American culture teaches independence like it’s a personality trait to be proud of, hands you a newborn, and says good luck, you’ve got this. We’re raised to believe needing help is a character flaw, not a completely reasonable response to raising an actual human being.

Hi there,

Last Monday night, at Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor, mothers, daughters, and a few brave dads showed up for a screening of No Country for Mothers, the new documentary from Reshma Saujani, founder of Moms First and Girls Who Code. The event was co-hosted by Elizabeth Baron, Jackie Blatt, Christine Ngo Isaac, Jackie Kier, Meredith Shumway & Allison Stern.

Allison Stern, founder of Mother Ventures, opened the evening, and afterward Reshma sat down with Zibby Owens for a Q&A that we could have listened to forever. The sweetest part of the night was spotting Reshma’s husband and her two kids in the audience, the same kids who stole several scenes in the documentary itself.

The film’s thesis is simple, and once you hear it, you cannot unhear it, no matter how hard you try: motherhood in America is impossible by design. Work ends at six, school pickup is at three. Childcare costs more than a paycheck. Some mothers are back at their desks two weeks postpartum, laptop balanced on a body still healing with a heavy heart. Moms aren’t broken. The system is, and it was never built with mothers in mind. And behind the logistics, there is a harder truth: we don’t have the village we need to make all of this happen without an enormous amount of pain, sacrifice, and money.

Other cultures raise kids collectively, with grandparents down the hall, aunties on call, neighbors who show up with a casserole and don’t leave until the dishes are done. American culture teaches independence like it’s a personality trait to be proud of, hands you a newborn, and says good luck, you’ve got this. We’re raised to believe needing help is a character flaw, not a completely reasonable response to raising an actual human being. That lack of support isn’t a personal failing in exhausted mothers. It’s a design choice, and it has quietly, systematically hurt women and their families for generations.

Watch the trailer:

And then, every time mothers get close to actually fixing this, someone hands them a culture war instead. Tradwife versus girlboss. Working mom versus stay-at-home mom. (I wrote about the Mommy Wars HERE). It’s the same fight in a new outfit, running on a loop since the 1950s, and it works brilliantly, because the worst thing you can accuse a woman of is being a bad mother. So women take the bait, burn an evening defending sourdough starters or spreadsheet skills in a stranger’s Instagram comments, and while everyone’s busy scoring points, the actual system failing all of us on paid leave and childcare can just go back to normal. As Reshma put it, most people can’t actually afford to be either a tradwife or a girlboss. They’re just trying to survive the week without a sick kid, a school closure, or a check-engine light blowing up the budget.

Women don’t have to agree on everything. We don’t even have to like each other to agree that the system is failing all of us. Choosing to support each other anyway, especially when it’s inconvenient, is the whole ballgame. Reshma talks about how mothers should be able to show up to work and everywhere else as their full selves, without performing the vanishing act pretending the sick kid, the school play, and the pediatrician appointment don’t exist between nine and six. Right now, so many women run a kind of split-screen life: flawless professional in the office, invisible everywhere else because admitting you have a family still somehow reads as a liability, not a fact of being a human person who reproduced. That shouldn’t be the cost of a paycheck. It’s a through-line in her career, not a plot twist.

Watch her TED TALK here

Reshma ran for Congress in 2010, lost, and instead of sulking about it (a very reasonable option), she channeled the loss into building Girls Who Code. When she became a mother herself, she pointed that same relentlessness at the systems failing parents — first Marshall Plan for Moms, then Moms First — and at a genuinely bipartisan push for paid leave.

And the numbers back her up: this isn’t actually a partisan issue, whatever cable news tells you. A 2024 national poll from BPC Action, Pivotal Ventures, and Morning Consult found 82% of voters support a federal paid family and medical leave program, including 90% of Democrats and 76% of Republicans. Nearly 8 in 10 voters (79%) said they specifically want policymakers working on bipartisan solutions for caregiving.

“People are dying to talk about this.” That’s what Reshma told the room Monday, and you could feel it from the 150 women who showed up that night. Mothers aren’t silent about this because it doesn’t matter to them; they’re silent because they are scrambling, they are busy, and there’s rarely a room built for the conversation.

Reshma wants the film to be just the beginning, and she hopes the gatherings can really be a place where this movement can grow: we need more living rooms, more theaters, more nights like this one, where women can say the true, unglamorous parts out loud and discuss possible solutions (that will only come when women work together). So here’s the ask, and it’s an easy yes: if you want to make a difference, host a screening. Invite friends from different stripes, pour the wine, order the cheese, and talk about it. Then, hopefully many of them will get involved with Moms First by donating, volunteering, and promoting them like I am doing here.

This is not a political issue. It’s a human one, and it’s ours to fix together, regardless of who we vote for. No Country for Mothers is currently touring the country. Find a screening or host your own at momsfirst.us/doc, and let’s get this country to care about moms and families.

Sending love,

Patricia

Hi there,

Before I start: if you’ve been here for a little while, you know I used to host salons, but took a pause to make sure I could recover from surgery. I’ve missed our community, and I’ve been planning a few special gatherings this summer and Fall. Maybe we can also gather casually for lunch or coffee somewhere? If you like that idea, send me a note at rsvp@matriark.com. In the meantime, I will send more info about future activations here soon - for now, save these dates: August 19th (TBC) and October 6th - great gatherings are coming!

OK, let’s move on with this week’s programming.

Every year, so many articles get written about the Hamptons, and most of them are about the eccentricity and excess of billionaires and celebrities. You know the drill: the finance bros comparing the size of their yachts, the influencers bringing their special lighting for a beach picnic, the white parties…

Thankfully, this beautiful place is a lot more than glitz and cheese, but when it comes to shopping and entertainment, there’s been a massive influx of large luxury brands since Covid, and it’s gotten a lot harder for small, independent businesses to thrive in such an expensive area while squeezing a year’s worth of sales into three months. It’s a lot of pressure. So today I’m rounding up my favorite women-owned businesses and brands you can visit and support while you’re out east, with my favorite piece form each of them (scroll for the edit below). There’s nothing wrong with picking up your Pradas or your Chanels, but make a little room to support these women too, so that every summer you come back, they’re still here, giving this ridiculous, beautiful place its actual character and soul!

Enjoy! Sending love,

Patricia

The Best Women Owned Places and Brands in the Hamptons, and my favorite pieces from each of them

Sag Harbor

I live here, so I’m doing Sag Harbor first :)

Anita Somayaji: I have a family crest pendant necklace by my friend Anita Somayaji, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been stopped and asked where it’s from. Anita is going to have an atelier in Sag Harbor soon, so for now, please contact her via her website if you want to get info on the crest (it’s not on the website) and get on her mailing list to get a notification of her new shop location soon. She is known for her constellation necklaces and Taylor Swift, my fellow Sagittarian, has one of her pieces too :)

Leallo: this is a great shop to get all your everyday basics. I just visited Megan Chiarello’s shop, and got her beautiful silk pants in this blue color that I plan to wear at home and also out to a casual dinner with a tee and a flip flop or a sweater. I also got the matching cami, and I’m going to get the black ones for Fall.

Doen: one of my favorite brands for feminine cardigans and dresses. I love this delicate short sleeve cardigan, and this super light dress inspired by Victorian-era underpinnings.

The 1818 Collective: the entire house is a dream and decorated by The 1818 Collective Founders, Interior Designers Kristin Fine and Analisse Taft-Gersten. I always stop by to check their vintage pieces, and I have my eye on these stem planters for my garden. I’m also in love with these sconces (they remind me of my Elsa Peretti’s silver bone cuffs).

Tutto Il Giorno and Urban Zen: love the food at Tutto (also love their cafe in East hampton) and this draped top is quintessentially Donna Karan.

TWP: I was trying my favorite pieces on last week, and found this beautiful book about TWP & Onna House - and my friend and artist Bastienne Schmidt (who we featured in the past HERE) was featured inside. TWP’s cropped shirts are now a staple in many women’s wardrobes as they are in mine, and I’m really considering this buttery soft suede trouser and shirt (or cropped shirt) for a set that is casual enough but can also double as a modern suit. I can think of 1,000 ways I can wear them separately too, including with the cotton cropped shirt.

Sag Harbor Florist: I will always have an excuse to stop by this place and leave all my money there :). I have bought countless planters for my garden, and I buy all my flower arrangements and gifts at the Sag Harbor Florist. I just recently got these nutrients for potted plants and I love them. The best florist in the Hamptons, hands down.

Via Coquina: The curation in this shop is superb, and it transports you to the Mediterranean villages and places where you can find the most unique pottery, textiles, jewelry and gifts. My favorite items are everything by this Egyptian brand, the stunning art of François Gangemi that it’s always displayed (and I’ve been coveting for a while now) , and their gorgeous olive soaps.

Amagansett

E-E Home: one of the chicest home stores in the Hamptons, they don’t have a website so you have to go there and check it out. Here is a little taste from their Instagram - but it doesn’t do justice. My favorite is their cookware - unbelievable design, unique pieces very hard to find anywhere else.

La Garçonne: I have shopped at La Garçonne for many years, and I’m happy they opened a store in Amagansett. Love this Comme des Garçons bag (and it’s on sale), and I’m intrigued by this Simone Rocha mule with faux fur for Fall. They also sell The Row, which has their own stand alone store in Amagansett too (I was there last week but sadly the service was quite terrible. I can’t stand the snobbery).

Il Buco Vita: besides eating at their restaurant, my favorite thing to do when I’m in Amagansett is to grab a latte at their cafe and browse their home products. From their rustic and whimsical Pig Casserole, to their vivid terracotta serving dishes, and their painterly floral collection, and most specially their fine art that are beautifully displayed all over the shop, it’s impossible to choose just one favorite.

Amber Waves: this is a special farm and I’m a huge fan of what they have been doing. Besides producing their vegetables and flowers, Amber Waves also trains their farmers (mostly women!) and hosts educational classes for adults and children. A non-profit place to eat, shop, have fun and to support! Last weekend they had JonnyPops there, who was distributing free popsicles and if you liked them, they would give you a free box in a cooler bag to take home. Not woman-owned, but kudos for focusing on families and offering healthier organic choices.

Bridgehampton:

Annabel The Shop (there are many cute pieces there, one of my favorites were this light blue slip dress, this fun necklace, and this bonbon bag)

L’Epicuriste is not women owned, but they brought in Carole Bamford’s line this year, and it’s worth shopping for. She is the queen of the Cotswolds, and her gorgeous candles, bath products and geranium scented items plus a few home pieces from her Daylesford Farm are all for sale at L’epicurist this summer. They smell subtle, herby and delicious.

Relax Bridgehampton: I bought this fun and affordable Cherry bag, and I always love their pajamas, especially the pointelle styles from Polkadot England)

Sundaes On Main for the kids and everyone with a sweet tooth

Malia Mills + Hoare and Hoare Antiques:

For a few years now, the beautifully curated Hoare and Hoare Antiques has been sharing the space with Malia Mills in Bridgehampton, and it’s always a treat to go visit Zoe Hoare. Besides her iconic swimsuits, I love this Malia Mill’s tunic that you can wear as regular clothing and also as a cover up. And I have my eye on Zoe’s vintage Swedish Trestle Table, vegan grape hanging soaps (a perfect hostess gift) and so much more - you have to go see her in person, her shop is magic. She pop-s up in many places too, so contact her to see where she will be next.

East Hampton

Though most of East Hampton is populated by famous luxury brands, they still have a few great options.

Ma-Tine by Marie Christine: my friend Marie Christine is a very talented interior designer, and her shop is so chic. You'll find vintage pieces she collected over the years, and my favorite items are this 19th century French comode, this pair of lounge chairs and these beautiful vintage brass ashtrays. You can shop her items online at Charish, but going there in person is more fun!

The Hedges Inn: this is probably the most charming luxury hotel in the Hamptons. The new owners, husband and wife Andrew and Sarah Wetenhall also own The Colony in Palm Beach, and their renovations truly gave justice to this local institution, started with the Hedges family in 1652.

Nili Lotan: an easy choice for elevated every day pieces, I have my eye on this jacket, delicate crochet top, and bag.

The Monogram Shop: besides their obvious ability to monogram most items in store, I tend to like their tongue in cheek (and very specific) pieces like this Love Means Nothing tennis hand towel, or Make Good Choices key rings (from moms to kids), or their Blow tissue box covers.

Clic Home and Clic Fashion: 2 well curated shops, and I wouldn’t expect anything less from the former Founder of Calypso - remember that? Now that gardening is my new obsession, I want to get this beautiful basket, this gorgeous watering can, and these strawberry gardening gloves. And I want to get this fun shirt with swimmers all over while the weather is still hot.

