The Stay or Go Podcast for Women Considering Divorce

Episode 118: EFT Tapping for Nervous System Regulation & Somatic Healing with Jess Johnson 

Ever feel like your mind knows you’re safe, but your body is still completely hijacked by anxiety, rage, or overthinking? 🤯 Babes, you are not crazy—and you definitely cannot "think" your way out of a body-level stress response!

In today’s episode, I am freaking out with excitement because I’m joined by the incredible Jess Johnson, a former trauma therapist turned mind-body connection coach. Jess uses evidence-based EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique/Tapping) to help high achievers, le...

Episode 117: Why Love Alone Can’t Save Your Marriage (And Leaving a "Good Guy" with Deep Wounds)

Hi there, love. Place a hand on your heart and take a deep breath with me. 🤍

In today’s deeply personal episode, I’m pulling back the curtain on a recent, heavy experience that brought up a truth many women in our community struggle with: Why love alone cannot save a relationship, especially when you are considering divorcing a "good guy" who carries deep, unhealed wounds. 💔

After learning about the tragic passing of an ex-part...

Episode 116: Reinvent Yourself After Divorce: How to Build Your Alter Ego with Quinn Otrera💫

Welcome back, babes! If you’ve been feeling a little stuck, overwhelmed, or like you’re experiencing an identity collapse while navigating marriage decisions or post-divorce life—this episode was made for you. 

This week, I’m joined by the incredible Quinn Otrera, and she is bringing a tool to the podcast that blew my mind: The Alter Ego Effect (inspired by Todd Herman’s work!).

We dig deep into what happens to our sense of self when the old roles we u...

Episode 115: Mismatched sex drives in marriage? Let’s talk about reclaiming your erotic blueprint, shedding the shame, and owning your desire. 

Welcome back, y'all! Hello, hello. Today, we are diving headfirst into one of my absolute favorite topics on the planet—one that is so often swept under the rug, especially when we’re trying to decide whether to stay or go. We are talking about sex drives, intimacy, and eroticism. 🌶️

I almost titled this episode "So You're Kinky AF, but Your Spouse Isn't—What to Do," but my marketing friends reminded me th...

Episode 114: What happens when your life looks absolutely perfect on the outside, but on the inside, you are completely starving for a deeper, more authentic connection?

This week, I am sitting down with my client turned dear friend, LeeAnna, for a deeply vulnerable, unfiltered conversation about what it actually looks like to face a divorce after 28 years of marriage while grappling with childhood trauma and insecure attachment.

LeeAnna opens up about the painful reality of leaving a marriage that wasn’t inherently "bad" or abusive, but was plagued by a low-level, insidious emotional neglect. From na...

Episode 113: You don't trust yourself because you've been taught not to love yourself. 💔 If you are constantly drowning in doubt, feeling paralyzed by the decision to stay or go, and wondering why you can’t just make a choice and move forward—this deep, incredibly vulnerable episode is for you.

This week, I’m pulling back the curtain on a massive piece of the puzzle that so many women considering divorce completely miss. 🧠✨ The root of your self-doubt isn’t just standard marital distress. It actually ties back to a deep-seated childhood injury: insecure attachment, or what author Kelly McD...

Episode 112: Considering divorce? These two essential self-care questions will help you ground yourself when everything feels overwhelming. 

Hey y'all, let’s just take a collective deep breath together. After a few heavy, deeply intellectual episodes, I felt it in my bones that we needed to slow down, vibe, and get back to the absolute basics this week. When I was in the thick of navigating my own separation and trying to decide whether to stay or go, my therapist started every single session with the same two questions. She didn’t dive into the big philosophical drama—she bro...

Episode 111: Hey loves! Welcome back to the podcast. Today, Quinn and I are wrapping up our two-part series on historian Gerda Lerner, and we are diving deep into her incredible book, The Creation of Feminist Consciousness. We’re unpacking exactly how women have spent the last 1,500 years fighting to break free from patriarchal programming and own their minds. 🧠✨

Before we get into the history, I have a quick but super important business update. Regular Tuesday episodes won't be posted on Substack anymore. To support the show, please switch your listening over to Apple or Spotify, hit follow, and lea...

