Maybe I Can® with Debbie Weiss

Ep. 162: Listening To Your Nervous System With Laurie James

• Debbie Weiss • Episode 162

Share episode

Send us a text

In this episode, I sit down with Laurie James — author, somatic practitioner, and host of the Confessions of a Free Bird podcast — for an honest conversation about divorce, caregiving, trauma, and what happens when the body carries what the mind tries to ignore.

Laurie shares the moment she knew she had to leave her marriage, why it took more than one attempt, and how years of stress, responsibility, and unprocessed trauma eventually showed up as serious physical illness. We talk about how trauma lives in the nervous system, why “little” traumas matter, and how somatic work helps the body complete what it never got to finish.

We also explore rest, guilt, freedom later in life, dating after divorce, and what healing can look like when you stop forcing yourself to push through.

If you’ve ever felt disconnected from your body, exhausted by holding everything together, or confused by reactions you can’t explain — this conversation is for you.

✨ Where To Find Laurie! ✨

🌐 Website:
https://www.laurieejames.com/


🧘‍♀️ FREE Beginner’s Guide to Somatic Healing:
https://laurieejames.myflodesk.com/bgtsh


🎙️ Podcast — Confessions of a Freebird (Midlife • Divorce • Healing):
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/confessions-of-a-freebird-midlife-divorce-heal/id1694026063

📸 Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/laurie.james/

🌸✨ WELCOME — START HERE ✨🌸
(Consider this your gentle nudge toward something new.)

💖 NEW! The Sprinkle Effect™ Card Deck
52 small mindset shifts to help you reconnect, refocus, and rediscover joy — one sprinkle at a time.
👉 https://bit.ly/4pUvreV

📘 NEW! The Sprinkle Effect™ Book
Small sprinkles. Big change. This is where the magic begins.
👉 https://www.debbierweiss.com/thesprinkleeffect

🌱 FREE GIFT FOR YOU
Kickstart Your New Life
A simple, life-changing workbook for women ready to turn the page and begin again — gently.
✨ Download here: https://www.debbierweiss.com/kickstart

🌸 READY TO GO DEEPER? 🌸
Maybe I Can: Begin to Change Your Life Course
A six-module journey designed to help you move through life transitions with clarity, courage, and confidence — at your own pace, with lifetime access.
👉 https://www.debbierweiss.com/beginchange

🤍 WORK WITH ME
From speaking and workshops to coaching and collaborations — explore all the ways we can sprinkle forward together.
👉 https://www.debbierweiss.com/workwithdebbie

...

SPEAKER_00:

