Author: Kristen

How to Build Safety, Belonging, and Worth From the Inside Out: Moving Away From Emotional Outsourcing

Many people come into therapy feeling overwhelmed, anxious, or disconnected, yet they struggle to explain why. I see this all the time in my office. These are capable, thoughtful, deeply caring people, but relationships feel draining, decisions feel heavy, and self-doubt feels constant.

Often, what sits underneath is a habit of looking outside of yourself for reassurance, direction, or validation. Over time, this can quietly erode your sense of internal stability, even if on the outside everything looks “fine.”

These patterns are not flaws. They are learned ways of coping.

What Is Emotional Outsourcing?

Beatriz Victoria Albina, a nurse practitioner, somatic psychology coach, and author who joined me on the Close the Chapter Podcast, coined the term emotional outsourcing to describe a pattern many people have been living with for most of their lives, often without realizing it.

Emotional outsourcing happens when safety, belonging, or worth are sourced primarily from outside yourself instead of being built internally. It shows up when feeling okay depends on someone else’s mood, approval, or reaction.

Instead of checking in with your own feelings, values, or needs, your attention moves outward:

Are they upset with me?
Did I do something wrong?
Am I still okay in their eyes?

When this becomes a pattern, it can lead to anxiety, over-responsibility in relationships, and a growing sense of disconnection from yourself.

How These Patterns Develop

These patterns do not develop because something is wrong with you. They develop through adaptation.

As children, we learn how to stay connected and safe in the environments we grow up in. If caregivers were emotionally unavailable, overwhelmed, unpredictable, or uncomfortable with feelings, many children learned to stay attuned to others in order to maintain connection.

This can look like being helpful, agreeable, quiet, responsible, high achieving, or emotionally self-sufficient. Some people learn to read the room quickly and adjust themselves. Others learn to minimize needs or take on too much responsibility too early.

These strategies were intelligent and protective at the time.

The challenge comes when they continue automatically into adulthood, even when they are no longer necessary or supportive.

Common Ways These Patterns Show Up

You might recognize yourself in some of these experiences:

  • Feeling responsible for other people’s emotions
  • Avoiding conflict or discomfort whenever possible
  • Over explaining or justifying your decisions
  • Struggling to rest unless everything feels resolved
  • Saying yes when you want to say no
  • Replaying conversations long after they are over

Underneath many of these behaviors is often a fear that if someone is disappointed, upset, or distant, it means something is wrong with you.

I hear this fear expressed in many different ways, but the message underneath is often the same: If I upset someone, I am not safe or lovable.

Caretaking and Healthy Connection

Caring deeply about others is not the problem.

Healthy connection allows for empathy, generosity, and support while staying connected to your own needs, limits, and values. You can care about others without abandoning yourself.

Patterns start to feel painful when caretaking is driven by fear, obligation, or the need for approval. In those moments, your sense of worth can rise and fall based on how others respond.

The difference is not what you do. The difference is how it feels inside your body and nervous system when you do it.

Rebuilding an Internal Sense of Safety and Worth

I encourage people to begin with awareness rather than self-criticism.

When you notice your attention moving outward in search of reassurance or certainty, gently bring it back inward.

Start with your body.
Feel your feet on the floor.
Notice your breath.
Allow your nervous system to settle, even for a moment.

From there, ask yourself simple questions and pause:

What am I feeling right now?
What do I need?
What matters to me?

If the answers feel unclear or unavailable, treat that as information rather than a problem. Silence often reflects parts of the self that learned it was safer to stay quiet.

Start with small, intentional choices. Pause before responding. Give yourself time to decide. Notice and name a preference, even if only to yourself. Allow yourself to release the urge to explain or justify.

Over time, these small moments help build internal trust and create a steadier sense of safety and worth.

An Invitation Back to Yourself

Compassion is essential in the healing process.

The parts of you that learned to manage relationships carefully were trying to protect you. When those parts are met with kindness rather than judgment, the nervous system begins to soften and shame loosens its grip. 

Self-criticism has rarely created lasting change. Healing grows more naturally in the presence of understanding.

A different way of living becomes possible when attention turns inward. One rooted in steadiness, self-connection, and inner support.

This does not mean becoming detached or uncaring. It means learning how to stay connected to yourself while caring for others.

Learning to offer yourself safety, belonging, and worth is not selfish. It is foundational. And it is one of the most meaningful steps toward emotional freedom and healthier relationships.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Want to Go Deeper?

If this resonates and you want additional guidance, I recommend End Emotional Outsourcing: How to Overcome Your Codependent, Perfectionist, and People-Pleasing Habits by Beatriz Victoria Albina. It offers compassionate insight and practical tools for building internal safety, self-trust, and emotional resilience.

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

Moving On Doesn’t Mean Letting Go: What Grief Is Really Asking of Us

There are some experiences that quietly change everything.

Grief is one of them.

And grief is not only about death. It can come from a divorce, a move, a job change, infertility, the end of a relationship, a health diagnosis, or the loss of the life you thought you were going to have.

