Episode 20
We've Been Programmed By the Boomers to be Secretive
Boomers love secrets!
I said it. Maybe you flinched reading that—maybe you’re nodding along, feeling it deep in your bones, the way “don’t tell anyone” was as common in your house as “finish your peas.” This episode is for every person who grew up in a family where “put on a smile” was mandatory, pain was packed neatly away, and no news—good or bad—ever left the front door until it was passé.
I’m Lauren Howard (L2). Here’s the deal: I was raised by a Greatest Generation dad and a very boomer mom. Our home? “Curated” was not an Instagram aesthetic, it was a lifestyle. Major life events? Hush-hush. Fights? Don’t you dare let the neighbors know. Moving across the country? Tell no one—not even the kids, until a for-sale sign is basically in your face.
Fast forward to adulthood, and I’m the one who “shouldn’t tell,” but thirty seconds later I’m blasting my life out to the internet. It’s a push-pull dance between inherited silence and radical honesty—a lifelong project of untangling which secrets keep us safe and which just keep us isolated.
WHY LISTEN?
- If you're part of the cycle of "boomer secrets" and want to break the shame around pain and joy.
- If generational expectations shape your willingness to be open about your struggles, and you want to over come them.
- If embracing your whole self, not just the curated parts would improve your life.
Click play. Let’s un-curate, together.
Transcript
Hello, nine year old. You are about to leave the only house
Speaker:that you have ever known. You're leaving all your friends. You're leaving everything you know,
Speaker:but don't tell anybody. If you share your joy,
Speaker:you also have to share your pain. And we don't share pain. That's private. Those
Speaker:are the secrets the boomers like you do not have to
Speaker:break yourself up into little pieces to make other people
Speaker:comfortable. Stay whole and let them choke.
Speaker:Hi, everybody. I'm Lauren Howard. I go by L2. Yes,
Speaker:you can call me L2. Everybody does. It's a long story. It's actually not
Speaker:that long a story, but we'll save it for another time. Welcome to
Speaker:Different Not Broken, which is our podcast on
Speaker:exactly that. That there are a lot of people in this world walking around feeling
Speaker:broken. And the reality is you're just different, and that's fine.
Speaker:Okay, so this is a genuine question that I have, and I would love to
Speaker:know your feedback on it. And I say this as I think
Speaker:I'm an elder millennial. I think I'm 38. I feel
Speaker:elder. I feel far older than a millennial, but
Speaker:I think I'm an elder millennial. My dad was considered greatest generation because
Speaker:he was about 10 years older than my mom. My mom definitely a boomer. So
Speaker:I was raised by very boomer esque people. And
Speaker:there was so much we weren't allowed to talk about in our house.
Speaker:I don't mean it as, like, topics were taboo. Everything
Speaker:had to be packaged up and made presentable to share with
Speaker:anybody outside the walls of our family. Right. Like, if you were fighting about
Speaker:something, nobody could know. If you were angry at each other, nobody could know. If
Speaker:we were moving, that had to be kept secret for a long time. If we
Speaker:were selling the house, we couldn't tell anybody. If you lost your job,
Speaker:oh, my gosh, don't tell anybody. I think of all of the different
Speaker:things that basically were. It had to be spoken in
Speaker:hushed tones. I obviously, I have railed against that
Speaker:very hard and do everything exactly the opposite. Maybe too much, though.
Speaker:Probably too much, though. But I still have that instinct when something
Speaker:happens of being like, oh, my God, don't tell anybody. Oh, my
Speaker:God, I don't think anybody can know. Oh, this is so embarrassing. Oh, what if
Speaker:somebody finds out? And I realized it's because we have been
Speaker:conditioned, because boomers like secrets. They
Speaker:like to have a very deliberately
Speaker:constructed, curated version of existence
Speaker:that is the only part about them that you find out. So if
Speaker:you lost your job, the answer Was not to tell people you lost
Speaker:your job. It was to just hide until you found another job.
