In this episode, I sit down with Amy Appleton, the founder of Steps of Style, who built a fashion and styling career out of the hardest chapter of her life. What started as a blog during infertility and IVF became a full creative business, and eventually her exit plan from a nineteen year marriage.

We talk about what it really looks like to leave a long marriage without framing it as a failure, why financial independence matters even when things feel stable, and how ageing became a source of power for her rather than something to fight. Amy is refreshingly unfiltered about anger, dating after divorce, raising kids solo, and why she stopped chasing relationships altogether. If you've ever felt like you lost yourself somewhere inside a marriage or a family role, this conversation is a reminder that rebuilding is possible, and that finding yourself is the whole point, not a consolation prize.

Amy Appleton: 

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This episode dives into one of the messiest and most misunderstood dynamics in modern parenting, the relationship between a mum and the woman who steps into her kids' life. Step parent coach Kris joins the conversation to unpack the assumptions that get made on both sides before anyone's even met, the moments that quietly break trust, and the role dads and partners actually play in how these relationships unfold, which turns out to be a lot more than they usually get credit for. Real experience gets shared throughout, including what it's like to step into a partner's kids' world without any of the rulebook, and neither guest holds back on the harder, messier parts of it. For anyone who's ever felt threatened by, competitive with, or unsure how to navigate the other woman in their children's life, this conversation offers a rare, honest look at both sides.

Find our guest: Kris, Step Parent Coach
Find our host: Rachel Maksimovic

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Today's guest is Megan Dalla-Camina, author, women's leadership expert and PhD researcher, whose work explores what happens when women start questioning the lives they've built and begin reconnecting with themselves. Her latest book, She Who Remembers, makes the case that so many women aren't actually lost, they've just become disconnected from who they are beneath years of expectations, achievements and caregiving.

Megan and I get into what it really means to stop "fixing" ourselves and start remembering ourselves instead, especially in the wake of divorce or separation, when identity can feel completely fractured. We talk about honouring where you're at before you try to figure out who you're meant to be next, why motherhood (and single motherhood especially) can intensify all of this, and how the collapse of a relationship can actually become a doorway back to yourself rather than just a failure. Megan also shares the daily rituals that have made the biggest difference in her own life, sleep, meditation, nature and nourishment, and why protecting your energy from mindless distraction matters just as much as any of it.

If you've ever felt like you don't know who you are anymore, this conversation is a really gentle, honest place to start.

Megan Dalla-Camina: Instagram

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Child support. Say those two words and most people think it's simple, one parent transfers money to the other, end of story. But if you've been through it, you know that's not even close to the truth.

In this episode I sit down with Terese Edwards, CEO of Single Mother Families Australia, who has spent over 15 years fighting for single parents at the highest levels of government. We talk about how child support can be weaponised, why so many women end up trapped in a system that was supposed to protect them, and what's actually changing after the biggest reforms since 1988.

Terese pulls back the curtain on the reports, the research, and the real stories behind the numbers, including why 25% of child support payments are $10 a week or less, and how private collect arrangements quietly leave women with no record and no recourse. We also get into the emotional side of all this, the guilt, the pressure to just be the bigger person, and why so many women stay silent.

This one is heavy in places but it's also full of hope. Terese has been in the room when the changes were announced, and she shares what's coming, what to hold on for, and why she genuinely believes we're in a turning point.

If you've ever felt like the system was working against you instead of for you, this conversation will make you feel seen.

Single Mother Families Australia
Single Mother Families Australia (Facebook)

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This week I'm joined by Leah Aguirre, licensed therapist, relationship expert and author of Is This Really Love. Leah has built a huge following talking honestly about emotional abuse and boundaries, and what makes her work land is that she's not just speaking from the clinical side, she's lived it too.

We get into so much in this one. The way our bodies often know something is wrong long before our minds catch up. The difference between someone who is genuinely abusive and someone who just doesn't have the emotional capacity to show up for you, and why that distinction matters so much when you're trying to make sense of what happened. Trauma bonds and why it can feel almost impossible to walk away from someone who hurts you and then loves you so tenderly straight after.

We also talk about the questions we're too afraid to ask when we're dating, the small moments that actually tell you everything about someone's character, and how to start rebuilding trust in yourself again after you've been made to question your own reality.

If you've ever looked back at a relationship and asked yourself how did I not see this, this episode is for you.

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What do you do when life doesn't turn out the way you imagined?

In this episode, I'm joined by Dr. Sarah Jane, creator of Spinal Energetics and author of the new book Your Spine Holds the Answer.

This conversation is about so much more than healing. It's about navigating the gap between the life you thought you'd have and the life you're actually living.

We talk about divorce, recurrent pregnancy loss, single motherhood, getting older, and the quiet grief that can come from watching other people live the life you once imagined for yourself.

We also explore why so many of us understand our attachment style, our triggers and our patterns, yet still find ourselves stuck in the same emotional loops. Why isn't awareness always enough? And what role does the body play in helping us move through experiences that our minds alone can't seem to resolve?

For the single mums listening, we also dive into chronic stress, living in survival mode, the fear of letting your guard down, and whether it's actually possible to feel safe again after life has knocked you around.

This conversation is an invitation to make space for grief without letting it define you, to loosen your grip on how life "should" look, and to remember that a meaningful life isn't reserved for those whose plans worked out.

In this episode we discuss:
• The grief of letting go of the life you imagined
• Divorce, infertility and rebuilding after loss
• The pressure women feel around age and timelines
• Why knowing your patterns isn't always enough to change them
• Chronic stress, survival mode and the nervous system
• Learning to feel safe in your body again
• Opening yourself up to love after heartbreak
• Finding hope when life hasn't gone to plan

Find Dr Sarah Jane:
@drsarahjanechiro
@spinalenergetics
Pre Order her book "Your Spine holds the answer"

Rach:
@rachel.maksimovic

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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

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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.

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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.

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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.

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