Latest / Reflect Reclaim & Liberate - with Sallyanne Hartnell / Why You're Still Not Over It: Healing After Divorce, Separation or Betrayal

Transcript

Why You're Still Not Over It: Healing After Divorce, Separation or Betrayal · Reflect Reclaim & Liberate - with Sallyanne Hartnell

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate, a podcast covering all things relationships, separation and divorce.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: How to create healthy, happy, fulfilling relationships without sacrificing any part of yourself.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Supporting anyone feeling challenged in their relationship or marriage, these are confidential conversations for you if you're navigating separation, divorce or reorganising life afterwards.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Decide whether to stay or leave a relationship or marriage, divorce with less drama, and consciously choose what's next for you.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast is recorded, the Warrantry people of the Kulin Nation, and pay my respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: I acknowledge them as the original storytellers of this land.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to this week's episode of Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Today we're talking about why you're still not over it, healing, specifically healing your nervous system after divorce, separation, or betrayal.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a quote I want to open with, and one that really landed so powerfully for me when I first saw it.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's often attributed to Jay Shetty, although it may not be explicitly that he said this explicitly in these exact words, but the sentiment is pretty powerful and it captures something that so many of us don't realise until we're either deep in the work of healing or we're sort of through the other side and can look back.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: And the quote goes like this: your nervous system doesn't just heal because time passes, it heals when safety and love show up enough times for it to finally believe it's over.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's really relevant if you're moving through a really challenging time.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And let's face it, that's what separation, divorce, and reorganizing life afterwards is a really challenging time.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: But time, when we're talking about healing and healing our nervous system, time isn't enough.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: Time isn't the only piece of the puzzle that we need, it's not the only thing at play here.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And we're often told, you know, give it time.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, time matters, but it's not everything, it's not the only thing.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Time alone doesn't heal heartbreak, doesn't heal trauma.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Time alone doesn't settle an overwhelmed, dysregulated nervous system.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Time alone won't teach you, won't teach your body how to feel safe again.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when I'm talking safety through this episode, I'm really talking emotional safety, right?
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: There are layers to other aspects of our safety, our physical safety, our sexual safety, but really I'm talking here mostly about emotional safety.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Healing and healing our nervous system isn't about how long or how far along you are from the big thing, the conversation, the separation, the divorce, the betrayal.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's about what happens inside that period of time, how you tend and care for yourself as you move through the time.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, time heals, and also there's work to be done in that time, right?
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: The nervous system, our nervous system governs our sense of safety, alertness, rest, connection, and it doesn't respond to logic.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: You can't think your way through this.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: It responds to experience, it responds to repetition, it responds to evidence.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: So, what heals our nervous system is not just the passing of time, but what happens in and through and during that time.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: It needs safety, it needs love, it needs gentleness, it needs rest, it needs repeated proof that the emotional threat has passed.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: It needs repeated evidence of safety, that you are okay, that you are out of danger, that you know the lion is not still coming at you, whatever your lion is.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: And this lines up with what we know and understand from neuroscience, specifically neuroplasticity, that the brain and the nervous system has the ability to change and adapt and reorganise in response to new inputs.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, we need time, but we also need to manage our inputs.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: If your body has lived through trauma, stress, long periods of instability, and let's face it, even if you chose it, even if you needed to choose it for yourself, divorces all of those things.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard, it's traumatic, it's painful, it's stressful, it's completely destabilizing.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: So it will mess with and dysregulate your nervous system.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it will take more than thinking, it will take more than insight to heal.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: It will take more than just giving yourself time, it will take consistent lived experiences, lived embodied experiences of safety, creating safety for yourself, doing that enough time so that your brain and your nervous system and your body can finally go, okay, okay, I get it, it's different now.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have to keep holding on, I don't have to keep bracing, I don't have to keep fighting or fleeing.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: I can let go.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: And the part about that, or the next the next part about that that is both really hard but also really hopeful is that you are the one.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: You are the one who gets to give yourself that proof.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: You are the one who gets to create that bank of evidence for yourself, not the person who perhaps hurt you, betrayed you.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Not a partner, not an ex-partner, not a parent, not even a therapist or me as your coach, though they can all help, I can definitely help, but ultimately the one person who lives inside your body is you, and that sounds really, you know, Captain Obvious.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: I know that, but it's something that we forget, you know, we outsource our healing, we outsource our support, and I'm all for that, right?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying don't have a therapist, don't have a coach, don't confide in your best friend, but ultimately you are the one that lives and breathes within your body, you are the one who has capacity to create safety for yourself, to build that bank of evidence for yourself.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're wondering why you're still feeling pain, you're still anxious, you're still emotionally raw, even though the relationship ended months ago or even years ago, or the crisis is behind you, or you've moved on mentally, that can be why.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Your mind knows, you thought your way through it, you've intellectualized it, you know, you've gone over and over and over it in your mind, but your body maybe hasn't caught up yet.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not that's not failing.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's not because you know you're stuck, that's not because you're still trapped in the trauma.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's just your nervous system doing what it is designed and wired to do, to keep you safe until it sees and feels and experiences enough evidence that you are actually safe.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: So, how do we give it that evidence?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: How do we create that bank of proof for it?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: How do we help our nervous system feel what our brain perhaps already knows?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about some ways you can do that because that is really where the healing happens.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's the doing in the time, right?