Speaker:You know, I remember when we moved from Florida to Louisiana when I
Speaker:was a kid, My parents didn't tell us we were moving. And there
Speaker:was a for sale sign in our front yard. No, no, no, it wasn't a
Speaker:for sale sign. The real estate agent came over with the car, like
Speaker:emblazoned in the real estate company. And I was like,
Speaker:that's the stuff that's usually on a for sale sign. I wonder why this person
Speaker:is at our house. And my mom is like, walking this person through the
Speaker:house while she's taking pictures and didn't tell us
Speaker:that it was because we were moving across the country. So
Speaker:me being somebody who could, you know, it's that pattern recognition.
Speaker:Even as a child, I was like, a real estate agent is at our
Speaker:house and my mother is showing the real estate agent that about our house.
Speaker:So I wonder if somebody's gonna buy our house. That's weird. I.
Speaker:I probably was maybe eight, maybe nine. And
Speaker:the real estate agent left and I looked at my mom and said, are we
Speaker:selling our house? The answer I got equated to, like, that's none of your business.
Speaker:I kind of feel like it's like a little bit my business. Not that I
Speaker:get to make the decision, but like, maybe good information to have. So of course
Speaker:my dad came in later and said, I
Speaker:got a job offer, we're going to go take it, we're moving. But it
Speaker:was, don't tell anybody. Hello, nine year
Speaker:old. You are about to leave the only house that you have ever
Speaker:known. You're leaving all your friends, you're leaving everything you know, but don't tell
Speaker:anybody. Hey, you probably feel anxious. Not that this was ever
Speaker:addressed, but like, you probably feel anxious about the fact that your entire life is
Speaker:going to change and you're going somewhere you've never been before. No
Speaker:big. Keep it to yourself. So, of course, the next day I went to school
Speaker:and like, told everybody because I was so upset about it.
Speaker:I don't think I told everybody. I think I told my teacher and I think
Speaker:I told one other person or something like that. My parents later that day were
Speaker:like, did you tell anybody? And I'm giving my mother a whole lot of credit
Speaker:by including my dad in this nonsense. But he was not particularly involved in
Speaker:this nonsense. He was also an innocent bystander in it. And
Speaker:I think I fessed up to who I told and she was like, oh, so
Speaker:no one. And thankfully, she took it well within the time period of that
Speaker:day or a couple of days, however long it had been. I think they had
Speaker:probably finalized the job offer and put the house on the market. So it was
Speaker:like, well, there's a sign in our front yard now, so everybody knows, so now
Speaker:we can't keep it a secret. But like, their instinct was to be like,
Speaker:hey, there's this major life changing thing happening. Don't tell anyone.
Speaker:Some of that is boomer. Some of that I think is just Jewish superstition.
Speaker:A lot of it is probably Jewish superstition. Like, you don't celebrate anything until it's
Speaker:done. And even then, be careful. I remember when I was pregnant with my
Speaker:oldest, my mom was like mortified
Speaker:that we would order furniture for the nursery before the baby
Speaker:was here, because apparently that's not a thing that the Jewish people do.
Speaker:She was like, other people can buy you stuff, but it doesn't go into your
Speaker:house. It has to stay somewhere else until the baby gets here. And I'm like,
Speaker:oh, that's why I'm like this. Oh, got it. That's why
Speaker:anytime something, something good happens, I'm like, nope, Wait until
Speaker:we have the signed form and all of the money in the
Speaker:bank and three years have passed and then we can talk about something good that
Speaker:we have done. We don't celebrate shit. Because
Speaker:the threat of the thing not happening has always been held
Speaker:over as this, like, impossible, insurmountable. Like,
Speaker:well, what if you tell someone and it doesn't happen?
Speaker:And for a long time felt like, realistic. And
Speaker:then I was like, wait, what if you tell someone and it doesn't happen? Well,
Speaker:then you tell them it didn't happen, right? Like, you just tell them
Speaker:it didn't happen. I feel like that's a pretty easy solution. So
Speaker:I, at one point, when I was pregnant with my oldest, I bought some clothes,
Speaker:like one of the baby stores, you know, I got an email that
Speaker:there was a sale and it was still fun to shop for baby clothes. So
Speaker:I was like, I'm gonna buy a bunch of baby clothes. So I went and
Speaker:bought a whole bunch of stuff on this sale that cost me like almost nothing.
