What positives as a result of your divorce?

Tamsin is joined by Naomi Woodford, who is a divorce recovery coach. They talk about recovery and beginning their new chapter positively. They also cover how past traumas, including childhood traumas, can impact relationships and did affect her adult relationships and marriage. They also discuss some of the steps you can take to stop this from happening.

Naomi says:
"As a Divorce Recovery Coach for women, I help you to heal through past and subsequent traumas, enabling you to gain clarity on what you want to do or have in the future and move on to your next chapter filled with confidence. Ditch the 'D' word, strengthen your sense of self worth and improve the relationship you have with others, but more importantly, yourself."

You can find out more about Naomi here

Naomi Woodford Coaching
https://www.naomiwoodfordcoaching.com/

FB: https://www.facebook.com/naomiwoodfordcoaching/

Tamsin is a Chartered Financial Planer with over 20 years experience. She works with couples and individuals who are at the end of a relationship and want agree how to divide their assets FAIRLY without a fight.

You can contact Tamsin at tamsin@smartdivorce.co.uk or arrange a free initial meeting using https://calendly.com/tamsin-caine/15min. She is also part of the team running Facebook group Separation, Divorce and Dissolution UK (https://www.facebook.com/groups/469020344490906)

Transcript

(The transcript has been created by an AI, apologies for any mistakes)

Tamsin Caine 0:06
Hello, and welcome to the Smart Divorce podcast. In series four, we're going to be talking to various different professionals and others who have gone through divorce and dissolution of the civil partnership to talk about the future, and how you can start helping things to look much more positively. And we have some fantastic guests lined up. But if there is anything specific that you would like us to cover, please do get in touch. And you can contact me through our website, www dot smart divorce.co.uk. And I look forward to hearing from you soon. Enjoy. Hi, and I'm delighted to be joined this afternoon by Naomi. And Naomi is a divorce recovery coach. So she helps women to heal emotionally and spiritually and after they've gone through divorce to feel happier and more competent in their next chapter. And next chapter is something that we talk a lot about in the spark first podcast. And her role is to show women that there's such a thing as having the opportunity to enjoy life after divorce. And then there was cases I'm sure she'll tell us more about and that her life is the best it's been she wants to inspire others, and to believe that it's possible for them to. And our second series, the podcast was all about this all about real life stories and people who've been through divorce and combat and happy the other side. But today we're going to concentrate on something slightly different, aren't we, we're going to look at how past traumas can influence your current relationships. So give us a bit of background let's, let's start where this is coming from.

Naomi Woodford 2:09
Okay, so yeah, up until recently, so I was really up until last year when I discovered the world of mindset and coaching. And it was only really then that I figured out that a lot of my relationship troubles taught, you know, my, even my marriage, even before my marriage was related, I think to my childhood, and to make that connection. At 35 years of age was quite a revelation for me, I thought, wow, this is, you know, on the surface, I thought you could see consciously where, you know, you can make these connections, this parts of your childhood, but to really make connections on a deep level was really fascinating to me. And so rather than just focusing on your life, after divorce, it's also taken me back to before I even got married before I even met my ex husband, and to really assess and analyse the relationships like I got into before even before then, that was really

Tamsin Caine 3:19
interesting. So did you is this work that you've done yourself on yourself? Did you work with somebody else to to? Because that's that's some pretty deep emotional stuff that you're that you're talking about there? How did that come about?

Naomi Woodford 3:36
Yeah, through Well, I, I came across the clip, click Academy, which is where I did my coaching, got my coaching qualifications with. And I've done a lot of work with coaches who have also joined the academy and a lot of it myself as well. So anything I teach and go through I've done myself so there's a lot of NLP works in your linguistic programming, some of the tools and techniques from that some energy healing work, like EFT and really just looking at the beliefs and patterns and stories that I told myself and went by believed and, and yeah, so I've had to do a lot of work myself. And that's been really cathartic. So I've had to forgive myself do a lot of the self forgiveness and forgiveness rituals to really learn to accept myself and that leads into self love as well as it all adds up when you let go of these past formers or these inner disturbances that maybe you did or didn't realise you had. It you just feel lighter, you're able to see you get you get more clarity, basically gain more clarity in your decisions. Why you made certain choices. Why am I Same decisions, and is yes, open my mind up completely. And this is exactly why I want to help other women do the same, then I feel more empowered by their decisions. Not be I guess you want to have your own beliefs?

