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

285. When Everyone Else Looks Happy & You Feel Alone: Holiday Grief During Divorce

• My Coach Dawn • Season 4 • Episode 285

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The holidays don’t just remind you who’s at your table...
They remind you who isn’t.

When you’re divorced, that quiet has a sound.
It’s the clink of one mug instead of two.
The solo grocery run.
The ache of seeing everyone else’s “perfect” family photos.
And the part no one talks about?
Your nervous system feels all of it long before your mind catches up.

In this episode, Dawn, Joy, and Tiff walk you through why holiday grief hits differently... not just emotionally, but neurologically.
Your brain codes the holidays as both comfort and threat, and that dual-wiring explains so much of the confusion, anxiety, tight chest, and “I don’t belong anywhere” thoughts that tend to surface this time of year.

And today, we’re going to help you work with all of it.

In this episode:

✨ Why holiday grief feels louder in your body
— the neuroscience behind scents, memories, and tradition triggering loss and longing

✨ The real reason divorced women feel like they “don’t belong anywhere”
— and how this actually traces back to belonging to yourself

✨ The phrase to repeat at any holiday party when your chest tightens
“I am safe to be seen in this moment.”

✨ A 60-second bathroom-stall nervous system reset
Cold-water wrists, humming, squats, breath work — your new somatic toolkit for holiday overwhelm

✨ How to turn this season from performance into personal power
(New traditions, choosing yourself, claiming authenticity, and ditching the performative holiday mask)

✨ Why your circle shifts after divorce
— and why that shift is actually a sign of growth, not failure

This episode is a warm hand on your back, reminding you that nothing about your holiday pain means you’re behind, broken, or unlovable. It means your nervous system still remembers love — and is learning how to feel safe again without him.

This week’s Thursday Premium episode is a guided, real-time grounding practice for the exact moment your nervous system spirals — in the grocery store aisle, the car, or the corner of the holiday party.

If you’re not a premium listener yet, now is the season to join.
 You’ll get:
 – All premium healing tracks
 – Monthly live workshop with Dawn
 – Access to exclusive Destined Homeopathics product drops
 – A private community focused on real-time support

Join Premium for $5/month inside your app.

Before you go:
Take our quiz “What’s Your Divorce Recovery Nervous System Type?” to understand how your body responds to grief — and get a personalized healing map.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MyCoachDawn

Instagram: (@dawnwiggins)

Instagram: (@coachtiffini)

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

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SPEAKER_03:

Holidays don't just remind you who's at your table, they remind you who isn't. And when you're divorced, that quiet has a sound. It's the clink of one mug instead of two, the moment you carry the groceries in alone. It's not that you miss him, you miss belonging somewhere you thought was yours forever. And if right now your chest feels tight and your brain is whispering, why am I still here? Breathe. Nothing about this moment means you're behind or broken or unlovable. It means your nervous system still remembers love and it's learning what safety feels like without him. 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, Don Wiggins, a therapist, coach, integrative healer, and divorcee. Join me for a fresh approach to healing grief and building your confidence after divorce. All right, my darlings, we've officially entered that time of year where we are juggling not just divorce grief, but divorce grief and the holidays. And so we're here to walk with you through it. And one of the things I want you to anticipate during this holiday season is we're gonna do the 12 days of Christmas towards the end of the year. And we will be during especially the Christmas and New Year's part of the year, we're gonna be releasing daily episodes to help you somatically walk through. They'll be much shorter. Um, but we are going to really help hold space for you during what we're calling the 12 days of divorce Christmas. So just anticipate that we are gonna be a massive part of your support system this year and really hold your hand as we move through this together. But for today, we are gonna start with at the top of the episode talking about why holiday grief hurts so differently and not just emotionally, but like in your body and from a neurological, from a literal brain perspective. And then as we move through the episode a little bit later, we're gonna teach you how to rewire the thought, I don't belong anywhere. We're gonna help you turn that into a truth that allows you to feel like you can breathe again. And about midway, we're gonna teach you one tiny phrase that will take the edge off when you feel alone in a room full of couples. And near the end, we're gonna guide you through a 60-second nervous system reset you can use in the bathroom at any holiday party you attend if you need to. And then stay with us to the end because we're going to show you how to turn this season into power instead of performance. But in the meantime, help me welcome Tiffer Doodle and producer Joy. Hi, everybody. Good morning.

