Pooja Lakshmin, REAL SELF-CARE: A Transformative Program for Redefining Wellness (Crystals, Cleanses, and Bubble Baths Not Included)
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[1:04]Pucha Laxman is the author of Real Self-Care, a transformative program for redefining wellness,
[1:10]crystals, cleanses, and bubble baths not included.
[1:13]She is a board-certified psychiatrist, New York Times contributor, and a leading voice at the intersection
[1:17]of mental health and gender, focused on helping women and people from marginalized communities
[1:22]escape the tyranny of self-care.
[1:24]In 2020, she founded Gemma, a physician-led women's mental health education platform,
[1:29]centering impact and equity.
[1:31]She maintains an active private practice where she treats women struggling with burnout,
[1:36]perfectionism, and disillusionment as well as clinical conditions like depression and anxiety.
[1:40]Having gone down the rabbit hole of extreme wellness for self, Real Self-Care is her
[1:44]answer to the juice cleanses, the gratitude less, and the bubble baths not only to care
[1:48]for ourselves for real, but in turn to transform our broken culture.
[1:53]Welcome, Dr. Laxman.
[1:54]Thank you so much for coming on mom's don't have time to read books to discuss.
[1:58]Real Self-Care, a transformative program for redefining wellness.
[2:03]It's such a pleasure to be here, Zibi.
[2:04]Thank you for having me.
[2:05]Oh my gosh, your book was so interesting.
[2:08]You talk about your own journey through self-care and some of the winding paths of your
[2:12]own career.
[2:13]And then you really like lay out this fabulous roadmap and explain the difference between
[2:18]faux self-care and real self-care and the martyr syndrome and like all the things that we
[2:23]do that I convince us, we're not doing that good a job.
[2:26]And by the way, I got a yellow on your score of the little quiz, so I'm not like, I'm
[2:31]not in dire straits.
[2:33]Yes, good, good about that.
[2:35]So why don't you tell listeners a little bit about your times article and how this
[2:39]book came about and what we should really know about Real Self-Care?
[2:43]Yeah, absolutely.
[2:44]Well, first I'll just say Zibi that I'm glad that you got a yellow because I know
[2:47]how much is going on in your life right now.
[2:49]And so I was a little worried that you might have gotten red, so I'm actually really happy
[2:53]with the yellow for you.
[2:55]So yeah, so I am a perinatal psychiatrist by training.
[2:59]So in my clinical practice, I take care of only women, mostly moms who are going through
[3:04]things like postpartum depression, postpartum anxiety.
[3:08]And you know, I would say maybe like around five years ago or so is when I really started
[3:12]to see that like actually maternal mental health is a social justice issue.
[3:21]Like even the smallest thing, like the fact that getting four consecutive hours of sleep
[3:26]postpartum is protective from postpartum depression or postpartum anxiety, like the ability
[3:32]to get that sleep.
[3:33]Like do you have a partner or do you have paid leave?
[3:36]Like right, like what is your support?
[3:37]Like do you even have access to know that sleep is something that's protective, right?
[3:43]All of that stuff is actually a system's issue, right?
[3:48]Is part of just the external landscape of the world that we live in.
[3:54]So that's kind of what got me fired up.
[3:56]Like I like to say that I'm kind of like a reluctant activist.
[3:59]You know, I didn't really expect to be somebody who was in this position, but I found myself
[4:04]here.
[4:05]So in I think it was maybe 2022 or 2021, I wrote a piece for The New York Times called
[4:10]This Is Betrayal, Not Burnout, especially during the pandemic.
[4:15]My patients were just burnt to a crisp and everyone was using that word burnout.
[4:22]But I just felt like it was really missing the mark because really the problem is outside
[4:27]of us.
[4:28]Like when we use the word burnout, we're exonerating the social systems, whether that is
[4:33]the lack of paid leave, whether that is the lack of affordable childcare, whether that's,
[4:38]you know, the fact that it's so hard to find a therapist and mental health support.
