Hi, friends! Happy Monday💛

As Caitlin prepares to to welcome their new little human into the world, we are sending you a little signing off episode with a found poem that emerged from all of the conversations we've gathered since we kicked this thing off last year.

Thank you for being along for the ride!

A Scratch That Poem

*Note: Every line from this poem is linked to the Scratch That episode from which it originally sprouted.

Hello, little butterbean, Sweet silly goose. little anxious heart. Dear listener, the freaks, other weirdos my sister Laura

Come sit with me. 

we can't believe you're here 

your presence feels like a miraculous little sparkle lighting up the dark sky.

What I hear us talking about is

becoming was a pretty disorienting, lonely experience.

Like we were gonna be lawyers and doctors and like be wearing suits or something. 

I have literally gashed the control panel of the passenger side door out with my wheelchair as I transferred in and out of this car for the last 15 years. And if anybody sits in the passenger seat, it does look like I'm trying to kidnap them

oh, this is, this is very different than I thought what almost 40 was gonna look like. 

I doubt myself all the time

I shrunk from the eye of the storm 

I don't know what the hell I'm doing.

oh, dear Lord. 

I am so quick to feel like, oh, you are ruining this. And if you could just get it right 

We were at the pool. I didn't bring a towel. I didn't bring a towel to the pool. Can we use your towels? Oh, my God. Like, what. What is that? 

the moment when you show up and you feel like the child in a room full of adults.

this little duck that looks really peaceful on top of the water, but underneath, I'm just paddling, like, furiously. 

and I couldn't let anyone know it

This is the dirty secret. And nobody can know that, actually, I'm like, I shouldn't be doing this, and I need to keep pretending like I can.

the failure of not matching 

when we immediately think like, oh, I should know

what the fuck is that?

It was like grief. It was shame.

it is feeling like a lot of doing and grasping and, like, white knuckling. 

I can never stop working relentlessly and fearfully to get it right, get it right, get it right.

nose to the grindstone

I don't think I'm capable of feeling easy breezy 

It feels all tangled and kind of ugly.

Tell me if I'm wrong. Did others feel this way? 

As I'm understanding it right now in the very middle of it

Yep.

I'm raising my hand here, 

Was everyone just pretending to be okay, or was I broken?

oh, no. No. No. No.

I just don't buy it. 

There was also this

There was a way that you were trying to help yourself survive even in that fumbling

I'm holding myself together with harshness and rigidity and why I oughta.

oh, the speed and rush and flurry and chaos and check, check, check. Because so many times it felt like my body was not mine. 

oh, like I'm actually in much more pain than I'm letting myself admit. 

and and how do we, like, not keep our bodies rigid 

What if your most important job was to notice, to witness breath, tears, goosebumps, heartbeats? Look! 

just, like, stop to look at a trail of ants in a sidewalk crack. 

Listen to the gasp from the back seat at the sight of a sunrise. Mama, take a picture. 

oh, there's my breath. Oh, there I am in there. 

You feel it, right?

Yes, dear Lord I have goosebumps up to my cheeks

Mhmm. I mean, you know it in your body probably.

One breath at a time. 

watch me Breathe in and out.

a lot of us out here don't match the pictures we've been given

I don't see through your eyes, you don't see through my eyes. We're all seeing things differently. 

We are learning 

we are recalibrating

in flux 

reorienting, and it is dizzying. 

The hints come in little bread crumbs, and I think you can trust it.

horses don't have an ability to lie to humans

grab the reins and trust that gut feeling

That is the thing we have control over, trying to show up, trying to show up again. We don't have control over the outcome.

It is all going to happen. 

One day at a time, baby.

it will be glorious and unbearable

And yes, it was funny because we made it so.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. 

we can use goals as playgrounds. 

The timelines that are presented to us are so narrow. And that is not what life is like. It's just not. 

Julia Child didn't start cooking until she was 45 or whatever.

Yes. Yes. Oh my gosh. Now I'm going yes. 

like, paying attention to what is alive in you. 

You can just shift the question.

