Healing Is My Hobby with Jessica Colarco, LCSW

Have you ever done the work — named the trauma, grieved the losses, started releasing the shame — and then looked up and thought… who am I? That disorientation isn't a problem. It's actually the beginning of something important.

In this episode, Jessica opens the June identity theme by introducing one of the most foundational questions in healing: where did your sense of self actually come from? Drawing on attachment theory and her clinical experience, she walks through the difference between your core self — the parts of you that were always there — and your adapted self — the version of you that learned how to survive. Most of us have spent so long living from the adapted self that we've lost touch with the core entirely. This episode is your invitation to start noticing the difference.

In This Episode

• Why identity doesn't form in a vacuum — and who was shaping yours before you had any say
• What attachment theory tells us about how we learned to see (or not see) ourselves
• The clinical distinction between your core self and your adapted self
• Jessica's personal story of performing the "Pinterest mom" identity — and what it cost her
• Why every major life transition is both disorienting and an invitation
• What's coming next in the June series

Resources & Links

🌿 Free worksheet — Core Self vs. Adapted Self: healingismyhobby.com/newsletter

📬 Newsletter: healingismyhobby.com/newsletter 📩 Contact Jessica: healingismyhobby.com 📸 Instagram: @healingismyhobby ▶️ YouTube: @healingismyhobby 🛋️ Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com | @jessicacolarcolcsw

identity healing, who am I, core self vs adapted self, attachment theory, identity development, trauma and identity, adapted self, healing journey, self-worth, identity after trauma, childhood roles, people pleasing, performing identity, inner child work, IFS therapy, self-discovery, anxiety and identity, LCSW podcast, mental health podcast, therapy podcast for women, healing is my hobby, Jessica Colarco

We close out May with the deepest layer of shame work yet. In this final episode of our shame and self-worth series, Jessica reframes shame not as a character flaw or a belief system — but as a trauma response. One that lives in the body, wires itself into the nervous system, and follows us long past the environments that first created it.

This episode unpacks the neurobiology of shame, the connection between early attachment wounds and the shame we carry into adulthood, and what it actually looks like to begin healing at the level where the wound lives.

If you've been listening all month, this is where it all comes together.

What We Cover in This Episode

• Why shame is one of the most overlooked trauma responses in clinical practice — and why naming it changes everything
• The developmental picture: how early environments teach the nervous system that being fully yourself is dangerous
• The dorsal vagal response (freeze and collapse) and why it shows up in shame — the heat in the face, the heaviness in the chest, the urge to disappear
• Why you cannot think your way out of a shame response, and why the body has to be part of healing
• Attachment theory and shame: how early relational wounds travel into adult relationships and show up in patterns like over-apologizing, difficulty receiving, and interpreting neutral interactions as rejection
• Dan Siegel's window of tolerance and what it means for trauma-informed shame work
• Four somatic regulation practices you can use in the moment when shame gets activated

Somatic Practices Mentioned

• Orient to your environment — slowly look around and name five things you can see to activate the social engagement system
• Slow your exhale — inhale for 4 counts, exhale for 6–8 to activate the parasympathetic nervous system
• Find a point of contact — feel your feet on the floor or your body in the chair to ground yourself when shame pulls you out of the present
• Name what's happening without judgment — neutral observation of physical sensation creates space between you and the response

Key Concepts Referenced

• Dorsal vagal response / freeze and collapse
• Window of tolerance (Dan Siegel)
• Attachment theory (John Bowlby)
• Polyvagal theory
• Somatic regulation
• Trauma-informed shame work

Closing Reflection

Healing shame doesn't happen all at once. It happens in layers — in moments of being witnessed and not rejected, in the slow practice of treating yourself as worthy even when part of you doesn't believe it yet. The shame that feels like the truest thing about you is not the truest thing about you. It is a wound. And wounds, when they receive the right care, do heal.