Episode 110: Hello, hello, babes! 💕 Oh my goodness, my heart is so incredibly full because the beautiful Yin to my Yang—the gorgeous, brilliant Quinn—is officially BACK! 🥰 It feels just like the good old days, vibing out together and diving straight into the deep end.

For this episode, Quinn and I really took one for the team. We spent weeks digging into the meaty, mind-blowing work of historian Gerda Lerner’s The Creation of Patriarchy, and let me tell you... once you see the matrix, you cannot unsee it. 😲

If you are sitting there considering divorce, feelin...

Episode 109: Hello, my loves. Welcome back. Today’s episode is a deeply personal, vulnerable, and ultimately liberating one for me.

For the past eight months, I have been spinning in a messy internal loop, trying to force a business model that just wasn’t working. Instead of looking at the numbers cleanly, my conditioning told me I just needed to try harder, surrender more, and carry the entire weight of the world on my shoulders.

If you are currently considering divorce, this loop probably sounds incredibly familiar. So often, we look inward and blame ourselves for...

Episode 108: We are so often told that self-connection is about positive vibes, daily mantras, and focusing only on the light. But if you have ever hit a wall with traditional manifestation work—if you have found yourself feeling completely stuck despite your best efforts—you already know there is a deeper layer of yourself waiting to be met.

This week, I am so excited to introduce you to Dani. We met back in 2024 in a coach training container, and she is hands-down one of the most uniquely grounded, delightful, and artistic coaches I have ever worked with. In m...

Episode 107: In this episode, I sit down with Deanna Elizabeth for a conversation about Human Design and the deeper work of self-connection it can open inside us.

This is not a conversation about a system of labels or complex data charts. It is a conversation about what happens when you begin to trust that authority may already be living within you.

We explore what it looks like to connect with your unique energetic blueprint. To listen for the truths beneath the noise of lifelong conditioning, family expectations, and trauma. And to approach Human Design not...

Episode 106: In this episode, I sit down with a woman from inside the Stay or Go community whose journey reveals the quiet, physical toll of living a life that only looks good on paper.

This is not a story about a high-conflict disaster. It is a story about the “box-checking” trap—the graduation, the career, the marriage, and the home—and the realization that checking every box can still leave you completely empty.

We explore what it looks like to finally listen to your own skin. To acknowledge the panic attacks that strike on the commute...

Episode 105: This week, I am opening up a conversation that I know is heavy, nuanced, and for many of you, deeply triggering. I’m reopening the topic of affairs, but from a vantage point I haven’t fully explored on this podcast before.

To help me navigate this, I’ve brought on a very special guest: my partner, Joe.

For a long time, I’ve spoken about affairs through the lens of what Joe describes in this episode as the “Deserted Island”—the experience of a partner so starved for connection and visibility that they reach for wate...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit stayorgo.substack.com

Episode 104: This week, I want to talk about the invisible architecture of your life. It’s something that sits underneath every decision you’ve ever made, every “yes” you’ve given, and every reason you have for staying exactly where you are right now.

It’s your values.

But here is the thing about values: most of us didn’t actually choose ours. We inherited them. We were handed a backpack full of beliefs by our families, our religions...

Episode 103: In this episode, I sit down with Allison Alexander for a conversation about tarot and the deeper work of self-connection it can open inside us.

This is not a conversation about fortune telling. It is a conversation about what happens when you begin to trust that wisdom may already be living within you.

We explore what it looks like to connect with your intuition. To listen for the truths beneath the noise of conditioning, fear, and overthinking. And to approach tarot not as something outside of you, but as a tool that helps you...

Episode 102: In this episode, I sit down with a woman from inside the Stay or Go community whose journey reveals something many of us quietly wrestle with.

This is not a story about a bad marriage. It is a story about what happens when “good enough” is no longer enough.

We explore what it looks like to stop abandoning yourself. To name what you truly want, even when you are not sure what it will cost. And to fully consider leaving, not as a threat, but as an act of integrity.

At the cent...