What are the things you're moving towards versus just what you're going against?

how can you rearrange what's in the box? 

what is it that you're resisting in yourself? 

what are we to do but imagine better futures?

this off script, kind of like, scrappy, build it yourself way, I'm like, oh, yeah, 

Like, we can just start asking different questions

That's freaking sick, bro.

That's freaking metal.

I think a new answer is emerging in me and I don't know what it is yet. 

but I do know that my body responded 

I'm paying attention to how my body feels right now.

my heart has not stopped pounding

so many tears coming up 

I feel like this tingling of excitement

my face is already hurting from all the smiling

And, also 

right now, I'm just like a hot jellyfish mess. You know? 

It's, like, so uncomfortable and hard to let things be messy

And I think it has been messier than I expected, but

But that messy middle was so important. 

grappling with the real limitations of my body. 

Wouldn't it be lovely, if you could grow wings and fly? 

Of course there's grief. There's loss. 

but two things can be true at the same time. 

The pain and the beauty, they're usually, like, intertwined and pushed right up next to each other.

Notice the strength and the toll. There is so much pain and fear and loss bleeding across this planet. Notice the question, how are we still breathing? 

Notice the blooms of survival.

It is what happens in between you and the person across from you and in that space, the divine comes in. However you think of the divine

Like, this is beautiful and complicated. This is the juicy part. This is the rough part.

you are a speck of spectacular dust here for one quick gasp of holy shit, I'm here.

oh, yeah. It's probably supposed to be strange because it's inherently a weird thing

to change and evolve and grow

you will always be you, you will never stop changing. 

It is so strange to put a part of yourself into the world 

This little pocket of conversation that we're having

this time capsule.

this one peak into one moment of time. 

Holy shit we just circled so many different things.

And did we land at exactly the place that we started? Maybe.

So thank you for being here.

and thank you. Thank you for this.

thank you for giving me this space

thank you for staying in the exploration

Thank you for digging in and winding through this path with us. 

I have so many more questions

Mentioned In This Episode:

Our collaborative Scratch That Spotify playlist "Songs That Have Held Us"

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Are there moments from the last year of episodes that you would add to a Scratch That poem?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Tatum Tricarico embodies a set of identities we don't always see together – she is a proud Disabled person, a Queer woman of faith, and a recent graduate from divinity school on her way to becoming a pastor. Tatum knows, first-hand, a lot of the wounds disabled and queer people have felt inside religious communities, and she's here to offer all of us – the ones on the outside and inside – new scripts for understanding the divine.

Check out Tatum's forthcoming book, Blessed Is the Body, a reflection on disability justice, the holiness of inclusion and acceptance, disabled leadership, the finitude of our bodies, and allowing space for lament and acceptance. Whether you grew up hearing your body is sinful or haven't read a page of the Bible, this episode offers us a tender reframe on how we could think about our bodies and what needs (or doesn't need) fixing.

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

⛪️ Tatum's early experiences with disability, queerness, and religion.

🧳 What it feels like to Tatum to embody a (disabled, queer, religious) role full of tension and contradiction.

🐧 Finding God in the "in between" spaces, like penguins.

🍃 Why Tatum had to let go of who she thought God was.

🏳️‍🌈 What Tatum thinks religious communities are missing out on when they exclude people.

👩‍🦯‍➡️ The yuck history of churches fighting to be excluded from the Americans with Disabilities Act.

💌 Tatum's decision to stay in the church, even as she continues to think creatively about God.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Find Tatum on Instagram @blind_person_in_area

Pre-Order her book from Herald Press or Amazon

Tatum's addition to the Scratch That Spotify playlist of songs that have held us – "Sight" by Sleeping At Last

Nancy Eiesland's book The Disabled God: Toward a Liberatory Theology of Disability

Amy Kenny 's book My Body is Not a Prayer Request: Disability Justice in the Church

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Do you relate to any of the experience Rebekah and Tatum shared in this episode? Have you revised any scripts around what is holy or divine?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

If you've listened to this podcast for three minutes, you know that we are big-time, long-time fans of author/illustrator Tyler Feder (Bodies Are Cool, Are You Mad At Me?, and Dancing At the Pity Party: A Dead Mom Graphic Memoir). Tyler has a unique ability of finding the simplest, sturdiest revision to break open the one-dimensional world in which we often live. Today, we talk with her about how she came to rewrite scripts around bodies and grief. (And! We get a sneak peek at a future script she might like to dismantle and rewrite.) We are still basking in the glow of this conversation✨

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

🫀 How Tyler ended up writing the picture book that all of us needed.

