Childhood Trauma, Emotional Healing and Learning to Love Yourself with Danielle Bernock

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, Ellie is joined by Danielle Bernock, an author, speaker, trauma-informed self-love coach, relationship repair specialist, childhood trauma survivor and founder of 4F Media.

Danielle, known as “that lady on the internet who loves you,” helps people understand childhood trauma, emotional neglect, shame and the lasting effects unresolved trauma can have on our self-worth, identity, nervous system and relationships.

Together, Ellie and Danielle explore childhood and emotional trauma, trauma recovery, self-love, people-pleasing, shame, feeling unseen or unworthy, repairing your relationship with yourself and moving from survival mode towards genuine healing. Danielle also answers some deeply personal questions Ellie had wanted to ask, offering an incredibly enlightening, refreshing and compassionate perspective.

This is an honest and supportive conversation for trauma survivors, neurodivergent adults and anyone trying to understand their past, develop self-compassion, rebuild their confidence or begin healing their relationship with themselves.

Danielle was an absolute pleasure to have on the podcast. She shared her experience and wisdom so openly and generously, and Ellie would love to welcome her back again.

Find Danielle Bernock:

Website: https://www.daniellebernock.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dbernock/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/daniellebernock/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniellebernock

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/DanielleBernockLovesYou

Find Ellie and AuDHD and Then Some:

https://linktr.ee/Ellieaudhd

Topics include: childhood trauma, emotional trauma, emotional neglect, trauma recovery, self-love, self-worth, shame, relationship repair, nervous system healing, people-pleasing, neurodivergence, autism, ADHD, AuDHD, mental health, self-compassion and moving from surviving to thriving.

⚠️ TRIGGER WARNING: This episode contains sensitive discussions around child loss, accidental overdose, grief, trauma and bereavement. Please listen with care.

This was an incredibly moving and meaningful conversation with Malisa Hepner, LCSW, author, podcast host and speaker, and I cannot thank her enough for joining me and sharing so openly.

At the heart of this episode is Malisa’s beautiful son, Jake, who tragically died at just 18 years old following an accidental overdose. Malisa speaks about Jake, motherhood and navigating unimaginable grief with such love and honesty. I am incredibly grateful to Malisa and her family for allowing us to hear part of Jake’s story and for using their experience to raise awareness and help others.

We also explore motherhood, mum guilt, spirituality, trauma, healing, perfectionism, self-compassion and what it means to keep moving through life when your world has fundamentally changed.

Unfortunately, technology was absolutely NOT on our side! One of our connections struggled throughout the interview, resulting in several technical difficulties, and after around 52 minutes we eventually had to admit defeat. 😂 We gave it everything we had, though, and what we managed to capture was far too important and beautiful not to share.

Malisa, thank you profusely for your patience, your honesty and your willingness to share such a deeply personal part of your life with AuDHD and Then Some.

We hold Jake, Malisa and her family in our thoughts, and I sincerely hope Malisa will come back for another conversation. Next time, preferably with the internet behaving itself! 💜

🎧 AuDHD and Then Some
Conversations about neurodivergence, trauma, grief, mental health, motherhood, healing and the beautifully complicated reality of being human.

Some podcast interviews feel like interviews. This one felt more like a night out. 😂

I genuinely could have spoken to Nikki Allen forever.

Nikki is the author of Loved You, Hated You, but her story goes far beyond the book. She has lived through heartbreak, betrayal, relationships that changed her, and some genuinely crazy experiences along the way. But rather than allowing those experiences to become the end of her story, Nikki has taken them and turned them into something else entirely: a rebirth.

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, we talk about losing yourself in relationships, emotional betrayal, starting again, reclaiming your identity, choosing yourself and finding the courage to turn painful experiences into something creative.

We also talk about how Loved You, Hated You began as a song, became a screenplay and eventually found its home as a novel, allowing Nikki to tell emotional truths through fiction.

But this conversation is definitely not all serious.