Tamsin Caine 5:22
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. I think it's, it'd be really interesting to explore a little bit more if it's okay with you about what what you mean by the kind of traumas that impact your later life? Because I suppose summer a fairly obviously going to, you know, huge traumas, I guess in the case of abuse, you know, it is, it's obviously going to impact your every part of your life, but are we talking about smaller traumas than that?

Naomi Woodford 5:55
Yeah, maybe even the smaller traumas that you didn't realise would have such an effect. So I've always made connections, generally, that my beliefs and how I felt about myself, my self worth is based on how my father was, he was the relationship I saw between my parents was very much he was quite domineering character, he had quite a temper on him, you had to kind of be seen and not heard, he would prioritise himself and his needs before us, and I'm the oldest of six. So there was quite a few of us. And, yeah, and my mum, on the other hand, was very submissive. And you could tell she, when, whenever we saw him come back from work, for instance, there would be this real tension in the air, you know, you'd have to quickly get in your places it was and clear things up and do things in certain way before he entered the door, it was very much like that. So you're living in this constant state of tension. And for a long time, I was thought it was maybe my dad that was wholly to blame for that, how I felt growing up. But actually, it's made me look at the relationship between my mum and my dad more so and how she reacted in certain situations, and those submissively. And maybe there's some accountability on how she, she came across, and how she dealt with things as well. And then in turn, is thinking about where they then learn how, how to act, behave, their beliefs all came from their, their parents, as well. So it goes back, we've got all these borrowed beliefs that we don't necessarily realise we're holding, and then taken to our, our adult lives. So yeah, it's been there's been a lot.

Tamsin Caine 7:54
Yeah, that's really interesting. So how did how did those things manifest themselves in your relationships?

Naomi Woodford 8:05
Gosh, has always been what up until recently, I would say very, very much a people pleaser, so quiet, quite reserved, quite introverted, when the main thing I think I've found is that I've always just been quiet, just to keep the peace, I might have an opinion. But I haven't always felt able to be assertive in that opinion, the fear of being judged or Yeah, not listened to. And I think that was the biggest revelation for me was. But I haven't been able to always speak up and have an opinion, because I was shouted down to as a child. And, you know, told to act and conform to a set in a certain way, basically. So I think that was the biggest thing for me. So I probably went through most of my relationship with my ex husband very, very timid. Sometimes, you know, we didn't really argue because I just wouldn't go there. I hated the confrontation. And there was no real expression, I felt like I couldn't communicate properly. And it wasn't necessarily his fault, either. I think a lot of it's come from, for me and to really look at your your self as well, in your, your part in the failing of the relationship has been really quite huge. And I think we all have to go through that and be honest with ourselves, and like be really difficult. And yeah, for me, that was probably the biggest things. So when we separated. I think the first initial reaction for those afterwards themselves is to blame the other one, you know, that's ended because of that. And to really look at yourself and be accountable for what you have or haven't done is really, yeah, it's raw, and it takes a lot of guts and honesty to open up. So that that pain, but once you've let go of that, I think it has a massive feeling of just lightness. And yeah, yeah, I think it's, it's been brilliant for me. It's been fantastic.

Tamsin Caine 10:13
Yeah, absolutely. And certainly the quiet, introverted person that you talk about is, I know that mainly for very long, but certainly not the person I recognise. From that, they, the wonderful videos that you record on Facebook, which I know Take, take some real guts to do and putting yourself out there and getting your face out there. And seeing is, is incredible if you are that sort of quiet, timid, introverted person that says, That's amazing. So earlier on, you mentioned a couple of things that I just like to come back to if it's okay. So NLP or neuro linguistic programming? I hope I said that right? Can you just expand on that and tell us a bit more about what it is and how it works?

