Model Minority Moms

Providing better for our children than we had is a no-brainer. But how much is too much when it comes to the endless types of activities we can sign up for? How much of our intention to provide exposure and opportunities is more of a projection of our own insecurities? Are we talking about T-Ball or are we talking about trauma? And what’s even the point of all of these activities? All that juice a...

If you were an overachieving child/ young adult, does it ever leave you entirely? What are the costs (and benefits) of being a perpetual overachiever? Do we secretly want our kids to overachieve though we're trying our best to present a chill demeanor? We bring the honest talk at a live recording at our beloved alma mater and poster child of overachievement, Harvard.

Ok, we are going there. You’re a working mom who is highly competent, driven, ambitious, well-credentialed and… you’re going to switch to a more flexible, lower-intensity career? Whaaat? It's a common and significant shift among many moms we know, but glossed over with shrugs, shame and a little chip on the shoulder. In MMM style, we unpack all the feelings around choosing to downshift your ca...

Language is loaded. Preserving our mother tongue with ourselves and the decision (and labor!) of passing it down to our children is super complicated. We talk about what it means to feel like a “cultural orphan,” our aspirations for our kids when we were first pregnant, and the honest reality of how it’s going. 

How do we actually know if a school is a “good” school for our kids? How do we actually get a spot? (spoiler: banana bread yields mixed results). How to manage transitions from a situation you and your kids know to something that is new?  What if we feel like we made a mistake moving our kids to the new school at the first dropoff :( Here are the real stories and the real feels behind the happy fi...

So yeeeah… we were talking and we are back together. Nope, not with our exes, with our show.  Why we disbanded, why we came back, and unpacking how restarting a thing is twisted in the fear of failure. Plus, a live recording opportunity in October!

Yep, you read that right. After publishing nearly 70 episodes over the last 2 years, we are wrapping up our show with one final episode. Tune in to hear how we came to this decision and our parting words to our dear listeners. The show is ending but you can still keep track of us. Feel free to follow us at: Jeanette: Instagram @acanary0 and website https://acanary.com Susan: Instagram @susanlieu a...

Monosyllabic answers. Slammed doors. Huge messes. No, we're not talking about toddlers. We are talking about the other "t" word... teenagers. Believe it or not, like it or not, our chubby little angels will turn into angsty, horny, grumpy teenagers one day. We talk to Dr. Emily Kline, author of "The School of Hard Talks: How to Have Real Conversations with your (Almost Grown) Kids," about an impor...

Are there any vacations any more post-kids? Or are there only trips now - a thing you do where you're not in your own home, where you don't have all the things that you've bought to make life a little easier, where your kids will sleep and eat less well? Do you need a vacation from your vacation? In this episode, Kate, Susan and Jeanette talk about the mindset shifts that have helped us enjoy 'vac...

Do you miss those days when you could breeze into the airport 45 minutes prior to departure in your Uber and carry-on-only luggage? With diapers, pack n plays, strollers, wagons and more traveling with kids is different now, to say the least. In this episode, we share our learnings and tips of making traveling with kids a little less stressful (with the usual healthy dose of humor and occasional f...

Some of us may have heard about the au pair program, considered it or even participated as a host family. Is it a Mary-Poppins-dream-come-true or is the reality having a foreign teenager live in your house, driving your car and not being of much help? Susan, Jeanette and Kate bring our honest perspectives of participating in the au pair program as well as channeling some of the anonymous au pair s...

Elimination communication. Child-led toileting. Pullups. Incentives. Potty training books. Pee everywhere. Poop smeared on walls. Kid and parent meltdown. What are the visions floating around in your head when you think of potty training? As Susan approaches potty training time, Jeanette and Kate talk through their experiences (the good and the fails) and give a real-life perspective on potty trai...

What our parents expect of us in their retirement is one thing. What we expect of our kids in our own retirement is another... or is it? In the second part of this episode, we ponder what we expect of our kids in our own retirement. Financial help? Emotional companionship? Occasional Popeye chicken drop-off at an aging hippie commune? (ok that last part only applies to Susan). Join us as we take a...