Nikki is hilarious, candid, down to earth and completely herself. We laughed, we went off on tangents, and at times I genuinely forgot we were recording a podcast at all.

What struck me most about Nikki is that she hasn’t allowed the difficult chapters of her life to define the rest of the book. She keeps reinventing herself, keeps creating, keeps getting back up and, quite frankly, keeps going and going and going.

And she’s amazing.

This is a conversation about heartbreak, relationships, emotional healing, self-love, identity, resilience, personal growth, women rebuilding their lives and what can happen when the ending you never wanted becomes the beginning of something completely different.

Nikki, I wish you every bit of luck and success with Loved You, Hated You and everything that comes next.

Here’s to the next 27 years. ❤️

🎙️ NEW EPISODE: Can an App Really Spot Relationship Red Flags? | Justin Smith, Founder of Cray

This was a REALLY interesting one, and I genuinely want to know what you all think. 👀

Today I'm joined by Justin Smith, founder of Cray, a dating safety app he created following his own experience of an eight-year relationship that he describes as emotionally abusive and incredibly traumatic.

Justin took that experience and turned it into something designed to help other people recognise potential red flags, manipulation and unsafe patterns earlier.

Now, I went into this conversation with QUESTIONS. 😂

Because who actually decides what a red flag is?

Is something that's unhealthy in one relationship necessarily unhealthy in another?

How much does circumstance matter?

And can an app really account for all of that?

I want to make something clear because I think it's important: Justin and I didn't agree on absolutely everything in this conversation.

There were opinions and generalisations I questioned, and you'll hear me offer different perspectives throughout. But that's exactly what I want this podcast to be.

I don't want to only interview people who think exactly like me.

I want to be able to sit across from someone, hear their story, respectfully question things, disagree where appropriate and let YOU make up your own mind.

And I have to give Justin a massive thank you for that. 💜

I threw some pretty challenging questions at him, including questions that could easily have felt like criticism of something he's spent 18 months building, and he took every single one like an absolute trooper. He explained his reasoning, answered openly and never shied away from the conversation.

Thank you, Justin, for trusting me with your story and for being willing to have a genuinely open conversation rather than expecting me to simply nod along.

🎧 Have a listen and then PLEASE come back and tell me what you think.

Can an app really help us identify relationship red flags? And who gets to decide what a red flag actually is?

I'm genuinely interested to see where you lot land on this one. 👀💜

🎧 Spotify link below 👇

TRIGGER WARNING: This episode discusses trauma, human trafficking in Mexico, addiction, abuse and CPTSD.

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, Ellie speaks with registered nurse, CPTSD survivor, trauma-informed coach and author Carrie Davidson about complex PTSD, trauma recovery, self-worth, addiction, survival and learning to rebuild your life after profound trauma.

Carrie shares parts of her extraordinary story, including her experience of human trafficking in Mexico and the impact trauma has had on her life.

We explore how Carrie's career in nursing and her ability to hyperfocus helped carry her through periods of trauma, while also discussing the reality that achievement, knowledge and professional success cannot necessarily allow someone to escape CPTSD.

Carrie talks openly about doing the work on yourself, rebuilding self-worth, understanding trauma responses and learning practical strategies to live alongside CPTSD while continuing to hope for further healing in the future.

This is a powerful and honest conversation about what happens when survival is no longer enough and you begin the difficult process of taking your life back.

Topics include: CPTSD | Complex PTSD | trauma recovery | human trafficking | addiction and trauma | nursing | hyperfocus | self-worth | nervous system | survival responses | healing after trauma | mental health | personal growth

Carrie's memoir, Addicted to Trauma: A Memoir of CPTSD, Addiction, and Taking My Life Back, is available through her website.

What happens when you finally achieve the dream you’ve spent years working towards… and discover it hasn’t made you happy?

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, I’m joined by former National Geographic photographer and conservation scientist turned transformational coach, Jen Guyton.

Jen spent years building an extraordinary career, eventually reaching a milestone most photographers could only dream of: having her incredible infrared photographs of spotted hyenas featured on the cover of National Geographic.