Episode 101: Today I talk about the deeper reality women are waking up to when it comes to marriage, the systems we’ve been living inside of, and the quiet cost of self-abandonment that so many of us were taught to normalize. And I name the double bind that keeps so many women stuck. The place where choosing yourself means losing love, and staying means losing yourself.

At the heart of this episode is something I’ve been building behind the scenes this year. A framework I’m calling CORE. Not as another set of tools to try, but as...

Episode 100: This 100th episode is a celebration, yes, but it is also something deeper.

In it I reflect on what it means to reach this milestone and on the woman I have become in the process of creating this podcast. What started as a small spark during one of the hardest seasons of my life has grown into something that has not only supported other women, but has changed me too.

At the heart of this episode is also a question I have been sitting with lately. What do we do with the pain we...

Episode 99: This week, I’m joined by the incredible Vanessa Kulick Price for a conversation that goes straight to the heart of what so many women are living through beneath the surface of divorce.

We talk about childhood trauma, grief, alcoholism, sobriety, motherhood, narcissistic dynamics, and the long process of learning how to come home to yourself. Vanessa shares so beautifully about what it means to finally name what is happening, to trust your own experience, and to begin building a life that feels deeply true from the inside out.

What I loved most about th...

Episode 98: This week, I want to talk about something that sits underneath almost every conversation I have with women who are considering divorce. It’s the question beneath the question.

Not just should I stay or go, but something deeper.Can I trust myself?

So many women come into this space looking for certainty. They want to know they’re not overreacting. They want reassurance they’re not making a mistake. They want someone to tell them what the right decision is.

But underneath all of that is the deeper ache of feeling discon...

Episode 97: This week’s episode goes straight to the heart of something many of you are living inside, even if you’ve never named it.

Is this my fate? Or do I actually have a say in what happens next?

If you’re considering divorce, you already know the weight of that question. The feeling that this decision will ripple through everything. Your children. Your future. The story of your life. It can feel predetermined, almost inevitable. Like this is just how it turned out.

In this episode, I unpack the difference between fate a...

I’m sitting down with “Jane,” a woman I’ve had the honor of walking alongside inside the Stay or Go community for over a year as she considered, wrestled with, and ultimately chose divorce. I watched her do this work in real time. Not in a dramatic, blow-it-all-up way. In a slow, honest, deeply courageous way.

Jane is divorcing what most people would call a “good guy.”

No addiction. No affair. No obvious villain. From the outside, her marriage looked fine. Maybe even better than fine. And yet inside, she felt alone. Unseen. Disconnected from her own...

Episode 95: I had the opportunity to sit down live with my dear friend, Chandra Zas, to talk about her chapters in The Handbook for Human Potential. And while at first glance this might seem like a departure from our usual stay-or-go conversations, it is anything but.

Because before you can make a clear decision about your marriage, you have to rebuild trust with yourself.

So many of us have been trained to override our bodies. We override exhaustion. We override sadness. We override anger. We override our no. We override our intuition. And then, standing...

Episode 94: In this episode, I start by inviting us to slow down together. I recorded this on February 8, 2026, and I could feel how loud life has been lately. Instead of showing up with a tidy bow and a perfect lesson, I let this be a real conversation between me and you. A place to breathe, to soften, and to tell the truth about what it feels like when your inner world is rearranging itself.

Because today we are talking about falling apart, and why it might be the most honest thing your soul has ever done.

Episode 93: In this episode, I sit down with Demetria Graves, a certified family law specialist and founder of the Graves Law Firm, for a conversation I have wanted to have for a long time. Demetria has spent over two decades guiding families through divorce with clarity, integrity, and a deep respect for what this moment costs people emotionally and financially. Together, we pull back the curtain on what the legal system actually cares about and what it does not, and why so many women unknowingly pay a steep price for staying stuck in indecision.

We talk candidly...

Episode 92: This week, I’m inviting you into a quieter, more intimate conversation. After a month filled with heavier topics—ADHD, misogyny, and partner violence—I found myself needing to pause. This episode emerged from that space. There’s no outline, no script—just me, speaking from the heart.

In it, I explore what it means to stay grounded as a deeply sensitive person in an increasingly fractured world. I reflect on a local production of Hadestown that unexpectedly cracked something open in me, illuminating the profound choice we face between fear and trust. We follow the tragic sto...

