What My Parents Got Right (and Very, Very Wrong): Lessons I Learned at a Singles Bar When I Was Five

In this candid minisode, Lauren Bernick pulls back the curtain on what’s really happening behind the scenes, both with her health and her next big creative leap.

She shares a real-time update on her mission to lower her LDL cholesterol naturally and the very human struggle of sticking to Dr. Greger’s protocol. From there, Lauren introduces her newest project: her upcoming book, Age Like a Badass Mother, a deeply personal and practical guide for Gen X and beyond.

The book will weave together stories from Lauren’s own life, lessons from podcast guests, and a framework for transformation built around three questions:
What’s the issue? What’s the root cause? And what’s the solution?

You’ll also hear Lauren reflect on her unconventional GenX childhood and the lasting influence of her parents, especially her mother, on how she views herself today. Some of these stories are crazy! Buckle up, Fluffy, it's going to be a ride. 

https://www.agelikeabadassmother.com/
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Transcript

Lauren Bernick (00:01.602)
Hey friends, okay, I'm trying something a little different. So I'm gonna do little mini episodes, mini-sodes in between the main episodes just to help us stay connected and just talk about some things that aren't necessarily always health related. For example, well this week, I do wanna give you an update on what's going on with my trying.

Dr. Greger's protocol, I'll give you an update about that in a second. But I also want to talk to you about other things and please feel free to write to me, message me on social media, tell me some things you want to talk about, like what are some topics? But this week, so I want to give you an update. Okay, how it's going with my lower LDL cholesterol naturally. This is a follow-up from last week, so.

Last week I I don't want to say failed spectacularly. I did not follow the protocol Where you're supposed to put like six tablespoons of this neutral tasting powder into all your meals two tablespoons a day it has like flax and wheat germ and psyllium fiber and There's a little bit of kelp in there and some sumac. There's a ton of things in there anyway

I would say it's going, okay, I am not sure that this is sustainable for the rest of my life. It's a lot to put two tablespoons, even if it's a totally neutral tasting powder, into every meal. Like, it's okay in a salad, it kind of makes it kind of thick. It's all right in something like chili or a soup. It's fine in like a smoothie bowl, like an acai bowl.

like if you make something like that. It's good in oatmeal. I had it in a stir fry and it really thickened it up. I had it in some macaroni and cheese, it made it a little too thick. So I'm not sure how this is gonna go. To be honest, I bet you I could do like three tablespoons a day, but I'm giving it my all. And then I'm trying to take the nasty things like omelet powder and turmeric and black cumin and you.

Lauren Bernick (02:23.02)
wrap it in this thing called a blight pape. It's like a edible film. I think it's made out of like potato starch and you put your nasty tasting stuff in there and you dip it in water and you swallow it down like a pill. goes down pretty easily. That's not really bad, but just like another pain in the butt of something else to do every single day. So again, I don't know how sustainable this is. I was for a while taking like an omelet,

capsule pill that I was getting from somewhere, that might be a more sustainable thing. Again, I'm just gonna give it my all for like a month, get my cholesterol retested and see where I land. Okay, so that's the update on that. What I wanna talk to you today is, I think it's something fun. So I'm writing a book, I wanna put that out there because it holds you accountable and I am writing a book I've just finished.

the book proposal. So when you write a non-fiction book, if you wanna try to sell it, which I'm gonna give it a whirl, I'll probably end up self-publishing or maybe not. Maybe somebody really will buy this book. But you write a non-fiction proposal, it's a very detailed thing. And I bought a template from somebody, Fran Hauser, she's amazing. She wrote The Myth of the Nice Girl.

and she's incredible, she's been very helpful. And so I've been following her template and I'm finished. I'm like, can't even anymore. It's like 65 pages, it's very detailed. And so now I have to try to find a literary agent and start submitting it. Okay, so this is what I wanna tell you. I wanna kinda tell you where I am with the book, what it is. I'm happy for some feedback to see if this is what you wanna hear about.

And basically what I'm doing, so the name of the book is called, Age Like a Badass Mother, Make the Rest of Your Life the Best of Your Life, a Guide for Gen X, and if you're not Gen X, don't get all up in arms. It's really for everybody, but for marketing purposes, you kind of have to make it a niche thing. That may change, and again, I'm not trying to alienate everybody, this podcast is for everyone.

Lauren Bernick (04:47.202)
for sure, but I'm a Gen Xer and I just have so many firmly fun Gen X stories. I don't know if they're just Gen X, but you're welcome to give me feedback on that. I know if you're not Gen X, you might not really be happy with that title, but anyway, it's not set in stone. We'll see how it goes. But eventually I'm gonna need some readers, some people to...

you know, read while I'm writing to make sure I'm heading in the right direction to give feedback. So you can also message me if that's something you're interested in. So the premise of this book, again, Age Like a Badass Mother, Make the Rest of Your Life the Best of Your Life, a Guide for Gen X and Beyond, maybe you can say and beyond. It's gonna be like a memoir with lessons and the lessons are lessons I've learned from the podcast. There's been so many.

And so what I'm gonna do is like every chapter I'm gonna begin with identifying the issue, its root cause and the solution. Because you know I love that, that's how I ended up here in the first place by like trying to reverse my heart disease. I love getting to the root of the problem. So the other thing is like each chapter is titled clearly, but then it's subtitled with a fun saying from my mother, not a fun saying, I would say they're like.

Her name was Linda, Linda-isms. And these are real things that my mother actually said. And I'll get back to that in a second, but it's gonna have a mantra and then like a fun Gen X mantra, like a song title. So again, it's gonna be my story woven in with these lessons. And you guys, I don't know how much you really know about, like I know that you have a sense of me.

I've really tried to be honest in who I am, like, but some wild times when I was young, really wild, like I'm no, you know, I don't know what to say. I'm a good girl, but I've had some bad moments. Let's just say that. But they were really fun. So anyway, like I'm gonna give you an example. So here's some of the table of contents. Well, let me see how long this takes to read.

Lauren Bernick (07:08.342)
Okay, so like chapter one is titled, Why We Need This Book. And then the Linda-ism, the saying from my mother, it's not that you're fat, it's that you're just not tall enough. And this is how she explained to me why she was taking my neighbor, who was tall and thin and beautiful, my same age, to a modeling agent that she knew and not taking me. So, and that first chapter is really about

how I've internalized, how we've all internalized all the commentary, all these years on our looks, you know, from teachers and parents and other kids and so many stories. Bosses, I mean, I'm sure you guys all have the same experience if you're a woman. Just that constant chatter growing up of, you know, commentary on your looks.

Okay, so that's chapter one, why we need this book, because we have to get rid of all that chatter and all that bullshit that we've been fed. If chapter two is called, If Not Now, When, and then the subtitle, the Linda-ism from my mom is, Shoulder Get Off the Pod. And this chapter is really about, you know, now is the time. If you're gonna make any changes in your life, you might only have, if you're 50, 60 years old, 70 years old,

you might only have a five, 10, 15, 20 years left to live, who knows? We don't really know, that's, you But if these are the, this is the time to make the changes. And we go through that. Chapter three is called the softening is an upgrade. And the Linda-ism is, I don't have the fight in me anymore, but I'd still spit on her grave. That's something my mother would say, or did say. And really the softening is about,

an emotional and sometimes physical upgrade, just being softer, being more, you know, not so up for a fight, like taking care of any relationships that need to be taken care of, repairing anything like that. Just realizing like we're all in this together. That's kind of the softening and...

Lauren Bernick (09:35.392)
And there's a lot to it. I know I'm not giving you very much, just giving you the chapter titles. I can go into some things more later on. Chapter four is feeling confidence in the face of your changing face and body. And the Linda-ism is, okay, I'm no Angie Dickinson, so what? That's definitely something my mother said. And you know, that is a thing for all of us. I know it is, and I don't want it to be, but...

You know, sometimes it's hard to look in the mirror and be like, shit, this is the person I am now? Like, I feel like I'm still 21 years old or whatever it is. So there's a whole chapter on that.

