Text Paige about this episode

Most of us have visited Victim Town. Some of us practically had a timeshare there.

Pain is real. Grief is real. Sometimes life genuinely kicks the absolute shit out of you.

But there comes a point when what happened to you stops being something you’re experiencing… and starts becoming who you are.

In this episode, I talk about the difference between feeling your pain and building your identity around it, why fake positivity is bullshit, and the uncomfortable truth that staying stuck can sometimes feel safer than changing.

I also share how I spent years making excuses in my second marriage, then swung completely the other way after we separated and blamed myself for everything—while holding on to a future that wasn’t actually there.

Until eventually, I had to ask:

Righto… now what?

This isn’t about denying what happened, rushing your grief, or pretending you’re okay. It’s about telling yourself the truth, taking back what you can control, and leaving Victim Town one small decision at a time.

You’re allowed to visit. Just don’t pitch a tent there.

Text Paige about this episode

If you’ve ever called yourself “easy-going” while quietly dying inside, this episode is your wake-up call.

I’m talking about the slow, sneaky way so many women learn to shrink themselves to keep the peace — the tiny daily self-abandonments that look harmless until one day you realise you don’t know what you feel, what you want, or who you are without everyone else’s approval.

We get into why people-pleasing isn’t just being nice. A lot of the time, it’s fear wearing good manners — a nervous system trained to avoid rejection, withdrawal, anger, or that stomach-drop moment when someone’s tone changes. I talk about the difference between real peace and silence, how toxic relationship patterns can teach you to emotionally disappear, and why high-functioning can hide anxiety, burnout, resentment, and that soul-tired exhaustion that often hits hard in midlife.

Then we get practical. I share five grounded ways to stop shrinking without trying to become a different person overnight: noticing where you self-abandon daily, setting boundaries without writing an essay, letting people be temporarily disappointed, rebuilding self-worth outside being needed, and practising conflict in small, safe ways so your body gets evidence that honesty isn’t automatically dangerous.

Your peace should not require your disappearance.

Text Paige about this episode

Strong women get tired too.

In this episode, I’m talking about the exhaustion that comes from always being the strong one — the reliable one, the fixer, the one who copes, carries, remembers, organises, supports, shows up, and somehow still feels guilty for being tired.

Because being needed is not the same as being valued. And being capable does not mean you should have to carry everything.

I unpack the hidden mental load so many women live with, especially in midlife — the emotional labour, the overthinking, the rescuing, the hyperindependence, the burnout that still looks high-functioning from the outside.

We also talk about the uncomfortable part: where we may have learned to stop asking for help, how “I’m fine” can become a whole personality, and why taking responsibility for our patterns is not the same as blaming ourselves.

This episode is for the woman who looks like she’s holding it all together, but quietly wonders how much longer she can keep doing it.

No shame. No perfect answers. Just an honest conversation about what it costs to be everyone’s rock — and what it might look like to finally put some of it down.