The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

Since arriving back home late Monday evening, I’ve barely sat down. Instead, picture me: walking around my house with a bowl of food, grabbing bites between hopping into meetings, unpacking, getting organized, and running off to meet friends. Summer always moves at a pace that keeps me on my toes—and this one has felt particularly propellant. I feel like I’m being swept forward by travel and projects that are (finally!) coming to fruition in the next days and months. It’s been a wild time, but I feel so inspired and excited by the work I’ve been creating, that it’s spilled over into ideas for trips, the food I’m cooking, and a broader sense of what’s possible. I feel steeped in gratitude lately.

Between the chaos, I’ve found plenty of moments of stillness and inspiration. Here are a few highlights from the week! x

Read more

I barely had time to think about my trip to Costa Rica, which came together in a flash when my friend Betsy texted me a month ago. At the time, I was prepping for my solo month in Montana, but when I looked at my calendar, I saw that the week she was asking about fell nestled between other summer plans. I took it as kismet—and the trip turned out to be nothing short of magic.

Although we traveled during the rainy season, we got incredibly lucky with the weather; it was warm enough that I lived in bikinis and shorts, soaking up the sun and salt water, and returning to surfing. By the end of the week, we made a handful of friends and promises to return soon (I’ve already booked an Airbnb in January…!).

Read on for how we spent each day, everything I wore, and where we stayed! x

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

Today ended the same way it began: driving my ATV through the dark in a bikini, along dirt roads in Costa Rica. In between, I had an epic sunrise surf session with new friends, belly laughs with one of my oldest friends, watched the final World Cup game crowded around a propped-up phone at a surf shack, got the best facial of my life, and ate so much fresh fruit and fish. It was as close to a perfect day as it gets—the last of a truly idyllic trip to the sweetest surf town. I’ll be sharing so many more details on Tuesday, including our full itinerary…

Until then, here are some highlights and 3 tips for traveling with a friend:

Read more

Every single month, for about two days around my ovulation and then again before my period, it feels like a switch flips. I go from being a fairly level-headed, happy person, to experiencing a depression so deep, I often compare it to falling down a tunnel with no handholds.

All of a sudden, I feel completely encompassed in darkness, which I experience as depression, insomnia, complete lack of creativity and motivation, and even suicidal ideation. It feels like all of the things that make me me go away, until I get my period and the clouds magically part.

Over the past few years, I’ve learned that my symptoms are consistent with PMDD or “Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder,” a cyclical hormone-based mood disorder. In the time since, I’ve tried a lot of different solutions—I go to acupuncture religiously and take Chinese herbs, I’ve tried different forms of birth control, I track my cycle like my life depends on it, and have made countless lifestyle changes. Everything helped a little, but nothing made such a dramatic and immediate difference as when I discovered the link between histamines and hormones and began taking a Zyrtec and Pepcid-AC every night of my luteal phase. I couldn’t believe that allergy medicine was making such an enormous difference, so I decided to call someone in who can explain what’s going on here and how safe this method is.

When I mentioned it offhand in a “Sunday Edition,” several of you reached out to ask for more details, so asked Dr. Elise Schroeder, a naturopathic doctor who specializes in women’s health education, and who I’ve been seeing for treatment for the past nearly two years, if she would be willing to come onto Morning Person to share her wisdom with all of you!

In our conversation, she broke down the basics of your menstrual cycle, the differences between PMS and PMDD, what happens hormonally in perimenopause, and the histamine-estrogen connection that has genuinely changed my life. We also got into antihistamines, bioidentical progesterone, and why “estrogen metabolism” is so important for our mental health!

Dr. Elise Schroeder is a naturopathic doctor, herbalist, and women’s health specialist based here in Portland, Oregon. Dr. Elise studied human biology and women’s studies at the University of New York at Albany before earning her Doctorate in Naturopathic Medicine at the National College of Naturopathic Medicine.

