Shows
Awakening Worth in Childless Women145: Five Unique Steps to Navigate Mother's DayI know that Mother's Day is one of the toughest days of the year for us women without kids. When I went through my first couple of Mother's Days, I followed all the advice I heard online....Just stay off social media. Just pretend it's just like any other day. Do something nice for yourself. These were all things that worked to help me push through the day, but really just amounted to band-aid solutions. They didn't actually me to fully let go of the triggers leading up to it or the pain I expe...2025-05-1132 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women144: The Biggest Lie You've Been Told As a Childless WomanWhat if the very thing you thought disqualified you from living a meaningful and powerful life… was actually the very thing meant to ignite it?In this episode, I’m speaking directly to the woman who didn’t get the life she planned. The one who didn’t become the mother she dreamed of being—and wonders if she’s now supposed to just sit on the sidelines while everyone else builds, leads, and creates.If that’s you, I want you to know: you were made for...2025-05-0419 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women143: The Huge Cost of Being a "Good Girl" as a Childless WomanWhat if I told you that being being a people pleaser might be the very thing holding you back from feeling free, worthy, and at peace in your own life?This episode is for the high-achieving, childless woman who is tired of over-functioning, over-giving, and still never feeling like enough. If you find yourself wondering…“Am I being selfish?”“Do people think I have it too easy?”“Should I be doing more?”…then you are going to resonate with this conversation.Here's a big truth we unpack: People-pleasing isn’t kindness—it’s self-abandonmen...2025-04-2729 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women139: How to Stop Holding Back Your Opinions About ParentingDo you ever find yourself in a conversation about parenting and, even though you have advice to share, you’re afraid to speak up because you’re afraid someone will say, ‘You can't possibly understand—you don’t have kids.’You might feel invisible in family gatherings, stop yourself from contributing to kid-focused discussions, or apologize and add disclaimers before sharing your perspective, like, "I know I don’t have kids, but…’It's very important that you start speaking up in these situations, and we're going to talk about why in this episode. Today's conversation...2025-03-2123 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women137: The Unconventional Way to Feel Equity at Work For Childless WomenIf you're frustrated with workplace structures, experiencing inequities, or feeling envy towards mothers or other women - this episode is for you. This is Part 2 of a discussion I had with my sister, Jen, about women in the workplace and the experiences of both mothers and childless women. This episode might ruffle some feathers. Jen and I are going to lay out why the diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives (or dismantling of them right now in the US) might not matter. Then, we suggest some new and unconventional ways to find equity in the...2025-03-091h 04Awakening Worth in Childless Women136: The Untold Power Struggle: Women, Work & MotherhoodI've been avoiding this topic, but it's time we talk about it. At some point along the way, most of my clients mention "work", and how being childless can be a unique experience in the workplace, no matter what kind of workplace it is.It's International Women's Day as we publish this episode, and with that comes renewed vigour for gender equality in the workplace. On today’s ep, my sister, Jen, who is a leadership coach and expert in boundaries and busy-ness, joins me to flesh out what it means to be a woman (wit...2025-03-0253 min
The EmbattledDisablity and Health CareThis podcast episode explores the impact of U.S. political party stances on healthcare, particularly for those with chronic illnesses and disabilities. Host Sheri Johnson discusses how healthcare policies affect daily life, covering topics such as insurance coverage, medication costs, and disability rights. She breaks down the approaches of major parties:2025-02-1523 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women119: How To Shift Your Reaction to "Miserable Childless Cat Ladies"If you are anything like me, you're probably tired of hearing about JD Vance and the comments he made publicly about childless women being miserable cat ladies and having no stake in America's future. I'm not even American, and yet angry reactions to this have been filling my feed these days.The thing is, the majority of them have been simply reactions to his comments. And my question became, "what good is this doing?"So I'm taking a different approach on the pod this week and actually showing you how to dissipate any re...2024-08-0428 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women118: 7 Signs You Might Need a Mindset TweakIf you want to be able to answer questions like “do you have kids” with authenticity instead of awkwardness, you must shift your mindset. It's not enough to just rehearse how you'll respond. And if you're anything like I used to be, what you're rehearsing might feel more defensive and hurt than empowering. When I first realized that I wasn't going to have kids, I just wanted everyone to just stop asking me about kids, stop giving me advice and stop saying things I didn’t want to hear. But once I realized that it was my own minds...2024-07-2824 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women117: Stop Waiting For Time to Change Everything"Time heals all wounds" is the biggest lie we've been told about grief. I used to believe this lie, myself. After any sort of big