In this insightful episode of Wired & Worthy, Dr. Amelia Kelley sits down with psychologist, psychodramatist, and author Dr. Tian Dayton to explore the lasting impact of growing up with addiction. Drawing from her latest book, Growing Up with Addiction, Tian explains how childhood experiences in families affected by addiction can shape our nervous systems, relationships, and emotional responses long into adulthood.

Together, they discuss codependency, complex PTSD, narcissistic family dynamics, and the intergenerational patterns that keep trauma alive. Tian also shares deeply personal stories about her own healing journey, including a profound near-death experience and a powerful moment with her daughter that changed how she understood breaking generational trauma.

This episode offers a compassionate reminder that while we cannot change our childhood experiences, we can learn to recognize unhealthy patterns, take responsibility for our healing, and build healthier relationships for future generations.

Key Takeaways:

• Growing up with addiction can create lasting emotional wounds, hypervigilance, and codependent behaviors.
• Trauma can pass through generations, even when addiction itself does not.
• Recognizing emotional triggers helps us understand unresolved pain rather than projecting it onto others.
• Narcissistic family dynamics can leave children feeling responsible for managing a parent's emotions.
• Recovery involves self-awareness, emotional honesty, forgiveness, and supportive relationships.
• Breaking generational trauma begins when parents take responsibility for their reactions instead of repeating learned behaviors.

About the Guest

Dr. Tian Dayton is a psychologist, psychodramatist, trauma specialist, and bestselling author whose work focuses on addiction, codependency, and relational trauma. She is the creator of Relational Trauma Repair (RTR), an experiential, body-based approach to helping individuals and clinicians address unresolved emotional wounds. Drawing on decades of professional experience and her personal recovery journey, Tian is passionate about helping people break unhealthy family patterns and build emotional resilience.

Her books include Growing Up with Addiction, Emotional Sobriety, and The ACOA Trauma Syndrome.

Connect with Dr. Tian Dayton

Website: https://www.tiandayton.com/

Relational Trauma Repair: https://relationaltraumarepair.com/

Book: Growing Up with Addiction

Free Reader's Guide: https://relationaltraumarepair.com/

Connect with Dr. Amelia Kelley:

🌍 Website: https://www.ameliakelley.com

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drameliakelley/

👩🏼‍💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drameliakelley/

In this insightful and refreshingly honest episode of Wired & Worthy, Dr. Amelia Kelley is joined by psychologist, spiritual teacher, and author Patrick Marando to explore the connection between self-worth, emotional healing, and finding inner peace. Patrick shares how trauma, perfectionism, and self-rejection can disconnect us from our authentic selves, and why learning to accept uncomfortable emotions is essential to developing a healthier relationship with ourselves.

Together, they discuss how overthinking often serves as a way to avoid difficult feelings, why embarrassment and guilt don't have to define our worth, and how to break free from conditional self-acceptance. In an unexpected twist, technical difficulties interrupt their conversation, giving Patrick and Dr. Amelia a real-life opportunity to practice the emotional acceptance they're discussing.

Whether you're struggling with anxiety, rejection sensitivity, perfectionism, or rediscovering yourself after trauma, this episode offers practical insights to help you navigate difficult emotions, reconnect with your true self, and recognize that your worth has never depended on being perfect.

Key Takeaways

• Trauma can disconnect us from our sense of identity, but self-discovery helps us reconnect.

• Overthinking is often an attempt to avoid uncomfortable emotions.

• Mistakes are opportunities to learn, not signs of failure.

• Accepting difficult emotions helps reduce self-judgment and anxiety.

• Guilt is about what happened, while shame affects how we see ourselves.

• True inner peace comes from self-acceptance, not external validation.

• Your self-worth is inherent and doesn't depend on perfection or approval.

About the Guest

Patrick Marando is a spiritual teacher, psychologist, energy healer, and author of Waking Up to Your Self: A Guide to Living Your Truth. Combining modern psychology with spiritual insight, he helps people break free from conditioned patterns, navigate difficult emotions, and reconnect with their authentic selves.

Through his SOULL™ Method, meditation, and energy work, Patrick guides individuals toward greater self-awareness, inner peace, and emotional healing. His approach emphasizes that true peace and self-worth are already within us. We simply need to learn how to reconnect with them.

Connect with Patrick Marando

🌐 Website: patrickmarando.com

📷 Instagram: @patrickmarando

♪ TikTok: @patrickmarando1

Connect with Dr. Amelia Kelley:🌍 Website: https://www.ameliakelley.com📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drameliakelley/👩🏼‍💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drameliakelley/

In this deeply honest episode, Dr. Amelia Kelley is joined by certified grief support specialist and Grieve Leave founder Rebecca Feinglos for a conversation about the grief of leaving a relationship you still love. Rebecca shares how losing her father forced her to reevaluate her marriage, the warning signs she once normalized, and the moment she realized how peaceful life could feel outside of an unhealthy relationship. Together, Rebecca and Dr. Amelia explore the cycle of abuse, silent treatment and love bombing, the grief of the future you thought you would have, and why missing someone does not necessarily mean leaving was the wrong decision. Rebecca also shares practical ways she rebuilt her life after divorce, from leaning on friends instead of reaching back toward her ex to learning how to be alone, creating new friendships, and finding community through grief.

Key Takeaways

• Healthy conflict is less about how often couples disagree and more about how they communicate, repair, and treat one another during conflict.
• Silent treatment, love bombing, and repeated cycles of disconnection and intense affection can make unhealthy relationships especially difficult to leave.

• Leaving a relationship can mean grieving both the person and the future you imagined with them, including milestones that may never happen the way you expected.

• Rebuilding after divorce happens one day at a time through new routines, supportive relationships, and learning what life feels like outside the relationship.

• Community can be an important part of healing. Rebecca suggests attending gatherings hosted by people you already know, seeking events around your interests, and actually following up when you meet someone you connect with.

• You can still love someone and choose not to return to the relationship. Grieving involves allowing your brain to gradually learn a new reality without that person.

About Rebecca Feinglos

Rebecca Feinglos, MPP, is a certified grief support specialist, founder of Grieve Leave, and host of the Grief’d Up podcast. After losing her mother as a teenager, her father suddenly in 2020, and navigating the end of her marriage, Rebecca took a year-long “grief sabbatical” that ultimately grew into Grieve Leave. Today, the organization helps individuals, workplaces, and communities better understand and support grief through education, storytelling, resources, workplace training, and community experiences like Sad Hours. Rebecca’s work has been featured in publications including TIME, the Los Angeles Times, Fortune, and Slate.

Connect with Rebecca

Website: Grieve Leave

Instagram: @grieveleave

Rebecca’s Instagram: @rfeinglos

Podcast: Grief’d Up

Connect with Dr. Amelia Kelley:🌍 Website: https://www.ameliakelley.com📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drameliakelley/👩🏼‍💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drameliakelley/