You’re listening to Burnt Toast!

We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay, and it’s time for your September Indulgence Gospel!

It’s time for a mailbag episode, so we’ll be diving into your questions about:

⭐️ How to clap back when people say, “Wow, you’ve changed!”

⭐️ What to do with ageist grandparents? (We’re surprisingly…Team Grandparent on this one?)

⭐️ Why it’s so hard to like photos of ourselves!!!

⭐️ Is Back To School (the hype, the myth, the culture)…a diet?

And so much more!

To hear the full story, you’ll need to be a paid Burnt Toast subscriber.

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Episode 210 Transcript

Virginia

Corinne, how are you? What’s going on?

Corinne

I’m doing good. It’s really nice and cool here, and I’m so happy. It’s like 68.

Virginia

It’s really nice and cool here, too. Listeners of the future: We are recording this in July to be ahead of the game, but it is very September weather, and it’s helping me get in the September mindset for doing this episode.

Well and because it’s cooler, I do have some Pants Chat for us to get into. I’m wearing a new pair of pants from Imbodhi, which is the brand that makes that jumpsuit I’m obsessed with. They are called the Sora Wide Leg Pant, and they are basically, like the pants version of the jumpsuit. They have a fold-down waist, and they’re very stretchy, and they are just the most comfortable thing. But I am unclear if I am wearing pants or pajamas?

Corinne

I’m looking at their website. I don’t know anything about this brand. It looks very similar to Beyond Yoga.

Virginia

It’s very similar to Beyond Yoga. It’s a great brand (and I have a $15 off coupon for listeners!). The quality is really good. But they go up to only 3x. I’m wearing the 1X so I think it’s a legit 3X but, yeah. There are bigger sizes they could be making, and they’ve chosen not to, at this point in time. So this is the Sora Wide-Legged Pants in ribbed oatmeal. They’re the most comfortable thing. But do you see what I mean? They definitely have that “is it pants, or is it pajamas” vibe?

Corinne

They’re soft pants.

Virginia

And I think because they’re wide leg soft pants, they feel more pajama to me. Maybe I’m good with that? Maybe I’m in my pajama pants era?

Corinne

That seems reasonable.

Virginia

Well, that’s my pants news.

Corinne

That’s great pants news.

Virginia

Let’s jump into questions.

Corinne

Yes, I will ask the first question.

Doesn’t back to school kind of seem like a diet? There are the first day of school photos, the perfect bento box lunches, the school supplies, etc.

Virginia

I mean, absolutely. Absolutely, it’s all a diet.

Corinne

Need we say more?

Virginia

It is a diet, and it’s a diet I go on every year. We do first day of school photos. My kid’s dad does a letterboard sign with a clever pun about what grade they’re going into. My kids sort of hate the tradition, but now sort of love it. And we’re doing it. We’re locked in. We’ve got to have all 12 years of photos.

Corinne

But what’s the diet element? That it has to be perfect?

Virginia

Well, when I think about my most diety years of Back To School culture, it was the years, especially, when my kids were starting a new school. If they were starting kindergarten, or other transition years, where stress is really, really high. You’re going through a lot of feelings, and as the parent, you’re like, what can I control? I can have an adorable, monogrammed backpack that must be sourced! I can control that we have the right lunchbox and this and that.

You can just get so hyper about needing all the details. You need a good first day of school outfit. The teachers send these incredibly detailed school supply lists, and you’re in the aisle at Staples trying to kill yourself to find the right kind of pens. You can just be really extra with it, and it can feel like if you get it wrong, you’re sabotaging your child’s happiness. The stakes are really high. And so there are a lot of diet-y elements, for sure.

Here’s what’s helping me divest:

Number one, my children pick their own clothes.

I have not had input on the clothes that go on my children’s bodies since they were probably three or four years old at the most. So there’s no first day outfit anymore. Whatever they want to wear is the first day outfit. So that’s one thing. I’m no longer like, “I need adorable dresses!!” My kids don’t even like to wear dresses. So, done.

Number two, the drugstore in our town does this great thing where they get all the school supply lists from our kids schools. And if you just tell them your kid’s name and the teacher they have for the next year, they will just bag up all the supplies and you just pay and pick them up.

Corinne

That’s amazing.

Virginia

And so I just handed this whole project off to my kid’s dad. I was like, “You’re on school supplies. You do the drug store thing every year.” I don’t think about it anymore, and it does mean you don’t get to sit there and pick out which color folders you want. And as someone who loved school supply shopping myself, that is a little hard for me! But that’s why I was like, I have to just remove myself completely. So I just try to step back from as much of it as I can.

What do you see with your friends kids? Do you notice any back to school feelings?

Corinne

To be honest, I haven’t. But most of my friends’ kids are in what I would consider barely school. So it hasn’t hit yet. I do remember, as a kid, wanting to school shop and and also wanting a first day outfit.

Virginia

It’s very similar to New Year’s resolution culture. You can be like, “This is the year everything’s going to be perfect!” This is the year that all these things are going to go well. And we all know we’re gonna be crying by October. It is what it is.

So you can go in with a lot of a lot of energy that can be misdirected. But also: If it helps you get through the stress of that first day to pack a really good lunch for your kid, great. Do it. I think the potential for harm is when you’re being so obsessive about getting that photo that your kid is really unhappy. It’s worth asking: Will getting this detail right make your child’s day smoother? Then fine. If it’s creating more work and drama for everyone, maybe time to step back.

Corinne

If your kid wants to have a special outfit and stuff, fine. And how can you make it not into a diet for them?

Virginia

Yes. I think especially as kids get older, they can bring this energy as well. I definitely did as a kid. I was very extra about my first day of school outfits and all of that. I would like plan the whole first week and be really manic about it.

Corinne

This is so not surprising.

Virginia.

In a surprise to no one, Virginia was herself.

So I guess my point is: This is all optional, and a lot of it is capitalism, not education.

Corinne

Great point.

Virginia

I’ll read the next question.

On vacation, I noticed that I am struggling with photos of myself, and it feels like the final frontier of my body liberation. I guess the question is, have either of you struggled with this? And any suggestions for coping and shifting it? I admire all the fat bodies on my socials and think they look amazing and feel pretty good in my body, and think I look good in the mirror. So why am I so uncomfortable with the photos. It just feels like it’s not how I look in my head or in the mirror. Photographs are different, obviously, than real life. But it surprises me how jarring they can feel.

Corinne

I feel like there are a million ways to answer this question, but I will just start with this. Have you ever seen a bad photo of a hot person?

Virginia

Oooh.

Corinne

Like, yeah. Obviously you have. There are horrible paparazzi photos of everybody, of America’s hottest people.

Virginia

Every beautiful person can take a bad photo. Yes, yes, yes.

Corinne

You’re pulling one second out of the movie of your life, or whatever. Obviously, there are going to be weird, bad photos.

Virginia

I also really lo