She’s been helping women achieve vitality since 2001, and her path has taken a lot of shapes over those two-plus decades: volunteer medicine, running Women In Balance, an education-focused women’s health institute, work in reproductive health and fertility clinics, and consulting on thousands of clinical hormone cases. She’s the real deal—and the best person I could think of to have this conversation.

Read on to listen to, watch (!), or read our conversation (edited for clarity and length)! I hope you find it as helpful as I did!

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

Before we get into things, I wanted to send another reminder that I’m still gathering feedback in advance of Morning Person’s fifth anniversary through the end of Monday! Your responses will directly influence what the next few years of this newsletter hold—thank you for taking the time! x

Share Your Thoughts!

The day before I left for Montana, one of my best friends Betsy sent me a link to a surf resort in Costa Rica. Maybe in the fall? she texted. Famous last words. We live thousands of miles apart, so it’s hard for us to resist any opportunity to travel together…

Within an hour, we’d determined that we both had a week-long window the following month—so we booked it! This means that from the moment I pulled back home into my driveway this week, I’ve been running around unpacking the van, tending to house to-dos, returning to strength classes, petting Toast, seeing friends, taking meetings (which I’d stacked this week for my return) and repacking for an international trip! (On my first day back, my Oura ring asked if I had perhaps been for a five-hour run? Nope, just running around my house.) Not to mention a completely unhinged work week and the fact that I’m currently enrolled in two online courses: a business class and writing class taught by (!).

Summer is often a generative, wild time for me and this one is no different!

I’ll have to work quite a bit from Costa Rica, but I’m also so excited to live in a bikini, get some surfing in, and have a solid week with a true soul sister. Updates to come!

For now, here are a few photos from my week at home—if I look a bit exhausted and crazed and happy all at once, well that’s because I am! See you back here Tuesday! x

Read more

Before we dive into things, I wanted to take a moment to ask for a favor…

It’s been a while since I’ve asked you about what you want to see on Morning Person and, in advance of this newsletter’s five-year anniversary next month (!), I would love to get a sense, through this short survey, of what’s working! What isn’t?? What would you love to see more of!? Let me know! This is your chance to weigh in, to make the next five years better than ever. x

Take the Survey!

Over the past few weeks, living in my van and camping my way through Montana, I’ve become something of an expert on whipping up simple, healthy meals that require minimal time and clean up, and draw from a limited rotation of ingredients. With the exception of a few meals at my fav, Basal in Missoula, I haven’t eaten out once. Even when I had the opportunity to—at a concert last weekend or a free night in Bozeman—I actually preferred cooking for myself, saving a bit of money but also because I knew I could made anything just as, or more, satisfying as I’d find out.

In this time, there have been certain formulas I’ve come to rely on: a rotation of bases that are endlessly customizable. Most of these require one pan, one burner, and virtually zero prep, and draw primarily from whole ingredients or minimally processed foods. Read on for the 7 dinners I’ve been eating, and my short-list of ingredients I always have on hand:

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

Being a novelist is the coolest because it provides a container for curiosity…

Some of you may remember that two summers ago, I happened to notice that the bushes alongside a hike I’ve done a million times in Tryon, just outside of Portland, were glittering with spider webs. On closer inspection, I noticed that the webs were perfect half-domes, tiny architectural marvels that each housed a tiny spider. The discovery sparked a million questions that ultimately led me to the research by , an evolutionary behavioral ecologist who’s devoted his career to answering these questions.

As I began to draft the outline of my current novel, I kept returning to these spiders and realized that their courtship rituals provided a rich metaphor for my protagonist, and my curiosity around them wasn’t going anywhere. So guess what?? I reached out to Dr. Watson, who generously offered that I join for part of his next research trip to visit the population he studies in Montana (!!).

Over the past few days, I’ve been following Dr. Watson himself through bushes at a biological station on Flathead Lake, asking one million questions and observing the incredible, intricate mating rituals of Sierra Domes (I shared as video below of two males measuring each others’ sizes before fighting; watch at your own level of spider comfort!).

