Motherhood might end, but the chaos sure doesn’t.

In this heartfelt episode of Moms Unhinged, Andrea Marie chats with Seattle-based comedian Jody Carroll, who has worn more hats than most: mom, foster mom, and now proud grandma (times two).

Jody shares what it’s really like to fall head-over-heels for grandbabies, foster kids, and stand-up comedy—all while managing a house full of dogs and emotions. From late-night feedings to late-night shows, she proves that you can reinvent yourself at any age (and laugh about it, too).

Mentioned In This Episode:

• Follow Jody on Instagram | TikTok | X
•  Follow Moms Unhinged for upcoming shows: Website | Instagram | YouTube

Someone told us that if you put your kids in sports, you're gonna avoid

all the drug and alcohol issues.

I was like, oh, this is great news.

So I signed my mother-in-law for pee wee soccer.

It didn't work for her either.

Darn it.

We are Moms Unhinged, a nationally touring standup comedy show.

Join us in our podcast as we explore everything from motherhood,

midlife, crisis, marriage, divorce, online dating, menopause, and

other things that irritate us.

Hello everyone and welcome to the Moms Unhinged Show.

I am here with the amazing, the fabulous Jody Carroll.

Welcome Jody.

Oh, thank you so much.

I'm so happy to be here.

I know, I've literally been joking with people that my whole reason for

starting this podcast is just so I get a chance to talk to you guys.

'Cause sometimes I miss you.

I know it's the first thing I said was like, wow, long no see.

I know, I know.

It's been so long.

So Jody is one of our amazing Northwestern area comedians based outside of Seattle.

She's been on a ton of shows over the last couple years with us

traveling all over and super exciting.

We are headed to Anchorage.

I'm not sure when this episode's coming out.

We may have already just been in Anchorage, maybe we're just getting there.

But anyway, we're gonna be together on a show in Anchorage

coming up, amongst other shows.

So, again, super excited to have you and also new grandma.

Yes.

Oh my.

Yes, new grandma.

I am new grandma for the second time, so he's just a month old.

And then my other little grand baby is a year and a half.

Oh my gosh.

Oh, how fun.

How fun, yeah.

It's shocking.

I asked my other daughter, she's the auntie.

I said, are you shocked at how much you love them?

And she said, yeah.

I'm really surprised.

She's single, doesn't have any kids.

And I said, me too.

I just can't believe how obsessed I am with these little babies.

They're just so sweet.

Oh, so great.

I mean, I can tell you, can brings you back to that time

that it was very difficult.

Oh gosh.

It was so difficult and I imagine.

So hard.

I'm like, I told my husband, I'm like, I feel so sorry for them.

And he, he said, what?

And I said, I just, it's exhausting.

And he said, remember, they're a lot younger, you know, you are right now.

Right, and they signed up for it.

They signed up for this.

Yes, I can't help but feel guilty like I brought you into the world

and now you're having a baby.

It's my fault.

Okay, so you feel like you have to do everything.

But it's funny how, it's funny how you really can't explain it to anyone.

You cannot.

There's no way to communicate the magnitude of how difficult it is.

Right.

And it must be so wonderful to be a grandma where you

don't have to get up at night.

You don't.

You can go home and sleep and that's just, and hand them

back when you know you need to.

And you get all the good stuff.

Right.

You do get all the good stuff.

There's a little bit of pressure.

I mean, depending on how you kind of picture yourself as a grandma,

like what you know, it's coming.

So you're kind of like, what kind of grandma am I gonna be?

And you know, there's a part of me that's just like, I have to be there

for them, every step of the way.

I've gotta do all the laundry.

I just gotta support them as much as I can.

Hmm.

So, it's a little bit, I find that to be the biggest challenge.

It's like, I remember that old saying, take pressure off yourself.

You're putting too much pressure on yourself.

Kind of used to be a thing.

I don't know what we say now, but I kind of went back to the old school like I

just need to take pressure off myself, be the best grandma like I can be.

Someone told me they're gonna love you because you're their grandma.

You don't have to be a certain type of grandma.

You know, to be loved.

It's kind of like when you love your mom, you love your

mom, no matter what, you know.

I think someone told me that it kind of goes the same for grandparents.

