If this is your first introduction to #IMOMSOHARD, we’ve got two words for you: you’re welcome. Because even if you never meet Kristin Hensley and Jen Smedley in person, we promise they’re going to feel like your new Mom BFFs. Just ask the 2 million+ followers who laugh along with them regularly on YouTube, Facebook, the #IMOMSOHARD podcast, and their cross-country comedy tour.
Maybe it’s because these two moms are real-life besties, with an easy chemistry that only real best friends can achieve. Maybe it’s because they are willing to share the embarrassing details that you only talk about with your closest friends, if at all: nipple hair, mom bods, and hemorrhoids, just to name a few. Their hilarious and relatable banter makes you feel like you’re chatting with someone you know; not like you’re eavesdropping on the conversation in someone’s inner circle, but like you’re a part of it.
Most of all, though, Kristin and Jen are here to let moms know that they’re not alone — and when motherhood gets lonely, which is inevitable at any stage, that’s a valuable thing. Mothers don’t need judgment, they need understanding, which Kristin and Jen give in spades.
The two have been in one another’s lives through dating, marriage, pregnancy, and motherhood, and like any close friends, have helped each other navigate the unexpected twists and turns.
“We quickly figured out that we were each other’s sounding board,” Kristin tells SheKnows. “The second I would tell something to Jen, she’d either make fun of me or pour me a glass of wine, and we’d laugh, and this thing that I had been carrying that I thought was so big very quickly became something small.” If that’s who they were to each other, they reasoned, then maybe they could be that to other women. Because if they so often felt like they were floundering (and outright failing), they knew other women had to be feeling the same way too — but no one was saying it out loud.
“When we started doing the videos, it was because nobody was really being that honest,” Jen says. “They were just showing all these wonderful Instagram moments. None of the ‘before’ pictures.” It was time to get real, and there was no better person to get real with than each other: “We can have these conversations because it’s a safe space. The worst thing that can happen is that someone can laugh at you.”
Or laugh with you, as millions of moms do on the regular. The pair have been a sensation since their very first YouTube video (in which Kristin forgot her baby’s name, because Mom Brain is a thing). Kristin and Jen regularly share their fears and fails in a way that has their fans — “the moms,” as the two call them — emphatically raising their hands in solidarity.
We got to the nitty-gritty of what everybody wants to know: is the duo the same way in real life as they are on social media? The resounding answer is yes — which is part of what makes their BFF chemistry nothing short of magic. And the second most frequently asked question, according to Kristin, is whether they ever fight … to which the answer is, again, yes. Because what friendship doesn’t hit the occasional snag?
“We have a rule,” laughs Kristin. “You get two punches, and not in the face. Gut or butt, no face, and then it’s over with.”
These days, when they’re not slugging it out (only below the neck!), the ladies of #IMOMSOHARD are gearing up for the next leg of their tour dates — and, like most moms, trying to plan what the heck they’re going to do with their kids all summer. They’ve recently partnered with Mother’s Cookies for their “World’s Funnest Mothers” sweepstakes through June 26th; to enter, moms simply have to post a photo of themselves having fun with their kids on Instagram, tag @motherscookiesus, and use the hashtags #worldsfunnestmothers and #sweeps.
“We don’t feel like moms get enough celebration for all the fun behind-the-scenes stuff that they do for their kids, so we thought this was the perfect opportunity,” says Jen. But, she’s quick to clarify, the photos don’t have to be “Pinterest stuff.”
“You know us,” she says. “We don’t have time for Pinterest moments, but we do have time for an impromptu dance party or something like that.”
Whether Kristin and Jen are “momming so hard” on the Internet, or via their podcast, or bringing women together through laughter and realness during their show, one thing remains consistent: they deliver the support and solidarity that all moms need. If you want to feel seriously seen, do yourself a favor and tune in.
“We’re all about celebrating moms, obviously,” says Jen. “Because if we don’t … who will?”
Celebrities — they’re just like us! Especially when it comes to embarrassing their kids.
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