https://ruptureeverafter.com/

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Glimmers are the opposite of triggers — moments of safety your nervous system stores and can return to. On their 32nd anniversary, recorded from the road on day four of a motorcycle trip, Monte and Mechelle each share three glimmers, one per decade of marriage.

Inside: the Gottman research on how couples narrate their shared history and what it predicts; the Holmberg and Holmes finding that memories of your early relationship shift to match how you feel now; and why repair in the present reaches backward into the past.

Stories include Lake Powell with the boats tied together, a surprise discovery flight, a camping trip where feeling dismissed turned into feeling chosen, an expired passport that canceled a trip to Portugal, and standing on a tide pool in the Azores forty years later.

Thanks for Sharing Podcast

Thewholenessnetwork.com

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

Topics: glimmers, nervous system regulation, attachment healing, relationship repair, emotional intimacy, long-term marriage, savoring, rupture and repair

#ruptureverafter #attachmenttheory #nervoussystemhealing #relationshiphealing

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Have you ever reacted to something small — a customer service call, a declined credit card, a look from someone you love — with a wave of white-hot anger, or a sudden urge to check out completely? That's not a character flaw. That's your nervous system doing exactly what it was built to do.

In this episode, Monte and Mechelle unpack two of the most misunderstood trauma responses: dysregulation — the emotional flashback, when half the brain goes offline and you drop into threat mode — and dissociation, when you leave the present moment and go somewhere else in your mind. Recorded on the road (helmet mics, wild turkeys, and a few breathtaking views included), it's a tender, honest look at why our bodies remember what our minds forget.

Along the way, they get into:

• The four F's — fight, flight, freeze, and fawn — and how to recognize them in yourself

• Why being "triggered" is really a trauma response, and how a single scent (yes, Old Spice) can carry decades of threat

• Why the memory isn't the proof — the body's reaction is

• What ducks, deer, and lions teach us about shaking off stress before it gets stuck

• The elephant and the rider: how emotion leads and reason scrambles to justify it

• How early attunement, or its absence, shapes a whole life — and why prevention matters more than crisis

• Real, unglamorous dysregulation in the wild, from the post office counter to the checkout line

Whether you tend to armor up or disappear, this is an invitation to trust your body, drop the judgment, and make room for your real self to show up and connect.

Mentioned in this episode: The Boy Who Was Raised by a Dog (Dr. Bruce Perry), The Righteous Mind (Jonathan Haidt), A General Theory of Love, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine — plus Peter Levine, Eckhart Tolle, Ms. Rachel, and Bluey.

Thanks for Sharing Podcast

Thewholenessnetwork.com

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Season 2 opens in the therapy room. Meet Jackie — the therapist Monte & Mechelle have been seeing since 2019, and the name you've heard us drop in almost every episode.

In this candid Season 2 opener, we finally introduce the woman behind the work. Jackie has spent 30+ years as a therapist specializing in trauma, addiction, and the partners affected by it — and she pulls back the curtain on what really happens in the room.

We talk about the difference between therapy and counseling (and why you can't be talked out of your trauma), how trust gets built when trust is the very thing that's broken, and why real healing starts in the body, not the head. Jackie shares her hardest and best days in the field, gets honest about sexless seasons and sexual trauma in marriage, breaks down the biggest myths about sex addiction, and revisits the question Monte kept asking early on — "Should we just get divorced?" — and why she never answered it.

Warm, funny, and deeply human. Turns out therapists are people too… just ask her kids.

New episodes every week.

Subscribe so you don't miss Season 2.

Breaking Free From Attachment Wounds online class

Thanks for Sharing Episodes

Porn Series

But is it Good Sex?

Healing Sex Addiction and Betrayal Trauma

Thanks for Sharing Podcast

Thewholenessnetwork.com

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

⏱️ CHAPTERS
00:00 Welcome, Jackie
01:30 What are you coming in with today?
03:15 How politics entered the therapy room
06:30 The hardest days of being a therapist
08:30 The day Jackie's mom died — and coming back to clients
14:00 Best days: when it "clicks" in the body, not the brain
19:00 Moments Jackie remembers from our sessions
23:00 Therapy vs. counseling — what's the difference?
27:30 Sexless marriage, sexual trauma & repair
35:30 Sex addiction: the biggest myths
40:30 "Should we get divorced?" — why Jackie never answered
43:30 The Stockdale paradox & rethinking growth
48:30 Therapists are people too
50:00 How you know therapy is working

rupture ever after, marriage podcast, couples therapy, therapist interview, therapy vs counseling, trauma healing, relationship repair, marriage repair, nervous system regulation, somatic therapy, healing trauma in marriage, sexless marriage, sexual trauma, sex addiction, sex addiction myths, CSAT therapist, attachment styles, EFT Sue Johnson, Gottman method, should we get divorced, saving your marriage, marriage counseling, relationship advice, mental health, going to therapy, what therapy is really like, IFS, emotional intimacy, long term marriage, Monte and Mechelle

Monte opens with the version of meditation he learned in 2010: focus on the breath, count to six, let the muddy water settle. Practical, mechanical, learnable. Then Mechelle tells hers, and it goes somewhere else entirely. Her sister-in-law told her to get quiet and ask for a gift. She went into a dark closet, sat down, and saw a narrow path with a great gulf on either side and her first thought was that falling off would be easier than crossing. What came back wasn't words exactly. It was closer to: we want you to make the whole trip. This isn't about easy.

