Running. Yeah, and he's just smashing
half marathons just two and half, just around the local
around the town. London landmarks and I'll just
do a quick 10K. Oh, there's never a personal
best. I mean you're like oh just
managed to do 5 jeez fuck it's. Going to be hard.
It's going to be really bad. It's going to be embarrassing.
Yeah, Yeah, it's going. To But there's going to be a lot
of people in exactly the same situation going how did we get
to do the London Marathon? And they won't do any training.
Yeah. And there's going to be people
dressed up as chickens and all. Sorts.
Oh, it's going to be all sorts. Isn't there going to be so many
different costumes that make us feel bad?
Yeah, yeah, because they're going to go faster.
Than we are, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Yeah, I know. But it it'll be good and I think
once we've done the London Marathon I've made a promise to
myself I'm never doing 1 again so.
I don't know. I I there was rumours of
something happening in Cyprus. Iron apple, Iron apple the half.
Iron Apple half marathon We're we're all about doing it next
year. Got a few of us dads together,
just purely long weekend. It's just about the run.
It just happens. It just.
Happens to be an iron apple and it's just taken place on Sunday
a few days ago when they did the well yesterday is when they did
the this year's half marathon. It's just like bizarrely in in
IA, Napa and Famagusta area of Cyprus.
Every year they have this massive half marathon that takes
place and you can do like 10 KS and five KS as well, but there's
a half marathon that takes place and it is solely devoted to
autism. Is it?
I didn't know that. There's no other charities.
It is simply devoted directly for autism.
That's it. So everybody.
Wants it? How is fundraising spreading?
Awareness is affected. Has family members that are
autistic, neurodiverse, and that is the entire marathon and it's
going it's getting bigger and bigger every.
Year. How do you access it then?
I mean, obviously the London Marathon's really tough to get
it to get into. Simply you just lock up, just
Google it, get an entry place. It's, it's dead simple to get
through. Oh, we've got, I've been in
touch with the provider about it and they're keen to, to have
this kind of podcast and stuff. Yeah, absolutely.
Spread awareness. I think the the president of
Cyprus got involved in the one yesterday, right?
I come here. If you ran it, I thought you
were. Going to say the president
obviously sent us an e-mail. No, no, no.
Not yet. He might do after this, but I
think he got involved as well and they've just gone right.
He's something like 1.5 or 1.8 million euros.
We're going to build a dedicated autism centre in this part of
Cyprus, bloody hell. And we're going to have it
completed in under a year. That's amazing.
It's just like, wow. That's cool, and that's your
knack of the words. It's where mums from, yeah, mums
from Cyprus, so it's got a bit of a personal touch there as
well. But I think it'd be great just
to get a group of us out there, have a long weekend, run it.
If anyone's keen, oh imagine if we've got loads of us over
there, like not just the lads we know, but just oh, I'd be sick.
Well, even mums as well, yeah. Anybody, anybody, anybody.
That'd be so good. Anybody that can come across
then, you know, we try and get a group of us together, that'd be
superb and then have a couple of sherbets in, well, just NATA
we're. Just going for a run, aren't we?
We not. Oh yeah, sorry, we'll cut that
bit out. We're not having any drinks or
any fun whatsoever. Afterwards, I Napa is not about
drinking. No, it's not.
I say I, you say Napa. I Nappa used to be like when we
were like 2000s. That was like the place to go,
wasn't it? That's when Craig David and
Artful Dodger and all the garage team was coming.
I remember going out there, I would have been about 17 at the
time and just being in these clubs, just full of lads from
London enjoying the music and everything else like that.
There's skinny little 17 year old me going.
I've never been, never been. I went to my first holiday was
lads holiday was in Turkey, in Bodrum.
And I mean, it was a bit of a dive.
Like the power kept going out randomly.
Like we kept trying to what there was a, there was a place
called the, it was called the golden plate, but we always
wanted to go to this. It's called the Sensi bar.
And it was the last bar at the end.
And it was just, we just liked it there.
But they try and catch you to get you to come in.
And these guys every time, oh, we were like 1718 or whatever,
maybe 19. And they just, we didn't have
the willpower to be like, no, we'd just go in.
Are they free shots? Free calm and come in, come in,
come in. And.
And one night the power went out and we were like, wicked, they
won't be able to see us. So we were just like walking
down the strip. Fucking lights come out like
mag, like, like proper big beaming lights right in our
faces. So all we hear is Gaz, Gaz, Ian,
come on, come in, come in. We were like, Nah, what?
So they still got us even though it's pitch black.
But I've only ever been, I've only ever been on like a lad's
holiday there and Ibiza. Yeah, that's it, Two holidays
notes written. Yeah, it was a stag, dude, so it
still counts. Stag do it.
Yeah. And that was very recently.
But yeah, yeah, I didn't get to do all the holidays at most.
No, I didn't do. I didn't do much of those
either. Did you not?
No. No, no.
No, no, absolutely not. I think the place I got to was
kind of stag dudes, where you go away for a long weekend and you
drink so much alcohol that you come back and you actually
genuinely think you are alcoholic.
