Exploring Alternatives: From functional medicine to non-traditional living situations

In this episode of the Divorce Curious Podcast, host Lisa Mitchell and functional medicine expert Sarah Scott-Weaver MSN, FNP-C, IFMPC, HN-BC dive into some seriously life-changing topics for anyone who is going through changes in their health and relationships. They're chatting about how functional medicine and living in a supportive community can totally transform your health journey, especially if you're dealing with stress and big life changes. Trust me, you don't want to miss this!

Takeaways

• Functional medicine is like a holistic health makeover.
• Stress hormones can mess with your mojo, but there's hope!
• Find a hormone-savvy healthcare provider who gets to the root of things.
• Living intentionally in a community can be your emotional safety net.
• Women are rethinking life choices during health transitions.
• Your social life is just as important as your physical health.
• Community living can be more romantic and supportive than you think.
• Women are craving spaces that feel safe and share the load, and many are finding that through platonic shared living arrangements 

About Sarah Scott-Weaver:

Sarah Scott-Weaver is a functional medicine nurse practitioner who understands firsthand how deeply life transitions—like divorce—can impact a woman’s body, mind, and sense of self. She works with women in midlife who are ready to stop surviving and start caring for themselves more deeply. Through a holistic, compassionate approach, Sarah helps women support their hormones, thyroid, gut, and mental health while embracing root-cause self-care and building a life that truly feels aligned. 

 You can connect with Sarah and explore her work through her Linktree at https://linktr.ee/entouragefunctionalmedicine. Inside her free Holistic Health Hub, she shares guides, videos, and educational resources on gut health, thyroid health, hormones, and mental well-being. You’ll also find links to her social media and the option to book a complimentary one-on-one call to discuss your health goals and what working together could look like.  

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Have a comment for me or a topic you want to see covered on the podcast? Email me at lisa@lisamitchell.biz

Connect with me on Instagram at @divorcecurioushelp

Transcript

Lisa Mitchell (00:00)
All right, welcome to another episode of the Divorce Curious Podcast. Today, I'm telling you y'all are in for a treat. Like I know I say that a lot, but I'm super, super excited today to welcome my guest, Sarah Scott Weaver. She has more letters behind her name than I think anybody else that I've ever had on any of my podcasts, which is saying a lot because I've had a lot of really credentialed people on.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (00:03)
you

Lisa Mitchell (00:23)
But Sarah, you are a doer of many things, not the least of which is a true medical professional in the functional medical space. And I would love for you to introduce yourself in whatever way you want to, to our audience here at Divorce Curious. And we will continue to unpack the myriad of skills and expertise that you have throughout our conversation.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (00:45)
Well, first of all, Lisa, thank you so much for this opportunity. It's fun to like be on here and share a little bit of my story. so I am a functional medicine nurse practitioner. have a concierge practice that I do telehealth in, Indiana, Texas, and Washington States. And I'm also a holistic nurse. So.

I've really had the opportunity in the process of like going through my divorce and building a business in the last five years to completely rearrange my lifestyle. And I know that's part of what we want to dive in together today.

Lisa Mitchell (01:28)
Yes,

yes, there's so much. Like I love, you're like this amazing, incredible, I don't wanna say like onion, but like the layers of what I know of you already. And just so those of you listening or watching know like Sarah and I are kind of recent acquaintances, kindred spirits, if you will. We were introduced by an amazing divorce coach, Leah Gia Quinta who was on season one of the Divorce Curies podcast. You should check out that episode.

Leah has recently managed to bring this great collaborative of women together. And I've gotten the opportunity to know Sarah and several others that you all will be meeting as well here soon through that effort. And the thing I love is like each one of us delivers our skill set and works within our passion with the main benefactor really being how do we care for women?

who are going through transition. And that can be from married to divorced, reevaluating their relationship, going through the different phases of their lives and their chronological phases and everything from perimenopause to menopause in this really interesting thread that seems to be emerging between women

beginning their journey through perimenopause and menopause and absolutely having no tolerance for bullshit of any kind at all anymore. I would love Sarah and your practice and in your circle and just I know I'm seeing it everywhere and it's like a hot topic on, know, Oprah was even talking about, you know, the gray divorce phase and her fad or,

Sarah Scott-Weaver (02:56)
Yep.

reach.

Mm-hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (03:12)
revelation that's happening now. And it's kind of in this collective consciousness about this, this army of women that are perimenopausal or menopausal that are reevaluating everything about how their life looks. What are you seeing with the people that you are helping through these different transitions?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (03:24)
Yep, we're done.

