The Hidden Ways Women Disappear: Sobriety, Motherhood & Identity | Jessica Guerrieri (Going Deeper)
Minimalist Moms Podcast | Purposeful Life & Parenting Tips
Diane Boden
4.7 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 19 May 2026
⏱️ 37 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What happens when women slowly lose themselves inside motherhood, marriage, addiction, caregiving, and the pressure to keep everything together?
In this Going Deeper Episode, I’m joined by novelist Jessica Guerrieri to discuss her emotionally layered new novel, Both Can Be True. Jessica vulnerably shares how addiction can evolve beyond substances into cravings for validation, desirability, productivity, and being needed - and why connection, honesty, and learning to stay present in difficult emotions are often the real path toward healing. We also explore motherhood’s contradictions, unresolved trauma, social media’s impact on selfhood, and the subtle ways women lose themselves while trying to be everything for everyone else.
While this conversation centers around Jessica’s novel, it ultimately becomes a deeper discussion about intentional living, emotional awareness, and what it looks like to reclaim yourself in a world that constantly pulls you away from who you truly are.
Links Discussed in This Episode |
- Checkout the podcast storefront for recommendations from Diane.
- Subscribe to the Minimalist Moms Youtube Channel
- Previous Episode: Sobriety, Storytelling, and the Truth About "Mommy Wine Culture" | Jessica Guerrieri (Going Deeper)
- Book: Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
- Connect with Jessica:
- Website
- Book: Both Can Be True: A Novel
About Jessica |
Jessica Guerrieri (grr-AIR-ee) is a Northern California–based writer and novelist, where she lives with her husband and three daughters. A former special education teacher, she left the classroom to raise her family and pursue writing full-time. Now more than a decade sober, she is a passionate advocate for addiction recovery, and her work centers on the complex interior lives of women, motherhood, and healing.
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Addiction, anything that it takes you outside of yourself, you aren't being intentional in the moment and you're not staying in it. |
| 0:09.9 | And so recovery has taught me more than anything else to stay in it. You can exist in the hard feelings. |
| 0:17.8 | It's absolutely possible. I thought I would explode, right, if I felt the level of |
| 0:23.1 | sadness or fear or whatever it was that I was trying to run from. And yet, when we do it, |
| 0:29.8 | we teach our kids that they can also do it and they see us doing it. And they know that they can also |
| 0:37.0 | survive the hard and be stronger people for it. |
| 0:41.8 | This is Diane Bowden and you're listening to the minimalist moms podcast. What happens when women |
| 0:46.7 | slowly lose themselves inside motherhood, marriage, addiction, caregiving and the pressure to |
| 0:52.0 | keep everything together? In today's episode, I'm |
| 0:54.9 | joined by novelist Jessica Guerrari to discuss her emotionally layered new novel, both can be true. |
| 1:01.3 | Jessica vulnerably shares how addiction can evolve beyond substances into cravings for validation, |
| 1:07.0 | desirability, productivity, and being needed, and why connection, honesty, and learning to stay |
| 1:12.2 | present and difficult emotions are often the real path toward healing. We also explore motherhood's |
| 1:17.4 | contradictions, unresolved trauma, social media's impact on selfhood, and the subtle ways |
| 1:22.4 | women lose themselves while trying to be everything for everyone else. While this conversation |
| 1:27.0 | centers around Jessica's novel, it ultimately becomes a deeper discussion |
| 1:30.2 | about intentional living, emotional awareness, and what it looks like to reclaim yourself |
| 1:34.4 | in a world that constantly pulls you away from who you truly are. |
| 1:38.2 | These going deeper episodes are more of a conversation as opposed to a specific strategic |
| 1:42.4 | interview. I'll be sure to link the other ones in the show notes. |
| 1:45.6 | I have topics such as unschooling, my parent is a hoarder, an Ironman battling brain cancer. |
| 1:51.4 | These have been some of my favorite interviews to record, so I hope that you have been enjoying them as well. |
... |
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