In this episode of 'Doing Divorce Different,' we sit down with Lora Cheadle, an attorney, TEDx speaker, and betrayal specialist, to discuss her personal journey through betrayal and healing. Lora shares her compelling story of overcoming the devastation of discovering her husband's infidelity over 15 years and how they both worked individually and together to rebuild their relationship. She introduces her five-step healing process encapsulated in the acronym 'FLAUNT,' emphasizing self-love, laughter, unconditional acceptance, and navigating negativity. Laura's insights provide valuable tips for anyone dealing with betrayal, whether they choose to stay in the relationship or move on. Tune in for an inspiring conversation on resilience, self-discovery, and unconditional acceptance.

00:00 Introduction and Guest Welcome

01:22 Lora Cheadle's Betrayal Story

02:41 Healing and Rebuilding After Betrayal

08:03 Five Steps to Heal from Betrayal

11:50 Navigating Negative Emotions

17:11 Unconditional Acceptance and Trust

22:10 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

Welcome listeners.

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I'm so thankful that you're here for

this episode of doing divorce different.

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I have Laura Cheadle with me today and

actually she was on Saddle Up Live and

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I thought I wanted to share this with

you because she's an amazing woman

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that has been betrayed more than once.

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and healed through it.

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And I love her story.

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I love her tips and you're going

to truly enjoy this episode.

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Thanks for being here.

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Welcome listeners.

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I'm very excited to have

Laura Cheadle here today.

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She's an attorney.

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She's done TEDx talks.

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She, um, talks about betrayal.

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You're actually a betrayal

specialist and coach.

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So Laura, welcome to the podcast.

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Thank you so much for having me.

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I'm really looking forward

to this conversation.

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Yeah.

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I think it's going to be really good.

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And I think we're going to get

your authentic story to what led

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you to do the work you're doing.

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We're going to talk about five steps

to kind of heal from, from betrayal.

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And we're also going to talk a

little bit about staying in a

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marriage when there's a betrayal.

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So those are the things

we're going to be covering.

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So welcome.

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I appreciate you taking

the time to be here.

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And would you mind just

starting by sharing Your story.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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Um, it was not a fun story.

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I'll just preface it by saying that

after 23 years of what I really thought

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was a good marriage, you know, one of

my best friends, father of my children,

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I was completely devastated to learn

that he had been cheating on me for

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15 years with five different women.

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Oh, yeah.

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And as you might imagine, when I

found out about the first one, I

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was stunned when I found out about

the second one, I was out of here.

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There is no way.

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No, how not going to do this.

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When I found out about the third

woman, I'm like, yep, we're done.

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Really done.

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Donner than done.

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Woman four and woman five.

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I actually started thinking,

when What is really going on?

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This doesn't make sense.

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We are best friends.

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We have a great time together.

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We have a great life.

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This doesn't make sense.

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And that's what actually brought

me back in a little bit and made me

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curious about why he was cheating on me.

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How could I have missed

an entire double life?

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And then long story short, it has taken

many years, but we have completely

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rebuilt ourselves and then came back

together and rebuilt our relationship.

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Oh my gosh.

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I didn't even know that.

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Yes.

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That's amazing.

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I mean, how do you get

over that betrayal, honey?

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I mean, that's a lot.

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It is a lot.

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It is a lot.

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Um, a lot of different ways.

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There's a lot of different

ways you get over it.

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But the first thing is you decide, you

decide to take this experience as a gift.

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What can I take from this?

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What can I learn from this?

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Uh, my, the, the saying that I

always say to people that I work

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with is saying that I said to myself

throughout this experience was

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the betrayal uncovers the truth.

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And that a wise woman is going to see what

truth has been uncovered, and then she

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is going to do something with that truth.

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And I was determined to get

everything out of this horrific

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experience that I could get that

would serve me in my next chapter.

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That's so good.

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Okay.

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I want, I want you to talk

more about this, how you, so

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betrayal uncovers the truth.

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So you learn some truths, I'm guessing.