[4:42]Like those are the real problems, but American society in particular is really, really good
[4:47]at making women feel bad about ourselves and like we're not doing enough.
[4:53]And so, you know, real self care is my message to all the women out there who are just
[4:59]like, you know, I, I'm burnt out, I'm stressed out, I'm not eating well, I'm not sleeping
[5:05]well, and I feel like it's my fault because I have this meditation app on my phone that
[5:10]I know I'm supposed to be using and I know I'm supposed to go to yoga.
[5:13]But like how am I supposed to find the time?
[5:16]I have a nine-month-old, I say this as a mom myself, like it's just madness, right?
[5:21]Like it's just trying to figure out how to squeeze everything in.
[5:24]Again, it's not because it's not for lack of trying on our parts.
[5:30]It's actually the entire way the system has been set up.
[5:33]But then what do you do with the fact that we're all operating in a systemic like framework
[5:40]that might not set us up for success?
[5:42]We still have to live within those confines.
[5:45]So you have a lot of, you know, suggestions and specific things we can do.
[5:49]But what do we do even with that information?
[5:51]Like, yes, we can become activists and yes, but I think awareness obviously is really important
[5:56]of it, right?
[5:57]Like, okay, this is not my fault.
[6:00]This is what where we all are.
[6:02]But then you still don't have the time for yoga and like then what do we do with all
[6:06]the information and you call out all these important things, like just because influencers
[6:11]look like, you know, you ask people to think critically about what people are posting and
[6:17]maybe these are paid posts and maybe these people aren't really getting their lives changed
[6:21]by this particular, I don't know, app or whatever it is they're doing.
[6:25]So how do we make sense of it all?
[6:27]What next?
[6:28]Like, what are help?
[6:31]Who just fixed the problem, please?
[6:34]It fixed it.
[6:35]Right.
[6:36]Absolutely.
[6:37]Well, and I think that's why this book is different because, you know, it's funny, I didn't
[6:39]set out to write a self-help book or a prescriptive book, but that's what came out when
[6:44]I started writing because I think it felt like I was in the room with my patients, you
[6:48]know?
[6:49]And so I really, I lay out these four principles, right?
[6:53]And they're all internal, right?
[6:54]This is the one is learning to set boundaries.
[6:57]Principle two is developing self-compassion and when I say self-compassion, I mean, in the
[7:02]way that you talk to yourself, in the conversation you're having in your own brain on a daily
[7:07]basis, bringing self-compassion there.
[7:10]And then principle three is really getting clear on what matters to me.
[7:15]Like what do I really care about and naming those things and it's going to be lots of
[7:19]things, right?
[7:20]It's not, there's no one right answer.
[7:22]And then four is bringing it back to power, like understanding what Audrey Lord said, like
[7:26]self-care, self-preservation by making a self-care personal and not commercial.
[7:33]We are actually bringing agency back to ourselves and that's only then is there a chance
[7:39]of the systems change happening.
[7:42]So I can dive into some of those a little bit more.
[7:45]But what I would say is that this framework is not, so it was also really important for
[7:50]me in writing a self-help book to also just say like, I don't, the prescription is going
[7:55]to be different for everybody in terms of the form.
[7:58]One person's real self-care is going to be like, hey, I have to, I really do need to
[8:04]send a difficult email to my boss.
[8:06]I really do need to say like, I'm going to not be available on email over the weekends,
[8:11]right?
[8:12]Like that's something that I really need to start setting a boundary with.
[8:14]Another person that's going to be like, me and my husband really need to sit down and have
[8:18]an honest, difficult conversation about the division of labor in our home.
[8:23]Another person that's going to be like, well, maybe I really do need a career change.
[8:26]Like maybe I want to start dreaming about something different for myself.
[8:29]So that sort of form that it takes is different for everybody.
[8:34]And for some people, it will still mean like, actually, yeah, yoga is great.