Yeah, That's so true.

I'm just, don't know.

I love being around the babies.

I love 'em so much, but I really think ththeardest part is putting

pressure on yourself to help out.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm sure.

You know what the biggest help is?

Taking their dogs.

Oh.

So it's like you'll be around your kids' dogs more than ever before.

Welcome to Grandparenting.

Take the dogs.

We now have eight dogs.

The dogs that we used to love.

The dogs we used to run, we used take them for one.

Yeah, we have they've our house all the time.

They got the downgrade.

Yeah.

Oh, that's so funny.

Now, so now tell us about, tell us about your kids.

Like how many kids, and I know that you've fostered kids, so I wanna get

into that as well and talk about like, what that was like to have, you had your

own kids and then you had foster kids.

Talk about that journey a little bit.

Okay.

We did.

We had three kids.

And you know, first two were two years apart, then three years apart.

And when our last child, our daughter, she, I think she was

about, I knew Empty Nest was coming.

It was four years away or so, and I thought, I'm not done.

I'm just not done being a mom.

You know, so and I have two adopted brothers.

I have two adopted brothers.

And my husband and I kind of always thought that was in our life that would

be in our story at some point somehow.

And so our church has a really great foster slash adoption program.

And we loved our church.

Still do, but we don't go as often.

And so we got involved with that and did a mountain of paperwork.

Oh yeah.

Just started down the road.

We weren't sure, maybe this is not our story, maybe this

is not for us, not a good fit.

But let's just go down the road and see if things start falling into place.

Then we'll know that it's right.

You know?

So things started falling into place and we got our first placement and it was a

little girl and she's still in our life.

She actually went back to her mom after two years.

We got her at two.

Two and a half, and then she went almost to the day, went

back to her mom two years later.

And her mom's grade, her mom's super healthy.

She got married to a wonderful man and they have two more kids.

They've got a great family.

So kind of a very, very happy ending story.

So that was so fun.

And then after that...

So when your kids were like, like what?

12 and up at that point?

So my kids were, I think like 14, 17, and then Casey was in college.

I remember getting a call from him from college, you know.

Oh.

I'm like, she's in the car right now.

And he was so excited, you know?

Oh, that's so great.

But yeah, that is the best part of fostering when your

kids are a little older because it's such a gift to your kids.

They see the world through completely different eyes.

And that trickles out into their friend groups, and those friends

see something happening special and they see the positive sides of

bringing other people into your house.

And that was really something that I hadn't thought about much when

we were getting ready to foster is how big of an impact it would

have on just your whole family.

Oh, that's so nice.

I mean, I thought about, you know, what, what impact it would have

on my husband, but the positive impact it has on your kids.

It's just like, wow.

Yeah.

Really, really cool.

Oh, that's so great.

So then, did you have multiple foster kids?

Or was it just the one?

She was the longest placement and we had, we call 'em triplets

because two were, they were twins and then the other child was just a

year older, so they ran in a pack.

So we had the triplets and we had them kind of off and on for

a year and then we had twins.

We did have twin girls.

The triplets were nine years old and then a 10-year-old.

And then the twins we had for almost exactly 10 months.

And the triplets went back with their grandma, and then the

twins went back to their mom.

Okay.

And that's not as happy of a story and they ended up getting

adopted by some godparents.

So they're fine, but the mom is not as happy as the story is.

Mm, yeah.

Yeah, the twins were 10 and we had them for a school year and that was really fun.

'Cause then our lunches again and taking 'em to the bus

stop and it was so fulfilling.

I really needed that.

I really needed some extra mom time.

You know?

So then when you had those series of foster kids, then you also had

your kids, you had two of your kids still in the house or were at that

time, were they kind of moving out?

Our first little foster child came, I think, I actually think my oldest

daughter was a senior, so I mean, yeah, my oldest daughter was a senior.

Yeah.

And it could have been close to the end of her senior year, but she

went to University of Washington at, which is in our area where we live.

And she was in, they were in each other's lives quite a bit.

Yeah, that's great.

She came home a lot.

You know.

Yeah.

Right, that's so great . Like, it's so funny, my brain automatically jumps to

like, oh my God, the logistics of it.

How did you like a car?

