Not Working Right Now

Burnout has a way of making everything feel black and white: stay miserable, or burn it all down. In this episode, Alicia sits down with Melyse — this time in the hot seat — to unpack the inspiration behind her newly released guide, Before You Burn It All Down . Together, they explore what burnout actually looks like (hint: sleep won’t fix it), why so many women feel stuck in all-or-nothing thinki...

What happens when life forces a pivot you never planned for — and you still choose to keep going? In this deeply honest conversation, Alicia and Melyse sit down with Marisa, founder of Defining Journeys , to unpack what happens before the pivot — and what can grow on the other side when life changes the plan. Marissa shares her winding, multi-path career journey — from early childhood education an...

Feeling stuck in the messy middle? This episode is your pause button. In Season 2, Episode 3, Alicia and Melyse guide listeners through a simple but powerful self-reflection practice: What’s working right now — and what’s not. No fixing. No optimizing. Just naming. This episode is a check-in designed to help you take one small, gentle action that builds momentum. Because action builds momentum, mo...

What started as a slightly unhinged idea (buying grocery carts full of pumpkins) turned into a real business, and a crash course in the messy middle. In this episode, Alicia and Melyse go behind the scenes of My Happy Porch and share what it actually looked like to build something from scratch: the humbling moments, underpricing their labor, washing pumpkins in the driveway, finding unexpected joy...

Happy 2026 — we’re back! If you’ve been here since Season 1, you might be wondering where we went. Short answer: life happened. Long answer? The messy middle got really messy. After telling you we weren’t going anywhere… we kind of disappeared. From September until now, we went quiet — not because we stopped caring about this community, but because everything else got loud. New businesses, career...

This week, we’re doing something different — and something fun. We asked you , our Not Working Right Now community, to send us your burning (and sometimes random) questions, and wow, you delivered. In this special Community Ask Me Anything episode, Alicia and Melyse dive into your submissions with their trademark honesty, humour, and a whole lot of messy realness. From parenting hacks to governmen...

This week on Not Working Right Now , we’re pulling back the curtain on what it’s like to start an SSRI for anxiety. Melyse is just 10 days into sertraline (Zoloft), and she’s sharing it all: why she decided to revisit medication, what the first week of side effects felt like (spoiler: it was a lot like first trimester nausea) , and the surprising early wins she didn’t expect to see. We also talk a...

In this solo episode, Alicia and Melyse are back to share a pulse check on summer, talk about their sanity ( or lack of! ), and explore what’s next in their messy middle journeys. Melyse spills details from Mom Camp 2025 —the highs, lows, and what she’ll do differently next year ( hint: more camps, less chaos ), what she’s learning in her coaching program, and her exciting next step: dipping her t...

In this episode of Not Working Right Now, we sit down with a grade school teacher Katie, who is also a mom, runner, yogi, and unofficial Christmas sweater influencer to dive into all things school and motherhood. Katie joins us to pull back the curtain on what really happens inside a classroom—and let’s just say, it’s not what most parents imagine. From managing 30+ kids (with only 40 minutes of p...

In this episode of Not Working Right Now , we sit down with Dr. Sarah Vadeboncoeur, a Naturopathic Doctor who helps women stop running on stress and start feeling like themselves again, because "being a Mom is not a medical diagnosis" We talk about why so many moms hit burnout in the messy middle years, how our bodies signal when something’s off (hint: it’s not just about being tired), and why res...

This one’s for the parents just trying to survive. In this bonus episode, we’re stepping away from career pivots and diving into the gloriously chaotic world of parenting — specifically, all the questionable hacks we’ve used that definitely wouldn’t make it into a parenting book… but should. From dyeing Advil red to make it more appealing, to telling our kids that “Le Monsieur” shuts down the park...

If you’ve ever felt like the version of you at work is shiny and put-together, while the version of you at home is running on fumes… this one’s for you. In this episode, we sit down with fellow messy mom and NWRN community member Sara, who recently hit pause on her HR career to face something that so many of us try to push through: burnout, postpartum depression, and the crushing pressure to be ev...

In this episode, we (Alicia + Melyse) open up about what finances actually feel like in this season of life — pausing careers, raising kids, and carrying the invisible weight of all those obligations while the bank account balance slowly shrinks. Spoiler: we are not financial advisors (and honestly, you probably shouldn’t take advice from us anyway). But we do know how heavy and lonely the money s...

This week on Not Working Right Now, we’re doing a little pulse check on life. In true messy-middle fashion, we sat down for a candid chat about what’s actually working for us right now… and what’s definitely not. No filters, no “perfect systems” — just two moms talking through the little wins, the ongoing struggles, and the hilarious in-betweens of trying to make life, motherhood, and work actuall...

We used to think rest meant crashing on the couch after the kids went to bed or booking a vacation we were too burnt out to enjoy. But since hitting pause on work, we’ve had to totally rethink what rest actually is. In this episode, we’re unpacking the messy process of slowing down, how we’ve figured out activities we can do that give our brain the rest it needs, and how doing less is sometimes th...

In this episode, we’re going back to before. Before the pause, before the unraveling, before we admitted that “fine” wasn’t cutting it anymore. We’re talking about what life looked like when we were juggling careers, kids, and expectations—and silently burning out under the weight of it all. If you’ve ever smiled through gritted teeth and said “I’m fine” when you were anything but… this one’s for...

Welcome to the very first episode of Not Working Right Now—a podcast for moms in the messy middle. You know the stage: you’re done having babies, but not done growing… and something about your current life just isn’t working right now. In this kickoff episode, we’re introducing ourselves, sharing how this whole thing started (spoiler: it began with a coffee and a “me too” moment), and opening up a...