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Maybe I Can podcast. I'm your host, Debbie Weiss, and today I'm very excited to say that I actually have a guest with me. I met Lori because she has a wonderful podcast, and she was kind enough to interview me. So I wanted you guys to learn more about her. So let me tell you a little bit about Lori James. She's a mother divorcee recovering caregiver-turned author, certified somatic practitioner and coach, and podcaster. Lori's podcast, Confessions of a Freebird, was inspired by her youngest of four children leaving the nest and is the sequel to her book Sandwiched, a memoir of holding on and letting go. Lori's book is about her journey from loneliness to finding belonging during a time when she was raising four teenage daughters. Her mother had a heart attack and needed care, all while her marriage began to crumble. Now Lori helps women divorce, heal, and date differently in midlife. She blends her coaching and somatic training to help her clients develop a better relationship with their bodies and nervous system. Doing so allows them to find the inner freedom to experience more happiness, joy, and create the life they desire. When she's not coaching clients or podcasting, she can be found nurturing her free spirit by walking her dog, skiing, sailing, hiking, spending time with close friends, or planning her next adventure. Well, hello, Lori, and welcome to the Maybe I Can podcast.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you, Debbie. It's such an honor to be here. And I feel honored that I am one of your first guests in a long time that you chose me. So thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, absolutely. So to kick off the podcast, I'm going to ask you the same question I ask or used to ask all my guests, which is can you tell us about a time when you went from a defeated I can't attitude to a more empowered maybe I can attitude?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah. Well, you touched on it in my intro. And that was leaving my marriage. I can remember that where exactly where I was when I made this decision. I was lying in bed. It was probably three in the morning, another sleepless night, and you know, umpteenth fights with my ex-husband about things that aren't important. And I just realized I can do this, I can leave this unhealthy marriage. And I remember lying there, and the experience that I had on more of a spiritual level was if I stay in this marriage, my soul is going to wither away and die. That's what I was truly feeling in that moment. Tears and everything. I don't think I may have gone back to sleep for an hour, but I got up the next morning. And this was actually my third attempt to trying to leave my marriage. But I think what was different about this time was I had done enough work, and my kids were launched. My youngest, which is a set of identical twins, they were in college. And the time before when I tried to leave, they had some medical issues. And I was, I think I was ready to leave then, but one had severe anxiety and panic attacks, and then I got her under control, and then her identical twin sister ended up having other medical issues, and I couldn't leave with them being in that state, and add this on top because I really felt that what was happening with them is the stress. They were juniors in high school and they were trying to figure out what college they were going to go to, and all the stress of the AP classes, and their stress manifested one in physical ailments of like throat, tonsil issues, and the other one in anxiety. That's how their stress showed up in their bodies. And so my mother was okay. She had been stable for a while. I had really good caregivers in there, which wasn't always the case. People can learn more about that in my book. But everything was status quo, and there were no buffers between me and my ex-husband. So it was just us facing each other. And we had been in therapy for five and a half years. And prior, just maybe a couple weeks prior to this, my therapist said, How long did your mother endure her relationship with her dad? Because my parents should have divorced long ago. She and I said, Well, forever, which you know caused her some various health issues. She's like, How long are you going to endure? And I'm like, I got it. I got it. And so I did it. I did it. I don't think my ex-husband was expecting it, even though we had struggled because I had tried two other times. So I think he thought I was just, you know, crying wool. And that morning we had therapy and I followed through. And three days later, I had found an apartment and I moved out of the house. Wow.

SPEAKER_00:

What do you think made the difference that time? What happened the other, or let me say, what happened the other two times when it didn't happen?

SPEAKER_01:

So the first time was a little bit more of a knee-jerk reaction, and I didn't feel like I was strong enough. And of course, he came back to me and said, I'll do almost anything. Well, that changed for a little while, but then things went back to the way they were. Sure. And, you know, he was a good provider, and he was he had his moments of being a good partner, but he was coming from a place what I know now and can truly see is he was come, most of his decisions were coming from a place of fear too, instead of a place of love and connection, which which tore us apart. And I thought we were two people that were dividing and conquering, and that we would come back together. So the first time was, you know, I'll do anything to save the marriage. Okay, so I believed him. Well, that didn't work. And then maybe two and a half years later was this time when I was ready and then my kids' health was in question and concern. And I had to be the adult in that situation and do what was right for my family. I'm the adult. Let me put my needs aside for a while to make sure my children are okay, especially right before they go to college. I wanted them to be in the best mental, physical state they could to be able to launch them. Sure. And then their senior year in high school, I was like, I'm, I don't want them to equate their senior year in high school with their parents getting divorced. So I waited and all the while still trying to work on the marriage, seeing if we could repair it, seeing if we could fix things. But you can't repair something when somebody doesn't know how to repair or is unwilling to repair when there's a rupture. And that was one of our biggest issues is I had learned, I felt like I'd learned how to do it. And he either didn't want to, didn't feel like what he was doing was wrong. And there was financial betrayal involved. And he, and to give you an example, another betrayal that happened very, very early on in our marriage, which should have been a huge red flag, was I'm adopted. Okay. And I had my adoption was private, so I had my adoption papers. I knew the last name of my adoptive mother, but I always said I did not want to know. I didn't want to make contact with her. That's opening up Pandora's box. You just don't know what you're opening up. I had, and I had my adopted mother and father, and you know, things weren't perfect, but they, you know, I knew that they loved me and I didn't want to hurt them. And I had told my ex-husband this I do not want to find my adoptive parents. And we get the internet, and he couldn't help himself, and he found my adoptive mother and contacted her without my knowledge. Oh my goodness. And came to me after he had communicated with her and to tell me this, and that she wanted to meet me. Which is so layered and so complicated. That's like a whole podcast in itself. Oh my goodness, you're not kidding. So, you know, there had been a so that was one of two or three pretty severe betrayals in our marriage. And he was never able to see it from my point of view of how hurtful that could be. How the fact that I like he wasn't on my side, he wasn't looking out for my best interest. He was doing it because he thought that was best for me. Right. Instead of trusting me that I knew what was best for me.

