Heal First Then Pick Your Life Partner: Relational Recovery When You Have CPTSD

Why do I have the fear of abandonment?

When you live with CPTSD, attachment threats activate the oldest and most overwhelming survival responses in your system. The fear of being left is not simply emotional discomfort. It can feel like a full-body alarm, a collapse in your sense of safety, and a terror that you will not survive the pain.

This experience is common, deeply uncomfortable, and confusing. In this episode, you will learn why abandonment fear feels so intense, how it forms, and what actually helps you begin to soothe it. Healing begins when you understand the internal mechanics rather than blaming yourself for the reactions you cannot yet control.

• What are the signs of abandonment issues?
• How do I heal my fear of abandonment?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

Am I recreating my trauma in my work life?

Many survivors build entire careers from fear, hypervigilance, shame, and the need to stay one step ahead of disappointment. These patterns can drive impressive achievement, but the cost is steep. Instead of feeling proud, you feel trapped. Instead of feeling fulfilled, you feel depleted. Instead of choosing your work, it feels like it is choosing you.

This episode explains how trauma can shape professional success, how to spot when your career has been built inside survival mode, and what it looks like to reclaim your work as a reflection of your True Self rather than a response to unresolved CPTSD.

• Is my productivity a coping response to unresolved CPTSD?
• Is my entire personality a trauma response?
• Have I used achievement to feel safe?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

Out of every 213 people, only one is ready for this level of work, in this way, at the ideal time in their life.  Are you one of them?  Take the "1 out of 213" Quiz here to find out. 

Here's the step-by-step narrowing from a starting pool of 100 people:

1. Have CPTSD: 10
2. "I MUST" response (50% of 10): 5
3. Successful in career (75% of 5): 3.75
4. Not currently married (50% of 3.75): 1.875
5. Willing and safe to be sober and non-medicated (25% of 1.875): 0.46875

Final expected number out of 100: = 0.47 people

That's about 1 in 213 people.

CPTSD Medicine Self Study

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn’t hurt.

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the “Why Is This Happening to Me?” Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak.

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever’s Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. Can’t stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret.

Continue your Self Study at cptsdmedicine.com/selfstudy

Each Learning Path begins with the questions that keep you up at night and reveals the truths most therapies never name.

Move from possession by trauma energies to life led by Self Energy. Work With Tanner

Enrollment is open for Happily Ever After, the six-month CPTSD Resolution and trauma recovery experience for high-functioning professionals. If this episode resonates and you’re ready to heal your CPTSD at the root, learn more about Happily Ever After. About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD and IFS Level 3 Practitioner, is the creator of CPTSD Medicine, a research-grounded and spiritually integrated framework that helps high-achieving professionals resolve CPTSD at the root. Her non-pharmaceutical method unburdens trauma energies, amplifies Self Energy, and teaches Self Leadership so humans can move from survival to sovereignty. About the CPTSD Medicine Podcast

Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, the CPTSD Medicine Podcast explores CPTSD healing and trauma recovery without medication. Learn why unresolved CPTSD impacts love, work, and self-trust, and study a structured path toward secure attachment, emotional safety, and lasting love. Designed for successful professionals ready for real CPTSD resolution at the root.

How do you become more confident?

Confidence is not a personality trait. It is a nervous system state. When you live with CPTSD, confidence often feels out of reach because your body is wired for caution, preparation, and self-doubt. Trauma patterns can disguise themselves as humility, politeness, or carefulness, even though they are really strategies for staying safe.

In this episode, you will learn what confidence actually feels like in the body, how to recognize the trauma-driven patterns that mask themselves as "being realistic," and what it takes to rebuild trust in your own strength and perspective.

• How do I deal with low confidence?
• What steps can I take to feel more confident in myself?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

What are the trust issues with C-PTSD?

Self-trust collapses when you grow up in an environment where your perceptions were dismissed, your emotions were minimized, or your needs were ignored. Over time, you learn to outsource your judgment, second-guess your instincts, and assume others know better than you. This is not a flaw. It is conditioning.

In this episode, you will learn three practices that begin rebuilding self-trust today. These shifts help you move from confusion and self-doubt into clarity and confidence. When you understand how CPTSD disrupts your internal guidance system, you can finally begin strengthening it from the inside out.

• Do people with C-PTSD self-sabotage?
• How do I learn to trust myself?
• How do you overcome trust issues?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

How do you know when it is time to call it quits in a relationship?

This is one of the hardest decisions a survivor of CPTSD will ever make. Emotional intensity, fear of abandonment, hope for repair, and old attachment wounds can collapse into each other, creating urgency and confusion at the exact moment when you need clarity the most.

This episode offers five powerful inquiries to explore before you choose to stay or go. These practices help you pause, contain the emotional surge, and bring discernment to a decision that may shape the rest of your life. When you understand what is happening inside the trauma ecosystem of CPTSD, you can choose from stability instead of fear.

• How do I know whether to stay or go in a relationship?
• What are the signs a relationship is failing?

A protocol for tapering long-term antidepressant use https://www.releasetoolkit.com.au/release-toolkit-for-consumers#antidepressant-tapering-plans

NOTE: I recommend that you share and discuss the RELEASE resources with your doctor. The information in the RELEASE resources is not medical advice. The RELEASE resources have been designed to help your doctor to help you.