But instead of feeling like she had finally "made it", Jen found herself asking a much bigger question: Is this actually the life I want?

We talk about success, fulfilment, identity, career changes and those moments in life when everything looks right from the outside but something inside you is asking for more.

Jen shares how she began exploring who she was beyond her achievements, why what we sometimes call a "midlife crisis" can actually be an invitation to reassess our lives, and how choosing to pivot opened doors she might never have discovered otherwise.

Today, Jen is a transformational coach while continuing her photography work, helping other ambitious people step away from the achievement trap and create lives that actually feel like their own.

A beautiful conversation about reaching the dream, discovering it isn't the destination you expected, and having the courage to ask: What now? 💜

What if your intuition isn’t something mystical that only certain people have, but something you can actually learn to reconnect with and trust?

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, I’m joined by the wonderful Janna Holterman, an ICU nurse, coach, mentor and trained intuitive who brings together neuroscience, nervous system regulation, emotional processing and intuition in the work she does with her clients.

And this conversation went in some BEAUTIFUL directions.

We touch on Janna’s own story and the devastating loss of her husband, Shane, and how that experience changed the course of her life. But our conversation is also very much about the woman Janna is today, the work she now does, and what she has learned about herself along the way.

We talk about intuition and what it actually feels like, learning to hear and trust yourself, nervous system regulation, emotional processing, and how our brains and bodies can influence the way we move through the world.

Janna also shares how she works with her clients, combining practical understanding of neuroscience with intuition and helping women move towards lives that feel sustainable, successful and, most importantly, like their own.

We explore what happens when you stop living according to all of the things you think you should be doing and start asking what you actually want your life to look like.

And despite touching on some deeply emotional subjects, this conversation was full of laughter.

Honestly, talking to Janna felt like catching up with an old friend over coffee. She’s funny, clever, warm and incredibly easy to talk to, and I could genuinely have carried on chatting to her for hours.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Intuition and learning to trust yourself
• Neuroscience and the nervous system
• Nervous system regulation
• Emotional processing
• Recognising what your body is trying to tell you
• Moving away from the life you think you “should” have
• Janna’s work with her clients
• Rebuilding and rediscovering yourself after life changes
• Creating sustainable success
• What Janna’s life looks like today

We also briefly discuss the loss of Janna’s husband, Shane, to suicide. Please listen with care if this is a sensitive subject for you.

Thank you so much, Janna, for such a beautiful, funny, open and genuinely fascinating conversation. ❤️

Why do two people experience the same world completely differently? Why do some personality types naturally click while others clash? And how much of who we are comes down to personality, life experience, evolution… or simply being human?

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, Ellie is joined by Arky Jones, creator of PersonalityPeek, for a conversation that very quickly becomes about MUCH more than personality tests.

We explore different personality types and personality assessments, how personality tests are created, what they can actually tell us about ourselves, and why they should be used as tools for self-discovery rather than boxes we squeeze ourselves into.

But, in true AuDHD and Then Some fashion, we also disappear down some pretty spectacular rabbit holes. 😂

From Homo sapiens and human evolution to relationships, compatibility, self-awareness, behaviour and why certain personalities seem to naturally mesh, this becomes a much bigger conversation about what actually makes us human.

We talk about how our personalities develop, why humans behave so differently from one another, what makes certain people connect, the patterns we repeat throughout our lives, and whether understanding ourselves can help us understand the people around us too.

Arky also takes us behind PersonalityPeek, explaining the thinking behind personality assessments and how understanding your own patterns, strengths and tendencies can become a starting point for personal growth.

And yes… Ellie took the personality assessment herself. 👀

The result was surprisingly bloody accurate.

This is one of those conversations that starts with “What personality type are you?” and somehow ends up asking “Why are human beings like this in the first place?”

If you’re interested in personality psychology, personality types, human behaviour, self-discovery, relationships, personal growth, evolution or simply understanding yourself and other people a little better, this one’s for you.

