Podcasts about momfluenced

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candice Lim and Kate Lindsay are joined by Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced, to chat about season two of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Mormon women once pioneered mommy blogging, so how did we get from vlogging to…swinging? The influencers who make up the reality show cast, known as “MomTok,” claim their racy antics are breaking stigmas and modernizing gender roles. In reality, they're weaponizing their misunderstanding of feminism for their own personal gain.  This podcast is produced by Daisy Rosario, Vic Whitley-Berry, Candice Lim, and Kate Lindsay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So thrilled to interview Sara Petersen, author of 'Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture' for the podcast. One of the most memorable books I've read in the past year, 'Momfluenced' helps you make sense of your own complicated parasocial relationship with the domestic goddesses we both love, and truthfully, sometimes hate to follow. We cover everything from trad wives, gatekeepers of the 'good mom aesthetic,' the economic and cultural value of momfluencing, those snarky subreddits, and so much more. If you've found yourself second guessing your follow list, this one is for you!If you like the pod, please consider supporting by sharing with friends and subscribing wherever you get your podcasts. We also love reading reviews, so please rate us 5 stars and write a review on Apple or Spotify. It goes a long way and is much appreciated! For a more dynamic experience, follow us on Instagram @haveyouheardpodcast. So many of our episodes, including this one, are shaped through discussions with listeners.Helpful references and links  / pop culture homework:Subscribe here to Sara Petersen's amazing substack, 'In Pursuit of Clean Countertops'Purchase 'Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture'

Wow, that woman's teeth are white.. what was I doing? Oh, right! Welcome to our first episode of 2024, where we tackle Sara Petersen's Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture. Join us for a discussion of parenthood in the age of Instagram, influencers, and cruel optimism.

American policy failures and bad PR have made millennials dread motherhood. Vox's Rachel Cohen and Momfluenced author Sara Petersen explain. This episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlin, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Rob Byers, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Switch on the twinkle lights, it's the Mother Culture Holiday Episode! In which Sara P. (author of Momfluenced and the beloved substack, In Pursuit Of Clean Countertops) shares hot tips for Santa training your kids, Sarah W. finds out about Elf On A Shelf's Jewish cousin. Then, Miranda tries to make everyone talk about big questions — like who and what the holidays are even for, and what ritual does for human beings — and little nice things, like actually really loving the holidays despite the workload, never, ever doing Elf On A Shelf (unless you want to), and the fact that latkes rule. After lots of goofing around, we wrap it all up with a particularly festive holiday edition of our fan-favorite kid culture segment. Links:  Sara's Book: Momfluenced  Sara's newsletter: In Pursuit of Clean Countertops Ritual: An Ancient Solution To Modern Problems from Hidden Brain Our Family Christmas Rituals That Have Nothing To Do With Religion Kid Culture:  Arthur Christmas The Christmas Chronicles Elf  Join our Patreon!

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate

Part 4: LAist Correspondent Emily Guerin and Imperfect Paradise host Antonia Cereijido explore how and why Sadie and Eddie Martinez's accuser, Katie Sorensen, went viral with her false accusation, plus how mom-fluencers can spread conspiracies. With insights from “Momfluenced” author Sara Peterson.   Support LAist Today: https://LAist.com/donate   #SadieMartinez #ImperfectParadise #LAistStudios Go to Hellofresh.com/50imperfect and use code 50imperfect for 50% off plus 15% off the next 2 months!Grow your business–no matter what stage you're in. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at SHOPIFY.COM/paradiseSupport for this podcast is made possible by Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live.This program is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Behold, a re-air of our most popular episode of 2023—The Cult of Momfluencers—which takes on new relevance, thanks to the disturbing recent case of (allegedly) abusive YouTube momfluencer Ruby Franke! Motherhood is hard, lonely, and exhausting... except, apparently, if you're a momfluencer. Since the mid-2000s, a crop of seemingly perfect, all-knowing mommy goddesses in billowy tunics have emerged on social media—and we can't help but feel that their highly monetizable (often misinformation-ridden) internet presences basically exist to make other moms feel less than. This week, with the help of journalist and real-life mother Sara Petersen, author of the book MOMFLUENCED, Isa and Amanda spill the (organic, non-toxic, totally baby-safe) tea about how famous internet moms have become their own kind of 21st Century cult leader. To keep up with all things Sounds Like A Cult, click here! Sources:YouTuber mom Ruby Franke arrested and charged in child abuse investigation: What to know: https://www.today.com/parents/moms/ruby-franke-arrested-child-abuse-rcna102754 Here's Everything You Need To Know About Ruby Franke, The YouTuber Who Was Charged With Aggravated Child Abuse, And Her Controversial Parenting Videos Over The Years: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/leylamohammed/youtuber-ruby-franke-of-8-passengers-child-abuse-explained Mommy Vlogger Ruby Franke Has Been Charged With Child Abuse: https://www.thecut.com/2023/09/ruby-franke-utah-mommy-vlogger-charged-with-child-abuse.html 8 Passengers Update: Ruby Franke Grows Her Cult and Shari Makes Amends With the Griffiths: https://www.therealitysnark.com/post/8-passengers-update-ruby-franke-grows-her-cult-and-shari-makes-amends-with-the-griffiths Mommy Vlogger Ruby Franke's Child Abuse Case Could Take Years, Experts Say: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/ruby-franke-child-abuse-case-years-1234832227/

Join the ‘momfluencer' conversation with our expert guest Sara Petersen, as we explore the intricate — and often fraught — world of mom influencers. Sara shares her unique perspective on maternal myths, the changing dynamics of influence in today's digital era, and the lesser-talked-about realm of dad influencers. Tune in as we uncover how the phases of motherhood drive specific content interests, as well as how the early days of mom blogging have transformed into today's influencer culture. Expect juicy insights, a bit of controversy, and a fresh take on the age-old tales of motherhood in today's Insta-crazy times. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sara Petersen, the author of the book Momfluenced joins me to talk about oversharing your kids lives, and getting influenced by social media and the online world.

Buy Sara's book y'all. MOMFLUENCED is an incredible read. You can also subscribe to her substack here.  

Hey you wild women! My next guest is the author of one of my favourite Substack newsletters, In the Pursuit of Clean Countertops. Sara Petersen is a freelance writer based in New Hampshire. Her essays about feminism, domesticity, and motherhood have appeared in The New York Times, Harper's Bazaar, The Washington Post, InStyle, Glamour, and more. Her first book, Momfluenced, explores motherhood through the phenomenon of mommy influencer culture and what we might learn from it. In this episode, we talk about how patriarchy is woven into our everyday lives (whether we know it or not), why the childcare system is broken, and how mothers carry the burden of most parenting. In this episode, you will learn about: Sara's new book, Momfluenced An inside look at mommy influencer culture How gender norms continue to shape our maternal identities The balance between authenticity and curated content Redefining motherhood in the age of social media What it means to be a wild woman: Rejecting and questioning the norms. Mentions: Sara's Book: Momfluenced ______________ Got a minute? I would love a review! ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Click here, scroll to the bottom, tap, and give me five stars. Then select "Write a Review." Make sure to highlight your favorite bits. Subscribe here. ______________ Connect with Sara Petersen @slouisepetersen Sara's newsletter Connect with Renée Warren @renee_warren @we.wild.women www.wewildwomen.com

Ellen & Annie got to talk with Sara Peterson, author of Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture. We have been waiting for this episode and Sara didn't disappoint! About her work, Sara says: "I want to understand why our culture idealizes motherhood (online and off) but fails again and again to give moms what they need to thrive (like universal preschool, paid family leave, subsidized childcare)." Buy Momfluenced hereSubscribe to Sara's newsletter hereThis is the Brandon Taylor "review" we referenced This is our final episode until the fall -- have a great summer, you're doing a great job! xxThe Good Moms 

Sara Petersen is a mom of 3 and author of the new book, Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture. Sara has written about motherhood and feminism for The New York Times, Harper's Bazaar, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. She also writes the newsletter, In Pursuit of Clean Countertops, where she explores the cult of ideal motherhood. Sara lives in New Hampshire with her 3 kids, ages 4, 8 and 10. Follow Sara at... Twitter: @slouisepetersen IG: @slouisepetersen Buy Momfluenced on Amazon Subscribe to "In Pursuit of Clean Countertops" on Substack: sarapetersen.substack.com ---------- Come join me in my sandbox of life and in this podcast to explore, play and discover something new every single week… because I know you've yelled "Mommy's on a Call" at least once in the last week!!!