Yeah, so a lot of the women that are lot of the clients that I'm coming to me are coming to me for hormonal care and they are tired of being gaslit, not only in their homes, but in the doctor's office as well. And I think that what we are seeing is, you I know the biochemical process that happens behind that. And a lot of that has to do

Lisa Mitchell (03:41)
Mmm.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (03:55)
with our stress hormones actually depleting our sex hormones. So it's like this hormonal floor that just pulls out from underneath us. And I think it dictates a lot of new symptoms or symptoms that are exasperated during this phase, insomnia, irritability, anxiety, depression.

Lisa Mitchell (04:00)
Really?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (04:20)
And a lot of these women are very misdiagnosed. go to their family practice person and they put them on a SSRI, antidepressant. And that doesn't really treat the root cause of what's going on for them. And a lot of them will not actually get a whole lot of relief from that treatment because it's the wrong solution entirely.

Lisa Mitchell (04:43)
Yes. Okay. So this is so interesting because I, you know, I'm going through this, my pretty much everyone in my friend circle and everyone in my professional circle, we're all of similar ages and we're at ⁓ different stages of transition, but everybody is kind of in this, what the hell is going on? who is this person? ⁓

Who is this person whose body I'm waking up in every day, right? And it's been so jarring in a lot of the conversations that I'm having that it's A, it's what's happening? B, it's like, what do I do about it? Because I realize I'm snapping at my husband. I don't have patience with my kids. I can't put up with anything at work anymore. I have zero tolerance for anything.

I don't know, I know this isn't my normal way of being, but I don't feel depressed and I don't like it. It's all these murky puzzle pieces that have people throwing darts in the dark, right? And to your point, I know some women that have gone to their traditional, you know, family doctors or GPs or even like their OBGYNs and

Sarah Scott-Weaver (05:35)
Mm-hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (05:47)
because you can get a comprehensive panel done and it still looks like normal because it's only tracking certain phases or things, right? Like it's not really testing the right thing or returning the comprehensive results. Nothing's wrong. You must be depressed, right? So, or nothing's wrong. So here's some, what's the one they put everybody on? The antidepressant.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (06:02)
Mm.

like Prozac or Zoloft Yeah. Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (06:10)
Yes, right. It's Olaf, right. Like it's

something here's a, here's a, know, and then they're giving it so casually as okay, well, this isn't a real problem, but we'll, we'll give you this so you can start to feel better. Right. And then that comes with all sorts of other side effects that they feel blindsided by because nobody explains what it does. So it's like this, weird ball. So tell me about what is an alternative approach if we

Sarah Scott-Weaver (06:17)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (06:36)
feel like we're literally taking crazy pills and nothing is really putting us back in that energetic and mental and emotional state that we want to be at.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (06:45)
Yeah, I mean, we're in a great phase of life right now. You know, we know who we are. Most women have had enough life experience that given the right support, we can be a touch point for the other people in our lives. And what happens with a lot of these antidepressants is where it turns this phase where we can really like

be in our bodies and love our bodies and start to really love sex into really blunted feelings around that. So really what we can do is partner up with a hormone savvy clinician that is going to not only look at the really basic things, but expand what we're looking at.

There's lots of tests out there that are covered by insurance. And if you utilize them correctly, like for instance, just taking the typical hormone panel and actually calculating the ratios, labs that look normal are actually not well balanced. just pairing with somebody who is going to do much deeper testing can be huge, but also really starting to look at this piece of

Lisa Mitchell (07:50)
Hmm.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (08:00)
this reawakening that happens. This happens for a reason. We are really starting to understand that life is passing us by and these uncomfortable feelings that are coming up are giving us clues about what's working and what's not working for us. So this really can be a time of redefining who we are, what we want out of life, what our partnerships look like.

what our homes look like, and start to nurture ourselves and our community of women in a way that we have this life that becomes more beautiful. We have these romantic moments in the garden with our cups of tea and our dogs and all of that stuff. And really can reevaluate who's in our life

that feels emotionally safe, who helps our nervous system stay out of that fight or flight state, and start choosing situations that feel more emotionally safety with people that are willing to share responsibilities and create laughter that helps restore that balance in our body's stress systems.

Lisa Mitchell (09:07)
Yeah, I love that. think what I heard you say is it's this way for a reason. These are data points. And it is an opportunity to really check in with yourself. it's so interesting. I coach a lot of women. the way, and even I even struggle with this. Like I did a retreat recently and the word I used,

Sarah Scott-Weaver (09:15)
Mm. Mm-hmm.

You're done.