Grief shows up anytime something meaningful no longer exists in the way it once did.

What often makes grief harder is how uncomfortable our culture is with it. There is an unspoken expectation that we should process it quickly, quietly, and neatly. But grief does not follow rules, timelines, or expectations. It follows the heart and the body.

The Pressure to “Move On”

One of the most painful messages people internalize is that moving on means letting go of love, attachment, or meaning.

Gina Moffa, my former podcast guest, and a licensed psychotherapist who works deeply with grief and trauma, gently challenges this belief. Grief does not require erasing the relationship or pretending it never mattered. In fact, trying to do that often creates more pain.

For so many, healing does not come from letting go. It comes from learning how to carry what matters differently and allowing the relationship to shift rather than disappear. Grief asks us to integrate loss into our lives, not rush past it.

Grief Lives in the Body

Grief often shows up long before we recognize it for what it is. Exhaustion, difficulty focusing, feeling slowed down, or disconnected from your body can all be signs that grief is present.

It affects the nervous system and can show up as brain fog, disrupted sleep, headaches, digestive issues, tension, inflammation, dehydration, and a noticeable drop in energy.

Grief requires endurance. And endurance requires care.

Especially in early grief, support often looks surprisingly simple. Drinking enough water. Eating regularly. Getting outside. Resting your body even if sleep feels difficult. Gentle movement. These are not small things. They are foundational.

What Does It Mean to Grieve Fully?

A question I hear often is, “What does it even mean to grieve fully when life still has to continue?”

Life does not pause for grief. There may be children to care for, work to do, and people depending on you. Fully grieving does not mean collapsing or crying all day long. It means not abandoning yourself while you are hurting.

Sometimes grieving fully looks like pausing to notice how you are actually doing. Sometimes it looks like allowing sadness without judging it. Sometimes it looks like asking, “What do I need right now?” and responding with kindness instead of criticism.

Grief does not need to be performed. It needs to be honored.

The Relationship Can Continue to Evolve

One of the most meaningful shifts in grief is realizing that the relationship does not necessarily end. It changes.

You may find yourself talking to the person you lost, thinking about what they would say, or continuing conversations internally that never had space before. When the relationship was complicated, grief can be complicated too. Missing someone deeply can coexist with acknowledging the pain that existed.

Healing does not require rewriting the past. It allows space for truth, compassion, and growth.

Making Room for Joy Without Guilt

Joy and laughter can feel surprising in grief, and sometimes even uncomfortable. There may be a quick thought that something is wrong or that enjoying a moment means forgetting the person you lost.

Joy is not a betrayal.

At times, laughter is the nervous system releasing tension. At other moments, it is a reminder that life still moves through you. Grief is not only sorrow. It is also love, memory, meaning, and moments of light that arrive unexpectedly.

Both can exist at the same time.

Gentle Truths to Hold Onto

If you are grieving, here are a few reminders I hope you will carry with you:

  • Do not compare your grief to anyone else’s. Your loss and your process are your own.
  • Choose self compassion over self improvement. Grief is not something to do better or faster.
  • Reach out for connection. Solitude can be healing, but isolation can deepen suffering. You do not have to carry this alone.

If You Are Walking Through Grief Right Now

If grief has been touching every part of your life lately, I want you to know this:

You are not weak.
You are not behind.
You are responding to loss in a deeply human way.

Take this one day at a time. Sometimes one moment at a time. Be gentle with yourself as you learn how to live in a world that feels different now.

And if you are looking for a compassionate, grounding guide, Gina Moffa’s book Moving On, Does It Mean Letting Go? offers wisdom, validation, and practical support for navigating loss without rushing your healing.

You deserve care, patience, and understanding as you move forward.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

When You’re Tired and  Sleep Isn’t Fixing It: Understanding Emotional Weariness

If you have been waking up feeling heavy, drained, or moving through your day on emotional fumes, I want you to pause with that for a moment. What you are feeling has meaning. It is not random, and it is not a signal to push yourself harder. Your body is speaking to you, offering important information, and it deserves your attention and compassion.

There is a deeper exhaustion many people are quietly carrying right now, the kind that lingers even after a full night of sleep and settles into the body in ways that feel difficult to shake. 

This experience has a name: weariness.

Weariness is not the same as being tired. It is a deeper form of emotional depletion that builds slowly over time. It comes from holding too much responsibility, too many emotions, too many worries, or too many unknowns without enough space to rest and restore. And in a world filled with ongoing stress, uncertainty, and disconnection, it makes complete sense that so many are struggling to find their footing.

Nothing about this makes you weak or inadequate. It simply means your body and nervous system are trying to get your attention. They are inviting you to slow down, listen inward, and tend to what has been carrying the weight.

What Weariness Really Is

Weariness often shows up through both physical and emotional signals:

  • Low or inconsistent energy
    • Difficulty getting started or motivated
    • Feeling emotionally flat or overwhelmed
    • A desire to withdraw from others
    • Changes in appetite
    • Persistent sadness, fear, irritability, or heaviness

These experiences are not personal failures. They are messages. Your system is doing its best to cope with what it has been carrying.