💀 The weird similarities in the ways people respond to disability and death.

🎭 How Tyler became the kind of person who can hold onto grief and laughter at the same time.

😬 The weird things people said around Tyler after her mom died and a peek at alternate scripts.

⏳ A cultural script Tyler would like to revise.

🎀 The 3 questions Rebekah's kid really wanted to ask Tyler, and her answers.

🕺 A dash of Myers Briggs/Enneagram chitter-chatter.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Tyler's books Bodies Are Cool, Are You Mad At Me?, and Dancing At the Pity Party: A Dead Mom Graphic Memoir

Tyler's addition to the Scratch That Spotify playlist of songs that have held us – "Kind of Girl" by MUNA

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! 

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Barry Lee's art is beautiful without being precious, whimsical but sturdy, absurd and deeply relatable, disrupts traditional beauty standards and is absolutely stunning. As a disabled and non-binary artist, they offer us a bright and playful world with a warmest, gentlest gut-punch. There was SO MUCH we wanted to talk with them about. Like when did Barry learn to separate from their body? How are they finding their way back? And what does art have to do with any of it? The conversation that unspooled spanned from early medical trauma to the curious things our grad school professors said that shaped our life arcs to an exploration of what we're moving toward today. They gave us so much to think about💛

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

🩺 How Barry learned early that their disabled body didn't belong to them.

📓 The artifact from the past Barry's mom gave them that prompted a turn toward embodiment.

😷 The near-death experience that taught Barry to trust their body.

🗓️ Why Barry likes the word practice to describe learning to be in their body.

💌 The entirely unique and expansive way that Barry defines accessibility.

✨ Invitations from disability and gender to dismantle.

🌱 Exploring what we are FOR (as opposed to simply against).

📦 Thinking outside of the box versus rearranging what's inside the box.

⚡️ Getting comfortable with being unpalatable.

🧳 Removing the shame that so often rests on top of suffering.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Gentle Reminders Journal: A Deep, Loving Guide to Help You Show Up for Yourself & Others

Barry's Instagram, Substack Portal Hopping, and website!

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Do you share this history of disembodiment? How did/are you finding your way back?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Have you gone through a big life change that has left you feeling disconnected from yourself? Maybe it's becoming a parent? Or a new illness/diagnosis? Maybe it's a new job or moving to a new city? It's so easy for us to lose ourselves when we confront these kinds of personal shifts, let alone all the great wide forces in the world. It's easy to get lost with new restrictions on time, easy to be flattened by survival mode, easy to go limp when we feel powerless. In this episode we ask – How can we get underneath what was serving us before to reimagine a new shape for now? What was fulfilling us before, and what accommodations do we need meet those needs in a new landscape?

Tune In to Hear Up Talk About:

🌶️ Caitlin's spicy hot-take soap box.

🕯️ How Caitlin layered & modified their pre-parenting practices after Charlie arrived.

🚚 How to decipher what to salvage and what to let go of.

🌱 When it's not just your circumstances, but YOU are the one changing.

⏰ How the restrictions of time and money complicate things.

🌎 All the big-picture, cultural forces that keep us from creating.

📝 Letting go of what any of this is supposed to look like, and writing scripts for ourselves that make us feel alive.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

The New One by Mike Birbiglia and J. Hope Stein

Our Scratch That episode "Getting Of the Conveyer Belt of Production with Maria Bowler"

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Have you gone through a big life change that has left you feeling disconnected from yourself? Like your lost or something is missing?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Is seeing yourself through the eyes of others your default setting? Are you highly attuned to the ways you're perceived? Same, baby. Same! In this episode, Caitlin tells us about the practice of self-portraiture as a tool for generating self-reflection/care/awareness/compassion for ourselves. There are plenty of reasons people resist this kind of witnessing, but, as we talk about here, it might also be a powerful way to take care of our micro and macro communities.