Naomi Woodford 11:02
Yeah, so neuro linguistic programming is basically language of the brain. So it's how we think and the idea is that we will have thoughts, then that dictate our actions and how we behave. And then it feeds into the thoughts again, so we can tell ourselves, for instance, or have in our mind that we can't do certain things, or I'm not good enough to do that. I don't deserve to do that. I'm not worthy enough to do that. All these stories and patterns, all these fears that can come out, but it's mainly just our brain keeping us safe. And that is, the easiest thing for our brains to do is to goes back to our primal instinct was to protect ourselves. And that's why right brains primal function has to do that. But to then push yourself and find another kind of path for your brain to think basically, is what NLP is about is, remapping your map of the world, basically, your perceptions. So there's a lots of tools and techniques that you can use within NLP. And they're really simple, but it's just training the brain in a different way. So you can subconsciously do that not just on a conscious level, but bring your thoughts and emotions to a conscious level, and then deal with them subconsciously.

Tamsin Caine 12:23
That's really interesting. I'm not an NLP practitioner by any stretch of the margin, nor do I know huge amounts about it. But one of the things that I've had a bit of an epiphany about this quite recently, and then somebody somebody said to me, it might, it could well have been something that I've read a few hours, but but somebody said, a thought is just a thought, not a fact. And so some people may be listening to this or watching this and thinking, Well, yeah, that's pretty obvious. But actually, it's not obvious until you start really unpacking it actually, you can you tell yourself things all the time, you know, you might have a memory of a certain event or incident and your memory of it will be one thing, and when you start some doubts, who was there witnessing exactly the same thing, and they'll have a completely different memory of it. And so I think that's really interesting. Sounds. Sounds a fascinating thing to explore, although, maybe slightly terrifying.

Naomi Woodford 13:28
Yeah, okay. It does. Yeah, it does sound terrifying at first, when you hear it, especially when it's the brain is talking about the brain and what it can do. And I think also with perception, it also helps as well, when you're dealing with your ex as well, maybe in particular, to really see where they might be coming from. And often we're very tunnel visioned in what we, we see in everyday life, we, and it's all it's not 100% true. For all of us, it's not 100% fact, or 100% of the time for everyone is so that will really has really helped me as well, to see things from a different perspective. And I think that really helps, especially if you're having to still communicate with your ex, by the children or finances involved, and the house, etc. So, yeah, I think it's really helped. And also to come from a place of compassion has been really hard to do. But it's not about other people. It's about how you, you carry on, that it doesn't matter who's to blame at the end of the day for any of it. Because it's only you that is hurting. If you don't let that go, if you can't let you know, let go forgive and let go. And I think that's really important.

Tamsin Caine 14:48
Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. And I think, especially when when you've got children involved in divorce, that you have to continue to have that relationship of some description with the other parent in You know that choices are new, you made that decision to have those have the children with the other person and, and that's kind of a life long responsibility therefore half for, for parenting those those children that that you brought into the world and I think if you can try and see things from the other person's point of view and, and sort this sort of thing out amicably, and as you say compassionately towards the other person, it's very difficult to fight with somebody who's very calm and controlled and can see your point of view. So I think that's, that's really brilliant advice. You also mentioned something called f t. Now, I think that I've heard that called tapping, am I on the right line? You are? Yeah, yeah. And a bit more about this? Because? To me, this seems absolutely bonkers. I'm sure it's not. But it just seems a bit strange to me. And I tried it once and then just felt really silly.

Naomi Woodford 16:04
I can completely understand that. Yeah. When I first tried EFT myself and was with someone else doing with me. She said, right, this is gonna look a little bit weird. And you might think, what are we doing here and, okay, so I'm quite firm, just go with it, I, first of all, be open to, to knowing about it. And yeah, so it's Emotional Freedom Technique, otherwise known as tapping. So it basically is a holistic practice where you will tap on certain points, meridian points of your body, so the head, the eyebrows around the eyebrows underneath, underneath the nose, your chin, collarbone, and then around the back, undo, and then back up to the head again, so but you would, it's about unblocking the negative energy, basically, the blocks that we might have, that we might work, hurrying, and yeah, and then it's basically talking, you tap as you talk. So he would start off with a setup statement that might say, even though I, for instance, used to suffer with stress and anxiety, I deeply and profoundly love myself. So you start off with something like a strong setup statement. And then you would repeat some of the negative comments or things you've said to yourself, but you talk through with us as a practitioner first. And then you replace them as you go through the tapping rounds with more positive affirmations and beliefs. And yeah, and then you come out feeling a lot lighter, I definitely recommend trying again, anyway,

Tamsin Caine 17:47
I will, I will try it again, I, I was watching a video on Instagram in attempting to do along with this. And I never seen it before. And I was just a bit confused when we so so that because for people who can't see you, for the people who listen to this on the podcast, you are actually tapping that part of the body that we're talking about. So when you're in your head, you're actually physically tapping with your fingers on your head.