Connect + Resources

• 📩 Subscribe to the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com
• 💬 Contact Jessica
• 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/
• ▶️ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby
• 🩺 Learn more about Jessica's clinical practice at jessicacolarcolcsw.com

shame and trauma, shame as a trauma response, dorsal vagal response, freeze and collapse, nervous system and shame, window of tolerance, attachment theory and shame, John Bowlby attachment, somatic practices for shame, trauma-informed therapy, shame in the body, healing shame, self-worth, PTSD and shame, polyvagal theory, anxiety and shame, high-functioning trauma, insecure attachment, early childhood trauma, nervous system regulation, body-based healing, self-compassion, trauma response, inner child healing, Healing Is My Hobby podcast, Jessica Colarco LCSW

Welcome to the Healing Lab — the episode where we stop talking about the work and actually start doing it. This month’s theme is shame and self-worth, and these experiments are rooted in something deeply personal: the belief that you cannot think your way into self-worth. You have to practice it.

In this episode, Jessica shares two somatic and behavioral experiments designed to interrupt the pattern of conditional worth — and invites you into the lab alongside her.

• The clinical framework behind conditional worth and why it shows up so often in high-achieving women
• Why shame lives in the body — and why that’s where healing has to begin
• Experiment #1: The Enough Body Scan — a daily somatic practice anchoring worthiness in physical sensation
• Experiment #2: The Daily Commitment — two to three things each day that are purely for you
• Jessica’s personal experience trying both experiments — what worked, what surprised her, what she’s keeping
• How these two experiments work together — inside-out and outside-in — to meet in the middle

When worth becomes conditional — when we believe we are only lovable while performing, producing, or caretaking — we stop giving ourselves permission to simply exist. The absence of self-directed care isn’t laziness. It’s the behavioral fingerprint of internalized shame.

These experiments work at the behavioral level because we can’t always change the belief directly — but we can change the behavior. And when we start treating ourselves as worthy of care, the belief begins slowly to shift.

Once a day for two weeks, set aside five minutes for a slow, intentional body scan from head to toe. At each body part — your head, jaw, shoulders, chest, stomach, hands, and legs — offer a single phrase:

“This is enough. You are enough.”

This is not a relaxation exercise. It’s not about finding tension or tracking discomfort. It’s about anchoring the message “I am enough” in physical sensation — giving it somewhere to land for those who can’t yet access it cognitively.

What to track:

• Does the phrase feel true, hollow, or somewhere in between?
• Does it begin to shift over the two weeks?
• Where in your body does it feel most resistant — and what do you make of that?

Jessica’s experience: She chose to do this experiment in the shower each morning. It was immediately impactful, helped set her intention for the day, and shifted the way she inhabits her body. She’s keeping it.

Every day for two weeks, do two to three things that are purely for you. Not for your kids, partner, clients, or boss. Just for you — without needing to earn them first.

You are someone you made a commitment to. Show up for yourself the way you show up for the people you love.

Ideas to spark your own list:

• Making yourself something you actually want to eat
• Moving your body in a way that feels genuinely good, not obligatory
• Sitting outside for 10 minutes with no agenda
• Reading something purely for pleasure, not for growth or information
• Doing something creative just because it’s enjoyable — baking, painting, crafting, whatever is yours
• Putting on music you love and actually sitting with it
• A slow bath or long, unhurried shower
• Watching something you enjoy without guilt or multitasking alongside it
• A cup of something you love, made slowly, with nowhere to be

What to track:

• Write down your two to three things each day
• At the end of each week, ask: How hard was it to follow through? Did I negotiate with myself, minimize, or skip?
• What did the inner voice say when I tried to give myself something?
• Did that voice get any quieter by the end of the week?

How These Experiments Work Together

The body scan works quietly from the inside out — planting the message “I am enough” at the level of physical sensation, asking your body to practice receiving worth.

The daily commitment works from the outside in — asking your behavior to demonstrate worth through concrete daily action.