Then she asked for the gift, and got a small fir tree. Prickly. Untouchable. And then arms that held the prickly part anyway.

She didn't tell anyone about this for years. What she says about finally being able to tell Monte — and about him being able to receive it is one of the quieter measures of repair in the whole season.

Two very different doors into the same room. Both count. Both are meditation.

Topics: meditation and getting quiet, nervous system regulation, attachment healing, self-trust, relationship repair, being known by your partner, emotional intimacy.

Rupture Ever After is Monte and Mechelle Wingle, sharing what actually helped on their therapy journey.

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

Follow us online

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

#ruptureverafter #nervoussystemhealing #relationshiphealing

We're opening the curtain on Season One — the stats, the surprises, and the question we're still sitting with: who are we, and what is this podcast actually for? Monte shares the Stockdale Paradox and what it's teaching us about holding hope while facing our hardest truths, and we look ahead to what Season Two might hold.

This episode covers attachment healing, nervous system regulation, and relationship repair — what we learned making this show, what surprised us in the numbers, and why the story matters less than what's actually happening underneath it.

We're taking a short break before Season Two. Join us for our free community gathering on July 19th at 3:00 PM MT — email ruptureeverafter@gmail.com to get the link or Sign up in the link below.

It’s a FREE gathering.

https://www.thewholenessnetwork.com/events/rupture-ever-after-open-house

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

Follow us online

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

Listen to the playlist:What does it sound like when a relationship tells its own story through music?In this episode of Rupture Ever After, Mechelle shares a deeply personal playlist — 17 songs she's been carrying through every chapter of her relationship with Monte. Organized into three movements — falling in love, the rupture, and healing — the playlist becomes a kind of emotional autobiography, surfacing memories, nervous system responses, and realizations that couldn't have arrived any other way.Monte hears several of these songs in full context for the first time. Some of them got through in ways conversation never quite could.Songs featured include classics from ABBA, Celine Dion, The Judds, Josh Groban, Regina Spektor, Shania Twain, and more.Whether you've used music to survive a hard season, process grief, or hold onto hope — this episode will likely bring something up for you.

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

@mechellewingle @winglemo

What actually makes therapy work? It's not the modality. Research consistently points to one thing: the relationship. In this episode, Mechelle and Monte explore the concept of limbic connection — the nervous system-level bond that forms between a therapist and client — and why healing almost always requires being in relationship with someone long enough to actually be known.

From the fears that keep people out of therapy ("I should be able to handle this on my own," "What if I find out I'm the problem?") to the slow, nonlinear work of building real trust, they get honest about what their own therapy has looked like over the years — including why insight alone doesn't move the needle and why the nervous system needs more than a few sessions.

In the second half, Mechelle brings in the Enneagram — not as a personality quiz, but as a map of survival strategies. Each type, she explains, developed their coping style in response to a wound — and the very strength that protected them is also what's kept them just out of reach of real connection. Whether you're new to the Enneagram or years deep, this conversation reframes it as a tool for self-understanding, not self-criticism.

Thanks for Sharing Podcast

Thewholenessnetwork.com

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

Keywords: limbic connection, Enneagram types, why therapy works, nervous system regulation, and healing in relationship

https://ruptureeverafter.com/

@mechellewingle @winglemo

Internal Family Systems (IFS), emotional flashbacks, and what happens when repair actually works.

Monte and Mechelle pick up right where they left off — in the middle of a real rupture. What started as a disagreement about a book series becomes a window into something much deeper: emotional flashbacks, family-of-origin limbic triggers, and what it looks like when two people who've done the work finally know how to find their way back to each other.

Then Mechelle leads listeners through their first live IFS experience — and Monte meets his Flame Princess.

This episode goes deep on what IFS actually is, where it came from, and why Richard Schwartz's two biggest barriers to getting people on board still show up today. Plus: the difference between speaking for your parts versus speaking from them, and why that distinction changes everything.

Part 2 of 2.

In this episode:

• What an emotional flashback actually looks like inside a marriage

• How family-of-origin limbic systems can pull you back to being five years old

• Micro vs. macro vs. mid-level ruptures — and how this one was different

• A guided IFS meditation you can do right now

• The origin story of IFS and Richard Schwartz

• Speaking for your parts vs. from your parts

• The 8 Cs of Self energy

• Why your Self can never be taken away — no matter what you've been through
  

Thanks for Sharing Podcast

Thewholenessnetwork.com

Information is not intended as professional advice and is for entertainment only.

Keywords: #IFS #InternalFamilySystems #NervousSystemHealing #AttachmentHealing #RuptureAndRepair #TraumaHealing #EmotionalFlashback #PartsWork #RelationshipHealing #RuptureEverAfter #TheWholenessNetwork