Weariness is the body saying, "Please slow down. Something inside needs care."

Why Weariness Feels So Intensely During Life Transitions

Transitions disrupt our emotional landscape. Even positive change can stir deep internal shifts. Breakups, moves, job changes, grief, parenting stress, illness, trauma, financial uncertainty, or loss of structure all activate the core emotions that live inside every human being.

When those emotions are not acknowledged or processed, they accumulate. That buildup often becomes weariness.

This is not a sign that you are failing. It is a reflection of your humanity. Weariness is a natural response to prolonged emotional strain. You are not meant to carry everything alone or ignore the signals your body is sending. You are meant to listen, tend, and nurture.

Weariness as an Invitation

Weariness is not asking you to push harder. It is asking you to pause.

It invites you to:

  • Move toward your emotions instead of away from them
    • Offer compassion rather than criticism
    • Slow down long enough to hear what your inner world is trying to tell you

Underneath weariness there is often an emotion waiting to be acknowledged. It may be sadness that has gone unnamed, fear you have carried quietly, or longing you have not allowed yourself to express. These emotions need space and care, not avoidance.

Healing begins when you stop bypassing and start listening.

How to Work Through Weariness

Here are supportive practices that help you reconnect with yourself and gently move the heaviness out of your system:

1. Write to Release

Writing allows your emotions to flow outward rather than collect inside. This creates clarity and regulation. It does not have to be perfect. It simply needs to be honest.

2. Practice Intentional Breathing

Slow, steady breathing communicates safety to your body. Square breathing in particular helps calm the nervous system and reduce the intensity of emotional overwhelm.

3. Acknowledge What You Feel

Speak the truth of your feelings. Naming your emotions is not indulgent. It is a powerful step toward healing. Telling yourself that what you feel makes sense is deeply regulating.

4. Offer Self Nourishment

Talk to yourself with tenderness. You would not shame a child for being exhausted. Extend the same mercy to yourself. Compassion interrupts the cycle of shame that intensifies weariness.

5. Move Your Body in Gentle Ways

Movement helps emotional energy shift. You do not need intense workouts. Slow walking, stretching, light yoga, or any simple movement can help release stuck emotions.

6. Rest Without Apology

Rest is not wasted time. It is essential. When your body is depleted, rest becomes part of the healing process. Weariness asks for stillness, not more striving.

7. Connect With Others and Express Gratitude

Reach out to three people this week. Share something kind, warm, or meaningful. You do not need anything in return. Offering connection supports both your heart and theirs.

8. Reduce Numbing Behaviors

Emotional numbing keeps you stuck. Whether through food, scrolling, work, shopping, or busyness, avoidance creates temporary relief but long term heaviness. Feeling what is true is the path out.

9. Support Your Nervous System

Weighted blankets, light therapy, grounding routines, warm baths, vitamin D under your doctor's guidance, and consistent daily rhythms all help regulate emotion.

What I Want You to Remember Most

Weariness is not something you should hide, dismiss, or push through with force. It is something you tend to with gentleness and presence.

It is your inner world saying, "Please care for me."

When you allow yourself to feel your feelings, breathe through them, write them out, rest, move, and nurture yourself, you begin to transform your emotional exhaustion into something softer and more manageable. You are not supposed to carry everything alone. You are supposed to feel supported, seen, and held, even if you are the one offering that care to yourself.

You Are Worthy of Renewal

If you are exhausted, overwhelmed, or feeling disconnected from yourself, please take this in:

You matter.
You are important.
You are loved.
You are enough.

Thank you for being part of this movement to bring more compassion, emotional awareness, and authenticity into the world. Together, we are rewriting the story of what mental health truly means.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

Healing After Divorce or A Breakup: What No One Tells You About Grief, Growth, and Starting Over

Have you ever found yourself sitting in the quiet after a divorce or breakup thinking, I didn’t expect it to feel like this? Maybe the grief feels heavier than you imagined. Maybe the silence feels unsettling. Maybe you keep wondering why you’re not “over it” yet. 

Divorce is not just the end of a relationship. It is an emotional unraveling. It brings old wounds to the surface and invites you to face feelings you may have avoided for years. And while that can feel overwhelming, it is also the beginning of deep healing.

Why Divorce Hurts So Deeply

Divorce doesn’t just end a relationship. It activates attachment wounds that started long before your marriage did. Many of us did not grow up with emotional attunement. We weren’t asked how we felt. We weren’t told our feelings were okay. We learned to push emotions aside, stay strong, or pretend we were fine. So as adults, we often choose partners who meet us at the same emotional developmental stage. When one person grows and the other stays stuck, the relationship begins to break apart.

And if we jump into another relationship too quickly, we end up recreating the same patterns in a different package. It is not because we are broken. It is because the deeper wounds have not been healed yet.

