Abusers often hide behind confusion — denying intent, twisting reality, and framing your hurt as an overreaction. What starts as a simple disagreement turns into you questioning your memory, your emotions, and your sanity. I share how this pattern plays out in everyday moments, from small promises broken to emotional gaslighting that keeps survivors trapped in cycles of guilt and self-doubt. If you’ve ever found yourself saying, “I don’t even know what’s real anymore,” this episode will help you...
Nov 19, 2025•21 min•Ep. 226
This episode builds off of last weeks where I disussed DARVO in Family Court. I cover exactly how to capture DARVO behavior in a way that lawyers, GALs, and court professionals can actually understand. You’ll learn how to: Identify the denial, attack, and role reversal phases in real-time. Translate emotional chaos into factual, court-readable documentation. Recognize when the abuser is using the legal system as a weapon. Communicate patterns to your attorney without being dismissed or labeled “...
Nov 14, 2025•21 min•Ep. 225
November is Family Court Awareness Month, a time to shed light on a system that too often fails to protect survivors and their children. In this episode, I explore what happens when a court system that frequently reframes abuse as “conflict,” rewards manipulation, and punishes protective parents for trying to keep their kids safe. I walk through: What Family Court Awareness Month is and why it matters. How the legal system can retraumatize survivors and reward abusers who appear calm, logical, a...
Nov 12, 2025•16 min•Ep. 224
If you’ve ever felt like your abuser managed to twist the truth so completely that you ended up defending yourself against their behavior — this episode is for you. Today, I’m breaking down DARVO — Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender — and how it shows up in divorce and custody cases. DARVO is psychological warfare disguised as concern. It’s the reason you end up explaining, over and over, why following a court order isn’t “withholding,” or why setting a boundary isn’t “abuse.” We’ll walk ...
Nov 07, 2025•24 min•Ep. 223
Not every discard looks like a dramatic blow-up. Sometimes it comes quietly — through silence, stonewalling, and indifference. That kind of ending can be even more destabilizing, because it leaves no scene to point to, only the hollow feeling that something is over. This episode unpacks what it means to be discarded in this way, how it twists reality and casts you as the villain, and why holding your boundaries in the face of emotional withdrawal is an act of self-preservation. If you’ve ever be...
Nov 05, 2025•32 min•Ep. 222
This week, I’m sharing a private Q&A episode usually reserved for my Patreon and Substack members. I wanted to make this one public because it speaks to something so many survivors struggle with: the pull of the trauma bond, the shame that lingers, and the confusion around whether someone has truly changed. In this episode, I answer two powerful listener questions: 1️⃣ How do I stop the shame and craving when I’m still trauma bonded? 2️⃣ How do I know if my ex is really changing — or if it’s...
Oct 31, 2025•25 min•Ep. 221
I explain how abusers redefine what abuse is, minimize their actions, and use comparisons to “someone worse” as a shield from accountability. I break down how they weaponize therapeutic language, flip the script so boundaries look like cruelty, and create a public image that leaves survivors questioning their own reality. Support the show *Please Note: there is a long intro that explains my services. If you do not want to listen, just fast-forward 5 mins past. This intro will be changed in futur...
Oct 29, 2025•10 min•Ep. 220
Trauma bonds aren’t about shared hardship or difficult experiences. They’re cycles of abuse and relief that hook your brain and body like an addiction. That’s why it feels impossible to just “get over it.” In this episode, I break down what trauma bonding really is—and what it isn’t. I talk about how intermittent reinforcement keeps survivors stuck, why naming it matters, and why treating it like an addiction can open a path back to yourself. You’ll hear practical ways to start loosening the bon...
Oct 24, 2025•18 min•Ep. 219
Control in an abusive relationship often hides behind the illusion of change. They might say the words you’ve been waiting to hear— "I know I hurt you," "I’m working on myself" —but without real accountability, it’s not growth. It’s performance. This episode unpacks how shame drives manipulative behavior, why false accountability keeps you trapped, and how tactics like gaslighting, projection, and DARVO are used to destabilize you. It also explores the difference between genuine conflict resolut...
Oct 22, 2025•18 min•Ep. 218
Family court is a system that doesn’t run on empathy — and that can be one of the hardest realities for survivors to face. In this episode, I share the lessons I’ve learned about communicating with attorneys while navigating years of custody battles and post-separation abuse. You’ll hear why sending every message, email, or update in real time can backfire, how to frame patterns in a way that lawyers and judges can’t ignore, and what it means to “play chess instead of checkers” when you’re up ag...
