No Need to Start the Day Over When You End the Day with Love

I have been thinking of starting the Boy Mom Podcast for over a year and am thrilled to finally launch on Valentine's Day this year. While I still have writing my full Mama Bear Tiger Teacher story down, I will tell you that the reason that this is my pen name is because every effective mother that raises a son that is flourishing has a dual personality--she is both Mama Bear as in don't mess with my cubs or I'll mess with you, as well as Tiger Teacher as in don't you mess with your mama, boy, or mama going to set you straight. This incredible duality is found in every boy-mom relationship I have encountered and leads to a litany of stories that range from heartbreaking to hilarious. The healthy mother-son relationship spans a wide gamut where there is enough freedom for both beings to become who they are truly meant to be and when that happens, the mature mother-son relationship is a powerful foundation from which legacies are born.

In this initial episode, you will meet Gen and Cole. My connection is first through Cole who was older than my oldest son, Jackson, and both played football together for the Stallions at St. Francis DeSales High School. I always liked Cole--both in the way he played on the field and in the way he conducted himself outside of football. He was a kid that I knew my kid could look up to and as aspirational parents often do when you have a kid in high school, you tend to know the kids and their parents a few years ahead of your own kid more than the kids coming up the rear behind you.

In its inaugural episode of the Boy Mom Podcast, Suzanne Carawan talks to Gen Yanulavich & Cole Potts.

When I heard that Cole was considering going to James Madison University, I couldn't believe it! Not only was I familiar with JMU because I am originally from the D.C. area and many of my own high school classmates went there, but also because at that time, one of our national board members, Delvin Joyce, was a JMU football star (inducted into the Dukes HOF in 2014) in his day who went on to play in the NFL before starting a successful career in financial services. The first chance I got, I talked to Delvin about Cole and kept telling him that he needed to keep an eye out for him. Delvin gave me that "sure, sure" response until one day he told me he really had been watching him and Cole was legit.

Long story short, that year, the Stallions went on a run and kept winning. I asked Delvin to send the team a video about having a winning mindset and to my surprise, he did! It was an exciting season that landed us in the state championship where we ended up losing in a heartbreaking missed kick (yes, I'm still bitter). The positive side of the season was that Cole went on to commit to JMU and develop a relationship with Delvin Joyce who I later learned is a much bigger deal in JMU football than I ever realized.

During all these years, I was Facebook friends with Gen and then later, Cole, and was a joy to follow his progress, Gen's joy at finding love again and her marriage, their full family going to a multitude of football games including a bowl game, and more. Facebook has a lot of downsides, but one of the upsides is that it can really give you enough snapshots to watch how quickly someone's kid can go from boy to man.

What I love about the Boy Mom Podcasts, however, is that we can get all the backstory of the snapshot images in time. We can learn the mindset, the mishaps, and the motivation behind the evolution of the boys and moms. I love hearing the love between moms and boys, and even moreso, how many men tell me that the podcast gives them a platform to tell their mom how incredibly impactful they've been in their journey to and through manhood.

Here's to many more podcasts to come, but for today, enjoy getting to know Gen and Cole. Happy Valentine's Day to all!

Gen Yanulavich with her entire brood showcasing that she is a bonafide Mama Bear Tiger Teacher.