Lisa Mitchell (09:31)
to describe the experience was indulgent. it felt indulgent, it felt selfish for me to be taking time to figure out what I wanted and how I felt and to get new tools about certain things. it's and then I got mad because I'm like, I'm so pissed off that we're living in a time where a woman deciding to be reflective and to have support.

and to take the time to evaluate what we even want and what we feel, brings on shame and guilt and feelings of selfishness because we're literally humans. Why do we feel so bad investing in ourselves and being curious about our own desires and what's good for us versus what's given to us and the impact on our bodies, right? the cortisol, I would love for you to say more about

Sarah Scott-Weaver (10:07)
Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (10:17)
the impact of what cortisol and what stress hormones and what kind of sometimes that life on autopilot or constant crisis and demand mode, what does that do to women?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (10:27)
Yeah, so I like to think of this like, you know, I spend my time between the Pacific Northwest and the Midwest and both places I love to hike. I like to go on to trails and I want you to kind of think of your hormones as hiking trails. So usually there's a point where you start and then the trail will fork off in lots of different directions. And so we start with

What we start with is the same building blocks, pregnant alone and cholesterol. So this is why it's important to take a whole body approach to hormones. If you have low cholesterol, that's a problem. And with people getting put on statins in their 30s, 40s and 50s, this can be something that can really take out our hormones.

Pregnant alone is a master hormone and it's not something that's typically tested when you go to a GYN or you go to a family practice doctor, but a lot of functional medicine people will test it because when you're looking for a solution that's a little more upstream, a little bit more root cause based, supplementing pregnant alone will often trickle down those hiking trails and have everything kind of

balance out on its own. You don't have to go in and do a little thing for every point. So what happens when your body gets stressed is it chooses the easiest trail. And the easiest trail is to go to cortisol. And so if you have limited pregnenolone and you have limited cholesterol, your body's gonna do a default to make stress hormones. And that means you have less to make

progesterone, which is the first thing to go. And that's what makes you insomnia, anxiety, hair fall out, like start to age, all of that. And then what happens next is your testosterone, which is your sex drive, muscle mass, brain power, focus, and then estrogen, which is a lot about weight gain, inflammation, and then our cycle being regulated.

So what we want to do is recognize that even if you're not, you you're past divorce and you've got your life settled down and you're still in that phase where you're between teenagers and aging parents and juggling a career, the best thing you can do for your hormones is to look at the stress pathways and really support

go in and support that. You can do that with a lot of lifestyle factors and you can do that with herbs and you can do that with something we call adaptogens, which are different agents that help keep those cortisol levels between the telephone poles.

Lisa Mitchell (13:15)
But yeah, I mean, this is part of where my default response to this is my God, I love it. And also why doesn't anybody tell people about this? I know that you're very intentional in your practice that this is something that, know, education is a big part of it. And part of why you're on the podcast and doing the work that you're doing is because yeah, like we should know about this. there are things besides.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (13:26)
Yeah. Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (13:41)
SSRIs and band-aids and exercise more and eat more protein and you know things that are well intentioned but maybe not gonna produce that rejuvenation and that return to yourself, Or optimize self that most women are really, really, really looking for and hoping to be able to find somebody to guide them back into that not feeling so insane all the time phase of life.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (14:05)
Yeah, yeah,

absolutely. And I think what happens a lot of times, you know, in my practice is sometimes women will be panicked. They'll be like, fix me, Sarah, fix me, fix me. And what we really have to start looking at is what, not only are you doing the protein and a little bit of exercise and are you getting sleep and hydrating, but what does your social health look like? Because that social health really equals biological health.

And we know that strong social bonds improve immune function and reduce inflammation and increase longevity. This is why single women live longer than married women do, right?

Lisa Mitchell (14:48)
That's like, I

love how often that stat and how often that reality is shared. Like it's, the perfect defense. It's the perfect defense, right? Especially for the audience of this show, of the Divorce Curious show that have either in the considering it, weighing their options and the thick of it right now, trying to make it to the other side or on the other side, figuring out what's what the new life, what the new normal looks like, right?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (14:54)
It's true! Yeah.

Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (15:13)
that piece of it, that stat. So tell me a little bit more about, I know we talked before we started recording today about this idea of community and this idea of kind of re-imagining what household looks like and re-imagining what family looks like and re-imagining what, you know, really what that community of support in life looks like. how are, how, I know you've re-imagined it.

in a couple of different versions of your life. And I would love for you to share kind of the precipice of that and the outcome that you're seeing from that.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (15:44)
Yeah, yeah. So when I went through my divorce, I really started to think about a lot about what it actually means to build a life and with someone and really whether that had to be a romantic partner. So there's so much pressure around having a romantic partner as a marketer of success. And the truth is,

I have lived in intentional community several times. I was in AmeriCorps and Triple C and we lived in a community environment then, which is like a national peace corps type situation. And then later I lived in Koinonia Partners in Georgia, which was an intentional community built on a shared purpose and in service to others. So I think that seed of intentional living had already been planted in me.

