If you’ve ever asked yourself, “Why can’t I walk away even after everything they did?” — this episode is for you. Lora Cheadle breaks down the truth about trauma bonds: what they are, how they form, and why they make it so hard to leave someone who has betrayed you. You’ll learn the neuroscience behind trauma bonding, how ancestral patterns may be keeping you stuck, and the legal and somatic reasons why this type of bond feels like life or death.
Through heartfelt insights, somatic tools, and practical steps for reclaiming your power, you’ll walk away with more clarity—and a plan to finally break free.
Whether you’re just starting your healing journey or feeling stuck in the cycle of apology and hope, this episode delivers the aha moments you’ve been waiting for.
Top Takeaways
- Trauma Bonds Are Biological, Not Weakness:
You’re not crazy for still feeling attached to someone who hurt you. Trauma bonding is a survival-based, chemical loop created by cycles of betrayal and apology—and it’s completely normal (but breakable). - Your History Could Be Keeping You Hooked:
Ancestral patterns and family modeling may be wiring you to stay stuck in trauma bonds. Lora explains how generational trauma gets passed down—and how to be the one who ends the cycle. - You Can Break the Bond Through Body and Soul:
From breathwork and somatic anchors to legal awareness and agency-building micro-acts, Lora outlines four powerful steps to reclaim your autonomy and start healing your nervous system for real.
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Betrayal Recovery Tool Kit
Find Relief, Reclaim Yourself, and Rewrite Your Story
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About Lora:
Lora Cheadle is a betrayal recovery coach, attorney, and TEDx speaker who helps women heal from betrayal on an energetic, emotional, and ancestral level—while also providing legal guidance to help them navigate the practical complexities of infidelity and relationship transitions. She empowers women to rise from the ashes, reclaim their identity and self-worth, break free from repeating patterns, and step into their power with confidence, clarity, and grace.
After being shattered by her husband’s fifteen years of infidelity, Lora knows firsthand what it takes to transform devastation into an invitation for healing, freedom, and joy. Her unique approach blends deep emotional healing with tangible legal and life strategies, guiding women beyond betrayal into lives of unapologetic confidence and purpose.
As the founder of Life Choreography Coaching & Advocacy, Lora provides comprehensive legal, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual support on demand. She believes that infidelity doesn’t have to be the end of the dream you poured your heart and soul into—it can be the beginning of a life filled with sovereignty, connection, and joy.
Licensed to practice law in California and Colorado, Lora is also a trauma-aware coach, clinical hypnotherapist, somatic attachment therapist, and advanced integrated energy practitioner. She is certified in yoga, mindfulness, group fitness, and personal training, bringing a holistic perspective to healing.
She is the author of FLAUNT! Drop Your Cover and Reveal Your Smart, Sexy, & Spiritual Self (an International Book Awards Finalist and Tattered Cover Bestseller) and It’s Not Burnout, It’s Betrayal: 5 Tools to FUEL UP & Thrive. She also hosts the podcast FLAUNT! Create a Life You Love After Infidelity and Betrayal.
Based in Colorado, Lora is an adventure-seeker who loves travel, a great book, and saying yes to life’s magic.
Let’s connect! Share your thoughts or questions from this episode with Lora at loracheadle.com. New episodes every week.
Subscribe, like, share, and join Lora Cheadle on your journey to reclaim your sparkle and create a life you love.
Special Offers from Our Sponsors!
Thank you to BetterHelp for sponsoring this podcast! Take charge of your mental health and get 10% off your first month of therapy at https://BetterHelp.com/FLAUNT
Are you ready to Rise, Reclaim, and Reign as the Queen of Your Life? Infidelity may have shaken your world, but it does not define you. You are powerful. You are worthy. And you are more than capable of creating a future filled with confidence, clarity, and joy.
I’m here to walk beside you, giving you the perspective, permission, and proven tools to transform betrayal into your greatest awakening. Whether through one-on-one coaching or my on-demand Affair Recovery Programs, you’ll gain the guidance and support to untangle yourself from the past, reclaim your power, and step boldly into your next chapter.
Your transformation starts now! Learn more at www.AffairRecoveryForWomen.com and visit www.LoraCheadle.com for even more resources and inspiration.
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- International Book Award, Finalist Motivational Self-Help, 2021
- Tattered Cover Bestseller, 2019
Have you spent your life playing by the rules, only to realize those rules weren’t made for you? What if you could break free—from expectations, from betrayal, from the roles you were taught to play—and reclaim your true self?
FLAUNT! is your guide to stripping away societal conditioning, healing from the heartbreak of betrayal, and rediscovering the fierce, confident woman you were born to be. With humor, wisdom, and powerful, actionable steps, Lora Cheadle empowers you to rise above the narratives that have confined you and boldly choreograph a life that is smart, sexy, spiritual, and uniquely your own.
It’s time to stop living for others and start living for you.
Buy Now on Amazon, or wherever books are sold.
It’s Not Burnout, It’s Betrayal: 5 Tools to FUEL UP & Thrive
Burnout isn’t just exhaustion—it’s a betrayal of your time, energy, and trust. This essential guide redefines burnout, exposing its hidden roots and equipping individuals, teams, and leaders with five powerful tools to reclaim their passion, purpose, and well-being.