SPEAKER_00:

Good morning.

SPEAKER_03:

Good morning. Not to be weird, but we're pretty excited about what we have planned for the podcast and our listeners and all the things this holiday season, right? We're we're turning it up around here.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay, let's talk for a moment about why the holidays hurt so freaking much. So there's this thing that's happening because the holidays signal our nervous system for both threat and loss, along with the idea of like holiday joy and um closeness and family, right? It's like all of a sudden, holiday, and maybe for some of us who have had like a lot of family hurt and pain, the holidays have always had these two different sort of collapsed meanings, right? We have on the one hand, the holidays are supposed to represent love and connection and togetherness and harmony, and I don't know, maybe share some of the things that you associate or want to associate the holidays with, right? The like Publix commercial, the Hallmark channel, whatever. But then the holidays also have embedded in them this perception of threat and loss. And so, in this one concept of the holidays, our nervous system codes them as multiple things. Like, think about the the fragrances of the holidays. Like some of those things would have historically been soothing, but now all of a sudden it's coded with this dual meaning of both something positive and something painful. And so part of our work to do with why it hurts so differently is like teasing apart what feels good, what feels painful, and giving space for both of those sensations. Do y'all relate to that at all?

SPEAKER_00:

I do, but I I just have to say something because when you said holiday commercial, yeah, like immediately, okay, immediately the Hershey's Kisses, right, that play the little holiday jingle or whatever every year. Uh-huh. Yes. That's good. But do you guys remember when Kmart released the Joe Boxer one and they had to take it off of the air because it was a bunch of men in boxers? And so the bells were well, the bells were their balls, okay? And they were Yes, yes. So if you've never Googled Christmas coming up, yeah, okay. YouTube. Yeah. Anyway, I yeah, I think that you know, for me going through divorce, holidays are steeped in so much tradition, whether it's family, and I feel like every family unit has their own traditions. And so when I was trying to navigate that post-divorce, that's what felt the most lonely for me because I felt like I didn't fit. It's like people would invite me to other things and they would invite me to different houses, but it's like I wouldn't get the inside jokes, you know.

SPEAKER_03:

It's not familiar, it's not comforting.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and sometimes the food was gross. And then I remember one particular thing where I was invited. They ate dinner at seven at night for Thanksgiving. And I'm like, who in the hell does that? Why are we all standing around? Like we're standing around in nice clothes all damn day.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm ready for my pajamas, and they're just Well, right, because then you're washing dishes and cleaning the kitchen at 9 p.m. is the thing, right? Like, yeah. Yeah, so there's something about that familiarity that we create, right? And all of a sudden, like in a divorce season, like nothing is familiar. Have you ever had that example of um, you know, we went through something sort of rough here this week in our house, and one night Grace was sitting on the sofa and she's like, I just want the fire and a Christmas movie, right? There are things that we perceive as like really comforting about the holiday season, but then it's like that sort of gets ripped from us, right? All of a sudden, this thing that we typically associate as comfort becomes painful.

SPEAKER_04:

Painful.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so can you think of any of those examples where like something that normally like a smell, right? Like a smell that would normally be comforting, and all of a sudden it brings a wave of grief, like the smell of cinnamon or mold wine or pumpkin pie or I don't know, Christmas trees, and all of a sudden, rather than it bringing joy, it like actually brings a flood of grief.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, for sure. Smells, sounds like a particular song in the grocery store that's playing brings you back to the moment where you were gift shopping and were dancing in the aisle about it, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03:

Like what about receiving all those picture Christmas cards from all the other families? All the perfect little worlds. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00:

That's the worst.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Everything that you were supposed to be, everything that you're supposed to have, everything, all the grief that comes with the shud of what it could, and you know, all the dreams of the future that you're supposed to have, and all of the things that it was, you know, like will never be, and your kids are never gonna have.