And I've always known that deep connection and those shared values create an environment where I thrive. So after my divorce, one of the options that I had was to live with my friend Kirsten. And Kirsten and met in the seventh grade lunch line. We've been friends for 35 years and we both realized we wanted to create a peaceful, supportive home where we could grow.

And that's really what we've done. And we share a lot of similar values. We both love to travel. We like our home to be cozy and neat. We both value laughter and play. We value having nourishing food. And we both really wanted to have a sense of calm. I have a teenager and we have three dogs. So we wanted to make sure we were making an environment that really not only helped ourselves, but these

beings that we have care for. But beyond that, it's been an incredible exchange of support, emotional, practical, and even financial. So for example, last year was a big turning point for both Kirsten and I. We had, I had to pivot my practice pretty quickly in a really big way, which meant that I was going to lose about half of my income between the time that I made the pivot and I made that jump.

or created more clientele. And I was seriously considering getting another job just to make ends meet. And Kirsten said to me, I'm going to float you. I want you to focus on your business. And that support really changed everything. And so today I'm standing in a place where I'm doing only my practice. And that's such a gift. Later that year, Kirsten was in a motor vehicle accident.

and sustained a pretty serious brain injury. And because of my skills in the medical profession and functional medicine, I was really able to step in and help her navigate the healing and care process. And that to me brought home to what exactly a partnership is. It's mutual, it's this unwavering support that isn't built on romance at all, though we have romantic moments, right?

sunshine and all the beauty and we always have fresh flowers in our house. We probably have more romance in our house than when we both had husbands. But it's really about friendship and trust and shared values. So in functional medicine, we're always talking about how that lifestyle and connection are forms of medicine.

Lisa Mitchell (18:50)
Right, right, yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (19:04)
And what I've experienced with living with my friend like exactly like that is there's this healing power of community, emotional safety and reciprocity. So then we are both have strengths in different areas. I like to cook. So I make sure that there's healthy food in the fridge for Kirsten who has a very busy, busy, busy work schedule. She's working two jobs. She's killing it.

with the fact that she's had a brain injury and able to manage all of that. But keeping that and like keeping the house cozy, Kiersten is very good at, I'm a little bit more of an introvert and Kiersten is very good about those social networks. So she's always dragging me out to networking and parties and has helped me grow in that way. So it's not just about like the nuts and bolts of

who's gonna pay the bills and my gosh, the mortgage is kind of expensive. But it's also those really wonderful things that happens when you have a fulfilling partnership in your life.

Lisa Mitchell (20:05)
Wow, so I'm sitting here thinking, as I'm sure many of the people watching or listening to this right now are, is like, damn, that sounds pretty nice, right? And when you compare it to, when I compare it to how the dynamic and the intentionality or lack thereof of previous households that I've had, you know, with, by my ex-husband or other roommates or situations, it's like the fact that...

you have been able to find someone who is not a romantic partner and not contractually bound to act like they care about you and be able to establish these norms and these rules and these ways of being and in this alignment, I think is a beautiful and I love that in those times of real great need or when support is really like the thing that makes or breaks the outcome that

Sarah Scott-Weaver (20:37)
Mm-hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (20:57)
you two were able to look not only to your point, the practicality of how does your household run, but like how do, how do we care for each other as people who are sharing space and sharing energetic life together? And I think, I think that's so beautiful. And I, it, it always challenges me to wonder who benefits from more people not adopting this possibility, right? I talk about it with, I,

Sarah Scott-Weaver (21:06)
Thank

Lisa Mitchell (21:23)
I talk about it with my girlfriends all the time. I joke with my best friend. I'm like, okay, when are you gonna ditch your husband so we can, you we were roommates together when we were 18 and 19. I'm like, when do we get to be roommates again? And when do we get to do life? And my other friend, you know, we both have these big houses and now that our kids are grown, we have lots of empty rooms and to the point of putting them on furnish finder to have traveling healthcare workers or whatever take up our space. And it's like,

We're both paying these big mortgages. We're both paying all these expenses. The single tax is so expensive and it's so real. And yet I have never seriously been able to find anybody in my circle who's like, yeah, for real, put one of our houses on the market, drop whatever paperwork we need to draw up to feel good about, you know, the joint responsibility of this investment and this way of living and let's fricking do it.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (21:52)
Hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (22:19)
You know, and I don't care. frankly, I don't care if that's a female friend or a male friend or whoever, it makes so much sense to me and everybody talks about it. I mean, the number, the number of comments you see about when do we start our commune or when do all our friends just want to live in a tiny house village and have a meeting house in the middle to have meals everybody from the female perspective, not everybody, I will say there seems to be a wide acceptance and almost

Sarah Scott-Weaver (22:26)
No.