Return to Clearwater Pond! Hannah and Sam are spending Memorial Day trying to read while being interrupted by their father. Luckily, Hannah had already finished "Yellowface" before arriving and so we can have a good chat about the industry's hottest novel and why it's supposed to make us uncomfortable (and succeeded: "I wouldn't do that!"). This leads to a long discussion on the worry of having someone steal your work (Sam is not worried). Maybe it all depends on perspective, which is at the core of "Apeirogon," which you really need to read, just like our Book Club did (they loved it). Oh, plus "George," by Frieda Hughes, which is about a real-life magpie; and "Open Throat," by Henry Hoke, which is about a made-up gay mountain lion. And then Sam remembers he read part of the Lauren Groff ARC, which was pretty interesting. Finally, we wrap with a bit about "Momfluenced," by Sara Petersen, who'll be joining Hannah at Labor in Vain, in Ipswich, on June 6.

A fascinating conversation with Sara Petersen on her hit new book Momfluenced: Inside The Maddening, Picture-Perfect World Of Mommy Influencer Culture

Samen met journalist, schrijver, columnist en meta-momfluencer Floor Bakhuys Roozeboom duiken we in de wereld van momfluencers op Instagram. Wat is er zoet aan dit fenomeen en wat is zuur? Moeten we deze miljoenenindustrie zien als  zoete wraak na eeuwenlang onbetaalde zorgtaken of  is het de toxische uitwas van vrouwonvriendelijk kapitalisme? We laten ons afleiden door Detox Gate. Voor de zoveelste keer lezen we over de gevaren van ontgiftingskuren. Wat is het toch dat klysma's en vasten zo aantrekkelijk maakt?Tips hebben we ook:

In this week's episode, Crystal and Laura chat with Sara Peterson, author of Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture. Sara has written about motherhood and feminism for The New York Times, Harper's Bazaar, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. She also writes the newsletter, In Pursuit of Clean Countertops, where she explores the cult of ideal motherhood. She lives in New Hampshire. You can find Sara on Twitter or Instagram. Subscribe to her amazing newsletter here! Heather Armstrong, mentioned in this episode, passed away a few days after recording. Sara wrote about Heather here. Have a domestic dilemma or question? Leave us a message on Speakpipe! ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.speakpipe.com/timetolean⁠⁠⁠⁠ OR DM us on IG @timetoleanpod Follow Laura on social media ⁠⁠⁠⁠@thatdarnchat⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Crystal on social media ⁠⁠⁠⁠@itscrystalbritt⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠Domestic Violence Resources ⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Grab a Fair Play Deck⁠⁠ Interested in learning more about Fair Play? You can check out the ⁠⁠⁠book here⁠⁠⁠ or check out this ⁠⁠⁠youtube ⁠⁠⁠video! Please note: We are not your doctors. None of what we say should be considered a replacement for therapy. :) --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/timetoleanpod/message

Today's guests: Lawrence M. Krauss, Best-selling author, theoretical physicist, author - "The Edge of Knowledge: Unsolved Mysteries of the Cosmos” Jen Gerson, Co-founder - The Line / contributing columnist - The Globe and Mail. Franco Terrazzano, Federal Director - Canadian Taxpayers Federation Sara Petersen, author - "Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, Kate interviews Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture, and they discuss all sorts of topics regarding the performance of motherhood online, from the origin of the ‘cult of domesticity' to modern moms rebooting civilization as homesteaders and beyond. Enjoy!SUPPORT OUR SPONSORSPre-order my book, One in a Millennial here!Right now, BÉIS is offering our listeners 15% off your first purchase by visiting BEISTRAVEL.com/BETHEREINFIVEVisit OliveandJune.com/BETHEREINFIVE for 20% off your first System! Get 10% off your first order sitewide with code BETHEREINFIVE at OSEAMalibu.com. You'll get free samples with every order, and free shipping on orders over $60.Head to shadyrays.com/TangleFree with code: BETHEREINFIVE for 30% OFF their best-selling Tangle Free Aviator and much more.

Kate shouts out a pimple patch she swears by and Doree makes real progress on decluttering her home one room at a time. Then, Sara Louise Petersen joins them to discuss her new book Momfluenced, the wild world of momfluencers, the Pastel QAnon phenomenon, and if there is an upside to living your life online. To leave a voicemail or text for a future episode, reach them at 781-591-0390. You can also email the podcast at forever35podcast@gmail.com.Visit forever35podcast.com for links to everything they mention on the show or visit shopmyshelf.us/forever35.Shop our merch at balancebound.co/shop/forever35.Donate to the Forever35 Giving Circle (https://www.grapevine.org/giving-circle/2nlhxOl/Forever35-Podcast) to help flip the Virginia State House!Follow the podcast on Instagram (@Forever35Podcast) and join the Forever35 Facebook Group (Password: Serums). Sign up for the newsletter! at forever35podcast.com/newsletter.Come to our virtual live show on May 17th! Get tickets at moment.co/forever35!This episode is sponsored by:WONDERCIDE - Try Wondercide Flea & Tick Spray today at wondercide.com/forever35 and get 20% off.BETTER HELP - Get 10% off your first month with the discount code FOREVER35. Go to betterhelp.com/FOREVER35 to get started today.PROSE - Get a FREE consultation and 15% off custom hair supplements! Go to Prose.com/forever35.RAKUTEN - Start all of your shopping at Rakuten.com or get the rakuten app to start saving today.STORYWORTH - For $10 off, visit storyworth.com/forever35. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Liberty and Kelly discuss Ghost Girl, Banana, Momfluenced, Ascension, and more great books. Subscribe to All the Books! using RSS, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher and never miss a book. Sign up for the weekly New Books! newsletter for even more new book news. Looking for fascinating stories, informed takes, useful advice, and more from experts in the world of books and reading? Subscribe to Book Riot's newest newsletter, The Deep Dive, to get exclusive content delivered to your inbox. Subscribe and choose your membership level today at bookriot.substack.com For a complete list of books discussed in this episode, visit our website. This content contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. Books Discussed On the Show: Ghost Girl, Banana by Wiz Wharton Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture by Sara Petersen Ascension by Nicholas Binge Hungry Ghost by Victoria Ying The Skin and Its Girl by Sarah Cypher Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture by Virginia Sole-Smith  Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma by Claire Dederer  The Lesbiana's Guide to Catholic School by Sonora Reyes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Momfluenced author Sar a Petersen talks about the pressure and responsibility of navigating social media as a mom! PLUS: Heather gives the full scoop on the Finals Four's travels through Rome, Venice, the Orient Express, and Paris!!! Check out our great sponsors! Fly-U-Home: Get up to a $100 eGift Card with a new membership by using code "HEATHER" at AirMedCareNetwork.com/heather ReliefBand: Go to Reliefband.com and use code HEATHER to get 20% off plus free shipping! Caraway: Visit carawayhome.com/HDW for 10% off your next purchase! Indeed: Visit Indeed.com/heather to start hiring now!

This week, we are talking all things momfluencers with author Sara Petersen whose new book Momfluenced comes out this month. We reminisce with Sara about some of our favourite momfluencers, and why they also irritate us. We discuss the weight mothers carry to perform a certain kind of motherhood online, and some examples of mom culture getting it really right that you'll want to check out.Sara has written about motherhood and feminism for The New York Times, Harper's Bazaar, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. She also writes the newsletter In Pursuit of Clean Countertops, where she explores the cult of ideal motherhood. She lives in New Hampshire.Links:Rebekah Taussig and Mia O'Malley, two momfluencers who are disrupting the assumption of a monolithic online cultureKarni Arieli's project Eye MamaFor more from Sara, follow her on Twitter and Instagram, and check out her website We love hearing from our listeners! Leave us a voice message, write to the show email, or send us a DM on any of our socials.If our conversations support you in your own reframing practice, please consider a donation on our Patreon, where you can also hear bonus episodes, or tipping us on Ko-fi. Subscribe to the Reframeables Newsletter. Follow us on TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube too.We love hearing from our listeners! Leave us a voice message, write to the show email, or send us a DM on any of our socials.If our conversations support you in your own reframing practice, please consider a donation on our Patreon, where you can also hear bonus episodes, or tipping us on Ko-fi. Subscribe to the Reframeables Newsletter. Follow us on TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube too.