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

Is it impossible to create or keep close relationships with CPTSD?

No. But unresolved CPTSD makes relationships confusing, fragile, and emotionally overwhelming. Many survivors try to hold relationships together by over-functioning, people-pleasing, suppressing their needs, ignoring their body signals, or staying stuck in survival mode dynamics. These missteps are not failures. They are adaptations that once kept you safe.

This episode names the patterns that keep you locked in painful cycles and explains what secure attachment actually requires when CPTSD is present. When you understand the relational architecture beneath your reactions, you can begin building real connection instead of recreating old wounds.

• How does CPTSD affect relationships?
• Do people with CPTSD sabotage relationships?
• Can I have a healthy relationship with CPTSD?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

Why is CPTSD so hard to live with?

Because it shapes how you see yourself, how you read other people, and how you choose relationships. The hurt is not random. It comes from old patterns that formed when you had no protection, no support, and no space to be fully yourself. Those same patterns show up today in the moments when you feel misunderstood, unseen, or unchosen.

This episode invites you to evaluate your past relationships, and even your present ones, from a place of strength rather than self-blame. When you finally understand the dynamics shaped by CPTSD, you can begin building healthy love from clarity instead of pain.

• Why does complex PTSD hurt so much?
• How do I comfort someone with CPTSD?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

How do you calm down during a trauma response?

When you have unresolved CPTSD, grounding is not as simple as "just breathe" or "focus on the present moment." Your body is responding to danger that once was real, and the level of fear that surges through you cannot be soothed by techniques that ignore the deeper patterns inside your system.

Grounding methods can either help you move through a trauma response or push you back into survival mode. The difference is understanding what your nervous system is protecting you from. In this episode, you will learn a grounding technique designed to make you stronger, not better at white-knuckling your way through fear.

• How do I release fear from trauma?
• How do I release trauma trapped in the body?

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit

How do you make the most out of a therapy session?

Most survivors walk into therapy with insight, motivation, and a genuine desire to heal. But CPTSD creates a gap between what you know and what you can actually embody. Sessions often feel uneven because Protective Parts, survival strategies, and emotional defenses show up faster than your conscious mind can work with.

This episode explains the hidden factors that shape every 1:1 session and how to prepare in a way that bridges the gap between intellectual wisdom and embodied healing. These practices help you move forward in your CPTSD Resolution journey with more clarity, momentum, and confidence.

• What are practical tips for making therapy more effective?
• How can my therapy sessions improve?

Step Closer

If this episode resonated, join my email list. I send about two emails a week.

https://cptsdmedicine.com/email

When You're Ready

CPTSD Resolution 101 Weekend Workshop Three days, seven people, live on Zoom. You'll leave with a clear, personalized map for your CPTSD Resolution. Offered twice a year in February and September. https://cptsdmedicine.com/weekendworkshop

Happily Ever After — The All-Inclusive CPTSD Resolution Experience Six months of close-proximity training with me. Application required. https://cptsdmedicine.com/services

About Dr. Tanner Wallace

Tanner Wallace, PhD and Level 3 IFS Practitioner, is the founder of CPTSD Medicine and the author of the CPTSD Medicine Healing Protocol, a proprietary applied mental health training curriculum that teaches HouseHolder CycleBreakers to resolve complex relational trauma at the root. A former tenured professor of health and human development, she left academia to build the services she could not find as a childhood trauma survivor diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder: a structured six-month container that trains humans to become their own best intervention scientists. Inside her signature container, Happily Ever After, she works with a small number of students to resolve, not manage, their CPTSD.

About the Podcast

Heal First, Then Pick Your Life Partner is for high-functioning adults with complex trauma who are tired of repeating painful relationship patterns. If you perform well professionally but struggle intensely in your closest relationships, this podcast helps you see why.

Each episode takes an ordinary moment of adult life — attending a family wedding, going through old photographs, ending a relationship, writing a holiday card, having a hard conversation with someone you love — and shows you what's actually happening underneath it through the lens of complex trauma. You'll hear my take on the lived experience of CPTSD, drawn from five years of building a proprietary trauma resolution curriculum and from my own work as a survivor who no longer qualifies for the diagnoses I once did.

This is diagnostic, declarative, and unlike anything else in the CPTSD space. Hosted by Dr. Tanner Wallace, PhD, founder of CPTSD Medicine.

Can't stop fighting in your relationship? → Follow the Fight Smarter Field Guide — a self-guided learning experience to understand your conflict patterns and practice responses that lead to repair, not regret. https://cptsdmedicine.com/the-fight-smarter-field-guide

In a relationship, but wondering if you should leave? → Begin the Red Flag Learning Path to recognize trauma-driven patterns and rebuild your inner compass toward love that doesn't hurt. https://cptsdmedicine.com/red-flag-checklist

Just been broken up with and need answers to feel sane again? → Explore the "Why Is This Happening to Me?" Study for clarity, validation, and grounded relief after heartbreak. https://cptsdmedicine.com/why-is-this-happening

Thinking your career is hurting your love life? → Start the Overachiever's Audit Study — a 10-minute self-reflection to see where achievement has become protection and how it may be blocking intimacy. https://cptsdmedicine.com/overachievers-audit