The first 30 days after discovering infidelity feel like an emotional tsunami—shock, rage, grief, and an overwhelming sense of uncertainty. But what you do (and don’t do) during this time can set the foundation for your healing journey.
In this power-packed episode, betrayal recovery coach and advocate Lora Cheadle walks you through the critical dos and don’ts of the first-month post-discovery. Learn how to stabilize your emotions, avoid common mistakes that keep women stuck, and reclaim your personal power—without waiting for closure, clarity, or your partner to change.
Top Takeaways:
- What NOT to do in the first 30 days (including the #1 mistake most women make!)
- How to regulate your nervous system using somatic healing and hypnotic meditation
- Why legal and financial clarity is crucial—even if you don’t plan on leaving
- How to reclaim your agency, set healthy boundaries, and start healing on your terms
- The powerful FLAUNT! framework to rediscover yourself beyond betrayal
This episode is the first in a 4-part series on betrayal recovery—so be sure to subscribe and tune in next week for Part 2!
Betrayal Recovery Tool Kit
Find Relief, Reclaim Yourself, and Rewrite Your Story
Download your Betrayal Recovery Roadmap & Tool Kit at www.BetrayalRecoveryGuide.com and start reclaiming yourself and your life today!
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.
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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.
Learn more at www.loracheadle.com and follow me across all social!
Transcript
Lora Cheadle [00:00:01]:
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 an invitation to reclaim themselves 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.
Lora Cheadle [00:00:35]:
Hello, and welcome to Flaunt. Create a life you love after infidelity or betrayal. I’m Lora Cheadle. I am an infidelity and betrayal recovery coach and advocate. If you’re wondering what that means, I am so glad that you asked. What it means is I help you recover from infidelity and betrayal legally, emotionally, and financially. And my passion, my biggest passion is not only helping you heal from betrayal, but leading you into the total transformation that is possible on the other side. I know when I went through it, it was awful.
Lora Cheadle [00:01:24]:
It was the most painful, most destabilizing experience that I have ever gone through. I didn’t know what was real. It was so destabilizing and so painful, and I know that you get it. But here’s the thing about that. It was so destabilizing and so painful that I realized I had no other option except to completely transform. I wanna say that again. I had no other option than to completely transform because it ruined everything. It shattered everything so deeply, and I was not willing to go back to that same life.
Lora Cheadle [00:02:17]:
I wasn’t willing to go back to that same life that had been broken like that. I wasn’t gonna go back. There was nothing that I wanted from that experience, either internally or in my world. I wanted to take the pieces that were meaningful, and I wanted to move forward in an entirely new way. And for me, that made it so worthwhile. And I hate to use that word worthwhile because I’m not a sugarcoater. I’m not gonna sugarcoat it and be like, oh my god. It’s the best thing that ever happened.
Lora Cheadle [00:03:01]:
Because it wasn’t. It was the worst thing that ever happened. But the result that came from it has been enormously positive. And I wouldn’t trade the woman that I have become because of that experience for anything. And that’s why I’m really, really passionate about what I do. Because what I want for you is for you to not go back either. Whether you’re with your partner or you separate is completely immaterial. What matters is that you have rebuilt yourself completely from the ground up, from the inside out, that you’re not patching over stuff.
Lora Cheadle [00:03:50]:
You are consciously creating and cocreating yourself and your life in a way that you really never had the opportunity to do before. Because if you’re anything like me, most of us just build our lives kind of by default. You go to school, you meet people, you get a job, you have a family, and you’re just always kind of catching up. Like, you create little pockets and little things, but you don’t just design a whole life. And when you go through betrayal, you really do have that opportunity to redesign your whole life, and that is what I am into. But before you can redesign your whole life, you know what you have to do? You have to get through the first thirty days, and that’s what today’s episode is about. Today’s episode is about the first thirty days after discovery. What to do and what to avoid.
Lora Cheadle [00:04:54]:
And there’s so many misperceptions, I guess. I don’t wanna say, like, lies, but there’s misperceptions around infidelity out there. And in those first thirty days, it’s really easy to get stuck. It’s really easy to be like, oh my god. I read this this article, and they said this, that, and the other thing, and to believe it. Or to get onto those infidelity forums on Facebook and see what happened in other people’s world, or to put your question to post your question and then to have all these people answer. And then it, like, becomes the self fulfilling prophecy because I read it. I believed it.
Lora Cheadle [00:05:35]:
Because this happened to other people. I believed it for me. And the thing is, what other people have happened, it can give you some some insight, but they’re not you. Their spouse is not your spouse. Your relationship is not their relationship. And it’s really important, especially these first thirty days, is to get really, really clear about yourself and what it is you want. Because here’s another thing that nobody tells you. You don’t have to stay stuck.
Lora Cheadle [00:06:19]:
There’s so much out there about betrayal breaks you and betrayal shatters you, and it’s never gonna be the same again. And it’s like, yes, and you’re only telling half the story. You don’t have to stay stuck. Just because this happened doesn’t mean you have to be this bitter woman for the rest of your life. You do not have to spend years in therapy. You do not have to wait for your partner. You don’t have to wait to get clarity. You don’t have to wait for him to change.
