Expectant and new moms receive all sorts of wisdom from well-meaning sources.
"Sleep now! You won't be able to later!" (If only that's how sleep worked, we'd have banked ours up during kindergarten nap time.) "Ohhhhhh, enjoy this phase. You'll blink and they'll be going to college!" (That probably feels true, but telling an exhausted, anxiety-ridden new parent they should be relishing the moment more is not the look.)
And like those largely unhelpful tropes, Meghan Trainor got one piece of advice that she was not all about.
"You know what I didn't like," Trainor recently told E! News, recounting the negative chatter she heard both when announcing her engagement to now-husband Daryl Sabara and her subsequent pregnancy, "they would say, like, 'Oh, sit down,' to my husband. Like, 'Just keep your head down and stay out of her way.' Or, like, 'Once you have a kid, it's their life now and you're in it.'"
Sigh.
Not only is that obnoxious AF, but, "That's not true at all," insisted Trainor, speaking to E! the day son Riley turned 4 months old. "My life feels like it's just begun. I've never thrived more in my life. Like, he inspired me to get my fitness together, get my health together, get my eating together. I started reading books. Like, I've never accomplished more in my entire life than after having a baby."
Hard to argue considering how everything's shaping up for the singer's hot girl summer. (Yes, Megan Thee Stallion says we're doing it again, keep up.)
The 27-year-old is currently finishing work on the spinoff competition series Top Chef Family Style, prepping for her judging role on E!'s upcoming Clash of the Cover Bands and figuring out the details for an upcoming comedy show with NBC "starring me. I think about my life," she said. "I get to be involved in every part of it and I've been meeting with the writers all week long to see what kind of show can we come up with that actually makes a difference, but that's also fun at the same time."
Basically, she's working, mama.
Hence her excitement over what Verizon is calling The Biggest Upgrade Ever, the wireless service allowing new and existing customers to trade in their old cell ("Even if it's broken!" noted Trainor), sign up for an unlimited plan and walk out with a new 5G phone.
"They're glowing up our summer!" raved Trainor, celebrating the fact that the brand she's relied on since the sixth grade is helping her stay connected with her bestie that recently decamped to New York City, show off Riley over FaceTime and manage the hundreds of pictures she snaps each day on set to share with her 12 million followers on the 'gram.
Of course, solid cell service is just one tool in her formidable arsenal, Trainor crediting Sabara, 28, as her secret weapon. "I'm very lucky, I have my husband, who's like super-dad," she raved. "He stepped up and is super-dad all day long." Between Sabara, her mom Kelli and her two brothers Ryan and Justin, who live at their L.A. pad, she said, "We're crushing life."
With that proverbial village in place, she's able to enjoy cuddle time with Riley during breaks on the Top Chef Family Style set ("He's in the trailer all day long, watching me on the screen. And Daryl says he, like, smiles when my voice comes on") and daily walks in the L.A. sun with the little man who makes her melt with every teeny smile.
"Especially if he makes eye contact with you, like, it's over," admitted Trainor. "It's the greatest feeling ever to see that big smile."
So smitten with her son that she can't bear to put him down for nap time ("I'm like, 'He's finally calm! I want to just hold him'") she's possibly even more in love with the man that's made this whole experience possible.
She knew the Spy Kids alum, her husband of two years, "was going to be as awesome as he is," at fatherhood she shared. "But he's just done so much extra for me."
He was there in that first terrifying week when breathing issues landed Riley in the NICU for a five-day stay, and the next bunch when Trainor would cry from the pain of her still-healing body.
"The first week after I came home, I definitely felt like I had a little PTSD—because you finally have the pain of the C-section," she explained. "And then I would tell my husband, like, 'I still feel them inside me digging around.'" She also admitted to overdoing it a bit, trying to do things for both herself and Riley, "and then I'd lie down for bed at night and I'd be crying myself to sleep. Like, 'What have I done?'"
But with that trauma firmly behind her—"I feel like a superwoman and I have my beautiful tiger stripe stretch marks and my scar to prove it"—she's back to killing it with Sabara as the linchpin that makes this whole operation possible.
"I try to thank him every single day. I'm like, 'I couldn't do any of these dreams without you taking care of our kid and taking care of my family,'" she shared. "Like, he takes care of all of us."
Because a year ago, she had no idea she'd have a baby that she loves "so damn much," and a thriving career that would require some masterful juggling.
"Anything that comes my way, he's like, 'I'm here for you. What do you need me to do so that your dreams can come true?'" she revealed. "Which, like, not a lot of people have that in their life in general. And to have my partner and my best friend do that for me, it's just, like, the greatest love ever."
No marriage advice needed, thanks.