What 50 Episodes Taught Me About Slowing Down and Starting Again (Season 1 ✔️ — Season 2 Arrives This Spring)

When I sat down to record this episode, I felt something I didn’t expect: a wave of emotion so strong it almost stopped me in my tracks. Fifty episodes. Fifty honest, vulnerable, messy, beautiful conversations and I realized this wasn’t just a milestone for the podcast. It was a milestone for me.

When I started Life After Launch, I wasn’t trying to figure out the empty nest for the first time. I had already lived the shock, the silence, the identity unraveling, the “Who am I now that no one needs me at 11pm?” moments. But what I didn’t realize then and what hit me today is how deeply this community was craving a place to feel seen. A place where your feelings weren’t minimized, rushed, or dismissed. A place where you could simply say, “Oh. It wasn’t just me.”

Season One became that place because you showed up with honesty, tenderness, and courage — every single week.

And then, right in the middle of all this reflection and gratitude, life knocked me flat. I got sick,really sick, in a way that forced me to stop everything. No multitasking, no pushing through, no staying “busy” just to stay busy. I had nothing to do but lie there and listen. And the only thing I could hear was the message I’d been ignoring for far too long:

Slow down. Pause. Breathe. Be.

That unexpected pause became the turning point of this episode and honestly, of this season. It made me see how much I’ve been sprinting through my own life. It made me realize how often I’ve filled every minute out of habit, not intention. And it reminded me that before I walk into my daughter’s wedding this sacred, emotional, once-in-a-lifetime moment ,I want to be present. Not exhausted. Not scattered. Not squeezed between tasks.

So as we close Season One, this episode is my love letter to you. It’s my reflection on what these 50 episodes taught me, what getting sick clarified for me, and why I’m choosing to pause before we move into Season Two.

Because Season Two? It’s stirring inside me already. And I want to walk into it fully grounded — for me, and for you.

✨ What We Explore in This Episode

• Why reaching 50 episodes shifted something in me emotionally
• What surprised me most about the honesty and vulnerability in this community
• How getting sick forced me into a pause I didn’t know I needed
• The realization that I’ve been sprinting through my own life and what I plan to do differently
• Why your daughter’s wedding (or other milestones) deserve your full presence, not your multitasking
• How this heart-centered pause will make Season Two deeper, richer, and more connected

If you're sitting in that quiet in-between space, the space between who you were and who you're becoming, I hope this episode reminds you that nothing about your feelings is wrong. You deserve the pause. You deserve the breath. You deserve a life that doesn’t rush past you. And you deserve to know that in this empty nest chapter… you are not alone.

We’re walking it together.

Always.