The Complex Trauma Podcast

You did the work. You stopped shrinking. You let someone in. And it still ended with you feeling invisible.
So what do you do with that?
In this episode I'm responding to a message from a listener going through a divorce. She didn't shrink. She showed up fully. And it still ended in abandonment.
 Her question was simple and devastating: how do you reconcile that? And, how do you ever trust again?
On today's episode I get into why adult relationships can reopen old wounds rather than heal them, what your nervous system is actually doing when someone starts pulling away, the difference between a trigger and a real present wound, and what rebuilding trust actually looks like from the inside out.
This one is for anyone who thought they'd finally broken the pattern only to find themselves right back in the wound.

Thanks for listening to The Complex Trauma Podcast!
Be sure to follow, share and give us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Follow on Instagram: @sarahherstichlcsw 
Follow on TikTok: @sarahherstichlcsw
Learn more about EMDR & trauma therapy in Pennsylvania with Reclaim Therapy
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or nutritional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Remember, I'm a therapist, but I'm not your therapist. Nothing in this podcast is meant to replace actual therapy or treatment. If you're in crisis or things feel really unsafe right now, please reach out to someone. You can call 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text them, or head to your nearest ER.
The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not represent the opinions of any organizations or institutions. Reliance on any information provided by this podcast is solely at your own risk.

In today's episode, I'm sitting down with Libby Ward, creator, speaker, and author of Honest Motherhood: On Losing My Mind and Finding Myself, to talk about what it really looks like to wake up mid-motherhood and realize you never actually knew yourself to begin with. Not because motherhood took you away from yourself, but because trauma did that long before your kids ever showed up.
We talk about the overfunctioning, the perfectionism, the hypervigilance disgused up as "being a good mom," and the moment Libby hit a wall in her car on an ordinary morning that changed everything. 
We also get into repair, the grief that comes with cycle breaking, and why loving your kids, while beautiful, is not actually enough on its own.
This one is raw, honest, and so worth your time.
In this episode we cover:
How Libby recognized her childhood trauma well into motherhood
The nervous system reality behind why "just calm down" isn't a real option
Overfunctioning and perfectionism as trauma responses
The granola bar moment (you will feel this one)
What cycle breaking actually looks like on a regular Tuesday
The grief of knowing better and still struggling
Why repair might be the most powerful thing you can offer your kids
Libby's book Honest Motherhood and what's inside the pre-order bonus
Links and resources:
Libby's website: https://libbyward.com/ 
Pre-order Honest Motherhood: On Losing My Mind and Finding Myself at https://libbyward.com/honest-motherhood-book
Follow Libby on Instagram
Follow Libby on TikTok

Thanks for listening to The Complex Trauma Podcast!
Be sure to follow, share and give us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Follow on Instagram: @sarahherstichlcsw 
Follow on TikTok: @sarahherstichlcsw
Learn more about EMDR & trauma therapy in Pennsylvania with Reclaim Therapy
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or nutritional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Remember, I'm a therapist, but I'm not your therapist. Nothing in this podcast is meant to replace actual therapy or treatment. If you're in crisis or things feel really unsafe right now, please reach out to someone. You can call 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text them, or head to your nearest ER.
The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not represent the opinions of any organizations or institutions. Reliance on any information provided by this podcast is solely at your own risk.

