January 28, 2025 • 37 mins
Neha Ruch is on a mission to redefine stay-at-home motherhood. She’s the co-founder of Mother Untitled, an online community for ambitious mothers, and the author of “The Power Pause: How to Plan A Career Break After Kids — and Come Back Stronger Than Ever.” Neha’s book is an empowering guide for anyone looking to take a break from work, downshift their career, or otherwise find more time with their families without falling off the corporate ladder. She’s sharing the financial, practical, and personal steps necessary to making stay-at-home motherhood work for you and your family.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hey bessies, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Today on the bright Side, we're changing the way we
talk about being a stay at home mom. Founder and
CEO of Mother Untitled, Neha Rouche is back on the
bright side and her new book, The Power Pause is
out now. She's flipping the script on parenthood and pausing
your career. She's here to give us fresh tools, empowering language,
and a whole new way to think about this transformative
(00:26):
phase of life. It's Tuesday, January twenty eighth. I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
And I'm Simone Boyce, and this is the bright Side
from Hello Sunshine, Simone.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I am truly grateful to be in conversation with Neha
Rush again. She was your friend that you brought on
the show, and I just fell in love with her
when she joined us last time. I felt like we
just scratched the surface about how challenging it can be
for moms to determine whether or not to stay at
home to raise their children or invest in childcare. I mean,
(00:59):
we talked about how some women fear that starting a
family could be a career ender even and she really
shed light on some of the false beliefs of stay
at home parenthood.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
It was such an enlightening conversation.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
It always is an enlightening conversation when Neha Rush is involved,
and I feel like Danielle, we have to kind of
start by giving some context as to why you're not
going to hear my voice in this interview. This is
an interview I've been looking forward to for forever, because,
as you mentioned, she's a friend of mine and I
have been cheering her on behind the scenes as she's
been working on this book. I know that she has
(01:32):
poured her heart and soul into The Power Pause, and
I know that she really believes that can help an
entire generation of women break through from some of these
false beliefs that I think we've inherited from our own mothers. Unfortunately,
there was a fire near my house. I'm sure you
guys are aware of bright Side besties of what's been
going on in LA with all these fires, and just
(01:55):
had to make the decision to keep my family safe
and get everybody out of the house. So unfortunately I
missed this interview, but I had spent so much time
highlighting her book, and there's so many things I want
to talk about and ask about. But I know that
I know that you guys had an electrifying conversation Danielle,
and I cannot wait to hear it.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
We also got to ask some of your questions, so
I don't want you to be you do, said yeah,
and we credited you would they everyone will know that
they're yours.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
I don't care about that.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I just the reason why I did that is because
this book is so interactive and it truly is comprehensive.
Like she's got exercises in there to help you, you know,
disentangle your identity from your work. She's got sample schedules
from mothers who are navigating some similar challenges that you
(02:45):
might be walking through. So yeah, I just want to
honor how incredibly thorough this this book is, and to
be honest, Danielle, like, this is the kind of book
that I wish was available not just when I decided
to pause my own.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Career, but I wish it was available.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
As I was thinking about building a family, because I
get so many young women reaching out to me asking
me about how to navigate, you know, breaks in your career,
especially like in broadcast journalism. And now not only can
I point to my experience and say, hey, look what's possible,
look how robust your career can be on the other
(03:24):
side of motherhood. But also I have this incredible guide
Naha's book to point them to.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Now it's interesting you say that.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
As I was talking to her, I was thinking, I'm
so glad that I'm learning about this before parenthood. I
really think that this is a book that applies to
almost any phase of life that you're in. If you're
thinking about becoming a mom, it's interesting. If you are
a mom, it's fascinating, And if you're not wanting to
(03:52):
be a mom, it's also interesting to learn about the
language that we're using as a culture around stay at
home parenthood.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Another thing that really stood out to me in Naha's book.
She talks about the transition itself, like what it's like
to put your career on pause and what it's like
to navigate the financial aspect of that. But she also
talks about the return, and she's encouraging parents to really
prepare yourselves for what it's like when you do return
(04:22):
to work. So that's a fresh perspective that I feel
like is not talked about enough in this conversation.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Absolutely, we touch on that and so much more.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Here's our conversation with neh Uche.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Okay, nay, how welcome back to the bright side.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Thank you, it's so nice to see your face. I'm
so happy to see you. Congratulations on Power Pause. This
is not just a beautiful cover, but truly a beautiful book.
So this book is already resonating with parents around the
country very deeply. I want to start with the language.
What is a power pause? The power pause is the
(05:01):
antidote to this idea that if you part with your
career for a chapter, that you're somehow a shut in
trope that has long since been associated with a stay
at home mother. And instead it's this reclaiming of language
that speaks to shifting priorities away from our paid work
for a chapter for family life, for mental health, for
(05:22):
elder care, for a variety of different priorities, and in
making room for that, allowing ourselves to discover new interests,
new skills, and ultimately be able to add that all
back to such a robust career portfolio. One thing I've
heard you say a lot about is that motherhood gets
bad pr Why is it important to you to provide
(05:45):
a different and possibly even more accurate view we've.
Speaker 4 (05:49):
Done such incredible work, only in the recent years of
finally starting to think about, well, is there value to
unpaid labor, dignifying that work, and really starting to elevate
it from the mems of divers and laundry, and really
think about the onspiring work that happens behind the scenes,
right you know, the women advocating for their child's care
(06:09):
to insurance companies, or navigating really complicated education systems to
get their kids the best possible structures and systems to
help them grow and learn. That's the work behind the scenes.
And when we shine a light on that, then we
do two things. We better understand why people might want
more room and time with their kids or for their kids,
(06:30):
and we also start to understand that, you know, women's
brains don't go and die if they take a break
from the paid workforce. Actually, it can expand in all
sorts of new directions. You're taking this on in a
very granular sense. In each chapter you outline a false
belief and then a new narrative to correct it. What
is the first false belief that you had to unlearn
(06:51):
in your own power?
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Pause?
Speaker 4 (06:53):
When I had my first child and I decided I
wanted to downshift my career. I switched to part time
so that I could be two days at the workplace
and then the rest of the week at home. In
twenty sixteen, it was the height of the leaning era,
the height of the girl boss era, and you know,
in some ways we had reached the pinnacle of that
(07:14):
second wave of feminism. In what we had to do
was rethink, well, if I have clocked in a decade
plus in my career and I don't serve my husband
cocktails at the end of the day, right, these are
dads who are three times as involved with their kids
versus any generation prior. And I have all this access
(07:35):
to tools and technology, so I know I'm going to
continue to grow. Then how can I re architect my
sense of playing the long game. I'm actually pausing, and
this isn't a career ender, and actually this is going
to be one stage in my life. The idea of ambition,
specifically is the determination to do things with care, and
(07:57):
the reality is we're going to care about a lot
of things over the long game life.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
I have a good friend who just had a baby,
and pre baby was very career focused. Post baby, she's
really considering a career pause. Now, for someone like her,
what's the first place to start? What questions should she
be asking herself or asking her partner? Well, I think
(08:23):
the first place is, you know, have I explored all
the options to make room for family? Because there are
more than the black and white idea of pausing or
staying full time right, there's such a vast in between
of stay at women working. The second question is do
I need to stay connected to this particular role to
(08:43):
preserve my options? And if the answer still feels like yes,
then you know, is there a part time or flexible
arrangement that feels available to me? And if the answer
is no, then you might say, okay, Well, if I pause,
what are ways in which I can think about strategically
navigating my exit so that I'm going to feel empowered,
(09:03):
so that I can know that I have a study
on ramp if I want to come back.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
To that particular work.
