I didn’t lose myself all at once. It happened slowly, quietly, in ways I didn’t recognize until my body started speaking louder than I could ignore.

In this episode, I’m sharing something I’m not just teaching, I’m living. We’re talking about what it really looks like to lose yourself while taking care of everyone else, and how patterns like people-pleasing and codependency can feel loving on the outside, but are actually forms of self-abandonment on the inside.

I open up about my own journey through codependency, relationships, burnout, and health challenges, and how my body ultimately forced me to stop and listen. I began to understand that my body wasn’t betraying me—it was trying to get my attention.

What You’ll Learn

• What codependency really is
• How people-pleasing can turn into self-abandonment
• How your body communicates when you’re ignoring yourself
• Why burnout and chronic stress often have deeper emotional patterns underneath
• Simple ways to begin reconnecting with yourself, even in the middle of a busy life

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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When we hear the word dementia, most of us think of loss. Decline. Goodbye. But what if that’s not the full story?

In this conversation, I sit down with Marilyn Raichle, who gently challenges everything we think we know about dementia. After being told her whole life to "walk away" when Alzheimer's came, Marilyn, Marilyn did the opposite. She stayed. And what she discovered changed everything.

What began as resistance and obligation became something deeply meaningful. Through art, presence, and an unexpected partnership with her mother, Marilyn found connection, creativity, and even joy in a place most of us fear. If you’re walking alongside someone with dementia—or holding regret about how you’ve shown up—this conversation will meet you with compassion, perspective, and hope.

What You’ll Learn

• Why shifting from “caregiver” to “care partner” changes everything
• How to connect with someone living with dementia (even when it feels hard)
• The powerful role of art, music, and shared moments in creating connection
• Why “they’re still here” is more than a phrase, it’s a mindset
• How to begin forgiving yourself for what you didn’t know before

Learn more about Marilyn, and get a copy of her book Don't Walk Away, A Care Partner's Journey, here: https://dontwalkaway.net/

Follow Marilyn on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/marilyn.raichle

Connect with Marilyn on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marilynraichle/ 

Follow Marilyn on Instagram: instagram.com/raichlem/

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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So many of us have spent our lives outsourcing our authority, worth, and wisdom to expectations, roles, and other people. In this episode, we explore how to bring it back to yourself.

In this conversation, I sit down with the deeply insightful Sheila Delaney to talk about what it really means to come back home to yourself, especially after burnout, chronic stress, or years of putting everyone else first. Sheila shares her powerful story of navigating a full-body shutdown, chronic illness, and the moment that changed everything. 

She also shares the question that led her back to self-trust.

What You’ll Learn

• The three pillars of self-trust
• How high-achieving women unknowingly burn themselves out
• The connection between stress, the body, and emotional patterns
• Small, practical ways to rebuild trust with yourself (starting today)

Correction: In the episode, Sheila states that 70-80% of women are autoimmune sufferers, per Dr Gabor Matè. The accurate statistic is that 70-80% of autoimmune sufferers are women, per Dr. Gabor Matè.

Take Sheila's Insourcing Assessment: http://insourcingway.com/earlyaccess 

Visit Sheila’s website: insourcingway.com

Follow Sheila on Substack: https://substack.com/@sheiladelaney

Listen to Sheila’s podcast, Crazy Beautiful Truth: https://open.spotify.com/show/3DAY5vT5sP0wPBzhLc8K77? si=75e26b95d0e64084

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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One of the most complicated relationships we have is the relationship with our own body. When chronic illness, pain, injury, or unexpected physical changes show up, many of us quietly begin blaming ourselves or believing our bodies have betrayed us.

In this episode, I share how the journey through nerve-damage and chronic pain forced me to confront the harsh inner voices that judged, blamed, and tried to “fix” what felt broken. What I discovered instead was a powerful shift: healing isn’t about fighting your body, it’s about learning to work in partnership with it.

Through powerful reflections, compassionate reframes, and practical exercises, I introduce the idea of the “courtroom inside the mind,” the hidden grief that comes with physical change, and how self-forgiveness can transform the way we relate to our bodies.

What You’ll Learn

• Why chronic illness and physical changes often trigger self-blame and inner criticism
• The three invisible griefs that often accompany chronic pain or illness
• Why self-blame creates the illusion of control, and how to release it
• A simple journaling practice that helps bring compassion into the conversation with your body

Download your free Body Forgiveness Workbook here.

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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What if the real healing begins the moment we stop fighting our bodies?

In this compassionate conversation, I sit down with Tami Stackelhouse—health coach, founder of the International Fibromyalgia Coaching Institute, and host of the Fibromyalgia Podcast—to talk about self-forgiveness in the face of chronic illness. Tami shares her personal journey with lifelong health challenges and fibromyalgia, and we explore what it really means to move from war to partnership with your body. We talk about perfectionism, lost capacity, relationship shame, asking for help, and how learning who you truly are, instead of who you think you “should” be, can become the foundation for healing.

If you’ve ever felt betrayed by your body, whispered “Why can’t you just work right?,” or carried shame about not being the mom, partner, friend, or professional you once were, this episode is for you.

What You’ll Learn

• Why self-forgiveness is essential in the chronic illness journey
• Where shame shows up most powerfully (especially for mothers and caregivers)
• How perfectionism and comparison silently fuel suffering
• The difference between trying to change your thoughts vs. changing your actions

Take Tami’s free Fibromyalgia Wellness Style℠ Quiz: https://fibroquiz.com/ 

Follow Tami on Facebook: https://facebook.com/FibroCoach

Follow Tami on Instagram: https://instagram.com/FibroCoach

Subscribe to Tami on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@fibromyalgiawellness

Connect with Tami on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/tamistackelhouse

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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“I thought I’d be further along by now.”