And the how?

You know, I'm like thinking of all the stuff, but I'm sure you

just had a big car and we're like, hey let's pile all in, you know?

I mean, you see foster parents doing it with way more.

Oh wow.

They've got eight kids and this one's coming in, this one's going out.

It's a little more crazy.

I am a little more controlling, a little, a little more OCD.

So I had to have, you know, some control around it.

And I mean, the help you get from your older kids is awesome.

You have built in baby babysitters.

Right.

Like, oh, sorry.

You can't go, you have to babysit Nire.

And then her friends would come to our house and hang out.

She had to babysit, you know?

And which was such a cool experience, you know, it's very interesting

how it impacts your older kids.

My neighborhood was so cool 'cause they saw what we were doing and they

felt like they could have a hand in that special experience by helping.

By babysitting, you know, "I'll take her this afternoon," or you know,

that's so great.

I mean it was really, it was really life giving and it's ended up being

just such great, great memories.

But we are not doing it anymore.

We are not doing it anymore, 'cause we now we have these grand babies.

Yeah.

And yeah, we've always had, we've always had kind of a in and out.

I would say that we had Nire, that was the biggest one.

And then the triplets, then the twins, and then we had a couple

others that were just quick ones,

Quick, yeah.

Uh huh.

Yeah.

And how does that work?

You just get a call and you might need to kind of act pretty quickly?

Right, yeah.

We get a call and then they either bring the child or you go pick them up and

you know, they check your car seat and then they're like, you're on your way.

And then every single week.

Every week, this is shocking.

We went through our church, so there's a social worker through

the church assigned to you.

There's also a social worker from the state assigned to you.

So every single week we had two social workers visiting our house.

I mean, that is unbelievable to me, looking back on it, like, wow, there

are people in our house asking us questions, asking us how it's going

every single week for, you know, five years in and out for five years.

I almost feel like regular parents need that too.

Honestly, I looked forward to it.

It's like, well, we're having trouble with this.

Yes, I honestly looked forward to it.

I am not doing that well, to be honest.

You know?

Social workers are cool people.

So cool.

I mean, what does it take in your heart, in your brain to say,

I'm gonna be a social worker?

Like that is a cool person.

So to have those people walking in your house and having

really cool discussions around.

Around your situation, right.

Around your place, about your kids.

But also on, on bigger pictures.

Yeah.

The foster care, you know, system.

It is upon when having people having feeling like you have support.

I remember when Casey, I'm switching topics, but I remember when my oldest

child was born, he was born low.

He was born low birth weight, I think like six.

Not too low, you know, six pounds, nine ounce.

But anyway, he had jaundice and today I don't think they worry about it too much.

But back then it was a huge concern.

They had the lights.

So, yes.

So they sent, did you have a jaundice baby?

But I remember seeing the babies baking, you know, they were.

We call him the light bright baby because he had this thing around his

torso and it was looked like light bright, all these little lights, and we

had to plug 'em into the wall at night.

Sitting by the window in the morning, you know, in the sunlight.

And every day I had a nurse come by and prick his little toe to

see how jaundice just was doing.

Yeah to check his and I mean, I would be looking out the

window waiting for that nurse.

Where is she?

It was awesome.

I remember.

She helped me with breastfeeding and everything else.

I had questions.

Yeah.

I remember when they gave me the baby to take home and I was

like, what are you talking about?

I take this home now.

I need help.

I don't know what I'm doing.

I have no idea.

It's so true.

It's so scary.

I was out of my mind scared.

I know, I know.

That's funny, waiting at the window.

Where's the nurse?

I know she's.

Oh, this big lady, she was big and she was yummy and delicious, and

she'd walk through my door and I'd never see, and she'd hold my little

baby, you know, with, with her big, strong, healthy, rested body.

And I was, oh, he does.

He's never looked so comfortable.

She was, and she is being paid to care about everything.

You know, like that's how.

Own paid for grandma coming into my house.

That's why it was her.

It's her fault that she put the pressure on me to be a good grandma.

That's right.

She set the standard way too high.

Yeah, yeah.

I also wanna find out about how?

So you, when did you, you've got all these children, so many

children at your house, in and out.

When did you get into comedy and how did that happen?