Speaker 4 (09:08):
But I think the other piece is if I am
pausing or me and my partner aligned on this being
a joint household decision. If you are wanting to shift,
that decision needs to be made together with the foundational
understanding that even if you pause, your paid work, you
are still contributing, So the partner working out of the
(09:31):
home is equally dependent on the work you're doing in
the home and the intellectual and emotional labor you're going
to be contributing, so they can single task. And deciding
that budgeting for that allows you the ability to then
walk through this stage of life knowing you both deserve
to be whole and healthy and that you feel respected
as you navigate the next chapter.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
That part feels so important because you could make a
decision and your partner, it says they're on the same page,
they're not.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
That's that, I think is what scares.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
A lot of women one hundred percent because even if
this is a financial no brainer, this idea of parting
with our financial independence, this idea of dependent has just
felt so scary for so long, and so being able
to challenge that and think of yourselves as a business
organization like depersonalize it for a little bit. In say,
(10:25):
household income in, household income out, we're making an adjustment
together to the household's income. Right. I've heard of couples
making big, bold moves from San Francisco to Virginia for
lower cost of living I've seen other couples say, you
know what, We're going to turn down travel opportunities for
this year because that's the sort of wig overom we
need to part with income. If you start to feel that,
(10:47):
wait a second, I don't feel like I'm going to
have equal access to this household income or the mindset
of both being interdependent on one another is getting harder
to come by in this conversation. Bring in a mayoral
counselor bring in a fair play facility tator, bring in
a financial planner, because the reality is if you don't
(11:08):
feel secure in that, then stepping into this is a risk.
If you are in a rocky marriage, this is not
the time to be parting with your income. If you
need to pause or make more room, consider ways in
which you can stay connected to income. Right.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Is there anything specifically that you did with your husband
that you think helped make your pause successful.
Speaker 4 (11:31):
We did bouts, a couple's therapy. I think we did
one thing really well, which is we had started looking
at our budget in our forecast well before we had children,
so we had an established cadence of meeting every January
and having a financial planning session for the year. Assigning
(11:52):
ourselves budgets, so it didn't feel prescriptive. Then when we
were doing it with kids, that was an exercise we'd
been doing year over year. You know, that was already
built into our vernacular. But we kept it up. And
I think this idea of a team of mentality serves
you later on because if you foundationally believe that you
both are contributing, you both are doing work of value,
(12:13):
you both deserve to be healthy and whole. Then on
the weekends when you have downtime, it's not you know,
the person working out of the home who needs a break.
You both need breaks. And then you're both figuring out
ways in which you can give yourselves that, whether that's
outsourcing you know, to a date night babysitter, or you're
trading off hours on the weekend. I would say we
really succeeded in seeing it as a partnership, and when
(12:39):
we hit troubles along the way. I remember the first
time he called it a luxury to stay home, and
he was like, well, it's a luxury, and I was said, what, listen,
have you ever been at home with two children? There's
nothing luxurious about those. We went to therapyge and just
you know, and so much of that was working through
the language, and we really had, you know, our values
(13:00):
were aligned, but we did have to sort of shift
our mindsets around value. Were you I rate when he
said that I rate bananas? I remember when he said that.
I couldn't quite get my head around why it was
so bothersome. And then I did the digging and I realized,
wait a second. We have associated stay at home motherhood
(13:22):
with luxury for so long in this country, and the
problem with that is as soon as you associate one
side with luxury, you decide it's not work of value,
and or you deem it not worthy of support. One
in three women feel forced to make this choice because
of the cost of childcare. The privilege I have is
to get to choose, and the privilege my husband and
(13:43):
I had was to.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Get to choose.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
But that was a privilege that we both shared. So
there was a nice lot talking too, But luckily it
helped fill up an entire chapter of the book.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Speaking of the book, before it even begins, you have
a page that says how to use this book, which
I love. You write that this book is for women
who have the privilege to pause their careers. According to
your American Mothers on Pause survey, over forty percent of
women say they worry about money after stepping back from work,
even though they also say it was totally worth it.
(14:18):
Is there anything specific, aside from aligning on budgets with
your spouse that you think can set you up for
financial success in the transition.
Speaker 4 (14:29):
There's some tactical pieces like planning six months ahead ideally
and having at least three months of reserves in the bank.
And most people don't know, but you can be getting
a spousal IRA, so your spouse can be contributing to
your IRA even when you're not.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Working for pay.
Speaker 4 (14:47):
There are some of those technical pieces that just take planning,
and I think that's the foundational piece, is planning and
making sure we don't like trip and fall into this
decision and then realize you don't have a plan. I
think the other piece that was interesting was some of
the creative ways people practiced and budgeting. Some said like, Okay,
we're going to go through six months having cut the
(15:09):
costs that were predicting cutting, and we're going to see
how that feels before we come in to it. I
heard of someone else trialing living on one income. So
they contributed all of.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Her Oh that's interesting her salary into her four to
one k, so that she a had that later on,
but b that they were able to practice living on
one income. And so there are some really creative and
interesting ways to do that. And again, I think it
just takes that forward thought and the joint team thinking
(15:42):
around money. Simon was sharing in preparation for this that
she felt there was also a little bit of a
mental battle here too, because a lot of women feel
pride around being independent, funding their own lives without having
to rely on a partner. Do you think there's ways
that we can reframe and feel empowered by the decision.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
If an at home parent was compensated, it would be
one hundred and eighty four thousand dollars a yere, no
one is paying you that. However, I do think having
some of that backpocket data is helpful in reframing that
this is not work anyone would do without help. If
your friend was getting paid, that they would be considered
(16:25):
having a big job. All of that data doesn't even
include the emotional and intellectual labor that we keep talking about.
It talks about stuffurring, it talks about cooking and talks
about nutrition, but it doesn't really speak to the stuff
you can't outsource.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
We have to take a quick break, but we'll be
right back with Neha Rush And we're back with Neha Roush.
I've tried to figure out a way to reframe the
question what you do, because I've noticed I'll ask people
(17:05):
and sometimes stay at home mothers, I can feel they're like, oh,
I just I must stay at home mom, or they
qualify I'm just to stay at home mom, And in
my mind, I'm like, it's not just.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
But there's no great way to ask that question.
Speaker 2 (17:22):
And I think that in reading your book, one of
the things that I was really learning is this struggle
with identity.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
In the moment of career pause.