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, we need time, we need time to process, we need time to heal, but you also need to do in that time.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: So, firstly, it's about the way you speak to yourself.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: So speak to yourself like you would someone you love.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: We can't always control what happened or happens or is happening to us, but we can learn to shape what happens within us in response to, right?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: And that starts with the voice inside your head.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: Think about someone you adore.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's your child, maybe it's your dearest friend, someone who's tender and fragile perhaps and hurting.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: How would you speak to that person?
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: You wouldn't say, get on with it, you should be over this by now, or why you're still struggling, or what's wrong with you, or come on, get over it, toughen up, it's been long enough.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: You wouldn't.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: You'd say, in your terminology, your words, I see you, I get it, I'm here, I'm holding space for you, I understand, and you know, you're safe.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: You might not use those exact words, but that is the message that you would give somebody that you love who is going through a hard time.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: So, how can you use those same phrases or similar phrases?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: How can you say that to yourself?
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: Most of us, many of us, were trained to be our own worst critics.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: Our inner critic is harsh.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we push, we judge, we analyse, we fix.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: But healing doesn't come from the top down, right?
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't come from being fixed, doesn't come from being thought through, it doesn't come from being intellectually wrangled to an answer.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: It comes from being felt, being witnessed, being treated with tenderness, with kindness, with compassion by the one person who will always be there for you, and that's you.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: So I invite you to try this.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: Next time the big feelings come up, next time the anxiety rises, or the grief catches you by surprise, or the overwhelming exhaustion, you know, floods your body, floods your chest.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Just pause and speak to yourself softly, lovingly, tenderly, like you matter, like this is important and it's hard and you matter because you do.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: And the more you do that, the more your nervous system starts to believe ah, this is different, this is safe, I'm okay.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: So watch the way your inner voice, your inner critic shows up and try and shift that to a softer, gentler, kinder, more loving way of speaking to yourself.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: The second way we can support our nervous system and our healing is to intentionally create daily micro moments of safety.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: Your body doesn't need this one great grand gesture.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's not going to happen like a volcano or an eruption or whatever.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: It needs tiny micro moments, dozens, maybe hundreds of little ones, and we need them every single day.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Moments when you just slow down, moments when you notice your breath, moments when you feel held, even if it's not by another human, but maybe it's by a cup of warm tea in your hands or a blanket wrapped around your shoulders, or those words we were talking about earlier may be kindly whispered or softly spoken to yourself, even out loud, right?
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: And this is where neuroplastic neuroplasticity really comes in.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: Each small moment of calm helps to rewire your brain, helps to dial down your nervous system, helps to dial down your reactivity.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Each time we repeat and create a moment of safety becomes another building block, and your nervous system does begin to reshape itself through experience, through evidence.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: So another invitation.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Each day, ask yourself gently, what does safety feel like in my body today?
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because it might be different today, tomorrow, yesterday.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: What does safety feel like in my body today?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: What's one small way I can offer that to myself?