If you’re ready to break free from burnout and step into a life of clarity, confidence, and fulfillment, this book is your roadmap.
Available now on Amazon. Download your free guide, BURNOUT UNCOVERED: Fostering Candid Conversations for Teams at www.ItsNotBurnoutItsBetrayal.com.
Transcript
Speaker A:
You’re listening to Flaunt, find your sparkle and create a life you love after infidelity or betrayal. A podcast for women who’ve been betrayed by their intimate partner and want to turn their devastation into an invitation to reclaim them selves and their worth. Tune in weekly so you can start making sense of it all and learn how to be okay on the inside no matter what goes on on the outside. Download your free betrayal recovery toolkit at betrayalrecoveryguide.com.
Speaker B:
If you have ever thought, oh my god. Why can’t I leave? Why do I still feel so connected? Why do I still feel like I’m in love even after everything? What I want you to know is this. You are not crazy. You are not weak. Chances are you are trauma bonded, and that’s what we’re gonna talk about in this episode. In this episode, I’m gonna show you exactly what trauma bonding is, how it works, how to spot it in yourself, and I think most importantly, how to start breaking free in body, in mind, and in soul. So welcome to this week’s episode. Why can’t you let go? Trauma bonds, infidelity, and how to break free.
Speaker B:
But before we get in to the goodness that this episode is, I wanna remind you to go to betrayalrecoveryguide.com and download your free betrayal recovery guide because it’s amazing and because it’s gonna help you so much. In the guide, there is an option to upgrade to a legal and financial checklist. And let me tell you, you’re absolutely going to want that. And there’s also an offer for a first time session with me for only $97. So, yes, betrayalrecoveryguide.com. Download your free betrayal recovery guide, and then you will get a lot of discounts to some of the amazing upgrades as well. But for now, let’s start talking about trauma bonding because that is a big thing. And, yes, obviously, the show is on betrayal and betrayal recovery, but trauma bonding happens in a lot of different relationships.
Speaker B:
So my ask for you during this episode is to also start thinking about where it might show up for you. It could have been that you were trauma bonded with one or both of your parents. It could be that it’s showing up in a relationship at work with kids, with a friendship, and also look at your partner’s trauma bonds, in his or her past because trauma bonding is significant. Okay. So first, what is it? It is an intense emotional attachment formed through cycles. Cycles of intermittent reward and then abuse. Reward and abuse. Love and hate.
Speaker B:
Think love bombing and then, oh, pulling away and totally disconnected. Think betrayal and then apology and then hope and then repeat. It is anything that cycles through that good and that bad, and that good and that bad, and that good and that bad. Now here’s before I talk about why it’s so powerful, here’s what I wanna say is different. Last week, I said that all relationships cycle through harmony, disharmony, and repair. And all relationships do cycle through harmony, disharmony, and repair. It is impossible to have a really deep heart relationship that is just always good. So you might be thinking, well, what is the difference then, Lora, between harmony, disharmony, and repair, and love bombing, cheating, apology, hope, repair.
Speaker B:
Why why is one a normal natural cycle, and why is one a traumatic bond? And I would say to you, that is an amazing question. Thank you for asking that. Here’s here’s some of the hallmarks of that. We have the normal cycles of harmony, disharmony, and repair, and they’re uncomfortable, but there’s a certain level of safety that underpins that. There’s a certain level of, yeah, I’m really mad at my kids right now, or even, oh my God, I cannot tell you how how mad I am at my parents or my coworker. There’s there’s intensity, of course, but there’s not this level of fear or threat or I’m really unsafe. Trauma bonds are formed, and I’ll go more into this a little bit later too, but trauma bonds are formed when, like, a primary caregiver is threatening to pull away from us, and our life is at stake because they’re gone. If we are a young child and we know that we’re reliant on our caregiver for food, for shelter, for all of those things, and somebody pulls away, it is a matter of life and death because we can’t do those things for ourselves.
Speaker B:
So in a trauma bonding type situation, that’s the intensity that you get, that extreme lack of safety, that intense, this is not going to work. I I will die if this person goes away, which is different than, I’m gonna be really sad if I lose my best friend for the last few years. That’s that’s not gonna be fun. I’m gonna be really sad. I’m gonna mourn it, but I’m not gonna die. Or, yeah. I’m really mad at my kids, and we’re in a really disconnected place, but I truly don’t have fear that this is it and that we’re never gonna reconcile again. So some of the difference between trauma bonding and a normal cycle of harmony, disharmony and repair is just that level of intensity and that inner felt sense of safety.
Speaker B:
Okay. So let’s start by talking about why betrayal bonds, these trauma bonds, are so powerful. The brain releases things like dopamine and oxytocin during that reconciliation phase. Even when the reconciliation phase is just temporary, the brain still goes, ah, and it releases all of these chemicals that make us feel not only relieved, but like we’ve come home again, Like, we have found the right place. Like, we are suddenly, oh, the sun is out and life is good and and everything is perfect. And what is problematic with that? What makes that so so stressful, so addict bad is that it’s addictive. It’s addictive to have that big of a stressor and then to go, oh, but I’m in love, and I’ve found home again, and all is right in the world. And then stress, and then, oh, all is right in the world again.
