Dear Divorce Diary: A Fresh Approach To Healing Grief & Building A Life Of Confidence After Divorce

218. Boosting Confidence Post-Divorce: The Power of Facing Your Fear (Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner!)

• My Coach Dawn • Season 4 • Episode 218

Share episode

Join The list for A Different D Word

What if Your Biggest Secret is the Key to Healing Post-Divorce?

We've all hidden away parts of ourselves in fear that if exposed, they might lead to rejection or judgment. But what if embracing these aspects could be the pivotal step towards profound healing and personal transformation after a divorce?

In this episode, you'll discover how vulnerability can become your greatest strength, why facing your inner shadows can lead to newfound power and joy, and how transformative techniques like EMDR and IFS can create lasting changes in your life.

Start your journey towards true healing today—listen to this episode and uncover the hidden strength that lies within your most vulnerable moments.

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.

Support the show

Speaker 1:

What if the thing you're most ashamed of the part of you, that you keep locked away terrified someone might see it, was actually the key to your deepest healing? I know that sounds impossible and scary, but I've lived it and in this episode I'm going to tell you about the moments when I was fully exposed post-divorce my rawest, most broken, most shame-filled self, and how, instead of rejection, I found something else entirely. Stay with me because this might just be the next door for you to walk through and break through. 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. Let's take a tour, if you will, of my post-divorce healing.

Speaker 1:

We're going to make three main stops today, and the first one goes a little like this I was sitting in my therapist's office sweet, sweet Gerda absolutely convinced that if I said the thing out loud, she would look at me differently, that she would confirm the worst fear I had about myself. But what actually happened is she held space, she didn't turn away and for the first time where I took that leap off the cliff of vulnerability, I felt the tiniest bit lighter. And this is what I need you to know is that healing doesn't happen, it cannot happen, in isolation. We can heal a certain amount in isolation, but when we let ourselves be really seen, it shifts something. I'm going to unpack this whole story and share all the moments in that season when I took that risk and when everything started to change and then stop. Two is going to be where we fast forward way past that season, to when I was in a week-long EMDR training where I had no choice because therapists, we practice on each other right. I had no choice but to let my dissociated trauma parts surface. This is where I started practicing IFS and EMDR in this really artful way. I was in a room full of strangers, therapists no less. I was so dysregulated that the facilitator had to step in and do her fancy EMDR magic just to bring me back. It was messy, it was raw, but by the end of that week I had unraveled, I had rewoven myself in ways I didn't even realize were possible.

Speaker 1:

And that's the thing. Every time I've let someone witness my shadows, I've walked away lighter. And yet this is where you often get stuck, where most women get stuck, because what if they find something inside themselves that they can't unsee? So many women have said that to me. And then at the end of the episode we're going to take a look at why so many women hesitate to take the leap, whether it's going to that next step, using that next tool, that next program, even just acknowledging their truth out loud. Most women avoid. The fear isn't actually about time or money, it's about facing what's inside. But let me tell you, after two decades of doing this work, not one woman I've worked with has ever regretted walking towards herself. Not one. Because on the other side of fear is power, joy and abundance. So we'll wrap up the episode talking about some of those experiences. I've seen women take that leap and be all the better for it. Take that leap and be all the better for it.

Speaker 1:

All right, gerda's office post-divorce. So I had been dating and holy crap that post-divorce dating even though there was a period of time where I was completely single. Right, I made the choice to be completely single and really work on myself. But once I started dating again, I dropped back into my repetition compulsion right. Remember this is pre-EMDR, pre-homeopathy, pre-quantum healing. So this is where I was heavily relying on talk therapy and somatics at the time. Right, yoga, inner child work not to the extent of IFS, inner child work and a lot of somatics, right, Like actively doing anger, doing sadness, these types of things. I had a picture of my young self on my bathroom mirror. I was doing a lot of journaling. These were the tools I was focusing on at the time, but the repetition compulsion right. My subconscious patterns to do with intimate relationships were pretty entrenched and so it was tough for it to change.

Speaker 1:

So when I sat on her sofa and I'm sure you can relate to this I had this stuck feeling in my throat, this burning feeling in my stomach, and my heart was racing and I was like I can't say it, I have to say it. I can't say it, I have to say it right. And there were just some things that I needed to reveal about some messes I made in the world of dating. These are things that I talk about more intimately inside our program, not necessarily for the whole world on the internet, but I knew that I needed to take that leap and let her hold that space and I did. I said the things right and she was so nurturing and maternal with me in those moments that it really helped unhook a bit of shame. That gave me more courage.

Speaker 1:

So then when she encouraged me to go tell the women's group she led that I was in. I was able to do it again. And then when she recommended that I go do this personal development workshop called the Living Course, I was able to do it even more. And then when she recommended that I go do this personal development workshop called the Living Course, I was able to do it even more. And what was really interesting about that is the Living Course was like a very public setting where people work on their pain in a fairly public way. And I was motivated to do these things because I was, like you know, a year, 18 months post-divorce, two years and in many ways I felt worse than ever. So you know, I had made a commitment to myself that I was going to heal this stuff to its root and so I was motivated.