That’s a sentence I hear all the time, and if I’m honest, it’s one I’ve said to myself, too.

In this episode, I’m talking about the quiet ache so many women carry: the feeling of being behind in life. Behind in our careers. Behind in healing. Behind in love, confidence, health, or fulfillment. On the outside, we may look capable and responsible—often the ones everyone else relies on. But inside, there’s a voice whispering I should have figured this out by now.

I want to gently explore where that voice comes from. How the feeling of being behind is often grief in disguise. Grief for the life we imagined. Grief for choices we wish we’d made differently. Grief for years spent surviving instead of thriving. And I talk about how self-forgiveness isn’t about excusing or pretending, it’s about softening our relationship with the past and integrating it with compassion.

What You’ll Learn

• Why the feeling of being “behind” is often rooted in invisible timelines
• How grief can sit underneath regret and self-judgment
• The hidden cost of being “the strong one” for decades
• Why midlife can actually be a season of readiness and self-trust
• Gentle reframes to help you soften shame and reconnect with yourself
• Why safety and support matter when doing deeper forgiveness work

💜 Download your companion worksheets for this episode here.

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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You don’t have to fix yourself first to deserve your own kindness.

So many high-achieving women I work with don’t hate themselves…but they don’t really like themselves, either. They tolerate themselves. They manage themselves. They critique themselves. And often, they live in a quiet, ongoing relationship with judgment.

Self-judgment doesn’t always scream. Sometimes it sounds reasonable. Motivating even. It can sound like: “Why am I like this?” “I should be further along by now.” “I know better than this.”

But underneath that voice is often a tired, overwhelmed part of us that simply wants understanding.

In this episode, I share where that inner critic comes from, how it once tried to protect us, and why being harder on ourselves rarely creates real change.

What You’ll Learn

• Why self-judgment is often something we learned, not something we chose
• How your inner critic may have originally developed as a survival strategy
• Why constant self-correction keeps your nervous system from ever fully resting
• The subtle ways self-judgment disguises itself as “motivation”
• What loving yourself actually looks like in everyday life
• How to begin meeting yourself with gentleness instead of punishment

💜 Download your companion worksheets for this episode here.

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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• LinkedIn

When we think about forgiveness, we usually think about other people. But some of the deepest resentment we carry is self-directed, and it often hides as guilt, self-criticism, exhaustion, regret, or a constant feeling that something just isn’t quite right.

In this episode, I walk through the 10 most common things we struggle to forgive ourselves for, especially as women in midlife: how we showed up (or didn’t), staying too long or leaving too soon, health and caregiving decisions, repeating old patterns, choosing others over ourselves, and grieving the life we thought we’d have by now.

This isn’t about “doing forgiveness right,” rushing to closure, or forcing compassion before you’re ready. It’s about telling the truth kindly, creating safety in your nervous system, and understanding that forgiveness comes after witnessing—not before.

What You’ll Learn

• Why self-forgiveness is often harder than forgiving others 
• What forgiveness is and isn’t, and why timing matters more than effort
• How the nervous system holds onto unresolved experiences
• Why repeating patterns doesn’t mean you’ve failed or regressed
• How survival, loyalty, and responsibility shape our past choices
• Why grief and gratitude can coexist

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn

When we think about forgiveness, we usually think about other people. But some of the deepest resentment we carry is self-directed, and it often hides as guilt, self-criticism, exhaustion, regret, or a constant feeling that something just isn’t quite right.

In this episode, I walk through the 10 most common things we struggle to forgive ourselves for, especially as women in midlife: how we showed up (or didn’t), staying too long or leaving too soon, health and caregiving decisions, repeating old patterns, choosing others over ourselves, and grieving the life we thought we’d have by now.

This isn’t about “doing forgiveness right,” rushing to closure, or forcing compassion before you’re ready. It’s about telling the truth kindly, creating safety in your nervous system, and understanding that forgiveness comes after witnessing—not before.

What You’ll Learn

• Why self-forgiveness is often harder than forgiving others 
• What forgiveness is and isn’t, and why timing matters more than effort
• How the nervous system holds onto unresolved experiences
• Why repeating patterns doesn’t mean you’ve failed or regressed
• How survival, loyalty, and responsibility shape our past choices
• Why grief and gratitude can coexist

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

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• LinkedIn

In a world that feels increasingly uncertain, overwhelming, and emotionally charged, how do we stay rooted without bypassing what’s real?

In this episode, I explore what it truly means to hold two truths at the same time: acknowledging fear, grief, and instability while also choosing presence, agency, and inner steadiness. Drawing from my personal caregiving journey, recent moments of self-doubt, and a powerful realization sparked by therapy, I reflect on how easily our nervous systems get hijacked and how quickly my inner critic can drown out my wise voice.

This conversation is an invitation to come home to yourself. I share the simple, grounding practices I’ve returned to in order to rebuild a foundation that doesn’t collapse when fear shows up—one breath, one choice, one moment at a time.

What You’ll Learn

• How an activated nervous system fuels comparison, perfectionism, and inner criticism
• Why “fantasy thinking” can keep you stuck and disconnected from reality
• How to recognize and disengage from the inner critic that assaults your wise voice
• Practical, non-flashy tools to calm the nervous system (breath, movement, sensory awareness)
• How journaling, gratitude, and naming what you can control restore a sense of agency
• Why coming home to yourself is an act of peace, not avoidance

Resources:

Your FREE Forgive Yourself resources: https://brendareisscoaching.com/podcast-resource-optin/

Are you struggling with a situation or a person in your life? Wondering if you are ready to work on forgiving yourself? Take our quiz to find out your emotional IQ and how this impacts your ability to forgive: https://archetype.brendareisscoaching.com/sf/357cdc60

Brenda’s Website/Links

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn