Dear Divorce Diary: A Fresh Approach To Healing Grief & Building A Life Of Confidence After Divorce
We are on a journey to get into the nitty gritty of divorce recovery and reveal why your divorce healing journey is still not working for you–even after you’ve tried therapy and read all the books.
Let's transform your pain into strength and take charge of your own narrative. Now’s the time we reclaim your healing journey–and why exactly we struggle to not only heal from past traumas but move beyond them to the ultimate goal: inner peace. That is real self-empowerment, and this is Dear Divorce Diary.
I’m Dawn Wiggins, a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and EMDR specialist. I draw on decades of experience to help women navigate the emotional rollercoaster after ending a marriage. Using a little bit of science, a few alternative remedies and emotional release techniques, a whole lot of love, and zero BS, we step out of the victim mindset and into building a new life after divorce.
We emphasize nuance because overcoming challenges after divorce means questioning everything that got us here and using your divorce as a springboard to a better, more resilient (and certainly happier!) you.
On Tuesday, we have our listener segment called: "Getting Unstuck," where we anonymously unpack a difficult situation a listener is going through in their divorce healing journey.
And, on Thursday, we explore a "Hidden Healing Gem," which is a healing product or process we've tried and tested personally and/or professionally and are sharing our results and observations with you!
We cover essential life after divorce topics like grief, anxiety, codependency, loneliness, boundaries, nervous system health, attachment styles, the Law of Attraction, and homeopathy.
Join us twice a week as we go beyond talk therapy to process your grief, find the healing you crave, and rebuild your confidence.
Dear Divorce Diary: A Fresh Approach To Healing Grief & Building A Life Of Confidence After Divorce
206. Can IFS Therapy Help You Bounce Back From Divorce and Ditch Codependency For Good?!
Join The Waitlist for A Different D Word
Have you ever felt like your healing just isn't sticking despite trying every tool you know?
For those navigating the tumultuous waters of post-divorce life, understanding the internal dialogue of our mind can be a game changer. In this episode of Dear Divorce Diary, you'll discover how internal family systems or parts work, how you can illuminate why you experience certain struggles, and how to harmonize your internal dynamics for deeper healing.
Explore the concept of 'parts' within ourselves and how they drive the way you experience life. Learn to identify and integrate your manager, exile, and firefighter parts for a more cohesive inner world. Gain practical insights into nurturing your undamaged self for profound personal growth.
Tune in now to unlock the secrets of your mind and start healing on a much deeper level.
Internal Family System’s (IFS) Self-Healing App
Loneliness Roadmap on HeartBeat
Post Divorce Roadmap - 21 Days of Guided Journaling
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MyCoachDawn
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dawnwiggins/
On the Web: https://www.mycoachdawn.com
A podcast exploring the journey of life after divorce, delving into topics like divorce grief, loneliness, anxiety, manifesting, the impact of different attachment styles and codependency, setting healthy boundaries, energy healing with homeopathy, managing the nervous system during divorce depression, understanding the stages of divorce grief, and using the Law of Attraction and EMDR therapy in the process of building your confidence, forgiveness and letting go.
If you have ever had a panic attack, taken an attachment styles quiz, sabotaged your own goals or felt like counseling did not work for you the way you needed it to, including EMDR therapy, you cannot afford to ignore this episode. Hi, love, welcome to Dear Divorce Diary, the podcast helping divorcees go beyond talk therapy to process your grief, find the healing you crave and build back your confidence. I'm your host, dawn Wiggins, a therapist, coach, integrative healer and divorcee. Join me for a fresh approach to healing grief and building your confidence after divorce. Love, I know you, and I know that just by virtue of you being here listening to this podcast. I know how smart you are. I know how dialed in you are. I know that you have an ear for discernment and you have a tendency to want to seek the truth. You like to know how things work and you really appreciate a deeper understanding in many, many areas of your life. I know you. I did pretty good there, didn't I? But I also know that there's a reason you're having these symptoms in this post-divorce situation that I mentioned at the top of the episode, and that there's a lot of noise out there in healing spaces about the tools you need to use and how to get grounded and the nervous system, and I really want to help you prioritize which tools you use, when and why and how. And this one needs to be at the top of your list because it sort of explains at a very deep level why you struggle with certain things.