[8:37]When I go to yoga once a week, I feel really grounded and centered.
[8:41]I'm not trying to take away anyone's yoga or bubble baths, but it's like thinking deeply
[8:46]about it.
[8:47]And those four principles that I've identified, that comes from my clinical work.
[8:51]And then also from my own personal journey of like, these are the internal steps that
[8:56]we can take.
[8:57]And it's like a line of inquiry for yourself.
[9:00]It's like having a different conversation with yourself that are grounded in these principles.
[9:05]As opposed to just that constant monotonous, oh, God, Pooja, you're not doing enough,
[9:09]oh, God, you're behind on your emails, oh, God, you're not a good mom, you know, like whatever
[9:13]the line of inquiry, like the normal narrative is, it's like, let's replace that with
[9:18]this different conversation.
[9:20]Basically, it's like more positive self-talk.
[9:22]Right.
[9:23]Someone wants them therapist.
[9:24]I don't know when it was, but would you talk to your friend, the way, like, what
[9:28]is your friend was going through the same thing, you'd be like, oh, my God, she's doing such
[9:30]a good job.
[9:31]No, it's fine.
[9:32]Right.
[9:33]Oh, and it's yourself.
[9:34]You're like, oh, my gosh, I'm a total failure.
[9:35]Like how could I get so behind or whatever?
[9:37]So I feel like that is such a critical thing.
[9:39]And so easy.
[9:40]Like, we can all, and I know you spell it out very clearly, but we can all imagine what
[9:46]we would say to a friend in a given circumstance.
[9:48]Right.
[9:49]And we all feel, you know, give them the benefit of the doubt and like praise the accomplishments.
[9:54]And yet it's so hard to do that for ourselves.
[9:56]So I feel like that's something so specific to just like, whatever you're.
[10:00]eating yourself up a bad.
[10:01]Would you beat your friend up like this?
[10:03]I don't know, that's been really helpful for me.
[10:04]Right, another one that I love on that too
[10:07]is, and this comes from acceptance and commitment therapy
[10:09]is like actually naming that critical voice
[10:12]and giving it sort of a character.
[10:13]Yeah.
[10:14]So for me, I always call that inner critic Angelica.
[10:18]And perhaps the main older sister, right,
[10:20]who's just like terrible, I have a patient who named hers,
[10:24]you know, the Anna went to our character
[10:26]from the Devil Wars Prada.
[10:27]Yeah.
[10:28]And that's kind of a fun way.
[10:29]I know it sounds silly, but it actually creates distance
[10:32]from that voice and reminds you that that's not you.
[10:35]Like that doesn't have to be you.
[10:37]And of course, you can spend years in therapy
[10:39]like figuring out that like it's your mom, right?
[10:41]Yeah.
[10:44]But I know that character, right, right, right.
[10:47]She's so familiar.
[10:48]No, I'm kidding.
[10:49]But yeah, I think that that's a really important,
[10:52]again, it's like it's about your relationship with yourself.
[10:56]And I think with real self care,
[10:58]the other piece of this too,
[11:00]is that it doesn't have to be something that is,
[11:04]like it can be small steps, right?
[11:07]Even just sort of like with the boundaries,
[11:09]you know, I know a lot of people,
[11:10]a lot of folks talk about boundaries.
[11:12]I feel like it's sort of a buzzword at this point.
[11:14]I think of boundaries as the pause.
[11:17]So when I was just starting on the faculty at George Washington
[11:21]University, my mentor took me out for lunch.
[11:23]And her piece of advice to me was that, you know,
[11:25]she was like, you don't have to answer your phone.
[11:28]You can let it go to voicemail
[11:29]and then just like see what they want and then respond.
[11:32]And that was kind of an aha moment for me because, you know,
[11:36]and we can say the same thing with text messages, right?
[11:37]It's like you take a pause, you wait and you see.
[11:41]And then you can say, yes, you can say no, you can negotiate.