Speaker 4 (17:31):
First of all, what do you do? It is such
a universal stumbling block. The phrase has just come to
stand in for who are you? And when you rely
on your professional title to sum up the things you
care about. There was a woman I interviewed.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
And she.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
Was a teacher, and she got great prating from saying
she was a teacher, because it immediately communicated that she
was empathetic, that she might have been calm, that she
was a communicator that she was intellectually curious, and it
communicated so much about her without that many words, And
when you part with that, you don't have that language
(18:14):
as easily available to you. So you have to figure out, well,
what belongs to me without that. If you are a teacher,
or if you're a brand marketer, or if you were
in the media, or if you were a lawyer, that
skill and experience doesn't evautrate just because you're not practicing right,
So if you want to identify with that, still go
right ahead. There's something interesting about the opportunity of reflecting on, well,
(18:38):
what parts of that identity go with me? What do
I get to take from In my example, from that
decade in brand marketing, I'm creative. I'm so curious about
how women work and stories and all of that gets
to go with me, And I wonder what else I
can now explore in this stage of life. I've heard
(18:59):
this anecdotally that women working out of the home me
not want to ask a woman who they perceive as
a stay at home mom. They might not want to
ask them what to do because they don't want to
make them uncomfortable. And I think that there is this
fear of we're going to make them uncomfortable, but that's
on them to work through. It's our job to include
them in the conversation. And worse than being asked what
(19:21):
you do is not being asked right because then you
are automatically content out of the conversation. So another way
to ask might be what are you up to for
the rest of the day. It gives you a chance
to talk about how you're actually spending your time. Right
on the inverse, the real language that served me was
right now, because it's a chapter in life. This is
(19:43):
one part of my story. I get to be with
my kids. That's what I'm actually doing with my time.
We'll see what comes next.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I love that so much because at the core of
that question is someone just trying to understand what your
interests are and how you spend your time. And so
you're just reframing that.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
And I think there's a relief that we give ourselves
that we don't have to be fixed into this decision forever.
But we can own the power or the privilege to
get to choose this and stand in the power of that.
If you didn't choose, you can say I'm spending time
with my kids right now.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
There's a lot of feelings I imagine that come up
after deciding to take a career pause. What are some
of those usual feelings. There's a real fear around becoming irrelevant.
It's sort of the third myth that we try and
dismantle in the book is this idea that your career
pause is your career ender. For the reasons we just
talked about, all of that experience goes with you, right
(20:39):
and I wish I had done a better job of this,
so I spent time with it on the book. When
you're resigning, you're actually networking on your way out to
essentially build the bridge back for yourself. You're taking a
mentor out for coffee, or you're taking the administrative assistant
who you had such a nice connection with out to
a drink, because you want to be able to nurture
(21:02):
that network that may serve you really well. And the
nice thing about what the era we're living in right
now is that we can stay connected. It takes thirty
minutes a week maybe to scroll your LinkedIn feed and
be able to engage with former employers, former colleagues, content
and know that.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
That web still exists.
Speaker 4 (21:23):
The other thing I wish I'd done was take stock
of my experience when I left. You know, you forget
those little moments that lit you up, that those big
wins that are sort of tangible and easy to communicate,
and you want those intact and I think being able
to sort of dignify what you did before reminds you
(21:43):
that those skills are still there for you to draw on.
The other piece is this idea of like, you can
also update your LinkedIn headline to say ten your market
or something interesting about you that makes you nance right,
curious about women currently volunteering, were currently on sabbatical, something
that just speaks to where you are without shutting yourself off.
(22:06):
And then there's a fear of feeling stuck and not
growling and not knowing what comes next. That's my favorite
part to talk about because that's actually where.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
You can use this.
Speaker 4 (22:16):
Stage of life to get really intentional, and I think
that's the part that's lesser talked about.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
My mom told me she took I think four years
off when she had my brother and I we were
two years apart, and she said those were some of
the hardest years of her life.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
She really enjoyed working.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
And she felt that sense of stuckness for a person
like that who takes a career pause and then thought,
maybe this isn't for me.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
What does somebody do?
Speaker 4 (22:47):
Then you're allowed to reevaluate your decision at any time.
First of all, it's normal to feel a little bit
of grief as your trait and discomfort as your transition.
Even if this was your choice, it's going to going
to feel uncomfortable. And I think that the part around
that is really starts with giving yourself permission that this
stage of life you might have chosen or not chosen to,
(23:10):
but it happened that you're making room to raise your kids,
but you can actually make room to grow alongside. When
we reframe that as yes, we are here in this
moment in this chapter to focus on our family life
and to thrive in family life, and for our family
to thrive, they deserve a healthy and whole parent. What
(23:34):
can I do now to plant seeds for my future
vision state? You know, I think a lot about how
when I was in the workforce, I know many women
were this way. You know, you go at the end
of your year end review and you kind of say
the things you have to say to get a promotion
or a salary bump. This is actually the only time
(23:54):
where you're reporting only to yourself. And when you're reporting
to yourself, what are those metrics? Right? And if you
aren't going to get a promotion and you aren't going
to get a salary, how else can you measure success?
And too often we see women feel like, well, if
I'm going to be taking care of my kids, my
metric for success is their behavior the state of my home.
(24:18):
But can we reframe this to think for ourselves if
we want to measure our own growth, how can we
start to back into what are measures of success? And
I mean I talk about a number of different ways,
but my favorite one is forecast your ideal day in
five ten years, right, great detail where you're spending time with,
(24:38):
what are you're spending time on, how do you feel
in your body? How do you feel in your mind?
Because that will reveal to you, well, what do I
really care about moving myself toward? And I think in
that way, we reclaim this time for ourselves and we
dignify that time with goals.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
For another short break, but don't go anywhere. We'll be
right back and we're back with njar roush Okay, going
to Your American Mother's on Pause survey, the majority of
stay at home moms say they find the process of
applying to jobs pretty intimidating.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Where do you think.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
The best place to look for the next big job
or the next big opportunity is when.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
You have been on a career pause. Well, ideally you
start that practice kind of right away. There's such an
interesting moment of self study, this idea that once you
step into a career break, no one's tracking those accomplishments,
but you can. Can you write down and make a
list in your phone iPhone out We're on a Google
(25:51):
doc of what's a moment that sparked your interest, What's
something that made you feel proud this week? Any and
all things. And it might seem completely disparate, but when
you look back, the dots will connect and they'll do
two things. One and I'll use the example of this
woman in North Carolina who what jumped out to her
(26:14):
and looking back at a year of notes was that
one time that she helped her local school system organize
a new bus route for her area which was underserved.
One it revealed to her that she's actually really interested
in project management. Second thing, when she realized she wanted
(26:35):
to go into project management, which was not necessarily like
a full pivot, but it was an evolution from where
she was. She started to put the bullets under her
experience over these last couple of years together, and she
was able to fancify that one experience to make it relevant.
Game changing suddenly gave her an ability to speak with
(26:58):
confidence to number of relevant experiences that she had during
that time away. And I'm not saying brush under the
rug that she paused her career to take care of
family life, but she has a way in which to
speak to how she expanded her skills in like really
tangible practical ways.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
What are some pitfalls to look out for when you're
planning a return to work.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
I ran into this and I work for myself. Whatever
your shift is that you're stepping into around career and family.
When you're entering in a new season, there's re examination
between your partner and you, and so we go back
to those meetings around how might we think about the
dynamic that's shifting. In this case, it might not be
(27:43):
a money conversation, but it might be a roles and
responsibilities conversation right, And I think too often we've been
so focused on the re entry and our children have
grown along side and maybe their needs have changed, but
we try and have similar to the money meetings are
pretty consistent back to school. It is a sort of
(28:05):
normal inflection point or revisiting period where we've re examined
the routines, who's doing pickups, lay out all the cards
and the fair play, and reassign them because what we
don't want to see is we take on more work
outside of the home and we're still holding all of
(28:26):
the cards that we were before. For many women who
have been carrying the sort of unpaid intellectual emotional labor
for so long, it can very quickly continue to default
that way unless you intentionally have that dialogue, and not
just with your husband, with your kids too. I got
some great wisdom from Tova Klein, who I interviewed for
the book, and she said, it's not about working in
(28:49):
or out of the home.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Right.
Speaker 4 (28:51):
We know that there are equally healthy outcomes for children
no matter what. It's about having a present parent when
you are there, So how can you redefine intently what
that presence is going to look like for you? And
maybe I'll give you my example. I now work until
four thirty every day, and I return home and I
put my phone away on the front console table and
(29:12):
I don't pick it up again untill eight. So I
know that from an hour's perspective, I'm spending far fewer hours.
But that was what allows me the ability to feel
really confident that they're still getting a whole and present parent.
The other piece of this is our needs and wants
are allowed to shift over time, just like the whole
(29:34):
family units.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Nothing makes me feel more loved and cared for than
when someone puts their phone away. Oh and so I
think your kids must feel that me too. Okay, this
is Simone's great question and I want to share it
even though she's not here. She said she wants to
talk child care. This feels like the biggest barrier for
her and most of the moms that she speaks to,
(29:57):
and the biggest struggle. So during her pause, it was
hard to find help and then pay for it. What
are some creative ways to find help?
Speaker 4 (30:07):
I think the first piece was that she struggled, and
if I remember correctly, with this idea that if I'm
not doing paid work, I don't deserve paid help, right,
and I think that that sadly, we see reflected in
the research that one in three women feel that way.
This work is of value, but it's also work, and
no one should expect to do that twenty four to
(30:28):
seven without breaks. With that in mind, the next question becomes, Okay,
the most readily available person to give you a break
is your partner in the case of a two parent household.
So how might we have conversations with our partner in
the case of especially if we don't have access to
paid help, about how we might be able to take
the mornings to ourselves, if our partner can wake up
(30:50):
with our child, or even rotate mornings so that we
can have a dependable hour every morning that we can
work out. You know, we can invest in whatever lights
us up and keeps us healthy.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Right.
Speaker 4 (31:02):
Part two of that is how might you think about
what else you can delegate? It doesn't always have to
be childcare, and I have a full robust list at
the end of the help chapter. Maybe for you it's
not about getting help with the kids, but it is
about the stuff that you do want to delegate, like laundry,
gift buying, cleaning, in general meals, whatever that might be.
(31:26):
Have that conversation with yourself and in the home about
what are stuff that I can either delegate or let
go of for this time or lower the bar on,
Like we know that we do have to do laundry
in a house, but how often do we have to
do it? I heard one woman say I just bought
ten under It turns out that like getting ten under
pats of underwear was just cheaper.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
I didn't have to.
Speaker 4 (31:46):
Get like a cleaning lady, but I could only have
to do laundry once a month, once a week and
not made.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Sense for us.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
And then the really creative ones were the ones who
decided to do like a coworking swap where one takes
three kids at a time and then the two others
get a break for a few hours each afternoon. It's
like a win win, But it does take saying you
need help, putting yourself out there with friends, asking what
(32:15):
other solutions other people are using. It can be nanny shares,
it can be mothers helpers, It can be your partner
or family. But everyone deserves those breaks.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Nah has you're doing these community events for your book launch,
do you find that women are gravitating towards a chapter
or an idea.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
In particular, the chapter on reframing our sense of ambition
that are in our sense of identity is always you know,
I think it sits at the heart of this work
because we have been fed this idea that our worth
is so tied up to what we do for a living,
(32:57):
and if we part with that, who are we? How
do we exist? How do we stay relevant? The other
piece that people are really interested in when they're in
community is when they look around and they realize, wait
a second, this is not the stay at home mom
fore yesteryear. I think this sort of stay at home
working mother divide has done us no good and we need,
we need a lot more together in this for these
(33:19):
next few years.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
In thinking about the stay at home mother of yesteryear,
I was really interested to learn that the term stay
at home mom only came into our vernacular in the
nineteen nineties, and at the time it was meant to
modernize the title housewife or homemaker. And so now in
twenty twenty five, your book is out and you've put
your stake in the ground, which is the word that
(33:42):
you use last time you came on the podcast. How
do you see the term and the perception of stay
at home mom evolve in the future.
Speaker 4 (33:51):
My hope is where you can just blur the edges
around it and just get rid of it entirely. I mean,
no one replies I'm a working mom. Like if you
ask what you do, you don't say I'm a working mom.
There's no reason to say I'm a stay at home mom.
Right Yeah, the ability to just say and I go
back to right now, I get to be with my kids.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
We'll see what comes next. One part of a very
ongoing story.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
So I'm obsessed with book dedications, and I open up
your book and it has a beautiful dedication. It says
for my father for always honoring my mother's impact in
our home and for believing in me and this work too.
Can you share more about the dedication.
Speaker 4 (34:35):
We immigrated here when I was three, and he always
worshiped the ground my mother walked on. I knew that,
but I didn't know how fully he credited her for
the work that he was able to do until I
got a little bit older. And he always made so
clear that he was not able to do what he
(34:59):
could do about her. He was building a company at
the time where there was a lot of immigrants coming
in from India, and she was the one who would
settle them into the local community and help line up
housing and schools, that she would house them in many
cases and they would live with us. I mean, it
was really she was his right, She was his head
(35:20):
of hr and he paid her such respect that I
didn't even fully understand when I took my own career
pods the shaman stigma I was going to feel. My
mother did ultimately return to work outside of the home,
but they always seemed like such a team. And then
that is and maybe is why I talk so much
about that mindset going into these kinds of shifts.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Did he support your career pause? Did you consult him
about it before you decided?
Speaker 4 (35:47):
I did, and he he did. I think, you know,
he also put this faith in me that I would
be able.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
To turn it into something.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
I had that belief and confidence pretty early on. And
we don't always get those messages when we're young, and
we don't always get those messages from the people who
raise us or surround us. And I do feel lucky
in that way, and it is absolutely because I had
him in my corner.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
It's so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
This almost feels like it's been a lifetime of practice
and of work. Who are really a culture shifter, And
I'm so glad that this book exists in the world,
and I'm so glad that you've been leading this charge.
So thank you for sharing your time with us today.
Thank you. Danielle nehal Ruche is the founder and CEO
(36:42):
of Mother Untitled and the author of The Power Pause,
which is out.
Speaker 3 (36:46):
Now, that's it for today's show. Tomorrow it is Wellness Wednesday, y'all,
and we're talking all about financial health and how to
use AI to reach our money goals. Here to walk
us through it is the self proclaimed Beyonce of personal finance,
Melissa Jean Baptiste. Join the conversation using hashtag the bright
(37:10):
Side and connect with us on social media at Hello
Sunshine on Instagram and at the bright Side Pod on
TikTok Oh, and feel free to tag us at Simone
Boyce and at Danielle Robe.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Listen and follow The bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
See you tomorrow, folks. Keep looking on the bright side.
Hey bessies, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Today on the bright Side, we're changing the way we
talk about being a stay at home mom. Founder and
CEO of Mother Untitled, Neha Rouche is back on the
bright side and her new book, The Power Pause is
out now. She's flipping the script on parenthood and pausing
your career. She's here to give us fresh tools, empowering language,
and a whole new way to think about this transformative
(00:26):
phase of life. It's Tuesday, January twenty eighth. I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
And I'm Simone Boyce, and this is the bright Side
from Hello Sunshine, Simone.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
I am truly grateful to be in conversation with Neha
Rush again. She was your friend that you brought on
the show, and I just fell in love with her
when she joined us last time. I felt like we
just scratched the surface about how challenging it can be
for moms to determine whether or not to stay at
home to raise their children or invest in childcare. I mean,
(00:59):
we talked about how some women fear that starting a
family could be a career ender even and she really
shed light on some of the false beliefs of stay
at home parenthood.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
It was such an enlightening conversation.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
It always is an enlightening conversation when Neha Rush is involved,
and I feel like Danielle, we have to kind of
start by giving some context as to why you're not
going to hear my voice in this interview. This is
an interview I've been looking forward to for forever, because,
as you mentioned, she's a friend of mine and I
have been cheering her on behind the scenes as she's
been working on this book. I know that she has
(01:32):
poured her heart and soul into The Power Pause, and
I know that she really believes that can help an
entire generation of women break through from some of these
false beliefs that I think we've inherited from our own mothers. Unfortunately,
there was a fire near my house. I'm sure you
guys are aware of bright Side besties of what's been
going on in LA with all these fires, and just
(01:55):
had to make the decision to keep my family safe
and get everybody out of the house. So unfortunately I
missed this interview, but I had spent so much time
highlighting her book, and there's so many things I want
to talk about and ask about. But I know that
I know that you guys had an electrifying conversation Danielle,
and I cannot wait to hear it.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
We also got to ask some of your questions, so
I don't want you to be you do, said yeah,
and we credited you would they everyone will know that
they're yours.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
I don't care about that.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I just the reason why I did that is because
this book is so interactive and it truly is comprehensive.
Like she's got exercises in there to help you, you know,
disentangle your identity from your work. She's got sample schedules
from mothers who are navigating some similar challenges that you
(02:45):
might be walking through. So yeah, I just want to
honor how incredibly thorough this this book is, and to
be honest, Danielle, like, this is the kind of book
that I wish was available not just when I decided
to pause my own.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Career, but I wish it was available.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
As I was thinking about building a family, because I
get so many young women reaching out to me asking
me about how to navigate, you know, breaks in your career,
especially like in broadcast journalism. And now not only can
I point to my experience and say, hey, look what's possible,
look how robust your career can be on the other
(03:24):
side of motherhood. But also I have this incredible guide
Naha's book to point them to.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Now it's interesting you say that.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
As I was talking to her, I was thinking, I'm
so glad that I'm learning about this before parenthood. I
really think that this is a book that applies to
almost any phase of life that you're in. If you're
thinking about becoming a mom, it's interesting. If you are
a mom, it's fascinating, And if you're not wanting to
(03:52):
be a mom, it's also interesting to learn about the
language that we're using as a culture around stay at
home parenthood.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Another thing that really stood out to me in Naha's book.
She talks about the transition itself, like what it's like
to put your career on pause and what it's like
to navigate the financial aspect of that. But she also
talks about the return, and she's encouraging parents to really
prepare yourselves for what it's like when you do return
(04:22):
to work. So that's a fresh perspective that I feel
like is not talked about enough in this conversation.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Absolutely, we touch on that and so much more.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Here's our conversation with neh Uche.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Okay, nay, how welcome back to the bright side.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Thank you, it's so nice to see your face. I'm
so happy to see you. Congratulations on Power Pause. This
is not just a beautiful cover, but truly a beautiful book.
So this book is already resonating with parents around the
country very deeply. I want to start with the language.
What is a power pause? The power pause is the
(05:01):
antidote to this idea that if you part with your
career for a chapter, that you're somehow a shut in
trope that has long since been associated with a stay
at home mother. And instead it's this reclaiming of language
that speaks to shifting priorities away from our paid work
for a chapter for family life, for mental health, for
(05:22):
elder care, for a variety of different priorities, and in
making room for that, allowing ourselves to discover new interests,
new skills, and ultimately be able to add that all
back to such a robust career portfolio. One thing I've
heard you say a lot about is that motherhood gets
bad pr Why is it important to you to provide
(05:45):
a different and possibly even more accurate view we've.
Speaker 4 (05:49):
Done such incredible work, only in the recent years of
finally starting to think about, well, is there value to
unpaid labor, dignifying that work, and really starting to elevate
it from the mems of divers and laundry, and really
think about the onspiring work that happens behind the scenes,
right you know, the women advocating for their child's care
(06:09):
to insurance companies, or navigating really complicated education systems to
get their kids the best possible structures and systems to
help them grow and learn. That's the work behind the scenes.
And when we shine a light on that, then we
do two things. We better understand why people might want
more room and time with their kids or for their kids,
(06:30):
and we also start to understand that, you know, women's
brains don't go and die if they take a break
from the paid workforce. Actually, it can expand in all
sorts of new directions. You're taking this on in a
very granular sense. In each chapter you outline a false
belief and then a new narrative to correct it. What
is the first false belief that you had to unlearn
(06:51):
in your own power?
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Pause?
Speaker 4 (06:53):
When I had my first child and I decided I
wanted to downshift my career. I switched to part time
so that I could be two days at the workplace
and then the rest of the week at home. In
twenty sixteen, it was the height of the leaning era,
the height of the girl boss era, and you know,
in some ways we had reached the pinnacle of that
(07:14):
second wave of feminism. In what we had to do
was rethink, well, if I have clocked in a decade
plus in my career and I don't serve my husband
cocktails at the end of the day, right, these are
dads who are three times as involved with their kids
versus any generation prior. And I have all this access
(07:35):
to tools and technology, so I know I'm going to
continue to grow. Then how can I re architect my
sense of playing the long game. I'm actually pausing, and
this isn't a career ender, and actually this is going
to be one stage in my life. The idea of ambition,
specifically is the determination to do things with care, and
(07:57):
the reality is we're going to care about a lot
of things over the long game life.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
I have a good friend who just had a baby,
and pre baby was very career focused. Post baby, she's
really considering a career pause. Now, for someone like her,
what's the first place to start? What questions should she
be asking herself or asking her partner? Well, I think
(08:23):
the first place is, you know, have I explored all
the options to make room for family? Because there are
more than the black and white idea of pausing or
staying full time right, there's such a vast in between
of stay at women working. The second question is do
I need to stay connected to this particular role to
(08:43):
preserve my options? And if the answer still feels like yes,
then you know, is there a part time or flexible
arrangement that feels available to me? And if the answer
is no, then you might say, okay, Well, if I pause,
what are ways in which I can think about strategically
navigating my exit so that I'm going to feel empowered,
(09:03):
so that I can know that I have a study
on ramp if I want to come back.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
To that particular work.