The kindness paradox is chapter five, the kindness paradox, and then the Linda-ism is kindness is never wasted unless you waste it on some schmuck. And you guys have heard all, there's so much evidence out there. We've heard Dan Buener, we've heard all kinds of experts talking about kindness and how much it does for keeping you young, all the hormones it releases when you help somebody, when you're kind to them.

Chapter six, gratitude raises your vibration. The Linda-ism is, thank you God, there's still shrimp on the buffet. It's always the first to go. And obviously when we reframe our life around gratitude, again, it's a hormonal release. literally shapes the way we're aging.

And then Chapter 7 is the importance of community. The Linda ism is you are the people you surround yourself with, so don't hang out with whores. Oh, my mom loved to call another woman a whore. Ah, days gone by. So yeah. Community, obviously, again, that's a whole Blue Zones thing. We know that and Ashton Applewhite. There were so many lessons. This just comes up over and over again about.

Lauren Bernick (11:44.31)
the importance of community. Trish Murphy, my friend, talked a lot about that. We've had so many good lessons about it. But I remember specifically Ashton Applewhite saying that having a community could give you seven and a half extra years of life. Chapter eight, the true fount of youth and health is eating plants. And my mother's Linda-ism is, oy vey, are you gorgeous, poo poo.

I mean, I could hear her saying that right now. And I don't even have to go into that. I mean, obviously all the experts we've had on, especially one that really sticks out in my mind is Dr. Kata, the dermatologist that talks about eating plants as a way to be really glowing from the inside out. So there's all that. Chapter nine, advocating for yourself. The Lindyism is, it's the least you could do for me.

And we've had so many examples of advocating for yourself. Two people who had stage four cancer who were not getting the help from their doctors and really were able to, mean, they're both still alive 10 and 14 years later because they really advocated for themselves. They fired their doctors, they got different health teams. And then there's also the advocating for yourself when it comes to career and.

relationships, chapter 10 menopause and the Lindy ism is I'm schvitzing in here did I finally make it to hell? I hope not but you know we go over all the hormones and different lessons we've learned about menopause, chapter 11 you teach people how to treat you the Lindy ism why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free she said that to me when I moved in with Andy

We weren't married, I moved into his house and she told me, you know, wasn't gonna buy the cow, calling me a cow when he could get the milk for free, which was just, made me so mad. And what I told her is, Mom, you try a pair of shoes on before you buy them, don't you? And I was right about that. You need to make sure about that, girl. Okay, chapter 13, plant-based recipes for the fountain of youth and health.

Lauren Bernick (14:08.52)
And the Linda-ism is, it's not as good as mine, but you tried. And that's just going to be compilation of recipes from a lot of my plant-based guests. And then number 14, Chapter 14, Favorite Health and Beauty Tips and Products. And again, the Linda-ism, a little powder and some paint make a woman what she ain't. So give me some feedback. Let me know if you think I'm on track. Wow.

I don't know that I'm to take so much feedback at this point since that 65 page proposal is written, but definitely I really do want feedback. Okay, so I thought it would be fun to tell you a little bit some wild stories about my parents because you know, the whole thing is called age like a badass mother and the book is age like a badass mother and it is a little bit of a play on the fact that I don't want to age like my mother.

I talked about her, if you didn't hear the episode when I think it was, well, it was a year ago, she died. She died in late November last year, 2024. And shortly after that, I did an episode about, you know, the whole process of losing her and what it's meant. So now I've had a year to really process it. you know, she was just a force. I don't even know.

what else to say, but go back and listen to that if you have any interest in it. It's about the experience of losing her. But I just want to give you a little background and maybe some fun stories. So when I'm seeing my parents, I'm talking about my mother and my stepfather. My real father is still alive, my biological father. I have a nice relationship with him. He's aging like a badass mother. I should probably have him on the podcast.