More than anything, I feel so wildly grateful to be here, and amazed by how many opportunities there are in life to learn something completely new. I still have a few days here, and cannot believe how much I’ve already learned. I feel like I’ll have a masters in these spiders by the time I leave, or at the very least, a newfound level of appreciation for this tiny creature.

Read on for more updates and photos from another memorable week in Montana, including my new favorite concert venue and recommendations from Bozeman:

Read more

I was fully expecting to feel miserable.

As the weeks ticked by since my breakup, I continued to look over my shoulder, checking for the thunderhead of grief I was sure would close in at any moment. If my divorce four years ago had taught me anything, it was to never let my guard down—for years following my separation, happiness felt like a rare exception; any joy I felt was swiftly washed away by a downpour of sadness that I had to work through or just let myself feel. So even as I felt happy and stable at home in Portland over the past month, I didn’t trust it. I feared the sadness would strike when I was most vulnerable: alone, hundreds of miles removed from my community, in Montana.

After saying goodbye to a friend in Missoula, I drove north towards Glacier National Park, singing a motley rotation of Labi Siffre, Harry Styles, and The Chicks. I was completely alone. Still, I felt…. good? And when I entered the park, my happiness only expanded. All around me were clear skies. Maybe I could trust it…

I spent the week pushing my legs up wildflower-filled trails leading to lakes at the basins of mountains, where other hikers—if there happened to be any—lent me their binoculars to look at mountain goats and bighorn sheep. In the afternoons, I’d work in the van during rainstorms, then cook myself beautiful meals, which I’d eat while plotting the next day’s hike. The mountains offered perspective and refused to let me feel anything other than astounded and grateful. The phrase “wildly happy” kept coming to me, as I shared, breathless, in this voice memo on my way to Iceberg Lake last Thursday, while crossing over alpine creeks:

I know it won’t last forever, and that life has other twists and turns in store, but that’s also what makes it so important to recognize these moments of progress and joy, that allow us to recognize how far we’ve come.

I worked so hard to get out of that two-year tunnel of grief, to learn how to sit in the hard stuff when it comes, as it did for the first quarter of this year. It feels like this happiness emerged directly from that darker space, where I learned how to redirect my attention again and again towards the beauty in my life, and how to tend to my community, my creativity, and my body through routines that nourish me.

All my life, I’ve been told that I needed a partner—it’s the social messaging we’re all fed—but by the time my breakup came, I felt stable enough to feel the tenderness and loss of someone I love, without letting it take me out. Even at thirty-four. Even with so many unknowns on the horizon. More importantly, I feel capable of sitting in the beauty of feeling so much. I’m beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, I can trust this feeling of being wildly happy…

Until then, I’ve shared my itinerary from Glacier National Park, one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen (with a few bear safety principles and the story of my grizzly run-in)!

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

This has been one of the most incredible weeks, and I didn’t see it coming. When I initially planned my trip to Montana (even “planned” is a generous word for throwing my things in the van, and heading east), I knew I was going to be in Missoula the weekend of the 20th at a music festival and Flathead Lake for the first week of July. But in between? I had no idea. This is only my second time in the state, and I barely scratched the surface when I went to Missoula for the first time last year, but I had a vague awareness of Glacier National Park and Yellowstone’s proximity. On little more than a whim, and my friend Jenn’s advice (a reader I met through Morning Person Bookclub!), I headed north for Glacier!

Let’s just say: I was not prepared for what I found there. Jenn sent me a few hikes, as well as tips for nabbing the best campsites and, after a brief stop at the ranger station outside of Whitefish, I drove up Going-to-the-Sun Road amid views so astounding, my eyes kept welling with tears. I could not believe what I was seeing. From there, I swear, every single day brought me on a more beautiful hike.

As I write this morning, between preparations to leave the campsite I’ve called home for the past four nights, I am beyond filled with gratitude. Last night, I wrote in my journal, “Sitting at my campsite, my last night in glacier, with a book and a campfire, after a hike that involved a grizzly sighting, thinking about how summer couldn’t get any sweeter than this.”

