What happens when the "honest mom" finally tells you the parts she's never posted?
This week I'm talking with Libby Ward about her memoir, Honest Motherhood. Libby built an audience of over 2 million by naming the mental load, the mother wound, and the impossible pressure to be everything. But the book goes further than any caption ever could: her rural church upbringing and the deconstruction that followed, the chaos of her own childhood and the long, complicated work of rebuilding a relationship on her own terms with her mother, and the exact moment in a minivan when she realized she'd become someone she never wanted to be.
We talk about trusting her own voice after a lifetime of trusting everyone else's, why she turned down a book deal with a major agent because it wasn't the book she wanted to write, and why writing this one nearly broke her even though the book tour feels like a vacation by comparison. We also get into the humor running through the whole thing, because Libby is proof that funny people usually have a little trauma to thank for it.
This is a conversation about permission. Permission to stop performing wellness, to hold boundaries and actually keep holding them, and to feel proud of your own work without waiting for someone else to say it's okay. If the conversation resonates, subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with any mom ready to break out of survival mode.
“Being honest about what I needed didn’t feel brave— it felt unnatural. No, scratch that. Disappointing other people made me want to peel my skin off.” -- Libby Ward
Connect with Libby Ward:
@libbyward
Support the show:
On Patreon.
Buy us a book
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Buy Honest Motherhood
This episode is produced, recorded, and its content edited by me.
Xx, Alex
00:00 — Intro + episode teaser
01:30 — Welcoming Libby, gushing over the book
04:00 — What she's never shared online: her mom, her childhood
07:30 — Her deconstruction journey and leaving the church mindset
11:00 — Why she started sharing online in the first place
14:30 — Turning down the wrong book deal
18:00 — Finding her voice: editors, coaches, and saying no to a ghostwriter
21:30 — Balancing content creation, motherhood, and ADHD ("rubber ball brain")
25:00 — Writing the book was "the seventh layer of hell"
28:30 — How she wove humor into heavy topics
32:00 — Learning to actually feel proud of herself
35:30 — Becoming a mom she didn't want to be
40:00 — The granola bar moment: her breaking point
43:00 — The "ball of yarn" metaphor for untangling trauma
46:30 — Her mother, going no contact, and why
50:30 — Boundaries, hope, and rebuilding the relationship
54:00 — What society needs to change ("men need to enter the chat")
58:00 — Rapid-fire: favorite word, staying hopeful, weirdly competitive
1:01:30 — Where to find Libby + outro
1:02:30 — Next week preview: Pioneer Girl / Little House / Yesteryear with Brett
Connect with us and suggest a great memoir!
Follow us on instagram! @babesinbooklandpod
xx, Alex
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