Speaker:And I had it shipped to my house. And my mother lost her
Speaker:ever loving shit. She was like, you should have had it shipped to my house.
Speaker:It doesn't go to your house. But like, I, I go to your house. Like,
Speaker:why wouldn't. Why does it matter? She's like, you don't bring baby
Speaker:stuff into the house until the baby gets here. That is
Speaker:inconvenient. Because what if I have to put together a crib? What if we
Speaker:need to paint the room? You want me to paint the room when
Speaker:there's a baby in it so the baby can smell fumes?
Speaker:I've now had a child, and no, the first year, my oldest was not
Speaker:in her room almost ever. At the time, it was like, what do you mean?
Speaker:I'm not allowed to have any baby stuff in my house
Speaker:because the baby's not here yet. Like, technically, the baby is here yet. The baby
Speaker:is in my belly. Anywhere I go, the baby is. So if I'm
Speaker:standing in the baby's room, the baby is in the baby's room.
Speaker:She was having none of it. So eventually, I'm sure we just ignored her and
Speaker:we were like, cool, bro. Don't worry about it. We'll figure it out. But it
Speaker:goes back to the same thing. I think there's a lot of that with pregnancy
Speaker:loss, too. I think you're not supposed to say anything about being pregnant for the
Speaker:first 14 weeks or however long it is that is the first
Speaker:trimester, because what if it doesn't work out meanwhile?
Speaker:Like, you have to pretend that you're not vomiting every
Speaker:37 seconds because you're pregnant. And if somebody asks why you're vomiting,
Speaker:you just have to have food poisoning for three months. That's not
Speaker:realistic. There's a spot in my backyard
Speaker:where, for some reason, and we had just moved into this house, for some reason,
Speaker:every time I walked across ar, I would hit a
Speaker:spot and puke. Every time. I don't know if it was the plants that were
Speaker:there. I don't know what it was, but I had a puke spot in the
Speaker:backyard. And if I walked across our backyard, I knew I was vomiting in that
Speaker:spot. You can't hide stuff
Speaker:like that. But we're not supposed to tell anybody, because
Speaker:if you share your joy, you also have to share your pain. And
Speaker:we don't share pain. That's private. That's
Speaker:kept for secret. Those are the secrets. The boomers like,
Speaker:pain is ugly. It doesn't come with a
Speaker:hoop skirt. And it's not curated. It's not perfect,
Speaker:obviously. I'm sure, like, a lot of that was their upbringing. They came out
Speaker:of very, very difficult times. My mom was born very
Speaker:shortly after the Depression, at the very
Speaker:tail end of World War II. My dad was born before World War II.
Speaker:They lived in worlds that had very little and
Speaker:eventually, you know, grew into something. And
Speaker:you curated the appearance of what you were able to get your hands on,
Speaker:I guess. But I do not have a lot of time for secrets.
Speaker:And for secrets that serve the purpose of shame. Right?
Speaker:Like, why would you not share your pain? Because pain is shameful.
Speaker:You don't want to tell somebody that you had joy because then you might
Speaker:have to tell them that you have loss. Somebody who doesn't want to be present
Speaker:for both shouldn't be present for either. Somebody who only wants to celebrate with you,
Speaker:but then isn't going to show up when you're on the other side of it
Speaker:or at the same time, somebody who only shows up when things are really
Speaker:terrible and only is able to have compassion for you when that
Speaker:compassion serves this image of who they are. But then
Speaker:on the day to day, you know, regular stuff, they're nowhere to be found.
Speaker:That's equally problematic. So it's something I have to work through all the
Speaker:time. Again, some of it is boomer stuff. Some of it I think is just
Speaker:Jewish superstition. If you
Speaker:ever see a Jewish person spitting three times, it's.
Speaker:It's to ward off the evil eye, because that's a thing that we do.
Speaker:And then, like, there's this. I. I have this
Speaker:like deep feeling in the pit of my stomach
Speaker:when I say or do things that are,
Speaker:quote, unquote, bringing on the evil eye. Which means, like, don't
Speaker:tempt fate, don't welcome things that we don't want here
Speaker:by asserting something that we don't know is true. Yet it is
Speaker:really, really hard to undo. And I say this as a person who talks about
Speaker:my whole entire life and every single part of it on the Internet pretty regularly,
Speaker:including, like right this second.