SPEAKER_00:

And I feel like that was so embarrassing for me because we had just purchased our new home in May. And I sent out all these cards announcing with a picture of our home this is our new address, you know, like so people could send Christmas cards. And then I pieced out two days after Christmas. So you know what I mean? So it's like all of a sudden it's like this happy news about it, and then all of a sudden, like I'm gone. And the Chris I couldn't even I couldn't even send Christmas cards the first year. I was like, I can't even do this. Right. And then the years after we're always with just me and Ari, you know, just me and my daughter on Christmas cards. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

I'm curious if there's like a level of almost um well, I mean, of course there's embarrassment, like you feel shame because you sent out the beautiful Instagram picture of your family and then pieced out is that is the word you used. But like, how do you fill in the gap between sending out the card, realizing this isn't it, this isn't he's never gonna change, this isn't where it's true.

SPEAKER_02:

What I sold what I sold wasn't the truth. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Right, what I sold wasn't the truth. Thank you for those words. What I sold wasn't the truth. And then the shame of sending out a new card of this is the truth, this is my vulnerable spot, and the self-acceptance and love that you get, an empowerment you get from saying, No, this is actually this is actually the truth.

SPEAKER_03:

Gosh, that's like a perfect segue into our next little topic here, right? But like, yeah, can the new Christmas card come with like bonus content, like an addendum that is like, our family is currently going through a rebrand?

SPEAKER_02:

Welcome to this is our new logo you can now find on this, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Um this is like this is so cringe worthy. So then I may or may not have put my new boyfriend in a Christmas card the following year, and then he was out of the Christmas card the year. Everybody's like, what the hell is happening to her right now?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I had that feeling so loud when because I was in the process of getting my license. Uh you know, I graduated from graduate school and I had to do that two years of post-graduate school supervision before I could get licensed and sit for the exam and all that stuff. And it was like I had an office with uh my name on the door and all the things, right? And it's like, I don't know, something about changing my name in my professional community, it that felt so like that. Like, oh, what I sold wasn't true, and now this is the real thing. This is the rebrand, and it feels so vulnerable to announce a name change publicly in a professional setting. I don't know, I definitely had all those feelings about that. Like everybody could see my what I didn't want them to see was happening behind the scenes. It was like there's a big glaring sign on the door. Right, right, right now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I've always been that way, I think. And I was so afraid that my friends were gonna be mad at me when everything came out and that I was gonna lose all of my friends because I felt like a fraud. I felt like I wasn't sharing really at the core of what was happening in my marriage. And even, you know, we even got to the point where then we were fighting in front of other people. There was one particular event where we were at a family function and it was bad. Like it was just really bad. And it was in front of a lot of family and um friends, and even people would ask me afterwards, like, are you okay? And I would be like, Yeah, it's fine. Like we always do, it's fine, like everything's okay. And really, like I was dying inside, like, because everyone was noticing, and it was the most embarrassing thing ever to feel like my life was falling apart and I couldn't share it with anybody. So, yeah, there was a lot of fear that once everything came out that I was gonna have nobody on the other side because everybody was gonna be pissed off that I was living this lie.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, so let's dig into that, right? Because I think, you know, here we're talking about this like rebrand, like I sold something that wasn't true, right? So then many of us walk around in life with this sense that I don't belong anywhere, right? I think that we have all struggled with that at some point in life. And I think post-divorce, it's like excruciatingly loud that sensation in our bodies, right? And so this idea that we struggle with, I don't belong anywhere. Can we talk, can we tie these two things together? Because it's really like we have divorced ourselves from the truth for so long, by the time we get to a divorce situation, right? We divorced ourselves from the truth of what was going on in our bodies, in our marriages, in our lives, in our own mental health. We have divorced ourselves from the feelings that needed to be owned and processed. And so now what's really happening when we say I don't belong anywhere is us actually having disassociated ourselves from the truth for so long, we don't feel like we belong in our own bodies anymore. We don't belong to ourselves anymore. And then we can't escape that sensation and we interpret it as I don't belong anywhere. But really, it's like I have not owned myself, I've not claimed myself, I have not claimed my truth, I have not spoken my truth, I have not felt my actual feelings, I have not um identified my actual needs or met them. You know, I just have not belonged to myself in so long. I I I'm not even in on the joke anymore.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

So what if belonging isn't a place, right? And Brene Brown has done so much beautiful work about this. But what if belonging isn't a place out there, it's a place in here. And I think many of our listeners don't even know quite where to start with that, right? Right. But that's the journey.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think from an IFS perspective, something that's really become a theme right now in our current cohort. And I kind of explained to the women, you know, we're we're month one.