Lisa Mitchell (22:45)
longing for or excitement around this idea of doing life like this. But when it comes to the execution, and I know that's where most of us are like, yeah, it sounds like a great idea, right? And then it dies. And so you've been able to translate that. And again, you shared you had a little bit of experience and kind of we'll say non, I hate to say non-traditional because who made the stupid tradition, but

Sarah Scott-Weaver (22:51)
Mm.

Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (23:11)
but what we commonly think of as household structures. If somebody was thinking, me, what advice do you give me knowing that I'm really serious about this? how do you find other people in alignment? What would you think to take it from theory to action? what are some practical steps that you found successful in your way of re-imagining what your household looked like?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (23:32)
You know, I think I took the deep dive into it and I don't regret it. But there has been times when I in my single motherhood where I didn't necessarily, I wasn't in a space where I wanted to live with another human, but starting to have friends that recognize that just raising kids and maintaining households

are a lot of work to do by yourself and creating moments where you guys are working together. So maybe it is starting off with having a soup party and everybody brings a soup and everybody brings mason jars and you guys swap and share soups and you take lunch home with you for the week. Maybe it's some sort of chore exchange.

somebody out there that in your life that likes to do laundry more than they like to do dishes, right? And doing some sort of swap with that. Maybe it's creating a family dinner moment. Maybe that's the thing that you miss the most or never really had like that calm family dinner in your marriage. And that's something you want to model and create for your children.

and making an agreement with another intentional human in your life to say, okay, every second Sunday, you do the main dish and I'll do the sides and we'll keep it simple and bring some paper plates. So thinking of like those little places where you're feeling like that, I mean, I am tired of doing this part by myself and putting it out there and trying to find somebody who

is willing to do like a little bit of an exchange around that. And I think that really starts off, know, Kirsten and I didn't go from zero to 60 in our friendship in that way. And we have had over those 35 years times that we were really close and times that we didn't speak to each other for a couple of years. And for us, it was maybe a little easier because I am spending time between these two places.

and I could come and stay with her for periods of time. So there was like a little bit of a trial run for us to see how well, you you don't know what people's habits are until you've been in the space with them for a little bit. Sometimes there's like the strangest little thing, the little quirk that they have that just is, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean, to be real, there are some things that we've had to work through. ⁓

Lisa Mitchell (25:51)
yeah.

You're like, nope, can't do it, won't work.

What is, what's one of the

things that you guys like when you think about your journey, you've shared some things that have worked really well. What have been some of the challenges to navigate from like a real talk perspective?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (26:13)
Yeah.

Yeah, so from a real talk perspective, Kirsten doesn't have children. She's never wanted to have children. And I have a 14 year old girl. And anybody who's had a 14 year old girl in their house knows exactly what that means. And while my daughter is a very sweet person, she's also having her own hormonal fluctuations. And she's a little neurodivergent herself. So I've got two. ⁓

Lisa Mitchell (26:30)
Uh-huh.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (26:42)
neurodivergent people in the house that don't really understand each other very well. And so we've had to do a little bit of I've had to do a little refereeing sometimes around that and like conversations about, okay, this is how my daughter's brain works. This is how Kirsten's brain works. Can you see why this person ended up, you know, saying that thing or blew their top or

maybe you guys aren't understanding each other totally. So there's been a little bit of that. And I would say, know, with the, with a brain injury, it does change your personality some, it changes, you know, she had it in the midst of perimenopause. So it was like a double whammy as far as ⁓ just that bandwidth was completely, completely gone. And so

Lisa Mitchell (27:21)
wow. Yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (27:28)
⁓ So those are things that we've had to work through. I think the easier things to work through is like who's doing laundry on what day and that sort of thing. And then I think we've also had some challenges as far as like, what are you thinking? As far as the sometimes, and we've done it to each other as far as dating goes. ⁓ Like, whoa, that's not something I'd put up with, but we...

Lisa Mitchell (27:47)
Yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (27:53)
have enough awareness, self-awareness and self-reflection to understand and listen to each other and work through those things. So it's a you know it's much different than marriage and I would choose it any day over living with an angry man child. But it still there's times it still does feel like work.

Lisa Mitchell (28:16)
Yeah, okay, I have two questions that I'm fascinated by. First of all,

Sarah Scott-Weaver (28:18)
Yeah. Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (28:20)
Does your daughter ever question, what are we doing? Why is our household like this? Why do we live? Why is there another adult woman in this house? what are we doing? Nobody, other people's families don't look like this. is there any of that? I mean, I'm just thinking of what I would hear from my daughter at 14. ⁓ She's 20 now and our conversations are different, but if I find a way to make this situation work in my life, she's probably gonna be like, mom, what are you doing? why would you do that?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (28:35)
Yeah.