Sara Petersen, author of Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture joins the show to share her sharp observations on this shiny world. In this candid conversation, Sara and Tara discuss how mommy influencer culture impacts women psychologically as consumers, as performers and as mothers. They both share their personal experiences of being influenced and offer strategies on becoming more aware of the messaging. This conversation will leave you thinking of how to define motherhood for yourself without letting a narrative determine it for you. If you ever went down a social media rabbit hole or said “Instagram made me buy it,” you should listen to this episode. Links:http://sara-petersen.com/Momfluenced: Inside the Maddening, Picture-Perfect World of Mommy Influencer Culture: https://amzn.to/40YABdL Follow & DM me @modernmomprobs Pick up my book Check out modernmomprobs Shout out to Citizens of Sound Leave a review

Motherhood is hard, lonely, and exhausting... except, apparently, if you're a momfluencer. Since the mid-2000s, a crop of seemingly perfect, all-knowing mommy goddesses in billowy tunics have emerged on social media—and we can't help but feel that their highly monetizable (often misinformation-ridden) internet presences basically exist to make other moms feel less than. This week, with the help of journalist and real-life mother Sara Petersen, author of the forthcoming book MOMFLUENCED, Isa and Amanda spill the (organic, non-toxic, totally baby-safe) tea about how famous internet moms have become their own kind of 21st Century cult leader. To support Sounds Like A Cult on Patreon, keep up with our live show dates, see Isa's live comedy, buy a copy of Amanda's book Cultish, or visit our website, click here! Thank you so much to our sponsor, Modern Fertility! To receive 50% or more off your first month of therapy, go to modernfertility.com/CULT. 

There's an influencer for every thing these days. Camping equipment? Sure. Nutritional supplements? You bet. Miniatures? You know it. College admissions? But of course. In this episode, though, we're going to focus on one of the original influencer niches: MOMS.The rise of the influencer ushered in a new outlet for self-help. Now, not only are there motivational books and talks, there's a product endorsement to help you live your best life. Influencers give us, perhaps, the direct line between personal growth and consumer capitalism. I talk with the author of the forthcoming Momfluenced, Sara Petersen, about all of that and more.Footnotes: Subscribe to Sara Petersen's newsletter Pre-order Momfluenced “Life After Lifestyle” by Toby Shorin “The Rhetoric of the Image” by Roland Barthes The Society of the Spectacle by Guy Debord Episode 393 with Kelly Diels Episode 395 with Steph Barron Hall “The Influencer Industry: Constructing and Commodifying Authenticity on Social Media” by Emily Dean Hund Radically rethink how you set goals: pre-order Tara's new book, What Works: A Comprehensive Framework to Change the Way We Approach Goal-Setting. Find it anywhere books are sold or at explorewhatworks.com/book. ★ Support this podcast ★

Writer, author, and mom of three Sara Peterson has been down all the instagram wormholes and has lived to tell about it. On this episode, your host Alexis , and Sara have a super candid conversation on the ways in which performative motherhood and momfluencers are wearing us all down. Sara shares with us what it means to be a "hot mom", why prescriptive parenting doesn't work, the new mom haircut, and we also discuss . . . haunted Mormons (IYKYK). Sara's book, MOMFLUENCED, will be out this spring. We go deep into momfluencer culture in this episode, so here are a few articles to provide "supplemental reading":Articles by Sara:Momfluencer Culture Enrages Me: Why Can't I Look Away?Why I want to quit social mediaApparently makeup for children is just as much a thing as skincare for childrenWhy I'm struggling to explain my beauty routine to my 4-year-old daughterAlso discussed in the episode:Mormon influencer exposes ‘soft swinging' secrets on TikTok: ‘Everyone hooked up'Subscribe to Sara's Substack, "In Pursuit of Clean Countertops", here.Poppyseed Health offers 24/7 on-demand text access to doulas, midwives, and nurses.

“Motherhood makes us all so insecure and vulnerable as it is. It's just an innately vulnerable experience that's just rife for feeling bad about yourself or feeling unsure about your choices. We're just ‘onslaughted' with so many people—most of them strangers—that we're just constantly consuming other people's renditions of motherhood. And it's dizzying in terms of feeling comfortable and solid with your own decisions.” ~ Sara Petersen Momfluencers on social media are pervasive in today's culture, with focuses on everything from fashion, to parenting philosophies, to humor. It's interesting to see the impact of performative motherhood, both on practicing artists and mothers, how we present our private and public selves. And there's a lot to learn from Sara Petersen's work, especially as it holds a mirror to American motherhood in this particular socio-historical moment. Join Kaitlin as she talks with Sara, a writer based in New Hampshire, about momfluencers, as well as how she became the writer and mother that she is today. Sara's first book, http://sara-petersen.com/ (Momfluenced) examines the performance of motherhood through the multi-layered phenomenon of momfluencer culture, what this reveals about the texture of modern motherhood and what we might learn from it. Momfluenced will be coming out in 2023 with Beacon Press. Sara and Kaitlin talk about: How Sara became a writer and how she manages to juggle writing with motherhood. The early life experiences that informed Sara's views and fantasies of what motherhood should look like, in juxtaposition with the performative aspects of motherhood that she now unpacks in her writing. Momfluencer culture and it's different faucets and trends The broad spectrum of postpartum mood disorders and intense changes we experience after birth, plus how they are habitually glossed over and downplayed. Find out more about Sara: Website: http://sara-petersen.com/ (http://sara-petersen.com/)  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/slouisepetersen/?hl=en (https://www.instagram.com/slouisepetersen/?hl=en)  Twitter: https://twitter.com/slouisepetersen (https://twitter.com/slouisepetersen)  In many of these episodes, we've covered the privilege of moms pursuing creative work who have the resources to do so without working a traditional 9 to 5 out-of-the-home job. If you're a creative parent building an artistic life while also caregiving and working an unrelated 9 to 5 job, we'd love to hear from you and how you're able to find creative moments in the mayhem of your daily life and work. Drop us a line hello@postpartumproduction.com Related resources: Sara Petersen's recent newsletter about her takeaways from this podcast interview: https://sarapetersen.substack.com/p/babies-dont-need-cardigans?utm_source=email (https://sarapetersen.substack.com/p/babies-dont-need-cardigans?utm_source=email ) Listen to Sarah Chaves in Episode 1 as she reflects on her juggle of creative pursuits with motherhood and a 9-to-5: https://www.postpartumproduction.com/episodes/01 (https://www.postpartumproduction.com/episodes/01) Here's Emily Henderson's blog: https://stylebyemilyhenderson.com/all-posts (https://stylebyemilyhenderson.com/all-posts)  Naomi Davis on Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/taza ( https://www.instagram.com/taza)  More about Writer and poet Kate Baer: https://www.katebaer.com/ (https://www.katebaer.com/)

Influencers can include pretty much anyone who has a significant following on social media – whether it be chefs, models, actors, or celebrities of any sort. And there is a new type of influencer on the rise, the influencer that is also a mother - the 'Momfluencer'. I am joined today by Sara Petersen, author of the upcoming book MOMFLUENCED, coming out in 2023 from Beacon Press. twitter & instagram @slouisepetersen

Before I found Sara Petersen's work, I had no idea what a momfluencer was and why I should care. On the podcast, Sara shares how important it is to have awareness around momfluencers so that we can stay anchored in our own values instead of being aimlessly influenced by those that want to sell us a product and the promise of being a better mother along with it. Sara shares how momfluencers often sell the “whole package”,  and therefore when they sell health, diet or nutritional information, people are more apt to buy into it.   Sara Petersen's first book, Momfluenced is coming out in 2023. In the book, she examines the performance of motherhood through the complexities of mommy influencer culture, what this reveals about the texture of modern motherhood, and what we might learn from it.  Join Sara's newsletter, In Pursuit of Clean Countertops here- https://sarapetersen.substack.com Connect with Sara on twitter and insta @slouiseptersen   