Speaker B:
If you think about stories, when you’re reading a, like, a chapter book, whether it’s fiction or nonfiction or whatever, the way that the books are structured is at the end of each chapter, there’s kind of a cliffhanger because it keeps you reading. Think about episodes, on TV. The end of an episode, especially at the end of a season, is a big cliffhanger where you don’t get that, you don’t get that resolution, you don’t get that relief. You’re left in that state of if you’re a seventies kid, who shot JR? You’re left in that place of, oh my god. There’s all this tension and there’s all this discord, and I don’t know what’s going to happen. So then you feel compelled to at least read the start of the next chapter or just to resolve it, to make it feel better, or that’s why we binge watch things that are available because it’s like, oh my god. I have to see the next one. Oh my god.
Speaker B:
I have to see the next one. And we get addicted to those dopamine, oxytocin hits of feeling good. That’s how we’re wired. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s just that when it is so intense and when it’s your relationship, which is safety. This is my home. This is our income. This is our family.
Speaker B:
This is what we have built. This is we have stood up in front of God and friends and family, and we’ve committed our lives to each other, and this feels big. We don’t just walk away from relationships because it’s big. So when we’re stressed in our relationship, we’re really stressed. And typically, it hearkens back to being a younger child and having that fear of abandonment. So then when our partner’s like, we can work this out, we go, I can figure this out. And then we instantly release, and we instantly relax, and those chemicals flood flood our body, and we feel so good again. And you know what? We want another hit.
Speaker B:
And it’s not that we necessarily go about creating more drama just so we can get the other hit. But when things start falling apart again, what our body leans into, what our mind leans into is that hit of I know how to make this feel good again. I know how to resolve this tension. It’s It’s by reading the next the first paragraph of the next chapter. It’s by binge watching the episodes. It’s by leaning in and making this work. So that’s why trauma bonds are so powerful is that it’s not just it’s not like I’m mentally weak and it’s not like, oh, I’m just so in love. It’s that it’s an addictive, powerful chemical experience in our body.
Speaker B:
So kinda just sum that up, that’s why you feel so obsessed. You feel so obsessed with making this work. You feel so obsessed with getting your partner to see the air of his ways and getting into therapy and getting into coaching and hiring the right person. Like, you were so obsessed with this because of all of those things we’ve talked about. It’s chemical. It goes to our childhood. It goes to safety, and we are wired to make things right. And the normal cycle of harmony, disharmony, and repair, we’re aware of.
Speaker B:
What we’re just not aware of is that this is an unhealthy cycle, that something that is normally healthy has triggered and moved into something that is not healthy any longer. So if you’ve ever said something like, why do I miss him even though he destroyed me? Yep. Might be trouble the bond did because you’re normal. It’s not stupid. You are not weak. You are literally neurologically hooked. So I want to go a little bit deeper and I’m going to grab my water here just a second. Cause I’m getting really passionate about this.
Speaker B:
I wanna go a little bit deeper into the whole neurobiology of betrayal and bonding because it’s really important to understand. As you know, I’m a lawyer, so I’m in my head a lot, but I’m also a somatic attachment therapist. I’m also a dancer. I also understand the power of getting into your body. So what I wanna do in this episode to really help you understand is talk to the head and then talk to the heart. I wanna talk to your intellect, talk to the head, explain it neurobiologically what is going on and why. And then I wanna drop in, and I wanna talk to your heart about those powerful feelings of, but I miss him, but I love him, but I don’t wanna let this life go. But when things are good, they’re so good.
Speaker B:
Why would I let that go? So you can, over time, start reconciling this. Start putting together what you know intellectually with what you feel. And of course, if you need help, and we all need help. Oh my goodness. Especially during like this, something like this, you deserve so much help. Reach out. Again, your first session is half price. Reach out.
Speaker B:
Let’s do this together. Let’s get you integrated and moving forward. Okay. So starting by talking to the head, the neurobiology of betrayal and of bonding. When our partner cheats on us, it activates the stress response, which is fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. This trauma response, this stress response that is activated when our partner cheats is normal. It’s natural. It’s what our body goes into to survive.
Speaker B:
When you’re triggered, you’re not weak. You’re not dysfunctional. You shouldn’t be able to talk yourself out of being in a state of fight, flight, freeze, or fun. That’s that’s not a thing. Yes. There are tools that you can do to reclaim your nervous system. I teach a lot of those tools on this show in my Facebook group. We do a heck of a lot of that when I coach with people one on one.
Speaker B:
Yes. There are tools that you can use to reclaim your brain and to get you out of that activated state, but also to a certain extent, you’re supposed to be in that state, and we can’t override all of our biology just because we know what’s going on. We can’t override our biology just because we think we should be a better, more spiritually evolved person. We react because our bodies react because that’s who we are. Okay. Fight. I think a lot of us know what fight is. It’s that intense anger.