Yeah, because you just start getting withdrawal symptoms.
That's my last thing to remember.
I think that was my brother in law's stag do.
I was getting I get withdrawal symptoms just from Ibiza.
Like I enjoyed Ibiza so much. When I got back I was like,
really sad. Yeah, yeah.
But So what? Sad coming back to the UK.
What I know, yeah, it was at the time I was having a lot of stuff
with, with my, my previous partner custody battles and
stuff like that with my, with my eldest.
So I think I was it was an escapism from that as well, so.
Switch off for a bit. Yeah, it was like, oh God, back
to the real world. It was probably a little bit
but. Yeah, no, it'd be good, I think.
I think that'll be the furthest I run in the future would be 1/2
marathon out of Bush. Yeah, I just.
Yeah, I can't. I know I've done.
I've done a few half marathons now and I've always said at the
end of it, that's my last one, Yeah.
And then a couple of days later I'm like, oh, let's book
another. Yeah, yeah.
I don't think I'm going to be feeling the same way with the
London Marathon. This is going to be like
seriously debilitating after I think like I couldn't walk for a
while after the half marathon. I'm probably a week.
It took me 6 months for my nail to grow back that.
Was great guys. Like the blood that came through
his sock, It was horrendous. One, it was pretty bad.
We've got to do things with our nipples as well.
What we doing with our nipples and?
You've got to protect them. Like the tape over there, She's
just getting pierced. She's going to do stuff with our
nipples. Like what?
Pierce them. I don't have any left after this
London Marathon. It'll be like a Kendall.
Have you had your, have they sent your tip?
We're just chatting. Absolutely.
Yeah, absolutely. We haven't caught up for a
while. We've not said anything remotely
about autism or we have a little bit, but have they have they
sent you the T-shirts? The last two, I've got the
T-shirts. Yeah, I.
Really like the ones we got from the Paris one, yeah.
You've got a vest and AT shirt. No, I just got a vest I think.
I've got a vest and AT shirt. But I think isn't some AH, isn't
someone supposed to be sorting this out with some some running
gear for the older? I don't honestly don't know
anymore. I don't know.
I don't know, but that's a nice T-shirt.
Thanks man. Thanks.
I like yours too. Oh.
Thank you very much. What did you just say?
Inclusion isn't optional. Inclusion is.
Damn right it's not. Silent isn't.
No, you've got a different. One what's right here?
Silence is an absence. I feel like we're doing.
Have you seen Dude, Where's My Car?
Yeah, it's written on the back. What does mine say?
It's. Mine say yeah.
Dude, thanks Charlie. Thank you.
Sorry. Yeah.
Thanks, Charlie. That was.
All sorry you're a spicy in court.
Always appreciate you just sending us free shit every now
and then. Really good quality stuff.
Charlie's actually very recently got an actual shop.
She's. Built the building.
At the moment she's absolutely expanding.
And I'm so yeah, you, you'll be able to go out there, order your
stuff. She's not going to stock it all
because cash flow totally understand why you would just
order a shit load of stuff and leave it in there.
But you can just go out there, try some of the clothes on that
she's got the hoodies and all that kind of stuff.
Try stuff on get. Them sent to your house.
Get your order in and get them sent to your house.
So that's very cool. Very happy for her doing that.
That's very, very good. Nice mug.
Also also from a certain place also got a mug.
Yeah, got a mug. She does like cups, flasks, you
know, all sorts of stuff. So yeah.
Really, really good. All good.
Well, I think. What just happened because it's,
it's, it's one of those that's been a couple of weeks, isn't
it? I think there's.
We've been just white paper right there, just legislation
all. We've done is talk about the
white paper and then the all we did was talk about what we
thought the white paper was. Going to look like.
Then the leaks about the white paper and then actually get told
by the minister that's not entirely true because some of
the leaks were incorrect. Then we went to the the launch
of it and then we went down to see her and try and digest it
all and ask questions from the community.
So yeah, it's just, it's literally been that it.
Was rough. I mean that that obviously we,
we, we kind of, we had like 10 questions, didn't we?
We had 1010 questions we had. 10 questions, yeah, but we had 1/2
an hour window. Half an hour window and.
We got through 5. And, and the minister gave very
detailed responses, which totally get, but obviously I
just meant we ran out of time, but credit to it, she said.
The rest of the questions, you know, you want to send them over
and I want to get them answered. In all honesty, I think I don't
know. I don't mean this from from her
point of view, but I don't think people trust everything that's
being said anyway. No, because even when she did
answer those questions, well, the response was don't believe
it, don't believe it. You know this is wrong or or
they've kind of slipped a bit of a snake around this stuff.
The the the trust is gone, isn't it to a certain?
Degree the trust has gone. So essentially, I don't know
what good it would have been to get all those answered anyway,
not because the minister wasn't being honest, but because even
if she was being honest, people are so sceptical that, you know,
I don't, I don't know. But I, I appreciated her having
us down there. It was very good of her.
And we were more than happy to to have her on.