SPEAKER_00:

And so that was that a through line through your marriage? Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

That was a very much a through line. He knew best what was best for me and for our children, versus allowing me to know what was best for me and also teaching our kids how to trust themselves and their intuition as they grow up as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So how long were you married?

SPEAKER_01:

26 years.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So I figured that based on the age of your kids. When did you finally realize what was happening? I mean, on the outside, I'm assuming that everything looked good looking from the outside in, right? If there's a stranger looking into your house and the kids, the marriage, the, you know, all the things.

SPEAKER_01:

Yep.

SPEAKER_00:

How long, when was it that you knew something inside you was just not feeling right?

SPEAKER_01:

So I think it was the the last betrayal that happened, which was a financial betrayal. And basically what happened is we were sitting in a lawyer's office, and instead of, and there was a little bit of a bait and switch about how he was going to handle an inheritance instead of having a conversation ahead of time. And I had prompted this like, how are we going to handle this? You know, I know that you inherited some money. How are we? We've been married for 20 years. Like, how are we going to handle this? We are two adults. Let's talk about this. I can't talk about it. I don't he avoided the conversation. And instead, he had his lawyer tell me how he was going to handle that. He didn't even have the guts to have the conversation up front with me. He had somebody else do it. And that's when my that's when everything changed. And that's when, and then of course, he never was able to apologize again, never able to see why I was so upset, why I felt like this was a betrayal of the relationship, and and why did he not trust me enough? Which then I internalized of what did I do wrong, right? Because that's where we go, especially, you know, we what what was my why did how did I cause this and how do I fix that? Well, you can't because he has these beliefs that he's not willing to change. He's got this perception that he is not willing to change. So, and that took me five and a half years of therapy to really figure it out. To hear that out. But that was really the pivotal moment, and that's what I write about in the book of that process of really your reality is just flipped on its head. You're like, oh my God, you are viewing this relationship in this life you created with somebody very different than he is. And the other thing is, I did everything possible. I gave everything to my marriage because I was trying to create this safe haven, this family unit that I didn't have as a child.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Right. So I was also overcompensating, I was people pleasing, I was appeasing. And and that worked for a while until you lose yourself in that process.

SPEAKER_00:

I lost myself during and I was just gonna say, yeah, it worked for a while on the outside, but it probably was not working for you on the inside.

SPEAKER_01:

I was miserable on the inside. Miserable. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

How scared were you to leave?

SPEAKER_01:

Or you had to suck that on a scale of the one to ten, maybe a hundred. Yeah. You know, which goes back to a core abandonment issue of being adopted and being left in my in a bassinet without any bonding. Like I was anxious. I'm like, on an and on a nervous system standpoint, your nervous system says if you leave, you're going to die. Right. Right. Because that's the attachment issues that happen. And when you don't have that proper bonding and that proper connection and nurturing when you're young, especially those first couple of days, and your nervous system feels like if I leave, I'm gonna die. And that took me a while to, and I didn't do my somatic work until after I left my marriage. I had done some body-based work, but mostly it was talk therapy.