Speaker 1:In today's episode, we're going to talk about internal family systems, or parts work, and it's not that we haven't talked about it before on the pod. I have linked one of my favorite apps in the show notes before, but we're going to get into it in a deeper level today so that you can connect the dots. Repetition is the key to learning, and but we're going to get into it in a deeper level today so that you can connect the dots. Repetition is the key to learning, and so we're going to circle back around to it right, so that we can just get a little deeper today. So internal family systems are parts work. What is it and what the heck does it have to do with this divorce and my recovery from it? The only part that I know that needs attention is my ex part, and we just should light him on fire.
Speaker 1:No, internal family systems means that inside of us, we all have parts of self. If it sounds a little Nurse Jackie-ish, right, like I'm talking about multiple personality disorder, yeah, I kind of am. That's how I want you to relate to it, right? Not like you have alters and you're losing track of time, although that does happen for some people and it's more common than you think, especially with particular types of trauma. But we do all have parts of self and they do have their own ways of relating to the world and to each other, even inside of us. So, for instance, one part of me wants to lose weight and one part of me wants to eat all of the chocolate. One part of me wants to be out of this marriage and another part wants this marriage to be healed. One part of me wants to go to bed and never get out again and one part of me wants to say screw it all and burn it down and start over again in a new town and just be the badass that I know that I am right. And so when you start to take a look at, when we feel what we relate to as inner conflict, that inner conflict is that internal family system, having an internal family squabble, but one of the key things that I see people missing in their healing journey is understanding the depth to which parts are driving the way you experience life, and that's what I really want to dig into today. So let's talk about the three types of parts and then we're going to keep it on sort of that level right, so that you can start to get a feel for the three types of parts that you have going on inside of you at any given moment, and then you can start to get curious about how these parts feel about each other and how each of them feel about the things that you have to tackle during this divorce.
Speaker 1:So the first type of part I want to talk about are manager parts. These are parts that are typically people pleasing. They are going to try to keep the peace at all costs. They're going to keep things running. They're sort of like controllers and protectors. They're the ones that can be sort of type A and strategic and try to keep you out of the fire. They try to. They do a lot of overthinking, a lot of analyzing, a lot of anxiety stuff right, where you're just sort of rehearsing things all the time.
Speaker 1:Dissociation is a really great sort of manager part. It's like, oh, I know what to do with this pain. I'm just going to disconnect from it. And so manager parts are parts that sort of like just keep our heads above water. And so manager parts are parts that sort of like just keep our heads above water, functioning and adulting, when we don't really have the resources to feel like we're actually capable of functioning or adulting right, managers are just the ones that keep the wheels on the bus turning right. But here's the thing they prioritize, not feeling.
Speaker 1:And so very often you, you know, might have one manager part that's like oh, we listen to that podcast, we need to schedule therapy, and the manager one manager part might schedule therapy. But then you have another manager part that is in charge of protecting the exiled parts and we're going to sort of dig into what's an exile next, right. And you might have another manager part that's like I know that one's scheduled therapy, but this one isn't sure the exiles are capable of doing therapy. So I'm going to protect these exiles at all costs and then proceed to get nothing out of the therapy, because I can't actually approach or work through or feel or get vulnerable about the things that the exile parts are handling in the system, right? And so if the part that's scheduled therapy isn't on the same page with the part that's trying to, you know, sabotage therapy, then you end up being someone who goes to session and goes in circles and feels like you don't get enough out of it. So that's sort of a you know, just a broad example.
Speaker 1:But let's dig into the exile parts and why they're so key and what their relationships can be with manager parts, right. So exiles are the parts of us that are the most wounded. They're the ones that have felt the brunt of the pain and the traumas that we've experienced in life. And then they've taken all that pain and they've put it in these cute little boxes from the container store and stacked them up in the basement of our minds so that we don't have to feel all that pain and carry it around with us on a daily basis. And so very often when I'm working with people and they're like you know I had a really great childhood or you know I just don't remember a lot of my childhood.