He's 89 years old and he lives by himself. He gets around, like he's amazing. I actually should have him on. But my parents divorced when I was like maybe four or five years old. And so she married my stepfather, Emil, when I was about, well, they actually didn't get married till I was like 15. I don't think he could extricate himself from his first marriage. He...

Lauren Bernick (16:30.808)
That's a whole nother story. These two, I call them affable delinquents. I don't even know where to start. But anyway, she got together with him. He moved in when I was about six years old. His name was Emil. I called him Abba, which is father in Hebrew. And so, you my mom is this Jewish lady and he was a Palestinian, Arab, like, can you even imagine this? And they were very, very deeply in love, but they fought like cats and dogs. And the two of them were just kind of

Crazy. but before she met him, let me back up. I don't know if my mother actually knew about babysitters or if that was a thing, but she was just like, if she went somewhere, I went somewhere. So I tell this story in the book about going to this singles bar in Forest Hills. grew up in Queens, New York.

Forest Hills or until I was like 10 years old, thought it was called, no, until I could learn to read, I thought it was called Faris Tills, F-A-H-R-E-S-T-I-L-L-S, Faris Tills. But once I could learn to read and write, I was like, this is Forest Hills. Okay, so anyway, this is, you you've heard of it because that's where the tennis stadium is.

All right, so wherever my mother went, I went, she took me to this singles bar, it was called Stratton's, and it was like a restaurant, so I could go with her, because it wasn't a full out singles bar, but it was a restaurant, but at night, it became this like full on singles bar. And I remember many nights just falling asleep in a booth there, and somebody would just throw a tablecloth over me and I'd go to sleep, you know, I'd bring a coloring book or I'd read or whatever.

My mother was very, very beautiful. And these guys were flocking to her. And also before I move on, let me just say, I thought to myself, am I misremembering this? And so I looked, I Googled it. I Googled Straten Forest Hills. I Googled, was it a singles bar? And it said, this is a place for divorces that would go and hang out. And I was like, divorcees? I hate that word. Just sounds like I am coming for your man.

Lauren Bernick (18:57.302)
What is the word for a divorced man? it's man. So anyway, yeah. I was like, am I misremembering this? So I looked it up and it really was like a place for people to hang out. And I just remember as the night went on, it would get louder and it would get smokier and people were dancing and all over each other. And the great thing about my mom is that she never...

discounted my opinion. She never made me feel like less than just because I didn't have all her worldly experience. She really took my, not advice, but you know, she factored in my opinion. And so like she'd bring a guy over to the booth where I was coloring or hanging out and they'd start talking and it's no wonder I became a podcaster because let me tell you.

I interviewed these guys. I was practicing my interview skills from the time I was five years old. Can you even imagine the sight of like a little girl, little curly headed girl with no two front teeth like asking this man like, besides my mom's looks, what do you like about her? And do you know how to cook? Do you like kids? Do you like dogs? Because I have a dog, Fluffy. Just asking them all that.

I thought these are pretty good questions. You what do you like about my mom besides her looks? That's not a bad question. And for the ones who ignored me or called me precocious, obviously I didn't know what that was, but I didn't like it, or just really kind of blew me off, I was like, you're not gonna get to talk to my mommy. You're gonna just get out of this booth right now. And my mom would just start laughing and she wouldn't say like,

Lauren, you know, don't talk to him that way. She, she, if I didn't like him, that was good enough for my mom. He had to move on. And I think that honestly, it's given me a lot of confidence in myself and my abilities and listening to myself, you know, so many people discount that voice in their head. And she really

Lauren Bernick (21:20.718)
Like I said, she took my opinion to heart. It mattered to her. She never, for all her, for all her craziness, she never brought any creepy men around me. She never brought any men around that I didn't like. And I have to say that was, that's a big, huge deal. And my stepfather was a really nice man. I will say I was not there when she met him. She met him all on her own. So good for you, Linda.

But anyway, so yeah, that's my story. We were just two single gals hanging out. I was living the life of a single woman when I was five years old. So that's one story. You know, she was kind of OCD and looking back, I mean, I don't wanna make fun of her because I think she did actually have some kind of mental disorders. I think that she for sure was OCD. She might've...