Naomi Woodford 18:17
And you're not, yeah, you're not working really hard. So no one's going to lock themselves out. Enough to make a kind of, if you can hear that. So enough of a an impact that you will feel it but obviously not enough to hurt yourself. So you would start with the top of your head in that motion. And then you'd move to the top of your eyebrow. And then it would be to the side of your eyebrow. And each time you're saying a line, or you're repeating a line that the practitioner is saying to you. So she will you're literally following a script. And that's what they do. And then you carry on going down to under the nose. And then under the on the chin. And then you would go to the collarbone and you tap there. And then you'd go onto the arm. But round, like round on your arm really where you're where you would your bra line would be and then back up to the top of your head. So it's

Tamsin Caine 19:16
a bit like rhythmic II, you tapping in time to you're talking?

Naomi Woodford 19:26
Yeah, yeah, you can do yeah, although you don't have to, there's no real. It wouldn't matter if you kind of missed a beat or anything like that. You don't go to any music or anything like that unless the practitioner wants to. But generally you would just get you get a feel for it, I think as well. So you get into your own kind of rhythm. But it's very much led by practitioner so you don't have to do anything apart from tap on these points and maybe feel a little bit silly at first, but yeah, it's a bit like acupuncture. That's how it's really described, just for the meridian points on your body.

Tamsin Caine 20:06
That's really fascinating because one of the things that I've discovered whilst our impact over the last year of recording these podcasts with various different people from all sorts of different walks of life, and it's becoming clearer and clearer that you need to deal with the emotional side and consequences of your divorce at some point, and if you don't do it, during your, your divorce proceedings, at some point, it will hit you and you'll need to deal with it. With it later, whether that be through psychotherapists, whether that be through a coach like yourself, whether it be through counselling, and I went to a counsellor hypnotherapist, and again, I just told you that was bonkers year ago. Because I was like, really, I've seen people get up on stage when they're drunk and pretend to be a chicken. And I thought that was what hypnosis or hypnotherapy was all going to be about. And it's not at all it's just the most deep sense of relaxation then I had that I think I've ever been through. And I knew exactly what was being said to me. And I knew exactly what I was doing and couldn't always remember it and recall afterwards, but it wasn't somebody was making me do and that was my greatest fear somebody making me do something really silly, that's going to, and potentially for doing it and put it out on social media, these sorts of fears that go through our heads about stuff like this. And so Think, think dealing with the emotional stuff is vitally important. And if there are ways of doing it, that that work for you that aren't necessarily just talking to a counsellor and being taken back, if something else works better. You know, you've got to try and find the one that fits for you reduce. Would you say that was there?

Naomi Woodford 22:03
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there's other ways you can release trauma, is it worth so many different ways? And I think it's, it's different for everyone. I think it's a case of trying it like you might have done with the FDA and thinking, no, this isn't what I want. Well, I don't feel like this is for me. But there's like chakra healing as well, which is something I do do. But there's loads even the rituals of as I said earlier, like forgiveness. The simple things like writing yourself a letter journaling, or the inner child work has been fascinating. And I love the inner child work.

Tamsin Caine 22:44
That Tell me more about that go, oh, gosh, yeah.