Speaker B:
I am going to break plates. I am going to scream. I am going to yell. I’m going to text you incessantly in all caps. I am going to, you know, hopefully not, but you feel like being violent. You feel like pushing somebody. You feel like slapping somebody. You feel like stomping over to the affair partner’s house and kicking her door down.
Speaker B:
Like that surge of anger, that’s fight. Flight is forget it. We’re getting divorced. I’m out of here. Done. Done. Done. Done.
Speaker B:
Done. Done. Washing your hands of the whole situation, but not in a healthy way, in a traumatic out of here way with the belief that, oh, divorce cures everything. Let me tell you, divorce does not cure any everything. Walking away does not cure everything. You’ve probably heard my dog poop example before, but infidelity is like when the neighbor’s dog comes into your house and poops a big juicy poop right there in the center of your living room. Yes. You’re gonna get really mad.
Speaker B:
You might storm over to your neighbors and demand that they take their dog, and they clean up the poop. That’s the fight. Flight is equivalent to throwing another rug on top of it and being like, I just don’t even see it. Or maybe picking up the poop, but not really cleaning it and putting another rug over the top. That’s flight. There’s no poop here. There is no poop in the living room. I’m just done with it.
Speaker B:
I’m just done. I I picked it up. I covered it. It’s done. A freeze is literally the ability to not function, to not do anything, to lay on the floor and cry, to not be able to get out of bed in the morning, to not be able to feed yourself, to not be able to take care of yourself. And then fawn, which is also known as fix, and this is kind of my default trauma response. I can fix it. I can take this on.
Speaker B:
I can I can show you what you did wrong? I can I can label your childhood trauma? I can find the right therapist for you. I can preread all the books for you and then highlight the paragraphs and the sentences and give it to you so you can be fixed. I will talk to my coach. I will talk to my therapist. I will talk to all my people about you, and I’ll solve your problems, and then I’ll go explain to you what you did wrong. I will explain to you where you need to grow, and I will fix it all. While I am helping you fix your end, I will also be losing the last 10 pounds. I will also be getting a new hairstyle for my hair, and I will also be leaning into this, that, or the other thing and working on this because I’m gonna make myself perfect, and I’m gonna make you fixed, and then I’m gonna lean in and make everything right for us.
Speaker B:
A lot of women have that fawning or that fixing trauma response, and that’s that’s my default mode. I’m not proud of it, but it is. It’s like this, I can win you back. I can make everything perfect, and I’m gonna make you miss me. I’m gonna show you how amazing I was and how amazing we can be. I’m just gonna just over give. I’m gonna over caretake. I’m gonna understand so much.
Speaker B:
But, really, it’s me doing that in order to feel safe again. It’s not really me doing it from a place of heart. It’s me doing it from a place of trauma. Do you see the difference? It’s subtle, but it’s important. Now what I will say is trauma trauma survivors, especially those with, like, a deep history of either ancestral trauma or, like, big t trauma trauma, are more vulnerable to trauma bonding with their partner than somebody who has just no trauma in their family, whose parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, all have these super healthy marriages where people communicated and there was a lot of respect. And those types of people who were raised in this, like, leave it to beaver kind of perfect way are less vulnerable to trauma bonds. But let’s face it, most of us, there’s some weird skeletons in our classes. There’s some interesting family history, and it makes us more vulnerable to trauma bonds.
Speaker B:
Now, as you know, I love the whole ancestral healing. I love the whole exploration of ancestral patterns because I really believe that we’re here to clear that. I really believe that any of us on the planet at this time are here specifically to clean up the past. Not only to really just clean up the past, but to put a block in place. If you think about, like, a firewall, put a block in place so our kids and their kids and new generations are not impacted by the legacy of trauma that we have grown up with. I really believe it’s part of this whole new earth paradigm. You know, we talk about new power structures and new earth and all of those things. That’s on the external level.
Speaker B:
And what I’m talking about is that healing on the internal level. And I really think if you’re alive right now and listening to this right now, there’s something in your karma, in your DNA, in your ancestral heritage that you are here to clear up, to stop, to transmute so we can be handing the next generation a really clean, powerful slate. So if you’re thinking, what are you talking about, Lora? I don’t exactly know what you’re talking about. Think about this. Did your mother stay in a toxic marriage? Did your grandmother truly have choice to leave her relationship? Was she truly able to get a job to support herself, to get a line of credit, to buy a house, to do all of that at in her lifetime? Like, is that something she truly could do or was she a little bit trapped? What about grandmothers, aunts, uncles? Were they really free? Were they really, really free, fully self expressed, healthy boundaries, or were they all kind of trapped? Because if you’re anything like me, I look at my family history, and there were a lot of kind of trapped women who were living in this sure. Some of it can be stable, but it’s it’s kind of silent misery there. They’re putting up with a lot. They know that it’s just the price that they have to pay for security or the price that they have to pay for companionship.
Speaker B:
It’s just their lot in life. My grandmothers didn’t use that phrase, but I know a lot of my friends’ moms and their grandmas would use that phrase. It was just my lot in life, honey. This is just my lot in life. And there’s a lot of belief around that. A lot of generations, our generations, yes, but even especially the older generations, a lot of women believe this is just my lot in life. I’m a woman. What can I do? That trauma, that belief lives in your nervous system.