Montauk:

Road to Nowhere: I like the more casual boho look of this shop and their selection, and I loved these linen jacquard pants and shirt for the guys in your life.

Utilitaria Montauk Outpost: they don’t have a website so you need to get out there and shop! My favorite items are by my friends Ashley Himmel (I just got this sweater and it’s very cute) and Lee Berzack’s Pantoffel (I have 2 of her slippers and live in them!)

The Surf Lodge: I know this place sometimes gets crazy but kudos to its Founder, fellow Brazilian Jayma Cardoso, who has been working and succeeding in the entertainment and hospitality industries for such a long time. Montauk was my family’s “first love” in the Hamptons, and I have amazing memories of our kids when they were little, soaking up the sun and eating outside at Jayma’s restaurant. Her shop is small but super well curated and worth the visit.

Southampton:

Elyse Walker: a like her edit in Southampton, and my favorites are Sir’s Striped Pant and Scarf Top, and these chic yet fun bathing suit and sarong.

Jenni Kayne: though I usually buy a lot of her sweaters, I do love this easy and chic Broderie Dress and I want this fluffy cozy throw.

Plain-T: Tatiana’s Teixeira’s best selling tea Detox Cistus Incanus is sold out, but worth the wait: it’s known for its strong antiviral properties, anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, detoxifier, immune system booster, cardiovascular supporter, and a natural tick repellent. She sells to Provisions and other health store, so maybe they’ll have them!)

Veronica Beard: I got many blazers at Veronca Beard but this summer I’m eyeing this Benny Tailored Vest and this adorable gingham dress.

Watermill:

AIREM (Dr. Eunice Park is my dermatologist in the Hamptons, and in addition to her treatments, I love her sheet mask and Crysalis Arnica Gel).

Calissa Hamptons: for their delicious Greek food! And you can also reserve a table to watch the World Cup matches too :)

Shou Sugi Ban House: there is nothing I don’t like here, but I’m partial to their massages. I want to book a retreat for the Fall and spend a few days as a staycation. A dream!

I’m counting on you to come out to support these amazing women and keep this place soulful and full of independent businesses! Love,

Patricia

*this newsletter is not intended as medical advice, please discuss the medications mentioned below with your doctor before considering them

Hi there,

Last week, I launched a Wellness Conference in Brazil with Iguatemi, where so many important topics on health, beauty and wellness were discussed. Today I want to focus on menopause, not only because it’s an important conversation and a reckoning with how far behind women’s health research remains, but because it’s a subject that stays controversial across every layer of the medical community. I was just reading Dr. Jen Gunter’s post on estradiol, and the flood of comments about how the medical community can’t seem to agree on anything is telling.

I watched a very engaging conversation between Brazilian actress and menopause activist Claudia Raia and Brazilian gynecologist Dr. André Vinícius, one of Brazil’s most important menopause specialists, a speaker at the The Harvard Medical School “Women’s Health and Menopause” (WHAM), and the author of Menopause Without Mysteries. Claudia not only advocates for more information and research on menopause; she also stars in the Brazilian play “Menopause Scenes”. She is committed!

Together, they did exactly what the title of his book promises. They turned the lights on a phase of life that most women navigate in the dark, often times confused, dismissed, and ashamed.

The most radical thing he said had nothing to do with hormones

You’d expect a leading gynecologist to spend his time on the physical aspects of menopause and the hormones, and he did discussed estrogen in depth, how it moves through the body, and why its decline reverberates far beyond the reproductive system.

But the message he kept returning to was almost startling in its simplicity, but so urgent that needs to be repeated: doctors need to listen.

Women are tired of doctors who scan the lab results, recite the statistics, deliver the standard lecture on what hormones do, and then move on. Listen. Because the woman in front of you arrives with her own constellation of symptoms, her own mental health, the specific changes she wants to make in her life — and too often those get waved away by physicians who prefer to go strictly by the book.

How many times does a woman in perimenopause walk into a doctor’s office and get prescribed antidepressants because her labs “are fine”? Hormones fluctuate wildly, and just because one test comes back “fine” doesn’t mean you’re not in perimenopause or menopause. Knowing what to ask, how to ask it, and then actually listening would have been far more helpful.

The gut

He also brought the frontier of the research to the stage, including work he presented at Harvard’s menopause conference on the estrobolome — the community of gut bacteria involved in how our bodies metabolize and absorb estrogen. Here’s what that actually means: when your body is done with a dose of estrogen, your liver tags it for disposal and sends it toward the exit — but certain gut bacteria can snip that tag off, reactivate the estrogen, and send it back into circulation. Your microbiome, in other words, helps decide how much estrogen you hold onto.

It’s a beautiful, under-appreciated idea: that the health of your gut shapes your hormonal reality, and that something as unglamorous as eating enough fiber is quietly doing hormonal work on your behalf. Menopause, it turns out, is not only happening in your ovaries. It’s happening in your gut, your brain, your sleep, your mood — everywhere.

And some good news

The Brazilian version of the FDA (called ANVISA) has just approved a non-hormonal medication for hot flashes — fezolinetant, sold as Veozah — which means relief is finally arriving for the women who can’t take hormone replacement therapy. The NY Times just came out with an article about all millions of women left out of the HRT conversation, and they mention this drug. The fact that it’s not widely known in the US when millions suffer from the same issue is a mystery to me.

And this issue is personal to me, and I fel like the women mentioned in the article. As a breast cancer survivor whose doctors won’t even open the conversation about HRT, I’ve spent years being told, in effect, to simply endure. So a hormone-free option isn’t an abstraction to me. It’s a door that had been locked, opening to all the women who cannot have HRT.

For my readers in the US: this same medication is FDA-approved here as well. And as of late 2025, a second non-hormonal drug — elinzanetant (Lynkuet) — has been approved too, with early data suggesting benefits for sleep and mood on top of hot flashes. The toolbox for women who’ve been left out is, at last, getting bigger — and that’s great news.

Dr. Vinicius also mentioned estetrol (E4) as a possible alternative in HRT, and it seems to have less impact on the liver and on breast tissue, which is very interesting and positive. If this is a viable alternative, I will for sure ask my doctor to try it.

Moving forward

I have many take aways from their talk, but the most important ones are:

First, medicine and treatments are moving forward. There are more options this year than there were last year, and the conversations being held — not only in Brazil but worldwide — are themselves a sign of how far we’ve come.

And second, we are all impatient, and for good reason. Because for every advance, you can feel the vastness of what’s still missing: the research not funded, the symptoms not studied, the women not prioritized. That a phase of life every woman on earth will pass through remains this under-examined is not an accident. It’s a choice the world keeps making, and we all need to advicate for ourselves and for more research and resources in women’s health.

In the meantime, the remedy Dr. Vinícius offered is one we can all carry, in the exam room and out of it. Insist on being heard. Turns out, our doctors’ most important organ is their ears. And if they are not using them, find a new doctor that does.

Sending love,

Patricia

photo from Vogue France

Hi there,

This will be a quick one. I read several articles talking about how older women are now showing up on catwalks - see NYTimes, and most recently, French Vogue. Fashion loves to romanticize things, but here is my take:

Older women have always been the engine behind fashion. We have more money, and that’s as simple as that. The fashion industry always knew that.

It’s quite infuriating but it’s the truth. Ageism is alive and well, and the industry didn’t all of the sudden started to have a conscience. Brands are struggling, prices skyrocketed, and they now need to appeal to their base and lure them into buying more.

Hopefully older women will continue to be more visible, in fashion and everywhere else, we will see.

I share this today to make a point about our power as consumers: Gen X + Older Millenials are 63% of personal luxury goods market share. We can support brands that embrace diversity of all kinds, and in this case, women of all ages.

Using our dollars to move things forward while buying beautiful things is… a beautiful thing.

Sending love,

Patricia

Carla-Rae Prober, Jan Planit, yours truly and Lauren Aiyana, photographed by Paulo Josepetti

Hi there,

It seems generational wars have been happening for at least 2,400 years.

I have always hated the way media weaponizes generational differences and turns them into full-on wars. OK Boomer. Slackers. Snowflakes. Zoomers. Delulu. The Me Generation. The Avocado Toast Generation. These labels are designed to rage-bait us and divide us, to make us roll our eyes at each other across the table and dismiss people we don’t even know just because of the year they were born. Though I’m not immune, I’ve always believed we have so much more to gain from crossing those lines than defending them. Yes, we’ll always have our differences. Young people will always push against older cultural standards — that’s their job, and it’s healthy, and good most of the times. Older people will tend to hold on to the world they created, and why wouldn’t they? But why can’t we do it with a generous dose of mutual respect? This wholesale disdain for an entire generation is, quite frankly, stupid, and while we are busy judging and dismissing younger or older people than us, we are missing out on so much.

This is why I was so taken by WelcomeHaus. A new company founded by Lauren Aiyana, Jan Planit and Carla-Rae Prober, 3 women of different generations supporting women in refining every dimension of their lives through intentional experiences, curated retreats, gatherings, and personalized individual mentorship.

Last Saturday, I attended their retreat in Montauk. The setting was idyllic: after driving and soaking up the Hamptons beauty, I arrived at a gorgeous beachfront house. It was a beautiful sunny day, and the ocean views and the sound of the waves crashing immediately put everyone in the mood for some R&R.

The view, at arrival

Getting saged before meditation / Photo credit Niels Schröder

The day started with a mediation session and reflections about what we are ready to release and let go, followed by an introduction by Jan, a delicious healthy lunch, a discussion with Dr. Donese Worden, a brief yoga session and a sweet offering of kindness and good energy, delivered to the ocean by Lauren. As the day went by, I realized that the best part wasn’t the striking views or the amazing setting. It was the founders, and the community they are building.

The meditation area

Each of WelcomeHaus’ founder brought something the others couldn’t replicate, and together they become larger than the sum of their parts. Lauren is the spiritual and wellness anchor; her meditation and sound bath brought a restorative, healing quality to everything we did. Jan is the builder, the entrepreneur who has spent decades believing in women and their capabilities, and whose work with young models like Cindy Crawford made her fiercely protective of them while deepening her conviction that women, when they truly see themselves, can build extraordinary things. And Carla-Rae is the creative force whose work in fashion and design has taught her that clothes and furniture are mere vehicles for true self-expression and confidence if you choose to engage with them in a more meaningful way.

Taking copious notes / Photo credit Niels Schröder

Yoga with a view / Photo credit Niels Schröder

Carla-Rae closed the retreat with a beautiful speech. She called on all of us to be kinder to other women. She told us that even in her 70s she still encounters “mean girl” behavior, and spoke about how we can show up in the world in a kinder and more supportive way. She shared how much less pain and suffering she would have endured had she had mentors like herself, Lauren and Jan in her life. And she spoke about how we dress, how we move through the world, how we present ourselves — not as performance or concealment, but as full expression of who we are.

Carla-Rae, speaking from the heart

The day also included Dr. Donese Worden, who shared her knowledge and wisdom about women’s health, cancer research, self-advocacy, and the very real ways our current healthcare system fails us. She reminded us that community isn’t just a nice-to-have — it’s medicine. She covered A LOT, and it was a masterclass.

Dr. Worden, getting ready to speak

All of them brought their hearts, their life experience, and their full selves to that space, and it was just great to watch women being their true selves, and genuinely building community.

If any of this resonates with you, I encourage you to follow WelcomeHaus and keep an eye on their upcoming Women’s Circle in July. I posted more photos and videos on Instagram, check them out. And below, I asked Lauren, Jan, and Carla-Rae to share their 10 favorite things — scroll and get to know them!

Thank you to WelcomeHaus for having me. It was my first retreat, and absolutely worth every minute of it. ❤️

Sending love,

Patricia

Click HERE If you want to read more about Lauren, HERE about Jan, and HERE about Carla. And follow Welcomehaus HERE.

Lauren, Jan and Carla-Rae’s Favorite Things

Carla-Rae, Lauren and Jan / Photo credit Niels Schröder

Hi there,

Back in March I announced to our paid subscribers that I was removing the paywall for the time being, mostly because the paid subscription promised access to in-person salons and curated experiences, which I wouldn’t have much time to do after my surgery in January and ongoing family commitments. Plus, I’ve been taking care of my advisory clients, who have grown in numbers over the last 6 moths.

I thought I’d give you a quick update. Since then, I’ve added a few special projects that I’m diligently working on. I am launching an exciting Wellness and Beauty Conference in Brazil on June 23rd, and after that I will be in the Hamptons enjoying my family and working on those projects, which I hope to share more about them soon.

From now on you may or may not hear from me on a weekly basis, but I promise to send a newsletter whenever I can, and always on Thursdays. Many of them will be quick, others will be profiles of interesting people I’m connecting with that I think are worth sharing with you.