Naomi Woodford 22:48
It's not something that's recognised as a physical being, as it were. So it's something that's spiritually it's, I guess, it's inside us all. But we wouldn't recognise it as being so not unless you know about it anyway. So the inner child is, is basically your younger self, and it's giving her what she didn't have, when when she was a child that she needed. And it's kind of going back, or recognising that acknowledging that and giving her what she needs. And it's a bit of an NLP technique. One of them anyway, is the reimprinting technique, where you will go back in stages, so So for instance, you you felt unworthy or, you know, lacked self worth, you would go back recently, to a memory where you felt that and then you'd go even further back still. And then you'd go back to your earliest memory that you could possibly go back to. And you would think about what she needed in that moment. What lessons, what wisdom does she need. And if there's other people in that scene, as well of your memory, you also pass them the lessons and the wisdom that they needed that time that they didn't give your younger self, your inner child, and then you just feel like you've just embrace your inner child, you integrate together. And yeah, it feels, it just feels like you've you let go. It's another way of just letting go and realising our traumas in childhood. Were not our fault. Yeah, I think we carry that a lot. And it's, it might be really obvious, but it's not either. And it can be really difficult for people to to look at their childhoods and not see it through rose tinted glasses, as it were. I mean, I've had to look at certain things that I thought my relationship with my both my parents has said my father more so but my mother as well. And just yeah, it's been it's been really hard and emotional. But if I feel so much lighter once I did it, so yeah, I really recommend that people don't often want to go there because they don't want to rock the boat. They don't want to blow this perception of their parents that they have, you know, they don't want to cause any family riffs or anything like that. You know, and often I you know, I'd hear I'll but I was a difficult child. So that's why that happened. And that's why my mom or my dad or my carer did that to me, or, you know, it's just accepting that it wasn't your fault, but you ultimately have responsibility now. Moving forward. We all do we all have choice. And that I think, was the one of the biggest things for me, as well as learning that we can blame other people forevermore. But what good is that going to do us? You know, we've got to let go.

Tamsin Caine 25:55
I think that's, I think that's really, really good advice. It's been really fascinating talking to you that I think I could be here for hours on end if I'm not. But if you have one piece of advice to give to somebody who was currently coming out the other side if if their divorce, what what would that advice be?

Naomi Woodford 26:22
Do the inner work before you move on? The biggest thing for me in the teachings that I really want to pass on one, anything's do the inner work, engage in positive coping strategies after your divorce of your separation? If you haven't quite divorced, whatever stage you're at, really, think about your choice. We all have that choice. And, you know, I got into negative coping strategies. And you know, drank too much. I went on dates, I was a bit of a data Holic. It was filling that void, you know, and I've got the financial stuff sorted out, you know, I went to see a solicitor, that's what they were for. But, you know, I didn't have anyone coming out, you know, when I was 30, telling me, what, what do you do? How are you meant to be feeling now, I'd spent all my, my married life, my 20s. So I was 19, when I got with my ex husband, spent all my 20s with him, and then to come back 30. Now, separating, was scary. And I just didn't know which way to go, you lose this identity, don't you and you, you go flip from one thing to the other, and you get lost along the way. And I think if someone had shown me this Handbook, as it were, this, this is what you're going to be feeling. These are the stages you're going to feel after a divorce. And it's going to be a bit of a roller coaster. But if you you know, do this, this and this, no, it will be more portly will have a positive impact more so when you and you can really let some of the stuff go before you get into further relationships. So yeah, definitely do, do the work and try and stay positive as much as you can and engage in those negative, engage in those positive coping strategies rather than the negative ones, because they'll serve you better in the long run.

Tamsin Caine 28:23
That's really, really good note to end on, I think, being positive. And so if anybody's listening to this and wants to get in touch with you, they've really been struck by the things that you've said, Today, how do they go about doing that? And we will include and this in the show notes, but how do they get in touch,

Naomi Woodford 28:43
so they can email pay? If you can put that in the show notes. You're fantastic. I do have a Facebook community group that are growing just for inspiration and advice and support that I give in there. Again, I'll put that in the show notes as well. But yeah, if you can email me that's probably the quickest way of getting to me or on LinkedIn. You can find me on LinkedIn, just Naomi referred boss recovery coach, so

Tamsin Caine 29:12
yeah. Fantastic. That's brilliant. Thank you so much for joining me today. Naomi. I've really enjoyed that. Thank you. I and I hope you enjoy the episode of the smart boss podcast. If you would like to get in touch please have a look in the show notes for our details or go onto the website WWW dot smart divorce.co.uk. Also, if you are listening on Apple podcasts or on Spotify and you wouldn't mind leaving us a lovely five star review. That would be fantastic. I know that lots of our listeners are finding this is incredibly helpful in their journey through separation divorce and dissolving a civil partnership. Also If you would like some foot further support, we do have Facebook group now. It's called separation divorce and dissolution UK. Please do go on to Facebook search of the group and we'd be delighted to have you join us. And the one thing I would say is do please answer their membership questions. Okay, have a great day and take care

Transcribed by https://otter.ai