Tune In to Hear Up Talk About:

👀 Perceiving ourselves versus perceiving ourselves being perceived.

⁉️ The workshop moment Rebekah realized some people move through world wholly unaware of how others perceive them. (What?!)

🚫 Reasons people resist or feel hesitant to "self-gaze."

🪩 A broad set of mediums we can use to create space for "self gaze."

⏳ The value of "being with yourself in it" versus the final product.

😭 Caitlin's reflection on the moment when they took their first self-portrait ™️.

📷 What Rebekah told a recently disabled college student about self-acceptance.

✨ The counter-intuitive collective result of our "navel gazing."

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

John Berger's Ways of Seeing

Our episode with Kate Bingaman Burt when she talks about her daily drawing practice (including the time she illustrated her credit card bills every month).

Our episode with Cody Cook-Parrott where they talk about their year of daily dance videos.

Rebekah's Instagram live chat with Kelle and Lainey Hampton

Andrea Gibson's poem "Tincture" that ends with the line "Tell us again about goosebumps./Tell us again about pain."

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Have you practiced any kind of self-portraiture? Tell us about it!

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

It's true! Can you believe it? We've been sending these conversations out into the world and through your speakers for a year now! Today we take a beat to reflect on the experience, pulling out steady threads and big-takeaways. We play a few clips that we're still thinking about and lift the lid on the noise, pressures, and messy insecurities we've bumped into while making this project. There are many big and genuine thank yous, as well as a little peek at some Scratch That changes ahead. Thank you for being here with us!!💛

Mentioned In This Episode:

"Getting Off the Conveyer Belt of Production with Maria Bowler"

Maria Bowler's book Making Time: A New Vision for Crafting a Life Beyond Productivity

Rebekah's Substack This Too

"Flipping the Script on Disability with Lucy & James Catchpole"

"The Hilarious & Heartbreaking with Hannah & Shane Burcaw"

"What Paradigms Are We Building? Part 2 with Abbie VanMeter"

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! 

🍎 Apple
🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Kate Bingaman Burt is so many things – illustrator, educator, parent, head of the Graphic Design program at Portland State University, and founder of the coolest risograph printing press and studio, Outlet PDX. She's also been drawing every day since 2006. Today we ask her how she melds these worlds together. How did becoming a parent affect her identity as an artist? How does her art practice shape her parenting? And how does she balance alllll the roles and tasks? Whether you're a parent, an artist, or none of the above, this conversation has some wisdom for you. Caitlin is listening on a loop.

Tune in to hear us talk about:

🧶 The legacy of creativity Kate grew up in.

💐 The moment in a small-town Missouri flower shop when Kate realized she could earn money making things with her hands.

📊 When our kids don't seem interested in the things we value so highly.

🚦 How Kate uses rules, limitations, and restrictions to generate creative momentum.

🫟 Diving into the process without the pressure for an amazing product.

❌ What to do with that helpless feeling that we're damaging our kids with our own stuff.

〰️ Making space for looking back and connecting the dots.

👻 Tuning in to the voice that compels us to make things without worrying if it's important enough.

🔍 Kate's advice for avoiding burnout.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Kate's TEDTalk "Rules of Engagement"

The Ten Rules from Corita Kent. The Rules mentioned into today's episode include #8 – "Don't try to create and analyze at the same time. They're different processes, and #9 – "Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It's lighter than you think."

Kate's addition to the Scratch That Spotify playlist of songs that have held us – Paul Simon's "Rene and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War."

For more of Kate in your life, head to her website!

Babies Caitlin and Kate at a workshop Kate hosted in Portland.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What stood out to you about our conversation with Kate? Anything you're tucking away or still chewing on?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Do you ever feel like you're doing it wrong? Like everyone else has it figured out, and you're the only one flailing? Today we open the can of worms that wriggle around when we compare ourselves to the ones around us. Why are we so good at noticing our own lack, but not our abundance? What do we miss out on when we strive to match instead of living our unique values out loud? What do we do when we are grieving the very thing our friend has? Today we dive into the complexity and offer a few breadcrumbs for navigating this gnarly terrain.

