If you've landed here wondering who Lauren is and whether this podcast is for you — this episode is your answer.

In this raw, unfiltered episode, Lauren shares the story she's never told in one place — from growing up in a volatile, abusive household, to being kicked out at 17 and living out of her car, to putting herself through nursing school, climbing to Director of Nursing, and still feeling like she was failing at everything.

The moment everything changed? Her 10-year-old son Jack looked up at her with tears streaming down his face and said "Mommy, my least favorite part of my day is coming home."

That was the wake up call.

In this episode Lauren covers:

1. How childhood trauma shaped her people-pleasing, identity-shifting patterns
2. Why tying your entire worth to nursing leads to burnout — fast
3. What it felt like to become Director of Nursing and still feel like a fraud
4. Why she left her job and started this podcast
5. Where Mind Your Mama is headed — and why burnt out nurses are sitting on a gold mine
6. How identity work, nervous system regulation, and digital products can change everything

This podcast is for the nurse who is exhausted, invisible at home, and knows deep down there is something more for her. You are not just a nurse. And Lauren is here to prove it.

Explore All of Lauren’s Freebies and Coaching Offers

Connect with Lauren:

Instagram: @laurentroutRN_coach

Email: lauren@mindyourmama.org

What if sleeping in separate beds from your husband was actually good for your marriage? What if scheduling sex was the secret to having more of it — and better? Lauren and Emily are back together for an unfiltered, judgment-free conversation that goes from sleep habits to self-worth, intimacy to parenting, and everything messy in between.

This is the raw, real talk that most people are thinking but nobody's saying out loud — and it just might change the way you look at your relationship.

1. The "Sleep Divorce" trend — what it is, why couples are doing it, and why it might actually save your marriage (not end it)
2. Why nighttime is the worst time for sex (for most moms) — and why that's completely valid
3. Scheduled sex: game-changer or romance killer? The surprising truth about why planned intimacy works
4. How movies, Bridgerton, and spicy romance books create unrealistic expectations about what sex should look like
5. The "roommate" problem — how couples slide from passionate partners to disconnected co-parents, and what actually pulls them back
6. Setting boundaries around intimacy without your partner feeling rejected
7. Using sex as a source of self-worth — Lauren gets vulnerable about her younger years and why she's determined her daughters won't make the same mistake
8. The 3-part journaling method Emily uses daily to build self-worth and feel "enough"
9. Do-overs in parenting — why repairing after you lose your cool matters more than getting it right every time
10. Why women collaborating is unstoppable — and a possible co-hosting announcement 👀

1. Sleep divorce is not a relationship failure — for many couples, better sleep means better moods, less resentment, and more desire
2. Set boundaries around when you're available for sex — and communicate them clearly, not reactively
3. Scheduling sex removes the guesswork and lets both partners show up intentionally rather than one person always feeling rejected or the other always feeling pestered
4. Media — from Bridgerton to romance novels to porn — sets unrealistic standards for what intimacy looks like, and comparing your sex life to those standards will always make you feel like you're failing
5. Self-worth is not determined by your frequency of sex, your partner's desire for you, or any external metric
6. Communication is the foundation — most couples slide into roommate territory not because they...

We were handed a blueprint.

Go to school.

Get good grades.

Climb the ladder.

Get married.

Buy the house.

Be grateful.

Don’t complain.

And if you do it all… you win.

But what do you actually win?

In this raw, unfiltered episode, Lauren pulls back the curtain on the “dream” so many high-achieving women were taught to chase — and what it cost her to finally admit it wasn’t hers.

From becoming Director of Nursing to feeling like a fraud…

From checking every box to feeling like a ghost in her own life…

From being needed to realizing she just wanted to be loved.

This episode is about:

• Performance-based identity

• Tying worth to usefulness

• The exhaustion of being the “strong one”

• Motherhood and soul-level burnout

• Approval addiction

• And what happens when you wake up

If you’ve ever laid in bed thinking, “Is this really it?”

This one will hit.

You don’t have to burn your life down.

But you do have to stop worshipping a dream that was never custom-built for you.

If this episode cracked something open for you, that’s not a breakdown — that’s awareness.

Inside my 1:1 coaching, we untangle the identity you inherited and help you build one that’s actually yours.

Explore All of Lauren’s Freebies and Coaching Offers

Connect with Lauren:

Instagram: @https://www.instagram.com/laurentroutn_coach/

Email: lauren@mindyourmama.org