I think was a little nervous about empty nesting.

Are you an empty?

You're an empty nester.

I'm an empty nester now.

Yeah, it's like quiet.

It is so quiet.

It is freaky.

Yeah, aren't you glad you have something?

To fill that space.

I would be like, what do I do at night?

I don't know.

Yeah.

And now you do have, I mean, no one.

It's like you say, no one can prepare you for when you're gonna have kids.

No one can prepare you for that feeling of empty nest.

It is a very nuanced kind of very, you hard to grasp what

that feeling is going to be.

Right.

Yeah 'cause you, you see all the people.

And yes, of course, everyone's like, woo-hoo, empty nest.

And we have a little joke about that we do on the shows, you know?

Oh yeah.

That's what we're working towards.

But at the same time, I'm like, I'm uh!

Uh, you know, it's also just heartbreaking, you know, that it's

never gonna be the same, you know?

It's really heartbreaking.

It really is, and I think I was a little nervous about it.

Right.

And I thought, well, let me ask myself this question.

If I could wake up in the morning and do anything, what would it be?

And I thought, I'd love to just be in a room full of funny

people working on a project.

And so I thought, well, maybe I can.

You know, be a comedy writer and write for some commercials or

advertising, stuff like that.

Maybe a show, you know, your mind goes crazy.

I don't know anything about the business at all.

And then you start looking into it and you realize all those people

are it, back in the day, they were plucked from the comedy clubs.

These people that were hiring comedy writers would go into the clubs.

And grab, we all know this now and this doesn't happen anymore.

Yeah, yeah.

Social media, they just take 'em off social media and they

can do it different ways now.

So I thought, okay, well if I wanna be a comedy writer, I guess

I have to do standup comedy.

How it started.

And did?

Once you get on the stage and you do it the first time, you're hooked.

Right?

Oh man.

That is.

So weird.

I always hate to say everything is like, oh, that's like crack.

'Cause like, I've never done crack, but it seems like what it would be.

It's not like I'm out there

doing comedy for a hit, but I mean, it sort of is.

You know, you're, it's such good drug.

Making people laugh is such a high,

it really is.

It feels so good and it feels productive.

Yeah.

Yeah, I know I go through phases of like, what am I doing?

This is ridiculous.

And then, and then you realize that someone will say something like

really profound things and you know, I lost a family member two weeks ago.

This is the first time I've laughed in two weeks.

I know that happens to us a lot on Moms Unhinged.

It does.

It's wild.

Mom shows, especially.

Have that quality about where people will say, I just saw a friend

through breast cancer and you guys, this is the first time I've laughed

in a month, or whatever it is.

So then you start to feel like you're doing something really productive.

Yeah, yeah.

Right.

So all that to say is when you first start, it does feel, for

some reason, when you first start, it doesn't feel frivolous.

It feels important, even though there's moments after

that that it feels frivolous.

But when you first start, and then when you get to those big shows

where you're getting feedback like that, it feels really important.

Yeah.

Saying that you're not, you know, you're not wasting, you're not wasting time

and you're not getting into trouble.

Like I could be at the mall shopping, I could be.

Yeah.

New furniture.

Comedy has turned to be a little expensive, but at least I'm

not, you know, I don't know.

It felt like a kind of a good creative outlet.

Yeah, it's a good creative.

It's better than just sitting, scrolling on your phone or doing something

that's like, yeah, not like whatever.

Or gardening or hiking.

I mean, who needs

it?

No offense to any gardeners or hikers out there.

I can't do it, I can't do it.

You guys are my heroes.

You're not a hiker.

No I'll do it, but it's not like if I could wake up in the morning,

there's some people that say, I would want to play tennis.

I want to play tennis.

If I could do anything, you know.

I'm like, I don't wanna go hiking.

I don't wanna garden, I don't wanna play tennis, I don't wanna watch a movie.

What would I wanna do?

I wanna be in a room with funny people and write something funny.

So fun to be collaborative and stuff.

And then standup gets a little isolating.

Yeah, it's definitely.

This is a lone wolf sport.

It is, yeah.

It can definitely be, there's community, but then also sometimes

you are adrift on your own out there.

Yeah, for sure.

That is, I know.