It's quite nice to see the podcast somewhere else for a
change. But but yeah, it's, it's one of
them. And I do very much feel like if
anybody wants to have their say, play it written, Rachel made a
point of this. Like make sure you go on the
website and be part of that consultation, because if you
don't do that and then you bitch and moan about how things have
turned out, you, you're in no position to say, well, I tried
to get my voice heard. If you didn't do that and you
don't like how things turn out, it's like it's like not voting
and then moaning about which party it's in a. 100%.
So not that our voices are going to be heard, or I don't, I don't
know, but at least if we try. Do as much as you can to at
least do exactly, yeah. MPs like get right to your MP.
Again, I don't know how much that works, but if you don't,
try. Yeah, trying to think what else
we we need to discuss really because there's been what has
really pissed people off, however.
How should we discuss what's pissed people off?
Even about how have I pissed people off?
Oh, we know there's a couple of ways, isn't there?
That's easy. So I think a few episodes ago we
made a comment or I, you know, between the two of us, we said a
lot of people now will vote on a policy that directly effects
them because it's so crazy out there at the moment in politics.
And I think not just in the UK, but it seems to be across
Europe, across America, politics just seems to be absolutely
nuts. And you don't, you don't know
where you stand because it changes day-to-day and and
everything else like that. I think we made a comment that
for me personally and probably for yourself, because the number
one thing, if you were looking at a rap sheet or a manifesto of
policies, I would automatically go to what is SM policy?
What are they going to do over the next 4-5 years that could
affect my child in a negative way, in a positive way?
And that would probably draw my eye to a manifesto.
And obviously if the rest of it's absolute bollocks, I'd
probably go do you know what? I don't believe it.
I'm not going to go there. I'll make an educated decision,
which again has proved really difficult to do in UK politics
at the moment. And I think we said tongue in
cheek and it's just, I want to stress this because I think 99%
of people got that it was tongue in cheek, but there's always
that 1% who are very, very loud. We said something like, do you
know what if a certain party came?
Out, I said. Reform.
All right, Gaz said reform, and it was said in tongue in cheek,
right? I'm amazed that we've got to
explain this. But that was kind of the point.
The whole point. Yeah, I used an extreme example
to make the point. Yeah, to highlight the policy.
Like, do you know what? Even if even if the Lib Dems
brought a really good send policy, we know they would.
And that wouldn't that wouldn't be make the point look extreme.
So the whole point was we choose a ridiculous party in that sense
to go. So do you know what?
If they came out with a SEM policy that was cast iron and
was really good, Yeah, you'd probably have a look at it.
Yeah. All right.
And that was it. And that was the end of the
conversation. And we thought most people would
actually get that and not go. Do you know what I think most
people did, to be fair? Yeah, I think most people did.
I think Gaz and Andy are going to vote reform.
I think Gaz. And Andy are Nazis.
Yeah, I do. Flipping out.
Luckily no one said that word, but they were probably thinking
it and certain group of of people and they weren't even
following us. They weren't even part of the
autism community. No, they just came out and go,
how dare you say that you're going to vote reform?
I was like, well, firstly, it's the UK, you can vote for whoever
you want. I'm not going to judge anybody
for who they vote. You know, they're voting
against. I've got too much shit going on
in my life to go, oh, you can't vote for them, but you must vote
for them. I'll just vote for whoever I
want to, all right? But it was just the fact that we
had to explain it again and again.
I really hate that shit. I really hate that like and I'll
use an example in a minute and I won't mention their name.
They we've obviously got the discord Discord group.
Yep, highly recommend joining it.
We please do chat. We go into the little.
Virtual pub, you can just go in there.
There's different threads and different topics affecting
autistic kids, and you remember those kids.
It's really good. I actually signposted a lot of
people in the Facebook group to there just because it's got that
kind of granularity and it's got more of a community feel.
You can go in there, ask a direct question.
I've got an issue with PDA. I don't know what this means.
Go in there, choose APDA topic thread, go in and ask the
question. And there are loads of parents
that are experiencing and all come and go.
This is the real life, you know, experience.
This is what you need to do. This is a good a resource to
look at. It's fantastic.
Exactly, it's really good. So somebody in there shared a
photo of something within the same community.
That's pretty shocking and shit. Can't remember exactly what it
was but it was a screenshot of their Instagram.
I'm trying to word this so I don't give up who they are just
because I haven't asked them, not because there's anything
wrong with what they've done. And at the top of it, I'm not
even going to mention the politician.
They, they follow a politician. You could see it in the stories
on the, on the Instagram, right? They posted it and then
immediately went, Oh my God. I just need you all to know that
I follow this person because they're my local MP.
I'm not a follower of of this. Particular party.
Personal party and I was like how awful that we're all just
autism parents trying to go on a journey and help each other out
and people are still scared to say who they vote for or who
they follow or any whether they're left-leaning or right
leaning. They're scared to say it because
they know, not think, they know that regardless of what we're
all here to do, that people will come at you and attack you.
We need to cancel that. Person, yeah.
And I actually say to it, I said, by the way, she goes, Oh
no, I said why did you feel the need to do that?