Speaker:It's still there. I remember with our second,
Speaker:I actually was pretty open about it when we finally got the positive
Speaker:pregnancy test because we went through IVF and it was like a whole thing. And
Speaker:when we finally got the positive pregnancy test, I don't remember if I told
Speaker:people or if I was like ready to tell people because the first one, we
Speaker:hadn't told people for a really long time. And we had been married for
Speaker:five years by the time we got pregnant. It took us a long time. And
Speaker:it was Thanksgiving. And we went out for Thanksgiving, which we didn't normally do.
Speaker:It was the last Thanksgiving with my dad. He was already pretty sick at that
Speaker:point. We had decided we were going to tell my parents and my husband
Speaker:being doing the right thing, but not
Speaker:thinking of the optics of the right thing he was
Speaker:doing, looked at the server and was like, can we get. There were five
Speaker:adults at the table. And he goes, can we get four glasses of champagne? My
Speaker:mom's like, four? Why do we need four? There's five of
Speaker:us. We need five. And he kind of goes.
Speaker:And I don't remember how he got out of it, but he did get out
Speaker:of it. And he. I think he said, oh, well, I don't want one. So
Speaker:he gives, performatively gives me his glass of champagne, and then he's like, you know,
Speaker:I. Give me that back. I want to make a tapas. I want to talk
Speaker:about what we're thankful about. And I'm like, you could have just paid for the
Speaker:fifth glass of champagne, you dingus. So we told our family that
Speaker:way. I still have it in my brain, like, nobody should know. We can only
Speaker:tell our immediate family. But of course, we're in public
Speaker:and somebody's gonna overhear. And so the server comes over
Speaker:and she's like, congratulations. And I'm like, I guess this is
Speaker:okay. Cause I don't know. You're a nice person. I like
Speaker:you, but if the rule is we don't tell anybody, I just told this complete
Speaker:stranger on accident, and that seems like it totally defeats the
Speaker:purpose, but I guess who's she gonna tell
Speaker:now? When we did our launch party for LB
Speaker:in 2024, the person who served that party was the person
Speaker:who served us that night. She basically got to see the child
Speaker:that she was there when I was five weeks pregnant.
Speaker:Also, funny story unrelated,
Speaker:we had another party at the same
Speaker:restaurant, like, four or five weeks later. We were
Speaker:closing our main office. We were moving to a different office. We decided to have
Speaker:a party to just kind of say goodbye to everything. And we invited a bunch
Speaker:of people. And I, at that point, I was 10 weeks pregnant and nobody knew.
Speaker:And so I decided I was gonna wear these, like, high heeled boots that I
Speaker:really liked. And I just wasn't thinking. I pulled up the
Speaker:zipper and I'm like, why can't I put these on? This is weird. I
Speaker:can't put them on. Okay, I guess I need to wear different shoes. I don't.
Speaker:I just wasn't thinking. And so I grabbed different shoes and I looked down at
Speaker:my feet and they're like. I was only. I was 10 weeks pregnant. They're
Speaker:like. They look like elephant feet. And I was like, why are my feet like
Speaker:this? This doesn't make any sense. What is happening? And so I go
Speaker:downstairs to my dad. We were staying in his house at the time. And I
Speaker:sit on the bed. And I go, dad, my feet are all swollen. What is
Speaker:happening? What's wrong with me? And he goes, I don't know
Speaker:how to tell you this, but you're pregnant. And
Speaker:I went, okay, but, like, I'm only 10 weeks pregnant. Why would my feet be
Speaker:so swollen? And he goes, you can't be a little
Speaker:bit pregnant. Welcome to being pregnant. I was
Speaker:like, this does not make sense. And he was like, it actually makes exactly perfect
Speaker:sense. You are the only person who's confused. And so we went to the party
Speaker:where we had, like, bought a whole bunch of, you know, wine and stuff so
Speaker:that everybody could have wine, and they had the bar. And I would usually have
Speaker:a glass of wine, even though I don't drink that much. But the manager of
Speaker:the restaurant, who we've known for a million years, got sparkling grape
Speaker:juice and put it behind the bar so that it would
Speaker:look like I was drinking wine the whole time. I was sitting across the table
Speaker:from a really good friend of ours who's an ER doctor. And I ordered.
