Hey, mama. I see you. Laptop out on the kitchen table, responding to emails as you dole out snacks. You've been told your whole life you can do anything you want, and your wishlist includes a job you love, financial stability, being there to watch your kids grow up, and the flexibility to do it all on your own terms and schedule. 

But what you hadn't counted on was the isolation, putting everyone else's needs before your own. And that overwhelming feeling of being pulled in all directions at once. Hey, I'm your host, Kimberlyn Owens-Hughes. And I believe in you and the life you've dreamed of. I believe you can have it all without sacrificing yourself in the process. 

In fact, I'm convinced that the better you treat yourself, the more you can show up and work your magic in your career, your family, and your life. This podcast is here to inspire, challenge, and support you in your work from home journey. I am so glad you are here. Now, listen in. 

Kimberlyn: Hello, hello. Welcome ladies. I am so excited to have you here. This is the very first podcast episode to go out for the Work it Mama Podcast. And I am just thrilled that you guys are here to start this journey with me. My name is Kimberlyn Owens-Hughes, and I am the host of the Work it Mama Podcast. And today, I want to tell you guys a little bit about my vision for this podcast, a little bit about my backstory, and I'm going to share with you my four non-negotiables as a work from home mom. Okay. So let's start out. So this podcast is called a Work it Mama, and it is intended to be a contribution to the lives of work from home moms, working moms as well. But. In particular, the content that you're going to hear on this podcast is directed towards the work from home mom's sector. Mostly because I think there's a lot of, a lot of stuff out there about working moms and a lot of stuff out there about stay at home moms, but there is a whole group of us, and I think that, especially after the pandemic, there's an even greater number of us who have made the decision to, to stay at home. Right? We want to, we want to be present with our kids. We want to have time for ourselves. And we still want to pursue a career that gives us recognition, money something that we're passionate about. And so we're not willing to give up that. 

But we're also not willing to give up raising our kids and give up being present for them for, you know, school pickups and lunches and all of the things that we might have missed as a work outside the home mom. So the content you're going to hear on this podcast is really directed towards that group. We're going to talk all things boundaries, we're going to talk all things self-care, scheduling, and I'm going to have some really awesome guests on here, who are going to come and talk about different aspects of working from home. So I'm going to have work from home moms themselves interviewed here on the podcast to see how they, quote, unquote, get it all done. I think there's this concept, and if you're anything like me as a work from home mom, We kind of want to be super mom, right? We want to do it all. We want to be in it all. And, and I think that is possible, but we have to really niche down and make sure what exactly we want to do, right? What exactly that all means because they all is not everything in the world. Right. But that all are maybe 2, 3, 4 things that are really important to us. So, like I said, we're going to be in our interviewing other work from home moms. Asking them about what is important to them and how they are able to juggle or balance, or really, and this is the word I think I like the most align, right? How they're able to align their lives with how they want to live right there are able to align their work and their parenting and their self care strategies to their utmost vision. So. That said, let me tell you guys a little bit about myself. 

So I am a mom of one daughter. She is, she's going to be nine actually tomorrow when this comes out. She's going to be nine. She is my only daughter. I am divorced from her father. So there is 

There's that. There's definitely, you're definitely gonna get some, at least one or two podcasts where we're going to talk about the single parenting life. And why I think that is applicable, especially to work from home moms. In my case, there's not really anyone else who could be present here for her, her dad, lives and works about a couple of hours away. 

So this situation really weighed heavily on my decision to ultimately not pursue a career outside the home as a mom. So I want to just kind of take you back. 

 So before I came a mom, I was actually an English teacher. I was an ESL teacher. I live in South America. I'm originally from the States, but I moved to Valparaiso, Chile, 16 years ago. And I started out as a teacher. I was working for institutes. I was working for businesses. 

I eventually got a job at a local college, where I, I really liked the schedule. And I think that I've always had that kind of work from home mentality of just not sitting at an office from nine to five. I had my teaching schedule, and then outside the teaching schedule, I would, you know, do my planning at home. It was very flexible. And at the same time, I started taking on translation work. I studied Spanish in college , even in grad school as well. And so I wanted to use kind of this free time that I had outside of the classes that I was teaching to start doing some translation work, which I knew that I could do from anywhere. And that was really the pull for me, as I really loved the flexibility. 

I loved not having to be in one place all the time. My teaching job, what I really liked obviously were the summers. I had three months, you know, vacation to myself. I could move around. I could travel. I could go back home. And that was really important for me at the time. 

