Life’s a Blog: Rebuilding After Betrayal

Trina Stewart
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  • Mental Health

Life doesn’t fall apart at 50. It gets real. After a 24-year marriage ended in betrayal, I found myself starting over in a way I never expected. This podcast is where I talk about that. The truth of it. The grief, the anger, the healing, and everything that comes with rebuilding a life when the one you knew is gone. I talk about relationships that look solid but aren’t. The disappointment when people don’t show up the way they said they would. The work it takes to stop chasing, set boundaries, and finally choose yourself. There’s a lot out there about dating, confidence, and “moving on.” This isn’t that. This is about doing the real work so you don’t repeat the same patterns. If you’re over 40, over 50, divorced, starting again, or just tired of pretending you’re fine, you’ll get it. We’ll get into:  betrayal and what it actually does to you  healing without shortcuts  dating later in life  learning to be on your own without feeling alone  recognizing red flags and trusting yourself again  building a life that finally feels like yours  Most episodes are just me. Some include conversations. All of it is honest. Because starting over isn’t the end of your story. It’s where you finally start living it. New episodes weekly.

  1. 10h ago

    Fear Nothing: Betrayal, Starting Over & Trusting Yourself Again

    Send us Fan Mail What happens when your desire to move forward becomes bigger than your fear? In this episode of Life’s A Blog, Trina gets personal about betrayal trauma, silent abuse, leaving a marriage, what our children learn by watching us love, and rebuilding trust in yourself after life pulls the carpet out from underneath you. She also shares why, after experiencing both death and betrayal, the two created very different kinds of grief. Inspired by Dolly Parton’s words about desire being larger than fear, Trina asks some uncomfortable questions: Are you making decisions from wisdom or fear? Are you showing your kids the kind of love you want them to accept? And what are you still afraid to do? Plus, a personal look at Alanis Morissette’s “You Learn” and why the song means something completely different after you’ve actually lived, loved, lost, failed and started over. You can sink in fear. Or you can swim in fear. Either way, fear may be there. The question is whether you keep moving. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  2. Sep 8

    How To Stop Building A Museum For Your Mistakes

    Send us Fan Mail Your brain can turn one bad morning into a full disaster trilogy by lunch and I just proved it. My Meta Business Suite gets hacked and someone burns about $1,000 on ads I didn’t create, in a language I don’t speak, selling scissors I don’t even own. Then my camera is stolen out of my car. Then the magazine I publish shows up a full week late. Real problems, real stress, real consequences and a whole lot of anxiety I add on top. I walk through what “failure amnesia” means to me after hearing Mel Robbins and Benny Blanco talk about it: not pretending the mess didn’t happen, but refusing to build a condo inside it and live there forever. We get into the difference between failure and finality, why “no” from a big company doesn’t have to be surrender, and how quickly we start building a prosecution case against ourselves even when someone else is the one who did wrong. The turning point is simple and usable: three questions that cut through the spiral. What actually happened? What am I making it mean? What can I actually do next? If you’re tired of suffering through reactions nobody has had yet, or you’ve been waiting for permission to move, start over, or try again, this one is for you. Subscribe, share it with a friend who overthinks like we do, and leave a review telling me what “next shot” you’re taking. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  3. Sep 1

    What Dolly Parton Taught Me About Love, Boundaries and Starting Over

    Send us Fan Mail Dolly Parton’s death made me rethink a moment I witnessed at CMA Fest — and what I completely misunderstood about a woman who was still excited about what came next. From Dolly’s marriage to Carl Dean and the story behind Light of a Clear Blue Morning to my own experiences with betrayal, control, motherhood and starting over at 53, I’m talking about the difference between loving someone and losing yourself in them — and the difference between controlling someone else and finally setting a boundary. If you’ve ever made yourself smaller for love, struggled to let someone make a choice you hated, or found yourself wondering what the hell comes next after life blows up, this episode is about taking your life back and asking a much better question: What do I want to happen next? Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  4. Aug 24

    Starting Over Without Starting From Zero

    Send us Fan Mail I’ve started over more times than I ever expected to. After a 22-year marriage. After loss. After another relationship ended. After leaving homes I had poured myself into. And now, once again, I’m unpacking boxes and trying to make a place I never imagined living in feel like mine. But this time I realized something: I’m not actually starting over. I’m starting from experience. This episode began with something ridiculously ordinary: pressure washing the front porch of my new place. It’s not glamorous. It’s not my dream home. Quite frankly, it’s a little sketchy. But standing there looking at that cleaner porch made me think about every house I’ve lived in and every version of myself that lived inside them. The house where I raised my children. The homes that came after my marriage ended. The house I helped make beautiful with another partner. My trailer at Lake Huron, where I finally learned how much I enjoy my own company. And now this little place that represents something completely different. For years, I thought starting over meant I had somehow ended up back at the beginning. I don’t believe that anymore. I know more now. I know what I will tolerate and what I won’t. I know I can support myself. I know I can be alone. I know I can lose people, relationships, homes and versions of my life and still find my way forward. And maybe that’s what rebuilding really is. Not creating some impressive new life overnight. Sometimes rebuilding looks like downsizing. Making the practical decision. Choosing purpose over comfort. Leaving somewhere you love because something else is asking you to grow. Making one little thing better today and another tomorrow. This week on Life’s a Blog, I’m talking about homes, divorce, grief, relationships, Lake Huron, nostalgia, starting again, and the realization that you can miss a place without wanting the life you lived there back. Because we don’t start over empty-handed. We bring every lesson, every scar, every mistake, every boundary and every bit of strength we earned along the way. This week’s song: “The House That Built Me” by Miranda Lambert. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  5. Aug 7

