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A lot of us hit adulthood thinking our childhood is “over,” then we watch ourselves react like a younger version of us just grabbed the steering wheel. Dr. Adam McCormick joins us to unpack why that happens, especially for people in service roles, and why the helping professions are full of high-functioning survivors who look fine on the outside while carrying heavy inner pressure.

We get practical about adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and a distinction that changes everything: ACEs are what happened, but trauma is the wound and the meaning we made. From there we talk about the scripts and “personal commandments” we inherit or create, how we keep corroborating them, and why the familiar can feel safer than the healthy. If you’ve ever wondered why boundaries feel risky, why self-care feels impossible, or why you pour yourself out for others but resist care for yourself, this conversation puts language around it.

We also connect childhood survival adaptations to real workplace outcomes like secondary trauma, burnout, compassion fatigue, and moral injury. Adam explains how the same emotional attunement that makes a social worker, therapist, counselor, teacher, or chaplain exceptional can also lead them to absorb others’ pain without realizing it. We close with Gabor Maté’s lens on attachment versus authenticity, plus slow, realistic ways to reclaim a healed and authentic self.

If this resonates, subscribe, share the episode with a colleague who carries a lot, and leave a review so more helping professionals can find it. What old script are you ready to question?

Find Dr. McCormick's book at: https://www.stedwards.edu/directory/sociology-social-work/adam-mccormick

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Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

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Porn is easy to blame. It’s harder, and far more useful, to ask what it’s doing for you. Dr. Daniel Roberts sits down with hypnotherapist Nelson Whiting to look underneath compulsive pornography use and talk about the real engines of stuck patterns: loneliness, grief, rejection, chronic stress, and the quiet identity belief that keeps showing up, “I’m not good enough.”

Nelson shares how his first exposure to self-hypnosis started as a simple breathing and affirmation routine that boosted learning and memory, then grew into a clinical practice focused on fast, measurable behavior change. We dig into why pornography can become a go-to form of escapism in high-pressure environments, including military culture, and why secrecy and shame can make standard approaches feel slow or ineffective. Instead of chasing the symptom, Nelson lays out a clear map from actions to emotions to memory to beliefs to identity, and explains why targeting the deeper layers is where lasting change happens.

We also get practical about the brain. When you’re in survival mode, your amygdala stays online, flexibility drops, and even smart plans can backfire. Nelson explains how hypnotherapy, meditation, and breathwork can calm the threat response so new thoughts and new choices finally feel possible, even when old triggers are still present.

If you want a science-informed, compassionate conversation about porn addiction recovery, self-hypnosis, trauma, and rebuilding agency, hit play. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs hope, and leave a review with the biggest takeaway you’re trying this week.

Learn more about Nelson's work at: https://www.nolimitshypnotherapy.com/

Support the show

Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

Follow us on your favorite social channels: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/moral-injury-support-network-for-servicewomen/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dr.danielroberts

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

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A patient dies quickly, a family can’t agree, a nurse goes home and still can’t turn it off. That ethical weight has a name: moral injury, and it doesn’t belong only to the battlefield.

We sit down with Kelly Edmondson, a trauma ICU nurse, healthcare executive, certified grief counselor, and founder of Timely Presence, to talk about what COVID looked like from inside hospital walls: constant uncertainty, fear of exposure, rapid loss, and the shock of feeling mistrusted in a profession that’s usually deeply trusted. From there, we get into the quieter, daily moral injuries of critical care and end-of-life decisions, where clinicians are asked to do painful work while wondering if the system is serving the patient, the family, or neither.

Kelly also shares the story of her son Darius, who died after an epilepsy-related seizure in his sleep, and the moment she realized grief isn’t the notification. Grief is the lived absence that returns on Mother’s Day, birthdays, and holidays. That insight led her to build Timely Presence, a grief aftercare service that helps people show up all year long on the dates that hurt most. We close with concrete guidance for leaders and employers, including her Presence Framework: regulate, respond, remain, plus why bereavement policies often fail the moment an employee returns to work.

Subscribe for more conversations on moral injury, grief support, and leadership under pressure, and if this resonates, share it with someone who needs language for what they’re carrying and leave us a review.

Learn more at: Timely Presence

Support the show

Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

Follow us on your favorite social channels: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/moral-injury-support-network-for-servicewomen/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dr.danielroberts

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