Hey guys, it's Jamie Scrimter here, second wife, stepmom of three and mum of one.

And you're listening to my podcast, where we talk about all things motherhood, stepmotherhood,

and living a kick-ass life. If you're ready for raw and real conversations and are striving

to live your very best life, then you are in the right place. Every week,

I'll provide you with tips and strategies and mindset shifts to inspire you to live your own

version of a kick-ass life. We'll bring you along as I create my own.

Hello, hello, welcome back to the podcast. So this week is a good episode. This is a real treat for all the moms, all the stepmoms, just anyone who feels like they just cannot get ahead. Or that their dreams maybe put on hold because motherhood and stepmotherhood, well, it's pretty

damn time consuming. Now, I often talk about when I first became a stepmom and then a mom,

I put this immense amount of pressure on myself to seem like I had it all together all the time.

Honestly, thinking back to that time of my life, it makes me feel

just exhausted. I worked 40 hours a week in child protection. I commuted three hours a day.

I dove head first into everything with the kids. When I first became a stepmom, I had my finger on

everything. I was helping my finger on everything. I was

helping my husband with everything. I had this mentality that I needed to have my finger on

everything so that I could just kind of save the day. I had my meals prepped in a crock pot every single

night, even though I wouldn't get home until, you know, sometimes seven, eight, nine o'clock at night, some

evenings. And I was always caught up on laundry.

Like, honestly, when I look back on it from the outside, I looked like I totally had my

shit together and I was just killing it in stepmotherhood.

But inside, I was miserable.

I was so full of anxiety and I was just so scared that if I didn't

keep up this facade, someone would find out that I had no idea what the F I was doing and that

...