Speaker 1:

So I took her recommendation and I'm sitting in this hot seat, day one of the living course, and there's multiple coaches. There's a lead coach, multiple coaches, and then there's like a horseshoe full of other participants and then there's a room full of like observers slash helpers, slash right. It's like a really interesting forum for healing and I had that same sort of heart racing, feeling like I cannot believe I signed up for this. What the hell was I thinking?

Speaker 1:

But as the weekend unfolded and the room full of people was sort of like Care Bear staring right, like beaming supportive energy, I soaked it up and I think that's the piece that women miss is that we're so guarded, we're so protected, we're so used to being wounded right that we keep that guard up. We are subconsciously keeping the guard up and blocking our own healing. So, even though I was doing this public thing that I was sure would cause me to puke, actually what happened is I softened and I exhaled and I felt safer in my own body at the end of the weekend, and so these were very powerful post-divorce experiences where I fundamentally shifted my confidence in that season by sort of being able to sit with my own pain and have it mirrored back to me in such a healing way that I felt less shame about who I was or how I got here, the underlying causes that led me to pick that partner in the first place. Now the intensity, I would say, is even more when we fast forward to when I'm EMDR training, and this is where things really really took on a different pace of healing. Because when you add EMDR to these moments of vulnerability, to these moments of embodiment, you add EMDR and all of a sudden, that subconscious repetition compulsion gets even better. Like you know, you can shift that pattern even more profoundly, and so I had already done, you know, the completed EM like basic EMDR training, and I had already been practicing EMDR for a while. But I went to this week-long advanced training where they utilized also parts theory or internal family systems, which you've heard us talk about here. And when I sat in that room full of strangers and really wanted to get the benefit of learning how to do this, I had to let all this stuff surface. And you know, as some clinicians are more experienced than others, the clinician I got paired with wasn't the most skilled clinician, and so, from my experience, how it felt, right, those young, dissociated parts of me that had picked my ex-husband, they didn't feel completely safe with the therapist facilitator that I was working with, but that's what the trainers were there for, right. And so you know, it was first a revelation to me how parts of self worked in that training and that I was finally able to attend to those parts of me more than just inner child work.

Speaker 1:

I can't it's hard to even capture or describe the profound differences between inner child work and this sort of broad strokes approach to looking at childhood wounds versus IFS and the specificity with which we can see that. Oh no, there are parts of self that have a strategy and they have a methodology and they have been using these adaptive methods to help keep me safe and protected and from getting hurt again, and they have helped me wiggle out of tight spots. These adaptive methods to help keep me safe and protected and from getting hurt again, and they have helped me wiggle out of tight spots. And there is a profound difference between inner child. So if you've already done inner child work and you're like, hmm, what's IFS? Like wow, it is such a deeper approach, and so even in me meeting my own parts, there was a relief that came from that training and then in the facilitator and a handful of the other therapists, seeing those vulnerable parts of me and accepting me and still finding me to be not just accepting me, right, but like we would get out of training and we might go to lunch together or we might chit, chat or whatever and talk about our practices, and these other women would still be like, wow, you know, that thing you do is amazing. Or wow, tell me more about that, right. Like it wasn't just that they accepted me, but they found value in the way I approached my work or my life or just who I was.

Speaker 1:

So, rather than my worst fear being confirmed that in these deeply vulnerable parts of me that felt so broken, so out of control, so dysregulated, so young, do you ever have that experience where, like, on the one hand, you're like I am a badass, independent woman and I could probably get through anything and be fine. I would be hurting, but like I would be fine and I could still take care of the house and the kids and the whatever. But then have these other parts of you that feel so profoundly incapable of doing anything because they feel so young and scared, independent or just out of control, and both of those energies can live inside of us at once, and that's what we're getting at here with this type of vulnerable work, is, those parts have to come to know each other and to create cohesion inside of you, to both feel seen, heard, understood. And that's what happened for me there with the fancy EMDR magic, and I got even better. But then fast forward to another season in my life where at the first time, I was working with a homeopath and she gave me a remedy. I felt so raw, exposed and ashamed because I knew she had seen something in me that even I couldn't face. And that's very often how homeopathy works. Right, we come and we tell her a story and the homeopath can spot the imbalanced energy and man did she and she nailed it and I got such immediate relief from that remedy.