In a perfect world, the specter of that perfect, white, thin, cishet mom wouldn’t be there at all. We wouldn’t be tasked with defining ourselves against that ideal because she wouldn’t be the biggest thing in the room. You’re listening to Burnt Toast. This is the podcast where we talk about diet culture, fatphobia, parenting, and health. Today I’m bringing back Sara Louise Petersen for another installment of momfluencer talk. Sara is a writer based in New Hampshire, and currently working on a book called Momfluenced. She came on a few weeks ago and you folks had a ton to say about that episode! Hearing your thoughts and questions made us realize there is a lot more to discuss here. This might become a new subgenre of the Burnt Toast podcast.If you enjoy this episode, please subscribe, rate and review us in your podcast player! And subscribe to the Burnt Toast newsletter for episode transcripts, reported essays, and more.Also! I’ll write more about this in a newsletter soon, but I’m very thrilled to announce that I’ve started a Burnt Toast Giving Circle with The States Project. We will be raising money to help flip a state legislature Democratic this November because radical right wing state governments are dismantling free and fair elections in swing states, suppressing the right to vote, denying people quality, affordable healthcare and eradicating our right to choose. But we can take those states back! And early money matters. I’d love if you could make a donation of any size; Burnt Toast will match the first $1000 we raise. We’ll talk soon about which state to support and the issues on the table. Stay tuned! And: The brilliant folks behind the Sunny Side Up Podcast spent this episode talking about Instagram and how we feed kids, inspired by this essay of mine. Great companion listen to today’s Instagram deep dive! Episode 30 TranscriptVirginiaSo today we want to talk about whether it is possible for momfluencer culture to diversify, and to represent different types of moms. And w e’re also asking: Should that even be the goal? SaraThere totally is room to follow moms that do not subscribe to cishet, white, normative, nuclear family ideal. So many moms have disrupted that narrative and have used their platforms in really cool, energizing ways to form really needed communities online. They have a different vibe than the stereotypical beachy waves, white momfluencer, the the type that we were talking about in our last episode. It feels like a totally different world.VirginiaI want to read this really great email I got from a listener after your episode because she is articulating the problem in a way that I hadn’t quite thought about before. So this is from Tori, and she writes: I noticed that at the beginning of this missive you mentioned that you and Sara are both cis, straight moms with varying levels of thin privilege, who gave birth, and at the end, you say that the next “phase” is seeing non-thin, non-white, non-straight, non-cisgender moms shifting the narrative. That struck a nerve with me. I’m a white, cis, lesbian with a non-binary partner (she gave birth to our child.) Our kid is four and does not call either of her parents mom, in my partner’s case, because that word is feminine, and my partner is transmasculine. And in my case, mostly because even as a femme lesbian, I didn’t want to embody the culture of motherhood that has been pretty toxic in my life and it didn’t feel right for me. I read today’s newsletter with some distance, because I have found that even engaging with these momfluencers by critiquing them gives them too much space in my brain. I feel lucky that I do not generally feel mom guilt. I do not buy into most of the cultural pressures that straight, white moms often struggle with. And I think that’s because I had a way out from the beginning. The queer parents I know just don’t even talk about it and we don’t compare ourselves. We talk about the absurd things our kids do, and arguments with our partners, and we share gossip about queer celebrities, but we do not really participate in this aspirational stuff. I am grateful to queer people for offering that pathway out of straight, white mom culture, and also from the fatphobia of that culture. Many lesbians are fat and I’m grateful to my people for showing me how to love other women’s interesting bodies as I learn to love my own. I guess I just want to gently suggest that all of this is optional. White moms—because I do think this is a whiteness problem—can stop putting their eyeballs on the momfluencers. I know that as a cultural critic, they’re available for you to talk about since Instagram is a visual medium, etc. And there’s comments and captions to analyze. But even the critique feels like adding fuel to the fire. I just want to offer up that focusing on people who do things differently (the ones you spoke about at the end of your conversation) is an even more powerful way of shifting around the way we talk about bodies. As a journalist, I’m sure you’ve engaged with the concept of de-platforming. And this is sort of a mini version of that. You have influence yourself and lifting up the alternatives rather than continuing to reinforce white dominant culture, even by picking it apart, is especially effective. We’re out here doing it differently and a whole other parent culture is possible.Tori, thank you. Reading this, I had a moment of feeling like, oh, right, it is optional. It is easy to get just sucked into feeling like this is the paradigm we’re in. SaraI also loved that email. It reminded me of a conversation I had with Rebekah Taussig, who wrote a book called Sitting Pretty. We were talking about this “ideal mother” that we’re all defining ourselves against or aligning ourselves with or comparing ourselves to. She said, in a perfect world, the specter of that perfect, white, cishet mom wouldn’t be there at all. We wouldn’t be tasked with defining ourselves against or in opposition to that ideal because she wouldn’t be the biggest thing in the room. There would be freedom to define our own parenting journeys, separate from the fetters of that looming ideal. That whole notion feels so radical to me because the ideal, white, cishet mom does loom so large in our culture.For me, I think it is still valuable to dissect where this ideal is coming from and to look at who has the power in this narrative. Where is the power coming from? You can’t look at any of this without examining whiteness, first and foremost. I think we have to keep asking ourselves how are we approaching this cultural criticism? Which voices are we centering? VirginiaFor those of us who are white moms and who do check more of those boxes, this is also our work to do, to hold the other privileged white moms accountable. We can’t completely eradicate whiteness from motherhood—or maybe that is what we should be doing, but that feels very difficult. So as we consider the process of doing that, can we ask more of our fellow white moms? Can we ask each other to reckon with these biases and to name these problems? That’s not work I want to ask parents with marginalization to do. It’s not their job to come in and fix the white moms. And Sara and I are the white moms, so we have to be doing this work. But also, I’m really here for the idea of how do we make space for these other voices? SaraThe popular narrative about how we talked about momfluencer culture is “Oh, I’m just sick of comparing myself to the perfect mom in her perfect house.” That is a really small concern in the grand scheme of things. A lot of marginalized moms, like, they don’t give a s**t. Their biggest concern is not having a kitchen that matches up to momfluencer standards. So, there is a way that white moms do perpetuate the ideal of whiteness, in holding ourselves to those standards and prioritizing those standards as worthy of our emotional and mental energy.VirginiaEven in prioritizing our ability to separate from those standards. There’s a strong parallel here with what we see in the fat community versus the “body positive” community. “Body positivity” has become reduced to this project of loving your body. Aubrey Gordon writes about this so well: loving your body doesn’t do s**t for fat rights. It doesn’t do s**t for narrowing the pay gap or making clothing more accessible or stopping discrimination on airplanes. Body positivity doesn’t actually address these larger systemic ways that fatphobia is baked into our culture. This is a perpetual problem of whiteness and of white women, that we take what is really this larger systemic  issue and we make it all about like ourselves and our feelings. How does her clean kitchen make me feel? I feel like a bad mom. That’s not what it’s about at all.SaraTotally. That’s a classic tenet of specifically white feminism. When you’re looking at intersectional feminism, you’re looking at the the the