Lora Cheadle [00:06:52]:
You don’t have to wait until you get closure. You don’t have to sit around wondering if you’re ever gonna feel like yourself again. Especially in the first thirty days, it’s really vitally excruciatingly important to do what you can do to reclaim your power, to reclaim your agency, to reclaim your sense of sovereignty. And, yes, in the first thirty days when you are the most wounded, when you are the most bloody, when you have been flayed open, it’s vitally important to take some steps to reclaim your power. And that’s what I’m gonna show you exactly what to do to avoid, to do. I’m gonna show you what to avoid, and I’m gonna show you what to do the first thirty days. Okay. We’re gonna talk about how to stabilize your emotions and your body when you feel like you’re spiraling.
Lora Cheadle [00:08:02]:
Because, again, if you’re anything like me, it’s like you talk yourself into getting out of bed. You talk yourself into getting dressed, putting on makeup, going to the store, and then you see something or you hear a song and suddenly you’re in a spiral. And the images are flashing in your head and the words are flashing in your head and then you’re back on the floor crying and you’re in this total spiral. So we’re gonna talk about how to stabilize your emotions and your body when you’re spiraling. We’re also very important going to talk about what not to do so you don’t end up making choices that you will regret later. And like I talked about reclaiming that sense of sovereignty, we’re gonna talk about how to take back control of your life in three key areas. Legally, I am a lawyer. We’re gonna talk about how to take back control of your life legally, emotionally, and spiritually.
Lora Cheadle [00:08:57]:
And, you know, when you hear about betrayal recovery, a lot of people talk about it in terms of emotional recovery and that is a piece of it. But I also feel like it is vitally important to get that legal aspect of things in and to get that spiritual piece in especially right at the beginning. Maybe it’s my background as a lawyer. Maybe it’s the fact that I channel and I’m very connected spiritually, but those two aspects for me and for the hundreds of women that I have worked with are the key transformational pieces that actually help them move forward much more quickly. Okay. So before we go on to section one, which is the immediate aftermath what not to do, I wanna say I wanna remind you. I wanna say that recovering from betrayal is not about fixing him. Recovering from betrayal is not about saving the marriage.
Lora Cheadle [00:10:00]:
Recovering about from betrayal is not about keeping the family together. Recovering from betrayal is about reclaiming you. Recovering from infidelity, 100% is about reclaiming you. When you reclaim yourself, then you are better equipped to save the marriage or save the family if that’s what you choose to do. You are better equipped to support your partner on his healing journey if he is interested in healing. But it all comes back to you and to reclaiming you and yourself. And, you know, for me, that was really, really hard. I’m not gonna lie.
Lora Cheadle [00:10:50]:
For me, that was hard because my husband had a background in trauma. Most cheaters have a huge background in trauma by the way. Most of the people that I work with truly have got a partner who had a horrific childhood, who have had a lot of pain. And part of the reason that they cheated was because they didn’t know how to handle that trauma. And cheating actually is a trauma response. And I’ve got some shows that talk about that, and I can talk about that in some future episodes as well. But even though the cheating is not about you, even though the cheating is about them and their trauma, it’s not your job to fix them. It is not your job to fix them.
Lora Cheadle [00:11:37]:
I know in my marriage, I could see where my husband was out of touch. I could see where he was depressed. I could see where he was acting out. I could see where he was drinking too much, making choices that really didn’t support him or me or the family, but it’s still not my job or my place to fix him. I so desperately wanted to fix him because from where I stood, fixing him would be so easy. It would be so easy to lean in and fix him, and then all of our problems would go away. And you know what? I hear that a lot on calls with people, the people that I work with, but also the people that I just talked to about my programs to see if we’re a good fit. So many of the women say, but it would be so simple.
Lora Cheadle [00:12:31]:
This is all he needs to do. And I’m like, I hear you, sister. But that’s not what betrayal recovery is about. It’s about reclaiming you. And then later on, if there’s a place for you to support him in his journey, when you fully reclaimed yourself, then you can step in, but not a moment before. Okay. So with that foundation laid, let’s talk about the very first segment, the immediate aftermath. What not to do? Okay.
Lora Cheadle [00:13:13]:
My husband and I did an episode together on trickle truth. Whether you are still in the middle of trickle truth or you just found out kind of in a big bombshell y way, Learning that your partner has cheated really sends you on an unbelievable roller coaster of emotions. It’s complete devastation. There’s rage. There’s sadness. There’s numbness. There’s this sense of panic. There’s obsession.
Lora Cheadle [00:13:44]:
There’s, like, this bargaining. I would do anything to make it not true. I would do anything to forget. One minute, you, like, hate them and you wanna leave. You wanna Lorraine Bob at them. You wanna do, like, all of these horrible things. You’re, like, praying that they get in a car accident on the way home. You’re just, like, so disgusted with them.
Lora Cheadle [00:14:07]:
And then the next moment, you’re nostalgic. You’re in love. You’re sad. You swear you will do anything to fix things and everything in between. And what I want you to know first and foremost is that roller coaster ride is normal. However you feel, it is normal. It’s normal to go up. It’s normal to go down.
Lora Cheadle [00:14:36]:
It’s normal to have all this hope and to be like, blah. People have done it. And it’s also normal to be like, never. There is no hope in the world because it’s a roller coaster, because it is an up and down and because you know you are not stable, I think the number one rule of things not to do is do not make any decisions. Do not make any big decisions for those first thirty days. The women that I work with, I usually so say don’t make any big decisions really. Give yourself a year. But in those first thirty days, do not make any big decisions.