Together, they approach the same belief from two directions. The body scan softens the ground. The daily commitment builds the evidence. Over time, those two things meet in the middle — and that’s where the shift happens.

A Note on Resistance

For those who have run on conditional worth for a long time, these experiments may bring up guilt — the sense that you haven’t earned this yet, or that you’re being selfish. The voice that says: this is indulgent.

That voice is not the truth. It’s the wound. The most powerful thing you can do when it shows up is not to argue with it — but to do the thing anyway. That “even when” is where the healing lives.

Coming Up Next Week

The final episode of May looks at shame through a trauma-informed lens — how it shows up in the body, how it lives in our nervous system, and what it actually means to heal it at that level.

Connect & Stay in the Loop

If you tried these experiments, Jessica wants to hear about it. Share what you noticed, what came up, and what surprised you.

📰 Newsletter: healingismyhobby.com

📸 Instagram: @healingismyhobby

🎥 YouTube: @healingismyhobby

💼 Clinical Practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com

self-worth, shame healing, conditional worth, somatic healing, body scan meditation, self-compassion practice, healing shame, worthiness, internalized shame, high-achieving women, therapy for anxiety, LCSW podcast, nervous system regulation, behavioral activation, self-care without guilt, healing is my hobby, Jessica Colarco, mental health podcast, trauma-informed therapy, inner critic, enough body scan, daily self-commitment, self-worth exercises, shame and the body, healing lab, self-worth practices, anxiety and perfectionism, people pleasing and worth, overcoming guilt, identity and self-worth

This is the Therapy Is My Cardio episode for May — which means we're not just talking about emotional shame today, we're doing the reps. If last week's episode gave you the clinical foundation (what shame is, where it comes from, and how it hides), this episode is where you put that understanding to work. Jessica walks you through the specific kind of shame that wraps itself around your feelings — the inner voice that calls you too much, too dramatic, too sensitive, or simply not allowed to feel what you feel. It's one of the quietest forms of self-abandonment there is, and today you're going to start unlearning it.

In This Episode:

• What emotional shame actually is — and how it's different from general shame
• How early experiences teach us that certain emotions are "wrong" — and what that does to a child's developing sense of self
• The clinical term for what happens next: emotional self-dismissal, and why it's so hard to recognize in yourself
• Why chronic emotional shame cuts you off from your own emotions as information — and the real consequences that has for your body, relationships, and sense of self
• The Warmup: a simple check-in practice to notice what feeling you've been pushing away before you even start the reps

The Three Reps:

• Rep 1 — Name It: The neuroscience behind why labeling an emotion reduces its intensity, and how to create distance from shame-based thoughts using defusion language ("I am having the thought that...")
• Rep 2 — Reality Check the Story: A CBT-based framework using three questions to slow down the shame spiral and examine whether what you're telling yourself is actually true — or just old conditioning playing on a loop
• Rep 3 — Self-Compassion: The rep people most want to skip, why compassion (not self-criticism) is what actually softens shame, and a short hand-on-heart practice to try right now
• The Cool Down: A simple weekly log practice — no journaling required — to track how often the inner critic is actually showing up, because you can't change a pattern you haven't seen clearly yet

Mentioned or Referenced:

• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and shame
• Defusion techniques from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
• The neuroscience of affect labeling ("name it to tame it")
• Self-compassion as a clinical intervention for shame

Next Week: Jessica heads into the Healing Lab to share personal experiments around self-worth that isn't tied to production or performance. You won't want to miss it.