community that is suffering the most and the most marginalized and working up to concerns about the clean countertops. Like, that’s not where we start. VirginiaWe’ll do a quick shout out here for Angela Garbes’ new book Essential Labor. She articulates the problems with white motherhood so well, and I think it’s a must read for all white moms. I had a lot of moments reading that of looking in a mirror in an uncomfortable but necessary way.Sara I also love her first book Like A Mother. Best book on pregnancy I’ve ever read. She looks at pregnancy from all different angles and it’s a beautiful, beautiful book.I’m also going to plug Koa Beck’s White Feminism. It was absolutely earth-shattering for me in terms of dismantling everything I thought I knew about feminism. VirginiaOkay, so we are going to talk about some case studies like we did last time, and this time, we really are focusing on momfluencers who are not in that traditional skinny-white-mom box at all. SaraSo should we start with Nabela Noor?VirginiaShe’s not technically a full momfluencer yet because she’s pregnant with her first child. She comes from the world of YouTube beauty influencers. I did not know about her until she wrote a children’s book this year called Beautifully Me, which I love. I actually interviewed Nabela on the @Parents Instagram a few months ago. And my younger daughter is obsessed with Beautifully Me. It’s a great kid’s book. (I also talked about it here.) And yet, there is also this continual emphasis on the importance of beauty, both in the book and in Nabela’s work. Her aesthetic on Instagram is all neutrals. Everything in her house is white and brass handles and beautiful flower arrangements. There’s a lot of emphasis on her look and her makeup. There’s this tension between the way she is challenging norms—but then there is some upholding.SaraI’m looking at her feed, and just the aesthetic tropes—she’s checking all the boxes. The all white everything, interior design-wise. The caressing her pregnant stomach, with a beautiful dress. Hyper-feminine imagery. The ultrasound photos, the very joyful, domestic Goddess Mother-vibe.But I wonder how fair or even productive it is to critique someone for adhering to those norms when she didn’t create them. It feels like critiquing a fish for swimming in the wrong water or something. Do you know what I mean? It’s tricky. What do you think?VirginiaI see that. The belly caressing in particular really moved me because she started caressing her belly like that when she was, like, nine weeks pregnant. To see this woman, who has a belly, caressing her belly without apology with so much joy and reverence for it, at a time when there’s often still a lot of negativity about the belly. We’re conditioned not to really celebrate the bump until it’s like the perfect basketball bump on your tiny body. And she’s never gonna have that perfect basketball bump on a tiny body. That’s not how she’s built. There was something very radical and moving to me to see her being so proud of that. That does feel powerful for me in terms of representation of pregnancy that doesn’t look like the way we’re told pregnancy needs to look. And yet, it does unsettle me to then see her grasping at holding up every other possible standard of perfect pregnancy. It’s like she’s only allowed one out or something.SaraYeah, that’s so interesting. Mia O’Malley went viral for sharing her own pregnancy photos and she wrote an essay accompanying them. This was, I think, three-ish years ago, and she still gets comments and emails from other moms saying they never even considered taking pregnancy photos because they had so internalized that this was a thin person thing to do. Like the basketball bump—if you don’t have that, your pregnancy is not worth celebrating or beautiful or whatever. The mere fact of representation is really powerful.VirginiaAnd for someone who reaches such a wide audience who haven’t reconsidered their feelings on fatness or beauty, she is asking them to do that. SaraYeah. If a mom disrupts any part of the stereotypical ideal—like in this case she’s disrupting thinness and whiteness—that’s a net positive.VirginiaYes, I agree. But I do think of what Tori was talking about in her email. Nabela is not opting out. She’s opting all the way in and saying, “I belong in this room.” SaraWell, and I think back to what you were saying before. The responsibility and the onus should be on white moms, with the most privilege, for them to opt out.VirginiaI agree with you. I think if anyone’s going to be making the big momfluencer bucks off the endorsement deals, I’m glad it’s Nabela. What else do we want to say about Mia? SaraIn addition to her main feed, she has a baby wearing feed. She became a babywearing consultant because when she was pregnant and when she had her newborn, every time she was shopping for a baby swing or a baby wrap, it was modeled on a thin model. Did you ever baby wear?VirginiaI was really uncomfortable babywearing and size was definitely a factor in that. SaraRight. I didn’t babywear until my third baby because I was just generally overwhelmed. Those wraps are like a mile long. They’re hard no matter what kind of body you have. But to have a body that’s never represented or to not have tutorials that speak to your particular shape is a real barrier to entry. It’s like, is this even going to work? Is it even going to be safe? VirginiaYeah, and I do have one fat friend who like came over with her Moby Wrap and helped me figure it out. That was very helpful, but I remember envying mothers for whom it felt effortless. It did not feel effortless for me, ever.  We’re making babywearing into something that you’re supposed to innately know and understand at a time when your body is a complete stranger to you.SaraAnd the baby’s a complete stranger!VirginiaThey’re very small and squishy. It’s very disorienting. SaraThere are a ton of fat moms and plus size moms who are creating networks of healthcare providers who don’t have anti-fat bias. This world of momfluencing is worlds away from the one we talked about last week. VirginiaThat is the real potential and promise of mom influencers, to help break down barriers and create communities that can share information. PlusMommy is another one who’s awesome in this space. She does really great advocacy, helping moms know what questions to ask at prenatal appointments. She also talks a lot about being a fat mom going to Disney World or being a fat mom at the playground. Our physical spaces are not built for larger bodies very often, and particularly our parenting spaces. SaraI want to bring up Andrea Landry, who runs the account Indigenous motherhood. She points out that indigenous mothers have always created their own communities, calling each other and saying, “don’t go to this doctor, you’re gonna face discrimination and racism at this practice.” But since Instagram, that community-building has a way broader-reaching impact.And in terms of looking at issues that maybe white moms should be focusing our attention on more than clean countertops, Andrea and I were talking about the huge amount of Indigenous children that are placed in foster care. They are removed from Indigenous communities, which is further colonizing these communities and preventing them from learning their traditions and languages. She was saying that even up until the early 2000s, Indigenous women were still experiencing forced sterilization. In Saskatchewan, they would wake up from C-sections having had hysterectomies without their consent. These things are still happening. It’s not helping us to stay in our bubble and it’s certainly not helping the greater motherhood cause.VirginiaShould we talk about disabled motherhood? SaraI mentioned Rebekah Taussig. She has really educated me on the structural issues impacting disabled moms that non-disabled moms are probably not aware of. In 30 states there are still discriminatory laws that mandate that custody can be removed from a disabled Mom on the basis of their disability. Like, not having the burden of proving that there was neglect or child endangerment or abuse. Just on the basis of the disability. VirginiaWow, this is a great country. I’m really proud.SaraIt’s so f*****g bad! It’s bad for all moms, but it is so much f*****g worse for marginalized moms. Okay, Daniizzie. So, she has twins. And yeah, a movie is being made, a documentary about her experience. She’s really cool. She posts a lot about access, in terms of specifically parent-related activities. Yeah, like inclusive playgrounds.VirginiaShe uses a wheelchair and she’s parenting twins. And yeah, of course, how would you play on most playgrounds with your kids? The ground is gravel. There are so many instant barriers. SaraReal safety issues. You have to follow your toddler up the huge curly slide or whatever.VirginiaI mean, sidebar: I