I get why Chappell Roan said all her friends with children aren't happy.

plus Beatles, Billionaires and nip-lashes

I get why Chappell Roan said all her friends with children aren't happy.

Chappell Roan’s recent interview has sent mums everywhere into a spiral. The internet is now awash with parents furiously defending their lifestyle while fans clap back at the overreactions. Here’s Chappell’s offending quote:

“All of my friends who have kids are in hell. I actually don’t know anyone who’s happy and has children at this age… I’ve literally not met anyone who’s happy, anyone who has light in their eyes, who has slept.”

Cue me staring into my own pupils in the mirror, checking if the spark left with my waist. And before you come at me with “you’re not friends with Chappell Roan”: You don’t know my life. You’ve not met all my friends. Maybe I am friends with her. Maybe, in between nappy changes and bath time, I’m whipping out my milky soakers at the Pink Pony Club.

If, however, you were about to point out that I’m technically not the same age as Chappell, then fuck you. We’re practically twins. We were both born in the '90s. She’s 28, I’m in my late-late twenties, otherwise known as my early-mid thirties.

Anyway, I get why she said what she said, and I think it has less to do with the miserable state of her friends and more to do with how we talk about having kids. Being a parent is hard and sometimes hellish, but those moments are a small part of the bigger picture.

I’ve only been a mum for five months. I’m a novice talking like an expert. I haven’t got to the stage where he can run away from me, call me a bitch, or cry into my shoulder because his friends are bullying him for being the son of such a MILF (I’m sure it’s all coming). But at every stage so far, I’ve been bombarded with warnings: “Just you wait until you get no sleep,” “Oh, the four-month regression is killer,” “Say goodbye to romance,” “Hope you’re ready to be miserable.” It’s endless fear-mongering. I spent the first few months on high alert waiting for the promised horror to drop. But it never did.

The problem is the branding. You can talk to your child-free friends about the bad bits; they love a good horror story about your near-death labour, or the time the baby shat through five layers of clothing onto your white trousers. But I’m not going to sit them down and start proselytising about how magical it is the rest of the time. Nobody wants to hear that. And I don’t want to sound like a Bible-bashing, apron-wearing, trad wife with a “God Bless This Mess” sign over the changing table. Loving your child, earnestly, openly, is kind of embarrassing. Or at least, talking about it is.

I’m a hardcore feminist, not some 1950s housewife finding purpose through my offspring. And if my friend was Chappell Roan, there’s no fucking way that during her 30-minute stopover between winning Grammys and schmoozing Beyoncé, I’d say, “Well that’s great, but today my baby giggled hysterically every time I pretended to eat his toes and I’d happily listen to that sound on repeat for the rest of the year .”

Maybe her friends haven’t slept much, but I bet above those deep set bags, the light in their eyes isn’t gone. I bet they’re just hiding it from Chappell. Because as cringe as it sounds, my eyes have never felt so sparkly.

Four Beatles is four too many

The latest film news is that we’re getting four new Beatles movies, all released in the same month. The cast looks great, but do we really need that many films about one band? Personally, I think biopics should only be commissioned once the subject is dead, especially if they’re even vaguely involved. Because I don’t want a sanitised, flattering version they’ve signed off on. Honestly, I don’t even want the truth. I want a wildly inaccurate, unhinged bastardisation where McCartney’s shagging Yoko on the side, and Ringo gets full John Wicks-style revenge on Lennon’s killer. Let it be fucking batshit!

The bonding Nip-lash

I recently had a TikTok go viral. (I don’t know what the official threshold is for “viral,” but it’s at nearly a million views, so I’m counting it.) In the video, I talk about the weird double standard of breastfeeding hygiene: when you bottle feed, you clean the bottles, run them through the dishwasher, and then sterilise them with some UV gadget that feels like a scam but I’ve somehow bought into. But when it comes to breastfeeding, I haven’t washed in a week, haven’t changed my bra in two, and I will shove that dirty tit straight into my baby’s mouth.

The comments were, as expected, split between mums who deeply related and others who were horrified by my unhygienic confession. There’s also the usual exhausting ‘breast is best’ discourse that could put the Energizer Bunny into a coma.

But my favourite comments came from panicked Gen Zs and Alphas recoiling in horror because I mentioned that my nipple hair tickles my baby’s mouth. “I’m going to grow nipple hair?!” one young girl commented in a panic.

Well, you might not have nip-lashes, but everyone has those couple rogue hairs somewhere on their body, The one stubborn chin whisker. The middle of the arm runaway. The single cheek bristle even. And once in a while you’ll pluck it out like a weed and wait for it’s resurrection.

Personally, I find nothing more bonding, more inherently womanly, than spotting a fellow female on public transport suddenly clock the return of her seasonal chin hair, like spiky cherry blossom. Watching them try to discreetly pluck it with their fingers is poetry.

So if you’re a Gen Alpha reading this: don’t fear the future errant hairs. Embrace them. They are the shared threads of womanhood.

Eat the rich (except Becca Bloom)

I love how wildly contradictory the public is when it comes to billionaires. Everyone swears they hate them, says they shouldn't exist, that we should eat the rich, guillotine at dawn, etc. But then a billionaire pops up on TikTok who doesn’t look evil, and suddenly we’re all feral in the comments, asking for closet tours and adoption papers. It’s like the opposite of a dollhouse- we’re the dolls now, peering into the absurd luxury of the real people playing with us.

The current queen of the moment is Becca Bloom, who films her Chanel and Hermès hauls with the breeziness of someone unpacking a Tesco delivery. In one video, she buys a brand-new laptop, not because hers is broken, but because the designer laptop sleeve she wanted didn’t come in her current size. It’s so vulgar it loops back to iconic. I’m sick of quiet luxury- I want it loud, proud and all over my For You Page.

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What I googled this week

• If I stay in a bath long enough will my whole body go wrinkly?

• How many nipple hairs is too many?

• Where does Chappell Roan hang out in London?

• What’s after a billionaire?

• When will my baby be smarter than my cat?

• Horniest romantasy novels?

• Designer laptop sleeves that aren’t actually that expensive?