Speaker B:
That kind of trauma is passed through the DNA physiologically. There’s a lot of amazing research that’s been done on that, but it’s also through stories. It’s through beliefs. It’s through body language. It’s the way your life was modeled. You know, women go in one room and they talk amongst themselves. Men go in another room and they talk amongst themselves. The women cook the food, and they serve the men.
Speaker B:
And they bring the man another beer. And men just go out after dinner and do whatever. They don’t stay in the kitchen and clean. And children go to the women, and men do the working. And there’s these stereotypical gender roles, but it’s below that. It’s deeper than that. It’s that whole ancestral level of how the woman serves the man and who is on top and who is a little bit subservient. So what I want you to realize through this discussion of the ancestral, like, the ancestral trauma, the ancestral beliefs is, no.
Speaker B:
It didn’t start with you. It never starts with us, but it absolutely can end with us. And like I just said, that’s why I think we are here. Now not only for us, but our partners had the same thing. They could be really good guys, and I’m just talking general heterosexual. So many of them are good guys. They’re they’re good people, but they too have a history of trauma in their background, in their DNA, in the stories that were told to them, in the way that they witnessed life being living, but life being lived. Perhaps they saw their fathers have an affair, maybe not explicitly, but they knew what was going on because their father was always gone, and he was always working late, or he would come home drunk.
Speaker B:
Think about grandfathers. Think about your partner, your husband’s father, and grandfather. Were the women full and powerful, or were the men and and were the men slightly abusive? How were their how were your partner’s parents and grandparents bonded? What was their bond like? Was it true love, mutual respect, or was it a little bit was there a little bit of a power dynamic? Was there a little bit of a trauma bond there? Was there a little bit of fear? Because for so many of the couples that I work with and, yeah, I work with women individually, but I also work with couples. And so many of the couples that I work with, there is kind of that dynamic there that on the woman’s side, her mother, her grandmother, her sis, sisters, aunts, whatever, they were all a little bit trapped. They were all a little bit bite bite their tongue type energy. And a lot of their partners, parents and grandparents, the men were kind of entitled. They were kind of abusive. They were kind of emotionally disconnected.
Speaker B:
So, yes, we’re we are our own people. Yes. We have choice. But sometimes we can’t even see the way that we were raised. We can’t even see the things that we believe because it’s just normal. It’s just the way things are. I’m gonna tell you a little bit of a story. My family versus my husband’s family.
Speaker B:
We my mom was an elementary school teacher. My grandmother was a secretary in a school. And my great grandmother, she was actually, an elementary school teacher as well. She taught in a one room schoolhouse, in the late twenties. So long history of women in education, which I think is really cool. But they were all super patient. They were all super tuned into kids and child development, and they were all very patient. So they all spoke very kindly.
Speaker B:
They all moved with that kind of slow, methodical demeanor that we think of when we think about teachers versus my husband’s family. Totally, totally different. They are, like, from the whole Ozarks, very loud, very shrill. You you don’t make concessions for kids. You just grow up fast. You figure it out. You have responsibility or you get whacked. And they’re very aggressive and abrupt with each other.
Speaker B:
When he first met my family, he was like, they are being so fake. They are being so fake. And when I first met his family, I had the same thought. I’m like, they’re being so fake. Why are they putting on this, like, oh, oh, oh, figure it out, walk it off, toughen up? We each thought each other’s family was acting fake because it was so different than the way we were raised. And it took us quite a long time to start figuring out and understanding and and unpacking. Neither of our families were being fake. They were just so different.
Speaker B:
And not only like that, that lives in our DNA, but that’s also stories, beliefs, family language, body language. There’s so much that impacts us that we’re not even aware that it’s impacting us. And why that matters is because of a trauma is because trauma bonding is directly related to how we were raised. So his family was very threatening, which made me kind of lean in and be like, oh, I gotta fawn more. I gotta fix this. I’ve gotta smooth things over because that’s gonna keep me safe. So that was kinda how that trauma bond formed with us is I’m gonna smooth it over. I’m gonna make it safe.
Speaker B:
I’m gonna fix all of this. Does that make sense? It’s subtle, but it makes so much sense, and it brings such a sense of clarity. So moving a little bit, still speaking to the head, still speaking to the head, I wanna move into a little bit of the legal and the financial realm and explain how trauma bonding keeps you legally and financially stuck in a toxic relationship whose time probably has come. Trauma bonded women often say things like, but he says he’s gonna change. But he’s in therapy and he’s working on it. They’re always giving him an excuse. He just didn’t understand. This is just part of his past and he’s figuring it out.
Speaker B:
I’m huge on compassion. Being compassionate makes me feel better. Quite frankly, it just makes me feel better. It helped me move into forgiveness. It helped me in my relationship. It helps me feel better and make my gut not hurt. And at the same time, when we’re constantly giving somebody an excuse, when we’re constantly giving somebody a pass, that’s an unhealthy level that’s not compassion. That’s explaining it away.
