I was live on Good Day Northwest Arkansas recently, talking to host Jason Suel about something that I think about basically every single day: why rest feels like just one more item on the to-do list for working moms.
If you caught the segment, hi, welcome, grab a coffee. If you missed it—no worries. I’ve got the full interview transcript right here, plus everything we talked about spelled out so you can actually absorb it without simultaneously keeping three kids alive.
Watch it first if you want. Or read. Either way, I’ve got you.
The Part Nobody Talks About: You’re Tired AND You Have a Beautiful Life
Here’s the thing I said on air that seemed to land hardest:
I was burned out in the middle of a life that looked really good on paper.
Beautiful kids. Meaningful work. A partner who showed up. And I was dying inside.
That’s the particular cruelty of burnout for working moms, isn’t it? It doesn’t show up when things are objectively bad. It shows up when you’re supposed to be grateful. When you look around and think, what is wrong with me?
Nothing is wrong with you.
What’s wrong is that the recovery plan you’ve been using — the one where you sneak into the bathroom and scroll for 45 seconds — isn’t actually a break. And I can prove it with brain science, which honestly makes me feel better about the whole thing.
Full Interview Transcript: Good Day Northwest Arkansas
Here’s the complete conversation with host Jason Suel and co-host.
Jason Suel, Good Day Northwest Arkansas: Well, for so many working moms, rest can feel like one more thing on the to-do list. So, Zoe is here right now. She’s a poet strategist, mom of three creator of poems of a burned-out toddler mom, a pocket-sized collection designed as a tech-free mindfulness tool for moms who need a real reset. Zoe, welcome. Thank you for joining us.
Zoe Loeser: Yes. So glad to be here.
Jason Suel: So I’m so curious about this book, but I want to know a bit more about what made you decide to want to start writing your poems down.
Zoe Loeser: I’ve been writing my whole life. It’s just something that I do. It’s something that’s a part of me. And I write when I need to process. So the poems in this book are literally the poems I took to therapy to figure out what in the world was going on with me when I was tired and broken and didn’t know really what else to do at a beautiful life. Beautiful kids. Wonderful job doing something I cared about and I was dying inside.
Jason Suel: That’s a good call out to a lot of moms. On Mother’s Day, we’ll be here before we know it.
Co-host: Everybody’s writing process is different. Did you set out to write a book or did you write everything down and went, “Oh, my gosh, I have a book.”
Zoe Loeser: I actually set out to be an entrepreneur, and I didn’t know how to do that. So I took a business class, and my business coach asked me what I wanted to be known for. And I said, well, here my skills, here’s what I’m an expert in, which at that time was our isolation epidemic in the United States. I was working in nonprofits for that. And I said, but if I could be known for anything, I’d love to be a poet. And she said, you can fail at anything. You might as well do something you love. So here I am.
Jason Suel: I love that story. You talk about replacing the phone scroll with the real reset. Why do you think scrolling often leaves moms feeling worse?
Zoe Loeser: Yes. So scrolling actually blocks our brain’s default network. That’s the part of our brain that activates when we’re awake but resting. So when moms are sneaking into the bathroom for their 30 second break if they reach for their phones they’re not actually getting a break. And there’s no shame our tired, precious brains can’t keep up with the the trillion dollar device. But you know we can do something about it. We can choose revolutionary acts of reading or art
Jason Suel: Yeah, I love that revolutionary acts of reading or art. And this book, as you’ve noticed, right, it’s small. That’s intentional. It’s four by six. 25 poems, 55 pages. So how did you design your work to actually fit in that small space?
Zoe Loeser: I obviously, my publisher that I use is fantastic, but I actually started thinking about it like toothpaste. Poetry is a very bizarre career choice. And so how do I actually get people to buy this? So you choose something that people are gonna pick up every day and like toothpaste. And so if you can keep this in your pocket and choose it for a break, it does wonders for our brains, it does wonders for our relationships, our relationships with our kids. Pocket size. Carry it with you.
Jason Suel: I love that. I wanna have you perform one of those for us. So what is this called? What anything we need to know?
Zoe Loeser: I believed the lie that I belong to everyone else and that’s gonna be the reckoning with that lie and the reclaiming that I am more powerful than I could imagine.
Jason Suel: Amazing. Well, we’re gonna step aside and the stage is all yours.
Cuffs on her wrists. I have cuffs on my wrists.
Poem Copyright 2025 Poems of a Burned Out Toddler Mom, Zoe Loeser LLC
I confess to revolutions playing small,
a vibranium hole plug with a to-do list.
Nauseous, apathetic, bitter-tongued anger
coiled on a patio chair.
Should I walk if my back is out?
Sit at a desk and do work without shriveling,
crashing, malnourished.
The motivation was how important it is.
Get to the other side.
Mix the paint.
Create the life that bursts
Phoenix power. Ignite a sun.
Lift the walls off your chest,
boundaries you crawled under and died.
This thing on my face cannot keep going.
I am not nameless. “I belong to everyone
else.” The truth got Daughter here:
Walk into the world with your work.
If you read that and felt something shift — that’s your brain’s default network waking back up. That’s what actual rest can do.
The Working Mom Self Care Reset That Doesn’t Require a Spa Day
So what does self care for working moms actually look like when you ditch the phone?
Here’s what I know from my own life, from therapy, and from the moms who’ve reached out after reading this book:
It doesn’t have to be long. A poem is two minutes. A page of a novel is three. You don’t need a whole morning to yourself. You need a real break — even a tiny one — that lets your brain do what it’s actually built to do.
It doesn’t have to be silent. I wrote in the carpool line. I read in the school pickup queue. I kept the book in my pocket like a secret weapon against the scroll.
It has to be screen-free. Not because screens are evil, but because your brain literally cannot rest and scroll at the same time. They use the same bandwidth. Pick one. Choose rest, even for two minutes.
The physical object matters. There’s something about holding a real book — a small, pocket-sized one — that signals to your nervous system that you’ve actually stopped. The analog choice isn’t precious or anti-technology. It’s strategic.
This is why I designed the book like toothpaste. Something you pick up every day. Something that fits in your working mom routine without requiring you to overhaul your life first.
For the Mom Who’s Living a Beautiful Life and Still Feels Like She’s Drowning
You’re not broken.
You’re running on a self care plan that was never actually designed for you. The working mom routine most of us inherited was built around productivity, not restoration. Keep going, push through, you’ll sleep when they’re older — and none of it is working.
I wrote Poems of a Burned-Out Toddler Mom for the version of myself who didn’t have words for what she was feeling. Who kept showing up for everyone and quietly disappearing inside herself.
These poems aren’t about having it figured out. They’re about being honest enough to look at what’s actually happening — and brave enough to decide you’re worth something different.
You are not nameless.
You belong to yourself first.
Grab the Book + Let’s Stay Connected
Poems of a Burned-Out Toddler Mom is a pocket-sized collection designed as a tech-free mindfulness tool for working moms who need a real reset — not another productivity hack, not a five-step morning routine, just honest words that meet you exactly where you are.
If this resonated and you want more of this in your life, let’s hug it out.
And if you’re a podcast host, event planner, or media producer looking for a speaker who can make a room full of burned-out moms feel genuinely seen —
Zoe Loeser is a poet, strategist, and mom of three. She’s the creator of Poems of a Burned-Out Toddler Mom, a pocket-sized, tech-free mindfulness tool for working moms. She speaks on burnout, the isolation epidemic, and the radical act of reclaiming yourself. Her follow-up collection, Poems of a Postpartum Toddler Mom, is in progress.
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