Now What? Podcast

When she became a single mum, Jen made a promise to herself: she was not going to live a smaller, harder life just because a relationship had ended. Years later, that promise turned into a "mommune" — a shared home in New York City with her best friend Annabelle, also a single mum, where they split rent, share dinners, divide the mental load of parenting, and raise their kids as one family unit. No romantic partners live in the house. No calendars or chore charts either. Just two women who decided that trust, presence and showing up for each other beats waiting around for a man to do it.

In this conversation, Jen unpacks how the mommune actually started (hint: it wasn't a business decision, it was years of shared play dates and swapped babysitting), how she and Annabelle split money and domestic labour without ever discussing finances directly, how dating still fits into her life without ever entering the home, and why she believes isolation, not money, is often the real crisis facing single mums.

This episode is for anyone who has ever sat alone on a Friday night after the kids are asleep and wondered if there's another way to build a home, a family and a life that doesn't hinge on finding "the one."

In this episode:

How a years-long friendship turned into a shared household
Splitting rent, groceries and bills without pooling finances
Why trust replaced micromanaging once a man was out of the equation
The "no men in the home" rule, and how dating still works around it
The moment Jen realised the mommune had given her her mental space back
Advice for anyone wanting to build this kind of support system, with or without moving in together

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jemima found out she was pregnant at 39. The father made it clear from the beginning — if she continued, she was on her own. She continued.

This conversation covers what nobody prepares you for when you're doing it completely alone from the start — the shame of a pregnancy you're hiding in plain sight, the identity shift that hits harder when there's no one to hand the baby to, the sleep deprivation, the finances, the friendships that quietly disappear, and the strange grief of losing a spontaneous life you didn't realise you'd miss.

Jemima is two years in, finally back at work, newly dating, and still figuring out who she is on the other side of it. She doesn't sugarcoat any of it — and that's exactly why this one is worth a listen.

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Four months out of a relationship breakdown, Rachel finds herself saying something she never thought she'd say: I'm never doing this again.
She gets it now. The bitterness. The wall. The absolute certainty that closing off is safer than trying again.
But she also knows there's a question worth sitting with — one that's harder than it sounds: is this protection, or is this avoidance? Because they feel identical from the inside. And the research says they have very different costs.
Hannah Rose Keys is back. Six months ago she was done with men entirely. Something shifted. This is that conversation.

Now What is hosted by Rachel Maksimovic. Follow @hannahrosekeys Follow @rachel.maksimovic & @nowwhat.podcast on Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tara Pavlovic is a Gold Coast-based content creator and mum of two who recently announced her separation — and the response from women everywhere made it clear this conversation needed to happen.

Rachel and Tara get into what the lead-up to leaving actually looks like from the inside. The years of therapy. The panic attacks. The couples counselling that didn't save the marriage but mattered anyway. The Fiji holiday they booked because they knew they could still have a good time together. And the moment Tara's body made the decision before her mind was ready to.

They also go somewhere neither of them planned — into what it does to a woman's sense of self when she realises her version of the marriage and his were two completely different realities. And what it means to lose trust in yourself so completely that you can't imagine ever choosing again.
Honest, raw, and at times genuinely surprising. This one will probably make you cry at least once.

In this episode:
Why the hardest part of leaving isn't what comes after — it's the decision itself
What couples counselling actually does when it doesn't save the marriage
How alcohol can hold a relationship together — and what happens when it's gone
The moment the panic attacks became impossible to ignore
Why she doesn't believe anyone will truly love her now
What it feels like to lose all trust in yourself after a marriage ends
What Tara would say to any woman sitting in that dark place right now

Find Tara: @tarapavlovic
Now What is hosted by Rachel Maksimovic. Follow @rachel.maksimovic & @nowwhat.podcast on Instagram.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rachel sits down with Kylie to talk about the parts of single motherhood and dating again that don't get said out loud enough — the fallout when a significant relationship ends and your kids are caught in it, the survival mode that masquerades as a personality, and the stories women tell themselves to excuse behaviour they should be walking away from. Kylie is five years out from her separation, has lived through a second major breakup, and speaks with the kind of hard-won clarity that only comes from actually doing the work. This is an honest conversation about blended families, self-trust, and what it really takes to be open to love again without losing yourself in the process.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.