PODCAST · society
A Life, Folded
by Lainey Cathan
Contact Lainey at: [email protected] A Life, Folded is available in eBook, paperback, and audiobook. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H668HWB4 Audible: https://bit.ly/4bFAtXM Welcome to a space of safety, acceptance, and understanding. Where we frankly and bravely dialogue about the harmful effects of pornography addiction, betrayal trauma, and narcissistic emotional abuse. We’ll explore reclaiming your core self by more thoroughly understanding these heartbreakingly complex interpersonal situations, no matter your relationship status. You are not alone in your pain, shame, and disbelief about a reality that can feel like a living nightmare. You might have thought you had a near-perfect relationship and devoted partner. I did. A Life, Folded is hosted by Lainey Cathan, a divorced, Christian woman. A little about Laine
Episodes
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94: Do Narcissists Get Caught on Purpose?
Is it possible that narcissists, the masters of lying, duplicity, and secrecy, might try to get caught in their despicable behavior on purpose? It is, and here are some common reasons why they might want to get caught and how they might possibly behave when they are. A Life, Folded is now…
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93: Common Trauma Responses
Fight. Flight. Freeze. Fawn. Flop. These are all highly common trauma responses. Experiencing these responses is normal. It's your brain's way of dealing with a traumatic even that it perceives as a threat. Understanding and gentle self-love, compassion, and grace go a long way to recovering your...
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92: Compassion for the Narcissist?
My therapist asked me a question once that rocked my world: do you think you can ever have compassion for your narcissistic ex-husband? I laughed. But she was serious. This caused me to deeply think about the real life of a narcissist. I may or may not be able to have compassion for the…
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91: Pray for the One Who Stays
A Life, Folded is now available in paperback, ebook, and audiobook. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H668HWB4 Audible: https://bit.ly/4bFAtXM It's difficult being alone, but it is more difficult living with a partner who is not keeping their marital covenants. Who thinks fidelity is an option. Now…
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90: The Profound Sorrow of Divorce
Even years after your divorce and healing, there is still profound sorrow. And that is okay. That is normal. When you have a beautiful, loving soul, you feel loss. You feel sorrow at what you never had and that your dreams won't come true as you had envisioned them. So don't castigate yourself…
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89: Zero Bullcrap Meter
Sometimes lifelong people-pleasers and those who give without boundaries simply snap. They realize that their blanket giving is not being returned. Their meter for the bullcrap of being used, taken advantage of, and not having their needs met is moving toward zero. And they start saying no. They...
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88: Relentlessly Pursue your Happiness
"I'll be so happy when the baby is finally out of diapers." "When I get that big promotion, my life will be awesome!" "I know that if I can just find a partner to love me again, then everything in my life will finally be okay." We can spend our days and lives waiting for "tomorrow" to find...
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87: Thrive after the Narcissistic Discard
Is it really possible to heal and then thrive after you have been emotionally destroyed through the narcissistic discard at the hands of someone you deeply loved and trusted? Yes! Absolutely! This episode discusses easy and practical strategies that will help victims of the cruel discard find…
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86: Sexual Coercion and Porn
Sexual coercion is often described like this quote taken from the National Domestic Violence Hotline: "Have you ever felt pressured by your partner to have sex? Have you ever felt guilted into it, or felt like you weren’t able to say no? Abuse is often centered on power and control in all aspects...
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85: Narcissists vs. Avoidant Attachment
Being deeply wounded by unhealthy and toxic individuals can cast a shadow over our entire lives and damage our self-worth. Do we keep allowing cluster b personality disordered individuals into our lives, destroying our peace? Or have we been hurt by someone with an attachment wound? How are...
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84: You Hang in There!
As we navigate life after experiencing betrayal trauma or post-divorce, we find many who share similar experiences. Being deeply hurt by a person they loved and were devoted to. The shock and grief of finding out they have been cheated on. We don't have to suffer in silence and shame. We can…
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83: How Narcissists Manipulate Others' Opinions of Them
Narcissists are master manipulators of everyone and everything. Of their family. Of their workplace. Of their congregation. But, they are especially concerned about managing their public persona. That whatever mask they like to wear, that people see them in that light. The helpful neighbor who...