Yeah,

yeah, I think my daughter's pretty open-minded around things and I could see if you were raised in a situation where, you know, like a fundamentalist Christian kind of situation where that would feel very weird. But the way that I've raised her is we've traveled quite a bit and we've lived in different places and part of her education was doing some world schooling.

So I think that she's seen these family structures that are different and she doesn't even question it. She's not even questioned it for us. And because we were coming and spending time here for months at a time, this feels like home. wasn't like a big, because we moved from Indiana to Washington state so she could go to high school here. She got accepted to this really exceptional high school. So I think there was a little soft buffer. It wasn't like an olive.

Lisa Mitchell (29:18)
love that. Yeah.

Hmm.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (29:40)
all of, you know, one day we're just gonna do this massive change. It was in increments and I think that's really helped her adjust well to the situation.

Lisa Mitchell (29:48)
Got it.

Love that. Okay. And then, okay, I had another question. Let me think what it was. ⁓ how does dating work? Like, how does it work when there is a serious partner in the mix and someone else, you know, as the promo goes, a hot new bombshell enters the villa, right? when one of you or both of you are having some sort of really romantic relationship and that other energy is in the house. How does that?

Do you guys have ground rules about that? I'm really curious on both the logistics and the energetics of that.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (30:14)
Yeah.

So Kirsten has a partner that a romantic partner, they've been together for four years. He lives four doors down. Neither one of them have the intention of moving in with each other. And so what that has looked like for us, I think the rub has been like, he's been vocal about his political views. I don't agree. And I really had to ask that

Lisa Mitchell (30:29)
Love that.

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (30:43)
if she had the understanding that if things got, the conversation got out of control or was disrupting the peace of the house, that I could ask him to leave our home. And so that was an agreement that we made. And so her situation has been pretty steady as far as like the same person. I'm still fairly new to dating and finding my feet underneath me. And so what I've chosen to do,

is to not have my romantic partners yet in the house, like in the house spending the night. Because what is 100 % my priority is stability for my daughter. And I just don't feel like she needs to do that dating process with me of getting used to somebody and then having to say goodbye to them when it doesn't work out. So what I've done is I've gone on my dates or I've even done overnights.

Lisa Mitchell (31:28)
Yeah. Yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (31:34)
with lovers and Kirsten stays home and hangs out with Oli that night. So she gives me the space to go and explore that relationship. And I know that my daughter is well taken care of. There's somebody in the house that loves her and is engaging with her and making sure that she's safe. it gives me that base to be able to go out and explore in that way, a deeper way. And

Also, it also gives me that base of like, I don't really want to put up with anything less than emotional safety these days. It kind of spoils you in a way. Because the companionship and the shared values and the emotional safety are so like in line and locked in. Like, I'm sorry if you can't offer that to me then.

Lisa Mitchell (32:14)
Yeah, yeah, you know, I, yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (32:27)
I'm not interested.

Lisa Mitchell (32:28)
Well, and that's so funny. I love to hear you say that because I have always said that my girlfriends have set an incredibly high bar for anyone that I try to date because they have, I know what support and love and psychological safety and physical safety and generosity looks like. I'm lucky in the fact that I have people

in my life, have emotional stakeholders in my life that have modeled, I have friends that'll bring me flowers and I have friends that buy us tickets to go do things that I want to do because they just know I'll like it, right? And I try to be that practice, being that great partner and reciprocate, Or initiate that kind of thing because A, I get joy out of seeing the people I love be happy and experience the things they want to experience, you know? And B, it's good practice for me to be the partner that I hope to attract.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (33:01)
you

Mm-hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (33:22)
at some point, And so, but it also is very difficult then when, and I haven't dated in quite a while by choice is I just needed a nice long palate cleanser because I wasn't finding that same level of care and intentionality and generosity and thoughtfulness. I wasn't finding that from the people that I was meeting on the dating ⁓ landscape. And so I'm like, you know what? I'm getting that.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (33:46)
Mm-hmm.

Lisa Mitchell (33:48)
I'm getting poured into and I'm getting those thoughtful gestures and I'm getting those acts of care from other sources. So it keeps me from having that desperate, I'll take the crumbs that anybody gives me kind of energy, it would be really difficult to date me now because my standards, because of the modeling and the experiences that I've had with non-romantic partners.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (34:02)
Yeah, it was.

Lisa Mitchell (34:12)
It only goes up from there, right? the expectation only gets higher. Now I'm willing to reciprocate and be thoughtful in the same way, but most people that I found are on the dating market are not coming from that same level of ⁓ intentionality. Yeah, intentionality, thoughtfulness. Yeah, yeah. It's funny when your friends spoil you so much, it's hard to date you.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (34:14)
Yeah.

Dapones. ⁓ Yeah, Dapones. Yeah.

