Mom Brain Is Real: 3 Things I’m Doing This Week to Get It Back on Track

It’s the start of May and here I am again, feeling like I’m starting from scratch. If you’ve ever wondered whether mom brain is real or whether you’re just losing it, friend, I am here to tell you the science says you’re not imagining things.

You know how this goes. You think you’ve finally found your groove. You’ve got the routine down, the rhythm feels good, you’re almost — almost — feeling like a functioning human being. And then your body, your mind, and your soul collectively decide: nope. Not today. Not this week. Maybe not this month.

Just like that, you’re back in survival mode and the mom brain fog rolls right in.

That’s where I am right now. Full survival mode. Running on caffeine and good intentions and the specific kind of momentum that comes from having no other choice. (If you’ve read The Working Mom Penalty, you already know the drill.)

Mom Brain Is Real: You’re Not Broken, You’re Biologically Wired For This

Here’s the thing I had to remind myself when I started spiraling about the spiral: mom brain is not a personal failing. This is not a discipline problem. This is not something a better planner or a stricter morning routine would fix.

Your brain — specifically the mom version of your brain — is doing something it was literally designed to do.

Research published in Nature Neuroscience has found that gray matter volume and cortical thickness decrease as pregnancy progresses, with only partial recovery after birth, and studies have found there’s less gray matter in mothers for up to six years after childbirth — suggesting long-term structural changes in the brain. Six years. Not six weeks. Six years.

And around 80% of pregnant people say they experience forgetfulness or difficulty concentrating, according to Banner Health — though researchers now believe what’s actually happening is less about cognitive decline and more about your brain ruthlessly reprioritizing. It is redirecting its resources toward the most important job it has ever been given: keeping small humans alive and loved.

OB-GYNs estimate that between 50% to 80% of postpartum patients experience mom brain, noting that environmental factors play a big role — a woman may be using her baseline cognitive functioning capacity from day to day, then add in a child, and multitasking demands immediately increase.

So the fogginess is real. The scattered thinking is real. The feeling of operating at 80% capacity while the world expects 110% is real. And mom brain has a biological explanation that has nothing to do with how capable or smart or organized you are.

You are not starting from scratch. You are starting from a brain that has been reorganized by motherhood and is doing its absolute best. (Bonus: my postpartum must-haves list has a few more things that helped me start feeling human again.)

That said — I’d still like to feel like myself again, please and thank you. So here’s what I’m trying this week.

01. Walking 10,000 Steps a Day

This one sounds simple. It is simple. And somehow I have turned it into an insurmountable mountain for years and I genuinely cannot explain why.

Just move. That’s the whole strategy. Take the dog out. Get the mail the long way. Walk an extra lap around the building at lunch. Park further away. Take the stairs. Exist in motion more than you exist sitting still.

The science on this one is consistent and honestly kind of remarkable. Walking can boost your energy, reduce stress, and improve mental clarity, according to UT Southwestern Medical Center. And a study published in BMC Psychiatry found that a 100-day, 10,000 step program showed a small but consistent improvement across measures of depression, anxiety, stress, and general wellbeing — and notably, the mental health benefits appeared whether or not participants actually hit the 10,000 step mark.

Which is the most comforting thing I’ve read this week. Participation matters more than perfection. Even trying counts.

I am choosing to receive this as a personal permission slip.

I’m about four days in and I won’t tell you I’ve hit 10,000 every day because I haven’t. But I’m moving more than I was last week, and my brain feels slightly less like a browser with 47 tabs open. Progress.

02. Creatine for Mom Brain — I Didn’t Know the Science and Now I Can’t Stop Talking About It

Okay. I need to talk about creatine.

Someone told me to look into it a few weeks ago and I did what I always do — I went down a research rabbit hole at 10pm when I should have been sleeping — and now I am obsessed. Not in a bro-supplement kind of way. In a “why did nobody tell me this sooner” kind of way.

Here’s what I didn’t know: creatine isn’t just for people at the gym who are trying to build muscle. It is increasingly being studied specifically for women, and specifically for what it does to the brain.

A key 2024 study found that a single dose of creatine improved cognitive performance and processing speed, showed positive changes in brain energy markers, and reduced subjective fatigue in sleep-deprived individuals. Sleep-deprived individuals. That is literally every mother I have ever met.

And a 2025 randomized controlled trial published in the Journal of the American Nutrition Association found that even low doses of creatine hydrochloride led to measurable improvements in brain energy, focus, and emotional balance — with no identified adverse effects.

Beyond the brain, pre-clinical and clinical evidence indicates positive effects from creatine supplementation on mood and cognition, possibly by restoring brain energy levels and homeostasis, and creatine supplementation may be even more effective for females by supporting a pro-energetic environment in the brain, according to research published by the National Institutes of Health.

I am not a doctor. Please consult yours before starting any new supplement. But I will say that after a week of adding creatine to my morning routine, I feel — and this is a scientific term — more like a person.

I’m using creatine monohydrate, 3–5 grams a day mixed into water or a smoothie. No loading phase. No complicated protocol. Just consistency. That’s the whole thing.

03. Getting Back to Journaling and Cleaning Up My iPad

This one is the most embarrassing to admit because I have every tool I need to be organized and I choose chaos anyway.

I have a perfectly good iPad. I have apps. I have a notes system that made sense when I set it up six months ago and has since devolved into a digital junk drawer. I have a journaling practice that I genuinely love when I actually do it and somehow cannot make myself sit down for ten minutes to do.

Why? I ask myself this regularly. I think I have landed on an honest answer: a small part of me is addicted to the chaos. Like if I clear the clutter and get organized and sit down and journal, I have to actually look at what’s in my head. And sometimes what’s in there is a lot and it’s easier to stay in the mess than to face it.

But here’s what I know about journaling from actual experience and also from research that supports it: writing things down externalizes the mental load. It moves the tabs from your brain to a page where they can’t keep you awake at 2am. It creates a moment of clarity in a life that doesn’t offer many of them voluntarily.

So this week I’m starting small. Ten minutes in the morning before I open my email. One page. No rules about what goes on it. Just whatever is in my head, out of my head, onto the page.

And I’m cleaning up the iPad. Archiving the old notes. Deleting the apps I downloaded in January with good intentions and haven’t opened since February. Creating a simple system I can actually maintain instead of an elaborate one I cannot.

The tools exist. I just have to use them.

Where I’m At Now

We’re halfway through the week and I genuinely feel a little more like myself. Not fixed — I don’t think “fixed” is the right frame for motherhood. More like stabilized. Like the mom brain fog is lifting slightly and I can see far enough ahead to take the next step.

That’s enough. That’s more than enough.

If you’re in your own spiral right now — your own start-from-scratch, survival-mode, foggy-brain moment — I see you. I’m right here with you. The biology is real, the exhaustion is real, and the fact that you’re still showing up is remarkable even when it doesn’t feel like it.

Pick one thing. Walk around the block. Take the supplement you’ve been meaning to try. Write three sentences in a notes app before bed. Just one thing.

The groove comes back. It always does.