Speaker 4 (09:08):
But I think the other piece is if I am
pausing or me and my partner aligned on this being
a joint household decision. If you are wanting to shift,
that decision needs to be made together with the foundational
understanding that even if you pause, your paid work, you
are still contributing, So the partner working out of the
(09:31):
home is equally dependent on the work you're doing in
the home and the intellectual and emotional labor you're going
to be contributing, so they can single task. And deciding
that budgeting for that allows you the ability to then
walk through this stage of life knowing you both deserve
to be whole and healthy and that you feel respected
as you navigate the next chapter.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
That part feels so important because you could make a
decision and your partner, it says they're on the same page,
they're not.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
That's that, I think is what scares.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
A lot of women one hundred percent because even if
this is a financial no brainer, this idea of parting
with our financial independence, this idea of dependent has just
felt so scary for so long, and so being able
to challenge that and think of yourselves as a business
organization like depersonalize it for a little bit. In say,
(10:25):
household income in, household income out, we're making an adjustment
together to the household's income. Right. I've heard of couples
making big, bold moves from San Francisco to Virginia for
lower cost of living I've seen other couples say, you
know what, We're going to turn down travel opportunities for
this year because that's the sort of wig overom we
need to part with income. If you start to feel that,
(10:47):
wait a second, I don't feel like I'm going to
have equal access to this household income or the mindset
of both being interdependent on one another is getting harder
to come by in this conversation. Bring in a mayoral
counselor bring in a fair play facility tator, bring in
a financial planner, because the reality is if you don't
(11:08):
feel secure in that, then stepping into this is a risk.
If you are in a rocky marriage, this is not
the time to be parting with your income. If you
need to pause or make more room, consider ways in
which you can stay connected to income. Right.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Is there anything specifically that you did with your husband
that you think helped make your pause successful.
Speaker 4 (11:31):
We did bouts, a couple's therapy. I think we did
one thing really well, which is we had started looking
at our budget in our forecast well before we had children,
so we had an established cadence of meeting every January
and having a financial planning session for the year. Assigning
(11:52):
ourselves budgets, so it didn't feel prescriptive. Then when we
were doing it with kids, that was an exercise we'd
been doing year over year. You know, that was already
built into our vernacular. But we kept it up. And
I think this idea of a team of mentality serves
you later on because if you foundationally believe that you
both are contributing, you both are doing work of value,
(12:13):
you both deserve to be healthy and whole. Then on
the weekends when you have downtime, it's not you know,
the person working out of the home who needs a break.
You both need breaks. And then you're both figuring out
ways in which you can give yourselves that, whether that's
outsourcing you know, to a date night babysitter, or you're
trading off hours on the weekend. I would say we
really succeeded in seeing it as a partnership, and when
(12:39):
we hit troubles along the way. I remember the first
time he called it a luxury to stay home, and
he was like, well, it's a luxury, and I was said, what, listen,
have you ever been at home with two children? There's
nothing luxurious about those. We went to therapyge and just
you know, and so much of that was working through
the language, and we really had, you know, our values
(13:00):
were aligned, but we did have to sort of shift
our mindsets around value. Were you I rate when he
said that I rate bananas? I remember when he said that.
I couldn't quite get my head around why it was
so bothersome. And then I did the digging and I realized,
wait a second. We have associated stay at home motherhood
(13:22):
with luxury for so long in this country, and the
problem with that is as soon as you associate one
side with luxury, you decide it's not work of value,
and or you deem it not worthy of support. One
in three women feel forced to make this choice because
of the cost of childcare. The privilege I have is
to get to choose, and the privilege my husband and
(13:43):
I had was to.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Get to choose.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
But that was a privilege that we both shared. So
there was a nice lot talking too, But luckily it
helped fill up an entire chapter of the book.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Speaking of the book, before it even begins, you have
a page that says how to use this book, which
I love. You write that this book is for women
who have the privilege to pause their careers. According to
your American Mothers on Pause survey, over forty percent of
women say they worry about money after stepping back from work,
even though they also say it was totally worth it.
(14:18):
Is there anything specific, aside from aligning on budgets with
your spouse that you think can set you up for
financial success in the transition.
Speaker 4 (14:29):
There's some tactical pieces like planning six months ahead ideally
and having at least three months of reserves in the bank.
And most people don't know, but you can be getting
a spousal IRA, so your spouse can be contributing to
your IRA even when you're not.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Working for pay.
Speaker 4 (14:47):
There are some of those technical pieces that just take planning,
and I think that's the foundational piece, is planning and
making sure we don't like trip and fall into this
decision and then realize you don't have a plan. I
think the other piece that was interesting was some of
the creative ways people practiced and budgeting. Some said like, Okay,
we're going to go through six months having cut the
(15:09):
costs that were predicting cutting, and we're going to see
how that feels before we come in to it. I
heard of someone else trialing living on one income. So
they contributed all of.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Her Oh that's interesting her salary into her four to
one k, so that she a had that later on,
but b that they were able to practice living on
one income. And so there are some really creative and
interesting ways to do that. And again, I think it
just takes that forward thought and the joint team thinking
(15:42):
around money. Simon was sharing in preparation for this that
she felt there was also a little bit of a
mental battle here too, because a lot of women feel
pride around being independent, funding their own lives without having
to rely on a partner. Do you think there's ways
that we can reframe and feel empowered by the decision.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
If an at home parent was compensated, it would be
one hundred and eighty four thousand dollars a yere, no
one is paying you that. However, I do think having
some of that backpocket data is helpful in reframing that
this is not work anyone would do without help. If
your friend was getting paid, that they would be considered
(16:25):
having a big job. All of that data doesn't even
include the emotional and intellectual labor that we keep talking about.
It talks about stuffurring, it talks about cooking and talks
about nutrition, but it doesn't really speak to the stuff
you can't outsource.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
We have to take a quick break, but we'll be
right back with Neha Rush And we're back with Neha Roush.
I've tried to figure out a way to reframe the
question what you do, because I've noticed I'll ask people
(17:05):
and sometimes stay at home mothers, I can feel they're like, oh,
I just I must stay at home mom, or they
qualify I'm just to stay at home mom, And in
my mind, I'm like, it's not just.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
But there's no great way to ask that question.
Speaker 2 (17:22):
And I think that in reading your book, one of
the things that I was really learning is this struggle
with identity.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
In the moment of career pause.