Slowing Down Is Where the Healing Happens

You cannot shortcut grief. You cannot bypass pain. You cannot skip the emotional work and expect transformation. Healing requires letting yourself feel the sadness, anger, fear, and shame with compassion rather than judgment. When you stop running from your emotions and start tending to them gently, the pain begins to soften. 

It becomes tolerable. It moves. It shifts. 

This is how you reconnect to yourself.

Why Your Healing Matters for Your Children

If you have children, your healing affects them profoundly. They may not have the words for what they feel, but they sense everything. When a parent hasn’t worked through their grief, it can spill onto the child in ways that feel confusing and heavy.

You may notice patterns like:

  • Leaning on your child for emotional comfort when you feel overwhelmed
  • Asking probing questions about the other parent
  • Speaking negatively about your ex, even subtly
  • Pulling away emotionally because you feel too depleted 

Children are not meant to carry adult emotions. Your healing gives them the safety and permission to feel their own.

Truths to Stay Grounded In

  • Healing is not linear.
  • A new relationship will not fix old wounds.
  • Your children need emotional presence and attunement, not adult details.
  • Feeling your feelings is courage, not weakness.
  • You will not feel this way forever.

This Season Is Not the End. It Is the Beginning.

You may not feel it yet, but this is an awakening. A clearing.
A chance to rediscover who you are, what you need, and what you want your life to look like. A time to come home to yourself.

Give yourself space to journal, breathe, connect with supportive people, and let small moments of laughter find you again.

Some days you will feel strong and grounded. Other days may feel heavy or confusing. Both are part of the healing process.

You will get to the other side. You will rebuild. You will learn to choose relationships from a place of security rather than fear.

But first, choose YOU.

This is your time to close the chapter with intention and open the door to the real, grounded, worthy you.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

Intuitive Eating: How to Break Up With Diet Culture and Come Home to Your Body

Intuitive Eating: How to Break Up With Diet Culture and Come Home to Your Body

Do you ever feel like your entire day is shaped by what you ate, did not eat, or think you should eat?

So many people carry quiet pain and shame around eating, their bodies, and the pressure to “get it right.” I see this struggle often because it reaches into almost every area of a person’s life.

A previous guest on my podcast, Evelyn Tribole, the co-author of Intuitive Eating, offers powerful insight into why so many people feel disconnected from their bodies. 

One of the things she teaches is that what we often call “loss of control” eating is usually the body’s response to restriction. Our bodies are designed for survival. When you do not consistently eat enough or you follow rigid food rules, your biology steps in and pushes you to eat. It is not a lack of willpower. It is your body protecting you.

Why Diet Culture Hurts Us So Much

It is common to lose touch with hunger and fullness cues. Diet culture turns hunger into something to fight and food into something to fear. Over time, these messages create confusion, doubt, and a sense of disconnection from your own body.

This is not a personal flaw. It is the predictable outcome of years of conditioning. Diet culture gradually pulls you away from yourself and keeps you stuck in cycles of guilt, pressure, and comparison.

Healing begins with recognizing these messages for what they are and choosing to step away from them.

What Intuitive Eating Actually Is

It is not abandoning health. It is not about perfection.

It is a compassionate approach to food and your body. It encourages you to tune back into your natural signals such as hunger, fullness, satisfaction, emotion, and energy, and respond with respect. It helps you build trust with your body rather than trying to control it.

This is about returning to yourself in a deeper and kinder way.

Learning to Recognize Hunger Again

Hunger can show up in many ways, not just a growling stomach. It might look like irritability, foggy thinking, difficulty focusing, low energy, or feeling suddenly tired. These are your body’s signals.

Stress, trauma, burnout, and dieting can quiet these cues. If hunger feels hard to recognize, there is nothing wrong with you. Your body has adapted to a life where it did not feel safe to speak up.

Reconnection begins with simple awareness. Try asking, “What is my body saying right now?” There is no right or wrong answer. It is simply information.

Emotional Eating Does Not Mean You Failed

Emotional eating is one of the most common sources of shame, but it is not weakness or lack of control. Food has always been tied to comfort, soothing, and connection.

The goal is not to eliminate emotional eating. It is to add more options. When you pause and ask, “What am I feeling?” and “What do I need?” you create space for choice. Sometimes you need rest. Sometimes you need connection. Sometimes you need nourishment.

Compassion brings clarity. Shame shuts everything down.

Why Boundaries Matter on This Journey

You cannot hear your body clearly when life is filled with pressure, overcommitting, and constant doing. When your nervous system is overwhelmed, your natural cues become quiet. You shift into survival mode.

Boundaries become essential. Rest, slowing down, saying no, and giving yourself space help your body feel safe again. Intuitive eating flourishes when there is room for you in your own life.

Food healing often begins with life healing.

You Do Not Need More Willpower

Diet culture convinced many people that they simply need more self-control around food. This is one of the most painful misconceptions.

When your body feels deprived, it will eventually push back. This is not a lack of willpower. It is a normal biological response. You do not need more discipline. You need more compassion, nourishment, and safety.