I’ll be sharing a lot more—including those hikes, Jenn’s campsite tips (she’s generously offered to share!), and that grizzly story—on Tuesday. I’ve also been treating my Instagram like a travel journal this week, if you want a little preview! Until then… here are a few photos, recs, and updates!

Read more

When I looked back through my photos from my week in Glacier National Park, it felt like every image was of either a mountain or a taco (a sign of an excellent week, in my opinion). No, but I can’t stop making these, given how easy and delicious they are. They truly take about five minutes and minimal cleanup, and are beyond easy to customize so I never get sick of them:

You will need (for 1 serving):

Two Sieta Cassave Flour Tortillas (their almond flour as also great!)
Half-package of Abbott’s plant-based meat (I usually use the “chorizo” flavor for tacos, but have tried all of them—good ingredients and a van staple, since they don’t go bad for weeks; I can stock up on a bunch and have them on hand for ages)
Arugula
Greek yogurt (I use this instead of sour cream; has the same effect but a bit healthier!)
Avocado
Hot sauce and/or salsa
Fermented greens (I add these to every meal and love the tartness they lend the tacos)
Additional options: chickpeas, fermented greens

How to make it:

Cook the plant-based meat per the packages instructions. As it cooks, in a separate pan, warm the tortillas and set them on a plate. Once the “meat” is cooked, add it to the tortilla, then pile high with arugula, Greek yogurt, avocado, hot sauce, and fermented greens to your heart’s content!

When I announced an AMA last month, hundreds of you responded with thoughtful questions that I kicked off with Part 1 here! This week, with Part 2, I’m providing transparent and honest responses to your questions around:

• My relationship with psychedelics

• Keeping friendships alive, despite being a horrific texter

• How I feel about becoming a therapist (and my plans!)

• My favorite podcasts and what’s next on my travel list!

• Whether I’m ready to ditch van life

As with Part 1, this entire post is behind a paywall because I get into some personal things here. Let’s get into it!

You mentioned that you might want to do psychedelic assisted therapy but haven’t written about your relationship with psychedelics, as far as I remember. Would love to hear what that relationship is like! 🌈 — Lizzy R.

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

This week—no, this day contained so much! For one thing, I’m back in the van and currently in Montana. I drove up Thursday to join my friend Lauren for Zootown, the same music festival we attended last year in Missoula. From pretty much the moment we arrived, we did not stop moving and, luckily, were both game to endure two days of dehydration and tired legs in the name of getting primo spots—we stood for eight hours (!) to be against the railing for The Chicks, but it was worth every second. “Wildly happy” is the phrase that kept coming to mind this week.

I’m currently camped lakeside, but will be continuing north to Glacier after a few days of work and rest, and would love any of your tips! Until then, here are a few highlights and recommendations from the week, including:

• A so-simple-its-stupid, 10-minute dinner

• My new favorite lipgloss and beauty store

• Early access to something big (!)

P.S. Thank you again for your thoughtful responses to this week’s post. They truly meant so much. x

Some of you may remember the survey I sent out last year about something big I’m building. In the time since, I’ve been using your responses and meeting so many of you over Zoom and coffee, as I create something I have a feeling you’re going to love (!). I’ll be sharing a lot more in the coming months—but if you’d like to get on the list for early access, drop your email here!

Get Early Access!

Read more

“I just broke up with C,” I told my friend as soon as she picked up the phone.

“What!?” she exclaimed. Another friend leaned against a brick wall as we waited in line for a food truck, “I need a second.”

“It’s real this time, I swear,” I quickly added.

The qualifier was necessary: Over the course of two years, I’d broken up with C half a dozen times, including the two that I shared here (and here). My girlfriends, understandably, needed some convincing.

Over texts, walks, and meals since our breakup several weeks ago, they each asked me some variation on the same question: Are you sure? What’s different this time?