She went well, I'm just worried that people are going to get
offended and I'm like, the offence is taken, not given.
Like if somebody gets offended, that's on them.
It's not on you, especially for something like that.
As I say, it's it's taken on giving.
Like do not Honestly, it's awful that people have to be like on
tender hooks all the. Time justify everything I do and
it's a crazy situation that we've got ourselves into.
It's so nuts and and it never used to be like that.
Now it's like it's OK for you to just scream and shout and give
people shit based on politically where they lean and politically
where they lean. Doesn't mean you could have
someone that's and I say right wing and left wing, not far
right and far left. Right.
You can be on the right wing and be a good person and you can be
on the left wing and be a good person.
It's the extremes that are the issue.
It's. It's just even having that word
Wing. Yeah, yeah, I know.
Do you know what I mean it? Shows opposite your opposite
end. Polarised opposite where
historically you can be right, left, centrist, everything else
like that. Yeah, but it's it's very much
been politicised and no sorry, not politicised.
It's obviously political. It's been weaponized, Yes.
It's been weaponized to deliberately count to someone or
just, you know, the idea that you can't sit down on the table
like us. Yeah.
And have a conversation. Now, if you go, do you know
what? I'm.
I'm leaning right and I go, I'm leaning left.
And although that's the end of the conversation, well, you
obviously you obviously. Must you?
Clearly. You clearly fucking hate your
kids. Yeah, you're clearly a Dick
head. We can't have any conversation
whatsoever. Yeah.
And you just see that kind of chasm getting bigger and bigger.
And it's now, like, people go, no, I can't even, you know,
associate with that person. I can't do that.
And how can you ever get to a common ground again and sit
down, have discussions? Do you know the, the big thing
about it, what I'm seeing is, is obviously there's, there's been
like the use of like words like fascist and Nazi and racist and
all that kind of stuff like. Or even throwing in the the P
word, you know, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like if you're if you're, if you're like towards the left,
then the right will shout you're a yeah, exactly.
If you're in the left, you'll shout you're a fascist.
Yeah, it's mental and and there's there's actual meaning
to these words and the more you use them at people where it's
completely irrelevant, like calling someone a fascist for
being on the right. Like do you know what fascism
is? It's it's about controlling
speech usually and might not listening to anyone else's
opinion and enforcing your opinion on someone else.
That's a part of what fascism is.
If you're shouting someone and stopping them speaking, by
calling them a fascist, you're doing the thing that you're
accusing them of. So anyway, all these things are
used and they're used so brazenly that they've lost
meaning. So now you've got people on the
right being called racist and they're like, whatever.
Well, this is. It they're like, they don't care
and they don't care because you've used it so much that it's
lost its meaning against people that weren't being racist.
No. Isn't that the real racists and.
And again, like you know the other side, just.
Shown this has gone off topic, I know I.
Don't mind just. You talked about UFOs and and
aliens on one. Episode yeah, I think we did.
And again, if you're the other, you know, if you if you lean to
the other side, you know, just shouting communist at somebody
and. Yeah, yeah, if you're on the
right and you're just calling someone on the left a communist
or like or, or Joseph Stalin. And you just got to look back
and just go do do you know what? Whether fascism, communism at
the extreme levels that these people are accusing others of
being. Yeah, they resulted in in
horrendous, horrendous crimes against humanity.
The amount of people and this is both sides.
It's not like, yeah, yeah, one side is no, we we know obviously
know, you know what happened in 1940s and everything else like
that. But equally what was going on in
communist Russia and all over the world, the same amount of
death, sometimes more were taking place.
But to start accusing people of being from both sides.
Yeah, yeah, it's. Yeah, and it's normally when
they're just asking questions. Well, this is this is it, yeah,
it's you've all probably seen the reels or videos of, you
know, from from from both sides that go on out there depending
on what your algorithms like, you would have seen both sides.
But it's just a horrendous place to get into.
And then you kind of feel like it has a knock on effect in in
every part of politics. And we, we, you know, you made a
point earlier on that regardless of what Georgia Gould said,
people now have got an opinion as it's going to be absolute
bollocks. I don't trust it.
And she could have, you know,
again, we don't know until it's actually put in action, but she
could have been literally 100% truthful.
Completely. Truthful, but because there's
that kind. Of like the boy who cried wolf
kind of thing, isn't it? Yes, you know.
So that's that's one thing we have got down a bloody rabbits
more here, but trying to bring it back.
Oh no, that was it. So that's that's what he's kind
of said to to this person. I said like, you don't ever
worry. You don't ever worry in this
group that anyone's going to give you any shit because she
said. I thought you'd kick.
I was like, I was like, mate, it actually kind of works the other
way around. If anyone's going to start
attacking you for for political views, when when you're being
the best parent you can to your autistic child and you're a good
part of the community and you're trying to help everyone out.
You're not the one that needs to worry about getting kicked out.
It would be the person that starts attacking you for a
political. Belief 100% and.
That's what we need to be. Most of us are actually.
If some of us are a little bit on the left or a little bit on
the right, most of us are in the centre.