Speaker 1:

But I also had to sit with the oh shit. I have been carrying around this energy and people have probably sensed it for a very long time. But in each of these moments, my most shame-filled parts, raw, hidden, unworthy, laid bare. These people did not turn away. They held me there in my most broken state until I could hold myself. And that is what we do in a different D word, because true healing is not available until we do these deeper pieces. You are predictably going to continue your repetition compulsions. You're going to continue attracting the things that attracted your first partner, your second partner, the guys you've been dating, the jobs you've been having, the relationship you know, like all the things, until we go to those spaces and feel seen, heard, understood, held, loved, accepted, and it's terrifying. But that's also why I can sit here on the podcast today and share vulnerable things, because I've done so much of the behind the scenes work to love and accept myself. Even if you don't, I can still sit with, like I stand by what I said and I know that it is helping other people speak up and stand in their truth and find their power.

Speaker 1:

No-transcript. There are a handful of things that they talk about. Right, I don't have time, I don't have the money, I don't have the space, I just don't have something I need. Right, and that's true, there is some resource internally that's missing for women to say, yes, I can approach this work. You know, when producer Joy and I, many years ago, before we launched the podcast and we would talk about her doing EMDR therapy and she's like I'm afraid of what I will find, you know that's not exactly what she said but, like you know, I'm afraid of what's going to happen. Who am I going to be after that process? Who am I going to be Right? And so when women say there's something missing for me to be able to commit to this, I'm afraid, I'm afraid it's not going to be a good fit, I'm afraid to commit, I'm afraid to take that next step, and they may list a whole host of resources that are missing.

Speaker 1:

What I want you to know that I hear is that, yes, there are resources missing for you to feel safe to do this deeper work that's the piece is to go deeper. You have to feel like there is enough resource that you are safe enough to go deeper. And so what I watch women do is say, like when I feel safer, then I will approach the work. But what they're missing is that you will not fundamentally feel safer until you do the work. So it's this catch 22,. Which do you do first for until you do the work? So it's this catch 22,. Which do you do first? Right, take the leap or wait. And so I want you to really sit with that right. I agree with you you are not well resourced enough right now to do this deeper work. There's too much insecurity, whether it's financial, emotional, psychological, support system, right, there's just not enough of some things for you to feel safe to move forward into this deeper work. But that's the point of the program. Love is that it gap fills those missing resources. Because what I know of the women who have joined this program and I have worked with in the past is that no one has ever regretted going deeper. No one has ever found a wound that they couldn't heal, no one has ever regretted feeling deeper peace or deeper empowerment. Because that is the point of the tools we use here is they function on such a deep level.

Speaker 1:

It's almost like this is such a funny therapist thing to reveal is very often, after someone does a couple of EMDR sessions or takes a homeopathic remedy or two, those issues are so sort of deleted right, like the negative beliefs or the issues or the disease vectors I call them. Sometimes they're so deleted from the brain they can't even find them anymore and they're like, oh, I don't know, I must have had a good night's sleep. It's like they can't even remember how they felt in the weeks previous before the EMDR or the homeopathic remedy and they always sort of attribute it to like, oh, I must have gotten a good night's sleep or, you know, it must have been that book that I read it. Just, you know it's like it's so profound it's hard to even put your finger on sometimes how the pain is. Just, you know layers of it, not all of it at once.

Speaker 1:

And producer Joy and I had this conversation actually we sort of got into a tussle about it, like maybe three weeks ago. I'm like looking at her for confirmation where she was like, oh, you know, that session you did with Kate, I wonder if that is the thing that really shifted this particular dynamic between us recently. And I like cackled and she was like rude Because we don't realize how profound all of these steps and layers of healing they create this transformation. And wow, I've just never seen a woman regret all of that. And so I want you to notice, if you tend to say to yourself I will go deeper when I feel safer, when I feel ready or when whatever, right that actually, what you're missing is the very thing that's going to facilitate the safety and that is a profound and comprehensive support system that is tailored to you, using these quantum techniques that are absolutely going to dial in to the parts of you that you are the most ashamed to sit with, the parts of you that you've been denying their own healing process. I know you felt that there are parts of you that you have been denying. You've been treating them as though they're not worthy of healing, because you can't stand to face them. You can't stand to let other people face them, and so those parts remain like baby in a corner, waiting for Patrick Swayze to say nobody puts baby in a corner. I am Patrick Swayze.

Speaker 1:

So if you have questions about our program, if anything I've said has resonated with you today, I want you to scroll to the bottom of the episode and find the link where it says sign up to book a call or to find out more about the program. I want you to fill out that form or jump on Instagram and send me a DM. Either way, let's just have the conversation. Sometimes people say like ah, I don't want to take the leap if it's not a good fit. I don't want you to take the leap if it's not a good fit either. We are here to help people get massive transformations, not to have people flounder and not be satisfied with their results and struggle and suffer and right like that's not good for anyone. So let's have the conversation and let's see if this is the right fit for you so that you can have your transformation, so that we can pull baby out of a corner. I love you so much. Scroll down, click the link. Peace, dear. Divorce Diary is a podcast by MyCoachDawn. You can find more at mycoachjohncom.

People on this episode

Contributor

Divorce Recovery Maven Dawn Wiggins

Host