And there's some pros and cons to that too, but yeah.

Yeah, not as many.

Not as many.

I mean there's definitely like tennis clubs and stuff, I guess.

Whatever.

It's not as social, but those road trips, I'm telling you, the road

trips with the Moms Unhinged people, those are core memories for me now.

Like those, a lot of stuff gets, you know, gets talked about, gets hashed

out in those roads and it's so fun.

It is so funny 'cause I remember one time I was on a road trip and one of

the, we were, it was a long road trip.

It was like a three or four hour drive we had to take and we were getting

into some deep spiritual things and someone was like, let's share our

core wounds, or something like that.

And I'm like, are the guy comedians who are on road trips doing this?

I don't think they are.

I bet you anything you are not.

Yeah, it is.

It is funny to see the, our age women who, you know, mom aged and above

women, having these discussions in this, well, in this little isolated

moment in time, on a road trip.

The road trips is so bonding.

Yeah, it is true.

It is true.

I love Moms Unhinged for that.

They've provided so many special times like that, like just driving

from show to show and kind of navigating your way through uncharted

territory in all sorts of ways.

Like even geographically, like I don't know where we're going, you know.

And then we don't really know each other all that well.

We don't know where this discussion is going.

I know, I know.

It is funny 'cause sometimes, yeah, the three people or four people in the car

don't have, don't know each other at all.

It's like, not like a regular road trip where it's like old friends.

Mm-hmm.

Let's all stick four comedians in a car and send them off somewhere, you know?

We can navigate this whole situation.

Hopefully they'll show up to the show on time.

Yeah, that it's always, I've definitely had some moments where

I'm like, oh, where are you?

Really?

So I wanna hear about, you know, speaking of crazy moments, crazy times.

You know, I'm sure you've had, one of the things I like to ask is like

about an unhinged moment that you've had either like, you know, with your

kids or you know, with you as a kid.

I think it all helps us all to know like, oh my gosh, I'm not alone things,

you know, I thought this was bad, but we all have some crazy times.

Yeah, we do all get unhinged.

We do get unhinged.

I like asking that at the beginning of the show.

Like, are you unhinged?

I know.

And then people clap.

And I'm like, if you're not clapping and you're hinged, we're not happy with you.

We don't like you got your shit together.

Yeah.

But yeah, I definitely got unhinged as a young mom.

There was one I am.

Okay, there's two, two times we never spanked our kids.

That was just not what we were gonna do.

And, so when my son, that lasted for about two years.

My son was two and we didn't spank him.

This is, and this is why.

This is why we did not spank our kids.

My son was two and he, we were coming outta a little gym.

Yeah.

And he started running and went toward a busy street.

Oh gosh.

I know it's giving me shivers right now.

And so I said, you know, I was yelling, "Casey, stop, stop,

stop, stop." And he didn't stop.

And he didn't stop.

And so somehow, you know, the Lord saved him.

And he did not, nothing happened to him.

Thank God.

And when I got to him, I was so unhinged.

I was, I didn't know what to do.

I was like, how am I gonna get it through his head that he needs to stop

so I spanked him on his little diaper.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You need to stop when I say stop.

Or I said something, swat.

And he turned to me and he goes, "Mama, no hit Casey." And he hit me

right here.

That didn't work.

Now it's my issue, not him running.

It's me.

It, he turned it on me.

Now I've got a problem.

I know.

My problem.

I'm the hitter.

You're not the runner.

No, that's not what we're talking anymore.

I'm the hitter and then another time.

It's just like, why do they have no self-preservation?

They just run towards the traffic.

Like you're just.

So scary.

It's amazing to me that so many kids survive.

Yeah.

They're like, we have these prairie dogs out here in Colorado, and they just

like will run in the middle of the road.

Like they have no, they're just standing out there in the middle

of the road looking, you know, we're like that's like a toddler.

Right.

Preserve yourself.

Do you wanna?

Do you wanna see tomorrow?

Yes.

Yeah, it is scary how they survive, how they get themselves into.

Towards danger, yeah.

And another time, and I don't drink anymore, but I used to drink and this

is a day that I was not drinking.

Okay?

So I know I was legit unhinged.

I had no alcohol in my system at all.

