Celeste Yvonne Just Wants To Talk About It

Celeste Yvonne has been writing and talking about motherhood for a decade. The Oakland native now calls Reno home, alongside her husband and two kids, ages 9 and 11. She went viral in 2018 for a post about those dark, sleepless nights in the early postpartum days. Since then, she’s written and talked about her sobriety journey and the mental load, through the lens of being a woman today.

I caught up with her via Zoom to talk about her life as a mom to two neurodivergent kids, writing her book and more.

Scary Mommy: Let’s get started with an abridged version of your motherhood history.

Celeste Yvonne: I started writing about motherhood for fun in 2016 when I was pregnant with my second child. We had had a miscarriage prior to that. And there was this standard rule that you're not supposed to talk about your pregnancy in the first trimester, but I was pregnant with a rainbow baby and I had no one to tell about it. And I was scared and I was excited.

And so I started writing an anonymous blog about it. And one thing led to another, and I started writing about motherhood once my second child was born and I put my name to it. And things were fine and dandy until I had a post blow up. It was called Dear Husband. And it's a post I wrote in those really dark, sleepless nights when you're nursing a baby. I didn't post it immediately. I posted it after my husband and I figured our stuff out. But it went crazy viral.

SM: And this is like 2017 then?

CY: I wrote the post in 2016, but when I posted it in 2018, it went crazy. And that's when I think this idea of the mental load really started to hit me that we need to be talking about this more. Why have we set this precedent for moms and we're not bringing it to the attention of husbands who have just as important a job as we do. And yet we have set these gender roles to essentially set women up to fail and to praise men for the very bare minimum of parenting.

And this was before books like Fair Play had come out, before emotional labor started trending on Instagram. So I didn't know there was a name to it. I don't even know if I knew what the mental load was. I just knew we had to talk about this side of parenting that rarely gets spoken about. And that was the beginning of my writing about it, my talking about it, and calling out these standards we've set.

SM: Sounds like we have kids around the same age; I have two sons who are 2013 and 2016.

CY: So mine are 2014, 2016, so nine and 11 right now. And my oldest is on the autism spectrum. My youngest has ADHD. So they're both neurodivergent, but they are very different and with their own challenges. And with my oldest, it's been quite a steep learning curve in how to advocate for neurodivergent children. I'm learning as I go, and trying to navigate the public school system after trying private school and failing, and learning about IEPs and 504s and ABA therapy and assessments, and all the language that goes into that. I wound up quitting my corporate job in 2023 to be a full-time stay-at home mom. And I'm still just the busiest I've ever been.

SM: Let’s talk about the writing of the book and how that all came to be.

CY: So funny story. In 2018 or 2019, after I started my blog, I decided I was going to do this challenge called the Ultimate Mom Challenge, where every month I was going to focus on a different dynamic of motherhood: being more green, being more sensory friendly, being better at the organization. I had different themes each month of things that I needed to tackle for me to feel like I was the “ultimate mom.”

And I got an agent along the way, and we were going to start working on this book called The Ultimate Mom Challenge, which is now what my handle is. But something significant happened at the end of 2017 that I kept secret from everybody: I quit drinking alcohol. And I thought this went very much against this persona that I was leading online about being this amazing ultimate mom, this fact that I had a drinking problem and I needed to quit.

So I went a full year of sobriety of not telling any of my followers. And at the end of 2018, after hitting my one-year milestone and realizing this wasn't something to be ashamed of, this was actually really exciting, I wrote my first post about it. I couldn't believe the response I got. People wanted to hear this side of my story. And my agent emailed me probably the next day and was like, "We're going to have to put your book aside. This is the story."

I mean, this is the real me, overcoming adversity and tackling inner demons. This is what life is all about. And the irony of it all. Here I am trying to be this perfect, ultimate mom, but the journey to get there is tackling inner demons. And so I started working on that book that came out in 2023. It's called It's Not About the Wine: The Loaded Truth Behind Mommy Wine Culture.

SM: How was the reaction to that?