Yeah, I always, I've done it a couple of times, like if being gay was a choice, I would, I would, it would be like a one and done. I, that, that I'd be in a happy relationship right now.

Lisa Mitchell (34:42)
Dude, all day.

Right, women are

prettier, they smell better, they're cleaner, they're more thoughtful, right? Like they have style. I'm ⁓ why, why? Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (34:54)
Yeah

Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (35:02)
Yeah,

it definitely is more evidence that it is not a choice. Definitely not a choice.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (35:07)
Yeah. Yeah,

absolutely. And I think it's just, you know, I think the big, takeaway is after divorce, people's nervous systems are often in this prolonged fight or flight state and that's high cortisol state to begin with. And then gosh, our adrenals get tired. And then that that's when there's the low cortisol and we're feeling extremely exhausted at that point. You're waking up tired.

And so choosing a living environment and situations, whether that's not a living, like necessarily you're choosing to live with another friend, but choosing to be involved in groups that have emotional safety and shared responsibility and laughter can actually restore the balance in your body's stress system. Your cortisol, your heart rate variability, it can help be restorative.

Lisa Mitchell (35:55)
Mmm.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (36:00)
in your sleep as well. So maybe the start is just finding a nice yoga studio or a nice meditation group with thoughtful humans in it that can model good relationships.

Lisa Mitchell (36:15)
Yeah, I love that. think sometimes to your earlier comment, right? It's like people come in in a panic and they're just like, fix me, like fix me, fix me, fix me. And we're so used to being sold like, well the right medication will fix you or the right this or that. And it's not that some of those things can't be really helpful, but I love your approach in the conversation we've had here today to really be thoughtful about zooming out and realizing that there are smaller, more

Sarah Scott-Weaver (36:29)
huh.

Lisa Mitchell (36:42)
controllable choices that we can make that can help facilitate that restoration and facilitate that ongoing healthy environment and help to kind of reset the balance and equilibrium. And yeah, the chemical situation, based on aging or cycle, kind of phase of life that you're in, there's a lot of situational things and a lot of relational elements that not only,

feel good from a physical safety standpoint, but also then it sounds like in your experience, actually help the body regulate and stabilize and heal and be able to kind of get to that internal status of more, more peacefulness and optimism and returning to feeling like, know, who the hell you are and what's happening to you.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (37:27)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. I think in functional medicine, we realize that there's not a one size fits all approach. And that is the same for relationships and living arrangements. And we are in a space in life that we get to rewrite the script for what thriving looks like. So that whether that's choosing to live differently with a friend or looking at Googling and seeing what kind of co-housing or community models.

are nearby is really similar to how we approach functional medicine, which is looking at root causes and personalized solutions.

Lisa Mitchell (38:04)
Mm, I love that. I love that. can't say it any better than that. I'm gonna let that be our kind of last big, big thought here. I would love to help people. I know I learned a lot in this short episode. I'm gonna have a lot of questions for you on our next Baddie Chat because my wheels are turning. Where can somebody go to connect with you further and start to get more curiosity around, like, how else?

How else can I start to help myself feel better?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (38:32)
Yeah, absolutely. have ⁓ my website is entourage.fm. N T O U R A G F dot com. And I have a lot of community events. So last night I had one called gathering ground with a therapist. So there's recreating intentionally here creating these circles of women that can gather around and just

take a breather for a moment and learn a little bit of information and help support each other. And then we're also doing quite a bit of same therapist, Beckett Berkhorn. We're doing integration circles for people that are curious about or have experienced psychedelic therapy. So everyone's welcome to those as well. And there's in-person and online options for both of those. So if you go onto my website, that will...

help you like if you want to try a community type thing, but you can also book a phone call with me and I'd be glad to chat with you for 15 minutes. And even if the intention is not necessarily around working with me from a functional medicine standpoint, I'm always glad to be a sounding board and give resources. It's like part of what I feel is important in giving is to be able to

Use all those letters behind my name to help make people's lives better.

Lisa Mitchell (39:56)
⁓ I love that. I love that. Your vibe is so good. Your heart is huge. Your generosity is palpable. So thank you so much for being a resource for the Divorce Curious audience here and for everybody else that you take your time to pour into and to serve and to use your skills and credentials and heart towards helping them find kind of their next best way of being.

Again, that was entouragefm.com. I'll link information in the show notes as well. So we'll make sure that you can connect with Sarah. Connect with Sarah, connect with her community, spend some time on the website. There's a ton of great resources there. Yeah, I just, we've covered so much in this episode, everything from kind of the nuts and bolts chemistry and approaches all the way to the other ways you can help reconsider your life and your.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (40:28)
Yeah!