In today’s newsletter, I’m going to share the tote bags that 'I’ve been shopping for. I know we all got plenty of canvas totes from when we shop at stores, but I’m talking about real totes. I seem to have a fetish for them, and though I may not buy them all, I will never have enough of them, ever. I’m constantly loading my car with a hundred things. Today I had a large tote on the passenger seat with my handbag, water bottle and another small mesh tote (a cute gift with purchase from Bergdorf Goodman) filled with snacks for me and my children. And on my way home, I got food and shopping bags, and I regretted not adding another huge bag in my car… My bags need bags, so I will share what I’ve ben looking at.

PS: I’m excited with my advisory work, and I’ve been thrilled to meet one on one with great Founders. If you or someone you know is looking for strategic guidance on retail positioning, merchandising or content strategy, I’m selectively taking on advisory clients. You can book a discovery call HERE. My Linkedin is HERE for additional credentials.

Thanks so much, enjoy!

Patricia

The Garden Tote

Maybe a decade ago I bought a Japanese garden tote at Dover Street market, and a friend of mine made fun of me, asking me if I had some tools I needed to carry. Years later, it became a trend and now everyone has a garden inspired tote, so I feel vindicated 😊 I have a black tote, but I’m going to buy this one in ivory (1).

The Construction Tote in bubble gum looks great too, and I it’s a little larger. And one of my favorites is this customizable tote* (3): you can add snaps, short straps, key clips, extra internal pockets (I wish more totes would come with them!) , suitcase strap, laptop pocket, external pockets crossbody straps, extra handles, monograming and additional color for the bottom - this is the most customization I’ve seen so far. I like their story too.

California Happy

The brand Pacifico Tote Co.* was founded in 2013 by filmmaker Roman Coppola (Sofia Coppola’s older brother) and designer Duffy Culligan after they took a boat trip from Santa Barbara to Catalina, and started asking why the best totes had to be so serious. It’s a good question! The color combinations are pure joy (and so are their T-shirts).

(4) The Ojai in blush, kelly green and yellow (5) The Mammoth in Natural, black and pink (6) The Big Sur in kelly green, and (7) The Catalina in Bottle green, butter and flamingo pink.

The OG and The Cute Spin Off

(8) Can’t beat the L.L.Bean* tote. I have all sizes, and just got the extra large (to hold more bags and snack…), and thinking about getting a mini too. But J Crew’s* version of it (9) is also very cute. It’s also customizable, and it comes in red, and in a smaller size.

Bright Fun Things

A while ago I got a phone case with my initials on it from this company, and I love their customized totes too. I think I’ll get the fun striped tote for my daughter and may get the natural color for me in the medium size, just lik the photos.

New Neutrals

These totes are by my friend Michael Hagen’s company Wyeth*. Easy, neutral but never boring. (12) in brown and natural and (13) and in blue and tan.

British Polish

(14) These are super chic and customizable, and the waterproof lining and zipper make it beach ready.

The Twofer

Who doesn’t love to get 2 for the price of 1? A beautiful reversible tote, these (15) come in the prettiest shade of pink reversing to a chocolate brown.

Always Chic

Phoebe Philo’s optic white bag with an outside pocket (16), J&M Davidson* Leopard Tote (17), and The Row canvas tote in brown and beige (18) are pricey but will never go out of style.

Pink Satin Dreams

This clean, modern yet frothy and feminine tote comes in a rainbow of colors, but this pink is the most irresistible. Who wouldn’t want a pink satin tote?

Honorable Mention

I’ve featured the Alex Mill* customizable totes before, but not in a special tote newsletter, so I will show it again, this time in Gwyneth Paltrow’s arms.

I could go on forever. But this is it for now. Sending love,

Patricia

Hi there,

Welcome to summer… Pool parties, boat days, company retreats, lakeside picnics, and the bathing suit dread. Today I’m going to share with you some astonishing information about how women see themselves, give some tips on how to shop for bathing suits (and not feel crappy about it), and share 7 styles I love for this season.

In 1998, psychologists put women in either a swimsuit or a sweater, gave them a math test, and watched who did better as part of a study curiously titled “That Swimsuit Becomes You.” I mean, every woman could have told them they didn’t need the experiment to know the answer, but science needs receipts, so here we are.

Of course the women in the swimsuit performed measurably worse! Because who in their right mind can concentrate on anything in a bathing suit when all we can think about is how we look? Self-consciousness about the body literally hijacks our brain. When we’re thinking about how we look, we have less mental bandwidth for literally everything else. So the swimsuit didn’t change them, it became them. It consumed their attention so completely that they temporarily lost access to their own competence. Torture!

So according to psychology researchers, the swimsuit is a cognitive event. Even imagining trying on a swimsuit in a dressing room is enough to trigger self-objectification.

And even if we shop online and try them on alone at home, research shows that “the physical presence of observers is clearly not necessary.” We are our toughest audience. Sigh…

Do you remember the last time you were truly unselfconscious in a bathing suit? Maybe you are one of those lucky women who couldn’t care less and, if so, I admire you and also slightly resent you. But if you’d rather stick a pencil in your neck than be seen in a bathing suit, you are not alone. You are, it turns out, statistically very normal. Unfortunately.

80%. Insane. Skipping graduations, birthday parties, vacations, pool invitations, boat days, and opting out of their actual lives because we don’t think our bodies measure up.

Half of all women have looked at an invitation and thought “not if it means a swimsuit”. That is an unacceptable number of summers not fully lived!

A third of us are either gone from the beach, or watching from the shade in our clothes.

And then there’s the shopping problem itself:

The average woman owns 3 swimsuits. She owns 7 pairs of jeans and 17 pairs of shoes.

WHAT’S ACTUALLY HAPPENING

Let’s be honest here. The swimsuit is not just exposing our bodies: it’s also exposing our messed up relationship with your bodies, which has been quietly shaped, since approximately puberty, by an industry that profits from our dissatisfaction.

We hate the dressing room because it forces us to evaluate our bodies the way we imagine others evaluate it — from the outside, as an object to be assessed. This happens with all clothing, but the more revealing the garment is, the higher the scrutiny.

FIVE THINGS THAT ACTUALLY HELP (NOT “LOVE YOURSELF”)

I can’t stand the “love every inch of yourself!” approach. I rather be more practical and rely on research:

1. Go for fit, not size.

The number one confidence killer in a bathing suit is ill fit. A too-small suit doesn’t make you look smaller, it creates bulges that didn’t exist and discomfort that will haunt you all the way to the beach. Size is a number on a tag that no one else will ever see. What people see is how you carry yourself. Buy the size that fits. If you need to go up, go up. Nobody cares. You’ll feel the difference immediately. By the way, this is good advice for all clothing, but it is essential for bathing suits.

Here are some basic things to look for:

Structure and support at the bust: underwire, boning, or thick straps

Ruching or diagonal seaming at the waist: creates shape without compression

Dark solids or vertical prints: work with the body’s natural lines

High-cut legs: lengthen a shorter frame and create proportion

A tie or cinch at the waist: the simplest way to define a silhouette

2. Shop at home. Obviously.

We already know this is the best approach. But you need a method:

3. Shift the question from ‘How do I look?’ to ‘What am I doing, and How do I feel while I am doing it?’

This is the body neutrality move and it is remarkably effective. Redirect your attention to what your body is doing. You’re swimming, you’re jumping waves in the ocean, you’re watching your kid do a cannonball, you’re floating on something inflatable drinking something pink, and you are smiling and feeling amazing. A body doing a thing becomes much less available as an object to critique because you’re too busy using it.

“My kids aren’t going to remember how I looked in a swimsuit. But they will remember the fun we had in the pool.” That’s it.

4. Forget body positivity. Try body neutrality instead.

Body positivity asks you to look in the mirror and love what you see. Body neutrality asks something more achievable: your body is not a project. It doesn’t need to be fixed or celebrated. It carried you here. It will carry you to the pool, and it is sufficient. Research consistently finds this approach more effective at reducing body dissatisfaction than the love-yourself version which, for many women, just adds another thing to feel like they’re failing at.

NOW ON TO THE FUN PART

Here are some gorgeous swimwear to get started. Get inspired by them and have fun shopping!

1. Seersucker gingham - the best summer combo, in a balconette bikini top with underwire support and bottom.

2. A beautiful blue and strategic rushing on a very glamorous strapless piece - AND it’s on sale.

3. Another great combo with leopard and scalloped edges, perfect as a body suit under a fun skirt or a sarong.

4. A striking piece, a collaboration with Burberry, in an iconic crinkled fabric.

5. The original zig zag , in a halter swimsuit and a flattering color combo.

6. A sexy corseted one-piece that comes in many colors (there is a nize zipper detail on the back too!). I just bought this!

7. A great bikini top and bottom by an amazing Brazilian brand I used to sell in my shop in Sag Harbor. They have tons of cover-ups too, so check them out.

JUST GO TO THE PARTY

Nobody is studying you the way you are studying yourself. They are eating chips, arguing about who forgot the sunscreen, refilling their rosé and living their lives. And if they do judge, who cares?

The swimsuit does not have to become you. You are allowed to put it on, walk out the door, and be at the party — present, distracted by conversation and delicious drinks and the actual pleasure of being in water on a hot day, instead of managing your visibility from the sideline.

Go. Take the picture. Get in the water. Your kids will remember.

And if you’re still not feeling it, wear shorts and a tee, throw on a kaftan, do whatever you need to do. But don’t miss the party because of the clothes. Just go.

Sending love and summer courage,

Patricia

Hi there,

I’m excited to share this with you today. I interviewed Amber Rae (scroll for video below), and it was such a candid, illuminating conversation. It has 3 parts: We start talking about how her challenges in childhood shaped how she sees love and relationship, then we talk about how she stumbled upon becoming an author and how she started her incredible work helping authors through their writing and marketing - this is a must see for aspiring book authors everywhere! And then we go over her book and her incredible story of leaving a 9 year marriage, how that unfolded, and why this is such an important book for women.

As children, especially as girls, we are taught that trading our honesty for goodness is how we earn safety, acceptance, and warmth. And so we grow up smiling through discomfort, staying quiet, small, pleasant, and compliant, the good girls we were trained to be. In exchange, we are rewarded with words like lovely, polite, sweet, elegant. From the outside, our lives look beautiful, calm, and just right. On the inside, we are burning, outperforming our true selves, muffling our real opinions, shrinking to fit a shape that was never ours to begin with. And this is where so many women quietly disappear.

Amber Rae has spent her career helping women close that gap between the mask we wear and our true selves. She began at Apple in marketing, moved through Omnicom’s first digital agency, dove into the Silicon Valley tech wave, and then did what so few people in that world dare to do: she walked away from all of it to follow her own curiosities wherever they led. What followed was a body of work that defies a single category. She is a USA Today bestselling author of Loveable: One Woman’s Path from Good to Free, Choose Wonder Over Worry, The Answers Are Within You, and The Feelings Journal, a keynote speaker who has taken the stage for Kate Spade, Meta, Microsoft, Merrill Lynch, Lululemon, and TED, a book coach who has guided over a hundred thought leaders to six- and seven-figure book deals, and a writing mentor whose work reaches millions of readers in nearly two hundred countries. She is also, foundationally, a journaler — thirty years of daily practice that she describes as the pathway to her inner truth.

And In her book Loveable: One Woman’s Path from Good to Free, Amber finally turned that lens on herself.

Nine years into a marriage that was, by every external measure, a good one, she was quietly hollowed out — emotionally and sexually disconnected, performing okayness for everyone, including herself. It took meeting a man — someone she recognized immediately as the love of her life — to force a reckoning she had been outrunning for years. What followed was not a clean escape. It was the slow, costly, irreversible work of choosing herself over the story she had agreed to live.

I met Amber through our advocacy work at CaringKind — thank you, Melissa Breitbart, for the introduction — and we are co-hosting an event TODAY MAY 21st at Veronica Beard Southampton alongside Pamela Bell, Melissa Breitbart and Maxine Friedman. Amber Rae will sign her book Loveable, and will have a fireside chat with Pamela Bell. 15% of all sales are going to CaringKind, so please come by if you are in town: Veronica Beard, 84B Main Street, Southampton.

I have been so moved by Amber Rae’s humanness, her way of living, and her courage to start again and carve an authentic life for herself. We sat down for an unfiltered conversation about the life that she left behind, people-pleasing, the seduction of the almost-right life, and what it actually feels like to break with your own reality in pursuit of what is true.

Watch our full interview and read Amber’s favorite things below.