[11:46]A boundary doesn't always mean no.
[11:48]A boundary is just the pause.
[11:50]And then you get to decide how you respond.
[11:54]A healthy boundary shouldn't be a brick wall.
[11:56]It actually should be one of those mesh nets,
[11:59]like on a trampoline that is flexible,
[12:02]that things can move through, right?
[12:03]That's a healthy boundary.
[12:04]And I think especially for moms, you know,
[12:07]we are just so overburdened.
[12:09]Our brains are just constantly on this cognitive overload.
[12:13]You know, we're like the CEOs of our whole,
[12:16]the whole family's life, right?
[12:18]And so it's just we're constantly in that react,
[12:21]fight or flight mode and to kind of step out of that
[12:23]and just say, wait,
[12:25]I can take a breath and then I can decide.
[12:28]I have a choice here.
[12:29]Whether it's my kid who wants something for me,
[12:31]whether it's like my work,
[12:33]whether it's my partner, right?
[12:36]And not being able to incorporate that into your thinking,
[12:41]then leads to kind of like these downstream effects
[12:46]where you're then able to look more strategically,
[12:48]like, well, what do I want for my life?
[12:50]What really fills me up?
[12:52]What are my goals, right?
[12:53]Because I think of real self care is not only like sort
[12:55]of the bomb in the moment.
[12:57]Like we all need that help just to survive really.
[13:02]Again, especially as moms,
[13:03]so many of us are kind of just drowning.
[13:05]But then it's also like step two
[13:07]or kind of maybe self care 2.0 is like allowing us to dream
[13:11]about, well, what do we want for ourselves?
[13:13]And just thinking about the folks in your community,
[13:17]you know, and moms don't have time to read books.
[13:19]Like none of my patients have time to read books.
[13:22]That's why I recorded an audiobook
[13:24]because I was like, it needs to be an audiobook, right?
[13:27]I also, you know, I have patients who I almost want
[13:30]to say like lost a decade, you know,
[13:33]because it's like you're in that decade
[13:34]of you have two or three kids and you're like breastfeeding
[13:37]and you're, you know, whatever, all the stuff
[13:39]that comes with that.
[13:40]And then you come out the other end of that
[13:42]and then you're just like, okay, wait,
[13:43]but like, who am I?
[13:44]What do I want?
[13:46]Especially as your kids start to become more independent
[13:48]and you finally have like a little bit more space to breathe.
[13:51]I think that's just like actually a really powerful season
[13:55]of life to start to ask yourself
[13:58]some of these different questions.
[14:00]And again, like the answers that come back
[14:04]might be a little bit surprising.
[14:05]And that's okay, you don't need to act right away.
[14:08]It's more about just having the conversation and inquiring.
[14:12]I had dinner last night with two girlfriends
[14:15]who were in their 40s.
[14:16]And we were all saying like, now friends are going off
[14:19]on all these different tangents.
[14:20]Some productive, some crazy, like because at this point
[14:24]with people's kids growing up,
[14:25]there's not that much guidance.
[14:27]And that's why like in your book, you know,
[14:29]this whole like, mnemonic happiness
[14:31]or maybe that's not how you pronounce it.
[14:32]You're like, mm-hmm, right.
[14:34]Like how important is it?
[14:36]Like how do you find meaning in what you're doing?
[14:38]Because if you're just going through the motions
[14:41]with your job or your career or whatever,
[14:43]like how do you take all that and and make it worthwhile
[14:48]because if you don't find meaning in what you're doing,
[14:50]like it's much harder to be dedicated yourself to it.
[14:53]And so I feel like it's this combination
[14:54]of like finding meaning, getting yourself through
[14:57]what you got like that decade
[14:59]and like being able to come out the other side
[15:01]and be like, oh, okay, well wait.
[15:03]Now I have this whole life ahead.
[15:05]Now what and what is, you know,
[15:07]maybe you self-care is reading books
[15:09]and maybe I did put that aside for a long time
[15:12]because I had no time.