Lisa Mitchell (40:45)
your household and your family structure and your support systems. And I just think it's, man, if there was ever a time when women were ready to just burn it all down and figure out a way to do it better, ⁓ we're there. I think we're going to be there. even saw, you know, we're recording this the beginning of November 2025. And today, as I was like getting my lunch ready, NBC did a segment on modern parenting.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (40:55)
and

Lisa Mitchell (41:09)
And it was two women who were friends who were living together and sharing expenses and collaboratively raising their children, talking about how they aligned on our approach and environment, just exactly what we talked about here, the intentionality. So I am encouraged that the conversation is being amplified and that women are being given. And I think too for, you know,

Sarah Scott-Weaver (41:20)
Thank you.

Lisa Mitchell (41:33)
dads that find themselves divorced or men that find themselves divorced. Like they're starved for community and for wellness as much as women. So I really hope that with conversations like ours today, Sarah, in the more broad awareness of it's okay to look at things differently and approach, you're creating an environment that you thrive in from a little more innovative and really supportive kind of way than what most people have the privilege of experiencing now under quote unquote normal.

Right. So, Sarah, thank you so much for being here with us on Divorce Curious today. Again, for those listening and watching, I'm going to have everything loaded up in show notes. I'll share it out on social. Take some time, put it on your to-do list, follow up with Sarah. Check out EntourageFM.com and start, you know, challenging yourself to see what's one little thing you can do today to make yourself feel a little bit better. We, think we have, we've learned today we have

Sarah Scott-Weaver (42:26)
more connected.

A little more connected, right? Send that voice note, send that text to your friend that you have seen, ask somebody out for coffee, find somebody who wants to go grocery shopping with you. That kind of friendship is not valued enough. It doesn't have to be fancy dinners, right?

Lisa Mitchell (42:27)
We have a little... Yeah, we have...

I agree.

I love my errands, my errand friends, like, hey, I'm going to Costco, you wanna come, that's, and we might grab a cart and separate and see each other again in the parking lot. It didn't matter. Like just even the chit chatting in the car and all that, like.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (42:48)
Yeah.

Yeah. Well, you want

a gallon of orange juice? Sure, I'll take some eggs, right?

Lisa Mitchell (43:00)
We do, I do, sent like everybody that

comes over, I send swap. Like I had a girlfriend over, we did like some body doubling, because we both had stuff to get through on Sunday. And I made a double batch of chicken noodle soup and sent a big bowl home with her family and some, you know, for her family, she's got kids at home that are in and out all the time. And A, it gives me joy to do that. B, it helps her, it helps her kids, you know, it takes one less thing off her brain that she needs to try to figure out. And

I love it that like that's kind of a joyful, like that's a joyful exchange, right? And I have a hard time receiving, I'm working on it. ⁓ But also I feel very, very cared for when somebody even thinks about, this could help make Lisa's life a little bit easier. I will be so loyal to somebody who puts me on their things to think about list, because it just, feels good to be seen. And I think we can all challenge ourselves. Who can you see today?

Sarah Scott-Weaver (43:31)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (43:49)
When you're done listening to this podcast, like, share, comment, right? Cause that's what we say here at the end of these things. But more importantly, pick up your phone, get in your car, go find a friend, deliver something that you know they'll enjoy or invite them to join you on something and just get in the same space and check in. And that's, that's one step towards lowering your cortisol and increasing your psychological safety and creating more community. So it's not as hard as we, we don't have to blow up our whole life all at one time.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (43:49)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Nope,

Lisa Mitchell (44:18)
or ever, we can integrate these little things. I've done it.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (44:18)
nope. You can totally mix it, like, oh, yeah, like you have done it a couple of times too. And it's always been, yeah. But sometimes that rearrangement needs to happen, right? So, yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (44:25)
Not good for the cortisol level, I can tell you that much.

Sometimes that is the move, but you don't have to

feel like you have to be ready to blow up your whole life before you can start making things incrementally and significantly better with just a few little tweaks and some intentional thinking. So, all Sarah, I'm gonna let you go before I start yapping again, or we're gonna be here for a million years. But good news is you and I get to yap more whenever we want. And we might invite our friends here at Divorce Curious to come back and yap again with us, because this was fun and I'm sure we're gonna get a lot of questions and comments.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (44:42)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Lisa Mitchell (44:59)
plenty of other topics that we could talk about. So thank you so much, Sarah. For those of you pondering, hmm, what's that one little thing I'm gonna do? We've given you some great ideas, but just do it. Just do it, like do it right now, because I'm gonna sign off. I'm gonna tell you to stay curious, and then I'm gonna tell you to go do that one little thing that helps make your life better and do it now. So on that, stay curious, friends. Thanks for joining us here at Divorce Curious, and we'll see you on the next episode.

Sarah Scott-Weaver (45:25)
Thank you.