Jun 2, 2026 · 54 min · 12 segments
Motherhood was supposed to feel natural. So why do so many moms secretly feel overwhelmed, exhausted, resentful, anxious, or like they’re failing? In this episode, Emily sits down with…
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Danielle DowlingGuest
Emily Rose MacDonaldHostWhat is this setup that you argue we all need to be aware of? And what are the impacts to the individual mothers of this setup?
Similar to how I did not know exactly who I was writing the book for, the framework that I call the motherhood setup really didn't arrive to me until after I had finished the book, when I was able to take sort of that 30,000 foot view through the editing process and feel into the primary themes of the book.
So the motherhood setup is a framework that I created that explains why modern motherhood is so overwhelming and why women are taught to believe that the overwhelm is their fault.
So what we call anxiety and overwhelm in motherhood, I see as the collision of three particular forces.
and we can kind of dig into the details of that, good girl conditioning and invisible labor.
And when those three forces collide, when they inevitably collide, a woman does what she's been trained to do.
And she assumes that if she's overwhelmed or anxious or has any kind of sticky feelings, that she is the problem.
And not because she's irrational, but because she's been taught to measure her worth by how well she quietly holds it all together.
While culture largely ignores the cost because it's built on the assumption that a woman will endure because we have and because we do.
If you look at even pandemic era in 2020, when women had to, mothers filled that gap right? There's not school any longer.
It all fell on the shoulders of the primary caregiver, which is primarily the woman.
And society was kind of like, culture was like, you're doing such a great job.
What is this setup that you argue we all need to be aware of? And what are the impacts to the individual mothers of this setup?
Similar to how I did not know exactly who I was writing the book for, the framework that I call the motherhood setup really didn't arrive to me until after I had finished the book, when I was able to take sort of that 30,000 foot view through the editing process and feel into the primary themes of the book.
So the motherhood setup is a framework that I created that explains why modern motherhood is so overwhelming and why women are taught to believe that the overwhelm is their fault.
So what we call anxiety and overwhelm in motherhood, I see as the collision of three particular forces.
and we can kind of dig into the details of that, good girl conditioning and invisible labor.
And when those three forces collide, when they inevitably collide, a woman does what she's been trained to do.
And she assumes that if she's overwhelmed or anxious or has any kind of sticky feelings, that she is the problem.
And not because she's irrational, but because she's been taught to measure her worth by how well she quietly holds it all together.
While culture largely ignores the cost because it's built on the assumption that a woman will endure because we have and because we do.
If you look at even pandemic era in 2020, when women had to, mothers filled that gap right? There's not school any longer.
It all fell on the shoulders of the primary caregiver, which is primarily the woman.
And society was kind of like, culture was like, you're doing such a great job.
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