But also at the time I was a bit of a workaholic. I actually, there was a point where for a year and a half, I did get a, an office job. I was hired on at the same college as an academic coordinator for the English department. And this really was a moment, I think, of contrast for me. Contrast being like, not this. 

 I was doing it as an high achiever. Overachiever. I was running the entire English department in the town where I was. There was a central department in the capital city of Santiago. But I was basically the secretary, the coordinator, the director. I was everything. I had to, you know, go and sit in other teacher's classes. I had to give them performance reviews. I had to print up worksheets and give out books. And I was doing everything and I was working until like nine o'clock at night. I would get in, in the morning, around eight, nine o'clock in the morning. And , I wouldn't leave the office until nine o'clock at night. And so I wasn't a mom by this point, but I did realize this is not the schedule I want to be on. Right? I don't want to be stuck to a desk. I don't want to have, and at that time, if you were on contract as, not as a teacher, but as like an administrator, if you will. You only got three weeks of vacation. And so, being from the States and living far away from my family, like, I was not content to have only three weeks vacation. And in February I wanted to go home. I wanted to travel. I didn't want to have to make a decision in that sense.

Okay. So when I became a mom, Everything changed, and yet nothing changed as well. I was very lucky to live in a country that gives women. We got a month and a half of prenatal leave. And then another six months of maternity leave, all paid for in order to be with my daughter. So it just so happened she was born in May. Our school year starts in March. 

So I basically got that entire year off, it was all paid for. I had already left my contracted position, so I was back to being a freelance teacher, if you will. Right. I was on contract per semester, per class, and I had the freedom to really just like, delve into motherhood, and I loved it. And I actually did keep on as a translator while she, while she was a baby, while I was at home, I do have memories of having her, you know, and on the nursing pillow, And my computer propped up. And as she is like nursing and sleeping, you know, I'm working on my laptop. 

So I did keep doing that , but I took a break from teaching. I loved teaching. It was one of those things that I felt really passionate about. But when I tried to go back to teaching the next year, Something was off, right. There was something about having someone else dictate a schedule for me that just didn't sit right. And so, I tried teaching kind of off and on. I think I went back that semester, and then the following semester I took off. Then I would go back for another couple of classes one semester and then the following semester would be just one class, until it just eventually faded out, where I was not willing to have someone else dictate my work schedule. Plus I was still doing translations, so I still had other responsibilities to coordinate. And the school was about 30 minutes from home. So you had to kind of to factor in traffic and commute. And it just stopped being the right decision for me. Right. I started realizing that the more freedom and more flexibility I had, the more aligned it would be with my purpose. And at this time, my purpose was to raise a daughter, to be present with her. I come from a family where both my parents worked outside the home. 

I was in daycare from A young age, and I was an afterschool kid. Right. I was the one who would go into afterschool every day, and be picked up at five, six o'clock in the evening just to see my parents over dinner and go to bed. And I knew that that was not what I wanted for my daughter. I think that I really missed being at home when I was younger. There was even a time where I was doing afterschool activities, I was doing sports after school when I was in high school. And there was a time where I even decided to quit softball, which I had been playing for years. Just because it was spring, and the only thing I wanted to do was to be able to hop in my car cause I was 16 hop in my car, drive windows down. You know, and just spend the afternoon at home. Like, all I wanted to do was just be at home. I didn't want to be doing something. I didn't want to be on someone else's schedule. I just wanted to be home. So. This really, I think affected how I viewed my parenting and how I wanted both the life for myself, but also the life for my daughter. Right. I didn't want to be too far away from home. I wanted to to be present with her and, and to be present also for myself. Like, I didn't want to be stretched too thin. And that's what I was feeling when I was doing, I was trying to do it all. So, I've been home working from home for at least six years now , besides like one or two classes that I was taking. 

So the past six years I have been working on perfecting, if you will. The perfectionist at heart in me, perfecting the work from home life. And it is. It's a struggle guys. I think no one actually prepares us to make our own schedule, to figure out our own rhythms of working. 

There's a lot of conditioning around, you know, the nine to five and the times that you're supposed to work and how you're supposed to get creative. But it's really based on this traditional system of working outside the office. And so. For me, it's been like a constant experimentation, right? 