She probably was, you know, I think that she had like a manic depressive, I know that I'm calling it that anymore, but I think she was like some days manic where she was like cleaning the house and she was waking me up in the middle of the night to go to the grocery store and where she was telling me to stay home and skip school, wait till my stepfather left, like stand with a blanket and when he leaves we'll go shopping and we'll do this and we'll do, like it was like that.

or she was in bed for days, didn't get out of bed for days, truly. So she also had this other thing where she wouldn't let me catch the school bus until I emptied the dishwasher in the morning. She was absolutely OCD, compulsive about the cleanliness of the house.

And because she wouldn't let me catch the bus until I emptied the dishwasher in the morning, I wasn't very organized and I was always sleeping late and running around. I missed like 42 days of school one year because if I missed the bus, well, she wouldn't take me to school. I guess you're not going to school today. So I missed so much school that they were like, know, lady, your kid's not gonna be able to go on to the next grade. And she's like, she's smart, she's fine. Don't be so hot, like.

Lauren Bernick (23:39.926)
You couldn't do that now, but I somehow she talked them into, know, me getting pushed on to the next grade. But she was compulsive about cleaning the house and she'd get up in the morning. She'd like clean the house like a whirling dervish, even on the days when she didn't get out of bed. She'd get up, she'd clean the house and then she'd get back in bed and I'd come home from school. She'd still be in bed. She'd be reading like those Harlequin romance novels, the bodice rippers. my God.

But she was like crazy about cleaning the house. Like if you, I remember us watching movies in the living room and if you got up to like go to the bathroom, she'd get up behind you and start fluffing the pillows on the couch and then, you know, put them back. And then you came back and you'd sit on the couch and she'd be like, I just fluffed the pillows. And I was like, but I'm not finished watching the movie. my God. She was like crazy. And then, you know, my parents also, they both smoked.

And when I was like 10 years old, was complaining about them smoking. And my dad, my stepdad, Abba, was like, you want to try a cigarette? I was like, no, I don't want to try a cigarette. It's disgusting. And he's like, no, you try a cigarette. That way you'll never smoke. And so he gave me a, I know that probably other people have had this experience. He literally gave me a cigarette and I was puffing on a cigarette at 10 years old. And I choked. I don't think I threw up, but

I mean, I was so sick. I just could not believe that he gave me a cigarette, but it did not stop me from smoking because when I was like 15, I was smoking in the house with my friends. I skipped school. I mean, that's all I needed to do was skip school after I missed so many school days. I skipped school, snuck in with my friends. My mother was outside where she was every day when it was sunny.

On our deck, she had a inflatable baby pool, like a little kiddie pool, and then she draped a pool float across that, so she was laying in the kiddie pool with just some water going over her. She had a little table next to her, and she had her Benson and Hedges Lights 100 on there, her lighter, her...

Lauren Bernick (26:01.198)
baby oil iodine mixture and she had her sun reflector. And she also had like a black and white TV out there that she'd plug in and she'd watch soaps all day from Ryan's Hope through General Hospital. And so my friends and I were like, snuck home, she didn't care. We were hanging out the window smoking and all of a sudden she catches us. I didn't think that she would like look up out my bathroom window where we were hanging out smoking because she was too busy with her.

Reflect her in her face. I didn't think that she would notice us, but she looks up and she yells at me What you smoke now? Okay, that's great. It's gonna curb your appetite good for you But you guys can smoke in the house, but you can't just sit around and smoke all day if you want to smoke You got to clean the house So I'll come in I'll make you guys some margaritas and you'll see you clean better with a little buzz Okay, you got okay. I'm

15 years old, my friends are 15, some are 16, because somebody drove us over there. And my mother's gonna let us smoke in the house if we clean, and she's gonna give us alcohol so we could clean better with the buzz. I mean, these are the, these are, I don't know if they're Gen X or just being under a certain age, like, or over a certain age. I mean.