SPEAKER_02:

In a different T-word.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, like we're in month one, right? So we start, we talk here all the time, and Dawn says all the time.

SPEAKER_03:

No, we are officially in month, we're officially in month two now.

SPEAKER_00:

We have graduated to month two today, actually, right? Yeah, last night was month two. Yeah. You know, Dawn says all the time that divorce is a symptom. And, you know, God, I believe that so much because the usually the first three months of the program that we do, the women are in it with their divorce, but then it starts to become about how did I get here? And then having to live with that and process that and that moment when I see them break down because they've realized that for five years, ten years, thirty years, forty years, they have given themselves up for somebody else. How did I allow that to happen to me? How did I think that's what I deserved? And so for me, yes, when there is no sense of belonging anywhere, it's because there are so many parts of you inside that do not feel seen and like they belong with you.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. So well said. So well said. So the the journey of coming home to belonging to self, right, is not a short one. It's not an easy one. It's an incre it's like the most rewarding journey you will ever, ever, ever, ever go on. But it's not short and it's not easy. But in the meantime, right, let's say you're at the holiday party and you're feeling all the feelings and the shit is popping off inside of you, outside of you, right? There are some phrases, right, that you can write down that you can carry with you, that you could put on your phone screen that you can remind yourself, right? And it's actually a phrase we've used. And I'd love to hear what you would add to this, right? But we've been using this phrase with the women in a different D-word this month, which is I am safe to be seen in this moment. I am safe to be seen in this moment. And that starts with me, right? To see myself and to see how much I'm suppressing and repressing and avoiding and trying to not have to be in touch with, but I'm safe to be seen. And I think so often we're trying to escape what we're feeling, what we're going through. We just want to distance from it. We don't want to deal with it. We don't, it's just so much, right? But until we start to coach ourselves into it's safe to be seen, we can't start coming home. And then we feel alone everywhere. Uh-uh. Yeah. So how does that phrase land in your bodies, right? And what would you add to it? Or what would would you maybe even add a whole nother phrase altogether?

SPEAKER_00:

I would say that the theme that I noticed the most too is that when you start to look at the husband from outside and say, okay, there's a lot of ways where we weren't aligned, this wasn't aligned, you're also going to take a really hard look at your friends. And you're going to say, are these people also avoidant, anxious? What sort of attachment style? Because when you're in that space to attract an anxious or avoidant man, you're in the same space to attract those same type of friends. Hot down. Right? So for me, it's like, are you safe to be seen with your current circle? And a lot of people are gonna say no. And if you don't feel like you're safe to be seen in your current circle, honey, you got the wrong circle.

SPEAKER_03:

But how can you attract a new circle until you step into authenticity, right? Because you can't transform what you can't own. So it's like such a balled-up process of yeah, you have to become safe to be seen inside of you first, and then over time, yes, your entire circle is probably not your entire circle, but let's say I would guess probably 60 to 75 percent of a woman's circle transforms when she divorces. Yeah, I would agree with that. It's not all or nothing, but it's right.

SPEAKER_04:

No, it's like and like and maybe not just if she divorces, but like if she goes through the work to heal. If she transforms, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right, because you start threatening their sense of was true, right? When you can hold a line, when you can be integrated in yourself and not take on their emotional manipulations and like and it of course no but if they're your friends, they're your friends for a reason, like I'm sure there's some deep love there, but when you start your glow up and your secure attachment journey and start noticing actually that's not that's not mine to carry, that's not my burden, like I'm not responsible for your emotions, I'm not responsible and you start having these conversations, it threatens. Some people can't they just can't. Like I've lost friends when I lost people that I thought were my ride or dies forever because they couldn't, for one reason or another, they couldn't handle me stepping into being authentic for myself.

SPEAKER_00:

I feel like that's the theme in our program right now, is a lot of the women are saying how triggered they are by their friends' reactions around their divorce.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, that has been a huge conversation, hasn't it?

SPEAKER_00:

Or like I would never do that. How are you doing that? You should be doing this, and it's like everybody wants to have an opinion about what you're doing, which is very triggering to somebody who's trying to navigate just daily life. Right.