My Interview with Amber Rae

How her childhood shaped how she sees love and relationship - until 5:23

How she stumbled upon becoming an author and how she started her incredible work helping authors through their writing and marketing - a must see for aspiring book authors everywhere! 5:24 - 18:26

Her book and her incredible story of leaving a 9 year marriage, how that unfolded, and why this is such an important book for women. 18:27 - until the end

Amber Rae Favorite Things

1. Favorite Book (other than your own): Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed

2. Favorite word: Delicious

3. Favorite thing to do with your son: I’m torn between cuddling and going on adventures together

4. Favorite food: pesto pasta with shrimp

5. Favorite summer spot in the Hamptons: Fresh Pond with my husband and little one

6. Favorite aspect of writing a book: Oof I truly love and obsess over every stage but it’s the unexpected discoveries on the page that stay with me.

7. Favorite part of your personality: I see the best in everyone

8. Favorite wellbeing ritual or habit: Journaling

9. Favorite season: Summer

10. Favorite object you own or covet: An abstract painting of a woman by Mark Wilson, which sadly no longer hangs in our home. We recently threw away every object we owned because of black mold, and my relationship to objects has evolved as a result.

Sending love,

Patricia

Hi there,

Reese Witherspoon stood in her kitchen casually blending a smoothie and told her 30 million Instagram followers that women need to catch up to AI. Mel Robbins did a sponsored Reel for Microsoft Copilot. Sheryl Sandberg announced her organization would focus on closing the “AI gender gap.” The Cut just published a piece calling it The Girlbossification of AI. The internet went wild, calling them sellouts, grifters, girlbosses shilling for technocrat bros. I can see where parts of the criticism is fair, but somewhere in all the noise, the actual argument got lost among the women attacking other women. Again.

I kept thinking about my mother.

For a decade, she refused to learn how to use a smartphone. She wore her internet indifference like a badge of honor. I tried to warn her; she shrugged. Then, quietly, she started to realize what was happening: she was being left out of the family chats, missing the inside jokes, the photos, the plans made in real time. Her friends were on WhatsApp. Her grandchildren were sending voice memos and the photos she cherished in a device she didn’t know how to use. The culture of everyday connection had moved to a world she refused to join.

So her world shrank while everyone else’s expanded.

She eventually learned WhatsApp, but by the time she came around, she had missed out on a lot. And the learning curve to adopt this technology was way higher than if she had learned all the concepts from the beginning stages of the smart phone.

We are living through a technological shift that makes the smartphone revolution look pedestrian, and women are, once again, at risk of being the ones who wait too long. Listen, I’m not saying AI is benign. But I’m asking you to think very carefully about what it means not to learn and understand this technology as it quantum leaps forward into who knows where.

The Numbers Don’t Lie: Women Will Be the Most Affected.

The data on women and AI is sobering.

33.7% of women work in roles being disrupted by AI vs. 25.5% of men (WEF/LinkedIn, 2025)

86% of workers both highly exposed to AI job loss and least able to adapt are women (Washington Post / UC Berkeley Haas, 2026)

Let that last number sink in: 86%. Women are disproportionately concentrated in the roles AI is designed to replace first: administrative assistants, customer service, data entry, paralegal support. These are not niche jobs. These are the jobs millions of women have built their livelihoods on.

Meanwhile, men use AI daily at a rate 22% higher than women. Men are 27% more likely to have been praised for using AI at work. Men are 23% more likely to receive manager encouragement to adopt it.

The gap is not just about who’s using AI. It’s about who’s being supported, rewarded, and positioned to lead through it. And the more we refuse to learn it, the further away we are from the job market and the every day realities that will become more dependent on AI.

NEWSFLASH: The Genie Is Not Going Back in the Bottle

All the reaction about resisting and denying a world with AI would be valid if AI were reversible. It is not. The train has left the station. Are we going to be delusional enough to think we can stop it, or are we going to face reality and do something about it?

The question of whether AI should exist is no longer on the table. The only questions left are: who will shape it, who will benefit from it, and how many people will be flattened by it.

Why Can’t Women Do Both?

We can fight for rigorous regulation, limitations for children and young adults, and copyright protection AND learn to use these tools. We can demand responsible environmental practices from companies building data centers AND build skills that keep us employed. We can push for diverse representation in AI development AND show up in rooms where AI decisions are being made. These are not contradictory positions — treating them as if they are is a false choice that only serves the people who would profit when we are out of the conversation.

The most powerful thing a woman can do right now is understand AI well enough to fight it intelligently, use it strategically, and influence it at the highest levels. And don’t forget: enjoy its benefits too.

I think this is very similar (but way more dangerous) to voting. Nobody in the US is legally required to cast a ballot. You can opt out, decide the whole system is corrupt, and that you can’t possibly partake in something so imperfect. And maybe you’re right about all of it. But you don’t get to then complain about who’s in office. You don’t get to be shocked by the policies, the appointments, the direction of the country because you handed that decision to someone else.

Black women have understood this better than anyone. Election after election, they have shown up at rates that shame every other demographic — and they have, more than once, single-handedly determined the outcome of races that shaped this country’s future. Not because the system was built for them. but because they understood that absence is also a choice, and that choice has consequences.

Yes, the environmental damage is horrible and real. The labor displacement, the data bias are real. But women who opt out of understanding this technology will not be the ones shaping the regulations, auditing the bias, or sitting in the rooms where the guardrails get set.

I am not telling you to upload your financials to a chatbot because a celebrity told you to. Understanding a technology and endorsing it are not the same thing. The most effective critics of AI are the people who understand it well enough to know what questions to ask and what regulations to demand.

I saw people complaining we are just funding the AI bros - well, if there were women in this space, we would be actually funding women and I bet the landscape would look different. But that will require women to participate and want to lead the way in AI. Sitting on our hands will just make things worse, and being shamed by other women definitely won’t help matters.

The Real Dangers (And the Real Possibilities)

The AI Bias

AI systems are not neutral. They are trained on historical data, and historical data reflects historical inequalities. AI systems evaluating leadership potential score female managers 25% lower than men with identical qualifications. Internal promotion algorithms recommend women for advancement 15% less frequently. A Harvard Business Review study found that female engineers using AI to generate code were rated nearly 9% less competent than male counterparts — despite identical outputs. AI pregnancy monitoring systems miss 30% more complications for women of color due to gaps in training data. This is not a bug. It is a reflection of whose experiences were centered when these systems were built.

What AI Can Do For Us

The same technology threatening to displace women is being used by women who’ve decided to engage on their own terms: streamlining administrative work to reclaim time for strategy; compressing days of research into hours; enabling small business owners to compete with capabilities once reserved for large enterprises. A survey of over 1,300 developers across 61 countries found that 64% of female developers say AI is accelerating their careers. When women engage with AI, they gain from it. The question is who gets to shape AI — and who gets left behind while it’s being shaped without them.

Men Are Accumulating All the Wealth. Again. Is That What We Want?

In 2025, billionaire wealth reached $16.1 trillion. The single largest sector was Technology at $5.2 trillion, driven by AI-fueled valuations. The people accumulating that wealth are, overwhelmingly, a very small group of men.

Eliminating gender bias in AI, the World Economic Forum estimates, could add $12 trillion to global GDP. Women’s participation in AI is an economic imperative. But that argument requires women to be in the conversation. And some people may say “why does everything have to be about money?”. Well, it doesn’t. But so long money exists, people will derive power from it, and we need to decide if we want more of the pie, or if we will just let men accumulate all the wealth. And power.

It’s Groundhog Day for Women

The internet felt like a fad. Then it reorganized the economy. Email and internet felt optional until not having it became professionally disqualifying. Smartphones seemed a luxury until they were a necessity. We are at that inflection point again.

If AI reshapes the labor market the way its advocates claim — and the data suggests it will — women without AI literacy and parallel income streams will be the most economically vulnerable. Opting out for moral reasons is not a privilege most of us will have.

Moving Atoms

Maybe I’m wrong about all of this. Maybe the pendulum swings back. Maybe we return to making things with our hands — farming, crafting, building, creating in ways that require a human body and a human soul. Elon Musk — I know, problematic messenger, but not entirely wrong observation — once said that jobs which “move atoms” will be the hardest for AI to replace. The carpenter, the chef, the plumber, the farmer, the nurse who holds your hand. Maybe the antidote to the algorithm is the profoundly, irreducibly physical.

I hope some version of that is true.

I don’t know how this ends. Nobody does. But I’m not sitting this one out.

And I hope you don’t either. Sending love,

Patricia

Hi there,

Let me start with my mother.

After I was born, she suffered from what we now call postpartum depression. Back then, they called it the blues, and women just suffered through it quietly, as women have been expected to do through most of recorded history.

What I inherited from that was not trauma exactly, it was a story. Over the years, I heard how difficult I had been as a baby, how I didn’t sleep for two years straight. Those stories lodged themselves in my body, and they became a quiet, low-grade warning: motherhood is awful, and it will break you.

So I didn’t want it.

This was easy enough, because I was busy. I came to the US, I built a career, I traveled, and I had a great time. When my friends in Brazil married young and had children immediately, I thought they were nuts. I couldn’t imagine giving up what I was building for that. I married my long-time boyfriend and, naturally, everyone started asking when we’d have children, which I dreaded for two reasons.

One: What if the same thing that happened to my mother happens to me? What if it breaks me?

Two: I couldn’t imagine having his children.

About 5 years of marriage, we divorced. Problem solved on both counts.

Divorced and Childless

I was 35 and single, and quietly resolving myself to a childless life. It wasn’t grief so much as math: by the time I met someone else, even if I wanted children, the window would probably be closed. So I moved on, and didn’t give it a second thought. All my friends who were parents were in Brazil, so I had no real proximity to children and all the care and realities that go with raising them. They were not top of mind.

I moved to Tribeca after my divorce, and my building was near the PS 234 elementary school. I remember lying in bed in the mornings, listening to children scream in the playground, and grunting about the noise. I remember watching parents line up outside the school and thinking: don’t they have somewhere to be? I thought my boss was overly dramatic about the logistics of co-parenting her teenage daughter with her ex , how hard can it really be? I thought certain colleagues talked about their children too much. I once attended a funeral where my ex showed up with his new baby, and his family looked at me with that expression of pity and worry that I must be devastated about my empty life. Little did they know how much pity I felt for the mother of his baby.

I just couldn’t see it from where they were standing, and they couldn’t see it from where I was. We all nudged and judged.

Motherhood at 40

Then, at 39, I met my husband Ron. At 40, after I had already closed that door in my mind, I had my daughter. My son came two years later.

To my surprise, motherhood didn’t exactly break me — it cracked me open. It expanded my capacity to see things differently, to love differently, and to feel the scale of the world differently. It changed me in ways I didn’t expect and couldn’t have manufactured on my own, and I’m eternally grateful for it.

But here is where I part with every saccharine Mother’s Day narrative out there: I don’t know if it would have changed you the same way.

I was rigid, linear, a little locked in my own ways, and I was 40. Motherhood pried something open in me that probably needed prying, and I was ready for it. I’m genuinely grateful for that.

But my personal transformation is not a universal prescription. Many women are already open, already empathetic, already living with full hearts with or without children, by choice or circumstance. They don’t need motherhood to get there.

I know women for whom it has been the great love of their lives. I know women for whom it has been unbearable. And I know women without children who are living with a wholeness I genuinely admire. Their lives are not missing anything. They are not waiting to be completed.

The Mommy Wars

Stay-at-home mothers weaponizing guilt against working mothers. Working mothers dismissing the labor of women who chose home. Mothers of every kind leveling the word selfish at women who deliberately chose not to have children, as if a woman’s body is a public property for all to weight in. That look of pity reserved for women who wanted children and couldn’t have them, doubled for the ones who are also single, because apparently the tragedy of not having children can only be surpassed by not having children and not having a partner.

What a waste of the most valuable resource women have: each other.

The mommy wars are a horrible distraction. From the absence of paid leave, the cost of childcare, the motherhood penalty, the medical establishment’s ongoing indifference to women’s pain, the fact that postpartum depression in my mother’s generation didn’t even have a name, for the right to choose to be a mother to begin with, and I could go on and on.

So the one thing I want for Mother’s Day is for people to let women be.

No need for forced solidarity or performative support. Just genuine disinterest in whether another woman’s choices match yours.

Leave the SAHM be without justifying herself to everyone else. Spare the career mother the weight of people’s concerns for her children. Stop making the women without children a cautionary tale. Resist the urge to give a pity face to the woman who tried and couldn’t.

Let. Them. Be.

That’s the gift.

Happy Mother’s Day to all who celebrate. Sending lots of love,

Patricia

* If you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner.