Lora Cheadle [00:15:16]:
Yes. If you need to get a hotel and separate, perfect. Do it. If your partner needs to go to get a hotel and separate, perfect. Do it. But don’t leap. Don’t file for divorce in the first thirty days. Don’t do anything in a state of crisis.
Lora Cheadle [00:15:34]:
Don’t quit your job. Don’t tell people without a lot of forethought. Yes. It’s important to tell your support people. It’s important to tell trusted advisers, but you can’t put this cat back in the bag. So blasting it out on Facebook might not be a great idea. Going to your partner’s place of business and telling everybody everything might not be a great idea. Maybe at some point you’re gonna wanna do that.
Lora Cheadle [00:16:08]:
I’m not saying don’t do all these things forever, but in those first thirty days, please know that you are on a roller coaster. Don’t make any big decisions in that first thirty days. Plus, when you’re on this roller coaster, you are triggered yourself. You are in a state of fight, flight, or freeze. And when you’re in a state of fight, flight, or freeze, you are not in the prefrontal cortex, which is the rational reasonable thinking portion of your brain. You are back in the amygdala, which is the survival portion of your brain, and you are not making good decisions. So just chill. Put some Band Aids on some things for those first thirty days, but don’t make any permanent decisions while you’re in a state of crisis.
Lora Cheadle [00:16:57]:
The number two thing not to do, and I know you’re gonna disobey me on this one, but do not rely on the betrayer for truth or for closure. And I’ll say more about that. But here’s the thing. In those first thirty days, you are in a state of trauma. You are on that roller coaster, but so are they. And you might not believe me or you might not hear me or you might not care. You might be like, he did this to me and I don’t care. They’re in a state of trauma too.
Lora Cheadle [00:17:37]:
Admitting this, getting found out, whatever it is, however this truth has come out, it disregulates them too. And, yes, I know you’re gonna say, but they should have thought about that earlier. And I don’t really care. They did this to me. I get that. And their nervous system is dysregulated, and they’re on a roller coaster. Your nervous system is dysregulated, and you are on a roller coaster. How do you think that’s gonna come together? It’s not.
Lora Cheadle [00:18:12]:
It’s like having two drunk people trying to have a conversation. Neither of you are in your right minds. So trying to rely on your partner those first thirty days for truth or disclosure, it’s just not realistic. It’s not physiologically realistic. He’s lied before. He’s probably still lying to protect himself because he doesn’t wanna get caught. So then that whole game of telling more lies to cover the lies, and then I’m gonna tell this one thing because it’s truth, but then you forget what you’ve said and then it becomes convoluted, that’s gonna happen. You need a chance to calm your own emotions, but he needs a chance to calm his emotions too.
Lora Cheadle [00:19:08]:
And the thing is right now, quite frankly, you need your energy to protect and to manage yourself. It’s not the right time to try to understand him. Understanding him will come later. Having compassion and understanding for him and his trauma and for how he used cheating as a tool, whatever it is. I’ve had plenty of shows on that, but that comes later, not in the first thirty days. These first thirty days are about you. Because he’s traumatized, he can’t help you, so you take care of you. So number one, don’t make any big life decisions.
Lora Cheadle [00:19:45]:
Number two, do not rely on the betrayer for truth or for closure because you’re not gonna get it and it’s not gonna be satisfying, and then it’s going to up the stress because you’re gonna be like, oh my gosh, you’re still lying and there’s gonna be gaps and all these different things. So just don’t go there. You can do it after thirty days, not those first thirty days. The third thing is don’t totally numb out. Don’t totally numb out. Whether that’s drinking, whether it’s binge watching TV, whether it’s throwing yourself into work or to the kids and completely ignoring things. What your body needs is healing and not distraction. What your mind needs is time to process, not distraction.
Lora Cheadle [00:20:42]:
I talk a lot about the difference between doing and being. And this is just really one of those times you need to be. You need to be in the pain. You need to be in the muck. You need to be in the despair. You need to be in the hatred, in the rage, and the, oh my god. I love you so much. We’re gonna get through this.
Lora Cheadle [00:21:00]:
Like, you need to be in whatever you are in and really try not to distract, dissociate, numb out. Let yourself feel what you are feeling. Because in the long run, healing is gonna be a lot quicker if you give yourself that chance. The last thing that I wanna say, and again, why do I know these things? Because I’m guilty of so many of them. The other thing I don’t want you to do is to rush to forgive or to rush to reconcile. Okay. Here’s a truth bomb. Women, especially high achieving women.
Lora Cheadle [00:21:45]:
Ding, ding, ding. Raise your hands here. High achieving women are told to work on the marriage. They, like me, we have this determination. We have this competitiveness that I can do it. Lora did it. I can do it. I see these other people on Instagram.
Lora Cheadle [00:22:06]:
They did it. I can do it. If I just work a little bit harder, oh my god, I can save the marriage by myself. Let me tell you, if I see one more program that is like, you can save this marriage all by yourself. No. You can’t. You can’t save the marriage all by yourself. I know you might want to.