SPEAKER_00:

Makes sense. I mean, so holding everything together all those years, what what do you think it was costing you?

SPEAKER_01:

My health, my happiness, and my body kept the score. Because about a year and a half ha after I left my marriage, I fell very ill. I landed in the hospital, not once, but twice within two weeks. My body was shutting down. And that is one of the we call it your my my body went into heightened stress, heightened overwhelm because divorcing is the second most stressful thing you can do in life. I was the one that moved out. I, and that's in the top five, seven things that you can do that's stressful is moving. I was dating, I was writing my book, I was starting to coach, I took on too much too soon. Yeah. So from a trauma trauma place, too much too soon, too much too fast, too much for too long, or too little for too long can turn into trauma. And it did. And my and severe back pain, the doctors didn't know what was wrong with me. They ran all kinds of tests. I left, I'm very active. I left the first time the hospital with a walker, and I had put on so much water weight. I looked like I was six months pregnant. I couldn't do anything for myself. My friends had to be there 24-7. I was passing out. Uh, my blood pressure was very low. I had migrating arthritis, these like hot patches that were moving around my body. I ended up developing fluid around my lungs. I ended up in the hospital again two weeks later. They kept me there for another four days, and I did make a full recovery, but it took me probably about seven or eight months. I couldn't drive. I lost 14 pounds. I was throwing up, I couldn't keep food down. That's your nervous system. Your autonomic nervous system is the longest nerve in your body. It goes from your brain down through your spine, and it has nerves that go to all of your organs, your stomach, which is why you kind of get that restriction in your stomach sometimes, it's like that that pit in your gut when something happens, that's your autonomic nervous system saying this could be dangerous because maybe it is similar to something that happened in the past. So it will turn on, and sometimes it gets overreactive if you haven't dealt with the trauma that you've experienced in your life. And this was even after talk therapy. This was after talk therapy. I felt like I had more healing that happened in the first year of working with a somatic practitioner than I did in five and a half years of talk therapy.

SPEAKER_00:

Wow. So, how did you even discover that?

SPEAKER_01:

I have a really good friend who is a therapist and knew this therapist who was a somatic practitioner. He also had training in other body-based modalities. And he said, and my girlfriend said, You need to go see Bob. And so I started seeing him as soon as I was healthy enough to drive because I couldn't drive for probably the first month after, and he really helped me. And it's the so you know, a lot of people are using the word somatic, yes, and nervous system regulation, and they don't really a lot of people are not using it properly. The training that I went through, which is Peter Levine's training, he is the founder of somatic experiencing, and he's been training and and in this field for 50 years. He's also, you know, at Gabor Mate's in this field, and another guy named Vessel Vander Kloek. They're all in this body-based. What is it? Yeah. Vessel Vander Kloek. He wrote the book The Body Keeps the Score. Anyway, so these, so and the training that I went through was three years. So it's not just four months or a couple long weekends. It's very, very intense. And it is really going into the body and feeling that gut restriction, that tightness in the chest, and the Developing the ability and capacity to in small doses be with that. Because when we can be with the restriction, we can be with the gut, the pit in the stomach, and we can stay with it and feel the sensations in small doses. That's how we complete the fight, flight, or freeze response that we may have not completed in the past because we've moved away from it, or it felt scary to stay with it. Or as children or in a relationship, somebody says, you know, you're overreacting, or why are you feeling that way? Or, you know, classic one from my childhood was stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about. We weren't allowed, we weren't validated, and we weren't allowed to feel those feelings. And so that gets stuck in the nervous system and in the body. And I I love the analogy. I use this analogy of a root beer float, because so many of us are age, you know, root beer floats. Think of your body as the root beer. And every time you put a scoop of ice cream in, what happens to it? It bubbles up. Well, if you don't let those bubbles settle and be with it and watch it, and you throw another scoop of ice cream on, and another, and maybe the last scoop of ice cream is really, really small, right? But you put that last scoop on, it could be something little, like the straw that broke the camel's back, and right, exactly. Right, it's overflowing all of a sudden.