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: Then do that.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Intentionally choose it, and intentionally choose it every day.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: It might be as simple as stepping outside and feeling the sun or even the rain on your skin.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: It might be just placing your hand over your heart and feeling your heartbeat, feeling your breath in and out, feeling your chest rise and fall.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: It might be pausing when you catch your reflection in a mirror or the window and giving yourself a nod.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm okay, I'm safe, I see you.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is for you, these are the moments that retrain your nervous system to trust again, to feel safe again.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not going to happen all at once, but it will gradually, gently, incrementally build that bank of evidence.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: So intentionally, consciously create those micro moments of safety every day because time isn't the only answer, time isn't the only part of healing.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: Your body, your nervous system needs that love, that safety and proof.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: It needs evidence.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: So build the evidence in small micro doses each day.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: And the third part I want to speak to is about rest.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Sacred laziness.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: You've probably heard me speak about it before.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: Let rest and slowness be a part of your healing, not a reward for it.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to earn rest, you don't have to earn slowness, you don't have to earn ease.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: It is not something that we are trained to do, but it is really important to allow rest, recovery as part of our healing journey.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: So many of us treat rest like a reward, something we only earn when we've pushed hard enough, when we've healed enough, when we've been strong enough, when we've ticked enough off that never-ending to-do list we constantly run in our head.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: But that's actually backwards.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually counterproductive and anathema to healing.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: Pushing through, productivity, getting shit done, not allowing ourselves to rest, to recharge, to regenerate is not actually helping us heal.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's not conducive to healing, and it's definitely not supporting or supportive of a regulated healed nervous system.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Rest is the healing.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: Slowness is the medicine that your body needs.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: And stillness is what tells your nervous system the danger has passed.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: If you can be still and rest, you are safe.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: So it is again giving your body, giving your nervous system evidence, I am safe.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: If your system is always on, you're rushing, you're scanning, you're doing, you're getting stuff done, it never gets to drop into the parasympathetic state, the rest and digest, the calm, safe state where healing happens, but also our body recognizes safety.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: I am safe.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: So if you are tired, rest.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: If you're foggy, if you're overwhelmed, if you're spinning on the spot, stop.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: Allow yourself time.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you feel scatterbrained, again, stop.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Pause.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: Not because you know you've done enough and you've earned it, but be because you actually need it.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: This is essential.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: And that concept of sacred laziness, I can't remember where I originally read it or or heard it, but we need laziness, we need stillness, we need rest, especially when we have done or are doing really hard things.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: So allow it, create space for it.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Even if you need to rebrand it as sacred, rest is necessary.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: Let yourself exhale, allow yourself to let go and simply be.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: Let your body feel like, or let your body feel what it's like to stop, to stop bracing, to stop doing, to stop being in constant motion, active, getting all that shit done, right?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Allow your body to know stillness and pause and slowness and rest because that gives our body, our nervous system, a really clear signal of safety.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's when your nervous system really gets the message.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: We're not in the shit storm anymore, we're okay, we're safe.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Don't have to keep holding on or bracing, not waiting for the next thing to hit.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: We are in the calm, we are safe, and we can rest.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: So healing your nervous system isn't a mindset shift, it's not a top-down model.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: You need to feel and be in your body, and it's also not necessarily a quick fix, it's a slow, steady, and loving, caring, tending retraining of your body to believe and know that it's safe again.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that takes time, intentional time.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: It happens through kind words and kind ways of speaking to ourselves.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: It happens through gentle moments and gentle movement.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: It happens by creating safety for ourselves consistently and with loving, tender, compassionate repetition.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: So neuroplasticity means you can change your system, your nervous system, your brain.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: And the change happens through intentional practice, through kindness, through compassion, through love, and through showing up for yourself again and again and again until your body catches up with what perhaps your mind already knows.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: You're safe.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: The hard stuff's over, or the hard stuff's easier, perhaps is a way to say it, that you've created safety for yourself, that you're okay, you're home, you're home now inside yourself.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: So give yourself proof, create evidence for yourself, bit by bit, moment by moment, because you do deserve to feel safe in your own skin.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, that takes time, but more than time, it takes love, it takes nurture and care, it takes intentionality, it takes choosing yourself and making yourself and your healing, your nervous system regulation, it makes it takes making that your priority.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: And all of those things, that love, that intentionality, that nurture, you are the one who gets to offer it to yourself.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, of course, I will help you if that's what you want, if you want support and care and tending to move through this and to heal.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, I'll be on your team.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: But the most important person in this healing is you.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: As always, thank you for being here.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: I hope if you find this useful and helpful, perhaps save it.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: Come back to it in those hard moments, in those moments when you don't feel safe, when you do doubt and question why it's taking so long.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, if you know someone that this would support, please please share it with them.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, bye for now.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Sally Ann Hartnell, divorce coach and strategist, and you've been listening to Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: You can follow me on Instagram at Reflect Coaching, and if you can think of anyone who would love or benefit from listening to this episode, please share it with them.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'd also be so grateful if you would follow and review the podcast so we can get it in the ears of a whole lot more people just like you who are ready to reclaim and liberate themselves in life and love.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you'll join me next week for another episode of Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: Until then