Speaker 4 (17:31):
First of all, what do you do? It is such
a universal stumbling block. The phrase has just come to
stand in for who are you? And when you rely
on your professional title to sum up the things you
care about. There was a woman I interviewed.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
And she.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
Was a teacher, and she got great prating from saying
she was a teacher, because it immediately communicated that she
was empathetic, that she might have been calm, that she
was a communicator that she was intellectually curious, and it
communicated so much about her without that many words, And
when you part with that, you don't have that language
(18:14):
as easily available to you. So you have to figure out, well,
what belongs to me without that. If you are a teacher,
or if you're a brand marketer, or if you were
in the media, or if you were a lawyer, that
skill and experience doesn't evautrate just because you're not practicing right,
So if you want to identify with that, still go
right ahead. There's something interesting about the opportunity of reflecting on, well,
(18:38):
what parts of that identity go with me? What do
I get to take from In my example, from that
decade in brand marketing, I'm creative. I'm so curious about
how women work and stories and all of that gets
to go with me, And I wonder what else I
can now explore in this stage of life. I've heard
(18:59):
this anecdotally that women working out of the home me
not want to ask a woman who they perceive as
a stay at home mom. They might not want to
ask them what to do because they don't want to
make them uncomfortable. And I think that there is this
fear of we're going to make them uncomfortable, but that's
on them to work through. It's our job to include
them in the conversation. And worse than being asked what
(19:21):
you do is not being asked right because then you
are automatically content out of the conversation. So another way
to ask might be what are you up to for
the rest of the day. It gives you a chance
to talk about how you're actually spending your time. Right
on the inverse, the real language that served me was
right now, because it's a chapter in life. This is
(19:43):
one part of my story. I get to be with
my kids. That's what I'm actually doing with my time.
We'll see what comes next.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I love that so much because at the core of
that question is someone just trying to understand what your
interests are and how you spend your time. And so
you're just reframing that.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
And I think there's a relief that we give ourselves
that we don't have to be fixed into this decision forever.
But we can own the power or the privilege to
get to choose this and stand in the power of that.
If you didn't choose, you can say I'm spending time
with my kids right now.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
There's a lot of feelings I imagine that come up
after deciding to take a career pause. What are some
of those usual feelings. There's a real fear around becoming irrelevant.
It's sort of the third myth that we try and
dismantle in the book is this idea that your career
pause is your career ender. For the reasons we just
talked about, all of that experience goes with you, right
(20:39):
and I wish I had done a better job of this,
so I spent time with it on the book. When
you're resigning, you're actually networking on your way out to
essentially build the bridge back for yourself. You're taking a
mentor out for coffee, or you're taking the administrative assistant
who you had such a nice connection with out to
a drink, because you want to be able to nurture
(21:02):
that network that may serve you really well. And the
nice thing about what the era we're living in right
now is that we can stay connected. It takes thirty
minutes a week maybe to scroll your LinkedIn feed and
be able to engage with former employers, former colleagues, content
and know that.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
That web still exists.
Speaker 4 (21:23):
The other thing I wish I'd done was take stock
of my experience when I left. You know, you forget
those little moments that lit you up, that those big
wins that are sort of tangible and easy to communicate,
and you want those intact and I think being able
to sort of dignify what you did before reminds you
(21:43):
that those skills are still there for you to draw on.
The other piece is this idea of like, you can
also update your LinkedIn headline to say ten your market
or something interesting about you that makes you nance right,
curious about women currently volunteering, were currently on sabbatical, something
that just speaks to where you are without shutting yourself off.
(22:06):
And then there's a fear of feeling stuck and not
growling and not knowing what comes next. That's my favorite
part to talk about because that's actually where.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
You can use this.
Speaker 4 (22:16):
Stage of life to get really intentional, and I think
that's the part that's lesser talked about.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
My mom told me she took I think four years
off when she had my brother and I we were
two years apart, and she said those were some of
the hardest years of her life.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
She really enjoyed working.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
And she felt that sense of stuckness for a person
like that who takes a career pause and then thought,
maybe this isn't for me.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
What does somebody do?
Speaker 4 (22:47):
Then you're allowed to reevaluate your decision at any time.
First of all, it's normal to feel a little bit
of grief as your trait and discomfort as your transition.
Even if this was your choice, it's going to going
to feel uncomfortable. And I think that the part around
that is really starts with giving yourself permission that this
stage of life you might have chosen or not chosen to,
(23:10):
but it happened that you're making room to raise your kids,
but you can actually make room to grow alongside. When
we reframe that as yes, we are here in this
moment in this chapter to focus on our family life
and to thrive in family life, and for our family
to thrive, they deserve a healthy and whole parent. What
(23:34):
can I do now to plant seeds for my future
vision state? You know, I think a lot about how
when I was in the workforce, I know many women
were this way. You know, you go at the end
of your year end review and you kind of say
the things you have to say to get a promotion
or a salary bump. This is actually the only time
(23:54):
where you're reporting only to yourself. And when you're reporting
to yourself, what are those metrics? Right? And if you
aren't going to get a promotion and you aren't going
to get a salary, how else can you measure success?
And too often we see women feel like, well, if
I'm going to be taking care of my kids, my
metric for success is their behavior the state of my home.
(24:18):
But can we reframe this to think for ourselves if
we want to measure our own growth, how can we
start to back into what are measures of success? And
I mean I talk about a number of different ways,
but my favorite one is forecast your ideal day in
five ten years, right, great detail where you're spending time with,
(24:38):
what are you're spending time on, how do you feel
in your body? How do you feel in your mind?
Because that will reveal to you, well, what do I
really care about moving myself toward? And I think in
that way, we reclaim this time for ourselves and we
dignify that time with goals.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
For another short break, but don't go anywhere. We'll be
right back and we're back with njar roush Okay, going
to Your American Mother's on Pause survey, the majority of
stay at home moms say they find the process of
applying to jobs pretty intimidating.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Where do you think.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
The best place to look for the next big job
or the next big opportunity is when.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
You have been on a career pause. Well, ideally you
start that practice kind of right away. There's such an
interesting moment of self study, this idea that once you
step into a career break, no one's tracking those accomplishments,
but you can. Can you write down and make a
list in your phone iPhone out We're on a Google
(25:51):
doc of what's a moment that sparked your interest, What's
something that made you feel proud this week? Any and
all things. And it might seem completely disparate, but when
you look back, the dots will connect and they'll do
two things. One and I'll use the example of this
woman in North Carolina who what jumped out to her
(26:14):
and looking back at a year of notes was that
one time that she helped her local school system organize
a new bus route for her area which was underserved.
One it revealed to her that she's actually really interested
in project management. Second thing, when she realized she wanted
(26:35):
to go into project management, which was not necessarily like
a full pivot, but it was an evolution from where
she was. She started to put the bullets under her
experience over these last couple of years together, and she
was able to fancify that one experience to make it relevant.
Game changing suddenly gave her an ability to speak with
(26:58):
confidence to number of relevant experiences that she had during
that time away. And I'm not saying brush under the
rug that she paused her career to take care of
family life, but she has a way in which to
speak to how she expanded her skills in like really
tangible practical ways.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
What are some pitfalls to look out for when you're
planning a return to work.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
I ran into this and I work for myself. Whatever
your shift is that you're stepping into around career and family.
When you're entering in a new season, there's re examination
between your partner and you, and so we go back
to those meetings around how might we think about the
dynamic that's shifting. In this case, it might not be
(27:43):
a money conversation, but it might be a roles and
responsibilities conversation right, And I think too often we've been
so focused on the re entry and our children have
grown along side and maybe their needs have changed, but
we try and have similar to the money meetings are
pretty consistent back to school. It is a sort of
(28:05):
normal inflection point or revisiting period where we've re examined
the routines, who's doing pickups, lay out all the cards
and the fair play, and reassign them because what we
don't want to see is we take on more work
outside of the home and we're still holding all of
(28:26):
the cards that we were before. For many women who
have been carrying the sort of unpaid intellectual emotional labor
for so long, it can very quickly continue to default
that way unless you intentionally have that dialogue, and not
just with your husband, with your kids too. I got
some great wisdom from Tova Klein, who I interviewed for
the book, and she said, it's not about working in
(28:49):
or out of the home.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Right.