Speaker B:
That is a trauma bond. Phrases I also hear are things like, I don’t wanna blow up my family. Again, I get it. I don’t want to lose everything if I leave. I get it. But what I want you to do is to recognize, he says he’s changing. He’s in therapy. He’s getting better.
Speaker B:
I don’t wanna blow up my family. I don’t wanna lose anything. That’s the trauma bond that’s talking. Of course, you don’t want to. Of course, you don’t want to. But if you’re in a situation, sometimes you need to. And that’s why I wanted to just spend a few moments talking about legal and financial issues so you can feel less stuck, so you can have some light of clarity that’s kind of shining on some of this. I get it can be a freight it can feel scary to think about losing your home, about finances, about custody, reputation.
Speaker B:
I get that that’s scary, but all of those things can really be exploited by a manipulative partner who is trauma bonded with you. So pay attention to what what is real? What is a real concern that you need to navigate? And what is your partner throwing something in your face and just provoking more fear? Well, you’re never gonna see your kids again. What are people gonna think? Be aware of that because trauma bonding muddies your ability to advocate for yourself. So if your partner is manipulating and they’re saying, you’re never gonna see your kids on Christmas again, every other Thanksgiving and splitting summer break, this is you love your kids, and this is gonna be awful. You’re never gonna have as good of a standard of living as we do now. You’re throwing it all away. What will our families think? And you feel that constriction, and it sends you into fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, it really muddies your ability to process because you’re no longer in the thinking portion of your brain. You’re way back in that survival mode and you’re trauma abundant, and what you’re gonna do is preserve the relationship at all costs.
Speaker B:
What you’re gonna do is say, no. I I’m I’m grateful for what we have. I can put up with this. It’s gonna be fine. I can do it. The position that I want you to be in is in a position where if something like that happens, okay, you feel that fight, flight, or freeze instinct kicks in. You first immediately turn to your tools. Okay.
Speaker B:
I know how to breathe through this. You take some long, slow, deep breaths. You do some somatic movement and somatic processing. You break away from your partner. You maybe take a walk. You maybe write some things out. You go check the notes from your appointment with me or from the appointment with the attorney. You check yourself.
Speaker B:
You prepare what you’re going to say to your partner. And then when you reengage, you can speak from that place of truth, from that place of heart and head. Yes. We will be sharing custody. Yes. Things will shift. That doesn’t mean I’m losing my kids. That doesn’t mean I won’t actually have more quality time with them.
Speaker B:
It might even mean that they are healthier and happier because they will no longer be witnessing a toxic dynamic. Breaking away from this marriage might be the single best thing that I do. Breaking up this family might preserve my kids in ways that I didn’t know they needed preserving because I didn’t understand until this moment how toxic and traumatic this bond between us was. Yes. It will shift our finances. Here are the things I can do. I can switch cell phone providers. I can share this.
Speaker B:
I can drop this cause. It puts you back in control of reality and of your mind, and it gives you the ability to advocate for yourself. Not that you have to say all of those things to your partner, but you can say things like, yes. It will change things, but, no, it’s not gonna make everything worse. It makes things different. Different is not worse, and it might even make them better. Now a couple of tips that I have on this before we move on is to 100% please, pretty, pretty, pretty, please, talk to an attorney. Talk to me.
Speaker B:
I am an attorney. Talk to a financial adviser. Talk to somebody. And here’s the key. Before you think you’re ready to talk to them, you don’t need to be prepared. You don’t need to know, oh, I am leaving or I’m not leaving. Talk to an attorney. Talk to your financial adviser.
Speaker B:
Get copies of your tax returns. Look things over. Check whose name is on the title of the cars, of the house. How are accounts titled? Where are your assets located? Figure some of these things out. Even if your deepest hope is we get through this and we just kinda go back to normal. There is no going back to normal. It gets better or it breaks away. But my point is whether or not you think you’re gonna need to know this information, start empowering yourself with the knowledge right now.
Speaker B:
Because knowledge is power. Knowledge will bring you clarity, and clarity breaks you free from the fear based control and manipulation that your partner can be putting on you or more likely that you can be putting on yourself. Because how many of us lay in bed at night and catastrophize things? Oh my god. I’m gonna end up as a bad lady living under a bridge, and I’m never gonna see my kids again, and I’m never gonna find love. And, yeah, we all do that. So knowledge is power. Knowledge will help you learn how to think clearly. Okay.
Speaker B:
The next thing I wanna talk about is some somatic signs that you are trauma bonded. You are probably trauma bonded if you have that type chest, shallow breathing, chronic fatigue, hypervigilance. You were always scanning for his moods. How does he feel? What is he saying? What can I do to keep things safe? You’re numb. You’re freeze in, like, in a freeze state. You feel totally foggy. You’ve got obsessive thoughts, a lot of rumination going on. And you also feel addicted to that high of reconciliation.
Speaker B:
You know? I mean, I think we’ve all been there to a certain degree, but when the whole focus is on make this go away so I can feel better, Those are all signs that you’re trauma bonded, that these things come up and your whole body just moves into something that is not not true, not accurate for you. And when you feel those sensations, let it first remind you that, Hey, this is probably my trauma bond kicking in. And then secondly, I want you to reach for a tool that’s going to make that better. And the tool is a breath. It is a trauma bond breaking breath. Say that three times fast. Nothing fancy. I just want you to inhale through the nose slowly.