I’m guessing you have the same question—what’s different this time?—so let me tell you…

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

In response to the piece I wrote on Tuesday, so many of you left thoughtful and beautiful comments—several of which echoed a similar sentiment, “I’m thinking about leaving a marriage and a good partner, but I’m worried I may regret it.” One reader wrote:

“I am reading this as I am too thinking about leaving a good man. Because I just don’t know. I don’t know for sure. And I don’t know whether I need to know or ever will. And so I fear regret. I fear losing something that I know is good and valuable. And someone I love. I have no answers but really appreciate you writing this. Thank you.”

This comment sat so heavy in my heart all day, because I remember being in exactly this place, and how much it felt like torment. Below I’m sharing the advice I wish I’d had, on this tender topic:

Read more

I had planned to publish a Part 2 to my AMA today, until I came across this question from a reader, Alex M.: “Super personal so please feel free to skip! I’m also incredibly curious about what people regret, or how they think about regrets. What are yours? How do you?”

As I began writing, I realized I had so much to say about regret—including things I’ve never shared about my divorce—that I wanted to devote an entire post to answering it honestly. Let’s get to it. x

In the earliest days of my separation from my husband, I agonized over my decision to leave. I was operating entirely off of the intuitive sense that something wasn’t working, and that I needed to leave in order to understand what that something was. Back then, I grasped for answers—from books, from friends. When I called my mom for advice, she told me, “I’m afraid that you don’t really understand what regret is, since you’ve never had to experience it.”

Up until that point, I had never regretted anything, and why would I? Every leap I’d ever taken had paid off. And I knew that I could undo any of my choices if I needed to: I could transfer to a different college, move back to a city I’d left, switch careers. But, it turned out, I couldn’t go back to my husband.

When I left my husband in the summer of 2022, a part of me believed that I could go back to him if I needed to—he had been such a huge part of my life for eleven years, that, even as I left, I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that there might someday come a day when he wasn’t. Throughout most of that summer and fall, we attended couple’s therapy together and explored the possibility of getting back together. That fall, at the advice of our therapist, I spent the night with him in the home we had once shared. I was supposed to stay for the week, but left after one night, writing in my journal as soon as I got back to my apartment, “Staying feels so much safer than leaving. Who’s to say which is better? If I stay, I feel like I will spend the rest of my life asking myself, But what if I had left?”

Still, two months later, I decided that I wanted to stay. When my husband came into my apartment to drop off our dog Toast, who we still shared custody of, I handed him a letter. He sat on my couch reading it: a heartfelt apology and entreaty to get back together. When he reached the end, my heart dropped when he told me he couldn’t do it. I had caused him too much pain, and he wanted to give the new relationship he had just started a chance.1

Finally, I knew what regret felt like. What I didn’t yet understand was that regret, at its worst, is a verdict, but it can also be an important teacher.

At the time, regret felt like the deepest grief and shame I have ever experienced. It was as if my husband, all of his friends, and his family, who had felt like my own, had died and I was entirely responsible for their deaths. At the same time that I grieved losing them, I had to contend with my deep shame. I felt like a monster, like I would never be worthy of love again, like I might be the worst person to ever walk the planet. The pain was so deep that I woke up sobbing every single night.

At one point, early on, I Googled “divorce regret” and found myself on the saddest forum I have ever visited. In it, men wrote about their grief and regret around leaving their wives, or engaging in affairs that led their wives to leave them. They mostly wrote from small apartments, isolated from their families, only able to see now what they had lost. For a long time, I lived in the airless grief of my own small, post-divorce apartment until slowly, I began to wonder if my regret was trying to tell me something beyond, “You ruined everything.”

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

It’s funny how, when I take the time to pause and reflect on my week (as ‘Sunday Edition’ creates the space for me to do), I can often identify a theme. And when I really look at it, there’s often a lesson to glean from it. This week, I put myself out there repeatedly. It began with this post (your comments have meant so much to me), then expanded into new social situations and new-to-me experiences—all from a place of safety and honoring my nervous system.