Lora Cheadle [00:22:25]:
I know you might think, you know what? I mate, I can, Lora. I’m smart enough. I’m determined enough. You can’t do it. You cannot coerce another person into doing something that they don’t want to do. People do what they wanna do. People heal when they’re ready to heal. You cannot save the marriage by yourself.
Lora Cheadle [00:22:47]:
Most of those programs that talk about you can do it all by yourself. It only takes one. No. It doesn’t. But a lot of those programs, what they do is they teach you to put up with stuff, Or they teach you to disassociate and just to go take care of yourself. So great. I have saved the relationship by being independent in my relationship and not having a relationship. I’ve saved my relationship because I do everything that I wanna do and I let him do everything he wants to do and we only come together.
Lora Cheadle [00:23:19]:
Is that a relationship? I mean, if that’s the kind of relationship you want, have at it. If you want parallel lives, have at it. I want a real relationship. I want a real deep heart centered, connected, committed relationship. And you know what? Relationships are gonna have problems. There’s gonna be ups. There’s gonna be downs. I can’t do that myself.
Lora Cheadle [00:23:41]:
You can’t do that yourself. Bang head on keyboard right now. You can’t save the marriage by yourself. So do not rush into forgiving. Do not rush into reconciling. I know you’re a high achieving woman. I know you’re a go getter. I know you can do it.
Lora Cheadle [00:24:00]:
I know you can lean and work on the marriage. I know you can learn all of these skills, but you deserve more. You deserve more. This isn’t a marriage problem. This is a him problem. Let’s truth bomb that for a second. This is not a marriage problem. This is his problem.
Lora Cheadle [00:24:20]:
He cheated. He cheated, not you. All of those programs that talk about you can do it yourself, that’s implicitly blaming you. You can do it yourself because, parentheses, you were the problem in the first place. No. You weren’t. This is not your problem. This was not your problem.
Lora Cheadle [00:24:42]:
This is not a marriage problem. This is him and his problem. You need to focus on you. It’s not about forgiving. It’s not about reconciliation. It is about you. So those are the first four things that I want you to focus on not doing. No major changes.
Lora Cheadle [00:25:03]:
Do not rely on the betrayer for truth or foreclosure because you’re gonna be disappointed. Don’t numb out, feel your feelings, and do not rush to forgive or to reconcile or to save the marriage on your own. For god’s sakes, do not do that. Climbing off soapbox right now. Okay. The second segment that I wanna talk about, because we talked about what not to do, and, yes, I did them all. I did them all. The second segment is what to not or what to do.
Lora Cheadle [00:25:32]:
What you should do to regain stability is the second thing that I wanna talk about. So we know what not to do. Now what you should do is regain stability. I want you to think about a boat. I love boat analogies. If you were in a boat, whether it’s a kayak, whether it’s a rowboat, whether it’s a bigger boat, and the boat starts rocking, everybody in the boat is in danger of falling in. The very first thing to do when a kayak or a boat starts rocking is to stabilize the dang boat so you don’t go overboard. Right? It makes sense.
Lora Cheadle [00:26:15]:
You regain stability. If you’re in a kayak and it’s rocking and all of these things are happening, you don’t apply your sunscreen. It doesn’t matter. Do not apply your sunscreen. Stabilize the boat, Then you can apply the sunscreen. If the boat is rocking and you’re about to fall out, it’s not a good time to pull out lunch and eat. Stabilize the boat. Then you can pull out lunch and eat.
Lora Cheadle [00:26:41]:
Everything is secondary. A sunburn is secondary. Being hungry is secondary. Being thirsty is secondary. Returning a phone call is secondary. Number one priority is stabilize the dang boat. Stabilize the dang boat. So that’s what your goal is for those first thirty days is to regain stability.
Lora Cheadle [00:27:07]:
Okay. How do you regain stability? You might be saying, but, Lora, you were just saying how horrible this is. How can I regain stability when I am on a roller coaster? I will tell you how. I’ve got three steps. Number one, The number one thing to do to regain stability, to balance out that boat so you can do everything else, is to regulate your nervous system. Two tools. The two best ways that I have found to reregulate the nervous system are somatic healing and hypnotic meditation. And I will say more about those, but let’s talk about the nervous system.
Lora Cheadle [00:27:53]:
Betrayal is trauma. Betrayal trauma. Betrayal is trauma. Whenever a body is traumatized or stressed, it goes into a state of fight, flight, or freeze. Some people say fight, flight, or fix, and I really love that. Because I think for many women, myself included, we tend to fix. This is kind of what I was talking about earlier, being the smart, high achieving women. We’re like, I can fix that.
Lora Cheadle [00:28:21]:
I can do that. I got that down. I I can manage all these things. I can fix it. Yes. And that’s a trauma response. Fight, flight, or fix is a trauma response. When you learn of your partner’s infidelity, it puts your body into survival mode because it is survival mode.
Lora Cheadle [00:28:47]:
The fabric of your life, your relationships, where you live, finances, the stability of your family, your health, your relationship, your support system, it’s all gone. That rug has been so pulled out from under you. You are in trauma and your body is in survival mode. Part of the reason that I said don’t make any decisions is because when you’re in survival mode, you can’t think clearly. You have to reset your nervous system in order to feel safe. And you know what? You have to reset your nervous system time and time and time again. It’s not like, well, I did a hard restart on a Monday morning, so I’m not gonna have to do that again until the next Monday. No.
