Dear Divorce Diary: A Fresh Approach To Healing Grief & Building A Life Of Confidence After Divorce
This isn’t a breakup pep talk. It’s a full-body recalibration for women navigating life after divorce. Dear Divorce Diary is a podcast for women dealing with grief, loneliness, anxiety, anxious or avoidant attachment, and identity loss after divorce — especially when quick fixes, positivity, and spiritual fluff no longer work.
I’m Dawn Wiggins, therapist, coach, and homeopath, and this show goes where most divorce advice won’t: into your nervous system, your unspoken grief, your buried rage, and the parts of you that shut down just to survive.
Through honest conversation, somatic tools, EMDR- and IFS-informed work, and nervous-system support, each episode helps you feel instead of perform healing — and rebuild safety, confidence, and self-trust from the inside out.
You’ll hear raw solo episodes, real voice notes from women in the trenches, and intimate conversations with experts who don’t just talk about healing — they embody it.
If you’re tired of being told to “move on” while your body is still bracing, this podcast is your place to land. Your nervous system already knows the truth — it just needs a space that can hold it.
Dear Divorce Diary: A Fresh Approach To Healing Grief & Building A Life Of Confidence After Divorce
342. I Keep Abandoning Myself When I Hurt | A Sleep Meditation for Divorce Anxiety & Heartbreak
This episode is only available to subscribers.
Dear Divorce Diary: Dedicated to Healing
Exclusive access to premium content!If you’ve been trying to hold it all together while quietly falling apart inside…
this episode is for you.
Because sometimes after divorce, the hardest part isn’t the heartbreak itself.
It’s realizing how quickly you leave yourself when the pain gets too big.
You disconnect.
Overthink.
Obsess over your ex.
Numb out.
Push through.
Care for everyone else while abandoning the parts of you that are hurting the most.
And eventually, your nervous system starts living in survival mode.
This Cocoon VIP episode is a guided sleep meditation designed to help you gently come back home to yourself.
To stay.
To breathe.
To stop emotionally disappearing every time grief, loneliness, rejection, anxiety, or heartbreak rises to the surface.
This is not about “fixing” yourself.
It’s about learning how to remain emotionally present with yourself in moments that normally trigger self-abandonment or dissociation.
Inside this guided healing track:
– Gentle nervous system regulation for divorce anxiety and emotional overwhelm
– Repetitive subconscious re-patterning affirmations
– Grounding support for dissociation and emotional shutdown
– A sleep-friendly meditation to help calm heartbreak and racing thoughts
– Support for rebuilding emotional safety and self-trust after divorce
This is the kind of episode you return to over and over again — especially on the nights when your body feels heavy with grief and your mind won’t stop spinning.
If you've been loving everyone else more than you've been loving yourself. But today's episode just land. Nothing to force. Just to receive. This is a great trap to compliment the work we did on Tuesday around self-abandonment. It's a wonderful track to fall asleep to. It will just help nug your subconscious mind in the direction you need it to go to change your reality. It will help reprogram your particular activating system. And if you're moving through your day and you feel yourself wanting to disassociate, this is a great track to listen to, to help stay grounded in safety, to feel what there is to feel and process what there is to process.
SPEAKER_03Hi, love. Welcome to Dear Divorce Diaries, the podcast helping divorce days 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 divorce day. Join me for a fresh approach to healing grief and building your confidence after divorce.
Affirmations For Ending Self Abandonment
SPEAKER_02Land in this moment. If you're cozy in the bed, just notice what it feels like to be tucked up, the pillow under your head, the cheater blanket on top, cocooned warm inside. If you're moving through your day, maybe identify some things in your environment, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can touch, name it out loud, something you can hear. Take another deep, clearing breath, and just allow yourself to receive these words. I can see how much I've been carrying. It makes sense that this has been hard. It's felt like I've been doing it all on my own. Pieces of myself trying to hold it all together. It is safe to come back home to myself. In this moment, I can turn towards me. I can feel these sensations and not leave myself. I don't have to chase the others to feel okay. I can stay here with me, all the versions of me who need the love and support of a whole self. I am receiving permission to give myself the care I've been giving them. Nothing about me is too much or not enough to stay with. I can let my attention come back home gently. I'm learning what it feels like to choose myself. Even if it's a new or uncomfortable sensation, I can stay. I don't have to understand everything about the situation to remain here emotionally supporting myself. I can stop leaving when I feel vulnerable or insecure. I can abide here with and for myself. There's nothing wrong with me for feeling this way. I can be with and for myself just as I am right now.
SPEAKER_01I am here with all of her, and I am not abandoning anymore.
Choosing Yourself Through Discomfort
Let The Words Take Root
SPEAKER_02So take a deep, clearing breath. Land in this moment. If you're cozy in the bed, just notice what it feels like to be tucked up, the pillow under your head, the sheet or blanket on top, cocooned warm inside. If you're moving through your day, maybe identify some things in your environment, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can touch, name it out loud, something you can hear. Take another deep, clearing breath, and just allow yourself to receive these words. I can see how much I've been carrying. It makes sense that this has been hard. It's felt like I've been doing it all on my own. Pieces of myself trying to hold it all together. It is safe to come back home to myself. In this moment, I can turn towards me. I can feel these sensations and not leave myself. I don't have to chase the others to feel okay. I can stay here with me, all the versions of me who need the love and support of a whole self. I am receiving permission to give myself the care I've been giving them. Nothing about me is too much or not enough to stay with. I don't have to earn my own support. I can let my attention come back home gently. I'm learning what it feels like to choose myself. Even if it's a new or uncomfortable sensation, I can stay. I don't have to understand everything about the situation to remain here emotionally supporting myself. I can stop leaving when I feel vulnerable or insecure. I can abide here with and for myself. There's nothing wrong with me for feeling this way. I can be with and for myself just as I am right now. I am here with all of her, and I am not abandoning anymore. So take a deep, clearing breath. Land in this moment. If you're cozy in the bed, just notice what it feels like to be tucked up, the pillow under your head, the sheet or blanket on top, cocooned warm inside. If you're moving through your day, maybe identify some things in your environment, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can see, name it out loud, something you can touch, name it out loud, something you can hear. Take another deep clearing breath. And just allow yourself to receive these words. I can see how much I've been carrying. It makes sense that this has been hard. It's felt like I've been doing it all on my own. Pieces of myself trying to hold it all together. It is safe to come back home to myself. In this moment, I can turn towards me. I can feel these sensations and not leave myself. I don't have to chase the others to feel okay. I can stay here with me, all the versions of me who need the love and support of a whole self. I am receiving permission to give myself the care I've been giving them. Nothing about me is too much or not enough to stay with. I don't have to earn my own support. I can let my attention come back home gently. I'm learning what it feels like to choose myself. Even if it's a new or uncomfortable sensation, I can stay. I don't have to understand everything about the situation to remain here emotionally supporting myself. I can stop leaving when I feel vulnerable or insecure. I can abide here with and for myself. There's nothing wrong with me for feeling this way. I can be with and for myself just as I am right now. I am here with all of her, and I am not abandoning anymore. Allow these words to sink into your body-mind like a garden you are watering. Allow these words to be part of your becoming to take root over time. It may surprise you that the next time you have one of these tense moments where you are tempted to self-abandon, how one of these phrases may pop in at the moment you need it most. Listening to tracks like these over and over again is installing a resource into your own subconscious mind. It's expanding your capacity over time. Give yourself the gift of learning how to stay. We love you so much. Peace.