SPEAKER_03:

It's so much easier to have an opinion about you than it is to own my own shit, right? And I think that's how so much of our society operates.

SPEAKER_04:

And for me, I was very I was I protected him. Like I would nobody knew. Nobody knew my marriage, nobody knew my truth, right? And so nobody knew anything. And when everything kind of came out, it was very, or like when we separated and everything, like it was so like, but he's such a good man. Or, you know, like it was so because the facade, right? Yeah, it was so jarring, it was so hard for people to kind of come to grips with, and like, what did you do? And I still have family in quotes to this day who struggle with the reality of he isn't made he wasn't at the top of the podium, right? Like, and it's easier to blame and to um shift and to focus on every on something that's actually not the problem, right?

SPEAKER_03:

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Well, yeah, and I think in the context of this conversation about the holidays, like how many of us before divorce used the holidays as texture to the con, right? Like if we were all running a con within our within ourselves or within our communities or within our families or within our own marriage, right? If there was so much shit we weren't looking at, or we were trying to look at it maybe, but like it wasn't moving, whatever, right? Right. And then here come the holidays and it's texture to the con, like the family photos, the matching fiction, matching pajamas, yes, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00:

That is the time of year where you were at holidays. Biggest stage.

SPEAKER_04:

Yep. And you go to the events.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And so now here we are at the holidays, and it's like, oh, the con is over. It didn't work. And now, yeah, these things that used to distract me from my pain or help me cover or hide from it or whatever, right? It's just become such a double-edged sword. Yeah. So let's talk about all right, you're in the holiday party, you're with the people, I don't know, you're trying to pull it together this year, right? You're trying to juggle all the things, and you're panicking, right? And and you've coached yourself, like it's safe to be seen, and I'm in the process, and I'm gonna feel my feelings and all the things. But like, all right, you're at the party and you're coming unglued. What do you do now? So here's my suggestion. Feel free to add to it, right? But let's make a bathroom run pact, right? Yeah. That it is a good and healthy idea to run to the bathroom in any particular context, right? Run cold water on those wrists, start humming, and do some squats. And I really mean all three of those things, right? Like squats, humming, and cold water, they're very much somatic tools to help really get back in your body, help move the energy through, through, through, through, through. The squats help access the suppressed rage and anger, right? Because anytime women push through their hips, like the deeper you can go, the better. It's a power move. It helps release anger. The humming helps cue to the nervous system that you're safe to feel the feelings that are coming up. Because we don't regulate the nervous system to distance from pain. We use nervous system tools to re-coach ourselves that it is safe to feel. So humming cues that nervous system that it's safe to feel what's coming up. And then that water on the wrist just helps bring some water to the literal fire, right? Like grounding in the moment, maybe a little bit of a distraction, even. What would y'all add to that? Like your your ideal bathroom break, like if you are going to recover yourself in the bathroom.

SPEAKER_00:

I mean, bring a sewing kit for me because if I'm wearing leggings and I'm squatting, we might have a problem.

SPEAKER_02:

Um lol.

SPEAKER_03:

You know what my you know what my daughter does in a bathroom is she always smells the soap and like compares it. But I bet that's a very grounding thing for her when she smells the soap to see whether or not she likes it, right? Yeah, breathing the smell of the soap. Interesting.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

That's hysterical.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I think bathroom breaks are good, right? So be able to breathe, do some deep breathing, and just really get yourself focused. That's the other thing about squatting.

SPEAKER_03:

It's hard to avoid a deep breath when you're doing physical robust work.

SPEAKER_04:

I think the only thing I would change or add is I would open the window just because for me, fresh air is that's a rubric in homeopathy. It's pivotal for me. Like I if you can't go outside and take your shoes off, right? Just fresh air is very grounding to me. But also now the someone on the outside of the door is gonna hear the open, the window open, you're running water and humming. So that's actually a really funny.

SPEAKER_01:

I am safe to be seen. I am safe to be seen. I am safe to be seen.

SPEAKER_03:

My kid came home. My kid came home yesterday, and uh, there were physical signs that she was stressed. And I was like, What were you so stressed about today? She's like, I knew you were gonna ask. I'm trying to remember. And then she came back and she's like, I farted in chapel, and everybody heard it.