Lora Cheadle [00:29:31]:
Early on, you need to reset your nervous system often. One of the tools that I use is somatic processing. For those of you who don’t know what somatic processing is, somatics is just using the body. Our body houses us, our nervous system, our, you know, our our thoughts, our feelings, our everything. We are our body. And have you ever noticed this is such a simple question, but have you ever noticed when something scares you, your body jumps? When you’re cold or really afraid, your body shakes? Like, have you ever been at the doctors and they do, you know, the stethoscope on your back and they’re like, take a deep breath and you’re like, and your body is shaky if or your breath is shaky if you’re nervous? Have you ever been jittery with excitement? I do a lot of public speaking and there’s like a. Our bodies reflect our emotional states. So if we’re tired or cold, we shake.
Lora Cheadle [00:30:35]:
If we’re hungry and we have low blood sugar, our body wilts. Our body is a reflection of our emotional state. What is so incredible about somatic healing and somatic processing is instead of just addressing the emotional state, which can be hard, we can go at it in reverse. We address the body, and by addressing the body, we change the emotional state. Just like our emotions change the body, the body can change the emotion. Pretty amazing. Right? One of the first things that I tell my people to do some my rise in rain program as well as my, starting strong program, we have somatic processing videos. And one of those things that I have people do in the somatic processing videos is shake.
Lora Cheadle [00:31:26]:
Literally shaking releases trauma from your body. And if you’re watching this on YouTube right now, you can see I’m shaking my hands. Shake your hands as fast as you can. Shake your shoulders. Jump up and down. Shake your head. Shake your hips. Shake.
Lora Cheadle [00:31:41]:
Pretend you are freezing cold and you’re shaking and shivering from head to toe. That is a way to release trauma by going through the body to change the emotion. Another thing that you can do to activate the parasympathetic nervous system, that’s the rest or digest phase, is deep belly breathing. When you’re stressed, when you’re nervous, your breath shortens and it gets shallow. So counter that by taking deep belly breaths. So shake to release trauma, deep belly breaths to calm the nervous system. And you can notice how much you have to fight, like, if your breath is shaky. But about five to eight really deep belly breaths, put one hand on your belly, is gonna change and calm that nervous system.
Lora Cheadle [00:32:39]:
The other thing that I mentioned is hypnotic meditations. I am a, clinical hypno hypnotherapist. And why hypnosis is so powerful is because it targets the subconscious area of the brain. Consciously, we know what’s going on. Consciously, we know I am traumatized because my partner cheated on me. Consciously, we know this is going to impact my finances, my marriage, my health, then my my life. Like, consciously, we know all those things, and we can deal with them. It’s overwhelming, but we can deal with them.
Lora Cheadle [00:33:16]:
Why we get stuck, why you might be stuck is not what’s going on in the conscious part of your mind, but it’s because of what’s going on in the subconscious part. The subconscious part is all of those messages that we grew up with. All of those messages that society fed to us, that we learned through media, that we learned through watching friends, family. Messages like, if he loved you, he wouldn’t cheat on you. There’s no truth in that statement, by the way. Not one iota of truth. I’ve got a whole episode that breaks down breaks that down, but that is not a true statement. That is an example of one of those subconscious statements that has been lodged in our subconscious mind.
Lora Cheadle [00:34:08]:
And then we act and react based on that, but we’re not consciously aware that’s there. Do you wanna know another one? Another truth that’s out there that is absolutely untrue is once a cheater, always a cheater. Not true. Not true. Not true. It can be true. Yes. But it is not black and white true.
Lora Cheadle [00:34:36]:
And yet still, what does society tells us? Society tells us once a cheater, always a cheater. If they loved you, they wouldn’t cheat. Society tells us all of these things and we believe it. And even though we’re not consciously aware of it, it seeps in. Think about some of the movies, whether it’s Fatal Attraction or Bridges of Madison County about affair stories. We have these beliefs about affair stories that they’re tragically romantic. We have that it’s the best sex ever. We have all of these subconscious beliefs about affairs that are not true.
Lora Cheadle [00:35:13]:
The only way to get access to the subconscious is through dreaming and through hypnosis. So when we go through the subconscious, dreaming you can just vent things out. That’s why sometimes even if you have a horrible dream, you feel better the next day because you’re like, got that stress and anxiety out of here. Clinically, using hypnosis in a clinical way helps you uncover those beliefs so you can challenge them with the rational portion of your mind and so you can rewrite that script in your brain. So if you’re stuck, it’s going to be a subconscious belief that needs identifying, that needs pulling out, and that needs rewriting. The number one thing to do is to reregulate your nervous system. The top two ways to do that are somatic healing, somatic processing, and hypnosis. Okay.
Lora Cheadle [00:36:07]:
The next thing that I wanna talk about, step two, the top two things you should do. One, calm and reregulate your nervous system. Number two, get legal and financial clarity without committing to anything. Like I said in the intro, when we think about betrayal recovery, we think it’s all about emotions. And, yes, we are hijacked by emotions, but, oh my goodness, ladies. You have got to get some legal and financial clarity early on in those first thirty days because it is going to help you for so many reasons. First of all, fear of the unknown keeps so many of us stuck. Fear of the unknown.