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

🙃 The moments of comparison that make Rebekah like a child among the grownups.

🫟 When the thing you're good at doesn't always look shiny or tidy.

🌤️ Learning to notice where we have abundance in addition to noticing the strain.

🌓 Rebekah grieving not having another kid while Caitlin prepares to welcome theirs.

♿️ How disability can make it taboo to express jealousy/grief for what you don't have.

❓ The guiding question to sort the comparison feelings – What is this actually about?

🤝 What makes it tricky and useful to share when we feel the pang of comparison.

🎨 Letting the both/and of our lives, co-exist side-by-side as a creative script building project.

📬 Less matching for the sake of it and more living our values out loud as a flag to find our people.

Mentioned In This Episode:

The episode we had with Emma Parker about infertility and miscarriage.

The episode when each of us wonders if we will have a second kid.

Our conversation with Amelia Hruby about social media.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Does your brain get stuck in comparison mode? How do you navigate feeling inferior to or envious of the people in your orbit? What are your tools? What are your angsts?

🍎 Apple
🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

As Caitlin prepares Charlie to welcome a sibling into the family, we delve into a swirly conversation about these complicated relationships. How much, if any, control do parents have over siblings relationships? What can parents do (or not do) to foster positive, long lasting relationship between their kids? How did our sibling relationships shape us? And how does that history inform the way we think about siblings relationships now?

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

🧭 What drives Caitlin's intentionality in guiding Charlie through the transition of becoming a sibling.

🌈 How Caitlin's experience being the "rainbow baby" shaped siblings dynamics in their family.

📖 Learning to be conscious of the stories we put onto our kids.

🤝 One skill we think is mandatory to maintain sibling relationships over the long haul.

🍄 Disrupting our assigned roles within a family ecosystem.

🌱 Practicing seeing each other anew, over and over again.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Nine Months: Before a Baby Is Born written by Miranda Paul and illustrated by Jason Chin

When Aidan Became a Brother written by Kyle Lukoff and illustrated by Kaylani Juanita

What Makes a Baby written by Cory Silverberg and illustrated by Fiona Smyth

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! How have your sibling relationships evolved over your life? What role did you play in your family of origin? How are you thinking about the relationships between your kids? And do you have anyone in your life you'd like to try to see anew?

🍎 Apple
🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Do you get heart palpitations just thinking about planning a kids' birthday party? Or wish all your days didn't just blur into a big bowl of mush? Today we take a careful and curious look at how we mark moments, big and small. How can we do this with a little more intention and a little less stress??

Tune In to Hear Up Talk About:

🍋 The inexpensive and spectacular ways Caitlin's mom marked a moment, large or small.

🕯️ Elevating a mundane moment through attention to sensory detail.

🧶 Why Rebekah still remembers the first day of kindergarten.

🎊 The many many ways paper chains have marked moments in Caitlin's life.

✨ Shifting from the big & expensive to the tiny, doable, and affordable.

🛒 The celebratory groceries practice Caitlin & Andrew share.

🤡 What makes planning kids' birthday parties so freaking stressful.

📝 Breaking the script on rehearsed moment to create novelty .

🏔️ Putting more energy into creating peak moments and less on fixing everyday grumbles.

🗓️ Marking moments as a way of making sure you remember your own life.

🍼 The REAL reason Caitlin is having a baby shower.

The sensory birthday party Caitlin talked about.

Breakfast in bed on Rebekah's 4th birthday, a smiley face made out of powdered donuts and sausage links.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

If you would like to support Kate Weiners in the aftermath of the fire that damaged her bookstore, Monstera's Plants, you can purchase a gift cared here. They are working very hard to re-open and could use some help in the meantime!

And if you missed our episode with Kate, listen to our conversation here.