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82: Does Betrayal Effect IQ?
After suffering through betrayal trauma, you might experience severe brain fog, an inability to remember, trouble making even basic decisions, lack of focus, and difficulties performing tasks that require deeper thinking. Has betrayal trauma permanently changed your IQ? Are you now stupid? No....
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81: Narcissists Weaponize Children
An unhealthy parents vehemently fights to gain custody of children they don't want to take care of. A parent drains resources to bribe a child's loyalty. Children are induced to move in, only to be treated like garbage once they have left the sanctity of a home with a safe parent. Why do...
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80: Dangers of Victimhood
BIG NEWS! A Life, Folded will be published in paperback, audiobook, and e-book on Tuesday, September 8, 2026. The pre-order for the Kindle book is open on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H668HWB4 Sometimes it is easier to stay in victim mode after you have been so deeply hurt. Doing the…
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79: What if...?
When you are suffering through betrayal trauma, narcissistic abuse, or the end of your relationship, it is easy to start catastrophizing both your present and future. Dire scenarios of doom and gloom keep you awake all night. If you imagine all the worse scenarios happening, it will be easier to...
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78: The Narcissist will do Literally Anything to Engage You
Why does your narcissistic ex-partner, alienated friend or family member reach out to you at random times? Why do they keep reappearing in your life, in strange ways? It is because the narcissist or other Cluster B Personality disordered-individuals will do literally anything to get you to engage...
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77: When Abuse Starts to Feel Normal
After years and decades of living with emotionally abusive partners, the insidious mistreatment begins to feel like a normal part of everyday life. It is often only through the lens of others that we understand how dysfunctional our lives have become. But we have a right to exert strong…
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76: Why Betrayal Trauma Physically Hurts
After people have experienced betrayal trauma, you oftwn hear them say things like, "Everything inside me shattered when I found out." Or, "I felt like I got punched in the stomach." Or, "My heart broke into a million pieces." So why do people often describe betrayal trauma in terms of physical...
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75: No More Blame Game
One common trait of both narcissists and addicts is they often play the blame game, shifting their bad behavior off onto others. Especially when emotional abuse is present, it become easy, normal even, to accept the blame. It must be my fault, right? Sometimes that is easier than accepting the...
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74: Staying in Your Own Recovery Lane
For many of us, a bulk of our adult lives have been focused on managing an addicted or narcissistic partner. When we decide we wish to work toward personal healing after abuse, it can be a hard habit to break to not want to rescue or unduly concern ourselves on the behavior of others. Post…
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73: How the Narcissist "Serves"
Have you ever been on the receiving end of something where the giver insists they are serving you, yet, it’s impossible to feel grateful because it isn’t something you ever wanted or asked for? What you did request in clear language was completely ignored and the giver substituted something else...
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72: What Porn is Doing to Your Body, Mind, and Soul
Porn is not a harmless pastime. It chips away at relationships. It damages intimacy. It destroys trust. This episode discusses what is happening in the porn user's body, mind, and soul. The news of pornography's devastating effects is troubling, but there is also great hope of healing, change…
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71: Why Narcissists Leave When You Get Sick
We all have natural expectations with committed relationships--that our spouse or partner will be there for us during difficult times. After all, don't we promise in poverty and wealth, in sickness and health? Everyone knows that life brings ups and downs for all relationships. But, that person…
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70: The Gratitude Trap
Have you ever had someone respond to your troubles with something like, "Well, I choose to focus on gratitude and what I do have versus what I don't." Ouch! Gratitude is an amazing, and necessary, emotion. Expressing gratitude can do much to improve our lives. However, it can also be a trap. If…
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69: Target-Love Bomb-Devalue-Discard
There is a somewhat predicable pattern that narcissists use when securing their next source of supply or fuel. Or, when keeping their current supply at the ready. That is targeting, love bombing, devaluing, and discarding. This cycle will continually perpetuate itself unless we become educated,...