Lora Cheadle [00:36:52]:
What’s gonna happen to me? Can I do this alone? How are we gonna divide our assets? Who’s got custody of the children? Where’s the dog gonna go? How are we gonna manage holidays? Fear of the unknown keeps us stuck. Going back to hypnosis because it’s one of my favorite things. Do do you know that the brain registers all things known as positive. What is known? Everything that you’ve done is unknown. Even if it’s negative, the brain sees that as a positive. So if somebody hits you and you survive, that’s a negative. But your brain says, positive. I’ve been hit and I can survive.
Lora Cheadle [00:37:35]:
It’s a positive. It’s a known, so I accept it. The brain sees all unknowns as negatives. It sees all unknowns as threats. Healthy, loving relationship with the love of my life where I’m honored and respected, haven’t had that. Clearly, the brain sees that as a threat because it’s an unknown. It’s positive, but the brain sees it as an as a threat because it’s an unknown. So abusive, physically, mentally abusive relationship, known brain says we could do this again.
Lora Cheadle [00:38:12]:
Healthy, strong, loving, respectful relationship, never had that. The brain is gonna say, fear. Never been there. Don’t know if we can survive that one or not. Hypnosis helps you get to the bottom of that. So this is in the legal section because the fear maybe I’ve never, you know, supported myself fully. Maybe I’ve never bought and sold property on my own. May maybe I’ve never maintained cars on my own.
Lora Cheadle [00:38:44]:
All of this fear of unknown, what is it gonna look like in a divorce? How will the assets get divided? What about retirement? When you know what’s happening, that fear of the unknown dissipates. Could it still be a tough transition? Sure could. But you’re not gonna allow that fear of the unknown to keep you stuck. Even if you have no thoughts of separating or divorce, I encourage you to meet with me and have a legal consultation. Meet with an attorney, have a legal consultation. Do some research, have talk about what will happen so you know. Just knowing your rights, what will happen to your assets, knowing your options will help you feel way more powerful. So many people are like, I just don’t wanna lose my kids.
Lora Cheadle [00:39:41]:
Okay. Let’s break that down. I get that. I wouldn’t I I wouldn’t want some of these things either, but let’s break it down and let’s talk about what it would really look like. Because what you have it pictured as in your mind is probably not how it’s actually going to look if it comes to pass. Now here, along those legal and financial lines, here are some of the things that I want you to do. And I want you to do these now even if it’s not the first thirty days. I want everybody to do them.
Lora Cheadle [00:40:15]:
Check your financial accounts. Check your credit cards. Make sure funds aren’t being drained. Make sure your name is on accounts that you think your name is on accounts. You can check beneficiary designations. Check life insurance policies. Just check things. You don’t have to do it all at once.
Lora Cheadle [00:40:35]:
Don’t overwhelm yourself. And when you feel anxious, go back and use some of those somatic processing techniques. Shake, deep breath, listen to one of my guided hypnotic meditations, do something to calm and re regulate. But keep putting one step foot in front of the other and start learning about your finances. Just where the where where are your accounts? Where are the banks? Some basics. Second thing, I do want you to schedule a legal consultation. No action is required. This is about information.
Lora Cheadle [00:41:08]:
Whether it’s me, whether it’s a free consultation with an attorney, whether it’s at a phone appointment, whether you’re even just googling something. Get some sort of legal consultation so you know what is going on. So you know if your state is equitable division or a fifty fifty. So you know. Did you know, like, how long you’ve been married can impact the amount of money that you get? It can impact the settlement. Some states, infidelity matters. Some states, it doesn’t. Know your rights.
Lora Cheadle [00:41:38]:
And I think that’s the bottom line is knowing your rights around division of property, alimony, which is like the spousal maintenance, custody. Just knowing your rights is actually going to put your mind at ease. The third thing that I really, really want you to do is start setting some healthy boundaries to take your power back. So set those healthy boundaries and take steps to take your power back. First thing is to decide how much contact do you want with your partner, if any. You might not want any contact with your partner. You might want to only text or only do emails. In fact, for the women that I work with, a lot of times, I recommend doing texts or emails because it slows things down.
Lora Cheadle [00:42:33]:
One of the apps that I use in coaching is the Voxer app, and it’s a walkie talkie app. And it allows for asynchronous communication, which means, like, my clients can send me a voice message, basically, a voice memo anytime. I listen to it, and I send them a voice mail every night that responds to that. So we don’t have to book an appointment. We’re not there face to face. They send me a message. I send them a message. And what’s nice about that is it slows things down and it gives you the pause.
Lora Cheadle [00:43:05]:
And sometimes my people are like, I’m gonna go back and delete that because it’s no longer applicable. Or they’ll send me another Vox, and they’ll be like, three hours has changed everything. Now this is what I’m thinking. If you want communication with your partner, I highly recommend not being face to face for those first thirty days, but to use an app like Voxer or WhatsApp or texting or email just so you can slow down, so you can make sure that you get it right, and then also so it’s recorded. Not necessarily because you wanna catch your partner doing something, but because when you’re in a state of trauma and you’re both in a state of trauma, you can’t remember. You can’t remember or you remember things wrong. And it’s as much for your own benefit as for your partner’s benefit to be like, okay. I can go back and review my notes.