You have not failed. You have been following a system that was never designed to nurture you.

How to Begin Your Intuitive Eating Journey

You do not have to do everything at once. Start with curiosity.

A simple place to begin is satisfaction. Ask yourself, “What sounds good?” or “How do I want to feel when I finish eating?” These questions help reconnect you with your preferences and your body’s natural guidance.

You can also notice when diet-culture thoughts appear. When they show up, simply acknowledge them. Awareness softens their power.

This journey is not about getting it perfect. It is about returning to yourself with compassion.

Finding Your Flow Again

Imagine yourself standing on a surfboard, moving with the rhythm of a wave. You rise and fall with the water. You adjust gently. You flow with what comes.

This is what healing your relationship with food can feel like: less force, more listening, less fear, more trust.

You deserve a peaceful relationship with your body. You deserve freedom from shame. You deserve to come home to yourself, one compassionate step at a time.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

Letting Go of Perfect: Healing Through Birth, Motherhood, and the Courage to Be “Good Enough”

The Start of Motherhood

There is a moment in motherhood when everything you thought you knew about yourself changes. The person you were before birth no longer fully exists, and the new version of you is still finding her footing.

Motherhood transforms every part of who we are. It is not just the birth of a baby but also the birth of a mother, a new identity, and a new rhythm of life. Many mothers enter this season believing they can prepare for everything. They plan, study, and hope to do it “right.” Then reality arrives—beautiful, messy, and unpredictable.

Perfectionism often grows louder in this season, whispering, “If I can do everything perfectly, everyone will be okay.” But motherhood asks us to release that illusion. It invites us to meet each moment with presence and compassion rather than control.

Lessons from My Interview with Amelia Kriss

Amelia Kriss, a therapist, coach, and writer who supports women and parents through birth story medicine and narrative healing, beautifully describes how perfectionism often intensifies during birth and early motherhood.

After the birth of her first child, she noticed her old patterns of over-preparing and striving for control rise to the surface. As she moved through that experience, she came to see birth not only as a physical process but as a deep transformation of identity—a rebirth of the self.

Why Perfectionism Gets Loud in Motherhood

Perfectionism can feel protective. It tells us that if we do things right, we can keep everyone safe. But motherhood is unpredictable and humbling. No matter how carefully we prepare, there will be moments we cannot control.

When plans fall apart, many women feel guilt or shame. Beneath that pain, there is often grief—the quiet mourning of the fantasy that we could do it all perfectly. Releasing that fantasy opens space for something gentler: presence.

Presence allows for mistakes, laughter, repair, and forgiveness. It is what our children truly need from us.

Your Birth Story Matters

After birth, focus often shifts entirely to the baby. The mother’s story, however, remains stored in her body. Every contraction, every fear, every moment of relief or confusion stays with her until it has a place to be seen and heard.

Here is a gentle way to begin reflecting on your birth story:

  1. Write what happened as clearly and simply as you remember.

  2. Write what you felt—the emotions that came and went.

  3. Notice the meaning you attached to those moments.

  4. Offer compassion to yourself, as you would to a dear friend.

We cannot change what happened, but we can change how we hold it. Healing begins when we shift from self-blame to understanding and compassion.

The Nervous System: The Foundation of Motherhood

Motherhood is a full-body experience. The nervous system carries both the tenderness and the overwhelm. Regulation helps us stay connected to ourselves and our children, even in the chaos of daily life.

Here are a few gentle ways to support your body:

  • Rocking or swaying: a rhythm that calms both mother and baby.
  • Hand over heart breathing: inhale for four counts, exhale for six.
  • Sensory grounding: name five things you see, four you feel, three you hear.
  • Water as release: let warm water or a shower symbolize the washing away of tension.

Calming the body helps us meet each moment with more steadiness and care.

Boundaries as Acts of Care

The early days of motherhood can bring a flood of opinions, expectations, and advice. Some are helpful; others feel heavy. Boundaries protect the space where healing and bonding can happen.

A few simple examples:

  • “We’re keeping the first few days for rest and bonding.”
  • “We’d love help with meals, but we’re not ready for visitors yet.”
  • “I’ll reach out when I feel ready for company.”

Boundaries are not rejection. They are clarity, and clarity helps the body and mind feel safe.

Learning to Ask for Help

For many mothers, asking for help feels vulnerable. It can stir feelings of guilt or fear of being seen as weak. But asking for help is an act of strength and courage.

Start by noticing your body’s signals of overwhelm—a racing heart, irritability, exhaustion. These are signs that something needs attention, not proof that you are failing.

Help can be simple. Ten minutes of rest. A meal from a friend. Time alone to breathe. Allowing others to support you creates room for connection and healing.

From Perfect to Present

Healing in motherhood means releasing control and leaning into connection. It invites us to soften instead of strive, to care for ourselves as deeply as we care for our children.