THE EPIDEMIC

Let’s call it what it is. Comparisonitis. It’s not a clinical diagnosis, but a term that organizational psychologists now use to describe the chronic, habitual loop of measuring ourselves against others until we’re too demoralized to move. It is, at this point, an epidemic. Social media didn’t invent it, but Instagram has absolutely turbocharged it into something we’ve never seen before at this scale.

We’ve all known this instinctively for years. I feel it on a daily basis. But it was through my advisory work with women founders that I realized that, not only it wasn’t just me, but it was everyone. The same story session after session, across industries, across very different women. Brilliant women, with real ideas and real capability, all frozen. Because they opened Instagram and saw someone doing something adjacent, and decided on the spot that it had already been done by someone better.

After watching so many people (myself included) suffer through this, I decided I had to go looking for answers. I’ve been looking at this for months, and today I’m sharing what I found. Why we do this, how it freezes us, my own spiral before pushing “publish” on this newsletter, and six things that actually help. I hope by the end of this you feel a little less alone in it, and a little more ready to live your life like nobody’s watching. Because, as it turns out, they really aren’t.

WHY WE DO THIS: looking sideways and upward social comparison

It’s normal for all humans to look sideways at other people as a way to evaluate themselves (called the Social Comparison Theory proposed by psychologist Leon Festinger in 1954). But research consistently shows that women engage in upward social comparison — measuring themselves against people they perceive as more successful, more put-together, further along — more frequently than men, and are far more likely to internalize the damage afterward. Men tend to deflect (“different circumstances,” “she got lucky”). Women absorb it directly into their sense of self. They are both comparing, but with very different aftermath.

And Instagram is a near-perfect machine for this because in most things that actually matter — am I a good enough mother, is my work meaningful, is my life adding up to something — there is no actual objective score. So we outsource the verdict to other people’s curated feed of best moments, and we use that as our mirror. No wonder we are all reeling with insecurity.

THE FREEZE: the spotlight that isn’t even on you

Psychologists Gilovich and Savitsky identified something called the Spotlight Effect — our consistent tendency to believe we are being observed and judged far more than we actually are. We walk through our lives convinced the room is paying attention to us: to our choices, our bodies, our work, our failures. It isn’t. Everyone else is too busy being convinced the room is paying attention to them.

This matters because comparisonitis feeds on that imaginary audience. You’re not just afraid you’re falling short, you’re afraid everyone can see it.

The shame of feeling behind is bad enough. But the belief that it’s obvious and visible, and that people are clocking the gap between you and others is what turns a passing moment of self-doubt into a full freeze. The spotlight isn’t real but the paralysis it causes very much is.

WHAT THE DATA SAYS: what hits us the most, how women lose it, and the self-defeating cycle.

Research has found that when we scroll through idealized images and lives on social media, we don’t feel bad about everything — we feel bad about the specific things that matter most to us personally. A writer feels like a fraud. A mother feels like she’s failing. A founder feels like she’s already been lapped.

To make matters worse for women, the “better than average” effect (Svenson, 1981) shows that most people naturally rate themselves above average on most things but men maintain this bias even after repeated failure, and women lose it faster and take longer to rebuild it. Every scroll accelerates that loss.

And to tie everything with a crazy self-defeating bow, just like women are conditioned to judge their bodies through someone else’s eyes, we do the exact same thing with everything else we create or care for. The newsletter, the home, the children, the relationship — they all become extensions of us, waiting to be graded. No wonder a bad scroll can level us.

A CONFESSION: this newsletter almost didn’t happen

I’m not a professional writer, nor do I have a degree in journalism, and English is not my first language. I didn’t come from fashion editorial, newspapers, or digital media. When I joined Substack, I was very intimidated by the caliber of the writers here, and I was convinced that, not only someone had already brilliantly covered every topic I thought of, but when I finally decide to write about it, I will be judged for being a terrible writer.

I had talked myself out of it approximately forty times before I finally hit “publish”. The voice in my head was relentless: “Who do I think I am to write anything here? I don’t belong here, and whatever I decide to write has already been done by someone better”. Sounds familiar?

That voice is still here, and sometimes it’s very loud. I still feel the anxiety every time I send you this newsletter. I often catch myself sliding into comparison mode, but I’ve learned a few things that help me interrupt the loop before it freezes me. I am sharing them below, and I hope it’s helpful to you too.

WHAT I TELL MY CLIENTS — AND MYSELF: six ways to get your blinders on

Though I’m not a life coach (my work is focused on brand and retail strategy), nothing will get done if the Founder is paralyzed with fear and comparisonitis. So I often share these practical and grounded tools I use for getting out of the comparison loop and back into my own life.

One last thing worth saying out loud. There is nothing wrong with us. Comparisonitis isn’t a personal failing, it’s just a product of well designed platforms that need all of us feeling inadequate, scrolling and engaging to continue to make billions of dollars. The strategies I shared above are meant to remind us that this system is built to keep us consuming instead of living.

So put the blinders on, and get back to your full, beautiful, imperfect life. Your chapter five is the only one that matters right now.

Sending love,

Patricia

PS: If you are an entrepreneur and need help with your brand, check my credentials and some of my advisory work HERE. You can also schedule a Discovery Call HERE so we can chat and see if we are a good fit.

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* If you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner.

Hi there,

If you’ve been anywhere near the internet this week, you’ve heard about Emma Grede’s book “Start With Yourself”, and the firestorm around her comments about working from home and spending three hours a day with her children. I have thoughts about that, and I may share them one day, but I didn’t want to wait another minute to talk about what it’s the most universal and urgent part of her book: the chapter on money.

Buried inside what is technically a business book is the most urgent chapter every woman needs to read. Stay-at-home mom, entrepreneurs, women in corporate careers, all of the above, or none of the above — the way Emma has learned to think about money, how she navigates the world, and her energy and passion for taking responsibility for her own fate are stunning lessons every single one of us can benefit from.

I honestly wasn’t expecting to be so taken by her. Of course I knew she is smart and charismatic, but I didn’t expect to appreciate this woman so much for her candor and mental strength. This woman is a force. I listened to the audiobook, and Emma speaks the way she apparently lives: with urgency, without apology, and without the polite hedging most of us have been trained to perform around money.

This is not the first time I’ve raised my voice about this. Some of you have been here long enough to remember when I recorded a podcast called WEALTHY specifically to talk to women about what they do and how they do it — and I ended every single conversation with the same question: Did you talk about money growing up? The answers were almost always the same. No.

Money is vital for everyone, and understanding our relationship with it — and actively working to change it — cannot wait. Whether you like Emma or not, or if you support her businesses or not, is not the point. Go buy the book, if only to read this part. It’s Track 14 on the audiobook on Spotify. 😊 My hardcopy in in the mail, and I’ll like to keep it on my desk. Now here are my biggest takeaways from what Emma wrote.

1. The Silence Is Costing Us

I loved how Emma explains this issue of silence because it’s true everywhere.

Despite running her own podcast and interviewing some of the most powerful women in business, she can’t get her female guests to speak candidly about capital raises, compensation, or deal structures — even off the mic.

Then she interviews Michael Rubin (founder of Fanatics, a $30 billion business), and when she asks him every money question, he answers them all, with zero shame or anxiety.

Often times women feel that talking about money is not elegant. Emma’s response is pure gold: “When we feel like it’s inelegant to talk about money, money has a way of elegantly passing us by.”

Elegance is buying your first house. Elegance is traveling on your own dime. Elegance is not having to ask anyone for permission to make a decision about your own life.

2. Money Is Not the Enemy

Emma is direct about something many women I know still resist hearing: money is neutral, and it’s foundational. Money buys space, ease, convenience, support, security, and access to opportunity. You can be a deeply ethical person and earn exceptionally well. You can care about the world and insist on being paid what you are worth. You can create culturally meaningful work and be compensated generously for it. These are not competing values, and liking money doesn’t make you a bad person.

3. Find Your Money Story + Stop Avoiding Money

I think most women already know this. Many of us arrive at adulthood carrying a distorted relationship with money, shaped by how our families talked about it (or didn’t). What did money mean in your house growing up? Was it discussed openly or hidden? Was it a source of conflict, of anxiety, of silence? Because whatever the answer is, it’s still shaping your decisions today.

Emma traces her own financial clarity back to her mother, who sat at the kitchen table every month, wrote the checks, balanced the accounts, and treated the bills as a basic reality of life, not a source of shame or something to avoid. She contrasts this with daughters of other single mothers whose mothers would stuff bills in the couch cushions or throw them away unopened because they couldn’t bring themselves to look. She calls for exposure therapy: think about money constantly, look at it directly, and stop turning away. I think that’s a great idea.

4. Scarcity Is a Magic Trick

One of Emma’s most powerful arguments is that scarcity — the feeling that there is only so much to go around, that if she gets more you get less — is largely engineered. It’s a made up story that disproportionately traps women.

She hears male colleagues and bankers openly sharing deal structures, and pay packages. They see other men succeeding and think: if him, why not me?

And women are fed a constant message that it’s winner-take-all. That there is one seat at the table, one shot, one window. And because we have so few visible models of success, we believe it.

Get out of your scarcity mindset and stop accepting the terms of a game designed to keep you distracted from your own value.

5. Stop Being The Last Person You Advocate For

Every time HR comes to Emma needing sign-off to exceed a salary band, it’s always because a man negotiated his way up to her. The women, with rare exceptions, accepted what they were offered.

Her negotiation framework is blunt and I love her for it: assume you are being paid less than you are worth and ask for more. Don’t over-explain and state the ask, never take the first offer, and most urgently: strip the language of pre-emptive defeat from your communications. I am guilty as anyone in doing this: No worries if this doesn’t work. This is of course negotiable. Sorry to bother you. Every time you write those words you are negotiating against yourself before the other person has said a word. Practice saying what you mean without the cushion. It gets easier, but only if you practice.

6. What Emma Is Asking You to Do — And I Co-Sign It!

Emma ends her chapter section with a direct call to action, and I want to add my name to every word of it.

Talk about money — openly, with your friends, your colleagues, your daughters. Don’t let anyone make you feel that caring about your financial security makes you less refined, less spiritual, less good.

Learn your own finances. Understand your mortgage rate, your retirement accounts, your investment vehicles. Don’t outsource your financial literacy to a partner, a parent, or an advisor without insisting on understanding every decision being made on your behalf. What Emma said about her husband is a mic crop in itself: She said she trusts her husband completely because knowing where you stand takes the stress of dependence out of the equation entirely. This is an incredible way to see financial independence inside of a relationship.

Find out what your work is worth in the market, and then share that information with other women, with full details intact. This is one of the most direct, immediate things we can do for each other. Men do this constantly. We can too.

Make introductions to your accountants, bankers, and lawyers. These networks are currency, so share them often.

Know your value. State it without apology.

Make a financial plan. Now.

Sending love,

Patricia

* Pro-tip: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner!

Hi there,

A working woman makes a ton of money, has an affair, gets caught, and when confronted, tells her husband she loves him — but asks for the divorce a day later. She packs her bags and walks out the door without saying goodbye to their children. She moves to a two-bedroom apartment, and when her 12-year-old daughter wants a bedroom at her new place, she declines and turns the spare room into a home office instead. She also declines a proposal from her husband of a 50/50 custody agreement, keeping only dinner on Thursday nights. She tells her husband she is “done with that stage of her life where she would parent a child.” All of this during the quarantine in 2020.

When she comes back to the house to tell the girls about the divorce, she doesn’t even take off her coat, but proceeds to ask her husband — who is still in shock from being cheated on and abandoned — to make her a sandwich. He obliges to not make the situation even more stressful for his children.

What would the internet call this woman? Can you just imagine?

And what would they say about the man? Would they say “Why did he make her a sandwich? Her husband is a doormat”? Or “He’s a rich man, so he doesn’t deserve any sympathy”? Would they say “he should have known better, it’s his fault she she changed their prenup”? I think not. My guess is the public would condemn this woman as a selfish witch to be shamed in public, and this man is a hero for putting the kids first and being civil even though he was betrayed.

This story, although real, happened in reverse. This happened to Belle Burden, and her husband was the one who cheated, as she detailed in her New York Times bestselling book Strangers. The internet is angry for her and she has a lot of support. But I’ve been baffled by the criticism, which has been equally passionate.

It turns out, when people can’t defend the man, they find another way to blame the woman. In Belle’s case, it was her privilege, and this is what I want to discuss this week.

Belle’s grandmother was Babe Paley, the iconic NYC socialite and Vogue editor. Her father Carter Burden was a New York City councilman, a descendant of the Vanderbilt family, and the former owner of The Village Voice and New York Magazine. Belle went to Harvard. She has trust funds, plural, and she acknowledges all of this openly in the book.