Lora Cheadle [00:44:00]:
Okay. Now I know what’s up. The second thing around that is you first you decide how much communication you want or not. The second thing is I want you to really stop letting his actions dictate your emotional state. They can be positive or negative. You are still you. They can be cooperative or antagonistic, and you can still be you. Decide your emotional state, and stick with it regardless of what they do.
Lora Cheadle [00:44:37]:
This goes to that whole thing of, like, you made me so mad. You don’t make. Nobody can make you mad. You can’t make anybody else mad. We are all responsible for our own emotional state. If I get mad in response, it’s on me. If I get frustrated in response to you, it’s on me. So stop letting your partner’s actions dictate your emotional state.
Lora Cheadle [00:45:01]:
And this sounds so easy. During my six month coaching, like, we work on this for six months, and you get so much better at it. You get to the place where you’re like, I don’t care if it’s at work or if it’s at my kids, and nobody can disrupt my happiness. But it’s still hard and it still takes practice. But start now, especially now. Otherwise, you are gonna be pinging high and pinging low, and it’s already a very very volatile time. The third thing is I want you to know that you hold all the cards in this moment. You will not always hold all the cards, but in this moment, you do.
Lora Cheadle [00:45:41]:
So I want you to be very clear, and you start setting the rules. This is where your power begins right here, right now, today. Set the rules. Set the rules for whether you want coaching, whether you want therapy, whether you want them to go to a 12 step program. You set those rules. You set the rules. Communicate. I’m not saying your partner is going to say yes and acquiesce to everything, but I want you to practice setting the rules.
Lora Cheadle [00:46:16]:
Okay? The third thing that I want you to do is to consciously choose to start the healing process. And that’s this third segment of the show today is talking about the healing process. But we don’t just heal. Healing doesn’t just magically happen after thirty days or after two years. You won’t heal if you just ignore it. Time does not heal all wounds. Healing is a conscious choice. And what I want you to do is choose to heal.
Lora Cheadle [00:47:00]:
You’re not choosing how or when or any of that, but just choose to heal. I choose to heal. Declare that to yourself. Write that down. I choose to heal. I choose to go beyond healing. I choose to thrive. I choose to transform.
Lora Cheadle [00:47:20]:
What do you choose? Claim that for yourself. Sometimes I don’t work with people who are only like, I just wanna survive. I just wanna heal. Good. That’s your starting place. Where else do you wanna go? Oh, I don’t know if that’s it. No. No.
Lora Cheadle [00:47:40]:
No. No. No. You’ve undergone a major cataclysmic, catastrophic event in your life. Oh my goodness. Take it and ride it and run with it and make this extraordinary. Choose to heal and choose to transform. So, yes, we’re talking about the first thirty days, and you can’t transform in thirty days.
Lora Cheadle [00:48:07]:
You can’t heal in thirty days. What I want you to do in that first thirty days is choose to start to heal. Choose to move into the direction of transformation, healing, joy, whatever it is for you. It’s after the first thirty days, after this first initial shock that the real healing begins. And I wanna be clear, healing is not about getting over it. You will not get over this. It’s about rebuilding yourself. Two parts of rebuilding yourself.
Lora Cheadle [00:48:50]:
The first part, we have touched on this earlier, but it’s about understanding your trauma response. Fight, flight, freeze, or fix. Sometimes people call it fun. Are you a fighter? When you’re in that rage, obsession, I’m gonna call the affair partner. I’m gonna call their their husband. I’m gonna I’m gonna that is really you needing control. Understand that the fight response is about needing control. Affirm for yourself, and you do a lot of journaling.
Lora Cheadle [00:49:25]:
I need control. These are the ways I have felt out of control. This is why control feels good to me. The second trauma response is flight. That’s overworking. That’s avoiding. That’s running away. That’s sweeping it under the rug.
Lora Cheadle [00:49:42]:
I’m gonna take care of the kids, and I’m gonna take care of myself, and I’m gonna go do this, and it’s gonna be fine. And I think I’m gonna lose 30 pounds and redecorate the house, and I can’t deal with this now. I have got a blah blah blah blah blah. That’s a flight response. That’s running away. That is not dealing with it. And not dealing with it in small doses when you do have things to do is valid. But not dealing with something for thirty years is not valid.
Lora Cheadle [00:50:22]:
Fight is about needing control because you’ve had control completely taken away from you. Flight is about running away because you just can’t handle it right now. Just make sure that right now doesn’t become a year, two years, ten years, fifty years. Freeze is that brain fog, that numbness, that stuck, and we get in that state when we just don’t know what to do. We don’t know what to do. How are we supposed to know what to do? Oh my goodness. Nobody should know what to do in this situation. But if you’re in freeze, that’s really a good time to reach out.
Lora Cheadle [00:51:06]:
Reach out to a friend, to a therapist, to coach, to clergy, to whoever. Use somebody outside of you to get you out of freeze. Use somebody outside of you to get you out of bed. I couldn’t get off the floor for a long time. And, yeah, feel your emotions and get yourself off the floor. Feel your emotions and have some constructive time doing things too. The last trauma response is that fixed response, that fixed, fun, people pleasing. I’m gonna do everything.
Lora Cheadle [00:51:46]:
I’m gonna make it right. And that, like I said earlier, us high achieving women just go into that because we can do it. I can just think my way through it. I can muscle way through it. I can make this work. I can make this no. You can’t make this work. You can’t.
