We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jill Moysiuk a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Jill, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

Five days before I was expecting to return to work following maternity leave, I lost my job.

And, you know what, it was one of the best things that ever happened to me. I think.

While I was initially pissed and heartbroken, I eventually decided (read: I needed something else to do besides cry) to look at my circumstances as an opportunity to journey down a new path and tell the corporate grind to suck it forever.

I was tired of limited vacation, waking up to an alarm, and getting gussied up every day to work long hours only to feel exhausted when it was finally time for me to do what I wanted.

Knowing I wasn’t truly fulfilled in my career, I couldn’t help but wonder if perhaps losing my job was the universe telling me I was ready for a significant change. The problem was I had no other work experience or even other interests, which meant I had some exploring to do.

Cue writing. Actually, no. Cue a serendipitous experience with my mother.

So, my mom never kept anything from my childhood. I never questioned this until I met my mother-in-law, who handed us a curated collection of treasures from my husband’s childhood.

After giving my mom grief about this for years, she turned up at our house soon after I’d lost my job, triumphant that she had, in fact, kept something! It was a book that I had written called What’s Good For A 10-Year-Old? I was amazed at my 10-year-old self. It was really good! And it even rhymed.

I read that book over and over that day, absolutely cheesed with ‘Little Jill.’

The next morning I woke up to our toddler at my bedside as I often do. I pulled him into bed with us and started playing with his perfect little toes as he fell back to sleep. While I massaged his feet, I started making a rhyme in my head about his fingers and toes, and after a few minutes, I wrote a whole poem about his little body.

I thought to myself, hey, that was pretty good!

So I reached for my phone and wrote it down. Soon, my husband woke up, and I said, “Listen to this…what do you think?!” He thought it was pretty good, too, so I started reading it to anyone who would listen!

Ten Little Fingers, Ten Little Toes is the first poem I ever wrote (as an adult), and I am working on turning it into a children’s book with my husband and daughter as the illustrators and my son, of course, as the inspiration!

In the meantime, I wanted to share some of the other poems I’ve written, all with motherhood as the common thread—the unfiltered kind of mom life. I’m talking about those moments when you’re just about to blow, and the toddler throws a cup that hits you right on the tit. Ya, that kind! ;)

It is my hope that Mom Said Duck will bring moms (and dads) together through humility and laughter, understanding that this wild thing called parenting can be as funny as it is trying.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

For four years, I wrote poems and published them in my weekly newsletter, Fresh Poem Friday, where I help moms start their weekend with a giggle. I still do this. But around the two-year mark in my Mom Said Duck journey, I recognized that my favourite part of my poems was not writing them but rather saying them, so I started a podcast, and my poems can be heard anywhere you listen to podcasts. Although I LOVE recording poems for my pod, something was still missing. So, around the four-year mark, I realized what it was: people. People were missing! From there, I applied for a government grant, and low and behold, I received it; and in 2024, I orchestrated a one-woman stand-up comedy/poetry night at a local community theatre called ‘Mom’s Night Out with Mom Said Duck’, and to my surprise and delight, the show sold out in 24 hours! That night was magic. It was on that stage that I had never felt more alive and aligned than I ever have, and I knew right away I had to do it again. I received a standing ovation for my performance, and the very next day, I booked a Christmas show in 2024. That show sold out in a few days and was just as fun as the first. After both shows, I received the most fulfilling feedback from moms, some with tears in their eyes about how connected they felt to my poems. I know this is my path thanks to their feedback and how I felt on stage. In 2025, I have two more shows on the horizon, the first at the café where I work which will be an intimate show, and the second will be at a well-known theatre in my city (Windsor, ON) which holds 200 people, and I fully plan on selling that one out too! Additionally, next month, I will be traveling to Miami to shoot an episode on a new TV show called Legacy Makers, where I will have my own episode to talk about my Mom Said Duck journey, which will be professionally produced and televised on major streaming platforms in the summer of 2025.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

My mission, which drives my creative journey, is to take my message (my poems) to as many moms as possible. I want to give moms a chance to be entertained instead of being the entertainment. And remind them that we’re all in this shit show together! Basically, I want moms to feel less alone and more normal in this wild experience of motherhood. Because, the way I see it, if we don’t laugh, we’ll probably cry!

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

When I first lost my job, I came across the book, “Don’t Keep Your Day Job” by Cathy Heller. In it, Cathy shares other people’s stories of folks who are “just like us”, who listened to the signs from the universe and took a leap of faith and found success in doing something that filled them up, as opposed to doing what they’ve always done just to make money, which feels safe. It was incredibly inspiring, and I read it now and again when I need a reminder that I’m not alone in my entrepreneurial journey, which is the reality of a solopreneur; it can feel incredibly isolating.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.momsaidduck.com
• Instagram: @momsaidduck
• Facebook: Mom Said Duck
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@momsaidduck
• Other: Podcasts: Mom Said Duck

Image Credits

N/A