And I'm not just talking about autism parents.
I mean, like everybody, the bulk of people.
I'd like, I'd like to think regardless of what political
persuasion you are, and again, you know, going back to our, we
use the, the orders and community as an example.
I guess that, you know, if somebody came into the Discord
group or messaged us or we put a post up and they were really
struggling with something, I would like to think we wouldn't
go away a minute. Who'd you vote for?
Before I help you, I'd like to think that even if you knew
somebody was leaning one way or another that you would go, do
you know what I can help you out with that because we've got
compassion and we're understanding as to what you're
going through and it's not very, very easy to deal with on the
day-to-day basis. So we'll take everything out
there and we do the human side of things and actually try and
being compassionate and help somebody.
I'd like to think that's where the community still, and I got
no reason to say no it isn't because everything I've seen is
really positive. I think the kind of proofing is
in the pudding where everybody gets to know each other's
personalities first. And then if you later down the
line find out their political leanings, it's of a benefit
because you go actually, I know this person is a good person
before I found out the political leaning.
So. So actually, I know their heart
is in the right place. Actually, most people want the
same thing. They've just got different
directions to get there. Yeah.
Do you know what I mean? It's kind of a bit like that.
And I think that's what most people.
Are yeah, we all want the best for our children.
Yeah, we literally, we're all here because.
And if reforming at the best sent pop joker.
Again, again, how else have I pissed people off?
I'm. Trying to think of comments I
had that that 1 today. Yes, you did.
Can you? Please don't refer to your
children with I think they them pronouns.
I'll be honest. I don't understand what they
mean by it, but I I don't. I think what I think.
Do you know what? Please hold Andy talk.
Yeah, we're getting more of of I think these sort of comments as
we as the platform gets bigger, which is, you know, it's good to
hear other people's opinions, but great love hearing opinions.
But I think it was a bit of a strange one, this one, because
we do talk about the whole point of this.
We share our experience about our children.
Also you will talk about Thomas, I'll talk about Lydia.
And I think people sometimes will, certain persons wanted to
highlight a point that yes, OK. I'm going to read this out OK?
I've not seen this. One without any any I'm just and
people can try to help me understand this right so this
was about what we were talking about so it's one of the ones
with me and mesh OK and the comment was again no so it.
Was you and Mesh in the previous episode talking about Thomas,
your son? OK, yeah.
No, no, just put the context. No hate or anything like that.
It was essentially about talking to talking to Thomas and autism
generally. The a lot of these meltdowns can
come from life not meeting expectations.
I'm going to be direct. This is the comment.
I'm going to be direct. Calling your son they in
brackets if they've not chosen this as a pronoun feels
offensive. Especially as an autistic
parent. It can come across as
dehumanising. The autistic community already
struggles with being treated as less individual, so language
like that adds to the problem. OK, now I've never called Thomas
by the pro name. They I've called him he and him
because he's a boy. OK, OK, again, if I'm upset
anyone by saying that, like I from ignorance, I don't
understand why, but I understand some people get upset about
pronouns and stuff. Yeah.
OK, so so they're saying I called him they and I don't know
if they misheard that, but again, that's kind of a comment
that's coming in and. But the only time you would say
they if you were talking about the community.
Yeah, I'd say yeah, I'd say like the thing with the, the, the in
my experience trying to ad Libby, like my experience with
autistic, autistic children is for them, they might have more
meltdowns when life doesn't meet expectations.
So it might be like a a pluralistic they generalising.
And I guess what they're saying, are you stripping away them as a
human being? Maybe.
Referring to them as they as opposed to like they're what,
Substandard? Yeah, I don't know.
It's.
Just. It's just.
So that's the kind that's strange.
Yeah, that's kind of a nerve with somebody.
And you know, we that's, that's fair enough.
Everyone's entitled to their opinions.
That's the beauty of. 100%. And and do air them but.
But we do upset people. We do.
And I, yeah, I mean, we did the Hidden 20% podcast.
Oh, God. And if you, if you get a chance,
go on Hidden 20%. We were the guests of Ben.
It was so nice. And it was it's a it's a
beautiful episode and the team heading to 80% when they're
doing the advertising, they took a, a section, put it into kind
of was it called a carousel? So image, we were a little bit
of text on it image, image about the conversation that took
place. And we were mid discussion about
the we want to say kind of the different abilities of of
individuals that are autistic that you can have in the
community can be so difficult sometimes with autism because
your your class is kind of autistic, whether you're high
functioning or with like our children profoundly autistic
and. Some people aren't liking issues
in the word profane. No, and you know, have a Coke
and a smile. But with our children, they're
in specialist settings, they're non verbal nappies.
You know, they're profoundly autistic.
Yeah. So we're still, everyone's still
grouped as autistic, which is absolutely fine that we have no
opinion on, on, on, on that If you're autistic, you're autistic
regardless of. Highlights how different
everything. And this is the difficulty.
Sometimes you can see with the white paper that in the
mainstream and the same between us, this is a difficulty.
Yeah, yeah. Is that, you know, autism is a,
you know, it covers a lot of people.