Connect with Jessica: 📩 Newsletter & blog: healingismyhobby.com 📱 Instagram: instagram.com/healingismyhobby ▶️ YouTube: youtube.com/@healingismyhobby 🩺 Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com

emotional shame, ashamed of your feelings, too sensitive, emotional self-dismissal, inner critic, shame and emotions, healing shame, therapy for shame, self-compassion for shame, name it to tame it, affect labeling, CBT for shame, cognitive behavioral therapy shame, defusion technique, acceptance and commitment therapy, how to stop invalidating yourself, self-abandonment, self-worth, shame spiral, shame and the nervous system, emotional regulation, healing inner critic, self-compassion practice, shame and self-criticism, feelings are not wrong, Healing Is My Hobby, Therapy Is My Cardio, Jessica Colarco LCSW, mental health podcast, anxiety and shame, emotional healing podcast

May Shame & Self-Worth Series, Episode 1

Shame is one of the most common — and most misunderstood — experiences in the healing journey. It's not embarrassment. It's not guilt. It's the quiet, persistent belief that something is fundamentally wrong with you. In this first episode of our May series on shame and self-worth, Jessica lays the clinical foundation: what shame actually is, where it comes from, and why understanding it is the first step toward being free of it.

What We Cover

Shame vs. guilt — they feel similar, but they operate very differently and lead to very different outcomes. Guilt says I did something bad. Shame says I am bad. That distinction is everything, and it matters deeply for how we approach healing.

Where shame comes from — shame isn't something we're born with. It forms in childhood, in the relational environment around us, shaped by how our emotions and needs were responded to. When a child's needs are consistently met with criticism, dismissal, or withdrawal, they don't conclude the adult is struggling — they conclude something is wrong with them. That belief can quietly run the show for decades.

How shame hides in plain sight — by the time you've been carrying it long enough, shame doesn't feel like shame anymore. It feels like truth. Jessica walks through some of the most common ways it shows up: chronic people pleasing, perfectionism, difficulty receiving care, over-functioning in relationships, and numbing behaviors.

The path toward healing — healing shame isn't about arriving at a destination where you never feel it again. It's about developing a different relationship with it. Recognizing it. Getting curious about it. And most importantly, letting yourself be witnessed — because shame grows in secrecy and heals in connection.

Resources & References

Research psychologist June Price Tangney's work on shame and guilt is referenced in this episode. Her decades of research distinguishes shame as a painful sense of being a flawed, unworthy person — not someone who made a mistake, but someone who is the mistake.

Internal Family Systems (IFS) framework is referenced as a lens for understanding how early shame experiences become carried by younger parts of the self.

This Month on Healing Is My Hobby

May is our shame and self-worth series. Each episode goes deeper — through the lens of what you've inherited, your emotional life, practical experiments you can try at home, and the trauma-informed perspective that every conversation about shame deserves.

Connect With Jessica

Sign up for the newsletter and read the blog at healingismyhobby.com Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/ Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com | Instagram: @jessicacolarcolcsw

shame, shame vs guilt, what is shame, self-worth, healing shame, clinical social worker podcast, LCSW podcast, shame and identity, shame in therapy, internal family systems, IFS parts, core beliefs, childhood shame, trauma and shame, people pleasing, perfectionism, over-functioning, emotional healing, self-compassion, window of tolerance, healing is my hobby, Jessica Colarco, mental health podcast, therapy podcast, shame series, shame and self-worth, worthiness, emotional wounds, generational shame, June Price Tangney

In this final episode of the April grief series, Jessica explores identity grief — the grief that comes not from death, but from losing a version of yourself. Whether it's a milestone birthday, a career shift, a diagnosis, or a life that looks nothing like the one you imagined, identity grief is real, clinically significant, and rarely given the space it deserves.

Jessica shares a deeply personal reflection on turning 47 and the quiet spiral that followed — and then walks listeners through the Three Layer Model she uses in clinical practice to help clients process identity grief. This is a Healing Lab episode, which means Jessica didn't just teach the framework — she tested three strategies herself and reports back honestly on what happened.

What You'll Hear in This Episode:

1. Jessica introduces the Three Layer Model of Identity Grief
2. Layer One: The Self That Was Lost — Honoring who you were, what she carried, what she protected, and what she was working toward. This layer asks us to slow down before rushing toward transformation.
3. Layer Two: The Self in Transition — The uncomfortable in-between where the old identity is gone but the new one hasn't formed. This is where many people get stuck, and where the real work of sitting with uncertainty lives.
4. Layer Three: The Emerging Self — Not a shortcut, but an arrival. The new self forms only in the ground of the first two layers.