🎧 Featuring Arky Jones, creator of PersonalityPeek

🔗 Take the PersonalityPeek assessment and learn more about Arky’s work at:
https://personalitypeek.com/

Topics include:
Personality types • Personality tests • Human behaviour • Homo sapiens • Human evolution • Psychology • Relationships • Personality compatibility • Self-awareness • Self-discovery • Personal growth • Identity • Why people behave the way they do

What actually IS hypnotherapy — and no, does it involve being hypnotised into thinking you’re a dog? 😂

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, Ellie Capstick sits down with therapist, clinical hypnotherapist, coach, trainer and author Andrew Parr to get underneath the myths, misconceptions and slightly bonkers image many of us have of hypnosis.

Andrew explains what therapeutic hypnotherapy actually is, what happens during a session and why the problem someone walks through the door with isn’t always the real problem underneath.

We talk about the deeper beliefs, experiences and emotional patterns that can sit beneath the surface of the things we’re struggling with — and why simply trying to tackle the obvious symptom doesn’t necessarily address what’s driving it.

Andrew also shares his journey into hypnotherapy, what more than three decades of working with people has taught him, and the ideas behind his book The Real You.

And, importantly, we answer the question we’re all secretly wondering…

Can a hypnotherapist actually make you believe you’re a dog? 😂🐶

A fascinating, refreshingly down-to-earth conversation about what hypnotherapy really is, what it isn’t, and what might actually be going on underneath the problems we think we’re trying to solve.

🎧 Topics include: hypnotherapy, hypnosis, subconscious beliefs, emotional patterns, behaviour, anxiety, habits, therapy, self-understanding and The Real You.

Is It Trauma… or Is It Neurodivergence? ADHD, Autism & the Nervous System | Elizabeth Ormes

Is it trauma? Is it ADHD or autism? Or can neurodivergence and trauma become so intertwined that it’s difficult to know where one ends and the other begins?

In this episode of AuDHD and Then Some, Ellie Capstick is joined by psychotherapist, trauma specialist and neurodivergent professional Elizabeth Ormes for an incredibly insightful conversation about AuDHD, ADHD, autism, trauma, masking and the neurodivergent nervous system.

Elizabeth brings nearly 30 years of experience in mental health — alongside her own lived experience of neurodivergence — and this turned into such a warm, fascinating and genuinely thought-provoking conversation.

We explore the huge overlap between trauma responses and neurodivergent traits, and what happens when a person has spent years masking, adapting, people-pleasing or living in survival mode without understanding why.

We talk about:

🧠 ADHD, autism and AuDHD⚡ Trauma and the neurodivergent nervous system🎭 Masking and losing your sense of identity❤️ People-pleasing and survival responses🫠 Emotional dysregulation, overwhelm and shutdown👩 Why neurodivergent women can be missed for so long🔍 Discovering your neurodivergence later in life🌱 Healing, self-understanding and learning who you are underneath the mask

We also ask an important question:

When you’ve spent your whole life believing something is “wrong” with you, what happens when you finally begin to understand your brain instead?

This episode isn’t about fixing neurodivergent people.

It’s about understanding ourselves — our brains, our bodies, our nervous systems and the experiences that have shaped us.

Whether you’re diagnosed with ADHD, autism or AuDHD, self-identifying, exploring whether you may be neurodivergent, or simply trying to understand yourself a little better, there is so much in this conversation to take away.

And yes… Elizabeth’s cat even makes a little appearance. 🐱❤️

🎙️ AuDHD and Then Some — real, honest conversations about ADHD, autism, AuDHD, late diagnosis, masking, mental health and life inside a neurodivergent brain.

Guest: Elizabeth Ormes — psychotherapist, trauma specialist, neurodivergent professional and founder of Actualizing Your Best Self.

Topics: AuDHD • ADHD in women • autism in women • neurodivergence • trauma • PTSD • complex trauma • nervous system regulation • autistic masking • ADHD masking • people-pleasing • emotional dysregulation • late diagnosed ADHD • late diagnosed autism • neurodivergent women • identity • healing