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68: The Importance of Empathy
When you hear of someone struggling, do you want to jump in and help? Solve the problem? Or tell them how you know exactly how they feel? Well, congratulations, you are just like everyone else! It is a beautiful facet of human behavior that we want to help. But, ironically, when we say things…
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67: The Pure Selfishness of Porn
Research consistently shows that porn consumption is associated with poorer relationship quality and sexual dissatisfaction. The idea that porn is a personal decision that doesn’t affect anyone else is simply not supported by research. Porn use leads to a higher probability of cheating, lying,...
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66: The Aging Narcissist
Most of us think of the aging process as a mellowing season. Many of us wish that the narcissists in our lives with also mellow with age. Unfortunately, narcissists typically get worse as they get older. They lose their looks and their charisma. They have burned bridges and have a shrinking pool…
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65: Major Self-Care Win!
Are you a fierce champion of others? Are you always at the ready to defend the underdog? Have you noticed, though, that you often struggle with these type of activities when it comes to taking care of yourself? For many of us, we have spent our entire lives having to deny our needs in order to...
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64: Earning Love
For many of us, growing up with problematic family dynamics or being partnered with emotionally abusive individuals has caused us to become people pleasers. These relationships have left us feeling like there is something inherently wrong with us and we are unlovable. We learned, perhaps at a…
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63: Survivor's Guilt After Betrayal
Have you ever felt horrible about taking care of yourself? For removing yourself from toxic situations, which may have ramifications elsewhere, such as with your children's feelings. I have and I realized that I was experiencing survivor's guilt. I understand that desire to protect your children...
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62: Can People Really Change?
One of the most common questions I hear is: How will I know if my partner has changed? Can people really change? The answer, of course, is yes...with an exception. Cluster B personality-disordered people do not change, because they think nothing is wrong with them. Take words with a grain of salt...
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61: What is Your Unique Purpose?
After being betrayed, abused by a narcissist, or suffering through the devastating realization of your partner's pornography use, you may feel broken. That you have nothing of value left to give. That is simply not true. We all have a divine, unique reason for being on the earth at this moment.…
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60: It's Not Fair
There is nothing fair about the fallout of going through betrayal trauma, being cheated on and manipulated, and being forced to pick up your life after it has exploded in your face due to actions of someone you deeply loved. But is there a way to reframe the message such that it honors your pain...
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59: Betrayal Trauma Symptoms
When you experience betrayal trauma in your life, it often causes resultant symptoms that can mirror PTSD. There are common behavioral, emotional, and even physical symptoms after you have been betrayed by your intimate partner. If you are experiencing any of these symptoms, they are completely...
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58: Why the Narcissist Hates You
Once you start to understand, heal, grow, exert boundaries, and improve yourself in any way, you will encounter the ire of the narcissists in your life. Cluster B personality-disordered individuals want you captive in the quagmire of their manipulation, gaslighting, and abuse. When you begin to...
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57: Emotional Affairs are Cheating
People often rationalize emotional affairs as harmless because they are "just emotional." But, the opposite is true. Emotional affairs are cheating. Emotional affairs crumble relationships as one partner goes to another for support, affirmation, and validation. This often leads to secrecy, shame,...
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56: Beautiful, Small Acts of Service
A small act of service on a difficult day changed the trajectory of my life and how I viewed everything moving forward. As we are navigating the excruciating pain of betrayal trauma and abuse at the hands of the narcissist, it is easy to begin thinking that we contribute nothing good to the…
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55: Survival Mode after Betrayal Trauma
When navigating the pain and uncertainty of betrayal trauma, it is not at all uncommon to have your body and nervous system go into survival mode. Everything has changed. Nothing seems real anymore. Everything you thought was true was not. You might find yourself struggling to seek to control...
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54: When You Tire of Being a Doormat
Perhaps as you go about making your new year's goals and undertaking a self-audit of your relationships, you have come to a disconcerting realization: that you are allowing, even encouraging, people to use you as their own personal doormats. People pleasing and unfettered helping behaviors at the...
