Comedian, writer and mum of three, Katherine Ryan has quickly become one of our favourite celeb mums thanks to her honest and hilarious views on mum life. Having first appeared on our screens in a range of comedy panel shows, the Canadian-Irish comedian has presented a huge range of TV shows, written sitcoms and even has a docuseries all about her life as a working mum.
Katherine Ryan's children
Katherine Ryan has three children, two daughters and a son. Katherine gave birth to her eldest daughter from a previous relationship, Violet, when she was 25. Years later, she rekindled her love with her childhood sweetheart, Bobby Kootstra, who you'll probably recognise from Celebrity Gogglebox.
Although the pair aren't married, they did enter a civil partnership together back in 2019 and they like to go by calling each other 'husband' and 'wife'. They have two children together; a son named Fred born June 2021 and a daughter named Fenna born December 2022.
Katherine Ryan TV show: Parental Guidance
This docuseries is a brilliant watch for every working mother struggling to balance their family and career. In the five episode series, Katherine gave viewers an insight into her own personal life of raising three children, while also exploring unconventional parenting techniques with her partner Bobby Koostra.
Parental Guidance aired back in February 2024 on W, but you can still catch up on all episodes on UK TV Play or Apple TV.
Katherine's parenting techniques and podcast
Not one to hold back, Katherine often shares her own parenting hacks and tips in her podcast, often making headlines with the more controversial ones. She recently caused a stir when talking about how she potty trains her tots.
‘I put them on the potty pretty much from the moment they’re born.’ she explained on her podcast, ‘Katherine Ryan: Telling Everybody Everything’.
‘A newborn is still scrunched up, you can’t sit them on the potty, but from about the time they can listen to a story and look at a book, I just put them on the potty randomly throughout the day, and they have an instinct to go.’ She continued.
‘It happens all over the world, just not in Western culture. We are the ones, the only ones, who train our babies to go in a nappy.
‘So yeah, in the early stages, when my children are learning to walk, they do chuck a p*** here and there on the ground and you have to be very careful that they don’t slip in it, but they see themselves peeing and they learn what peeing is.
‘That’s fine with me because crucially what I’m not doing when I potty train my kids young is I am avoiding the stage where the rest of us in Western culture train them to go in their pants.
‘And then it becomes really easy at six months when you start to wean them and give them solid food, then they make a face when they need to go for a poo because it’s no longer breastmilk poo that goes everywhere.
‘And when they go, just be like “wow”, and reward it with nappy free time because that’s far more comfortable and just try at different times throughout the day to pop them on and see if they sit and go, “Do you need a peepee?”
You can listen to Katherine’s podcast, Katherine Ryan: Telling Everybody Everything on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Samantha Ball is a Commercial Content Writer and freelanced for the Mother&Baby website for two years before joining the team full-time. She's a mum of two and loves browsing for the best products and cute outfits.