emotion, I thought time would eventually clear it away. This is a super-short solo episode where I break down why this common, widely-held belief is actually a myth, and what you can do about it. This is the second episode in my summer series on how to answer all the insensitive questions and remarks we get as childless women. Tune in each week all summer long if you want to have...2024-07-2108 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women116: How to Answer The "Insensitive" Questions and CommentsDo you have kids? Who's going to take care of you when you're old? What's your purpose then? You can borrow my kids anytime! You've probably heard them all, or at least some of the questions and comments that bother us women without kids. Maybe you've thought to yourself, or maybe even out loud, "I wish people would just stop asking questions or saying insensitive things". And if you have, you might have noticed that there's always someone else who says something that gets under your skin and sometimes it comes right out of left field.I...2024-07-1525 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women115: Let's Talk Terminology for Women Without KidsChildless? Childfree? Woman Without Kids? Take your pick! I've been really curious about how women who don't have kids and wanted them identify themselves. Some appear to be really attached to the Childless Not By Choice term, and yet my own experience and in the multiple discussions we've had in my group program, childless seems to make us FEEL less. In this solo episode, I unpack all the different terms, the fact that it's not as black and white as childfree versus childless, and how to detach yourself from the terminology altogether. If you...2024-07-0824 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women114: Navigating Loneliness As a Childless WomanFeeling lonely is one of the most common complaints I hear from childless women so if you're feeling lonely, you are definitely not the only one!I felt lonely too when I first started down the path to permanently childless, especially once my husband seemed to have moved forward without me and didn't seem to understand what I was going through. So I thought it was high time to talk more openly about loneliness and how to dissipate it. Tune into this solo episode to find out: why retreating and avoiding the situations that mak...2024-07-0121 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women113: Why I Decided Against IVFThere was a time when I didn't quite feel like I had found a place within the childless community and the reason was that I had not done IVF. It seemed as though so many of the women there had tried IVF and they had this common language and terms that I wasn't familiar with. Then I realized that there are SO many different paths that all converge on leading a life without children and yet perhaps there were other women out there who felt like I did. So on today's episode, I'm pulling back the curtains on w...2024-06-2334 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women112: How to Get Through Emotions After Speeches Like Harrison Butker'sHarrison Butker's commencement speech at Benedictine College ruffled a LOT of feathers, especially within the childfree community. There were a lot of insults thrown at him, arguments started on social media comment sections, even calls to cancel his NFL contract. Were they justified? In my opinion, it doesn't really matter. What matters is this: how do YOU feel when you hear words like Harrison's and if it's outrage, do you know how to dissipate that? You might think you don't want to dissipate that anger, because, well, it's justified right? But what good is it, if everyone just w...2024-06-1734 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women111: Purpose is Not Something You Find (Part 2)Download your free guide to Finding Purpose Beyond Parenthood: Getting Through Grief and Triggers to a Life of Meaning and Joy!Last week I talked about how purpose is not something you "find". It's also not a singular mission. It's not a destination. And it doesn't have to be big. Once you begin to practice all the things that I outlined that will bring you a sense of meaning and purpose, you may find that you are still struggling. It might mean that there is something standing in the way. Identifying your personal obstac...2024-06-1132 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women110: Purpose is Not Something You Find (Part 1)Download your free guide to Finding Purpose Beyond Parenthood: Getting Through Grief and Triggers to a Life of Meaning and Joy!Purpose is not some concept that you find. It's not a destination. It's not singular. And it doesn't come from having kids. I understand why you believe it does. I did too. It's because society tells us that when you have kids, you'll be flooded with purpose. Especially as women, becoming a mother is supposed to be our sole (and soul) purpose. And when we don't get to have kids, we end up feeling lost...2024-06-0227 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women109: The Unsung Sisterhood of Women Without Kids, With Ruby WarringtonIt is so clear to me that Ruby Warrington is a thought leader in the childfree/childless space! She has authored, Women Without Kids: The Revolutionary Rise of an Unsung Sisterhood, and in my view, the whole book was revolutionary. She discusses concepts that were swirling around vaguely in my head and my mind was blown when I saw them so well articulated on the pages of her book.We get into some of these concepts on today's episode. Topics ranging from the "motherhood spectrum" to the urge to leave a legacy and it's link to the fear...2024-05-271h 06Awakening Worth in Childless Women108: The Hidden Things You Didn't Know You Were GrievingMany childless people don't even realize they are