I don't know where these experiences ended. My parents were like, my stepfather had a job, he owned his own company, he would remodel people's houses. And so he either had a lot of money or he had no money. And my parents did not understand the concept of saving for a rainy day. So we would either have a lot of money or we'd have no money. And...

This led to, again, I was 15, my mother takes me to this really nice steak lunch, which makes me want to throw up now. But we go to this steakhouse, we eat this really nice lunch, and then she overeats, obviously, that's what she always did, and then she'd unzip her pants. She leans back, she lights a cigarette, she looks at me and she goes, well, that was the last of our money. I thought we should have a nice steak lunch. You need to go get a job.

Lauren Bernick (28:21.438)
And so that's where I got my job at the Houston Post in a telemarketing room. That's where I met Andy, my husband. He was the boss there. And I had to give my mom my paycheck every week. Well, my two best friends worked there too. Actually, I had a lot of friends that worked there too, because it was right in the neighborhood. But before I would hand over my check every week, well, I'd put, once I turned 16, I'd put gas in my car. had a car.

junker that literally fell apart on the street. The steering wheel actually pulled out of that car, which is not good. You have to have a steering wheel. That's a whole other story. But anyway, before I'd hand over my paycheck to my mom, this is still, I was probably like 15, my friends and I would, somebody was old enough to drive, we would go cash our checks, buy a little dime bag of weed.

which was $10 worth of weed, weed gets super high, and we'd go to Fuddruckers for lunch. That was like my splurge for the week, Fuddruckers and some weed. We'd chip in for the dime bag, so there was three of us. it know, listen, it was like $3 something a person. Okay, and that weed would last for the week. We didn't smoke that much, but we'd get high at work. So this is who you're taking your health advice from. I hope you're enjoying it.

So we'd go to Fuddruckers and this is how I became a vegetarian, okay? I don't know if you remember Fuddruckers used to have a butcher shop in it. This is like 40 years ago. They had a butcher shop. So they had this, it was disgusting. They would have these like cow bodies hanging in the butcher shop where you could see.

and they always had some butcher with this bloody apron. And then they'd have all the patties in front, you know, in like a case all displayed like, look at our freshly killed bloody cow bodies. It was so gross. And we were so high and week after week we'd go and we'd get like a child's meal. I remember it cost like $2. And finally they changed the policy in this Fuddruckers. They were like, you have to be under like 10 to get a child's meal, but we would get a...

Lauren Bernick (30:46.574)
a tiny hamburger, some french fries, a chocolate chip cookie, and a drink for $2. And like I said, finally they changed that and we had to get a big girl burger. But by the time they changed it, I was so disgusted from standing in that line and being high and looking at these dead cow bodies that week after week I would eat less and less of this burger until finally I couldn't even take a bite. I was like, this is disgusting.

really got the association of what I was eating. And so I think their marketing plan failed. And I did notice that they took those butcher shops out of the Fuddruckers and they also started offering a veggie burger. So good for you Fuddruckers. You probably made a lot of people vegetarian. I know you made me a vegetarian. I still ate cheese and eggs and I wasn't a very healthy vegetarian but.

That's how I became a vegetarian. All right, I have a lot of other stories. I'll save them for another day. But I think you can see how I pretty much set myself up for heart disease with my smoking and my eating meat and my smoking weed. just, you name it, I was doing all the unhealthy things. So.

You know, my mother also had me on the Atkins diet, which was the precursor to the keto diet. So, you know, they always say that things run in your family and it's familial and yeah, but my family all ate meat and smoked. So it was familial. I did set myself up for heart disease that way. I also do, we know I have some DNA level stuff going on, but okay. Well, those are my fun stories for the week. Let me know what you think about.

some of the book chapters and if you think anything's really missing from it and if you want to be a reader in the future. I'm not there yet, but let me know. Let me know if any of these stories resonate with you. I don't even know what to say. It was a mixed bag. Like I said, my mom was kind of kooky, but she also instilled some really good things in me. All right, until next week.

Lauren Bernick (33:11.118)
I will see you then. Thank you for listening. You mean the world to me. Bye bye.