Belle is what pop culture would call the ultimate trust fund baby. Or a nepo baby. A white, blonde, beautiful, and wealthy woman. Privileged indeed.

Well, that’s exactly what’s happening. Her wealth isn’t being used to contextualize her story. It’s being used to dismiss it. And when we dismiss it, saying she’s too rich, too connected, and too privileged to deserve compassion, aren’t we still doing the same thing : centering the woman’s behavior and ignoring the man’s?

Listen, I’m no white privilege apologist, and I’m not saying Belle Burden needs saving. Yes, a wealthy woman’s resources will most certainly cushion a crisis or a tragic situation. I am well aware of the system’s inequalities, and I’m not here to defend them. But think about it: if this is the kind of backlash a white, wealthy, well-connected woman endures, I can only imagine what a woman of color would face in the same situation.

We are saying that most of us will never pass the test — we are not struggling enough, not broke enough, not powerless enough, not likable enough, not thin enough, not modest enough, not feminine enough, not (fill in the blanks) enough. And we never will because the goal post is ever-changing — perfectly designed to make whatever happened the woman's responsibility. In Belle’s case, it’s her wealth and social status that serves as the “yes, but.”

I wrote about this same pattern a few weeks ago with Kristin Cabot. And here it is again: a different story, a different woman, the same mechanism. When a man behaves badly, we examine the woman. And we hold her accountable for not predicting, preventing, or perfectly responding to his failures.

Belle Burden said that women have been taught to “fill in the hole that men left, to be quiet about men behaving badly, to move on with grace.” She described breaking that silence as feeling like jumping off a cliff — terrifying and exhilarating — because she was setting fire to the rules she had always lived by.

And how did some women respond to this?

They called her a doormat and said she should have known better.

Before Belle wrote the book, she published an essay about it - which her ex approved. Belle recounts that Henry didn’t really see anything wrong with the narrative, and that he believed that, as a man, he was allowed to leave in this way.

The only people who can prove him wrong are us. Not by turning against each other, but by refusing to.

Sending love,

Patricia

Our clothes aren’t just communicating to other people, they’re communicating to us. And we can activate that effect intentionally by assigning conscious meaning to what we wear.

* Pro-tip: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner!

Hi there,

I want to start this newsletter by thanking everyone who read and responded to my previous newsletter about Kristin Cabot. Wow, what a sore subject for women! Some of the comments on my Instagram post are insane, and they just prove how much works still needs to be done. Stay tuned for more deep dives about relationships and friendships, we need to keep talking about how we show up (or don’t) for each other.

This week I want to discuss confidence. I like The Oxford English Dictionary’s definition: a feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s own abilities or qualities. It puts the origin where it belongs: inside us, not in other people’s reactions. Before confidence is perceived by anyone else, it has to be felt internally by us.

We tend to think of confidence as something we need for the big moments, like the salary negotiation, the difficult conversation, the pitch to a new client.

But I’d argue we need it even more in the small ones, like when we want to raise our hand in a meeting and ask the question everyone else is too afraid to ask. When we need to say no to the thing that doesn’t serve us, even when saying yes would be easier. Or when we decide to try the thing we’ve been thinking about for years — the business, the book, the move — instead of waiting until we feel ‘ready,’ which may never come.

And I believe confidence is passed down, not necessarily genetically, but visually and energetically. Our kids are watching, and when they see us comfortable in our own skin — asking questions, saying no and trying new things — it gives them permission to do the same.

So I did some research, and picked 6 things you can wear (1 of them is invisible), and 1 that you should not wear - small yet fascinating things I learned that you can start doing today.

6 Things To Wear

1. Start with Your Shoulders

This one sounds simple, but it does more than you think. A garment that sits correctly on your shoulders naturally pulls your posture open — chest lifted, spine straight — without you having to think about it. Professor Karen Pine at the University of Hertfordshire found that when women feel stressed or unhappy, they neglect over 90% of their wardrobe and default to baggy, body-hiding clothes. It’s an understandable instinct to shrink, camouflage, and disappear. But the research suggests the opposite helps more: wearing something that fits well, flatters your body, and reminds you of a time you felt good. The shoulders are where this starts. When your jacket fits there, everything else follows.

2. The Texture Secret

This is the one most people don’t think about. The texture of what’s touching your skin all day is sending constant signals to your brain through your somatosensory system — the network that connects touch to emotion. Research in textile psychology shows that soft, smooth fabrics promote relaxation and reduce cortisol, while rough or stiff textures can trigger low-level stress and anxiety that you may not even consciously register. That silk lining, the weight of a well-made wool blazer on your shoulders, the softness of quality cotton against your wrists aren’t luxuries. They’re neurological inputs that either support or quietly undermine your confidence all day long. The next time you reach for something in your closet, close your eyes and touch it first. If it doesn’t feel good in your hand, it won’t feel good on your body. And your brain will know the difference.

3. Enclothed Cognition: Give Your Outfit a Story

Our clothes aren’t just communicating to other people, they’re communicating to us. And you can activate that effect intentionally by assigning conscious meaning to what you put on.

Researchers Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky coined the term Enclothed cognition in a study that shows that what we wear influences how we think, feel, and act.

Participants who wore a white lab coat described as a “doctor’s coat” showed an increase in focus and attention. But when the identical coat was described as a “painter’s coat,” or when participants didn’t actually wear the coat, there was no cognitive boost. Only when they wore it and believed it carried a specific meaning did their performance change.

So try this: before you leave the house, give what you’re wearing a meaningful story. Wear that blouse because red is your power color. Put on that lucky blazer that you wore when you closed that deal. Wear your grandmother’s pearl necklace, it carries her strength. The science says the boost comes from what you believe about what you’re wearing, not from what anyone else sees.

4. Go Monochrome

Wearing a single color from head to toe does something subtle but powerful: it eliminates the low-grade decision fatigue of wondering whether your pieces “go together” and projects a unified visual identity that reads as intentional and authoritative. A 2014 study in Color Research & Application found that wearing red increased feelings of confidence and attractiveness. But here’s the insight that matters more than the specific color: coherence increases confidence. An all-cream look, a full tonal navy, head-to-toe espresso — the monochrome signals to your own brain: I thought about this, I’m deliberate, and I’m in control. Try it for a day and notice how it changes not just how others respond to you, but how you feel moving through your own life.

5. Get Dressed on Purpose — Even When No One Will See You

The act of intentionally choosing what to wear is a psychological ritual that signals to your brain that the day has started. Professor Karen Pine’s research found that choosing uplifting clothes, even on a day you’re not leaving the house, can help shift a low mood. And here’s the flip side that’s equally important: staying in pajamas makes your brain read it as rest mode. You’re not just comfortable, you’re cognitively downshifted. I’m not saying wear a blazer to make coffee. I’m saying put something on that makes you feel like you, and you may feel a lot more confident in your Zoom meetings.

6. Scent: The Invisible Clothing

In previous studies, 65% of women surveyed reported feeling more confident when they wore perfume. Wearing a scent doesn't just change how others perceive you, it changes how you carry yourself. Perfume works like enclothed cognition for your nose. When you spray something that makes you feel powerful, your body language follows. You fidget less and stand differently.

In a study by Higuchi et al. (2005), video observers rated women wearing perfume as more confident, and video analysis confirmed that there were fewer anxious behaviors — such as face touching and fidgeting — when the women wore fragrance. Here’s the fascinating part: when men wore a scented deodorant and were videotaped introducing themselves, women (who couldn’t smell anything) rated them as more attractive on muted video. The confidence the scent gave the wearer changed their body language enough to be visible on screen.

So if you have a favorite scent, wear it when you need a little confidence boost.

What NOT To Wear

Women are much more likely than men to wear painful, distracting, or restricting clothing. And if you spend the day tugging, adjusting, or sucking in, your clothing is stealing your cognitive resources. Every time you pull down a hem, adjust a strap, or check whether something is riding up, you’re redirecting brainpower away from the meeting, the conversation, or the idea toward managing your appearance. The research calls it self-objectification.

So don’t choose ill-fitting, too tight or too lose, or any clothes that are going to make you feel self conscious. Your confidence level will tank, and nobody needs that. Remember that you should wear the clothes - and not the clothes wearing you.

None of these are about performing confidence for other people. That’s a different conversation — and it’s one we’ll have soon, because how women are perceived based on how we have to present externally, and the double standards that come with that, deserves its own space.

Today is about the inside job. Confidence isn’t something you either have or you don’t. It’s something you practice every day. Fashion can be a powerful thing. Use it to your advantage.

Sending love,

Patricia

Before we start, a pro-tip: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner!

And thank you ll for coming to Veronica Beard last week. We had a GREAT turn out and it was so much fun raising money for CaringKind. Veronica Beard donated 15% of all proceeds of our event, and we are so grateful. I got myself a gorgeous pink jacket, and loved it so much I ended up getting it in khaki with a matching pant. I’ll wear this suit year round. More fun things to come, thanks again for showing up for a great cause!

Hi there,

Have you seen Oprah’s interview with Kristin Cabot? You know, the woman caught on the Coldplay kiss cam last summer with her boss, in what became the most watched video of 2025. Three hundred billion views (!) of fifteen seconds that she will never forget.

Well, spoil alert: it turns out that Kristin Cabot was already separated from her husband. Living apart, planning a divorce, amicably and quietly, like adults. Her husband was at the same concert that night, with someone else. He supported her then, and he supports her now.

None of that mattered.

What followed was over fifty death threats, a radio station broadcasting her home address, paparazzi stalking her for weeks, strangers trespassing to peer through her windows, and — my personal favorite — a group of grown women surrounding her car at her teenage son’s workplace, screaming at her while the boy watched. Her children were afraid they were going to die. Every inch of her appearance was dissected online for apparently wrecking the home of her innocent boss, who by the way told her he was separated too. She was accused of sleeping her way to the top despite her successful 25-year career before the scandal. Was it right for the head of HR to get with her boss? Of course not. But didn’t the boss also get with the head of HR?

That man, the boss and CEO is Andy Byron. He quietly resigned, has never been harassed (and if he was, for sure not even close to the extent that she was), hasn’t had his body scrutinized or his home invaded or his children terrorized. He simply… disappeared into peace, and into his next chapter.

Through it all, what surprised Kristin Cabot the most was that the majority of the cruel, sometimes violent and aggressive reactions came from women. But why are we surprised? We’ve seen this movie, and sadly we know how it ends.

Janet Jackson didn’t rip her own costume off at the Super Bowl. Justin Timberlake did. She was blacklisted from radio, MTV, and the Grammys, and highly judged by women. He won two Grammys that same week, and was invited back to headline the Super Bowl fourteen years later.

Monica Lewinsky, then a 22-year-old intern, became a punchline for a generation, with the harshest judgement coming from women. How she lived through that and overcame the trauma is a miracle to me. Bill Clinton kept the presidency, the foundation, the speaking fees, and the legacy.

Britney Spears was dumped, then publicly humiliated by her ex-boyfriend on every talk show in America, and highly criticized by women before she wrote a book years later sharing that she had an abortion because he wasn’t ready to be a father — the same Justin Timberlake, by the way, the man really does collect these. He left unscathed, and went on to make movies, and win awards.

In the court of public opinion, women burn other women. And let the men walk.

And here’s what should really bother us: men don’t do this to each other. They don’t dissect each other’s hairlines or weight or outfit choices. They don’t form groups in parking lots to scream at each other. They don’t make it their personal mission to destroy another man’s reputation over a fifteen-second clip.

We could learn something from that. I’m not suggesting we become complicit and silent like the men in the Epstein files (I wrote this article about that), or condone bad behavior on women just because of their gender. But we should refuse to destroy a woman’s life, especially when we don’t even know their story. Tearing each other apart doesn’t elevate the group — it just makes all women look like high-school girls.

While we are here, ripping each other to shreds over fifteen seconds of kiss cam footage, they are holding their positions. They are keeping their seats at the table. They are watching us fight over crumbs while they eat the meal.

So I wanted to understand why. Why do we do this to each other? What is it in us — smart, empathetic, supposedly evolved women — that makes us reach for the knife the moment one of our own stumbles? I went looking for answers. What I found was infuriating, uncomfortable, and — if we’re honest with ourselves — very familiar.

Here’s what I learned.

The Receipts

Before we get to the uncomfortable question at the center of all of this, let’s establish something: this is not anecdotal. The data is in, and it is damning.

The American Psychological Association published a study showing that organizations led by women face greater public punishment after ethical failures than those led by men — because we expect women to be moral, communal, and nurturing. When they fall short, we punish them for violating an identity we assigned to them without their consent.