Healing Lab — Three Strategies Jessica Tried:

1. Strategy 1: Write a letter to the self you thought you'd be. Jessica wrote to the version of herself she imagined at 25 — and to the 47-year-old she never became. She thanked her, honored her, and said goodbye. She cried. She invites you to try it too.
2. Strategy 2: The inventory. Rather than cataloging what's missing, Jessica split the page — what she thought she'd have by now on one side, and what she actually has that she never could have anticipated on the other. Not toxic positivity, just a fuller picture.
3. Strategy 3: Return to one thing that is only yours. Jessica realized she had stopped doing things that existed outside of her roles. She went back to something she used to love — just for herself, no output required — and something loosened.
4. The episode closes with a final reflection prompt and a look ahead to May's theme: shame and self-worth.

Reflection Questions From This Episode:

1. Who is a version of yourself you haven't fully grieved?
2. What do you want her to know before you say goodbye?
3. What is one thing that used to be yours — with no purpose attached?

Resources & Links:

Want to stay in the know? Subscribe to our newsletter here. Contact Jessica here. Let's connect: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/ | YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby | Would you like to learn more about Jessica's clinical practice? Click here.

identity grief, grief beyond death, losing yourself, who am I now, self-concept loss, grief no one talks about, types of grief, feeling like a side character, losing your sense of self, milestone grief, birthday grief, midlife identity shift, in-between self, feeling untethered, unprocessed grief, imagined future self, ambiguous loss, Three Layer Model, identity grief framework, self in transition, emerging self, disenfranchised grief, grief ritual, grief letter writing, identity and roles, identity integration,"I don't know who I am anymore," "grieving a version of yourself," "grief after divorce," "grief after kids grow up," "grief after burnout," "who am I after [life change]," "why do I feel lost after a big change," "midlife identity crisis women," "grief that has no name", Healing Is My Hobby, Healing Lab segment, Jessica Colarco LCSW, anxiety therapist podcast, mental health podcast for women, therapy podcast, grief podcast, emotional healing podcast, licensed clinical social worker podcast

We're three weeks into grief month, and this episode goes somewhere that doesn't get nearly enough airtime — grieving someone who is still alive. Whether you've had to create distance from a relationship for your own well-being, or you're mourning a version of a person who is no longer who they once were, this kind of loss is real, disorienting, and deserves to be named.

In this Therapy Is My Cardio segment, Jessica walks through the clinical framework of ambiguous loss and four powerful shifts that actually move the needle — straight from the therapy room.

What You'll Learn in This Episode

1. What ambiguous loss is and why it's one of the hardest kinds of grief to process
2. The two main forms ambiguous loss takes — and which one you may be living with
3. Why humans struggle so much with unresolved, "open loop" losses
4. Four practical reps for working through relational grief
5. Why your healing does not require the other person's participation
6. How grief and love can coexist without contradiction

Coming Up Next Week

We're closing out grief month with identity grief — grieving a version of yourself that existed before the thing that changed everything. Don't miss it.

Clinical Concepts Mentioned

1. Ambiguous loss (Pauline Boss)
2. Role grief vs. person grief
3. Narrative disruption in grief processing
4. Internal resolution without external closure
5. Grief and love as co-existing emotional states

Connect With Jessica

Newsletter: https://healingismyhobby.com

Website: https://healingismyhobby.com

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

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby

Clinical Practice: https://jessicacolarcolcsw.com

Clinical Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jessicacolarcolcsw

Want to stay in the know? Subscribe to our newsletter here. Contact Jessica here. Let's connect: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby Would you like to learn more about Jessica's clinical practice? Click here.