Episode 91: This is one of the most important—and most difficult—episodes I’ve ever recorded.

In it, I speak openly and directly about intimate partner violence, including heartbreaking local and national examples of the very real dangers women face when they decide to leave. This is not a conversation many of us were raised to have. I wasn’t. But after years of coaching women who are considering divorce, I know we cannot afford to keep looking away.

Together, we unpack critical statistics that are too often hidden behind passive headlines. I share a deeply p...

Episode 90: In this second part of the series, I take you inside what has been one of the most tender, clarifying, and ultimately empowering chapters of my life: navigating an adult ADHD diagnosis, beginning medication, and reclaiming parts of myself I didn’t know I had lost.

We start with a kind of radical idea—what if knowing yourself deeply, even when it’s painful, is the path to peace? In a time when there’s growing pushback against diagnosis and therapy language, I share a different perspective. One rooted in lived experience. One that says language doesn’t...

Episode 89: Welcome to 2026, my loves. I’m starting this year with one of the most personal and tender episodes I’ve ever shared. In Part One of this two-part series, I’m opening the door to my recent ADHD diagnosis—how it reframed not just the last few years, but the landscape of my entire life.

This isn’t just an episode about ADHD. It’s about the slow unraveling of shame. About finally understanding why therapy, coaching, somatic work—even with all the growth they gave me—could never quite reach the black box of suffering I carried. It’s...

Episode 88: Two days before Christmas can feel especially heavy when you are quietly considering divorce. The holidays have a way of magnifying everything: the grief, the pressure to perform, the old family dynamics, and the fear of being asked questions you are not ready to answer.

In this episode, I pull you in close with warmth and honesty. I share a story I had forgotten until I found it in my journals: a Christmas with my in-laws when something deeply personal about my faith journey was shared before I was ready. What followed was a long, well...

Episode 87: In this conversation with my dear friend Quinn, we finally do what I wish someone had done for me all those years ago. We open the black box of divorce and lay the process out in a way that is human, honest, and actually useful. Not theory, not legal jargon, but the lived reality of two women who walked very different paths through the same fire.

Quinn’s journey into divorce was long and chronic, shaped by decades of Mormon conditioning and a lifetime of being told not to trust herself. Mine was sharper and more su...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit stayorgo.substack.com

Episode 86: Ohhhh my loves — this one’s a biggie. 💥 What started as a simple question from one of my beautiful Substack subscribers turned into something so much deeper. In this episode, I finally give the practice of journaling the spotlight it deserves. Not the surface-level, “dear diary” kind of journaling. I’m talking about the real thing. The gritty, raw, healing kind. The kind that has quietly become one of the most sacred tools in my own self-resourcing practice — and one of the top ways...

Episode 85: Okay, y’all. This episode has been building all month. After revisiting my journals, hosting powerful conversations in the community, listening to Olivia’s story, and sitting with a few seriously paradigm-shifting insights, I knew I needed to pull it all together and share where I’ve landed.

We’re talking narcissism, but not in the black-and-white, overused “therapy speak” way you’re seeing all over the internet. I’m breaking down the difference between actual narcissistic abuse and emotionally immature behavior that might be just subtle enough to keep you spinning. I introduce the continuum I developed this...

Episode 84: In today’s episode, I sit down with “Olivia,” a woman I worked with one-on-one during the early days of her unraveling a 21-year marriage marked by deep narcissistic abuse. What unfolds in this conversation is one of the most raw, courageous, and unflinching portraits we’ve ever had on the podcast of what it means to wake up inside a marriage and realize: this isn’t love. Not the kind that sees you. Not the kind that holds you.

Together, we trace Olivia’s journey from the exhaustion and confusion of her lowest point—when the gaslightin...

Episode 83: This week’s episode feels like opening a sealed box from a past lifetime and discovering not only who I was, but the quiet, determined woman I was becoming long before I could see her clearly. These final journal entries are some of the rawest I have ever shared. They move through the full terrain of my inner world during the months surrounding my separation and divorce, including the parts I still feel in my body when I read them.

Before we dive into those pages, I share a personal update that has been nothing short of...