 I try something out. It works then suddenly it doesn't work, and I have to pivot and try something else. And it's really been like six years of that. Right. I've gone through burnout more times than I can count. Obviously there was the pandemic. So there was a time when working from home used to mean I got the home to myself or there was a time where I, you know, working from home really just meant working at the nearest Starbucks while my kid was in school, so I could work from anywhere. I traveled a bunch. I've worked on, you know, on trips that were initially meant for pleasure. 

I've kind of done it all, and I've experimented with all different types of schedules and routines and rhythms. Which is kind of why I wanted to make this podcast as well, because I think there is this struggle and no one is telling us how we're supposed to do it. And I don't pretend to, I hope I don't pretend at any time during this podcast to tell you guys how to do it. And this is just a space to discuss the issues, and really to help you reflect on what is the life that is most going to fit you and your family, what is going to feel most aligned? What is most important to you and how can you make that happen? 

So, that said, I really, I want to talk right now about my four non-negotiables as a work from home mom. And the first one's a big one. My first non-negotiable is sleep. 

Okay. You say, but sleep is non-negotiable for anyone. Well, there was a time when I actually thought that the only way for me to work from home and have a sick toddler at home, or have a kid home during summer break. The only way for me to get good work done was to work at night. And I have pulled so many all-nighters since college. 

There was a time , like I said, I, I thought that was the way to do it. And after burning out Multiple times. I finally realized that I really needed to prioritize my sleep. I am not as good of a worker. I'm not as good as a mom. I'm not as good as a person if I haven't gotten a solid eight to nine hours of sleep. And that's just a fact, right? And I think everyone knows this, but we don't necessarily prioritize the sleep. And I had to come to the realization that pulling all nighters was actually hurting my health way more than it was helping me balance everything. And that is why sleep is my number one non-negotiable. I still have gotten to the point where it feels luxurious to, you know, shut off everything, go to bed by 9: 30, 10. When for so many years I was staying up until midnight or, you know, staying up all night just to get work done and now, like, there are times when I'm a little overwhelmed and you know, so many things and I feel like I'm not getting any space. And part of me says, well, I'll just stay up all night. But then the other side of my brain being like, not this, not this. Screw them. Right. This is not your responsibility to sacrifice your sleep. For someone else's work. It's not your responsibility. It is your responsibility to get it done, but you don't have to sacrifice sleep to get it done. And that helps me kind of recenter and rework things and ask for help and delegate. And rework my schedule so that I can get the work done during the day, and particularly during the morning when my creativity is at its best. 

Yeah, I prioritize my sleep guys. And this even means like, on weekends. I allow myself to take naps now, which was honestly before unheard of. I would caffeinate, I would drink more coffee and I would push through. And I was also working on the weekends, which, you know I think that's a good, a good turning point to talk about my second non-negotiable, which are my hard stops. And one of the hard stops that I have been implementing this year for the past, I guess three, four months. Are my no work on Sunday policy. And. It's been hard, right. I used to work on weekends. I used to see my weekends as like the time where I could get the most work done. 

As a divorced mom, Sofia goes with her dad on the weekends. So the weekends for me were like this open period of time where I felt like I could get so much done that I would procrastinate or leave things to the weekend. To purposely get them done on the weekends so that I could have a little bit more like space during the week. Not to say that I was super relaxed during the week. I was still parenting and I was still taking on work that was a little bit more urgent, but if I had big projects, I would leave those to the weekend. 

And so by shifting this around and creating this hard stop. I remember it was back in January, we were on vacation in Miami and I had a conversation with a, I think she was sixties, early sixties, and she was a Jewish mom of, I think she said six. And she was talking to me about the Sabbath. 

It just so happened that it was a Saturday morning. They were respecting the Sabbath, and she was telling me about what they were going to do that day and how they were going to follow the Sabbath, even though they were on vacation, right. How they were not going to get in the car, how they were going to walk everywhere, how they weren't going to prepare any food. 

And it got me thinking that, man, I feel like I am always on call. I feel like I'm always supposed to be working at some point. And wouldn't it be nice if I could just pull a hard stop. Have a Sabbath. Have a day where I purposefully do not open my computer. I do not do any work. And I let it be that. And I give time to myself. I give time to my partner. I give time to the house. We still do housework on Sundays. But it's more from a place of rest. It's more from a place of enjoyment. So I'll pop in my headphones and listen to a podcast, or music and dance around while I'm vacuuming. It's not like another thing on this long to-do list of things to get done on Sundays. So, that is my other non-negotiable are these hard stops. So one hard stop is on Sundays. My other hard stop is at 7:00 PM. And this kind of goes back to the sleep piece. So that 7:00 PM is the time that my daughter and I have dinner. And that's the time where we eat, we come together. We get ready for the next day. We snuggle in bed. 