SPEAKER_00:

And so what does somatic breathing do to your nervous system?

SPEAKER_01:

So so so it's not about breath.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, yeah, I realized I said breathing. Yeah, that's okay.

SPEAKER_01:

And a lot of and breath work can help to calm your nervous system down. But so I so first I want to start with somatic is derived from the Greek word soma, which means body. So we're body experiencing, we're experiencing what's happening in the body. Instead of trying to move away from it because it feels uncomfortable or emotional pain feels it, it is uh it can feel physically painful to feel our emotions. It's learning to develop the capacity to be with those feelings in small, tolerable doses. So that way we can stretch the nervous system to build more capacity. So it's we we start by stabilizing the nervous system, kind of grounding exercises, feel the chair underneath you, feel where the your feet are making contact with the floor, where the back of the chair is supporting you, and seeing if you can just feel and notice any sensations in the body. Just by doing that, because I've been doing this now for a long enough period of time, like five years, seven years, I can instantly drop into my body. Yeah. I tend to have a lot of tingling in general in my body, in my extremities. Sometimes I feel little bubbliness. Sometimes I'll get a restriction or nervousness before I come onto a podcast. So I'll just sit with that for a little bit, let it complete that fight, flight, or freeze. And there's a ton of other exercises, visualization exercises to rewire the brain. There's some drawing. If you have a lot of activation, there's movement, like shaking out the, if you have a lot of anxiety, shaking out the arms. If you, you know, when there's trauma like inescapable, like if you felt like you couldn't escape something, we have you run in place and then like feel the sensations after you've done that. It's pushing against the wall or something hard. If you have anger, there's lots of different exercises, but so much of it is doing it and then tracking and noticing without judgment, if you can, what's happening in the body, right? And then noticing what images come up, what what thoughts come up, what, and and working with what comes up as you're doing these exercises.

SPEAKER_00:

And what about someone who's never even thought about any of these things, these traumas, these tiny traumas that I don't know about you, but for the longest time, I thought, well, actually, I thought about it before I wrote my memoir because I thought, well, it's not like I've had, thank goodness, some big trauma. You know, I didn't, I wasn't kidnapped, I didn't fall off a mountain. So what am I going to share that somebody's going to be inspired by because I didn't have any big traumas? And then that was the first time that I learned about little traumas.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And those can those add up. You know, it's like the going back to the ice cream scoop. You put enough little scoops of ice cream, you know, because there's big tea trauma and there's little tea trauma. Yes. But it's it's not even about defining what's big and what's little because everybody is different. It's trauma. So Peter Levine says one of his quotes is it's not what happened to you that causes the trauma. It's what stays stuck in your nervous system. What stays stuck in your body because you did not process it and complete the fight, flight, or freeze threat response our body automatically goes into when there has been an experience of too much too soon, too much too fast, too much for too long, or too little for too long. So too little for too long could be I didn't get my emotional needs met for my whole childhood. Right, right. And most of our parents wouldn't have the capability based off their trauma and how they were raised to give that to us. Right? Yes. Too much too soon, a car accident, boom, being startled, falling down, breaking your hip, like all these things, realizing that your child has special needs, and the doctor tells you, and you have this shock. I could relate to that one, but or some type of diagnosis that is a shock to the system. And those types of things can be traumatized if we don't process them and allow our bodies to complete the threat response that our body goes into.