The Power of Moments by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker

Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! How do you think about Caitlin's ideas of "romanticizing" your life or "memorializing" a life before it ends? What ways have you found to make a moment, large or small, more meaningful? What do you think makes this work hard?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Y'ALL. Today is the day! We bring you our chat with writer, artist, dancer, quilter, human, our favorite buddy, and the one-and-only – Cody Cook Parrot!! From the ways they're learning to reparent themselves around money and the discomfort they feel in class jumping to the buoy they feel in trans love and weirdo community, Cody meets us with open-hearted transparency and LOL warmth.

For more of Cody in your life, check out their website – this is where you can find their books, learn more about their podcast, sign up for their newsletter, or enroll in one of their classes.

And don't forget to pre-order their upcoming book! The Practice of Attention Cultivating Presence in a Distracted World

We're excited to share this one with you☀️

Tune in to hear us talk about:

🗒️ Cody's very first ritual practice.

🤸‍♀️ One way that Cody makes personal practice playful instead of punitive.

🫁 The 3 things Cody has been doing consistently for the longest.

💰 How reparenting is becoming a useful tool when little 9 year old Cody is sabotaging adult Cody's financial goals.

🧑‍🧑‍🧒 Linking reparenting with Internal Family Systems.

🏳️‍⚧️ The trans love and weirdo community that buoys Cody.

✌️ The words Cody's mentor said to them that helped them delete Instagram years later.

🎲 Taking the leap that aligns with our values before we know the outcome.

📖 Writing the book we needed.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Cody's very first podcast Have Company

The book that invited Cody into their first personal practice – The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

Cody's money coach Hadassah Damien and their program "Ride Free Fearless Money"

Cody's book How to Not Always Be Working

Caitlin's book Feel Something Make Something

Our episode with Amelia Hruby about leaving social media

Pre-Order Cody's new book, The Practice of Attention Cultivating Presence in a Distracted World

Cody's addition to the Scratch That Spotify playlist of songs that have held us – Joan Armatrading "Down To Zero"

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What question do you think prospective parents should be asking? What questions do you have about parenting? Or what questions do you wish you'd asked before you became one?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

On today's episode, we dive into our postpartum experiences, piecing together in hindsight what happened and why. Caitlin offers the plans they're building to set themselves up for sturdy support this time around. The stories we share are tender, the reflections wobbly, and the plans hopeful.

Tune In to Hear Us Talk About:

🩺 The overwhelming lack of medical curiosity or understanding about PPD and menopause.

🕯️ When Caitlin realized they had capital P – Postpartum depression.

🚫 The horrible experience Caitlin had when they tried to reach out for medical support.

♿️ The roles disability and ableism played in Rebekah's postpartum experience.

❌ A few reasons it can be difficult to tell anyone about your PPD symptoms.

🤝 What is Caitlin doing differently with this pregnancy to prepare for Postpartum?

🛒 The very practical, tangible, helpful thing Caitlin's sister is doing to build in supports for this postpartum stretch.

🧑‍🧑‍🧒‍🧒 The broad number of people who can experience PPD beyond a birthing parent.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What were your experiences around postpartum? And what help have you received or offered during postpartum that felt especially helpful?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Today on Scratch That we are the ones being interviewed! Caitlin's wise and warm BFF, Kaplan Trudo is wading into the process of deciding whether or not to pursue becoming a parent and wants to hear from us. How did we decide we wanted to become parents? What does it feel like to co-parent with another person? They dig in with questions we never thought to ask before becoming parents ourselves.

Want more of Kaplan? You can find their writing and some yoga practices (recorded as love notes to Caitlin 🥹) on Patreon or follow their Instagram.

Tune in to hear us talk about:

🔍 What becoming parents showed us about our partners and how it shifted our relationships.

✅ The one thing Rebekah wishes she'd thought more about before becoming a parent.

🕸️ Parenting as a big group project.

🧑‍🧒‍🧒 Caitlin's epiphany about their relationship with their partner as the third client in the therapy room.

🏆 A reframe for the parent who really, really wants to "get it right."

👴 Staying connected to our children/parents as we all get older.

🎮 What happens when our values don't align with our co-parents?

