On today's episode, we revisit Dax's mom's episode from July 2nd, 2018. Laura Labo (Dax's Mom) is an American entrepreneur, businesswoman and Dax's #1 love of his life. In this special episode, Laura sits down with the Armchair Expert to discuss her life story, the mistakes that made her and the struggle of raising a family as a single mother. Dax describes the many reasons he loves her and Laura talks about the recent death of her husband. The two of them travel down memory lane in a delightful and endearing lovefest in which they talk about Laura's bouts with depression, the impetus for Dax's love addiction and the exact degree of ugliness to which Dax was as a baby.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new content on YouTube or listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free by joining Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial by visiting wondery.com/links/armchair-expert-with-dax-shepard/ now.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What are the highlights of Laura LeBeau's life story?
You were born in 1951. You have five brothers. All right. And you were the third eldest, right?
Yes.
Uncle Larry, Uncle Tom, then you, then Uncle Alger, then Uncle Joel, then Uncle Robbie. Right. Yeah. And as a little sister to two boys...
infatuated with them.
You were.
Oh, my God. They were so who wouldn't have been. They were so good to me.
They were.
Well, I mean, I could tell you a thousand stories, not just the ones where they use me as a goalie in the basement when they played hockey and I had a zillion pads on and stuff and they just kept shooting pucks at me. But the better stories are, you know, my brothers both had paper routes, which was common for boys in the 50s.
In Michigan, by the way, this is all in Michigan.
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Chapter 2: How did Laura cope as a single mother?
I had worked at Sears saving money to go to Europe on this, um, student exchange program. And so I definitely did not want to get pregnant, but at the same time at the moment, you know, I knew I would get pregnant and I made the conscious decision of, well, so then we'll get married, you know, like, so can't say it was unintentional, but it was, Unplanned. Unthought out.
Cognitive dissonance. You were juggling two different goals that were contradictory in pursuing both at the same time.
I think this is what you would call 17 year old experience and logic making a good decision. Yeah. When I graduated, I was four months and no one knew I was pregnant.
No, but give me just a context. How many girls, cause that was Vietnam. How many girls were getting pregnant in high school back then? Was it like 10%? Is it less?
Is it more? I don't know what the percentage was, but in my, it was common though. Yeah. And it was common for both males and females. I mean, I, there were probably six or seven of us in my senior class that were married at graduation.
Wow. Yeah. That's pretty wild. Yeah.
Yeah, it was a different time. It was, you know, I can remember in my senior year, maybe in the fall or not positive, but in my senior year, I can remember there was a girl in school that was his name, Dan. Anyway, it doesn't matter his name, but he was killed in action and she was engaged to him. And so it's. Here she is engaged in senior year, which is not uncommon.
A lot of girls in my class were engaged to guys from the upper class that had gone to Vietnam. And I just remember being so sad for her that she had lost him.
Yeah. Yeah. That's brutal.
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Chapter 3: What challenges did Laura face during her marriages?
It's a longevity platform that helps you be proactive about your health. With cutting-edge genetic testing and biomarker analysis, you can create a health plan that is tailored just for you. As you know, we're both in this study now, And I've been going back to 23andMe and ordering different results, which is so cool. It's all sitting there for me to do.
Oh, that's so cool because we've done it before and we really loved what we learned.
Also, do it as a family or like as a friendship. It's really fun because you can get your results and you can read them together. It's fun.
It is. Advocate for your health today. Go to 23andMe.com slash DAX for your limited time offer. That's 23andMe.com slash DAX. But then we moved about a mile down the road on Middle Road.
To our house.
To the house, which this is David, my older brother's utopia. This is the greatest period of his life from five years old to eight years old in Middle Road on property. Right. Yes. Dirt bikes. Yep. A dad, a mom. Everything was great.
Yeah. Well, in fact, even now in my current home, when I ride my tractor to cut my grass, I often say a secret prayer to myself and say, don't be an idiot. Don't blow this this time. This is your happiest. Because I remember on Middle Road being so happy riding the tractor, cutting the grass.
Two little boys, we had a dump cart on the tractor and I'd put the boys in the dump cart and I would take them out in the woods and we would find wild pear trees and pick pears. And it was just like heaven. It was like everything I ever wanted. It was just, I was so incredibly happy. It was perfect.
And then things go sideways and we don't need to get into that. Yeah. Just 23 year olds being married with two kids pressure. He's not home. You guys, God knows what kind of hanky panky you're both up to, but suffice to say you leave dad. Yes. In 1978.
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Chapter 4: How did Laura's upbringing influence her views on relationships?
And we saved you a couple of times throughout your life. Right. That same rationale where you were contemplating hurting yourself. And that kind of was the life raft.
Yeah, that's it. Because I knew because at that time your dad was using very heavily and my family lived far away. Yeah. And it was like I was literally all that you guys had.
