February is barreling into her second half and so much is happening! It’s a good reminder for me to slow down. In slowing down, I’ve been practicing listening. My head is often so noisy inside and pinging with, frankly, a bunch of crap that I don’t need to hear. However, these past few days, I’ve been homing in on listening to my intuition and following it even when it doesn’t make sense. “Go to this gas station, not the one on Ventura. This bottle of milk is fresher than that one. Write that article about Kim you’ve been meaning to write, it could help someone going through a similar loss.”

So, in an effort to slow it down, listen to my inner wisdom, and to focus on my novel and my writing in general, I’m taking a hiatus on the podcast.

It’s hard because I miss it. I loved bringing you new conversations every week. But there are still 85 episodes there for you to browse and maybe there are some that you didn’t hear before that you might want to go back and listen to now? Going over them this weekend, I was so proud of each and every one. I love every guest I’ve had on the show and each episode really does offer something unique and representative of how varied and badass we are as women.

Revising my novel with my new agent’s guidance has been so much fun! (Not to say that it’s not excruciating work, sometimes cutting things, adding things, etc.) I’m loving deepening the layers of these characters even more before we get ready to go to publishers. Also, I’ve been re-visiting old pieces I’ve written, and I found this piece on Medium. It’s what started this whole evolution: MILF Podcast, my book, becoming a single mom.

It all started with this poem I wrote about my postpartum depression and anxiety. I submitted the piece as an essay to Stephanie, the editor of Human Parts, back in 2014, and she came back with: “what if you wrote this as a poem?” I was like, ‘brilliant!’ I’m so glad I followed her advice because I think it’s so much more impactful in this form. Take a read and let me know what you think in the comments!

It’s still my greatest hope that one day every mother everywhere will feel she is a part of something important, that the work she does by raising and caring for her children every day is important. Moreover, it’s worthy of support, love, and praise. (MILF of the month, Lauren Candela)

I love you. Keep going.

Xoxo,
Jen