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Our conversation with Shane and Hannah Burcaw where they describe their thoughts on intergenerational living.

Our conversation with Kate Wieners where she talks about using percentage ratings for how important something is to each partner.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What question do you think prospective parents should be asking? What questions do you have about parenting? Or what questions do you wish you'd asked before you became one?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

We gave ourselves a homework assignment – huddle up with our partners and our kids and write a little family manifesto. How simple! How fun! How sweet! LOL. Turns out it might be a bit trickier than our rosy idealism pictured. Today, we share the ragged and the spectacular parts of the experience, offer up the manifestos we made, and brainstorm what we want to try next time.

Tune In to Hear Up Talk About:

🌟 The stakes of manifesto writing that tripped us up from the start.

🔍 What the process of this project revealed to us about ourselves and our families.

🎵 The part of the creation process when Rebekah's family really got on board.

📜 Manifestos as a living breathing document.

🧠 A juicy brainstorm of different manifesto mediums to try.

📋 Caitlin's mini workshop on the purpose of a manifesto and how to approach making one.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Listen to Rebekah's family's manifesto here.

Our conversation with S. Bear Bergman

And his book – Special Topics in Being a Parent: A Queer and Tender Guide to Things I've Learned About Parenting, Mostly the Hard Way

Caitlin always recommends using Lisa Congdon's Values Deck to kick off a manifesto draft.

The manifesto workbook Caitlin uses in their workshops (attached below!)

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What questions do you have about manifesto writing? What sounds daunting or exciting about them? If you end up trying this, let us know how it goes! Ragged, spectacular, or anything in between – all parts are welcome.

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

This episode is a happy goodbye to all the good parenting goals we are sending off to sea. There is only so much we can prioritize, so much energy, so many battles to fight and hills to die on. Today, we each share three parenting goals we really do value, but can't value enough to keep beating our heads against the wall for.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Sarah Knight's TED Talk "The Magic of Not Giving a F***"

Our conversation with S. Bear Bergman where he talks about choosing 2-3 things to teach our kids.

Our conversation with James and Lucy Catchpole where they talk about limitations as the parameters for a particular, beautiful life.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What are the parenting goals you're ditching, dropping, toasting, gently releasing?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

Today on Scratch That we chat with the tender and wise trailblazer S. Bear Bergman. We found Bear when we fell head-over-heels in love with his parenting book, Special Topics In Being a Parent. Unlike so many parenting advice we've read, Bear's approach felt adaptable and possible. It was only after we booked our interview that we realized Bear is a BFD. A founding member of the very first Gay/Straight Alliance, Bear has spent the last several decades telling stories, writing books, and inviting humans into greater justice, equity, and inclusion. He is brimming with deep insight, flexible scripts, and the most non-judgmental advice. We're excited to share our conversation with you💛

Tune in to hear us talk about:

🍳 The two-ingredient recipe that makes the tone of Bear's parenting book different from so many others.

🔬 The part about trial and error that Bear thinks we don't talk about enough.

🤝 Collaborative vs controlling parenting.

🔨 The part of parenting differently than you were parented that no one talks about.

🔎 A clarifying strategy for the chaotic parenting moments when so many things are going wrong.

🚮 Figuring out what parenting priorities to simply let go of.

🫜 Trading a family tree for a family garden.

🚫 The 2 kids' shows Caitlin and Bear CANNOT abide by.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Special Topics in Being a Parent: A Queer and Tender Guide to Things I've Learned About Parenting, Mostly the Hard Way

Special Topics in Being a Human: A Queer and Tender Guide to Things I've Learned the Hard Way about Caring For People, Including Myself

The song Bear added to our collective Scratch That Spotify playlist – "Might as Well Dance" by Patty Larkin

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! 

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

How do we talk to our kids about war, death, families being separated, floods, guns, violence, any of it? Should we shield them as much and as long as possible? Should we hold their hand as we tell them what we know to be real? How do we balance protecting our kids with equipping them? These questions feel important, the stakes feel high, we're doing our best, and making it up as we go. Today we dive into it as we try to figure out how we want to navigate the conversations that scare us.