SPEAKER_02:

She's like, nobody said anything, but everybody heard it, and I did get so stressed out.

SPEAKER_03:

But right, it starts from such a young age, like feeling vulnerable, like you know, being human.

unknown:

Right.

SPEAKER_03:

Being human, everybody farming farts. I also read this thing. I think I reposted it to my stories. If you are not on the IG, well, if you're on the IG, but you don't follow, like, let's follow each other. Um, but I read this thing about how we celebrate so much, like marriage and like birth and whatever, and we have all these parties to announce like engagement, marriage, gender, whatever. But then when we get divorced, there's no freaking parties to like, you know, there's not the same amount of community support, right?

SPEAKER_04:

So half the sex in the city. Yeah, there's a sex in the city episode about how she throws herself a I'm single party.

SPEAKER_03:

Because she was so tired of bringing it up. Right, because she was right.

SPEAKER_04:

Because like there needs to be more I'm single party. I'm an amazing human being. I'm a single party, right?

SPEAKER_03:

Like yeah, half the planet gets or half the United States, right, gets divorced. And like, yeah, let's do better. Celebrating being human, right? It's safe to be seen while you're running the water and squatting and sewing up your pants.

SPEAKER_00:

And people want to make it into something I feel like that's so awkward still that they're not quite sure how to. And so I've been experiencing this lately because I just changed my last name back to my maiden name after being divorced for like 14 years. And so people are like congratulating me because I don't know what they thought. And they're like, Oh, is congratulations in order? Like, did you get married? And I go, No, actually, it's from my divorce. And they're like, Oh, and I'm like, No, you can congratulate me too. Like, that's fine. Like, I'll take that all day.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I'm coming home to myself, right? I'm coming home to myself. Yeah, freaking congratulate me. I'll take it. Yeah, love that. Okay, so this is a season that's incredibly painful. We're not gonna sugarcoat that, right? But and also, let's turn it into a season of power because we are talking about, we understand that all of these rituals and traditional traditions and feeling like you don't belong, these are all gonna be very real sensations. Let's own them, let's run with it, right? But also, let's own, let's congratulate ourselves, let's congratulate each other around this is a powerful, powerful, powerful season. Let's ditch the performance, let's claim the authenticity, let's come home to self and let's own this thing, this idea that everything is always working out for us. That's the real freaking power move during this season. I am feeling this horrible, horrible, horrible pain, and yet everything is always working out for me. And I think that while most people will struggle to find the truth in that sentence during this season, if you don't start claiming it now, it's all too much, it's all too heavy, it's all too hard, right? So, this is my power recommendation and my personal power move every time I'm going through something painful. When I'm not, every time something amazing happens, I'm like, hot damn, everything's working out for me. Everything's time every time something painful is happening, I'm like, hot damn, everything is always working out for me. Because if we do not turn this pain into power and purpose, we get stuck and we cannot see. We cannot see the silver lining, we cannot as efficiently move towards joy, hope, faith, growth, shedding, letting go. Too many women struggle to believe that they can have what they want, that they can be themselves, that they can manifest the shit out of their lives, right? And it starts with this power move is claiming even when you are in the bathroom having to sew up your pants, everything is always working out for you. I know y'all have watched me use this phrase for years, and I think you've also watched it work.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

What else would you add to that, you know, ways that our listeners can turn this painful holiday season into power rather than performance?

SPEAKER_00:

I would create new traditions. Like for me, that was probably one of the most exciting things. And I know I've talked about this before. I might have written an email about it or whatever, but you know, I left two days after Christmas, and so that that Christmas I spent on my friend's couch. Um, and we had my daughter and I had Christmas at her house. But the first Christmas after was like a year after I left. And I didn't have a lot of money. We were in Myrtle Beach, my daughter was um three, and we literally I call it a family dollar Christmas. I went out and bought a$25 Christmas tree.

SPEAKER_03:

I love that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, again, I had said this before, but like I'm not making a ham dinner for her and I, right? So I literally made hot dogs and shells and cheese, and then we went to the movies and we kind of kept that tradition for quite a long time. Um obsessed. It was authentic, it was so authentic, and that's the thing we're leaning into. Yes. And it was one of the best Christmases, like, and looking back at our traditions that I've ever had, and it's so funny now that she's you know 20 and she like recalls all this, and so there's different things that she asks to still do. We no longer have hot dogs and shells and cheese, but you know, it's it's just decorate.

