Guest: Melissa Radke

A Celebration of the Women Who Made Us This Way: Melissa Radke Returns to the For the Love Podcast

Melissa Radke is the best friend you never knew you always wanted with a Texas-sized heart and sense of humor to match. She’s also an author, speaker, TV personality, and For the Love fan-favorite, best known for her gut-busting sense of humor, deep honesty, and fierce Southern sass. Melissa first gained a national following with her viral videos about parenting and real life, which led to a reality show (The Radkes) and a bestselling book (Eat Cake. Be Brave.) A fierce advocate for women finding their voice—especially in midlife—Melissa brings laughter and tears to everything she touches. Her newest project, Chicken Fried Women, a collection of stories (with a companion podcast series) celebrates the women—battered on the outside, tender on the inside, some salty, some spicy—who made us who we are.

In this life-giving conversation filled with snort-laughs and tears, we talk about: 

  • The incredible women who raised us, taught us, prayed for us, and even humbled us when we needed it most
  • The stories that have become legend in our families—Melissa tells a story about her Aunt Melba helping her mother with fastening her girdle in a cramped church bathroom stall that left Jen and Amy in stitches
  • The friends who have shown up for us in times of crisis with remedies and solutions that we never could have fathomed for ourselves

Fierce, Free & Full of Questions: Melissa Radke Gets Jen to Tell it All

The For the Love world is totally upside-down today, y’all. Jen is a guest on her own podcast, and gets interviewed about her new book, Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire, by the ever-so-magical Melissa Radke! Jen reveals the first outlier women who made lasting impressions on her: watching how they lived in her own skins in a way that didn’t fit the template Jen had been prescribed from her conservative upbringing. The two talk about growing up in the church and the messaging they received about who they should be as women, and the hard work of pushing past those boundaries to become the women they were designed to be. Listen as Melissa pulls an “Oprah” on Jen, how some of  Jen’s words made Melissa “mad,” and how they both are learning to discover who they are and how to love every part of themselves (and we can too). Finding a sense of belonging to ourselves, uncovering who we are and what we want, is the start of the journey to becoming Fierce, Free and Full of Fire.

Eat Cake & Be Brave: The Funny Formula For Life With Melissa Radke

We close out with a last laugh in our “For the Love of Laughter” series with none other than one of our own. We asked you:  “Who’s funny? Who is that funny person we should absolutely have on the podcast?” And you responded–Melissa Radke!  Melissa is that funny friend who wryly observes all the things in life that we face as women and moms, and takes them to task–hilariously head on. Whether it’s struggling with “Mom Guilt,” or trying to make logical the complexities of “Red Ribbon Week”–140 million viewers of her videos can’t get enough of her side-splitting soliloquies. You’ll also hear Melissa’s amazing mom hacks for everything from kids’ costumes to a “nutritious” lunch. If you’ve been labeled as “too” much of something–too big, too loud, too vocal, too much–you’ll find courage in Melissa’s message of pushing aside what some people might say you are, and believing in who you’re made to be.