Download You’re Guide to Recognizing Trauma Bonds and Reclaiming Your Clarity.
Your brain didn’t get the memo that the divorce is over — and that’s not a flaw, it’s biology. The Rewiring Toolkit turns this episode into action: build your rescue thought, name the hook that’s draining your energy, and start stacking the small daily habits that rewire the pattern.
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When Love and Control Get Confused: Finding Clarity with Dr. Nadine Macaluso
You know something feels wrong. But then comes the affection, the reassurance, or the promise that things will change—and you find yourself questioning your own experience.
How can someone who says they love you leave you feeling so afraid, confused, or powerless?
In this conversation on We Chat Divorce, therapist and Run Like Hell author Dr. Nadine Macaluso joins Catherine Shanahan and Karen Chellew to explore trauma bonds, financial control, and rebuilding trust in yourself. Drawing on her own experience and her work helping others, Dr. Nadine brings understanding to a question many people struggle to say aloud: Why is it so hard to leave someone who hurts me?
We’re revisiting this conversation from last year ahead of Dr. Nadine’s upcoming return to the show. Whether you’re hearing it for the first time or listening with a new perspective, it offers language for experiences that can be difficult to explain.
About Our Guest: Dr. Nadine Macoluso
Dr. Nadine Macaluso, PhD is a trauma-informed educator, author, and speaker helping women recognize, escape, and heal from trauma bonds and coercive control, who was formerly married to the Wolf of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort.
Her inspiring story begins with growing up on welfare in Brooklyn, becoming a model to support herself and her mother, then falling madly in love with a charming stockbroker.
After eight traumatizing years she found the courage to leave, embarked on a profound healing journey, found healthy love, and discovered her calling as a therapist, earning a PhD at 45 and becoming a global source of wisdom and hope for women recovering from pathological partnerships.