Tune in to hear us talk about:

🫟 The sticky conversations Caitlin loves diving into with their kid and why some topics feel so much harder.

🇺🇸 How our parents' talked with us about politics in the 90s.

🪦 The very different responses we had to our kids seeing dead animals and the one thread we share.

📚 How Caitlin is using books and stories as invitations and bridges into hard conversations.

🪧 The conversations Rebekah had with a fellow protester that illuminated how she wants to move through today's politic landscape with her son.

⚙️ A potentially measured and responsible new strategy to equip our kids for the scary realities of today's world.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

What Makes a Baby by Cory Silverberg

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What helps you navigate conversations (with your kids or anyone else!) about the scary things happening in the world right now? And what book recommendations do you have? For any age! What are the book that are helping you understand our history and humanity?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

A year ago, Kate Wieners quit her corporate job to open a cozy, plant-filled bookstore, Monstera's Books. And while it sounds like the pitch for a movie we'd all love, today Kate talks with us about the real-life, fleshed-out story. What stars had to align for her to leave the "good enough" setup she already had for the risk of a dream? What has it been like to be a partner and a parent as she makes this great leap? What is it like to create a third-space community around books and storytelling right now? And does the nervous-scary of a big risky dream ever go away?

Tune in to hear us talk about:

☎️ The story of the old 70s phone they use in the store and all the ways it sets the tone for the shop.

💫 What Kate's husband Justin said when he heard her name her bookstore dream out loud at a party.

％ The strategies Kate and Justin have developed to navigate living, parenting, and working together.

🔧 The big and unexpected monkey wrench in their plans and how that became the scary ideal way to actually launch their plans.

🔔 The epiphany Kate had while waiting for someone else to tell her she had a brilliant plan.

🌿 Why Kate thinks Monstera's Books is a worthy competitor to Amazon.

🫟 Just making the next decision and getting comfortable with chaos.

📚 The conversation Kate overheard in the bookstore that highlighted the unique power of third spaces (especially ones that center storytelling).

💓 The tremendous value/power of little risks. (Or how something as simple as a romance bookclub could save someone's life.)

✨ How paying attention to the sparkle dream in ourselves can meet a much larger need in our communities.

⚡️ What Kate hopes her daughters take away from growing up in this bookstore.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Two books recommended by Monstera's Books patrons – The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese and A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas

Two of Kate's top book recommendations – I Am, I Am, I Am: Seventeen Brushes with Death by Maggie O'Farrell and Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! Shout out your favorite local bookstore! Tell us about your favorite third space! Share a little or big dream that's been tugging at your chest! We're here for all of it💛

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨

What does living alongside a toddler reveal to us about our high school and college students? How does time in the classroom inform the way we approach learning with our pre-schoolers? On today's episode, we reflect on our experiences teaching and learning and cobble together a list of guiding principles.

Tune in to hear us talk about:

✨ Curiosity as sacred.

⏱ The cost of separating places and times of learning.

🌱 Shame vs safety in a learning environment.

❓ The power of asking "silly" questions and admitting you don't know.

☁️ Valuing "idleness" in a world that rewards gold stars.

🧶 Why it's good and important to make so many crappy things.

🥁 Continually seeking out experiences where we're not very skilled.

⚡️ The scrappy trickster energy required to view constraints as possibility.

Mentioned In Today's Episode:

"Dispatches from the Ruins" is an essay in Ross Gay's book Inciting Joy.

Here's the clip of Ira Glass talking about the gap between your good taste and what you are able to make when you start out.

As Always:

Check out Caitlin and Rebekah's Book Shop! Here you can find every book mentioned in our episodes, as well as a few additional faves.

Use this link to get a 25% discount on a PokPok subcription! And if you haven't listened yet, check out our interview with PokPok creators, Esther and Melissa.

We would love to hear from you! What were your experiences in school? What worked well and what do you wish had been different? How do you think about education and learning as an adult? And does that show up in how you parent/re-parent now?

🍎 Apple

🟢 Spotify

Find Rebekah on Substack & Caitlin on Instagram ✨