I hadn't even drank the day before.

Not drink, just hadn't drink.

And so I'm like, okay, this was legit because I was not drinking.

And so they're playing Monopoly and all three of 'em, they're at this

age where there's this magic time where the three of 'em, get along.

They're gelling.

Yeah, they're gelling and, exactly, so I don't know what it is, eight, 10.

Yeah.

11 and 13th, something in there.

They played Monopoly all the time.

And they fought all the time when they played Monopoly.

And so they were fighting and I just.

I came downstairs and I started jumping, physically, jumping with

my feet on the Monopoly board.

And all the pieces are going, woo.

Jumping, jumping, jumping.

I'm like, I can't take it anymore.

Picked up the board, ripped it, ripped it, ripped.

It ripped the board in half, and then I got a big garbage

bag in the middle of the game.

We have not had Monopoly game in our house since.

That is hilarious.

Every once in a while I have lost my mind.

I lost my mind.

Just go ballistic Hulk rage on the Monopoly board.

Rage.

God.

But

Because I couldn't spank them.

Casey had already put that away, couldn't spank them.

So I spanked the Monopoly in, its in my own way.

And they from time to time will say, it's like, you like the Walgreens?

Oh, she doesn't like the two from one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The inside joke you have about Walgreens.

Listener, if you don't know, Andrea's had her unhinged moment in Walgreens.

I know.

An inside joke about Walgreens.

So now they have an inside joke about should we play Monopoly?

Yeah.

Every once in a while.

Like, it's an old joke now, so they don't bring it, you know, but it's out.

Pardon the fun.

My gosh.

I know, and I'm sure at the time you just probably felt like such, you

know, it's so hard when you get so mad.

The fighting is what always got me when they were fighting and bickering.

I'm like, stop it.

You know?

And you just want it to stop because it can be constant.

And especially like if they are, if like Monopoly always triggers them,

they're like, then why are we playing?

Let's play a different game.

Right.

Like, what are you doing to yourselves?

You're right.

I hadn't thought about that for a while.

But fighting with each other, the kids fighting with each other was a big deal.

And my mom used to get mad at us fighting.

And I remember in my head thinking, why?

Why does she care?

She's not in the fight.

Yeah, yeah.

Right.

We're fighting.

She's not.

But then as mom, you understand, oh wow, that's really stressful.

Really annoying.

Yeah.

Why don't we just let him fight?

Like why do we care?

I always, I think I always felt like a little bit protective

of, especially the younger kids.

'Cause I always felt the, like my older son was just a little

more, you know, he knew a little bit more how to bully, you know?

'Cause you, you know, as you grow up, you use your words a little

bit more in a different way.

And like, I always felt like coming in and wanting to rescue

the underdog or whatever.

So I don't know what.

That's a really good reason.

But I mean, to be fair.

Whatever situation.

Yeah, to be fair, my younger son could like needle the older one too, you know?

Then you'd wanna come in and say the other one.

So whoever the underdog was, you're being mama bear.

yeah, that could.

That could be it.

Yeah all your young moms out there, just

let 'em fight it out.

Unless its physical.

Get some popcorn, right?

That's good.

Take bets.

See who's gonna win over under, you know?

Oh my goodness.

Well, Jody, this has been just so much fun.

Thank you so much.

That made me laugh so hard.

And why don't you let people know where

they can find you?

To.

get in touch with you and follow you.

Thank you.

That would be great.

I'm @jodycarrollcomedy on everything except for X, which I just got on.

And on X it's @gramsplainit.

So I have a new thing on all my socials.

So go to @JodyCarrollComedy, go to on Instagram.

TikTok.

I have a whole new series gramsplaining.

Ah, nice.

I talk about being a grandma.

'Cause I have so much experience.

18 and a half months of experience, not a year and a half, you're

supposed to say by months.

19 months.

18 and a half months.

And it's been really fun to do some funny stuff about it.

I love it.

Yeah 'cause I'm sure it's so fresh, it's so new.

You've got lots of things to talk about, I'm sure.

Oh,

great.

Well, thank you so much again, and can't wait to see.

Thank you.

Yes, thanks for everything, Andrea.

Thanks for listening and make sure you subscribe, share, and follow us on

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