We we mentioned the kind of the colour paint card.
Yes, different shades. It's like an infinite.
Version of man. Yeah, yeah.
So we were talking about the different abilities of people
who have autism. And we say sometimes we'll hear
stories of, of like, I know somebody who's autistic.
They've just completed their law degree.
I was like, that's fantastic. On the other end, I've got my
daughter, and I said, that's great for you, but to highlight
her level of autism, you know, she can't still wipe her own
bum. Yeah, I have to do that at the
age of five and the foreseeable future.
I'm going to be doing that for a couple of years.
Yeah. OK.
And that was like, this is the difference that a lot of parents
will have to deal with. OK.
Most people understood that. Yeah.
And a lot of people can relate to.
That and they understood your intent behind it.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, which is the important bit.
Again, we had an individual comment on there who doesn't
seem to be following any of the platforms.
That's usually the way it is because they don't know you so.
Yes, and they didn't have the context of it.
They don't know what the autism diet cares does and they just
went. I think that's really wrong that
you have asked permission of your daughter to even mention
that. I'm like, well you want me to
ask my permission of my non verbal global developmental
delay daughter whether I can talk about her?
Yeah. And it raises the question like,
you can't. So I mean, the babies are still
in that piece and have to have their.
So is there a point where the age comes in?
Yeah, absolutely should. Like if I said I had to wipe my
baby's arse, no one's going to go.
Did you ask the baby's permission?
Did. You ask the baby permission to
do. That to say that.
Again, it's like the same sort of individuals go we need more
advocacy. We need more people speaking
out. And this was an autistic person
that said this. Yeah, I.
Wasn't yeah, high functioning, Yeah.
They, they, they work in mental health, I believe.
So they're high functioning. They've got a job and everything
else like that. We're laughing because we know.
We know a bit more, but I tried not.
We're not gonna. We're not gonna definitely.
Look, it's not relevant, but we're kind of saying that you
want advocacy. And what the whole point of this
is that we went out there. We weren't the same as a lot of
a lot of kind of advocates before us who were doing
sterling work. We were just kind of two idiots
ago. Should we just talk about what
real life is like? Yeah, Yeah.
And not just the glossy rainbow part of it, but just actually
say sometimes it can be really difficult, especially it can be,
you know what, it can be fucking shit.
You can sit there like rocking in the car, not wanting to go
home. You can be desperate after being
sleep deprived. You can be kind of resentful.
Everything else, Like we, we talk about absolutely
everything. And that's why the community's
growing and that's why people go, do you know what?
I thought I was alone. I thought was the only person
experiencing this and I couldn't reach out to anybody.
Now we've got a community of you know what about 100 and 4000 and
50,000 people across the platforms which.
Is in less than a year, which is mental.
Which is great. Yeah.
And that's through actually saying it as it is.
Yeah. And sometimes having that dark
humour and going, do you know what, fuck it, if I don't laugh
at this, I'm going to cry. Yeah.
And then you get again in the same kind of post, people going,
well, that's typical of people like unit parents.
Or was it autism? Parents always somehow make it
about themselves. Yeah, Yeah.
That was it, yeah. And that was the the other one
you like. It's like, yeah, well, yeah,
yeah, because it's about our personal experiences as as this
is about the closing the fucking name Dickhead.
Yeah, yeah. Autism dad cast.
Yeah. It's, you know, we're going to
be talking about it from a dad's perspective.
I can't talk about it from a child's perspective, no.
And they can't have a podcast. So we're just trying to raise
awareness for all the parents and the children.
We talk about the difficulties the children have, but it's, do
you know what the most vocal, in fact, yeah, most of the most of
the grief we get is actually from not just the community,
from autistic people themselves who are in comparison
exceptionally high functioning adults.
And they give us a hard time because they they feel like
we're attacking them as autistic.
Yeah, because in some sort of weird way we're saying they're
not autistic enough. Maybe.
Yeah, I don't know if it's that at.
All. Yeah, maybe.
It's like, no, you know, what if if you are autistic,
neurodiverse, you know, it can be whatever.
And you've managed to kind of, I'm say, lead a very successful
life in the sense that maybe you can live in your own home
without additional support. You can hold down a job.
You can have a career, have relationships, have friendship
groups. Do you know what fucking well
done because I appreciate from a parent how difficult it is.
And I would give anything for Lydia to be able to go.
Do you know what, Lydia? Fast forward 21, she's, she's
maybe living in an apartment, she's holding down a job, she's
got friends. I'd I'd fucking give anything
for that. Yeah, she could jump.
In anything for that. She could jump into the comments
on a podcast and start, you know, expressing a feelings that
would be amazing. I would, I would love.
It Thomas can do that, yeah. I would love her to live the to
be able to live the life of that person there.
Yeah, it is. In no way are we saying there's
a clear divide. You're either profoundly
autistic or you're not. Or you're all right.
Or you're sound and. Life, you're not in the club at
all. Life isn't difficult for you?
Absolutely not. In fact, I think a lot of the
time that we, when we talk about it, especially where like Send
between is, for lack of a better term, we actually talk about how
much more difficult their lives are.