A 2025 study in Politics & Gender published by Cambridge University Press tested 1,700 Americans and found that when a male political candidate deviated from his party’s platform, voters shrugged it off. When a woman did the same thing, her approval dropped by 11 points — roughly the same penalty as being caught embezzling.

Let that sink in: a woman having her own opinion costs her the same credibility as a man committing a financial crime.

A European study commissioned by the European Women’s Lobby (EWL) found women are 27 times more likely to face online harassment than men. And 92% of women who experience online violence say it negatively impacts their wellbeing, which is a politely clinical way of saying it breaks them.

And here’s the number that should make every woman reading this sit with herself for a moment: a UK think tank Demos analyzed hundreds of thousands of tweets using the words “slut” and “whore.” Accounts with male names sent those words 116,530 times. Accounts with female names: 94,546.

We are nearly neck and neck with men in the act of tearing each other apart.

The Million-Dollar Question: WHY?

Why do we do this to each other? Why did a group of grown women think it was appropriate — righteous, even — to surround Kristin Cabot’s car and scream at her in front of her child? Why did women across the internet spend more energy mocking her appearance than questioning the silence of the man standing right next to her?

Kristin herself tried to make sense of it on Oprah’s podcast. She said she thinks she became representative of something that touches on a lot of fear in people. She became a symbol — the other woman. The homewrecker, the threat. Except here’s the thing about that narrative: for there to be an “other woman,” the man has to be at fault too. He has to be the one breaking a vow, making a choice, walking into that concert with her. Andy Byron was right there, but the fury landed on her. Because the “other woman” story gives us a villain we feel entitled to destroy, and it is almost never the man.

There is no single answer to the question of why. But there are several theories, and every one of them should make us furious — not at each other, but at the system that taught us this behavior in the first place.

Could it be internalized misogyny?

Internalized misogyny is what happens when women absorb the culture’s contempt for women and start running it like their own operating system. It’s not conscious, it’s the water we swim in. Researchers describe it as the phenomenon where women evaluate other women using the exact stereotypes that were designed to diminish all of us — policing appearance, scrutinizing private lives, labeling and mocking each other to decrease each other’s perceived worth. Psychologists have identified three core expressions: devaluation of women, distrust of women, and gender bias in favor of men. And women score on all three. Every single one of us. Because we were raised in the same culture that told us, from the playground forward, that women are less reliable, less rational, less trustworthy than men. We internalized the message, and now we enforce it — on each other.

Could it be intrasexual competition?

This one gets uncomfortable. Researchers at McMaster University introduced an attractively dressed woman to pairs of female study participants. When she wore a low-cut top and short skirt, the other women reacted aggressively, mocking her, rolling their eyes, making cutting remarks behind her back. When the same woman wore jeans and a T-shirt, there was barely a reaction. The lead researcher concluded that the policing of female sexuality is driven largely by women themselves.

Could it be status policing?

A now-famous ethnographic study embedded researchers in a university dorm for an entire year. They found that women across every social tier used the word “slut” — but it almost never had anything to do with sex. Higher-status women used it to mean low-class or trashy. Lower-status women used it to mean snobby or mean. The label was a weapon of hierarchy, not morality. It functioned as a border patrol system: You do not belong here. Stay in your lane. A separate study at Cornell reinforced the pattern — women rated a fictional peer with 20 sexual partners as less competent, less warm, and less emotionally stable than one with 2 partners. Even women who were themselves sexually active made these judgments. We punish in others what we fear being punished for ourselves.

Could it be the patriarchal bargain?

This is the one that should keep us up at night. Scholars describe internalized misogyny as a tool — designed by patriarchy to keep women subordinate by redirecting their energy from opposing the system to fighting each other. When women enforce the rules of respectability on other women, they are performing the system’s maintenance for free. Every time we pile on another woman — in a comment section, in a parking lot, in a group text — we are doing the work the system needs us to do to keep itself running. We become the enforcers of our own oppression. And we do it thinking we’re on the right side.

What Now

We are not bad people! But internalized misogyny is real, intrasexual competition is biological, status policing is sociological, and the patriarchal bargain is structural. These are deep, ancient forces, and none of us are immune.

We could be Kristin Cabot. Any one of us. Fifteen seconds is all it takes to destroy someone’s life. The next time a woman’s face goes viral for the wrong reasons, or she wears something we feel threaten by, or she makes a big mistake in public, before we click, comment, share the meme, and gossip, let’s ask ourselves these questions:

Would men be judged the same way? Is turning against her and destroying her life the solution for this problem? And if a man is involved, why isn’t he paying the same price?

Sending love,

Patricia

Hi there,

I want to start by saying THANK YOU. The fact that you chose to pay for this newsletter, and to financially support Matriark and my work means more to me than I can put into words. I don’t take that lightly.

I’m writing to you today with some good news about a change I’m making, and the reasons for them.

What’s Changing

Effective immediately, I’m…

Read more

Hi there,

Before we start, I want to remind you of this special event I am co-hosting to benefit CaringKind, a trusted partner in brain health, supporting families and individuals impacted by Alzheimer’s and related dementia.

I’m so honored to have been selected to join 100 WOMEN OF IMPACT, convened by CaringKind, a national movement of women leaders committed to shaping the future of brain health and well-being. Guided by shared purpose and compassion, we champion research that confirms Alzheimer’s and related dementia risk can be significantly reduced by up to 40%.

Please join me alongside my co-host’s and fellow Women Of Impact Meredith Burns, Melissa Breitbart, Jan Planit, and Amber Rae on Friday, March 27th from 12:30–2:30 PM at Veronica Beard in Southampton. I hope to see you there!

OK, onwards to this week’s newsletter!

PS: Pro-tip: if you prefer audio, you can listen to this newsletter on Substack. Just find the play button on the top right corner!

Some of the statistics cited in this newsletter are based on published medical research available at the time of writing, and others were shared with me with my doctor in 2018. Please consult your own healthcare team for the most current information and personalized medical advice. This is a personal story, not medical guidance.

You may remember back in 2013, when Angelina Jolie wrote an op-ed at the of The New York Times titled “My Medical Choice,” revealing that she carried the BRCA1 gene mutation. That gave her an estimated 87% risk of breast cancer and a 50% risk of ovarian cancer, and she shared she had already undergone a preventive double mastectomy. Two years later, she followed with the removal of her ovaries and fallopian tubes.

Referrals for genetic counseling doubled. BRCA testing surged 64%. Women who had been quietly terrified suddenly had permission to ask more questions, and choose. They called it the “Angelina Effect.”

Today, prophylactic mastectomies are far more common than they were in 2013. But it’s major surgery, and a deeply personal decision, and it requires more information than most of us are given when we need it most.

I know, because I lived it.

The Phone Call

In 2018, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. My former doctor called me and simply said “I’m sorry, you have breast cancer. Youn need to find a surgeon and an oncologist, so get your pathology reports sent over. I have no more information.” (I also wrote about this here). Now you know why she is no longer my doctor.

I didn’t even know there was more than one type of breast cancer. I thought cancer was cancer, the big, terrifying, C word. I hung up the phone and the only thought in my mind, on an absolute loop, was: I can’t die. I need to be here for my kids.

What followed was two weeks of bureaucratic chaos. Calling the hospital to get pathology reports sent to Memorial Sloan Kettering (a full-time job in itself), then my surgeon requesting an entirely new pathology analysis to confirm the diagnosis. Two weeks of not knowing if I was facing something survivable or something catastrophic was torture.

Thankfully, my cancer was caught in the earliest form, and it was non-invasive, encapsulated. The five-year survival rate was over 99%. I exhaled for the first time in fourteen days.

“It’s Not Necessary”. Why I Did It Anyway.

My instinct from the start was to have a mastectomy. Just get rid of it. But my surgeon, rightly so (medically speaking), told me it wasn’t necessary. She walked me through the statistics: the 10-year survival rate was 98% regardless of treatment approach after surgery. The recurrence rate after lumpectomy and radiation was from 5 to 15% in 10 years. The annual risk of developing cancer in the other breast was about roughly 5-6% at 10 years, about 10% over 25 years.

(These are the statistics she shared with me then; current numbers may vary.)

The numbers seemed to be in my favor. I was distraught, exhausted from the diagnostic saga, and just wanted someone to get the cancer out of me so I could get on with my life. So we did a lumpectomy and radiation. When radiation ended, I was relieved and got right back to my life.

But here’s what no one told me : when the treatment ends, the anxiety begins. At least for me, it did.

Every year, I went for my screening, and it was always terrifying. Multiple times I had scares that required additional biopsies, on both breasts. Then, two years ago, I had to have a small spot removed that was deemed very high-risk. Doctors are excellent during treatment, but they don’t prepare you for the emotional aftermath, the yearly dread, and the constant vigilance. There is a heavy, invisible weight of constantly living on alert.

Sure, I was lucky it was caught early, and the statistics were on my side. But survival rate is different than recurrence rate - who wants to go through this again, even if we have high chances of surviving it??? If it came back, it could come back invasive. And then I’d be looking at a whole different battle, like chemo, and maybe a far more uncertain outcome. And though the statistics of survival are “good”, what if I fell on the “bad side”? I’m already an anxious person, and living in fear, and waiting for the other shoe to drop was eroding my quality of life.

So two years ago, I made my decision: double mastectomy. I went back to my doctor, who once again gently and professionally told me it wasn’t necessary. This time, I pushed back. “I know the statistics, but this is about my mental health. This is about my quality of life. I can’t keep living like this.”

She relented. And last January, I went through with it.

Listen, I’m not here to convince you to do it. This is a huge decision and it must be done carefully (it took me 7 years to do it). But if you take one thing from my story, let it be this: listen to the doctors and do your research. Ask other doctors and people you know who went through it. And then if you want to pursue a different route, you are allowed to advocate for yourself, even when the data says you’re fine. Your mental health counts too. Your peace of mind is a legitimate medical concern. You know your body and your limits better than anyone else.

If You’re Considering This: Implants vs. DIEP Flap

I want to share what I learned, and hopefully this will help. I was offered two main options:

Option 1: Silicone implants. Shorter surgery, shorter recovery. But implants are not lifetime devices. I was told by my surgeon that they last 10 to 20 years before needing replacement, and there was risk of rupture. H also told me that if I chose silicone, their ruptures may be “silent” with no visible symptoms, and after I researched it, I learned that the leak can potentially cause inflammation, and a symptoms like fatigue, joint pain, and brain fog (what some women and doctors refer to as “breast implant illness.”). At the time of my research, there was also a rare but real cancer risk called BIA-ALCL (breast implant-associated anaplastic large cell lymphoma), primarily linked to textured implants. The FDA explicitly states that breast implants are not lifetime devices and that patients should expect at least one additional surgery. If I didn’t have any other choice, I would go for this and would do a lot of surveillance, but I had another option.

Option 2: DIEP flap reconstruction. This is what I chose. It used tissue from my abdomen for reconstruction. If I lose weight, it will “shrink” with me, if I gain weight, it will grow with me. The surgery is longer (mine was eight hours) because they do reconstruction all at once, and there is the added recovery of your core / abdomen, so recovery takes about six weeks.

The surgery went very well, but recovery is not a walk in the park. And it’s where the story gets both harder and more beautiful.

The Village And The Things Hospitals Don’t Tell You

Before my surgery, I called the hospital to ask what I should buy to prepare for recovery. The nurse told me I was fine and didn’t need anything specific. I asked again: Are you sure? Nothing?? I mentioned a recliner, special shirts, and other gear, and she told me to just use several pillows to elevate my back during sleep, and nothing else.

Reader, that nurse was wrong. Alright, so technically she was right: sure, I would have survived not having anything else, but my life would have been infinitely worse if I didn’t.

Thank God for the women who had gone before me. I reached out to friends who’d had similar procedures, and they were extraordinary. They shared resources, told me exactly what to buy, and gave me tips on navigating recovery - information the hospital simply did not provide. Because of them, I knew to rent a recliner that could stand me up to a fully upright position (so I wouldn’t strain my abdomen). I in fact slept on it for 2 weeks, and renting that clunky ugly thing was the best thing I ever did. I knew to buy open-front shirts with built-in pockets for the surgical drains which, by the way, are the single worst part of recovery, but very manageable with the right gear. I can’t understand, for the life of me, why that nurse couldn’t just agree that those were good ideas!

(Side note to every hospital administrator reading this: put pockets for drains in the gowns. It would help your patients AND save a lot of your nurses’ time. You’re welcome.)

And then there was the meal train.

Nine of my friends organized a meal delivery for my family with delicious food every single day for a week, so my husband and mother-in-law wouldn’t have to worry about cooking while taking care of me during those crucial days. A small-town tradition, with me as its lucky recipient.