When perfection loosens its grip, presence begins to grow. In presence, we can make space for mistakes, repair, laughter, and joy. In those real and ordinary moments, love becomes visible and lasting.

You don’t have to be perfect to be a good mother.
 You simply have to keep showing up with honesty, grace, and an open heart.

If You Needed This Today

Take a slow breath.
You are already enough.
You don’t have to earn your worth by doing everything flawlessly.
You are learning, growing, and healing—and that is exactly what your child needs most.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

Dive a little deeper into this topic below

How to Connect With Core Emotions and Heal from the Inside Out

How to Connect With Core Emotions and Heal from the Inside Out

I often hear from clients that they’re scared to connect to their emotions. They’re afraid that if they really allow themselves to feel, they won’t be able to handle it, that they’ll get stuck and never find their way out. So instead, they move away from their feelings, they numb them, or they stay busy enough to avoid them. What I know after all these years of doing this work is this: if we don’t connect to our core emotions, we don’t move forward. Healing, growth, and peace come only when we allow ourselves to feel what’s underneath the pain, the trauma, and the fear. That’s why I wanted to share this. It’s such an important conversation to really understand what the core emotions are, how to move through them, and how to feel more empowered when connecting to them. Because the truth is, most of us have been conditioned out of our feelings very early in life.

The Seven Core Emotions

Decades of neuroscience research have shown that there are seven core emotions that all humans share:

  • Anger
  • Fear
  • Sadness
  • Disgust
  • Joy
  • Excitement
  • Sexual Excitement

I like to call this list a cheat sheet. When someone says, “I don’t know what I feel,” this is where we start. Anger helps set boundaries and protect what matters. Healthy anger is different from rage. It’s more grounded. Fear keeps us alert but can take over when ignored. Sadness helps us release and heal. Disgust shows when something’s out of alignment with our values. Joy flows naturally when emotions are felt rather than numbed. Excitement fuels curiosity and energy. Sexual excitement is simply part of being human. These emotions are our inner compass. Without them, it’s like steering a sailboat without a sail.

When We Disconnect

When we don’t connect with our emotions, we start to feel lost. Disconnection often turns into anxiety, guilt, and shame, which are inhibitory emotions. Guilt comes from actions out of alignment with our values and can guide positive change. Shame attacks the self and keeps us stuck in “I’m not enough.” Anxiety grows from unprocessed fear and pain. Because no one wants to feel those things, people find ways to escape-through perfectionism, work, alcohol, shopping, or people-pleasing. But every time we avoid pain, we strengthen the belief that I can’t stand this. The truth is we can. Healing begins with, I can stand to feel this.

How Disconnection Starts

Many of us grew up in homes where emotions were avoided or expressed in overwhelming ways. When caregivers didn’t connect to their feelings, we learned not to connect to ours. This can create what I call emotional stuckness-a pause in development that keeps us from fully living. Reconnecting to emotions restores aliveness and helps us access the wisdom we already have.

The Body Knows First

Our bodies feel emotions before our minds name them. Here are some examples: Anger can feel like heat or tension in the chest. Fear can feel like a pit in the stomach. Sadness can feel like heavy in the heart or throat. Shame can feel like a hot flush or urge to shrink. When we notice these sensations, we reconnect to what’s real. Awareness is the first step toward healing.

Taking Responsibility for Our Feelings

True healing begins when we take responsibility for our emotions instead of expecting others to fix them. Empathy from others is beautiful, but it starts within. When we connect to our emotions, we can be present in our own lives and relationships. Denying emotions only builds intensity inside. Healing begins when we name what we feel and remind ourselves that it’s safe to do so. Healing isn’t linear. It’s messy, beautiful, and human. As Richard Rohr said, “Pain that’s not transformed will be transmitted.” When we tend to our pain, we stop passing it on.

The Heart of Healing

Connecting to your emotions is the birthplace of empathy and compassion-for yourself and others. When you stop numbing and start naming, you begin to live more fully. So here’s the invitation:

  • Don’t numb emotions. Name them.
  • Don’t run from pain. Tend to it.

That’s where transformation begins. Every emotion carries wisdom. Feeling them is how we heal, how we grow, and how we come back home to ourselves.

– Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

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10 Ways to Find Your Voice and Communicate with Courage

10 Ways to Find Your Voice and Communicate with Courage

So many people were never taught how to have a voice, speak truth with love and confidence, or have honest conversations without fear.

We were taught to keep the peace instead of being real. Somewhere along the way, we learned to quiet ourselves to feel safe or accepted.

The problem is, when we silence our truth long enough, we disconnect from who we really are. We lose that sense of authenticity that helps us build deep, healthy connections with ourselves and others.

Here are ten ways to begin finding your voice and communicating with more courage, clarity, and authenticity.

1. Breathe First

I start every kind of self-work with breathing. Slow down, breathe in through your nose, and exhale through your mouth like you’re cooling soup. This calms the nervous system so you can think clearly. When your body feels safe, your words will follow.