Speaker B:
And then I want you to hold that breath for about a count of four and simply name what you feel. It could be rage. It can be spinning. It can be exhaustion. It can be not again. Name whatever it is you feel. And then I want you to exhale audibly. Something.
Speaker B:
Some sort of noise. So you’re pushing your gut and you’re making that volume come out. And then I want you to say this does not define me. This does not define me. And I want you to do this with your hand. Like, no. No. No.
Speaker B:
No. No. Get a hand or both hands. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. This does not define me. You were shaking your hand. No, no, no, no, no, no. So you inhale, you hold that breath for about four counts and you name what you feel.
Speaker B:
You exhale audibly. You shake with your hand and no. No. No. No. No. And you say, this does not define me. You can pat.
Speaker B:
You can shake. That’s what I want you to do. Every time you feel a physical sensation around this, every time you get a text and your throat closes, every time somebody walks in the door and you just clench, breath, hold a name what you’re feeling, exhale, and then shake, shake, shake it off with your hand. This does not define me. Because the truth is this is not in your head. This is in your body. A trauma bod is not just in your head. It’s not just in your belief system.
Speaker B:
It’s not just in your DNA. It’s, like, in your body. It’s in your throat. It’s in your gut, and you can move it out. Now I wanna move into this next part of the show, which is specifically focused on breaking the trauma bond. And that somatic activity that we just did was a good one to start breaking that bond. But here are four steps that I want you to really start considering using to help break that bond. And this is where I’m moving more into that heart.
Speaker B:
We’ve done a lot about that intellectual. This is what’s going on. This is what a trauma bond is. This is why it’s so powerful. Now we’re moving into that heart about how to break it and how to set yourself free. The first the first thing, put your hand on your heart and name it without shame. I am trauma bonded to Sean. I am trauma bonded to name your partner.
Speaker B:
I have a trauma bond. I was trauma bonded with my parents, and I came to think that a trauma bond represented love. My husband was trauma bonded with his mom, and he thought that that was the deepest form of love. And anything less than that, to him, didn’t feel like love. So the first way to name the trauma bond is literally put your hand on your heart and name it without shame, without embarrassment. I am trauma bonded. This is biology. This is ancestral conditioning.
Speaker B:
This is not weakness or failure. The second thing I want you to do is to create a safety anchor. I want you to choose a thing, a person, a place, a ritual. It doesn’t matter what it is. Just something that reminds you of who you are. And I want you to return to that thing daily to find your safe space. And whenever you find that anchor, whenever you think about that anchor, just, again, affirm to yourself I am safe. I like using it sounds funny, but I wear rings or earrings a lot or necklaces, just some kind of jewelry.
Speaker B:
And so often my jewelry is my anchor, and I’ll just reach up and touch my necklace or I’ll reach up and touch my earring, or I’ll give my ring a full spin on my hand, and I’ll just remind myself I am safe. I am safe. I am in the now and I am safe. So choose your anchor. Step one, name it without shame, hand on your heart, step two, choose a safety anchor and use it daily. Not only when you feel that trauma bond kicking in, but when you feel anxiety, you’ve got a project at work coming up. Stress. Something’s happening with a kid or a family member.
Speaker B:
Stress. I am safe. I am safe. And as you say it and as you touch it or hold on to it or think about it, it’ll just drop you in to feeling safe. The third step, the third thing to do to start breaking the trauma bond is to start tracking the cycles. Journaling, voice notes. For those of you who coach with me, we talk back and forth on Voxer all day every day. Sometimes several times a day, we talk back and forth.
Speaker B:
People tell me what’s going on, what they’re feeling, what they’re thinking, what they’re worrying about. And I am the voice literally in their ear reminding them of who they are and what to do and either validating or challenging their position. You can do that by journaling. You can do that with voice note to yourself. You can pick up a Voxer package and just use Voxer with me without coaching. We can just Vox together. But what I want you to start noticing is that cycle. Love, hurt, apology, hope.
Speaker B:
Love. Oh my god. It’s so intense. You’re the best. I’ve never felt this before. Hurt. I’ve betrayed you. I did it again.
Speaker B:
I lied. Apology. I’ll never do this again. I don’t know what I was thinking. I can’t figure it out. And then hope. It’s never gonna happen again. It’s never gonna happen again.
Speaker B:
And write it down. And here’s why that is so powerful. Awareness kills denial, and it’s really easy to get stuck and to think that it didn’t happen or to be like, well, it wasn’t that bad that time. That was not really a cycle. That wasn’t that bad. He didn’t fully cheat. He just something else. But when it’s written down, when you’ve got voice memo after voice memo, you can start saying, no.
Speaker B:
This is the pattern. This is a pattern. We actually went through the same pattern two times this week or two times this day, and you can’t deny it. Suddenly, you can’t deny it because there it is. You have been tracking the cycles and you are aware of what’s going on. So, again, to recap, the first way to break the cycle, hand on the heart, breathe, name it without shame. I’m trauma bonded. Second thing to do is create a safety anchor.