Speaker 4 (28:51):
We know that there are equally healthy outcomes for children
no matter what. It's about having a present parent when
you are there, So how can you redefine intently what
that presence is going to look like for you? And
maybe I'll give you my example. I now work until
four thirty every day, and I return home and I
put my phone away on the front console table and
(29:12):
I don't pick it up again untill eight. So I
know that from an hour's perspective, I'm spending far fewer hours.
But that was what allows me the ability to feel
really confident that they're still getting a whole and present parent.
The other piece of this is our needs and wants
are allowed to shift over time, just like the whole
(29:34):
family units.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Nothing makes me feel more loved and cared for than
when someone puts their phone away. Oh and so I
think your kids must feel that me too. Okay, this
is Simone's great question and I want to share it
even though she's not here. She said she wants to
talk child care. This feels like the biggest barrier for
her and most of the moms that she speaks to,
(29:57):
and the biggest struggle. So during her pause, it was
hard to find help and then pay for it. What
are some creative ways to find help?
Speaker 4 (30:07):
I think the first piece was that she struggled, and
if I remember correctly, with this idea that if I'm
not doing paid work, I don't deserve paid help, right,
and I think that that sadly, we see reflected in
the research that one in three women feel that way.
This work is of value, but it's also work, and
no one should expect to do that twenty four to
(30:28):
seven without breaks. With that in mind, the next question becomes, Okay,
the most readily available person to give you a break
is your partner in the case of a two parent household.
So how might we have conversations with our partner in
the case of especially if we don't have access to
paid help, about how we might be able to take
the mornings to ourselves, if our partner can wake up
(30:50):
with our child, or even rotate mornings so that we
can have a dependable hour every morning that we can
work out. You know, we can invest in whatever lights
us up and keeps us healthy.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Right.
Speaker 4 (31:02):
Part two of that is how might you think about
what else you can delegate? It doesn't always have to
be childcare, and I have a full robust list at
the end of the help chapter. Maybe for you it's
not about getting help with the kids, but it is
about the stuff that you do want to delegate, like laundry,
gift buying, cleaning, in general meals, whatever that might be.
(31:26):
Have that conversation with yourself and in the home about
what are stuff that I can either delegate or let
go of for this time or lower the bar on,
Like we know that we do have to do laundry
in a house, but how often do we have to
do it? I heard one woman say I just bought
ten under It turns out that like getting ten under
pats of underwear was just cheaper.
Speaker 1 (31:45):
I didn't have to.
Speaker 4 (31:46):
Get like a cleaning lady, but I could only have
to do laundry once a month, once a week and
not made.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Sense for us.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
And then the really creative ones were the ones who
decided to do like a coworking swap where one takes
three kids at a time and then the two others
get a break for a few hours each afternoon. It's
like a win win, But it does take saying you
need help, putting yourself out there with friends, asking what
(32:15):
other solutions other people are using. It can be nanny shares,
it can be mothers helpers, It can be your partner
or family. But everyone deserves those breaks.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Nah has you're doing these community events for your book launch,
do you find that women are gravitating towards a chapter
or an idea.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
In particular, the chapter on reframing our sense of ambition
that are in our sense of identity is always you know,
I think it sits at the heart of this work
because we have been fed this idea that our worth
is so tied up to what we do for a living,
(32:57):
and if we part with that, who are we? How
do we exist? How do we stay relevant? The other
piece that people are really interested in when they're in
community is when they look around and they realize, wait
a second, this is not the stay at home mom
fore yesteryear. I think this sort of stay at home
working mother divide has done us no good and we need,
we need a lot more together in this for these
(33:19):
next few years.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
In thinking about the stay at home mother of yesteryear,
I was really interested to learn that the term stay
at home mom only came into our vernacular in the
nineteen nineties, and at the time it was meant to
modernize the title housewife or homemaker. And so now in
twenty twenty five, your book is out and you've put
your stake in the ground, which is the word that
(33:42):
you use last time you came on the podcast. How
do you see the term and the perception of stay
at home mom evolve in the future.
Speaker 4 (33:51):
My hope is where you can just blur the edges
around it and just get rid of it entirely. I mean,
no one replies I'm a working mom. Like if you
ask what you do, you don't say I'm a working mom.
There's no reason to say I'm a stay at home mom.
Right Yeah, the ability to just say and I go
back to right now, I get to be with my kids.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
We'll see what comes next. One part of a very
ongoing story.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
So I'm obsessed with book dedications, and I open up
your book and it has a beautiful dedication. It says
for my father for always honoring my mother's impact in
our home and for believing in me and this work too.
Can you share more about the dedication.
Speaker 4 (34:35):
We immigrated here when I was three, and he always
worshiped the ground my mother walked on. I knew that,
but I didn't know how fully he credited her for
the work that he was able to do until I
got a little bit older. And he always made so
clear that he was not able to do what he
(34:59):
could do about her. He was building a company at
the time where there was a lot of immigrants coming
in from India, and she was the one who would
settle them into the local community and help line up
housing and schools, that she would house them in many
cases and they would live with us. I mean, it
was really she was his right, She was his head
(35:20):
of hr and he paid her such respect that I
didn't even fully understand when I took my own career
pods the shaman stigma I was going to feel. My
mother did ultimately return to work outside of the home,
but they always seemed like such a team. And then
that is and maybe is why I talk so much
about that mindset going into these kinds of shifts.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Did he support your career pause? Did you consult him
about it before you decided?
Speaker 4 (35:47):
I did, and he he did. I think, you know,
he also put this faith in me that I would
be able.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
To turn it into something.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
I had that belief and confidence pretty early on. And
we don't always get those messages when we're young, and
we don't always get those messages from the people who
raise us or surround us. And I do feel lucky
in that way, and it is absolutely because I had
him in my corner.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
It's so beautiful.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
This almost feels like it's been a lifetime of practice
and of work. Who are really a culture shifter, And
I'm so glad that this book exists in the world,
and I'm so glad that you've been leading this charge.
So thank you for sharing your time with us today.
Thank you. Danielle nehal Ruche is the founder and CEO
(36:42):
of Mother Untitled and the author of The Power Pause,
which is out.
Speaker 3 (36:46):
Now, that's it for today's show. Tomorrow it is Wellness Wednesday, y'all,
and we're talking all about financial health and how to
use AI to reach our money goals. Here to walk
us through it is the self proclaimed Beyonce of personal finance,
Melissa Jean Baptiste. Join the conversation using hashtag the bright
(37:10):
Side and connect with us on social media at Hello
Sunshine on Instagram and at the bright Side Pod on
TikTok Oh, and feel free to tag us at Simone
Boyce and at Danielle Robe.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Listen and follow The bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
See you tomorrow, folks. Keep looking on the bright side.
Host
Simone Boyce
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