    The Red Flags You Ignore Become Your Teacher

    Send us Fan Mail What if the red flags that changed your life were not only in other people, but in the ways you learned to cope, stay quiet, overgive, or hold on too long? We go straight into the uncomfortable truth: some of the biggest warning signs we face are our own, especially when we are still healing. I share the moments that finally made me ask, “What red flags have I ignored in my own life?” and how intuition often knows long before the heart is ready to admit it. We unpack real examples of red flags in relationships and marriage, including financial control that starts small and ends in entitlement, plus the kind of chronic people-pleasing that drains you at work, in friendships, and at home. We also talk about silent treatment as emotional abuse, why it leaves you walking on pins and needles, and how one clear boundary can change everything. If you have ever talked yourself out of what you felt, this conversation will hit close. Then we get practical about red flags in health and lifestyle: ignoring exhaustion, pushing through pain, forgetting meds, and treating your body like it can carry unlimited stress. I share why I am choosing to sell a trailer I deeply love, not because it failed me, but because fatigue, time, and split-living became the loudest signals. Something can be perfect for one season and still not be right for the next, and letting go can be an act of self-respect. If this resonates, subscribe so you do not miss what comes next, share it with a friend who is stuck explaining away the obvious, and leave a review to help more people find the show. What red flag are you ready to stop excusing? Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  6. Jul 22

    The Mistakes I Made After Betrayal Trauma—and How I Forgave Myself

    Send us Fan Mail What happens after betrayal trauma, when the relationship ends but the pain follows you into every part of your life? In this deeply honest episode of Life’s a Blog, I share the mistakes I made after my separation—the drinking, isolation, overspending, unhealthy relationships, risky business partnerships, anger, and desperate need for other people to understand my pain. I spent years looking for safety in money, work, relationships, validation, and people who could never heal what was broken inside me. I pushed away people who loved me, tried to carry everyone else’s grief, and judged the woman I became while living in survival mode. But this episode is not about shame. It is about accountability, compassion, and learning to forgive yourself for the choices you made while trying to survive. We talk about rebuilding confidence, creating boundaries, trusting yourself again, healing after divorce and betrayal, and understanding that making mistakes does not mean you are one. Featuring the message behind Carrie Underwood’s “Lessons Learned,” this episode is for anyone rebuilding their life after heartbreak, grief, addiction, separation, or betrayal. You are not defined by who you became in survival mode. You are defined by what you choose when healing begins. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  7. Jul 14

    Happiness Starts When You Tell The Whole Truth

    Send us Fan Mail Are you missing the life you had, or the version of it you created in your mind? In this episode of Life’s a Blog, I’m talking about what it really takes to create a happier version of yourself after betrayal, heartbreak, grief and major life changes. Not the fake “everything is fine” version. The real version who has been hurt, disappointed and exhausted, but still wants more from life. We explore how romanticizing the past can keep you stuck, how to know whether you need to change or the situation does, and why new chapters deserve a fair chance before you walk away. I also share the four behaviours that may be keeping you unhappy, the signs that you are quietly quitting your own life, and how participation can create opportunities that often look like luck. Inspired by “I Lived” by OneRepublic, this episode is a reminder that betrayal may have changed you, but it does not get to finish your story. You are still here. You still get a say. And you are not done living. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

  8. Jul 1

    Learning to Trust Happiness Again

    Send us Fan Mail After years of surviving betrayal, grief, financial stress, and starting over, why can peace feel so uncomfortable? In this deeply personal episode of Life's a Blog, I share how the unexpected success of my magazine made me realize I was still living in survival mode. We explore trauma through the insights of Gabor Maté, discuss why we wait for apologies that may never come, reflect on the wisdom of Mel Robbins, and discover why healing isn't about forgetting the past—it's about trusting that happiness is allowed to stay. If you've experienced betrayal, heartbreak, divorce, grief, or are rebuilding your life, this episode will remind you that you're not broken—you've adapted, and your best chapters may still be ahead. Support the show Just a quick note! I’m not a therapist, counsellor, or mental health professional. I’m simply sharing my personal experiences, reflections, and the things I’ve learned while navigating my own healing journey. Everything discussed on this podcast comes from my perspective and is meant for conversation and storytelling purposes. It should not be taken as professional advice. If you’re struggling or working through something difficult, I always encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional. This podcast is intended for entertainment, reflection, and shared human experience.

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About

Life doesn’t fall apart at 50. It gets real. After a 24-year marriage ended in betrayal, I found myself starting over in a way I never expected. This podcast is where I talk about that. The truth of it. The grief, the anger, the healing, and everything that comes with rebuilding a life when the one you knew is gone. I talk about relationships that look solid but aren’t. The disappointment when people don’t show up the way they said they would. The work it takes to stop chasing, set boundaries, and finally choose yourself. There’s a lot out there about dating, confidence, and “moving on.” This isn’t that. This is about doing the real work so you don’t repeat the same patterns. If you’re over 40, over 50, divorced, starting again, or just tired of pretending you’re fine, you’ll get it. We’ll get into:  betrayal and what it actually does to you  healing without shortcuts  dating later in life  learning to be on your own without feeling alone  recognizing red flags and trusting yourself again  building a life that finally feels like yours  Most episodes are just me. Some include conversations. All of it is honest. Because starting over isn’t the end of your story. It’s where you finally start living it. New episodes weekly.

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