Show Notes
It’s one of the words Carolyn hears most in the Women’s Divorce Academy community, and it’s the one that keeps the most women stuck. In this solo episode, Carolyn sets the diagnosis question aside – nobody can answer it from the outside, and it turns out you don’t need to – and asks a more useful one: is this how your ex behaves, and what do you do about it? She walks through how capable women end up in these relationships, what the pattern tends to look like once a separation is under way, a...
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Content note: This episode discusses domestic and family violence. If you need support, in Australia you can call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit 1800respect.org.au. Support services outside Australia are listed below. If you’re in immediate danger, call emergency services. There’s a lot of talk about leaving an abusive relationship. What comes after gets far less attention. Eleven years ago, Jo Mason’s life looked perfect from the outside. Behind closed doors, she was living with dome...
Carolyn spent a year believing she couldn't afford a lawyer, so she went without one. She now calls it a mistake – and an expensive one. This episode is about keeping the bill down, from someone who sends them. Perth family lawyer Ella Hickman walks through what legal help actually costs, what runs the meter up without a woman realising, and where to put your money when there isn't much of it. She's blunt about her own profession, including the point at which she tells a client to stop. The h...
Carolyn gets asked one question more than any other: where do I start? This episode is her answer – the TRUST Method, the five-stage path Women's Divorce Academy is built on, and the reason the order you do things in matters more than any single piece of advice you'll be given. She takes you through all five stages, and she's honest about the one she got badly wrong herself. A decision made in the first year after her separation cost her a full year of support she was entitled to. Another, ma...
When Carolyn started working at News Corp, Mel Wilson was her boss – a journalist who seemed to have everything together. Carolyn had no idea Mel was going through a separation too. Ten years on, Mel talks about what was happening underneath. A six-month-old and a three-and-a-half-year-old. A household budget sum that came out at zero. A job interview where she did something her future boss would call brave years later. An offer from her parents she tried very hard to refuse. Mel shares how s...
A note on this episode: Di describes emotional and financial abuse in her marriage. If anything here lands close to home, the support services below are available any time. Di Geddes knew her marriage was in trouble on the day she married. She stayed for 21 years. What finally ended it wasn't a single moment – it was her eldest son standing in front of her and asking her to do something. By the time she left, Di had a breast cancer diagnosis behind her, no savings and no self-belief. In the ...