2. Name the Fear

Grab a pen and paper and write it down. What are you afraid of? Someone getting mad? Hurting their feelings? Being rejected? Most of those fears come from the past. Naming them helps you move through them instead of letting them control you.

3. Let Go of the Outcome

You can’t control how someone else reacts. You can only control how you show up. The goal isn’t to make them agree or change. The goal is to speak your truth with honesty and grace, even if it feels scary.

4. Be Gentle with Yourself

Finding your voice takes courage. You’re going to stumble sometimes, and that’s okay. Talk to yourself with kindness. Encourage yourself the way you would a child learning something new.

5. Write It Out

Before a hard conversation, write everything down. Get it all out of your head and onto paper. Then highlight your three main points. That clarity helps you stay grounded when emotions run high.

6. Use Real Feelings

Don’t say “I feel like you…” That’s a thought, not a feeling. Say “I feel sad,” or “I feel afraid.” Real emotion words open the door to real connection.

7. Say What You Need Up Front

Tell the other person what you need before you start. “I just need you to listen.” “I don’t need advice right now.” That sets the tone for safety and helps both of you stay grounded.

8. Check the Story in Your Head

Before you assume how someone will react, pause and ask yourself, “What story am I making up?” Half the time, those stories aren’t even true. Stay curious instead of assuming.

9. Set Boundaries

Healthy boundaries are everything. Saying no doesn’t make you mean; it makes you honest. Boundaries protect your peace and your energy so you can stay connected without losing yourself.

10. Reflect Afterward

After you speak your truth, take a moment to process. Journal about how it went. Notice what felt good and what felt hard. That’s where the growth happens.

Finding Freedom in Your Voice

Finding your voice takes courage, patience, and a lot of compassion for yourself. Some conversations will go beautifully, and others might feel uncomfortable. But every time you show up honestly, you grow stronger. Every time you speak from the heart, you free yourself a little more.

So keep going. Keep choosing truth over silence, connection over pretending, and courage over fear. Finding your voice isn’t easy, but it’s one of the most healing, freeing things you will ever do.

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

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The Fawn Response: Understanding People Pleasing, Codependency, and Your Healing Journey

The Fawn Response: Understanding People Pleasing, Codependency, and Your Healing Journey

Have you ever noticed yourself saying yes, when everything inside of you wanted to say no? Or keeping quiet about what you really think because you are afraid of conflict or rejection? If so, you may be caught in what is called the fawn response, a survival pattern rooted in trauma that shows up as people pleasing and codependency.

I see this every day in my counseling practice, in my own life, and in the lives of people I love. The fawn response is rarely talked about compared to fight, flight, or freeze. I want to take you deeper into understanding this pattern, how it develops, what it looks like, and how to begin healing so you can step into your worth, value, and freedom.

What Is the Fawn Response?

The fawn response is a trauma survival strategy where you learn to avoid conflict and stay safe by appeasing others. Instead of fighting back or running away, your nervous system chooses to please, smooth things over, and keep the peace.

Psychotherapist Pete Walker coined the term fawn response. It often develops in childhood, especially in homes where love felt conditional or where parents were emotionally unavailable, neglectful, or abusive. Children learn that protesting or expressing their truth is not safe, so they trade authenticity for acceptance.

Signs You Might Be in a Fawn Response

Here are common patterns I see in people who identify as fawners:

  • You apologize constantly, even when you have done nothing wrong.
  • Saying no feels scary, so you default to yes even when it costs you.
  • You avoid conflict at all costs, even if it means abandoning yourself.
  • You seek validation and reassurance to feel worthy.
  • You shape shift to become who you think others want you to be.
  • You feel depleted, resentful, or burned out and do not understand why.
  • You take responsibility for other people’s emotions and reactions.

Children who learn to fawn often walk on eggshells around caregivers, taking care of a parent’s emotional needs in hopes of staying safe. As adults, the same pattern shows up in relationships, friendships, and workplaces.

Why the Fawn Response Keeps You Stuck

While fawning may have helped you survive childhood, it keeps you stuck as an adult.

  • It disconnects you from your authentic self.
  • It reinforces the belief that love must be earned.
  • It creates unhealthy, one sided relationships.
  • It can lead to anxiety, depression, chronic stress, and burnout.

Fawning may look like kindness or compassion on the surface, but it actually silences your truth and drains your energy. Over time, it leaves you feeling invisible, depleted, and disconnected from joy.

How to Begin Healing the Fawn Response

Healing begins with awareness. When you notice your fawning patterns, you create space to choose differently.

1. Pause and Ask Yourself

  • Am I doing this to please someone else at my own expense?
  • Does this action align with my values and truth?
  • Am I abandoning myself right now?

2. Come Back to Your Body

Take slow, deep breaths. Feel your feet on the ground. Place a hand on your heart. These grounding practices help regulate your nervous system when fear of conflict rises.