grieving. Who would have known you can grieve the loss of an imagined future? What I find is that many women without kids, even those who choose not to have them, feel some sort of grief and it's not always the loss of that future. Identifying what specifically you're grieving is key to processing it.In this solo episode, I'm giving you the first step of the Grow Through Grief pillar of my framework: identify what hidden grief might be lying under the surface. That is, after you realize or a...2024-05-1730 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women107: 5 Steps for Navigating Mother's Day as a Childless WomanThese are 5 steps you haven't heard before. You've probably heard people talk about staying off social media and opting out of Mother's Day emails. Maybe doing something nice for yourself and saying "no" to the celebrations. These are all valid things you can do to avoid feeling the pain of Mother's Day as a childless woman who wanted to be a mother.And yet, they're all band-aid solutions. None of them will actually help you feel better next year on this day. Or throughout the year. None of them will help you to live a happy, purpose-driven, joyful...2024-05-1030 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women106: The Wisdom of Aging As a Childless WomanMenopause is a huge transformational time for women and another topic that we don’t talk about enough. Women may joke about their memory, or hot flashes or complain about heavy periods. But they don’t talk about the deep stuff. The vulnerable stuff. Or the scary stuff. There is SO much going on for women during perimenopause and midlife, and childless women experience it, quite often, right alongside trying to start a family before it’s too late. That, to me, adds a whole other element. In this solo episode, I shed light on:what childl...2024-05-0518 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women105: Unleashing Your Inner RebelIt's hard to fit in when you are in the minority. Childless women over 40 make up roughly 20% of the population (depending on what country you live in). Sometimes I wonder how many of them are living in the larger cities because it sure feels like everyone around me in my little town are parents. But what if we embraced this unchosen nonconformity? What if we unleashed the inner rebel within us and did EVERYTHING our own way? How liberating would that feel, especially if you let go of what everyone else thought about it?In this...2024-04-3027 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women104: What If NOT Having Children Was the Norm in Society?In our current society, women without kids make up anywhere between 15 and 25% of the adult female population, depending on the country. Recently, I started to wonder what life would look like - what grief would look like - if that were reversed. If mothers were in the minority, would childless women feel so much FOMO, inadequacy or lack of belonging? Would the grief run as deep? Would we still wonder what our legacy or purpose is?Join me for this solo episode where I contemplate:aging in a world where childless women made up a la...2024-04-2119 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women103: What To Do When Your People Just Don't Get ItHave you ever come away from a conversation thinking "gosh, "people just don't get it"? Either they say something insensitive or simply can't empathize with your childless circumstances. It's definitely happened to me. Even recently. But the mistake I see in the childless space is the assumption that there is nothing you can do about it. You just have to deal with the irritation or "trigger" and move on somehow. What I have noticed, in myself and my clients, is that there IS something you can do about it. The first step is recognizing when it's ha...2024-04-1438 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women102: Navigating Anger as a Childless WomanAnger is an emotion that comes up a lot with my childless clients who wanted kids. Anger can be a really complicated emotion because it's not only an emotion in and of itself, but it can also disguise other emotions. What makes it even tougher to manage is that most little girls are taught not to express the tough emotions. Anger is something boys are allowed to show, but not girls. Yes, even in today's society. So you might be someone who was conditioned to suppress anger, and maybe other negative emotions as well. Join me on...2024-04-0728 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women101: How Childless Women Will Change the WorldAs I embark on the next 100 episodes on the Awakening Worth Podcast, I spend this session reflecting on the deeper reason I keep hitting record and why you should keep hitting the play button. I've come to realize that so many of us are stuck in this pronatalist ideology and it's impacting, well...really, all of humanity. It's us, the childless women, who feel it the most, but it's affecting all of us. On this solo episode, I'm delving into:what pronatalism is and why you need to start paying attention to how it's aff...2024-03-3127 minAwakening Worth in Childless Women100: From the Partner's Perspective, with Mike Johnson (my hubby)Celebrating 100 episodes today! My husband, Mike Johnson, and I mark this special occasion together on the podcast with a conversation that makes its way through life without children from HIS perspective. As we share the narrative of our journey, from the heartbreak of miscarriage to the multitude of decisions along the fertility treatment path, we peel back the layers of our different perspectives. Mike lends his voice to explore the complexities of a partner's role in facing childlessness, an area frequently overshadowed by the focus on women. We shed light on the decision-making process behind IVF and dono...2024-03-0843 min