Oct 17, 2025•19 min•Ep. 217
When you’re trauma bonded, wanting them isn’t about love—it’s about relief. The relief of the fight being over. The relief of feeling seen again, even for a moment. In this episode, I break down why your body can know they’re toxic and still long for their presence, and why that doesn’t make you weak—it makes you human. We’ll explore how your nervous system and brain chemistry keep you hooked, why reconciliation feels addictive, and the painful truth that craving relief isn’t the same as craving...
Oct 15, 2025•18 min•Ep. 216
This episode takes a deep dive into the realities of co-parenting and divorcing a high-conflict person. I answer some of the most common questions I hear from survivors—like how to handle manipulation of your child, what to do when the other parent lies about you, what parallel parenting really looks like, and how to survive smear campaigns and legal abuse. You’ll hear the patterns I see over and over again in these cases—fake “redemption arcs,” crisis creation before court, love-bombing during ...
Oct 10, 2025•32 min•Ep. 215
I’m sharing the truth about a trauma bond I was in—how it formed, why I stayed, and what it took to finally break free. This isn’t a highlight reel or a neatly packaged story. It’s the messy reality of living in a cycle of harm and hope, of being pulled in and pushed away, of mistaking control for care. If you’ve ever been asked, “Why didn’t you just leave?” —or asked yourself the same thing—I want you to know this episode isn’t about shame. It’s about understanding. It’s about the hooks that ke...
Oct 08, 2025•41 min•Ep. 214
When you’re trauma bonded, wanting them isn’t about love—it’s about relief. The relief of the fight being over. The relief of feeling seen again, even for a moment. In this episode, I break down why your body can know they’re toxic and still long for their presence, and why that doesn’t make you weak—it makes you human. We’ll explore how your nervous system and brain chemistry keep you hooked, why reconciliation feels addictive, and the painful truth that craving relief isn’t the same as craving...
Oct 01, 2025•22 min•Ep. 213
This episode is a little different. Instead of diving into a specific topic, I’m sharing updates, announcements, and all the ways you can work with me. If you’re new here—or wondering what I offer beyond the podcast—you’ll hear about: Upcoming divorce-focused episodes and why I’m expanding the podcast to include them. My Substack and daily writing for survivors. Self-paced courses on emotional abuse, boundaries, documentation for court, and breaking trauma bonds. Coaching options: intro calls, v...
Sep 29, 2025•18 min•Ep. 212
Sexual coercion is one of the most misunderstood and silenced forms of abuse. It’s not seduction. It’s not miscommunication. It’s pressure, guilt, manipulation, and punishment used to get sex when you’ve already said no, shown hesitation, or felt unsafe. It’s not about intimacy—it’s about power and control. This is a bonus episode from Unhooked —my private podcast series for survivors breaking free from emotional abuse. In this episode, I break down how sexual coercion works, the subtle (and not...
Sep 24, 2025•9 min•Ep. 211
They’re kind again… so does that mean they’ve changed? In this episode, we unpack why the “nice” version is part of the abuse cycle — and how to tell the difference between real change and a calculated reset. One of the most confusing parts of an emotionally abusive relationship is when the cruelty suddenly stops — and the “nice” version of the person shows up. Maybe they’re warmer, calmer, even kind for a while. You start to wonder… are they finally changing? Was I wrong about the abuse? In thi...
Sep 17, 2025•15 min•Ep. 210
In this raw and validating conversation, fitness expert and former pro athlete Holly Rilinger shares her first public telling of the emotional abuse she endured inside a long-term relationship that looked perfect on the outside. Holly opens up about how the relationship began with admiration and love bombing, then slowly eroded her confidence, identity, and sense of self. From subtle criticisms about her appearance to the complete absence of repair after conflict, she found herself living in con...
Sep 10, 2025•57 min•Ep. 209
Most survivors don’t start by asking “Is this abuse?” They ask “Why do I feel crazy?” This episode dives deep into the emotional confusion that defines so many abusive dynamics—especially when gaslighting, blame-shifting, and chronic invalidation are at play. If you’ve ever found yourself apologizing after being hurt, doubting your memory, or shrinking yourself to avoid their reactions, you’re not alone—and you’re not overreacting. We’ll explore: How emotional abuse trains you to question your r...
Sep 03, 2025•13 min•Ep. 208
Dr. Kerry McAvoy joins me to discuss the most confusing and painful parts of surviving a relationship with someone who has Cluster B traits, including narcissistic, antisocial, borderline, and histrionic personality disorders. We explore: The neurological and psychological reasons why people with Cluster B disorders don’t change Why survivors feel crazy, confused, and exhausted—and why that’s by design How splitting, emotional dysregulation, and weaponized remorse show up in real relationships T...