Speaker 1:Either of those things are usually really great clues that there are exiled parts that have not been brought into the fold of self right and have not been sort of included in the internal family systems, meetings or awareness or consciousness. And so when we know that we're doing really, really good, therapy is when, or healing work is when we're able to create an environment within ourselves and within our relationships where those exiles feel safe enough to come up from the basement and to feel seen, heard and to be able to process their pain, and so many of us have. You know, when you hear about inner child work, a lot of times there are child parts that have been exiled right when you have sort of the most heinous types of abuse and neglect. Very often those exiled parts are the ones that hold the somatic experience of those. So what do I mean by that? I mean that when we do EMDR therapy and exile is able to come to the therapy session and we're processing that person in session may feel the physical memory of being hit by a parent or a spouse. They might actually get a handprint in a place where they were previously struck or abused right, and they may have the physical sensation resurface in the re-experiencing, in the processing of the trauma or the painful experience. Because memory is not one-dimensional, it's not like a flat piece of paper. It has neurochemicals associated with it, it has physical sensations, it has adrenaline, it has nerve sensations. Right, memory is multi-dimensional, and so when our memories feel flat or we don't feel emotionally connected to them or any sensations around them, we know that there are exiled parts that are holding that pain for us, and the goal is to be able to create a safe enough environment for them to come forward. Now there's a third type of part, and those are firefighter parts. And those are firefighter parts.
Speaker 1:Firefighter parts are parts that are like sort of the last resort protectors of the internal family system. I want you to think of what an actual firefighter's role is in the world. Right, this building is burning down, this home is burning down and this firefighter is coming to put the fire out. Home is burning down and this firefighter is coming to put the fire out. So, let's say, an exiled gets triggered, which PS, when we're experiencing triggers, that's what's happening Somehow pain pierced that basement veil, right, and some exile got triggered, and that's what a trigger is very often. And so when an exile gets triggered in a way that it feels like the fire is not containable, then a firefighter part will show up on scene to put the fire out, and they're typically some pretty heroic strategies.
Speaker 1:So for people who abandon their children. So for people who abandon their children, that's usually a firefighter part. People who complete suicide, that's usually a firefighter part. People who shut down completely and cannot process or function or get out of bed that kind of depression is typically a firefighter part. Most forms of self-harm, like cutting and those types of things, firefighter parts it's. I need some heroic measure to turn this pain off and I am out of options. Out of options. And so firefighter parts can often look like addiction right, where I am just going to numb myself with this bottle of wine and food, or extreme versions of shutdown right, or of needing to escape.
Speaker 1:And so when you start to look at, okay, we've got managers, exiles and firefighters and the relationship and roles between them, imagine the manager schedules therapy, emdr therapy, right, and the exiles are like we're not sure about this. And then, the same day as therapy, your ex hits you with another legal maneuver and your car breaks down and you get a call from your kid's school and now you've got therapy and something happening with your kid and something happening with your car and your ex and all the things right, and the firefighter is going to say like oh, no, no, no, no, no. I've got a solution to this right. And you just collapse and you run away from it all and you hide. So it's very possible that the firefighter doesn't agree with the manager's choices or that the exile is going to run and hide from the manager, and so there's these internal dynamics inside of us and that's what causes us to self-sabotage, as we, you know, or you know, we might call ourselves lazy, but no, it's not laziness, it's.
Speaker 1:There's a lack of cohesion between these parts of me. You're not lazy, you're not unwilling, there's nothing, you know, inherently wrong with you. There are these parts of you that don't know how to get along yet and they don't feel well supported enough yet. And so that brings me to the sort of the last piece of this puzzle, which is the self. The self, capital S, is a part inside of all of us that has been completely unaffected, never damaged, never harmed. Nothing's wrong with this part. It is true and bright and shining and available and grounded, and always present and clear-headed and wise-minded, and it is always inside of you, love, and that self is sort of able to sit in this elevated perspective and engage with each part of you, provide care and love and concern and strategies and a listening ear for every part of you. Strategies and a listening ear for every part of you. And what I see most often with people who are in the thick of divorce is they can't quite make contact with self. They're so triggered in a particular part that they don't. They've lost track that self is there. They've lost track that there's a part of them that is so strong and so clear and so wise that all will be well and so love.