Right.
Yeah.
And I knew that Carly dad couldn't raise the three of us. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. I knew that this was. Yeah, I could not.
If you're wondering why would I just drag my mom down this terribly traumatic memory lane, I think what's really powerful and amazing about your story is if you are 28 years old right now and you're getting beat up and your life is miserable and you think that's it and that's the rest of your life, what's coming is so beautiful and there's so much ahead. There was so much ahead for you.
I can't imagine in those moments you felt like there was so much ahead for you.
There was so much I was so far in debt and it was such my self-esteem was so smashed. It was so it was such a horrible, horrible time that looking back on it, I'm amazed. That was my life.
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Chapter 5: What experiences shaped Dax's view of his mother?
I'm sure we'll talk about it, but I want to know how you met him. Blind date. Oh. Oh.
I'd never figured out on my own.
Yeah, that's what it took.
Somebody, yeah.
Honestly, if I had to figure it out on my own, I still believe that. Like, if I should ever date again, which right at this moment I have no intention of, I would not date without, like, Dax picking up the person or something. You know, like somebody I trust. That's how I feel.
OK, the one little thing I want to go over before we move off of Greg and Tara and all that is to me, I feel like this is where my first introduction to being a love addict kind of starts because and by the way, these are my fondest memories alive. So I'm not being critical of this. I'm just aware of it.
Mm hmm.
You worked so much. You had so much going on. I know where you're going.
You were so fucking tired.
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Chapter 6: How did Laura's perspective on love evolve over time?
And they would say, we're taking the car. We're going up to Kroger. Can we have money? All right. And I'd say, see my purse.
Let me also add on top of all the jobs and the divorce and everything that was going on. David and I were also fucking terrible kids. I mean, we fought nonstop. We were constantly in a fight that you were separating us.
You wanted my attention.
Yeah, boy, we fought nonstop. I can only imagine what it was like dealing with that. So anyways, you and Greg, you get divorced. And then you meet another man. We'll keep him anonymous because he's still alive. And you've now been through this twice. What was it that this time around you were like, fuck it, I think this is it. I'm going to go for it again. Did you have to talk yourself into that?
Very candidly, I will tell you that we had a visit from my in-laws and they were sitting in the family room and they started openly talking about how good my two stepchildren were and how awful my three biological children were because we had custody of all five.
And they started talking about it and I said to them, I'm very uncomfortable with you speaking badly about my children and I need to ask you to stop. And they kept going and I asked them again. And when they kept going a third time, which I actually think it was choreographed by my ex-husband, and I just stood up and yelled down to your bedroom, Dax, pack your
shit we're out of here and i went in the kitchen and got a garbage bag and i went to carly's bedroom and started throwing her shit in and my shit in and and we dax came running up from the lower level with his bag and david ran out of his bedroom with his bag and we got in the car But what had happened just prior to this happening was all in one weekend while they were visiting.
And I was so just really quick as we skipped over. You met a man at work and you married him and he had two kids. So now there were five of us kids. And this man had to travel during the wintertime. And so you were often throughout the winter left with five kids now and also a full time job.
And I was going to school at night.
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Chapter 7: What lessons did Laura learn from her struggles?
You wanted to get close to the tailpipe?
Yeah. This is brutal. It is brutal. And I had on white pants. And all of a sudden I realized, Jesus, her crotch falls. My pants are getting dirty. And the absurdity of that, that I was going to kill myself, but I was concerned about my pants getting dirty. I went into a hysterical laughing thing, opened the garage drawer, drove the car out and said, no, I got to fix this.
You can't just run away from everything. You have to fix this.
Hmm. Now, while all that's happening, which is, you know, the personal life is not is not thriving. You are climbing the ladder at General Motors very successfully for someone without a college degree and a woman. Yes. Against many odds. You end up at this point. You're the you're a fleet manager, right?
Which is a good supervisor over three departments.
Right. So you're a baller now at GM. You've done very well. And they have this wonderful thing for the employees at the GM Proving Grounds. They have a family day and they invite everyone to bring their family. And the Proving Grounds, if you have no awareness of it, is just... You know, dozens of square miles of race track. It's Disney World for cars. There's hill climbs.
There's tracks that you don't have such steering wheel if you're going 70 miles an hour. It's just a blast. And so you started volunteering because you wanted overtime, if I remember correctly, to start organizing this huge event that they would have at the proving grounds. So you're doing that. You do that a few years in a row, I guess.
And and the Longley Press show. Yeah. That they had out there. Yeah.
Right. So you're dabbling in this side thing just for overtime, which is basically event planning and execution. So you get an offer to go work at an ad agency in Detroit, which is Campbell Ewald, which at the time had the General Motors account. I don't know if they still do or not. But Chevrolet account, Chevrolet account. OK.
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