hate playgrounds. Until my children became old enough to play independently on them, I just viewed them as parent punishment. But I will also fully acknowledge the privilege in that. I didn’t want to get up on the slide, but I could do it.SaraOh, I just discovered KC Davis. She has a book called How to Keep House While Drowning. She has a post about laundry where she has a bunch of photos of beautiful laundry rooms, and all she says is, “This is a hobby.” VirginiaThis is blowing my mind a little bit right now.SaraIt is an actual task that we must do to keep our family in clean clothes. But we’ve also internalized that it should look good and be pretty.VirginiaAnd is that actually going to make the task of laundry more enjoyable? Is it more delightful to stain treat skid marks in a room with shiplap? No, it would still be gross. And there’s then the added labor of trying to make the room continually look like that photo. Because it will not. The whole point of a laundry room is to be filled with dirty laundry. So it’s never going to look good unless you’re not doing laundry in it.SaraI think so much about this. I’m really into pretty houses and s**t, but I am constantly thinking about how it’s only pretty if it’s clean. The biggest battle is the actual domestic labor.VirginiaHer account is strugglecare. And before people who have beautiful laundry rooms all DM us, she says: There’s nothing wrong with being someone who likes this. Just call it what it is. This is a hobby. It’s a fine hobby to have.  There’s a great parallel here with diet culture because I often think about fitness in the same terms. Fitness is a great hobby! But somebody loving to train for triathlons and having the “triathlon body” doesn’t make them better than people who don’t like to train for triathlons. It’s the same weird infusion of hobbies with moral value because they relate to thinness and whiteness. This kind of laundry room personifies a certain kind of mom, that’s why we’re making it “better” than other laundry rooms.SaraI really want to talk about Cia. They identify as queer and non-binary. They have a lovely, illuminating post about gender dysphoria in regards to breastfeeding. They talk about how breastfeeding in our culture is so wrapped up in the image of a beautiful white mother luxuriating in her femininity. Cia talks about feeling really good about feeding their child and bonding with their child, but also feeling like they don’t fit into this prescribed norm of what breastfeeding should look like.VirginiaYeah, this is a really important conversation. I think about, for non-binary folks going through pregnancy, the importance of communities around that. Because the body changes could be so dysmorphia-inducing. But also, you deserve to be just as proud of what your body’s doing as anyone else. It’s ridiculous that they aren’t included in the conversation.SaraWell, and the reason it feels disorienting and not great is because, again, of the ideal.VirginiaRight, right. It’s the thin white mom taking up way too much space in this conversation. I’m also loving all the normalizing the body changes in this feed, like there’s a lot of photos of their belly, and their postpartum belly. Yeah, this is very cool. When we were talking earlier about disabled mothers losing custody rights, it also reminded me we were going to talk a little bit about The School for Good Mothers and process our feelings about that book. We’re going to try to do it without plot spoilers, because people may want to read it. Although, it’s very important to know that you don’t have to read it. Sara read it and wrote a piece about it. And I was like, “Oh, I’m reading it right now!” And she texted me to say, are you? Do you want to stop? And then I was texting her at 6am when I finished it, in tears. But! We wanted to bring it into this conversation because it articulates the ways that the standards of white motherhood creates these huge disparities and very real trauma.SaraRight now, I can only watch basically like tea and crumpets television. So, if you’re in a space like that, maybe wait a hot second on this book and read it when you’re feeling a little less tea and crumpet-y?VirginiaI would say when the world is better, but I don’t know when that will be. SaraMaybe when there’s more sun?It just hits close to home, which is why it’s such a harrowing read. Just the very arbitrary ways we define good mothering—mothering, specifically, because I think it’s important to note that mothers are held to a different standard than fathers. There is one character who isn’t harrowing—I find her hilarious. So, she has basically a momfluencer character in the book named Susanna. She’s not a momfluencer, but she follows all the like, you know, “essential oil will heal all things.” VirginiaShe is the new girlfriend of the ex-husband of the main character. So the main character’s daughter is now being raised by this new girlfriend and the father. So, she’s watching her child be parented by a momfluencer, basically, and it’s kind of your worst nightmare.SaraAt one point this wellness-y, culty momfluencer removes carbs from the toddler’s diet.VirginiaYes, it’s like, who’s the child abuser? Obviously, it’s not good for a two-year-old to not eat carbs. That’s science. Meanwhile, this woman of color whose parental rights have been terminated over a very minor issue, is watching this happen. Jessamine Chan does such a good job of articulating how the system continually rewards and reinforces Susanna’s style of parenting, even when it is patently bad, like with the decision around the carbs. But there’s a totally different set of standards used to measure mothers of color.SaraThe standards are funny in that they are so over the top. Like the teachers at the school test them on their hugs. This is the hug you give when your toddler is having a meltdown about sharing and is the hug seven seconds too long? Are you doing the bedtime hug? Are you communicating the right kind of maternal warmth through this embrace? VirginiaSo much in there comes out of parenting influencers and the parenting advice that we see on social media. You might have to come back and we’ll do a whole episode about parenting influencers because the way that positive parenting is pushed on social…Butter For Your Burnt ToastSaraSo I have a tortilla recommendation. Do you know the podcast Home Cooking with Samin Nosrat?VirginiaYes! It was everyone’s coping strategy during lockdown.SaraShe recommended these tortillas and I immediately bought them. You put them on a super hot pan for 15 seconds and they balloon up into this crispy, delightful, salty... It’s so good. They’re so good.VirginiaThey have pork fat tortillas, duck fat tortillas, and avocado oil. This sounds amazing. I will be getting them immediately.SaraYeah, I got the duck fat and avocado oil. They were both good. VirginiaWe do a lot of tacos because it’s one of the few meals my family can agree on eating. So I would really like to up our tortilla game. Thank you! I am also going to recommend a food. So, as people know, I had COVID. By the time this airs, I’m hopefully over it. But as we are recording this, I am on day seven and I’m still testing positive. For the first few days I couldn’t even move. But as the fog began to lift, I was like okay, now I need comfort food so I have to bake something. We had a bunch of bananas going brown on the kitchen counter, so I made this banana bread recipe. I did not think I had strong opinions about banana bread. I thought that it was a food that you could just Google any banana bread recipe and it would all turn out the same. Yep, no, no, this is the best banana bread. It is smitten kitchen’s the ultimate banana bread recipe and she is correct. It has this amazing, thick crust and then the inside is still really squishy and gooey. Just make it. Thank me later. It’s very easy to make, too. There’s not a lot of ingredients. I mean, I made it while still having COVID and not being able to stand for more than fifteen minutes at a time. I ate it all week and no one else in my family wanted it and I was so happy. Well, Sara, thank you so much for doing this again. Remind us where we can follow you. SaraOkay, so I’m on Twitter and Instagram.VirginiaThank you for being here.SaraThank you, Virginia!The Burnt Toast Podcast is produced and hosted by me, Virginia Sole-Smith. You can follow me on Instagram or Twitter.Burnt Toast transcripts and essays are edited and formatted by Corinne Fay, who runs @SellTradePlus, an Instagram account where you can buy and sell plus size clothing.The Burnt Toast logo is by Deanna Lowe.Our theme music is by Jeff Bailey and Chris Maxwell.Tommy Harron is our audio engineer.Thanks for listening and for supporting independent anti-diet journalism. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit virginiasolesmith.substack.com/subscribe