SPEAKER_00:

And so that is what the practice of somatic work is about, yeah, is helping that trauma get processed through your body.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And the beautiful thing about somatic experiencing is it's not going back into the story. And you might bring like little cliff notes up about it, and then just like, what are you noticing in the body and being with it and allowing your body, what does your body want to do? What does, you know, what what thoughts are coming up, revisualizing what you might have wanted to happen instead, those types of things to help rewire because our nervous system doesn't know past from present. It it doesn't, so it and it also takes your database of experiences from the past and uses it to dictate what's safe, what's life-threatening, and what's dangerous. So if we've had a lot of if we've had physical abuse and somebody looks like that shows up on the street and looks like a perpetrator that you may have had, your body's gonna tense up. Sure. And you may not even know it. Right. And so, and then you come and you work with somebody, if you're working with a somatic practitioner, and then you say, God, I was walking on the street and like I I don't even know what happened, but I all of a sudden had this tightness. We're like, you know, can you feel that now? Can we just sit with it and see what happens and see what comes up with it? So that's what we would do in a session.

SPEAKER_00:

How do you even become aware? I mean, I guess, is there a beginning part of the practice where you learn to tune into that, not just working with the practice?

SPEAKER_01:

Really great question. Part of it is just so there's two pieces to somatic experiencing. I like part of part of it is nervous system regulation, is just starting to tap into your body. And that could be, you know, just taking a moment, doing a some, you know, whether it's a meditation and just feeling like feeling the chair underneath you and slowing down enough, feeling where your feet are touching the ground, and just taking a minute and seeing if you can feel anything in the body. Some people cannot. And it took me a little while to what am I feeling in my body? If you can't feel in your body, what we talk about is orienting, orienting to your space, looking around the room, you know, maybe landing on something that's pleasant to your eyes, whether that's a picture of a vacation or a piece of artwork that you really love, or you know, the great the book that you wrote and how much how proud and gratifying that was. And just like, you know, keeping your gaze on that and noticing if anything changes in the body. Like maybe your shoulders soften a little bit. Maybe you take a natural breath. Maybe you can feel your stomach digesting a little bit more. That means your your nervous system is coming down into what we call a parasympathetic rest and digest state, because we want our nervous system to go up and down like a very easy, soft kiddie roller coaster for those who are listening. I'm putting my hand up and down. What our society rewards us to do is be productive, go, go, go, do, do, do, stay, stay, stay, and then tell we burn out and we crash. Yes. Right. We don't, I think there's more acceptance around it, and there's, but we are rewarded to go, go, go, do our corporations, our society, you know. I do it to myself. Like, you know, I feel better when I'm productive and I check five things off of my to-do list. But there's more and more research that is showing we need to do the rest. We need to get good sleep. We need to rest. We need to nurture our body, exercise, go out for a walk in nature. We need to do those things first to then be more productive or and to be happier too.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. I don't know about you, but it it I still struggle with feeling guilty. Yeah. Right. When I'm not sitting down and I have all those things on my to-do list that I'm looking at right over there, and I didn't check a lot off yet today. And for me, it's already half the day is over.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And it it's that panic feeling, and yet trying to, I've really been trying to listen and tune in. When my body says I need rest, it's okay.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, but even feeling that panic right now, it's like, okay, when you feel that panic, that's your nervous system saying, I need to get this done, otherwise, I'm not going to be safe or that something's going to go wrong. So can you just notice that panic feeling? Where does that show up in your body? And can you just even for two or three minutes just sit with the sensation of that panic in your body and see what happens with it? And just tend to that and maybe even ask it like, why are you here? What message do you have for me? And then, and and whatever message it is, really validate, is that true in this moment? If I don't get X, Y, and Z done, that I'm not going to be okay. Is that really true? Right. Yeah. And then and then just notice what shifts and changes in the body.

SPEAKER_00:

Just listening to you say that makes me my shoulders kind of come down a little bit, right? Yes. And takes that pull stress. And it's it's all a story we tell ourselves. Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

But it's also our nervous system telling our brain, we need to get this done based off of past experience. I need to get all these things done because you've held a lot. Yeah. You know, we've recorded you because you're on my podcast too. Like you have dealt with a lot, and you had to keep a lot of balls in the air to keep other people alive. Right. So that could still be a little stored in your nervous system of I need to do all these things to keep other people alive. So that could still be in your nervous system communicating that to your brain. And then the brain thinks, so because 80% of the time it's the nervous system that sends the message to the brain, not it's only 20% that the brain sends the message to the body.