[15:13]I mean, I was with my kids on the string break last week.
[15:15]Like literally I could barely get through three pages.
[15:17]And I was like, if this was my life all the time,
[15:19]like I would never be able to do my job ever,
[15:21]you know, within like climbing a tummy.
[15:23]But I think finding meaning is just so important.
[15:25]Yeah.
[15:26]And with that also giving yourself permission, right?
[15:29]Cause I think for moms in particular,
[15:31]anytime you take that space for yourself,
[15:34]no matter how old your kids are,
[15:35]there's that requisite guilt that comes.
[15:38]And for me, I've been living it myself right now
[15:40]with this book launch of like I've had to,
[15:44]we've had child care on the weekends
[15:46]because like there's, yes, you know,
[15:47]there's so much to do when you're launching a book.
[15:50]And like acknowledging the fact that there's no perfect solution.
[15:55]There's no perfect answer, right?
[15:57]Like my son right now is almost 10 months,
[16:00]which is just like one cute age.
[16:02]Like he's calling and he's like pulling up
[16:05]and like it's really cute.
[16:06]And then part of me is sort of like, oh gosh,
[16:09]like is it terrible for me to have a babysitter on the weekends?
[16:12]You know, like it's that mom guilt that comes up
[16:15]that I talk about in the book, right?
[16:17]That that's always with us.
[16:18]And that you have to learn that it's gonna be there.
[16:21]It's gonna be there.
[16:22]And the guilt does not have to be a moral compass, right?
[16:27]It can just be a feeling that's there.
[16:29]And you can turn the volume down.
[16:31]You don't have to listen to it.
[16:32]You don't need to let it guide all of your decisions.
[16:35]Yeah, yeah, you're right about in the book
[16:38]how you were going through IVF and you were writing the book
[16:40]and how even that was like getting in the way
[16:42]of your writing schedule and how are you even gonna get it done?
[16:44]So tell me a little bit about what it was like writing
[16:47]the book and all of that and how you did manage to pull it up.
[16:50]Honestly, I still don't even know about it.
[16:53]We were going through IVF.
[16:54]I'd had a miscarriage maybe like six months
[16:56]before we started IVF and I'm 39 now.
[16:58]So I was like an older person starting my family.
[17:02]And so it was like, it was really rough.
[17:05]Also while I was doing IVF,
[17:07]I was like limiting how much caffeine I drank.
[17:10]And it wasn't drinking alcohol, right?
[17:11]So I was like, you know, it was like there was no external
[17:15]substance involved with writing this book.
[17:19]But I had to really give myself that compassion
[17:22]because like, you know, I acknowledge in the book
[17:23]I'm completely a workaholic.
[17:25]Like, you know, they always say you teach what you need to know.
[17:28]Right?
[17:28]So I had to give myself compassion
[17:30]because I had made this schedule for the chapters, right?
[17:33]To deliver.
[17:34]And of course I got behind.
[17:36]And then I just had to say, you know what, it's okay.
[17:38]It's okay to be behind.
[17:39]It's okay to be late.
[17:41]I'm writing a book called Real Self Care.
[17:43]Like, I don't want to be a hypocrite and burn out
[17:46]while I'm writing real self care.
[17:48]Or even right now, like, burn out
[17:51]while I'm on a book tour for real self care, right?
[17:54]Like, I need to bring all the stuff that I'm telling
[17:57]everybody else to do to my own work.
[17:59]And that's hard, right?
[18:01]Because if you're somebody who enjoys what you do
[18:05]and is passionate about all of the things that you do,
[18:08]I imagine maybe this resonates for you to be like when,
[18:11]when your work is something that really brings you
[18:14]a lot of energy, finding that line of like,
[18:18]okay, when have I pushed too far?
[18:21]How do I know that this is actually costing me emotionally
[18:25]energetically too much?