There’s a slew of “Look at this mama, she’s so beautiful inside and out.” And it’s always on the photos of women who are thin. We see this equating of “you are slaying motherhood,” with “you don’t have any physical reminders that you’ve created a human and birthed a human.” Welcome to Burnt Toast! This is the podcast about about diet culture, fatphobia, parenting, and health. I’m Virginia Sole-Smith.Today’s conversation is with Sara Petersen, a writer based in New Hampshire. Her first book Momfluenced, which examines the performance of motherhood through momfluencer culture, what this reveals about the texture of modern motherhood, and what we might learn from it, is coming next year from Beacon Press.If you enjoy this episode, please subscribe, rate and review us in your podcast player! Andsubscribe to the Burnt Toast newsletter for episode transcripts, reported essays, and more. (Here’s a 20% discount if you’d like to go paid!)Quick disclaimer: Sara and I are both white, straight, cisgender women who had our children biologically. We both have varying degrees of thin privilege. This conversation is inevitably focused on the experience of motherhood as this white, straight, cisgender phenomenon because that’s the reality of momfluencing. It’s not an inclusive world.If a conversation about pregnancy, childbirth and body changes does not sound safe for you, feel free to skip this one. Episode 27 TranscriptVirginiaHi, Sara, thank you for being here!SaraHi, I’m so psyched.VirginiaWhy don’t we start by defining some terms.  What is a momfluencer? I loved the way you put it in your Harper’s Bazaar piece, that “they enrage us and yet we cannot look away.”SaraThe standard definition is an influencer who is also a mother who has monetized her social media platforms. I’m broadening it for my research and book to look at how we all perform motherhood on social media, whether or not we have a monetized following.VirginiaInteresting. That makes sense because it is true you get micro-influenced by mothers in your space, even if they’re not “capital M” momfluencers.SaraTotally, and it impacts how you think about posting your own motherhood content on your own page. It’s this self-conscious narratization of your own story. You start calling yourself a mama versus a mother or a mom. And there’s a romanticization of the basic facts of motherhood.VirginiaAs professional momfluencers have become a legitimate industry, we are seeing much more analysis and discourse around them, which I really cannot get enough of. And I’m so excited for your book. What made you want to dive so deep into this topic?SaraTaza, Naomi Davis, was one of my first obsessions. She made motherhood look so joyful. That was confounding for me because I’m someone—obviously I love my kids and I’m super grateful for them—but nine times out of ten, I don’t love the work of motherhood. It’s tedious, it’s monotonous, it’s boring a lot of the time, like playing store or whatever. So seeing someone constantly posting this beautiful, joyful picture of motherhood got in my psyche. Why wasn’t I so readily able to access that same joy? And then I went down the rabbit hole from there.VirginiaThere’s also the aesthetics of momfluencing. I’m recording in my four year old’s bedroom right now because my office is under construction. I’m sitting next to a giant sloth named Stella who is an important part of our family and she’s pretty hideous. SaraI really should have brought Kevin. I have a dolphin in my house. Oh, it’s narwhal named Kevin.VirginiaI find motherhood is a real drag on my aesthetic vibe. This room is filled with stuffed animals that I would never have chosen to surround myself with because they bring my children great joy. But in the momfluencer vision, your children perfectly fit into this beautifully curated life. Their children do not have giant sloths and narwhals. Or they have the cute Etsy versions. SaraThe detritus of children in a home is ugly, nine out of ten times. I just spoke to Bethanie Garcia about this—The Garcia Diaries. She’ll do the staged photoshoots with her kids in cute little shaker fishermen cardigans, but she’s transparent about the fact that she bribes her kids to wear those because  as soon as the photoshoot is done, they want to wear their SpiderMan onesies. VirginiaWe should mention for folks who are as fascinated by momfluencers as we are, if you want more on these topics, we recommend Kathryn Jezer-Morton’s newsletter Mothers Under the Influence and the podcast Under the Influence with Jo Piazza. And Meg Conley wrote about the mommies of Instagram. But we are going to talk about momfluencer’s bodies and how the momfluencing sphere intersects with diet culture. It’s important to articulate that these women are both products of and creators of diet culture. They are both living under these rigid standards about what their bodies should look like and reinforcing those standards through all this content creation. There’s also a very specific vernacular to how much influencers do diet culture. SaraPregnancy and postpartum are the two biggest phases where you’re going to see it. Documenting of pregnancies and the barrage of comments. Like, “how do you look so good, pregnant with your fifth kid? I’m pregnant with my first.” Then there are the postpartum photos. It’s “How did you get your body back so quickly? How did you bounce back?”VirginiaYou have made humans and yet you look like you’ve never made humans, which means you’ve achieved what diet culture tells us is a woman’s primary goal in life: To be a mother and to look like that never happened to you. There’s often a lot of body positive talk woven in with the “bouncing back.” Which can get murky, because there’s a lot of “I’m doing this for me. This is #selfcare,” without acknowledging that you’re reinforcing fatphobia in that process. There’s also the reality that there are very few major name fat momfluencers. There’s often this rhetoric of like, “Oh, you’re so brave, because you’re showing us stretch marks.” But the only people who get to be brave are thin white women. SaraAnother one of the tropes is the conflating of moral goodness with how one’s body is presenting. There’s a slew of “Look at this mama, she’s so beautiful inside and out.” And it’s always, again, on the photos of women who are thin. We see this equating of “you are slaying motherhood” with “you don’t have any physical reminders that you’ve created human and birthed a human.” Which adds to the erasure of the labor of motherhood. It erases the need for things like postpartum leave and universal preschool, things that actually help mothers in systemic, meaningful ways, versus the hashtag #noexcuses. VirginiaYou’re right. If you manage to look like you never had a kid at six weeks postpartum, then why do you need maternity leaves? Because you got your body back. You’re done. Oh, that’s infuriating. So you have some case studies for us to analyze. SaraAlright, so the first one we’re going to look at is Hannah Neeleman. She’s @ballerinafarm. She’s a rancher in Utah. She’s Mormon. She’s married to one of the heirs to JetBlue. But that’s not a big part of her platform because that would go against the homesteading rancherwoman vibe.This is the birth announcement for her seventh child. The comments are praising her superwoman powers. Like, “How does she look like this pregnant with her seventh kid?” Then there’s another comment that says, “I think she’s just got amazing abs and was able to hide it this long!” So there’s this really pointed dissection of mothers’ bodies where commenters are saying, “I knew it!!!!!!! I thought I saw a little pooch last week!!! ❤️❤️❤️ congrats!!!” VirginiaThere’s a sense of ownership over this woman’s body. That’s a very uncomfortable dynamic.SaraYep. She posts a lot of cleaning videos where she’ll clean up the mess of six children and make it look like a lark, with lots of thumbs up. She does it all with a smile. There’s a comment under this pregnancy announcement post that says, “This is what true feminism looks like! Doing it all! So cool.”VirginiaSara, help me, how is this feminism?Sara Feminism here is being a mother, assuming motherhood as a gender essentialist, natural role that a mother should do easily and well and with a smile on her face. She’s adhering to all the patriarchal standards that there are. She is conventionally attractive. She’s retaining her heterosexual desirability, in spite of and despite motherhood. She’s in the home and she’s happy about it all. She’s not complaining.VirginiaI think about young women, especially coming from rural America, from a conservative background, aspiring to this. It feels like such an unfair bar. There’s so many things about this that are resting on all the different kinds of privilege she has. She’s only doing it all because she’s married to a gazillionaire. I mean, and she’s certainly not doing it all.SaraShe also homeschools her kids. And there’s never any acknowledgement of outside childcare help or housecleaning help. Another part of her “doing it all” narrative is the idealization of her marriage. When she went to the pageant, she made a big point of posting stories like “Daniel’s staying at home with the kids and he’s the best.”VirginiaThat’s interesting. It’s almost like a cosplay of equality and co-parenting, with that need to overly praise your husband for doing his part.Who do we have next? SaraAmber Fillerup Clark. She used to be known as Barefoot Blonde. I don’t know if I would call her ex-Mormon, but she’s written some really insightful posts disagreeing with the church, which is refreshing. But she, again, is a thin woman. This is how she announced her fourth pregnancy.I guess we could say she feels “empowered” to lean into her sexuality in a way that not all momfluencers do. There’s a comment that says "No wonder he keeps putting babies in you. LOOK AT YOU! 