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53: Why Do Narcissists Ruin Your Sleep
After learning that I was married to a narcissist, I began doing a lot of research to learn and make sense of my life. I was so surprised to read that one common complaint about narcissists is their purposeful habit of interrupting the proper sleep and rest of their partners. That had been my...
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52: Depression After Betrayal Trauma
Have you suffered issues with depression after being betrayed by your intimate partner? If you have, please know that this is an extremely normal reaction to such a jarring and traumatizing event in life, but it seems that it is not spoken about as frequently as other health issues. Have you also...
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51: Changing Your Body Will NOT Stop His Porn Use
His porn use must have something to do with you, right? If you looked more like a porn star, had the surgical enhancements they have, he'd stop, right? You can change and that will make him change, right? WRONG. Porn use, emotional affairs, and nefarious cheating has nothing to do with you and it...
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50: Am I Being Manipulated?
How can we discern if behaviors in our relationship are simply troubling or moving into an area where undue influence is being exerted? The concern with manipulation is that it is slow and insidious in its progression such that it eventually begins to feel normal, caring even. We can at times…
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49: Hoovering
Hoovering is a common tactic used by cluster b personality disordered individuals to suck their sources of supply back in to their cycle of abuse and drama. What is hoovering? How do you know what is real and what has been made up to influence you? How do you recognize hoovering tactics? Why is…
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48: Porn Kills Self-Esteem--Both the Partner AND the User
It is common to hear things such as: porn hurts no one! It's a harmless past time! It protects me and actually keeps me from cheating. Nonsense. If individuals don't understand that porn is cheating, they need a bracing reality check. This episode delves further into how porn is permanently...
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47: Narcissist's Flying Monkeys
Why would people who have been your friends, neighbors, or even family members suddenly start to vilify and lie about you? Well, if you are removing yourself from a relationship with a narcissist or cluster b-personality disordered individual, they have to have individuals who support and…
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46: What Makes You Attractive
What if what makes you the most attractive to others is when you are living your authentic life, healing, discovering yourself, and not inhabiting a space where you tell yourself you can only be happy when you have a partner? #alifefolded #betrayal #betrayaltrauma #betrayaltraumarecovery...
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45: Why Do Narcissists Drive Like Maniacs?
After doing a lot of research, I learned that one common complaint about narcissists is their unsafe and erratic driving patterns. Why do so many narcissists drive unsafely? #alifefolded #narcissist #narcissisticabuseawareness #narcissisticabuserecovery #narcissisticabusesurvivor #narcissistic...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Contact Lainey at: [email protected] A Life, Folded is available in eBook, paperback, and audiobook. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H668HWB4 Audible: https://bit.ly/4bFAtXM
Welcome to a space of safety, acceptance, and understanding. Where we frankly and bravely dialogue about the harmful effects of pornography addiction, betrayal trauma, and narcissistic emotional abuse. We’ll explore reclaiming your core self by more thoroughly understanding these heartbreakingly complex interpersonal situations, no matter your relationship status. You are not alone in your pain, shame, and disbelief about a reality that can feel like a living nightmare. You might have thought you had a near-perfect relationship and devoted partner. I did.
A Life, Folded is hosted by Lainey Cathan, a divorced, Christian woman. A little about Laine
HOSTED BY
Lainey Cathan
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How many episodes does A Life, Folded have?
A Life, Folded currently has 93 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is A Life, Folded about?
Contact Lainey at: [email protected] A Life, Folded is available in eBook, paperback, and audiobook. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H668HWB4 Audible: https://bit.ly/4bFAtXM Welcome to a space of safety, acceptance, and understanding. Where we frankly and bravely dialogue about the harmful effects...
How often does A Life, Folded release new episodes?
A Life, Folded has 93 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to A Life, Folded?
You can listen to A Life, Folded on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts A Life, Folded?
A Life, Folded is created and hosted by Lainey Cathan.
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