[18:27]I think because of the IVF process and the fact that
[18:31]was not only so like, logistically taxing
[18:34]because of like all the doctor's appointments
[18:35]and things like that, but also just emotionally
[18:37]that was like a nice counterbalance for me.
[18:41]And I think now even having my son is also
[18:44]a nice counterbalance of like just knowing like, okay,
[18:47]these are like hard stops to my time.
[18:50]The calculus, I think, becomes like a little bit more clear.
[18:54]I remember before I had him, I had friends say like,
[18:58]once they became mothers that actually,
[19:02]they sort of became more productive work-wise
[19:06]because it was easier to know what their know was.
[19:10]And that definitely has been true for me as well.
[19:15]Yeah, I think also the reminder that like,
[19:17]it doesn't all have to get done immediately.
[19:20]Like, I always feel the pressure,
[19:21]but when I take the pressure off and say, okay,
[19:24]well, it would be nice if I could reply to this right away.
[19:27]Or I could like make whole bucket of emails
[19:29]and tackle this one topic all at once when it works for me.
[19:32]Like, is anything, there's no fallout.
[19:34]Like, right. I think it's easy in any job
[19:38]to magnify things that everything has to be done.
[19:42]But I don't know.
[19:43]I'm curious too, when you see,
[19:44]are you still seeing patients also?
[19:46]Like, what is that?
[19:47]Like, how to stay totally, although,
[19:49]I guess I stay totally present
[19:50]because I'm interviewing you right now.
[19:51]I mean, this is what I do.
[19:52]I just, like, when you're giving advice,
[19:56]how do you stay in that moment and offer the...
[20:00]advice, you know, medically, psychologically, all of it and bringing your own experience into it,
[20:06]or do not bring your own experience into it. Yeah. So I actually, I don't bring my own
[20:10]experience into it. So as a psychiatrist, I actually do do therapy with a good number of
[20:15]my patients. So I prescribe medication and you therapy. And I don't talk about my own stuff.
[20:20]Some of my patients don't even know that I've written a book or that I'm on social media,
[20:24]actually. So I missed marketing opportunity. That's like marketing 101 to your
[20:30]families, to your people in your community. But I think for me, it's really actually important
[20:36]that I'm there for them. And that's, you know, sort of like the boundaries of psychotherapy
[20:40]and psychiatry. I'm there for them. And I see patients right now about one and a half days a week.
[20:45]And then the rest of my time is writing or Gemma, which is my women's mental health platform.
[20:50]It's actually, that's a sell for me. It fills me up actually to have that just intense
[20:56]one-on-one interaction where I'm not thinking about all that other noise that's out there. And I
[21:02]can just focus on my patient who, you know, to be completely frank, like I haven't taken new
[21:06]patients for several years. Like, so it's, it's these are people that I have long-term relationships
[21:11]with who I really feel a strong connection to. And so those are the sort of the grounding moments
[21:17]in my week where I get to just do what I'm trained to do and what I really enjoyed doing.
[21:23]But part of my real self-care journey was learning for myself that if I saw patients five days
[21:29]a week, I burn out. And also learning for myself that I really enjoy doing psychotherapy. So I
[21:35]can't do just 30 minute med checks. Or my whole practice can't be 30 minute med checks because that
[21:41]burns me out. Like the thing that actually is really fulfilling for me is those 50 minute sessions
[21:46]and developing those long-term relationships. And but then that means my practice is much smaller.
[21:51]And so that's part of the reason that I found a Gemma with my two colleagues because I was like,
[21:55]well, we, I need a way to kind of bring this information out and part of it is a book, sure,
[22:01]but again, not everybody has time to read a book. So we're kind of building the master class
[22:06]for women's mental health. And that's, I think that's been a real self-care decision for me,
[22:13]kind of like realizing, well, what is really sustainable for me when I can't spend 40 hours a week
[22:19]with patients? Because that's just, it energetically, it's too much for me.