😍" So she gets a lot of the hypersexualized comments that make me feel feelings.VirginiaWell, again, it’s the sense of ownership over her body that her followers have. Because yes, she’s putting a semi-naked photo of herself out there for the world to discuss, but I still feel violated on her behalf. Does she not deserve some privacy? SaraTotally. This is the whole, “but they’re putting themselves out there so they deserve whatever intrusive behavior or commentary they get.” Which is obviously absurd logic. There’s a comment here that says, “She already looks hungry and then to think that she’s meant to be nurturing a baby as well in there 🥺”VirginiaI think a lot about the responsibility of influencers putting these images out for young girls. They do have a responsibility to not perpetuate these  dangerous beauty ideals. And yet, we do not know this woman’s health. We cannot make assumptions based on her body that she has an eating disorder or she’s not eating enough to nourish her pregnancy. Healthy pregnancies look different on every person. There’s no evidence here that she’s doing anything dangerous for her pregnancy. I’m troubled by the standard this reinforces and I feel like it’s important to just emphasize that we don’t actually know what we’re seeing. We also don’t know how much of this is even real, right? Because the photos are heavily edited and styled.Alright, who’s next?SaraI just wanted to briefly touch on Rachel Hollis. I included her infamous tiger stripes bikini shots. Do you want to describe the image Virginia?VirginiaYes. She is standing on a beautiful beach and she is wearing a monogrammed bikini top. Her hair is very messy. She’s giving us a lot of beachy waves and big sunglasses. This does look like something that maybe her husband just snapped on his iPhone. It has a much more loose, casual, lower quality vibe to the photo. Her stomach, which is very flat because she is a thin person, has some bumpy skin. I wouldn’t even say it’s loose skin exactly. It’s like her skin is just not perfectly taught. There’s a little bit of texture to her stomach.SaraThis one exemplifies something that is characteristic of Rachel Hollis’ whole thing, which is, “Everything I have is a result of my individual hard work and not because of my various layers of privilege.” And she writes, “Those marks prove that I was blessed enough to carry my babies. And that flabby tummy means I worked hard to lose what weight I could.” So again, it’s this imperative. I have to work out. I have to change the way my body looks after birthing humans because that makes me morally superior to people who choose not to exercise or choose not to prioritize weight loss after pregnancy. She goes on to uphold her sexual desirability when she says, “I wear a bikini because the only man whose opinion matters knows what I went through to look this way. That same man says he’s never seen anything sexier than my body, marks and all.” VirginiaI feel frustrated that none of these women are even questioning the premise. There is never a sense of maybe I don’t have to lose the baby weight. Maybe my body is allowed to look like it changed. SaraKatie Crenshaw—she’s a great follow—writes a lot about body image stuff as it pertains to motherhood. She talks about the b******t of calling images like these brave. She says, let’s stop qualifying perceived flaws. Imperfections aren’t more beautiful or acceptable because someone produced a child. There’s no moral hierarchy. That’s so important to underscore in this whole conversation, this assumption that if our bodies changed because we had children we are somehow given more grace than people who haven’t birthed children when their bodies change.VirginiaYes, lots of people’s stomachs who look like Rachel Hollis’ stomach, or significantly fatter, are actually just fat stomachs and they haven’t had kids. They don’t owe us an explanation or justification for that either. You don’t have to earn the right to have a flawed body.SaraIt goes back to the tiger stripes, like Rachel Hollis saying that somehow her body looks the way it does, because she’s gone through some sort of whatever. The warrior goddess mentality of motherhood.VirginiaWhich is also another way of fetishizing motherhood, instead of seeing motherhood. If  you’re equating the experience of giving birth to running a triathlon—now you’re stronger than ever, and it’s made you a better person—then we don’t have to do anything for moms because they’re walking through this fire so willingly and bravely. If they can withstand that, then they don’t need paid leave or childcare. So this justification for her body is both harming moms and harming all the people who are not moms.SaraWhich goes back to @ballerinafarm and how she does it all with six kids and one on the way. That’s not good. We shouldn’t be worshiping this cult of burnout.VirginiaI will just quickly shout out of course Maintenance Phase did an excellent two part episode on Rachel Hollis. So, if you want way more Rachel Hollis analysis, Aubrey and Michael have you covered there. SaraDo you want to go into Hilaria?VirginiaOkay. She is another extremely thin woman. She’s in a profile, so you can really see the definition of her ab muscles, which I feel is important to the story. She’s wearing a black lacy bra and underwear. She is holding a cute little baby in a red onesie. They are near a bathtub, although they are both wearing clothes. Her hair is also in a nice half up style. So I feel like this is not post-bath. She is sniffing her baby in her underwear. SaraSo again, a lot of the same patterns that we’ve seen in our other case studies. The “Oh my goodness you look absolutely incredible!! 👏👏🙌🙌❤️❤️ After baby number 2 my body decided to give in to gravity. 🤦🏻‍♀️” That demonization of a body doing what a body does. VirginiaThat other comment you pulled is “Dam girl!!!!!!!🔥 I wish I'd looked like that. If I had, I too would have had more! But I didn't, so I stopped at 2.”SaraYeah, that one really stuck out for me. We’re in a place where we’re considering how many children to have, how many human beings to add to our family based on how our body responds to pregnancy?VirginiaI think she’s saying the silent part out loud. The postpartum experience can be so brutal and put you through the wringer in so many ways. For me, personally, it was more about like, I want my body back. I don’t want my body to belong to this other creature anymore. But I can understand what they’re saying, even though it makes me also die inside.SaraWhat I hate about that is the emphasis on the visuals of the body. I had a heinous time, especially postpartum with my first kid. It had nothing to do with how my body felt or looked, but it had everything to do with postpartum depression and the huge mental and emotional shifts that I went through. We’re putting so much emphasis on the appearance of the body versus what the person in the body is experiencing.VirginiaYes, like if this person had only managed to look a certain way—even if two was the right number to stop at, or the postpartum experience was brutal due to mental health—it would be like, well, I can have more because my body bounces back. SaraThis perceived notion of success runs rampant in all things motherhood. I successfully breastfed, I successfully potty trained. VirginiaWasn’t there some controversy about her and surrogacy or secret surrogacy? SaraYeah, her next kid was born via surrogacy. There was some discourse about, “Oh, she just didn’t want to be pregnant and put her body through that again. So she had someone else do it.” The assumption that we all should be and can be judging mothers and their behaviors.VirginiaWe’re assuming it’s a choice. I mean, it may have been a choice for her. I have no idea. But obviously, using a surrogate is often not a choice. We’re also then feeding into this hierarchy of the best mothers are the ones who can have them biologically and look like it never happened. Second to that would be you—I apologize, I may be using the wrong terms—gestated them yourself, even if you look like that happened. You can be a brave thin mom who gestated your own children. Moving down the hierarchy is people who need IVF or need assistance or go the adoption route. We’re playing into this terrible hierarchy of who’s the the “real” or “true” mom. We’re also belittling the experience that every mom has with their body. Only if you went through some hideous natural birth experience is your story worth telling, is that a true motherhood war story. Other ways that motherhood intersects with our bodies isn’t worth talking about isn’t worth holding space for. I know moms who adopted their kids whose bodies also changed dramatically. It’s still a very physical experience of being a mom.Also, if your body was your job in the way this woman’s body is, maybe it is a reasonable business decision to say I can’t be pregnant because I have to maintain my body looking like this. SaraThere are lots of burgeoning conversations happening in the momfluencer space about how we need to be focusing less, obviously, on mother’s bodies and more on the experience of motherhood, which is work and which is often rendered invisible. VirginiaI’m so here for that shift in conversation. And I hope some of these influencers feel like they can participate. There’s definitely some opportunity to change some narratives here.SaraYeah, it’s almost always met with overwhelming fan support. VirginiaI think the next phase of this is we need to see non-thin moms able to do the same thing, and non-white moms, and non-straight moms, and non-cisgender moms. We need to blow apart this definition of motherhood in so many ways, right? And I am grateful you are doing it. Butter For Your Burnt ToastSaraOkay, so my favorite thing to do these days is to knit while listening to a podcast. It’s so heavenly. Because you feel like you’re doing something. Not that you need to be productive at all times, but there’s this virtuous sense of here I am using my hands while also feeding my brain that just feels very good to me. It’s just basically relaxing.Some of the podcasts I’ve been really into are: Once Upon a Time at Bennington College, and The Plot Thickens.VirginiaAnd what are you knitting while you’re listening to all these things?SaraThe patterns I mostly use are from a knitting momfluencer. Her knitting patterns are beautiful. It’s a cosmos-pink, funnel neck, chunky sweater that I made for my daughter.VirginiaMy recommendation is ignoring your children to read books. Because unlike when you stare at your phone while you’re with your kids—I do that as well, to be clear, but you have to feel guilty because you’re not “present”—when you’re reading, you’re modeling “good behavior.” I’ll pick up my book, become invisible in plain sight, and just read. I do recommend starting out with some light fiction, something you can dip in and out of, because you will get interrupted. The thing I’m reading right now, which I’ll admit is so beautifully written it’s not ideal for this, is Matrix by Lauren Groff. I can tell I’m already going to be mad when it’s over. I’m actually going more slowly with it because I don’t want this to end and I want this to be a 500 page book and it’s not.SaraThat’s the highest praise.VirginiaSo Sara, tell listeners where they can follow your work.SaraSo, I’m on Twitter and Instagram at @SLouisePetersen. Louise is my middle name. And then I have a website Sara-Petersen.com.The Burnt Toast Podcast is produced and hosted by me, Virginia Sole-Smith. You can follow me on Instagram or Twitter.Burnt Toast transcripts and essays are edited and formatted by Corinne Fay, who runs @SellTradePlus, an Instagram account where you can buy and sell plus size clothing.The Burnt Toast logo is by Deanna Lowe.Our theme music is by Jeff Bailey and Chris Maxwell.Tommy Harron is our audio engineer.Thanks for listening and for supporting independent anti diet journalism! This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit virginiasolesmith.substack.com/subscribe