I felt so taken care of by friends, by family, by the dedicated nurses, and by my surgical team. I’ll never be able to thank my breast surgeon enough. Her precision, care and her super human team - the best. She introduced me to my plastic surgeon, who is not only technically brilliant but genuinely empathetic. There’s a special trust involved in letting someone reconstruct part of your body, and I was lucky to find a surgeon who is equal parts artist and human being.

A Love Letter

All in all, despite the trials and tribulation, the stress, anxiety and difficult decisions, I’m writing this not as a cautionary tale, but as a love letter.

To our bodies, these imperfect yet resilient, miraculous machines that carry us through everything and somehow keep going.

To the caregivers, the friends who show up with casseroles, the family members who hold your hand when you’re scared, and the women in your orbit who text to check on you six weeks later when everyone else has moved on.

To the nurses, who do the unglamorous, essential, tender work of keeping us alive and comfortable, and who deserve pockets in those gowns, honestly.

To the surgeons with skilled, steady-hands who fix us, and rebuild us.

And most of all, this is a love letter to the survivors. The ones who carry the anxiety before every scan, the worries about the statistics, the fears about not being there for your children and families, and the strength to keep going no matter what. You are brave, and you are not alone.

Angelina Jolie wrote in her op-ed: “Life comes with many challenges. The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.” That was the most important thing for me. I can’t worry about things I don’t control, but I can choose to have peace of mind, to know I did my best for me and my family, and to regain a little more joy in my life.

Sending love and health,

Patricia

Spring has sprung (this week, at least!). I don’t think I could have taken another week of snow, and in honor of warmer weather, I selected 31 incredible pieces to refresh your wardrobe. Clothing, jewelry, shoes, bags, scarves… And the beauty of these items is that they can be mixed together in dozens of outfit options, and I’m sure most of them would work with your existing wardrobe.

But before we get to them (6 beautiful boards below), I have a special invite to share. My dad and grandfather suffered from dementia, and staying informed of the latest research, applying strategies for my current life to reduce cognitive decline, and helping those affected by supporting organizations that are advancing brain health is very important to me.

I am proud to celebrate organizations like CaringKind, a trusted partner in brain health, supporting families and individuals impacted by Alzheimer’s and related dementia.

So I’m so honored to have been selected to join 100 WOMEN OF IMPACT, a national movement of women leaders committed to shaping the future of brain health and well-being. Guided by shared purpose and compassion, we champion research that confirms Alzheimer’s and related dementia risk can be significantly reduced by up to 40%.

Convened by CaringKind, the movement brings together women leaders across sectors who understand that leadership carries a shared responsibility, advocacy and sustained action. It all starts with a conversation.

Please join me alongside my co-host’s and fellow Women Of Impact Meredith Burns, Melissa Breitbart, Jan Planit, and Amber Rae on Friday, March 27th from 12:30–2:30 PM at Veronica Beard in Southampton.

Join the conversation and learn more about what you can do to advance women’s brain health, shop with purpose and become part of an inspiring community of female leaders. Hope to see you there!

RSVP: SOUTHAMPTONRSVP@VERONICABEARD.COM

Now on to our Spring edit below, hope you love it! Sending love,

Patricia

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Hi there,

Every March 8th, the internet fills up with support for women. Brands that have never once considered the women in their supply chains suddenly find their feminist awakening. People proclaiming their outrage for the status quo, while only promoting men to higher positions. Companies launching philanthropic campaigns, collaborations with high profile women who lend them credibility, only to go back to business as usual in April. I’m tired of watching performance replace action in a moment when women can’t afford it. But it looks great on Instagram, doesn’t it?

I’m supportive of International Women’s Day, but I’d show up on a random Tuesday in October too because that’s what this work actually requires.

Matriark was built in 2019 on a single conviction: that supporting women is a given daily practice, not a marketing strategy. It’s the brands you choose, the businesses you recommend, the organizations you fund, and the women you champion in your own orbit every single day of the year, not just when there’s a hashtag for it.

When a woman’s business thrives, she hires other women, she funds her kids’ education, she donates to her community. Money in the hands of women doesn’t stay still, it moves, and it multiplies.

But women are still earning 84 cents for each dollar a man makes, the same relative wages as they were in 2002 (and, of course, the numbers are worse for women of color). At the current rate, it’ll take a whopping 48 years to reach parity in C-suite leadership. 42% of women face discrimination at work. 137 women and girls are killed every single day (60% by intimate partners or family). The data is damning.

So, as I always do, I’m sharing my favorite products from a very special list of 18 clothing, accessories and home decor brands from all over the world as my own way to change things within my reach, and a list of 25 organizations that are actually moving the needle for real women and girls. Use this list today, use it in June, use it on a Tuesday in October.

We’ve made a lot of strides, but there is still a lot to do, so let’s get to work. Happy Women’s History Month!

Sending love,

Patricia

17 of my favorite products and 1 place from amazing independent brands

Women-made, women-owned, women-powered.

1. Broyt is brand started by Eve Singer, featuring vintage finds. I love these tortoise shell French hair pins, modern and nostalgic at the same time. Through Broyt, Eve also creates meaningful gatherings, plans events and offers tableware rentals from her shop.

2. A tailored yet relaxed jacket by the brand Ossou, Co-Founded by Nina Khosla (founder of Fforme) and Talia Shuvalov (founder of Erede). “Ossou" is derived from the word "bone," symbolizing a foundational approach to wardrobe essentials. You’ll find many wardrobe staples at Ossou, but always with a modern twist.

3. Kiwi designer Jessica McCormack started designing jewelry to reinvigorate some of the antique jewelry making techniques that she had discovered while working at the jewelry department at Sotheby’s. Her pieces are instant heirlooms, and absolutely gorgeous. These Button Back diamond necklace and bracelet are a dream. Watch this fun video about her and her company.

4. A timeless and chic strapless organic cotton dress by Danish designer Malene Birger, whose creations reflect a sophisticated Scandinavian minimalism and luxurious utility.

5. I love too many items at TWP, but I’ve been looking for a soft denim trouser for a long time, and this cotton-linen piece is perfect. TWP stands for Trish Wescoat Pound, who blends the utilitarian spirit of the American Midwest with a metropolitan sensibility. Working with her daughter Jillian, a stylist, Trish designs clothes that are stylish, modern, wearable and timeless.

6. This is a remarkable 1850’s one-of-a-kind corset available at Desert Vintage, a shop that called Tucson's iconic 4th Avenue home since 1974, offering a carefully selected collection of unique vintage and antique pieces for both men and women. Since Salima Boufelfel and Roberto Cowan took the helm in 2012, the shop has built a loyal following by blending timeless finds with a modern sensibility, making one-of-a-kind style accessible and wearable for everyone. Run, don’t walk!

7. Australian Designer Danielle Milojevic designs pieces that allow individuality to radiate through, and this fun T-shirt from her brand Antipodean is a great example.

8. Love this long glamorous dress by Aflalo, which also comes in black if you are feeling less adventurous. Designer Yael Aflalo is also the Founder of Reformation.

9. Very affordable and cool eyewear, with a great mix of sunglasses too. Stock for for summer! The models wear the Jane and the Dakota. Designer Elisa Johnson founded her eponymous brand in May 2021. Elisa studied fashion in New York City, and noticed a lack of options in the market for eyewear, and the small number of Black owned brands. Her pieces have the craftsmanship and elevated designs of luxury brands, at a far more accessible price point.

10. Wales Boner Julien Slipper is a modern version of the ballerina, with a higher vamp and a feminine lace with metal tip. In addition to designing for her own line, Grace Wales Bonner has been appointed as the new Creative Director of Menswear at Hermès.

11. 2025 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Winner Ashlynn Park’s peplum blouse is super feminine and yet so modern, the perfect piece for warmer weather.

12. Zero Maria Cornejo has been on the forefront of sustainable fashion for years, and I love her organic cotton Takeo Pant. We sold this in our store in Sag Harbor, and the fit was amazing.

13. A gorgeous embroidered placemat that you can add initials to. You can tell Oeuvres Sensibles has a creative, free, and artistic hand, all because of its Founder Sarah Espeute, who strives to restore value to objects through artisanal work, encouraging a new way of looking at design.

14. Anima Mundi has so many incredible concoctions, but her Collagen Booster Powder is my favorite.

15. A beautiful set of 4 dessert silver shell-bowl spoons, adding more sparkle and personality to your table. Les Objoies is a Paris-based brand dedicated to celebrating the emotional connection we share with objects. Founder Océane Buret sources pieces from all over France, Italy, and beyond.

16. A. 4 in 1 candle accessory, it works as a snuffer, a burnt wick + mushroom trimmer, a wet wax rescue spoon, and a smokeless wick dipper. If you burn candles often, you will know this is a life saver. Check the videos of its functions here (scroll down the page to see). Swand’s Founder Susan Nichols (who is also an inventor of yogitoes® designed a candle care tool that was both functional and worthy of her altar or her coffee table.

17. Well designed headboards are hard to come by, and custom pieces can be a small fortune. I love this company because they have a few ready to sell items, but can also do custom pieces that are actually chic and beautiful. My favorite shape is the Provence (pictured here), but there are 3 more options, each coming in 7 different sizes. Ylse Atelier is based in Sweden - their skilled upholsterers work in their own atelier in Frihamnen, Stockholm, and they operate with an all-women team. Daniella Peri (CEO) and Mikaela Rosén started the brand in late 2023 and want to make it easy to customize a beautiful bedroom.

I love when a space takes on different personalities. Maison Welles is a cultural home in Greenwich Village, encompassing a café, champagne lounge, and retail space. But the space vocation is is much bigger than that: Founder Ana McNeill built this space for creators and thinkers, and designed for conversation, creativity, and celebration.

25 great organizations to support and donate

Your dollars can fund legal battles, shelters, microloans, job training, and advocacy that changes laws. If you can give even anything, give it here.

All Against Abuse

Asian American Feminist Collective

Black Girls Code

Center for Reproductive Rights

Days for Girls International

Educate Girls Globally

Every Mother Counts

Girls Inc.

Girls Not Brides

Global Fund for Women

Gloria’s Foundation

Madre

Malala Fund

Ms. Foundation for Women

Outright International

National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center

Planned Parenthood

Shared Hope International

The Family Equality Council

The Loveland Foundation

The Trevor Project

Together Rising

Vital Voices

Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement

Women for Women International

Hi there,

Are you watching Love Story, the new series about John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy? I’m surprised by my reaction to it. I lived through the 90s, and I’m not usually into nostalgia, but I was hit with this heartache, a combination of grief and longing for that era.

Back then, we only had tabloids, magazines, and the news. No Instagram, no curated content feed, no quick missives on Threads. And so we only got fragments of John and Carolyn: a photograph outside their apartment in Tribeca, a grainy image at an airport, or a glimpse of that stunning Narciso Rodriguez slip dress at their secret wedding.

For straight women of that era, John was the idea of a man. He rollerbladed without a shirt through Manhattan, and rode his bike in a suit on his way to work. He picked his dog Friday’s poop as a good citizen would. I still remember seeing that photo in a tabloid while waiting in line at the supermarket.

He walked around with nonchalance and with an impossible shadow: he was the son of Camelot, member of one of the most iconic American families, raised by Jackie Kennedy Onassis. American royalty without a crown, historical, and almost mythological. And yet he seemed entirely unburdened by it. Or at least, he made it look that way, which was a huge part of his appeal.

And then there was her.

Carolyn Bessette walked into public consciousness blond, severe in the best way, and always stylish without ever seeming to try. Her connection to Calvin Klein gave her an edge that went beyond fashion; she was the 90s, personified. For those of us who were born outside the United States, she was almost unreal. She looked like what America promised to be, the most distilled, sophisticated and aspirational version of itself: powerful, modern, cool, and devastatingly beautiful.

But it all ended 3 years after their wedding.

I was traveling for work to Boulder, Colorado when the news broke. The shock was breathtaking. I immediately thought of Princess Diana and, like her, it felt like a cruel loss of members of a royal family whose lives were in the precipice of blooming.

Fast forward to almost 27 years later, and here we are, with unlimited access to the most intimate and exhausting details of everyone’s lives. Spectacle, click bait, vulgarity and outrageousness seem the only way to relevance.

There’s a lot of nostalgia for 90s fashion right now (too much, to be honest), but Love Story makes me long for something much harder to find: people whose lives make me quietly raise my own standards, and who exude chicness in the broadest sense. As a way of being, a way of moving through life with depth, beauty and mystery. John and Carolyn had it. They were the last of something. We just didn’t know it yet.

Sending love and 90s nostalgia,

Patricia