It's one of the main markers of Asian filial piety - supporting your parents in their old age. Except historically, women shouldered most of that burden and were also shut out from working outside the home. Except historically, very few people lived for years and decades with severe chronic illnesses. Except historically, no one had much of a choice. And except historically, we were expected to ex...

This was our Episode #18 from Christmas last year that was a surprise hit. We recorded it on a lark and it ended up being one of the most popular episodes of 2021. Reposting it for the enjoyment of fans new and old! Having kids brings a whole slew of questions, stresses, and joys around the end of year holidays. What do you actually believe in (Santa, Jesus, Buddha, any others???) and want to tell...

A lot of listeners have asked us about our mental health journeys - what prompted us to seek mental therapy, how we dealt with the stigma of seeking therapy, how we found a therapist that was a good fit. In this next episode of FOR REAL THO, we answer one listener's question about our mental health journeys, how we think it's helped us and our thoughts on finding the right one for you.

We are SO excited to introduce a new series of episodes called FOR REAL THO where we discuss questions and topics that our listeners have submitted to us through our website. We will periodically release these short episodes where we give you our straight-talk about what we think about your question. Have a question of your own? Submit it through our website modelminoritymoms.com. Our first FOR RE...

There's a lot of talk today amongst millennials about cutting ties with the people who hurt you, bring you down, disagree with you - our show wades into that territory quite often as well. And while that route might be the wiser one at times, the fact is that we will have disagreements at some point with almost everyone in our lives and we can't cut ties with all of them. Not only will that hurt u...

It will happen to almost everyone. One day, you will react to your kids' behavior in a way that you aren't proud of. What does that look like and how do you handle the aftermath? Well, it probably is heavily influenced by how your parents dealt with (or didn't deal with) the ruptures in your relationship with them. We started this episode intending to just have a frank conversation about dealing w...

Fighting over toys/parental attention/who gets to talk/who picks the next song or TV show. Crying over mean words and hurts, real and perceived. Competition with your sibling to be the smarter/cuter/funnier/stronger/more interesting one. On the other hand, we melt when our offspring get along with each other. Welcome to the world of parenting siblings!!! 

When you have your first kid, your discretionary time goes from 100 pre-kid to 50. When you have a second, it goes from 50 to 5 (but it feels like -50). When the options go from "do you want to take our kid or go for a run?" to "do you want to take our 2 year old to sing-along or watch our infant?", the challenges of life (and sanity) management increase to a whole new level. Join Kate, Susan and...

We're only half-kidding. There's no actual PhD in infant feeding that you can get (that we are aware of). But after having learned about the intricacies of latches, lip ties, tongue ties, lipase, craniosacral therapy, breast milk banks, pumps, flanges, let-down, expression, just to name a few topics in infant feeding... don't you think we deserve at least a master's degree? :) Send this episode to...

'Nap when your baby is napping' they say to exhausted moms... but what if this is your second baby and you have a toddler running around 24x7? What if your baby is sleeping fine but your toddler is suddenly experiencing a sleep 'regression'? Or God help you if both of your children are waking up multiple times a night.  With Kate five months into being a mom of two, we re-visit the sleep ques...

Thinking about having a second kid? Or already have more than one? (or you have none but just curious?) A newly minted mom-of-two, Kate shares how her experience with her second baby has been so different from the first... and how a lot of common advice for transitioning to life with two children just hasn't worked thus far :( Take it as inspiration, birth control, commiseration -- these stories a...

In the final episode of our food series, we try to get to the bottom of this question: Why does 'fusion' food make us so mad? Is it because it's bad? Is it because it's ignorant? Not authentic? Not respectful? Is it ever good? Isn't all food fusion anyway?? Susan, Kate and Jeanette have a frank conversation about why 'fusion' food provokes so many strong feelings.