For the sympathy, you know, that's all we've said for the
last four months is like, we are fortunate in the sense of the
white paper because our children are profoundly autistic.
Yeah. So all we've really gone about
and talked about is like what happens to those kids that send
between us, the ones that are going to fall through the
cracks, the ones that are going to be forced into mainstream
school but are getting the. Correct.
Yeah, they're going to have assistance and health care.
Everything put into place to allow them to achieve their full
potential. And not only the kids, the
parents are having a harder time, so we've got it easier.
Well, the parents are having to go to tribunals, fight,
remortgage homes, everything else like that.
We, we literally could have gone.
Do you know what? Our kids are all right.
Fuck a lot of you. In really cold terms, we could
have done that. Yeah, we are.
Instead, we've gone. Do you know what?
We're a community. We all stick together.
That's why we can do this. Actually, is the only reason I
personally can do this podcast is because my child is so
autistic that he gets the support that he needs and I can
find the time to do this because I haven't got a fight at
tribunals. I haven't got a fight writing
emails and paperwork every night.
All the stuff that all these other parents are struggling to
do. I don't have to do that.
Have you asked Thomas if it's OK to say that he's that autistic?
And I'm not going to ask him because it's a clear it's.
A ridiculous comment. That's why we're not we're not
entertaining ridiculous comments anymore.
If you want to have a ridiculous comment, do you know what?
Go for it. But.
Yeah, I'm not. I mean this.
I mean this just because I can't respond to those comments, I
just cock because it's just pointless.
It's pointless what was dropping in all day.
I will read them because I I'm more than happy to read you I
think. We had another one going, a
classic, and it wasn't just aimed at us.
I think it was aimed at autism parents that have a platform
where they try and do good was something like, yeah, classic
autism parents trying to make money off their children.
As I make money, make money. Jesus we're still doing our 9 to
fives like. Yeah, I'm still working our
tits. Off.
We're still working. That's why we that's why this
podcast started at 5:30, because we had to wait till we both
finish work. Yeah, finish work.
Yeah, absolutely nuts. And again, it's it's like, do
you know what you've not even taken the time to research like
what we do watch the reels watch is going down to try and that
make a difference the the the amount of emails and and
messages that we responded to. Can you help with any HCP?
I'm going through a tribunal. What would you do in this
situation here? None of that you've just gone.
Oh, that's really offended me. Yeah, I must write a comment to
let everybody know how offended I am.
It's like, you know when someone says I'm going to leave a group
and like, well. Go on.
Go on then. Goodbye.
You don't need to make an announcement about it, just go
close the door behind you. But.
It's not going away. It's this kind of again, it's
this. I must let everybody know that
I'm offended. Yeah, no, like, again, if you're
offended, that's on you. Yeah.
And you know, if you are, you're, it may offend you.
And you've got every right to to to feel like that.
Absolutely. We're going to keep doing what
we're doing. Absolutely.
Everyone's got every right to be offended.
By all means, be offended. But it it's, it's navigating
into kind of everywhere. We had the other one.
We had another comment the other day which comes kind of from the
other side. We've had a few of those where
autism doesn't exist, it's just bad parenting.
Those are still. Yeah, they still come about.
We have one of those from a teacher.
Yes, we did have one of them from a teacher.
A mainstream school teacher who just said, I know what it's, I
know these kids, it doesn't exist.
It's just purely bad parenting and they're trying to label
their children. I was like, great, look forward
to you being trained. I just meant them, innit?
It's just the ignorance is just absolutely on another level.
And again, that's a teacher, that's one of these teachers
that's apparently going to get trained by by 20-30.
Yeah, it's unreal, mate. It's absolutely not.
So anything else? I don't think so.
I think it's good to be back. Yes, it's weird.
It feels like it's because all it's been is legislation for
ages. And I get that it's really
important to everybody, it's important to us.
But I just started to get a little bit swamped.
It's hardcore. Yeah, it's just a little.
Bit. It's I just want to talk to
parents and get some dads on and just talk parenting stuff and
experiences. It's just like.
This is well like for credit to Rachel because she is like.
In it. She's in.
It like Shawshank Redemption tunnelling through shit.
Yeah, constantly tunnelling through it with no idea where
it's going to end. Finding something else and
making everyone aware of it and it's like.
That's got to be, that's got to take a toll in it if we're we're
like this after what, since January?
Yeah, like we've not touched on it, I mean near as much as we.
Came back from the Christmas podcast, you know, doing the BBC
sort of stuff and came back and they were straight into this in
January. So what we've done like close to
four months of this or three, you know, 3-4 months of this.
Yeah, and yeah. So credit to anyone that's
living in this cause. Yeah.
Brutal. Yeah.
Of course we had to go. We had the Rachel and Haley on,
didn't we? No, Sorry.
Haley and Emil. Yeah.
Talking about it. Why?
God, we have. We've been.
Yeah. So I am going to be glad to see
the back of it. All right, mate.
I think that's it. I think that's it.
I think that's. It if we have a friend that you
please let us know, that'd be great to.