Speaker B:
Find your, ring, something to look at. Repeat to yourself, I am safe and feel that feeling of safety. Third thing to do is to track the cycles so you’re aware of what’s really going on and how often the cycle is repeating, keeping you bonded and stuck. And then the fourth thing is to really reclaim an autonomy in kind of micro or tiny ways. Make small decisions without him. You plan dinner, you decide what you’re gonna wear. You decide what movie you’re gonna see. Like what you pick where you’re gonna go.
Speaker B:
You pick what time you meet. Small things, but just things where you’re like asserting yourself, tuning in with what I feel. I wanna go to bed now. I don’t want dinner. I want a smoothie. Just start making those tiny little micro decisions on your own. And again, noticing what comes up. Do you feel anxious? Do you feel agitated? Do you feel empowered? Just start making small decisions on your own without him and see how it feels.
Speaker B:
Because every act of agency really does weaken the trauma bond. Every small act of agency really does weaken the trauma bond. You can be googling for apartments. You can be talking to an attorney. You can hire me or another coach or a therapist. These small acts, it’s not really of defiance, but of just reclaiming yourself, helps weaken that trauma bond because remember at the beginning, I was talking about the trauma bond is so powerful because our body thinks we’re not safe. You’re proving to yourself that you are safe. I do know how to spend money.
Speaker B:
I do know how to manage money. I do know how to make an investment in myself for my own healing. I know how to do that. I don’t need to run this by him. I don’t need to save this, fix this. I’m doing it for me. And I think that’s one of the more powerful things that I want to leave you with here is you don’t have to be ready to leave or ready to stay or ready to do anything other than reclaim yourself. This is all a process.
Speaker B:
You know, like I said earlier, divorce isn’t just the answer. Walking away doesn’t make it go away. It’s putting the rug over the pile of dog poop. The only thing that works is doing the work. The only way the work works is when you’re working on yourself, when you’re reclaiming yourself, when when you’re nurturing and loving on yourself and not focusing on somebody else’s healing. And, oh my god, that’s hard to do because we do see others more clearly than we see ourself. I get that. You don’t have to be ready for anything.
Speaker B:
In fact, most of my people that I work with no. All of my people that I work with, I say don’t make any decisions in that first year anyway. You were in the wild, radical unknown here. Let a year go by, and we’ll figure it out. Just be ready and willing to reclaim yourself and use every day as another opportunity to slowly but steadily reclaim your agency. Make decisions. Weaken that trauma bond. So when the time comes for you to make a decision or something happens or your partner makes a decision, it’s easier to make that decision.
Speaker B:
And then the impact is less traumatic because you’ve done an awful lot of healing along the way. Now I wanna end just with a call to action on the spiritual end, on that ancestral end, coming back to that. You can invite in your ancestors to heal. You can invite in your ancestors to help. Whether or not that feels comfortable to you, it’s an entirely personal decision. But it’s just one of those things that sometimes when I’m laying there in bed at night, I’ll call in my great grandmothers. I’ll call in my grandmothers. I will call in those people, and I will thank them for their journey.
Speaker B:
I will thank them for being there for me. And I will also invite them to hope, to help me see the patterns that I am being asked to break, to help show me their pain points and what they wish they would have known or would have said or would have had the ability to do. I just ask them to stand by me. Dear grandmothers, show me how to be free. I release the need to stay small in order to feel loved. I release the need to dim my own light in order to be loved. Please walk with me. Please surround me, guide me, and move me forward into my full power knowing that I am here to be a breaker of generational patterns and to heal for myself and for the next generation going forward.
Speaker B:
Thank you for listening today. Thank you for being willing to explore. You know, as I said earlier, it’s the head and the heart. It’s the head understanding what it is, but then it’s the heart. Okay. This is what I need to do. Just a little small step. I need I need the support of my ancestors.
Speaker B:
I need the support of my own hand on my heart. I need the support of my breath. I need the support of movement. I need Lora as my coach. I need clergy. I need lawyers. I need whatever it is, you need a new deserve it. And, again, those small acts, small acts each and every day will help you break this trauma bond, We’ll help you see it for what it is intellectually.
Speaker B:
Feel it lovingly release it from that heart space. Reach out if you need anything. I am always here. I truly am always here. That’s why the Voxer connection with my clients is so powerful because healing takes place in those small quiet places when I’m here. In the meantime, go to betrayalrecoveryguidedown.com. Download your free betrayal recovery guide. Have an amazing week.
Speaker B:
And as usual, always remember to full launch exactly who you are, the fullness and beauty of who you are because who you are is always more than enough.
Speaker A:
Tune in next time to flaunt. Find your sparkle and create a life you love after infidelity or betrayal with Lora Cheadle every Wednesday at 7AM and 7PM Eastern Standard Time on syndicated DreamVision seven radio network. Uncover the truth of what’s possible for you on the other side of betrayal and develop the skills and strategies necessary to embrace the future and flourish today. Download your free betrayal recovery toolkit at betrayalrecoveryguide.com.
Calm the chaos inside & out
