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
Ep. 362 Why Does Everything Good for Me Feel Like a Chore After Divorce?
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You know the things that would probably help.
The walk.
The boundary.
The therapy session.
The earlier bedtime.
The journal sitting untouched on your nightstand.
So why does it feel so hard to actually do them?
If you've ever found yourself reaching for your phone instead of your healing, texting your ex when you knew better, pouring another glass of wine, avoiding the hard conversation, or putting off the very thing that might help you feel better... this episode is for you.
In this conversation, Dawn explores the frustrating paradox so many women face after divorce: wanting to heal while simultaneously resisting the very things that support healing.
You'll learn why your nervous system often chooses familiar pain over unfamiliar growth, how childhood conditioning can make healthy choices feel surprisingly uncomfortable, and why this struggle has far less to do with willpower than you've been led to believe.
Most importantly, you'll walk away with a simple, practical tool to help you start choosing yourself—even when it feels hard.
Because healing isn't about being perfect.
It's about learning to recognize the moments when you're standing at a crossroads between temporary relief and lasting change.
And choosing yourself, one small decision at a time.
In This Episode:
- Why healing often feels harder than staying stuck
- The post-divorce paradox nobody talks about
- How your nervous system confuses familiar pain with safety
- The childhood patterns that may still be driving your choices
- Why self-care can feel uncomfortable at first
- A simple exercise to help you stop abandoning yourself in real time
If you've been wondering why you can't seem to follow through on the things you know would help, this episode might give you the answer you've been looking for.
You can't think your way into healing 🥵 You have to practice your way there 👭If you're ready for the next step, learn more about A Different D Word and apply here ✨
Welcome And What The Show Does
SPEAKER_00Hi, 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.
Knowing Vs Choosing Healthy Actions
SPEAKER_00You are a woman who already knows what's good for you. And if not in every way, you're learning it and you're invested in learning it. But knowing and choosing are two different beasts. Maybe it's the yoga class you keep skipping, the boundary you avoid setting, or the journal collecting dust. They call that shelf esteem. Lol. Maybe you say, I'll do it tomorrow, or I don't
Hidden Grief And Shame Behind Avoidance
SPEAKER_00have the energy. But what if the real reason you're not choosing what's healthy isn't laziness or a lack of willpower, but it's hidden grief. Maybe with a side of shame. In today's episode, we dive deep into why women fresh out of divorce struggle to choose what supports their healing, even when they know what to do.
Survival Mode And Self Rejection
SPEAKER_00We're gonna unpack the sneaky emotional loops that make short-term relief, like numbing, people pleasing, getting into a fight with your ex, feel safer. What? Than long-term healing. And how your nervous system is often still in survival mode, prioritizing comfort over growth. We're also gonna talk about why you're more afraid of being rejected by others than you are aware of how often you're rejecting yourself. This episode isn't about shaming yourself for not doing enough. It's about understanding why it feels so hard and what to do differently.
Practical Prompts And Premium Access
SPEAKER_00I'm gonna give you a very specific calendar task, plus a three-question prompt to guide you in that exact moment when you feel the urge to avoid the thing you know would help you heal. You can access the full episode by becoming a premium subscriber, which is just five dollars a month. Scroll down to the show notes and click the link where you'll get your very own individualized RSS feed for your podcast app. You deserve to stop abandoning yourself, and this episode will help you connect with how Divorce Diary is a podcast by My Coach Dawn. You can find more at mycoachdawn.com