It felt akin to exploring outside as a kid all day, knowing I had a warm house and dinner to come home to. I’ve been thinking about how to create that more for myself—this sense of being free, but held, to explore and take risks. Read on for highlights from my week, including a few favorite outfits, recs, and a wildly good and simple (!) sweet potato dinner:

The weather was all over the place this week. Here are three of my favorite outfits—for an art opening, coffee with friends, and dinner out!

Read more

This simple meal—born out of a sparsely stocked fridge and picked-over garden—was so delicious and satisfying; far greater than the sum of its parts. The cool tofu over the roasted sweet potatoes, topped with rich and caramelized scallions and a crunch from some fermented greens is the perfect combination of flavor, textures, and temperature. Just trust me on this one. I wanted a second serving almost as soon as I finished my first…!

Read more

I write briefly, but honestly, about body image in this post. If you feel this might be difficult for you, for any reason, please trust yourself and skip this piece.

I had a completely different post slated and ready to go live this morning. That piece, a reflection on some relational dynamics I’m navigating, was good and I was excited for it to go live because I knew so many of you would relate to it. But it was also incendiary and something that would be difficult to come back from once it was out floating in your inboxes…

Read more

The Sunday Edition is Tuesday’s little sister—off-the-cuff updates I’d bring up over a coffee catch-up with a friend.

Beginning last weekend, I got hit hard by luteal phase. For the past eight days, I’ve woken up every single morning at 3 a.m., something that used to happen to me all the time, but hasn’t in months.

If I know one thing about insomnia (unfortunately, I know a lot about insomnia), it’s to resist fighting it. By Wednesday, I decided to embrace the early wake-ups and head to the 6 a.m. class at my favorite workout studio. Then back again on Thursday and Friday. It’s been years since I was a regular at early bird classes, which were my go-to until I left my traditional nine-to-five and realized I could spend mornings reading, journaling, and working on my fiction. I was surprised to remember how much I loved it.

The early movement and rush of endorphins noticeably improved my mood and productivity, and I found that I was actually able to fall asleep around 9 each night, a schedule that works better for my body (even if I had to excuse myself from a few plans slightly early this week). I’m still not getting enough sleep, but it is a noticeable improvement from four hours a night to six. I am such a creature of habit, but have found myself reminded again and again recently that habits are meant to change and adapt as we do. What worked for me at one point, or on one day, may not be what works for me the next!

Any tips for combatting cycle-related sleep issues?? (A woman I met at a party last night brought my attention to the link between hormones and histamines and shared that a protocol that she says changed her life. I’m going to talk to my doctor about it this week!)

Leave a comment

In spite of the sleep issues, it was a beautiful and tender week filled with hikes and hangs with girlfriends (more to share soon). Read on for a few highlights and recommendations, including 9 tangible practices that have noticeably increased my happiness:

Read more

The thing that confounded friends (and pretty much everyone in my life) about my decision to end my marriage is that I was, at least on the surface, happy.

Back then, almost all of my free time was built around entertainment and enjoyment, organized around the question, What do we want to do? On weeknights, my husband and I would cook a new Alison Roman or Molly Baz recipe then eat it in front of the television, a habit we picked up during COVID. On weekends, we checked out new restaurants in Portland, and drank sour beers after hikes in the Columbia River Gorge, or traveled to boutique hotels in cities with new restaurants, new hikes, new beers.

Everything about our life together signaled that we had made it, so I couldn’t understand why I didn’t feel fulfilled in the way I had been promised.

It took years for me to admit this to myself—how could I have so much and still be unhappy? To feel so disconnected from the life I had built? The moment I acknowledged this, it was as if a knot came loose. My life and marriage unraveled faster than I could grab hold of the thread, and I was left with a new question, What is a happy life, if not this?

It’s only now, four summers later, that I can begin to see the answer.

Read more