ambiguous loss, grieving someone who is still alive, living loss, relational grief, disenfranchised grief, grief without closure, unresolved grief, open loop grief, emotional estrangement, role grief, narrative disruption in grief, grief and love coexisting, internal healing without apology, Pauline Boss ambiguous loss, relational trauma, emotionally absent parent, estrangement grief, IFS and grief, healing without closure, trauma-informed grief work, how to grieve someone who is still alive, grieving a parent who is emotionally absent, estrangement grief support, how to heal from relationship grief, can you grieve someone you still love, closure without an apology, grieving what you never had, Healing Is My Hobby podcast, Therapy Is My Cardio, Jessica Colarco LCSW, grief series podcast, anxiety and grief podcast, mental health podcast for women, IFS grief therapy podcast

Episode Summary

In this week's This Might Be a Trauma Response segment, Jessica takes the conversation about grief a layer deeper — moving beyond last week's broad definition of loss into a specific and often invisible form of pain: disenfranchised grief. This is the grief that never got witnessed. The loss that was minimized, dismissed, or met with an "at least" instead of acknowledgment. Jessica explores what happens psychologically when grief goes unvalidated, names the symptoms it can create, and offers a path forward through self-witnessing.

What's Covered in This Episode

1. What disenfranchised grief is — and why it's so psychologically costly
2. How suppressed grief doesn't disappear, it transforms into symptoms
3. Five common presentations of unacknowledged grief
4. The clinical concept of grief without witness
5. Why healing grief requires acknowledgment — and how to give it to yourself
6. A simple but powerful self-witnessing reflection practice

Key Clinical Concepts

Disenfranchised Grief

Grief that is not socially recognized or validated — losses that others communicate are "not big enough to count." This can include relational losses, identity shifts, ambiguous loss, and more. When grief isn't witnessed externally, it doesn't resolve; it suppresses.

Suppressed Grief & Its Symptoms

Jessica outlines five places suppressed grief tends to surface:

1. Emotional numbness — a flatness or reduced emotional range
2. Disproportionate irritability — especially common in women, who are socialized to internalize pain
3. Avoidance — staying busy, changing subjects, pulling away from people
4. Persistent low-grade sadness — a heaviness underneath daily functioning
5. Physical symptoms — chest tightness, fatigue, headaches, digestive issues

Self-Witnessing

When external validation isn't available, healing can begin with self-witnessing — the act of naming your own loss and affirming its reality to yourself. Jessica frames this as "the beginning of everything."

This Week's Reflection Practice

Think of one loss in your life that never got acknowledged. It could be from years ago, something recent, or something you've never said out loud.

Then say this somewhere private, just for you:

"This was real. This hurt. And I am allowed to feel it."

Coming Up Next Week

Jessica turns to one of the most complex and misunderstood grief experiences: grieving someone who is still alive. The parent who is physically present but emotionally absent. The relationship that's technically intact but quietly over. The grief with no clear ending because there was no clear event.

Connect & Stay in the Know

Subscribe to the newsletter or learn more at:

healingismyhobby.com

Instagram: @healingismyhobby

YouTube: @healingismyhobby

Want to learn more about Jessica's clinical practice?

Visit jessicacolarcolcsw.com or follow @jessicacolarcolcsw on Instagram.

disenfranchised grief, unacknowledged grief, minimized loss, grief without validation, emotional numbness, irritability, low-grade sadness, physical symptoms of grief, self-witnessing, somatic grief, IFS and grief, ambiguous loss, "grief that doesn't count," "giving yourself permission to grieve," "why am I like this", mental health podcast, therapy podcast, LCSW podcast, trauma response, Jessica Colarco

In this month's opening episode, Jessica introduces April's theme: grief — and challenges the widely-held belief that grief only belongs to death. Drawing on clinical definitions and her own therapeutic lens, she explores how grief shows up across a wide range of losses, why unacknowledged grief doesn't disappear, and what it means to finally name what you're carrying. She also introduces the concept of disenfranchised grief and invites listeners into a simple but powerful reflective practice to close out the episode.