SPEAKER_01:

That could be a dish, that could be a side dish. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00:

And you know, like we love to decorate ornaments, and sometimes we'll go to the movies, and just all these little traditions that we've picked up over the years that have made it very special for us has been. Been amazing.

SPEAKER_03:

So, ladies, what you're hearing is that if you're invited to a holiday party in Tifferdoodle's honor, you could bring shells and cheese with some hot dogs sliced up and be part of our seven.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Or you don't have to fucking go. And that's the beauty of it, right? Yeah. Like that perfectionist part of you or that image part of you that's saying, Well, I have to go. I have to save face. Girl, she is overworked. Give her a break. Lay at home.

SPEAKER_01:

That's it.

SPEAKER_00:

Put on some slippers, make some shells and cheese and hot cocoa, and just watch home alone. That is like my mantra.

SPEAKER_03:

Unless you're a craft girl. Unless you're a craft girl. And then it can't be shells and cheese. It has to be craft.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, ew, uh. Okay. Whatever. We can debate that on another. That's fine.

SPEAKER_04:

It's just such a pivotal shift. When you go from needing to be chosen to choosing you. Like you don't need a partner to feel chosen. You don't need that. You get to choose you. You get to step into your authentic self and create your own self of traditions and choices. Yeah. You're not going to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_03:

And allow the people who want to choose you to choose you. Like we choose you, right? Like if you, you know, you heard us at the top of the at the top of the show saying we we're launching this new segment about wins. Like, like lean into us. We choose you. Send us your wins. Send us your little happy, happy joy joys. Send us your tiny little something that everybody else would measure as bullshit, but we would measure it as everything because we know in this season, right, that you need to be celebrated for all the little things. Send it to us. Let us choose you. Receive that, right? Learn how to choose you by going towards the people who are claiming you as part of their tribe in a way that is healthy and whole and they're willing to witness your pain. So much of why we divorce ourselves from our own belonging is because it's really hard for people to witness pain and not try to fix it or push it down, right? And so the more you move towards people who can just sit with you and witness your pain and accept you in those painful moments without trying to numb it or laugh it off or push it away or distance from it, they can hold space for you. That helps you learn how to choose you, how to belong to you. And that's what we want to do with you over here.

SPEAKER_00:

I want to add one more thing. Please. Last thing is all of my holidays, because I had a lot of them post-divorce alone before I'm in the relationship I am now. I had like 10 or 11 Christmases that were just either me or me and my daughter. And what I will tell you is that the holidays where I felt the loneliest was when I was doing something I didn't want to do. When I accepted an invitation somewhere that I didn't really want to go. Yes.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. When you didn't honor, you didn't honor your intuition or the voice or the whatever the thing. Hot damn. Yeah. Yeah. All right, darlings. If this episode softens something inside of you, imagine, right? If you just started to claim your own power. And this week, our Thursday premium episode is a guided practice that you can use the moment your chest tightens in the freaking grocery store. Do you know how many of us have grocery store aisle stories? And how many of the women we work with have grocery store aisle stories, right? So during this holiday season, this week's Thursday episode is going to be literally a guided meditation that you can put an earbud in and you can use if you're at the party or you're at the store, you're in the car, you're wherever you are, and you are, you know, headed towards panic. It's a track to help guide you and hold you through that. So that's Thursday's episode. If you're not a premium listener, strongly recommend because we are creating an entire community just around premium listenership, right? Access to products that nobody else gets access to, um, live workshops with our team, all the access to all of the episodes that we do here at Dare Divorce Diary. And a lot of them are healing tracks, right? It's not just us talking about the things, it's actually implementing the work. So strongly recommend premium listenership and then send us your wins. Get in the habit of sending us your wins. Hello at mycoachdawn.com. Send us an email, voice note, picture, sentences, whatever it is, but just get in that habit. It is going to change your life. We love you so much. Peace.com.

Contributor

Divorce Recovery Maven Dawn Wiggins

Host