CY: I think we have seen such a cultural shift in how we talk about addiction over the last 10 years… And I have to say it very gently because I'm not an abolitionist. I don't want people to stop drinking if they find enjoyment from it. But I also carry this message that it is a group one carcinogen, and it's not doing our mental health any favors. So if you are someone, especially mothers struggling with postpartum depression, medicating with alcohol is not going to help your situation.

And this goes very much against what I think previous generations have been told, even by their own doctors, to have a nice glass of wine every night to help you relax. This is a cultural shift that I think we have to get used to. But don't shoot the messenger. This is a substance issue just as much as it is an individual issue.

SM: So did you get any ridiculous questions like: “Then how do you unwind at the end of the day?:

CY: I specifically remember one comment someone said, "You don't need running shoes to run, but they help." I mean, this was kind of the message I was getting, that alcohol or wine was the equivalent of running shoes to help us push through our nightly routine.

And I feel for that because for many years, alcohol felt like my only crutch. And for some people who can just have one, and it does feel like a harmless escape, that's fine. We all have crutches. Right now, I escape — I guess you would call it — with a nightly Diet Coke. And that comes with its own toxicity. And that is a crutch I can deal with because I can stop with just one.

SM: Yup. So what are your days like?

CY: To be fair, my days are very unpredictable because my oldest is on an IEP, and I get calls from the school several times a week, at least. I have to have my phone on me at all times and be ready to drop everything to pick him up.

And that's just where we are at this point in our lives. And I hope it changes. I was just talking to my son last week. Because he was like, "You should go back and get a job." And I'm like, "Well, I don't know if you're ready for that. Are you ready for that?" He says, "Yeah." And then I had to go pick him up from school on Thursday. And I said, "Remember that conversation we had about you being ready for me to go back to work?" And he's like, "Yeah, I'm not ready."

So yeah, this is just the phase of life we're in. And I'm extremely privileged that my husband makes enough that I can be home, and I'm not trying to balance a job while at the same time being flexible. But I'm hoping it's a temporary situation because I would like to go back to work. I do get empowerment from my own salary.

SM: What's been something that really has surprised you about motherhood in different phases?

CY: I went into motherhood with this idea of what it would look and feel like. And I think one of the reasons I feel so called to talk about the hard parts is because all I saw growing up was the idyllic side of it. But when you're going through postpartum depression or generalized anxiety disorder, it does not feel satisfying or fulfilling most of the time, in my experience.

And we don't talk about that enough. And it doesn't mean you're doing something wrong. I think it's important to have the full breadth of what motherhood looks like on a day-to-day basis, because a lot of it is grueling and very unsatisfying.

SM: What do you do to feel good? Where's the joy, I guess, coming from?

CY: I think I've had to make a very important shift internally in not only how I see motherhood, but how I see me and my time. And I have learned and done a lot of work on centering myself after many years, most of my years as a mother doing the exact opposite, and thinking that's what a good mom does. So for me, prioritizing my own activities and individual time is the most important thing I can do because it is how I refill my cup. It is how I am able to find peace, so I can show up as the best partner, the best mom, the best family member for others. The martyrdom narrative needs to go away now.

SM: So what's a dream day for you?

CY: A great day for me is a day where I don't get any phone calls from school, and I go to the gym uninterrupted. I get home. I can work on my writing. I can query agents. I remember to eat lunch. I get a walk in with my dog. And then I pick the kids up from school and they've both had great days. And we get home and we play Roblox together. And my husband has dinner all figured out, and we have a relaxing, peaceful evening with no kids fighting. That's my dream day.

SM: That sounds pretty good, I got to say. Do you have time to read books too? Are you reading anything interesting?

CY: I try to read as many books as possible. I just read Girl Dinner; I loved it. I read Dial A for Aunties; amazing. I'm currently reading Intermezzo by Sally Rooney.

SM: Good ones! Last question: You're on death row, what's your last meal?

CY: It would be fully loaded nachos. Live and die for the dream nacho situation. It's hard to find. I feel like most restaurants just can't get it right. But when you find that one — generally it's a bar — that has that perfect loaded nachos and it's just like, it's topped evenly. It's topped to perfection. Every single scoop is the perfect seven layer of bliss. That would be it.

This conversation has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.