[22:24]You in the beginning of the book, talk about your own journey sort of in this cult for two years
[22:30]and that was a wild unexpected introduction. But anyway, one thing that I kind of love the image of
[22:35]is you, you know, almost like licking your wounds and going back to your childhood home and
[22:40]being in your old bedroom with your parents and the support you got. And I was just wondering
[22:45]about your relationship with your parents now and how, what that all looks like.
[22:49]Oh, yeah, that's a great question. Well, I will say after that experience in my life,
[22:54]I went through like seven years of psychoanalysis and psychoanalysis is that like intense type of
[22:59]therapy where you're on the couch and the analyst is behind you. You know, and I think that
[23:03]my parents and I like, we've come a really long way, you know, I think especially with like the immigrant
[23:09]experience, I like to say like because my parents sacrificed so much for me, my dad's a physician,
[23:16]you know, there's certainly a lot of privilege in my life. Because they sacrificed so much for me,
[23:22]I had the privilege of this existential crisis in my late 20s when I blew up my life,
[23:28]right? Because I didn't have student loans. So I could just up and leave Madison and, you know,
[23:35]focused on female sexuality for two years and just do all that stuff. And I was able to land
[23:40]back and still be a doctor. And they, you know, I was in my childhood bedroom. I mean, it wasn't
[23:46]a pretty picture. I was like just binge watching like, you know, reruns of SVU and like texting
[23:51]with my friends from college who had stayed with me, love them to death. But I think like we've
[23:55]come a long way. And I think like now myself as a parent, you know, it's like no, every generation
[24:02]is just like going to therapy for like the wounds from the previous generation. Like that's just
[24:08]what it is. It's just the cycle. And I think since we work through that process together, I was able to
[24:13]also come to motherhood on my own terms and not feel like I needed to do it because they wanted
[24:19]me to or, you know, to fulfill some sort of expectation. But I also recognize that I, you know,
[24:25]have the luxury of being able to like pay for IVF and, you know, like all the resources to make
[24:30]that happen at this age. So yeah, it's been like all relationships. It's a lot of work and it's a process.
[24:37]Yeah. Wow. Would you write another book? Are you going to write another book? How do you feel about
[24:42]the whole thing? Are you like just so excited that the book is done and you never want to do it again?
[24:46]I do feel a little bit like I'm hobbling out like a cane. So like maybe ask me in like a month.
[24:53]Yeah. Like a lot more experience with this than I do. No, it's a lot to lunch a book. It is.
[25:04]I mean, it's a lot. It's, yeah, it's very, I found it very emotional. Like it's emotional launching it,
[25:09]especially when you include your own story. Would you do here? I don't know. You're like putting it
[25:13]out there. It's a lot. Yeah. No, totally it is. And I don't know. It's been, there's been like
[25:18]definite like exciting and joyous movements. And there's been low moments too. And like,
[25:22]so I think just the roller coaster of it, emotionally, like the ups and downs.
[25:27]It's a lot. So I might need a little space. Yeah.
[25:33]Oh my gosh. Well, thank you so much. I found your book really fascinating. I learned a lot.
[25:38]I really appreciated how open you were about it. And sort of the new lens, like shifting the
[25:43]framework of how we even evaluate all the self-care, talking, shove down our throats all the time
[25:48]and being able to look analytically at some of those suggestions and the over, like sort of pulling
[25:53]back a little bit to see where we are in the whole ecosystem. And I think that helps each individual
[25:57]journey. So thank you for your book. And I hope you survived the tour. Thank you so much for having
[26:03]me. It's such a pleasure. Thanks a lot. Bye bye. Thanks, Evie. Take care. I'll get you too. Bye bye.
[26:11]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Don't
[26:15]forget to follow me on Instagram at zebi Owens and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[26:20]Also sign up for my newsletter at zebiowens.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet
[26:25]lots of authors on Zoom every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan in fact,
[26:28]texture sound for the sound editing. And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing
[26:33]this fantastic intro and outro music.