SPEAKER_00:

Interesting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

So the more we can get in touch with the body and manage the body, then our thoughts will change and calm down.

SPEAKER_00:

Makes sense. Now, I obviously assume that when you're coaching, I mean, do you primarily work with women who are in the process of getting divorced or know they want to get divorced? How does that, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

So my my clients range, I do have, I would say the majority of my clients are either thinking about divorce, going through a divorce, healing. Sometimes they catch them on the back end too. But I do have some clients that are happily married, but just have had some trauma and have have found me and and just want to focus on the healing part.

SPEAKER_00:

Sure. Yeah, it doesn't certainly have to be about divorce. We've all had trauma. We've all that's life, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's not any one person in particular. It applies to all of us. Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

But divorce is, you know, it is a traumatic experience.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Yes. It's funny. My parents got divorced when I was maybe 21. They were separated for three different times when I was 12 and 13. And of course, that was super traumatic. And and they weren't, I don't recall them being the kind of people who were always fighting, you know, where you are being traumatized by listening to all of their arguments. But even being 21 and having them divorce, I would think that I wouldn't feel that same trauma as a child, you know, like, okay, you're grown up. At that point, I actually wasn't living in the house anymore. What does it matter? But it always matters. I mean, it's it's still always your family breaking up.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And it feels feelings that you had when you were younger, 12, 13, are going to naturally show up when you're older as well. You know, if you do the somatic work, they're less intense, maybe show up a little bit less often, but they're still gonna going to be there. And somatic healing and somatic experiencing is again, it's not about healing so you don't feel these things. Right. It's about learning how to develop the capacity to feel what's happening and complete the fight, flight, and freeze response. So it's still gonna show up, but if you do the work, it shows up and it's less intense. And then you have more tools to manage as well.

SPEAKER_00:

Makes sense. Switching gears for a minute, I'm very curious, even though I'm I haven't tipped my toe into the dating arena yet. Um I just passed the three-year mark as a widow, and um yeah, I don't know where I am with that. I I I'm not ready to proactively look to date, kind of at that point. And good for you knowing yourself. Yes. I just there's too many other things that I'm excited about in my life, yeah, and feel like I need to look at those things and pursue things just for myself.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. But especially you're you're somebody you gave so much of yourself, and I'm sure you still are to your son and your kids. Yep. But you gave so much of yourself to your husband and to your kids. So that's understandable.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it actually is as an aside. This past weekend, a very close friend of mine, family friend, who's, you know, the friends who are your family. Her mom was in ICU and required a bunch of surgeries and whatever. I had plans to do something else this weekend. And I also have my dog is 14 and a half. He takes probably at least 20 pills a day. I'm kind of just keeping him alive. He's my he's my pal. Yeah. So I was planning on being away for the weekend to attend a conference, and so I had someone watch watching the dog. So, like the dog was taken care of, and my kids were doing their own thing, and I didn't go to the conference, and I instead went to be with my friend and her mom to support them both. And I realized I had the freedom to, because my dog was taken care of primarily. That I had the freedom when she asked, Well, will you stay over tomorrow night too? And after we left the hospital, and she said, Well, let's just go home and relax and watch movies and have something to eat. For the first time in my life, I thought, wow, I can just do this.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

You know what I'm saying? Without the worry, because I knew that everybody was taken care of. Yeah. And it was like, sure, I'll do that. Yeah. You're a free bird. Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_01:

That freedom, that freedom that we can start feeling at our age. It's a beautiful thing.