Speaker 1:I want you to start noticing your internal patterns between how often you're able to operate from an awareness of self. Maybe you've never operated from an awareness of self, maybe this is like a completely like new concept to you, right, and you've just been sort of underwater for so long that you've not even been aware of self. She's in there, she's always been there, and the more we sort of are able to get grounded and pause and find her and feel her and make contact with her, the more cohesive the managers, the exiles, the firefighters can be. Now, when we talk about self-abandonment and self-rejection, that's when one part of the system is not being kind or loving or accepting to another part of the system and it can absolutely re-traumatize the original parts that were that you know carried all these traumas from external factors, from childhood, from marriage, from you know, living and loving as parents and partners and all of these types of things. So I want you to really notice, start to notice, start to get curious about how you experience the world is a mirror of your internal family system and your internal parts.
Speaker 1:When you have trouble getting along with other people or having compassion for other people or feeling loved by other people, it's probably because you have parts of self that are not good at relating to each other or resolving conflict or finding a strategy that everyone can agree upon. It's very, very, very helpful when you're doing this internal family systems work to personify your parts right. I love giving parts funny little names and really noticing how they carry themselves and how they dress and how they like to be related to. When we really personalize these parts of ourselves. You know, like if you were taken you know the movie taken with liam neeson like if you were taken by someone right, you would start telling them my name is dawn and I have a daughter and I and I have a dog and her name is lilliput and I'm a person and you would start giving all these personal details about yourself right To humanize yourself. The more you can be in touch with and humanize and get to know and develop these beautiful relationships with your exiled parts, the more compassion you will have for them, the more you will start to heal in this very beautiful, deep and compassionate way. This is your call to action to start journaling with those parts of you. Start visualizing her, start making contact with her.
Speaker 1:You know, I have found that as a mother, I've been willing to do things to protect my daughter that I wasn't willing to do to protect myself. I've been willing to set boundaries for her that I wasn't willing to set for myself. I've't willing to do to protect myself. I've been willing to set boundaries for her that I wasn't willing to set for myself. I've been willing to defend her for things that I wouldn't defend myself for. And I think the same thing happens when we develop relationship with our parts of self. All of a sudden it's like, oh crap, I've been really hard on this particular part of myself and all she needs is to be seen and loved and accepted and brought into the fold of self. I'm going to put a link in the show notes for the IFS Guide app there are in-app purchases. There is some free content in the IFS Guide app and there is some in-app purchases. I think even the basic in-app content just helps sort of wrap your mind around this concept and gives you a space to start working on some of this from.
Speaker 1:This is the work that is done when we're treating complex post-traumatic stress disorder. This is the work that I do in EMDR with patients is getting to know parts of self and creating that cohesion and integration. This is the work that is often done when we're using homeopathy or we're doing EFT. Tapping right Is we are helping these various parts of our subconscious mind become a more integrated and team-oriented self. All parts are necessary. All parts are important. There's no killing off parts. There's no telling parts that they're you know. There's no name calling parts Like.
Speaker 1:Every part has an important strategy in helping you get from that trauma to this day, and so it's really, really important to understand how every part has had an actual, really clever strategy to help you survive the pain that you have survived, strategy to help you survive the pain that you have survived. So I love really getting to know parts and understanding how they experienced a particular trauma and where they got a brilliant idea to function in a particular way. Every part has its own particular magic and PS, can we just give a shout out to God for the design of the system. It's freaking elegant. I've always said that the way that the mind was designed to keep secrets from us, to hold pain from us, so that we could get from one day to the next. It's elegant, it's beautiful, it's purposeful and it is working perfectly.
Speaker 1:And now it's just time to get in touch with those pieces so that you can call them all home. All right, check out the app in the show notes and if you have more question about parts, don't hesitate to hit me up. Love you so much. Peace, dear Divorce Diary is a podcast by MyCoachDawn. You can find more at mycoachdawncom.