3. Journal Your Truth

Journaling can help you reconnect with your voice. Try prompts like

  • I feel___because of ____.
  • What I wish I had said was…
  • What you could never take from me is…

4. Practice Self-Validation

Say to yourself:

  • It is okay for me to have my own feelings.
  • Despite what others say, I know I am valuable.
  • I am courageous for leaning into this discomfort.

5. Seek Support

Therapies like EMDR and IFS are powerful tools for trauma healing. Working with a therapist can help you reprocess the past, reconnect with your inner child, and learn to set healthy boundaries.

The Courage to Be Disliked

One of the hardest yet most freeing parts of healing the fawn response is learning to tolerate not being liked by everyone. For people pleasers, this can feel scary, but it is also where true freedom begins.

It takes courage to speak your truth, risk conflict, and show up as your authentic self. Some people may not understand, and that is okay. The relationships meant for you will honor who you really are.

You are inherently lovable, valuable, and worthy without having to prove it. The fawn response was a survival strategy, not a flaw. Now you have the chance to heal, return to yourself, and create connections rooted in truth.

I am so proud of you for reflecting, for being here, and for choosing your healing journey.💕

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

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The Mind–Body Stress Reset: Listening to Your Body and Finding Calm

The Mind–Body Stress Reset: Listening to Your Body and Finding Calm

Have you ever noticed your body reacting before your mind even catches up? Maybe your shoulders tense, your stomach sinks, or your chest feels heavy. These are not random. They are messages from your nervous system saying, something feels off. Once you start listening, you can gently guide yourself back to calm.

Stress Lives in the Body

So often, we think of stress as something only in our minds. But stress lives in the body too. It shows up through physical sensations, emotions, and patterns of responding that can feel automatic.

Here are a few ways the nervous system may react when it feels unsafe:

  • Fight: snapping at loved ones, feeling edgy or defensive.
  • Flight: staying overly busy, struggling to sit still, avoiding stillness.
  • Freeze: shutting down, feeling paralyzed, unable to take the next step.
  • Fawn: working hard to please others so things feel “okay.”
  • Shut Down: going numb, disconnecting, or checking out completely.

These reactions are not flaws. They are your body’s survival strategies. When you can name them, you can start to work with them instead of against them.

Why Awareness Isn’t Always Enough

Mindfulness is a wonderful tool, especially when stress feels manageable. But when the body is at a higher level of stress, maybe a 7, 8, or 9 on a scale of 1 to 10, simply noticing what is happening may not feel calming. In fact, it can make you feel more overwhelmed.

Think of stress like a scale that is tipped too far in one direction. The more pressure, triggers, or responsibilities pile up, the heavier it feels. To bring that scale back toward balance, the body needs support on the other side. Practices and resources gently signal, you are safe now, you can settle. That support could be as simple as pausing to breathe deeply, going for a walk outside, or reaching out to someone you trust. These small practices begin to tip the balance back toward calm.

Discovering Your Stress Signature

Every person has a unique stress signature. Maybe your heart races, maybe your jaw clenches, or maybe you withdraw and feel far away.

Take a moment and ask yourself: How does my body show me I am stressed? Becoming familiar with your signals helps you recognize what is happening sooner and respond with more compassion.

Gentle Tools to Reset

Here are some simple ways to help the body and mind find steadiness again:

Breath With Intention

Breath is one of the most powerful ways to reset. Each inhale gently activates your system. Each exhale calms it. By lengthening the exhale, you send your body the message that you are safe.

Try this: Inhale slowly through your nose for four counts. Exhale gently through your mouth for six counts. Repeat a few times and notice if your shoulders begin to soften.

Create Islands of Safety

When life feels overwhelming, the body needs moments of safety to reset. These do not have to be long or complicated.

  • Place your hand on your heart and feel its steady rhythm.
  • Name five calming things you can see in the space around you.
  • Wrap up in a blanket and let yourself feel held.

Even small pauses like these can give your nervous system a break.

Reframe Stressful Memories

Stressful experiences often replay in the body as if they are happening all over again. One way to soften this is to gently reimagine the memory. Picture support arriving. Imagine a safer ending. This is not about denying what happened, it is about giving your nervous system a new way to hold the story so it does not keep you stuck.

Compassion Over Shame

Stress responses are not weaknesses. They are the body’s way of trying to keep you safe. Every single person has experienced them. Healing does not come from criticizing yourself. It comes from noticing what is happening and offering compassion.

Instead of asking, What is wrong with me? try asking, What does my body need right now? That small shift opens the door to healing.

As you begin to notice and respond to your body’s needs, you gently step out of survival mode and into a space of greater calm, clarity, and connection.

Calm is possible. Your body carries an innate wisdom, and when you listen, it will guide you back home to balance, safety, and peace.

Source: Close the Chapter Podcast: Ep 283 The Mind-Body Stress Reset with Rebekkah LaDyne

- Kristen D Boice M.A., LMFT, EMDR Trained

Do you want to join a community of souls wanting to grow, evolve, and on a healing journey?

I would love for you to join our free Close the Chapter Facebook community and check out my YouTube Channel where I post weekly videos with Mental Health Tips.

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