Aug 27, 2025•58 min•Ep. 207
I’m sharing one of the most requested and emotionally charged topics: the trauma bond. This episode is part of my private podcast series Unhooked: Mapping the Cycle of Abuse , and I felt it was important to bring it here too—for anyone who’s stuck in the pain, confusion, or shame of staying in a relationship they know is harming them. We explore why trauma bonds form, how they keep you hooked, and what it takes to begin breaking free. This isn’t just about naming abuse—it’s about understanding h...
Aug 20, 2025•14 min•Ep. 206
Trauma Bonding —a term that’s often misunderstood and sometimes avoided because naming it means facing the abuse beneath it. In this episode, I break down what a trauma bond is (and isn’t), why it’s more than “shared trauma,” and how it functions as an emotional and physical addiction. Then, we talk about something that might feel uncomfortable: the places where you do have control once you’ve recognized you’re trauma bonded. I cover: The truth about intermittent reinforcement and why it keeps y...
Aug 13, 2025•18 min•Ep. 205
This episode explores one of the most insidious aspects of emotional abuse: shame offloading. When someone can’t face their own emotional wounds—whether it’s failure, inadequacy, or internal contradictions—they often project that pain onto the person closest to them. You become the emotional scapegoat, the one who’s blamed, punished, or humiliated—not because you did something wrong, but because they can’t sit with their own discomfort. I walk through how this dynamic shows up in abusive relatio...
Aug 06, 2025•27 min•Ep. 204
Why do emotionally abusive people double down on false narratives, deny reality, and convince themselves they’re the victim—even when they’re causing visible harm? I'm joined by Paul Colaianni, host of The Overwhelmed Brain and Love and Abuse podcasts and creator of The Healed Being program, one of the few resources for people who have been emotionally abusive and genuinely want to change. We unpack one of the most confusing dynamics in abusive relationships: the distorted thinking that abusers ...
Jul 30, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 203
This episode takes you inside the lived experience of emotional abuse. The story captures how emotional dysregulation, boundary violations, and false repair cycles can slowly erode a person’s sense of self. We discuss how the classic cycle of abuse—tension, explosion, and reconciliation—can unfold in covert ways, leaving the survivor walking on eggshells, questioning their reality, and constantly managing someone else’s emotional state at the expense of their own. This is not a story of screamin...
Jul 23, 2025•20 min•Ep. 202
There’s a version of abuse that presents as calm and reasonable. It doesn’t look chaotic, and at first, it doesn’t even feel that way. It feels quiet and measured. It sounds like someone who wants to work through things. Someone who seems thoughtful and emotionally attuned. Under the surface, there’s control, pressure, and a constant pull to make you question whether your reactions are valid, whether your needs are too much, and whether you’re the one creating the problem. In this episode, I sha...
Jul 16, 2025•11 min•Ep. 201
In this episode, I share the story that shaped everything: how I ended up in an emotionally abusive relationship, how I stayed, and how I finally saw it for what it was. This is the manipulation I didn’t see—until I did. I talk about the slow unraveling of my reality, the gaslighting, the shame, the trauma bond, and the hope that kept me stuck. I explain how I lost myself piece by piece, how I started to map the cycle, and what it took to finally break free. If you’ve ever felt confused, blamed,...
Jul 09, 2025•23 min•Ep. 200
If you’ve ever felt like you were stuck in a relationship that kept repeating the same painful patterns—no matter how much you tried to fix it—this episode is for you. In this episode, learn how the cycle of abuse plays out in emotionally abusive relationships—not as a clean four-part theory, but as a lived, messy, repetitive trap that keeps survivors hooked through false hope and temporary calm. You’ll learn: How to identify your specific version of the abuse cycle Why tension, incident, reconc...
Jul 02, 2025•36 min•Ep. 199
This is one of the most common—and most heartbreaking—questions I hear: Can a narcissist change? In this episode of You Are Not Crazy , I’m walking you through the reality behind that question. The short answer? Maybe—but almost never. Real change requires emotional accountability, humility, and deep psychological work… and most narcissists aren’t willing to do that. Not because they can’t—but because they don’t see the need. In this episode, we explore why narcissistic change is so rare, how su...
Jun 25, 2025•14 min•Ep. 198
When you're breaking a trauma bond or coming to terms with the end of a manipulative relationship, it doesn’t just bruise you—it shatters something inside. This kind of grief defies logic. You’re not just mourning a relationship. You’re grieving the version of you who believed in it, the future you imagined, and the love you gave so fully. I walk through what this heartbreak really is—and what it isn’t. It’s not weakness. It’s not over-sensitivity. It’s a nervous system crash after prolonged emo...
Jun 18, 2025•8 min•Ep. 197