We'll read them. We won't reply.
Seriously. Like if anyone like just drop a
message, let us know because if we might, we might say
something. He's actually like, Oh yeah,
maybe that shouldn't have been said.
But feel free, let us know, and we might reply again.
Please join our Facebook, we've got a Facebook group as well If
discord's a bit like what? If not, join the discord, it's
free. If you want to go a level
deeper, we've got the stem and whistle where a couple of nights
a week we all meet up, video chat and just shoot the shit
with each other and laugh at each other at how shit our weeks
have been with our children. Yeah, and sometimes we don't
even talk about our children. Which sometimes we don't.
Sometimes we don't. Sometimes there was once.
Conspiracy theories as well. Conspiracy theory night, which I
missed. Actually I was quite as deep.
I was gutted about that. That was deep.
I was going to get a tinfoil hat out.
Yeah, yeah. Flat, by the way.
But was it? Was it Emma that was apparently
a completely blown away? She was like, what?
And what's really nice is we're building relationships with all
these people, these parents. Yeah.
Like we're chatting to people every week.
It's it's good. It's good fun.
You just get to know them and their lives and their.
Kids, corporate wise, we've got a LinkedIn page, yeah as well.
So if you are on LinkedIn, have a quick look on there, let us
know. But yeah, I think, I think
that's literally everything. Actually give us a follow on
YouTube. Oh God, we've got 100 and
however many 140,000 cumulative followers across all platforms.
We've got about 2200 people following us on YouTube.
If you would like us to be able to make some money just saying
YouTube is the place to go, give us follow on there.
That would be absolutely amazing.
It costs you nothing. You can even turn off the
notifications if you don't get bothered.
This is good on YouTube is I think a couple of the dads
mentioned it to us. There's a hype button for what
hype? If you're watching a video, I
think something like you, you've given 2000 points, for instance,
every YouTube account and every month you can just hype a show
or a video or a creator that you're following and it pushes
their video up in the ranking so more people find it.
It cost you nothing to do, and you can do it to any creator
that you follow. But it'd be nice if we did it to
us. Go and do that.
Go and click. Because when we look at the
Spotify charts, or is no, it's the Apple podcast charts, we
always laugh because we're like, oh, you're ranked #4 in the UK
for parenting or you're ranked #1.
In the PowerPoint, no. No, they don't pay anything, but
it's nice to know that. Oh my God, On Apple, we're doing
really well. On Spotify, yeah, we're doing
really well. But then on YouTube, you're
like, come on, guys, give us a help out.
If you, if you go on YouTube, you know, watch, watch our
videos, like it, put a comment in there, share it, whatever you
want to do and it would just mean so much.
To us, and if it feels like a pain in the ass because you're
worried like, oh, follow it, I'm going to get all these
notifications. Just turn the notifications off
if if you don't want to be bothered by any of that shit.
But honestly, if you do want to give us a Chuck in any way to
help us pay for trains or just, hey, if you want to try and help
us not have to do 9 to 5 jobs, this is the way to do it.
Yeah, just give us a follow everywhere if you can, because
it would be very much appreciated.
We do this. I mean, we'd enjoy doing it, but
if, if, if it means anything to you at all, us doing these
podcasts, just go on those platforms and just give us some
love. Very much appreciated.
Obviously, ideally I would love nothing more than to do this
full time. Oh my God, I would love to do
this full time. Just advocating for your kids.
Just. Offending more people 24/7.
Offending people all the time now seriously, if you could
like, imagine if you could make a living advocating for disabled
kids like. Do you know it'd be it'd be
fantastic. And what I'd love to do as well
this year is. Set up a charity.
It'd be so many different things, but what I'd love to do
this year is also we've got a good following in America,
Australia, UAE is is kind of maybe have a dad come on from
those different regions go, this is how it works over here and we
can go, Oh my God, it's so different in America to, to kind
of mainland Europe to UAE. And just get a bit of an
overview of that as well, because we all go through the
same struggles, but how it's handled and derisate process,
yeah, in those countries is obviously different to over
here. So it's good to get an
understanding. And it's, you kind of see
comments sometimes where people, we all think it's like
everything's fucking terrible. Yeah.
And it's better in certain countries, like Australia, for
example. Australia might have some things
really good, but then they look at something we have and go,
wow, that's brilliant, that's amazing.
And we're like, what really. We've got something that's good.
Yeah, we did. That so sort of UAE was like, Oh
my God, that's so different there.
But then again, a lot of it, you've got to put your hand in
your pocket and you go, oh, OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It does you up a little bit. Yeah.
Yeah, it's it's not cheap. Yeah, but all right, mate.
Well, thank you very much. Glad to have you back.
I say that like you've been away.
So like, you've literally just missed one.
Episode I missed one episode, yeah.
But yeah, we'll get back into the swing of it, guys.
Anything you want us to talk about in the next episode?
Chuck's a message. We'll have a look at it because
there's probably loads of stuff we still haven't touched on.
Yeah, absolutely. All right.
Thanks guys. Love you loads.
Take care, bye bye.