Speaker:I think I ordered salmon. I don't remember, But I know I ordered something that
Speaker:I always order that I love there. I take a sip of my grape juice
Speaker:and I put it down. And then I look at my food, and I think,
Speaker:I must have just made this, like, awful face. And he looks at me and
Speaker:he goes, something wrong with your food? And I said,
Speaker:no, it just all of a sudden doesn't look that good. I don't know. My
Speaker:phone pings. It's him across the table, and it
Speaker:says, how many weeks?
Speaker:And I was like, God damn it, get your doctor ass out of here. So
Speaker:I think they ended up bringing me, like, literal saltines at this very fancy
Speaker:party because all I wanted to do is puke. But anyway, like, I'm standing in
Speaker:a room of, like, my favorite people, but because I was 10 weeks pregnant, not
Speaker:12 weeks pregnant, I didn't say anything to them, even though it would have been
Speaker:an amazing time to celebrate with all of them. And that's
Speaker:stupid, because every single one of those people would have
Speaker:supported me through immense amounts of pain, just
Speaker:like they would have celebrated with me. So I think it is time, first off,
Speaker:that we very much normalize the discussion of
Speaker:pregnancy loss, but also dispel
Speaker:these very deep connections that we have with this
Speaker:very boomerish idea of curated life and
Speaker:how things are supposed to look and what you can share publicly and what you
Speaker:can't share publicly. That doesn't mean you have to share everything publicly.
Speaker:Absolutely. Like, use your discretion. Share what you're comfortable with. People like me have
Speaker:big mouths that, like, I'm the type of person that I'm always like, oh, my
Speaker:God, this is embarrassing. I'm never going to tell anybody. And then I immediately pick
Speaker:up the phone and go, oh, my God, just guess what's happened. Or post it
Speaker:on the whole Internet for everybody to find out. My titer for embarrassment is
Speaker:very big for about 30 seconds. And then I'm like. And time to publicly
Speaker:embarrass myself. Like, I'm literally the one who's always like, oh, my God, don't tell
Speaker:anybody. And then immediately tell somebody.
Speaker:It's deeply, deeply tied to this
Speaker:archaic idea from generations past that
Speaker:you have to keep the jagged edges secret,
Speaker:that they. They can't be shown publicly, that you have to be
Speaker:fully presentable, fully put together, fully made up, only
Speaker:digestible to everybody around all the time. And I have
Speaker:a friend who posts things like this on Instagram all the time. I think he's
Speaker:the one that I got it from. But you do not have to break yourself
Speaker:up into little pieces to make other people comfortable.
Speaker:Stay whole and let them choke. Your pain
Speaker:is allowed as much airtime as your joy. There is
Speaker:nothing more shameful about pain than joy.
Speaker:And this idea that we have to keep those things secret
Speaker:because sharing them is
Speaker:ugly or uncomfortable or
Speaker:in some ways, attention seeking is not
Speaker:correct. There are situations in your life where you should get attention, and
Speaker:attention doesn't have to be a bad thing. It doesn't have to be a dirty
Speaker:word. There are times where you need people focused on
Speaker:you, and it is okay to exist in those times and not keep them to
Speaker:yourself. If you're comfortable with Chairman, even if it's just a very small
Speaker:group of very trusted people, we should not be
Speaker:responsible for carrying around prior generations. Shame
Speaker:about the ways that we exist in 2025. We're
Speaker:different people. We have different access to information. And every
Speaker:time you share one of your experiences,
Speaker:it normalizes it for somebody else. Isolation. L.
Speaker:For this week's small talk again, Remember, this is something we do every week. It's
Speaker:his birthday and he was being shit because he's always a shit on his birthday,
Speaker:which is fine. Then he's like, fine, we'll just go somewhere. And he doesn't tell
Speaker:us where we're going. We end up at Guitar Center. Like, most people are like,
Speaker:for my birthday, I would like a cake and a new pair
Speaker:of shoes. And my husband is like, please only present me with
Speaker:$10,000 items and make sure that they are
Speaker:of only the highest quality and that you know everything about them inside
Speaker:and out. And I will still hate it, but I might keep it. You know
Speaker:the ones. I don't know anything about music. Like, I think it's a mixer.