And my hard stop is one so that I can have that time for her. And it's also a hard stop to keep myself from the temptation to open up my computer after she's gone to bed, right. That's my hard stop. I'm prioritizing my sleep, and I am saying that after 7:00 PM no more work is done. A part of me wishes I could do the hard stop earlier during the afternoon, but I've also noticed that, so Sofia gets off of school around 2:30. I go pick her up, we have lunch. We have lunch in south America later than then in North America. So we have lunch at that time. We usually hang out for a little bit. 

So we do have some kind of a hard stop for lunch as well. But then, she will get to a point where she'll just want to veg out on the couch and watch TV, and she doesn't need me. And she doesn't want me around. And I've found this nice, like little, sweet spot, 5:30, 6:30, 6:00 to 7:00, where I can get checklist items done. My creativity isn't great, cause my brain doesn't operate as well as it does in the morning. But there's still, there are things that I can do just to get myself prepared so that the next day I'm not doing these checklist items instead of the creativity that I need to prioritize. So those are my hard stops. That is the second non-negotiable. 

My third non-negotiable is outside time. And this is something that I resist a lot. And I think that during the pandemic Is when I started realizing how important it really is for me. And I think it's always been important. I remember back when I was younger, I would read outside. I would study outside. I love the sun. I love being outdoors when it's pretty. I do resist it when it's raining or when it's not so pretty. But I do realize that if I am inside for too long, I get antsy. My work isn't good. I don't have as much mental clarity. I feel heavy. And so this is one of the things that I don't have an actual set time for going outside. But I do have kind of buffer times between my work and parenting and other responsibilities where I can listen to my body. You know, saying I need to get outside. I need there to be no roof over my head. I need this feeling of just oneness with nature. And so I do try to prioritize every single day a little bit of time outside, whether it's watering my garden, whether it's walking, whether it's just sitting outside and reading a book. I do have a patio area now that I can, I can go and sit in that's covered. So, if it is raining, there is a place where I can go and sit. Just to prioritize that time outside. So that's my third non-negotiable. And my final non-negotiable that I want to tell you guys about is breakfast. 

Okay. I am not a huge morning routine person. I do have like an ideal morning routine, which involves meditation, journaling. But I would say that I probably do it 25% of the time. There are mornings when I, you know, I need it and I do it. But most of the mornings, like go back to number one. I just want to prioritize my sleep. I just want to sleep. I don't like to have to get up super early. 

And so my morning routine, the thing that kind of gets me centered in the morning is my breakfast. Right. I eat the same thing every day. I fix it the same way. It has become this kind of rhythm that is easy for me to get into this almost meditative state where I am fixing breakfast. I'm making my coffee and making my eggs. I'm making my oatmeal. And I sit down with a big glass of water. And there's something so grounding about this routine that, that makes it one of my non-negotiables. There was also a time when I tried to do uh intermittent fasting. Which I did lose a little bit of weight there, but I realized that my stress hormones were out of whack and after listing to several hormone experts talk about like the importance of eating in the morning, the importance of not going straight to coffee first thing in the morning, which was my absolute go-to. I would always, you know, Down a double espresso before anything else. Now I actually take the time to nourish my body. And I eat and I drink that glass of water. And then I get to my coffee. And it's become, like I said, it's become a ritual. It's become almost this meditative state in the morning where I fuel my body, I hydrate. And give it a little bit of what, what it loves. Like I love coffee. And there's something so beautiful about that, you know, little morning coffee ritual that. Just keeps me grounded and it keeps me Puts me in a good place for the day. So even if I don't do the meditation and even if I don't do the journaling, the breakfast is non negotiable. So, that said I would love if you guys reach out to me. You can find me on Instagram. I am at at @kimberlyn_owenshughes. That's all together. And I'd love for you to share your non-negotiables. 

Thank you so much for hanging out with me today. I truly help you found the inspiration, challenge, or support you needed. If you enjoyed this episode, I would love for you to screenshot it and share it with another work from home friend. Or head over to Instagram, tag me, and let me know your biggest takeaways. 

You can find my Instagram handle in the show notes. I'll see you guys next week.