SPEAKER_00:

It is. I don't recall ever feeling this way in my entire life. I must have when I was a kid, but it's been so long and it feels so good. And I think when it comes to dating, it's like, oh, I don't really want to have to deal with someone else and their stuff. Of course, it would, the companionship would be nice, but anyhow, that's where I am. But how about you? And how do you help your clients? What mistakes do people make when they're coming out of divorce and they're just starting dating again?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh my goodness. Great question. So I used to have a six-week date differently course that I taught. I haven't taught it in a couple of years. But when I'm working with clients one-on-one who are going through the dating process, I use a similar framework that I created for this course. And again, it's it's all body-based, but we focus on, you know, typically we start with beliefs, the belief system of, you know, am I lovable or this is going to be a lot of work? Or am I going to end up there no good guys out there, or all guys my age only want to date younger women, which is not that I'm dating somebody who's a year younger than me right at the moment. So that's and the first guy I ever dated went on a date with after I left my marriage was five years younger than me, which was very good for the ego. Wow. I would imagine so. I love that. We only went on one day because neither of us were really ready. But so I talk about beliefs. I I work with attachment styles for people to really understand how they attach and how they're showing up, because that was a huge piece of awareness with me. I talk about values, what are your values and what values you want in your partner that might be different than the last person? I talk about my four C's, which is the chemistry connection, compatibility, and then conflict repair. I mean, do you you and sometimes that fourth one takes a while to figure out? Right. But there's, you know, and there's a lot of alignment. You know, are we aligned spiritually? Are we aligned financially? You know, there's a lot of those things. Are we in a similar place in our life with our families and children? And then there's a whole manifesting piece that also happens um, too. So that's kind of the general framework that I work with with women. But it's again, it's all body-based as well. But you know, there's a lot of women. So for anybody listening, I have a lot of girlfriends that are divorced, and like, I'm out, like, yeah, I don't want to date. And it's like, you know what? More power to you. Like, I get it. Yeah. I'm a relationship person, so I ultimately, and that could be because I'm more anxiously attached. Right. So that could be from that, but but in general, like I'm happier when I'm in a relationship and I enjoy that. I obviously wrong in the past, and I understand why. And I feel like I've done the work. I mean, there's it's a journey, right? It's not a destination, and I hated that for years, but yeah, yeah, I love that. So, yeah, so don't feel bad for anybody listening who's like, I have zero desire to date. Honor that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think that's that's where I am. My other limiting belief, or whatever, is I don't want to take care of someone else. I've taken care of too many people. And at this age, I mean, come on, you gotta start thinking about that. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01:

And that is that is a real concern and a real issue. And I was in a relationship for three and a half years, and he had a lot of health issues. And and I'm the same. I raised four children, I cared for my elderly parents for 14 and a half years. I didn't want to care for anybody else. And and he I think it would have been easier if he was better at caring for himself. Yes, but then I found myself falling back into that role. I walked him in three and a half years, I walked him through three surgeries. I'm like, this is not what I signed up for, and there were other issues too, but yeah, so it is a real concern, and that's something that we have to take in consideration for sure.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yep, I agree. All right, I could talk to you forever. I've already gone longer than I thought I would, and I could keep going, but in the interest of time, I would love if you would share where everyone can find you to learn more about the somatic work that you do and about your book and all the things.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, thank you. The the easiest way people can find me is my website, which is Lori L-A-U-R-I-E, middle initial e James. So there's two E's in there. I can I think I gave you the links for the put in the show notes. And I'm on Instagram and Facebook, more active on Instagram, also on LinkedIn. But my website is the best place. That's where you can buy my book and book an inquiry call if you're interested. And sometimes I do group somatic classes that are virtual as well throughout the year. So you can get on my mailing list and and stay in touch with me that way. I love it.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, Lori, thank you so much for being here and for being my first guest in probably close to a year. It's been an absolute pleasure.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, my pleasure too. Thank you so much, Debbie. I look forward to staying connected with you. Absolutely. Everyone, thanks for listening, and I'll see you next week.

unknown:

Bye.

Head Shot

Debbie Weiss

Host