You might not call it shame. But if you were emotionally neglected, there's a chance it's been running the show.
Most people who grew up emotionally neglected don't have a name for what they carry. They just know that asking for help feels wrong, that they can't stop replaying conversations, that being seen makes them want to disappear.
This episode is about why that story forms, where it lives in the body, and why it's so hard to recognize as shame at all.
I break down the difference between shame from overt trauma and the kind that grows from absence, why a child's nervous system is wired to turn unmet needs into self-blame, and what it actually looks like to start healing something you can't even point to.
In this episode:
Why emotional neglect is described as an invisible injury
How shame forms as a survival strategy to preserve attachment
The version of freeze that looks like high-functioning
Why self-awareness can sometimes be shame in disguise
What it means that your nervous system never built a map for settled
The grief of growing up in an environment that couldn't hold all of you
What healing actually looks like when insight alone isn't enough
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Thanks for listening to The Complex Trauma Podcast!
Be sure to follow, share and give us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Follow on Instagram: @sarahherstichlcsw 
Follow on TikTok: @sarahherstichlcsw
Learn more about EMDR & trauma therapy in Pennsylvania with Reclaim Therapy
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or nutritional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Remember, I'm a therapist, but I'm not your therapist. Nothing in this podcast is meant to replace actual therapy or treatment. If you're in crisis or things feel really unsafe right now, please reach out to someone. You can call 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text them, or head to your nearest ER.
The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not represent the opinions of any organizations or institutions. Reliance on any information provided by this podcast is solely at your own risk.

Sex and complex trauma. It's one of those topics that doesn't get nearly enough airtime, and yet it comes up so frequently in the therapy room.
In this episode I'm talking with Rachael Garner, a certified sex therapist and EMDR clinician who works with complex trauma survivors, about what actually happens to our relationship with sex, desire, and our bodies when we've experienced complex trauma. And there is a lot more nuance here than most people realize.
We talk about why dissociation during sex happens and what your body is doing when it checks out. We get into the difference between physiological arousal and actual desire, why zero libido sometimes has nothing to do with your partner, and how sexual neglect, not just abuse, can shape the way you relate to your own sexuality.
We also talk about what healing looks like in this area, why it has to be slow, what partners often get wrong even with the best intentions, and how nervous system flexibility connects trauma work and sexual healing in a way that's genuinely hopeful.
Rachael Garner is a Certified Sex Therapist, an EMDR Certified Therapist, and an EMDRIA-Approved Consultant-in-Training specializing in complex trauma and sexual issues through a somatic- and attachment-based lens. She is in private practice in Jackson MS, where she resides with her husband and two boys. 
Learn more about Rachael and her work at https://www.garnercounseling.com.

Thanks for listening to The Complex Trauma Podcast!
Be sure to follow, share and give us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Follow on Instagram: @sarahherstichlcsw 
Follow on TikTok: @sarahherstichlcsw
Learn more about EMDR & trauma therapy in Pennsylvania with Reclaim Therapy
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or nutritional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Remember, I'm a therapist, but I'm not your therapist. Nothing in this podcast is meant to replace actual therapy or treatment. If you're in crisis or things feel really unsafe right now, please reach out to someone. You can call 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text them, or head to your nearest ER.
The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not represent the opinions of any organizations or institutions. Reliance on any information provided by this podcast is solely at your own risk.

If you've ever gone completely blank in the middle of a hard conversation, or found yourself frozen, heart hammering, unable to say a single thing, this episode is for you.
A listener wrote in asking why she shuts down instead of getting upset. Why everyone else seems to cry or fight while she just goes numb and feels nothing. And whether something is wrong with her.
The answer is no. And this whole episode is the explanation.
We cover the difference between freeze and shutdown, because they get used interchangeably and they are not the same thing. Freeze is high activation trapped under stillness. Shutdown is the system going offline entirely. Two different nervous system responses, two different origins, two different things that actually help.
We also talk about why the tools that usually work, breathing, grounding, thinking your way through it, don't reach you when you're in shutdown, and what actually does.
If you recognize yourself in either of these patterns, this episode will give you language for something that's probably been really hard to explain.

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Thanks for listening to The Complex Trauma Podcast!
Be sure to follow, share and give us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Follow on Instagram: @sarahherstichlcsw 
Follow on TikTok: @sarahherstichlcsw
Learn more about EMDR & trauma therapy in Pennsylvania with Reclaim Therapy
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or nutritional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Remember, I'm a therapist, but I'm not your therapist. Nothing in this podcast is meant to replace actual therapy or treatment. If you're in crisis or things feel really unsafe right now, please reach out to someone. You can call 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text them, or head to your nearest ER.
The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not represent the opinions of any organizations or institutions. Reliance on any information provided by this podcast is solely at your own risk.