What You'll Hear in This Episode:

1. Why grief extends far beyond death and loss of life
2. The clinical definition of grief and what counts as a "significant loss"
3. Examples of losses that often go unrecognized: identity shifts, relationship changes, unmet expectations, life transitions
4. What happens when grief goes unnamed and unprocessed — and how it shows up sideways
5. An introduction to disenfranchised grief: what it is and why it matters
6. How unacknowledged grief can become prolonged grief
7. The power of naming and witnessing as the first act of healing
8. A reflective prompt to take with you this week

This Week's Reflective Prompt: What is one thing I'm grieving that I've never called grief?

You don't have to say it out loud. Write it in a journal, a note on your phone, or sit with it quietly. Naming it is the first step.

Coming Up Next Week: Jessica goes deeper into disenfranchised grief — the losses nobody validated — and what happens psychologically when grief goes without witness.

Connect & Stay Connected:

📩 Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com 📬 Contact Jessica: healingismyhobby.com 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/ ▶️ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby 🩺 Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com

grief beyond death, disenfranchised grief, unprocessed grief, types of grief, grief and identity, ambiguous loss, prolonged grief disorder, grief therapy, grief without a death, what is grief clinically, grief and anxiety, emotional flatness grief, grief and avoidance, grief naming healing, grief podcast, mental health podcast, LCSW podcast, healing podcast, grief support, grief awareness

This Might Be a Trauma Response: High-Functioning Trauma

Healing Is My Hobby | This Might Be a Trauma Response Series

What if the most common sign of trauma isn't falling apart — it's having it all together?

In this installment of the This Might Be a Trauma Response series, Jessica breaks down high-functioning trauma: what it is, why it's so easy to miss, and the four ways it most commonly shows up in everyday life. This episode is for the person who keeps going, keeps producing, keeps holding it together — and quietly wonders why something still feels off.

In this episode, you'll hear about:

1. What high-functioning trauma actually is (and why it's not a character flaw)
2. The four most common high-functioning trauma responses: hyperproductivity, perfectionism, hyperindependence, and fawning
3. Why each of these patterns started as a survival strategy — and why they're still running even when the danger is gone
4. The fourth trauma response that doesn't get talked about enough: fawning, or "fight, flight, freeze, or please"
5. A simple but powerful grounding practice called Values Grounding to bring you back to yourself

This week's healing tool — Values Grounding:

Find a quiet five minutes and sit with these three questions:

1. Who am I when I'm not performing?
2. What do I actually value — deeply, quietly, before the world told me who to be?
3. Is what I'm doing right now aligned with those values, or am I running a pattern that belongs to the past?

Write down 3–5 words. Don't overthink it. Trust what comes first.

If you've been listening to this series and want to go deeper on identity — who you are beneath the trauma and anxiety — Jessica's other podcast, Chasing Brighter (co-hosted with her sister Kelly), is dedicating the entire month of May to Identity and Expectations. Find it at chasingbrighter.com or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Stay connected:

1. 📬 Sign up for the newsletter + read the blog: healingismyhobby.com
2. 📩 Send a message: Contact Jessica
3. 📸 Instagram: @healingismyhobby
4. 🎥 YouTube: @healingismyhobby
5. 🖥️ Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com | @jessicacolarcolcsw

high functioning trauma, trauma responses, hyperproductivity, perfectionism, hyperindependence, fawning, people pleasing, fight flight freeze fawn, values grounding, healing, what is high functioning trauma, signs of high functioning trauma, trauma that looks like success, why am I always productive, perfectionism as trauma response, people pleasing and trauma, fawning trauma response, how to stop people pleasing, hyperindependence healing, why I can't ask for help, mental health podcast, healing podcast, women's mental health, therapy insights, self-awareness, emotional healing, anxiety podcast, trauma recovery, This Might Be a Trauma Response, Healing Is My Hobby