Speaker:They have, like, the blocks, like, the squares that you can program
Speaker:to do different things, and if you hit them in different. Okay, he's had that.
Speaker:He's had that for, like, years. He's never touched it.
Speaker:He's never played with it. He's like, I just saw the synthesizer, and I think,
Speaker:I really like it. And I really like that. And I was like, okay, but
Speaker:I'll buy it. I don't care about buying it. But, like, are you going to
Speaker:use it? And he just. I swear to God, this man looks at me and
Speaker:goes, I mean, well, that's always the question. And I was like, no,
Speaker:it should not be the question. You should know. Like, yes, this is something
Speaker:I'm going to use. Not, like, this is the thing that I want because it's
Speaker:expensive anyway. This is my life. And then he's looking at other ones, and then
Speaker:he's, like, looking at ones that are, like, $4,500. And I was like, did not
Speaker:sign up for that, bro. But it's his birthday, and I'm trying to keep my
Speaker:mouth shut, and I'm like, maybe, like, maybe he's just gonna say no, and I
Speaker:can get out of buying a $3,000 present for his birthday. Like, that'd be magical.
Speaker:So that's starting to percolate through my brain. And we're standing in
Speaker:the store, and this one pops up. Or he just,
Speaker:like, sees this one, and he's starting to, like, tinker on his phone, and he's
Speaker:like, oh. And I can see that he's, like, thinking about it. He, like, kind
Speaker:of looks at me and does the like. And I'm
Speaker:just like. He had already been so grumpy. I was like,
Speaker:shut up and work harder and it'll be fine. A sales guy walks over.
Speaker:He's very nice. His name is Jason. Shout out to Jason. Jason
Speaker:comes over and he says, hey, do you have this one in stock? And he's
Speaker:like, I don't know if we do, but let me go check in the back.
Speaker:And this is my husband's luck in everything that he does. Oh, to be
Speaker:a white man in America. So he comes back and he's like, we do have
Speaker:it in stock in the back. And he's like, okay. And this is all the
Speaker:information and, like, points to the tag. And he goes, yeah, except that's not the
Speaker:right price. And he goes, what?
Speaker:And he goes, it's. It's on sale. It's less than that. I don't know why
Speaker:the tag's wrong. He's like, let me go ring it in and I'll tell you.
Speaker:So anyway, he's ringing it out. What this man leaves out, not the
Speaker:gentleman who worked there, who was a very nice man, but what Kyle leaves
Speaker:out is that if you buy the synthesizer, you
Speaker:also need the monitors and the synthesizer stand
Speaker:and the bench and the monitor stands, none of which I had
Speaker:purchased him previously, because who the fuck knows that? So he's like, all
Speaker:right, I'm just going to go look at a couple other things. And of course,
Speaker:of course, in typical Kyle Howard fashion, he's like, no, I'll pay for these.
Speaker:And I'm like, how does that make a difference? Because it came off of your
Speaker:debit card number. We've had the same account for 15 years. Like, how does that.
Speaker:Are you squirreling away money that I don't know about? Because if you are,
Speaker:gimme. Because I spend a lot of money on you, sir. His mom
Speaker:was there, and his mom actually covered a bunch of the stuff because she didn't
Speaker:have anything for him for his birthday because he was being such a shit. And
Speaker:so she was like, I got those. That's fine. And then he wasn't a shit
Speaker:the rest of the day because he got a new toy and a new thing
Speaker:to obsess over and be hyper fixated on. Thanks for being here,
Speaker:guys. Have a good day. Love you. Mean it.
Speaker:Somebody just stole one of my dogs. Somebody just walked in and took one. That's
Speaker:fair. My shirt is so filthy now because he walked up and slapped me with
Speaker:his tongue. And since his tongue is at shoulder level. Oh, my God,
Speaker:there's so much slobber in my hair right now. These are my choices. Chihuahua.
Speaker:You don't have this problem with Chihuahuas?