Lora Cheadle [00:52:01]:
You can’t. You can’t. You can do your part, but you can’t change another person, and waiting for him to change is not fair to you. So when you understand your trauma response, when you know what you’re doing, oh, I’m in a state of fight. Oh, I’m in a state of fix. I’m flighting. Know what it is and use those tools we talked about earlier. Somatic processing, shaking, breathing, dancing, moving, hypnosis.
Lora Cheadle [00:52:29]:
Use those tools to calm and reregulate your nervous system. Instead of judging yourself instead of judging yourself, hypnosis, breath work, emotional processing, breath, do something to reregulate yourself. The second thing to heal, to really start the healing process is to start the work of reclaiming your identity and your confidence. Most of us lose ourselves along the way. We lose ourselves to motherhood, to being a wife, to being in a career, to being a stay at home mom. We lose ourselves along the way. And reclaiming your identity and your confidence is really just coming back home to yourself, to who you are, to what you deserve. And if you’ve been listening to me for a while, you know my flaunt framework is what will get you there.
Lora Cheadle [00:53:41]:
The f is about finding your fetish. It’s about finding your joy. It’s about leaning into doing and being the things that light you up, that give you pleasure, joy, but also just that deep sense of contentment. The l is about laughing. It’s about calming and reregulating the nervous system through laughter. It’s about friends. It’s about family. It’s about laughing through life.
Lora Cheadle [00:54:10]:
It’s about love and laughter. It’s about all of the things that make you happy. It’s about not working so hard all the time, but living in that state of gratitude and appreciation. The AU is what I call the golden center of flaunting. Oh my gosh. This is where so much magic happens. That’s about accepting unconditionally. Accepting both yourself and others in the situation unconditionally.
Lora Cheadle [00:54:41]:
You might know I am not a big believer in forgiveness. I am a big believer in unconditional acceptance. Accept your age, your weight, your size, your income, the choices that you made. Accept the choices that you made. Accept the fact that your partner did this. Accept the fact that you are here now. Accept the fact that you might not have joint Christmases, that you might have your kids half time. Acceptance.
Lora Cheadle [00:55:13]:
Accepting unconditionally is where so much power and magic happens. The n is navigating. Navigating this new normal. Navigating everything that you have to navigate now that things have changed. You know, if you had a new medical condition, you would have to navigate that new normal. If you lose somebody that you love or a catastrophic thing happens like the Malibu fires, you have to navigate that new normal step at a time in the best way that you can in that moment. How do you do that? By the t in flaunt, which is trusting in yourself, trusting in your truth, trusting in your emotions, your intuition. I had mentioned earlier, I’m really big into the spiritual side of things.
Lora Cheadle [00:56:06]:
I’m really big into the solo lessons and the solo contracts, and what does this mean, and how do I identify and address my truth, my karma, my mission, my divine path? What is my divine right action? Knowing how to trust in yourself? I can’t even say enough about that. I’m pausing because I’m like, how do I even how do I even express that? That’s where it all begins. When you are connected to the spirit within you, that’s where everything changes. Because you’re no longer reliant on other people’s truths or lies, you can assess it all for yourself and you know that ultimately you will always have your own back because you’re always divinely connected and supported because you were living your truth. So this has been a lot, and the first thirty days are hard. What I want you to take away from today’s episode is first, you don’t have to have all the answers right now. You’re not supposed to have all the answers right now. It’s okay not to know.
Lora Cheadle [00:57:22]:
The second is you don’t have to fix the relation today. Even if that is your deepest passion to fix this relationship, to really, really go deep and recreate anything, that’s not something you’re gonna do today. But the third thing is you do have to take care of you. It is all about you. You do have to take care of yourself. You have to heal yourself, which means learning how to reregulate your nervous system. It means practicing and practicing again and trying tools and trying other tools and working with people and sending me a Vox and being like, oh my gosh, Lora. Let’s do another tool in our next session because I’m struggling with this.
Lora Cheadle [00:58:04]:
But it means learning how to grow up and regulate your own nervous system. It means, again, growing up. And I mean that with in a loving way, not in a condescending way, but understanding your legal and financial obligations in your situation so you never feel trapped. I mean, I’m embarrassed to admit, but there were so many things I’d be like, I’ll let him deal with it. Taking care of yourself means understanding legally, financially, so you know what’s going on, so you’re not trapped, so you know exactly what you need to do. And then the third thing that means is choosing to heal and choosing to heal on a deeper level. Choosing that path. Not just emotional healing, mentally healing, spiritually healing, even healing on an ancestral level.
Lora Cheadle [00:58:54]:
It means choosing your highest soul’s path because you deserve way more than survival. You deserve to rise. You deserve to rebuild. You deserve to reclaim your power. As you probably know, I’ve got my amazing betrayal recovery guide. Go to betrayalrecoveryguide.com and download it for free. There are five different tools in there that will help you do everything that we have talked about. If you wanna work with me one on one, I would love nothing more than to guide you through this process and to lead you out on the other side transformed, powerful, confident, clear, and most importantly, joyful.
Lora Cheadle [00:59:41]:
Have an amazing week. I really look forward to seeing you next time. But for now, always remember to flaunt exactly who you are because who you are is always more bad enough.
Alexia Vernon [00:59:58]:
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.