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Okay.

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Oh, I learned a lot of truths.

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And the thing is, when we go through

a betrayal, whether it's infidelity,

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whether it's just feeling betrayed

because your marriage didn't turn out,

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whether how it was supposed to, whatever

that betrayal is, our first instinct

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is to point our finger at the other

person and say, you did this to me.

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And how could you do this?

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And why didn't you do

this or to internalize it?

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And then just start blaming ourselves.

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Oh my gosh, what did I do and to move

into that state of despair and collapse.

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And what betrayal uncovers is the

truth about us, the truth about where

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we need to grow, the truth about

where we were wounded, the truth about

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our beliefs that no longer serve us.

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And it was very painful.

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To uncover some of those to admit to

myself, not that I caused the affairs

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I did not cause at all, but there are

some things in me that were uncovered.

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Some of my need to control was uncovered.

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Some of my fear of

abandonment was uncovered.

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Some of the ways that I liked and liked

is a strange word, but to martyr myself.

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I liked to be the one who

did it all for everybody.

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I like to overextend myself because

then I could kind of feel like a

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martyr, like, oh, you all need me.

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And those are some unhealthy dynamics and

patterns that were uncovered in me for

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me to see, heal and address and change.

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So when this happened to you.

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Did you kind of just start

working on yourself and then,

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or did you both work together?

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What, what happened?

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It was a combination of both.

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Uh, I was kind of laughing

because no, first I collapsed.

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Yeah.

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First I was in shock.

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I was in grief.

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I was in despair.

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I was in denial.

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I was in rage.

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I was in all of that.

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And then when that happened, That's when

I started realizing I can't control him.

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I can control me, but at the same time I

was curious because it was so egregious.

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It wasn't just, I met somebody and

got drunk and had a one night stand.

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It wasn't that I fell in love with what

five women are you kidding me over?

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Who does that?

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So I really put down that

judgment and I got curious.

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Why, why did you do this?

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Why did this make sense to you?

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As you might know, cause you're

an attorney too, I had a drive

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to figure out what was going on.

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It needed to make sense to me.

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Humans do things that

make sense on some level.

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Yeah.

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Why?

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Why did this seem like a good idea?

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Okay.

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So you had it, you figured out

for yourself some truths and then

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how did it make sense to you?

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Even more from your spouse's perspective.

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As I was working on me, as I was growing,

I was continuing to have conversations

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with him and we started learning how

to talk together in different ways.

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We were living apart.

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He was doing his work.

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I was doing mine.

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He started uncovering his trauma

background and his history.

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I started uncovering some of my

beliefs about womanhood, some

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of my wounded patterns as well.

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Then we started having constructive

conversations with no goal in mind

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other than to hear each other and

to find out about what was going on.

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We weren't fighting to save the marriage.

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We were fighting to figure it out

because believe me, there were a lot of

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things he couldn't figure out either.

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So the goal of our

conversation, yeah, was to talk.

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I love that.

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Okay.

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Now I'm kind of jumping backwards

because you have five steps.

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Are we going through some of those steps

now just so that I can get them, Cecilia?

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Um, no, and I will, I'll put a bookmark.

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That was just more story.

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I will put a bookmark in

because it is part of it.

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The five steps are encapsulated

in the acronym flaunt.

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And I love the energy of the

word flaunt because it's just

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putting yourself out there.

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This is what happens to me.

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This is it for good or for bad.

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This is it.

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The F stands for find your fetish and

fetish is intentionally a triggering

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word because it requires us to

look in and say, what lights me up?

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Not what is supposed to light me

up, but what does light me up?

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And yes, I was doing the hard work,

but I was also returning to dance.

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I love dance.

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I was returning to different

forms of creativity.

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I was reconnecting with friends.

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I was doing things to light me

up, not to light anybody else up.

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Right.

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Yeah.

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The L in flaunt is for laugh out loud.

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And according to the Mayo Clinic,

laughter is the number one way to calm

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and re regulate the nervous system.

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So I intentionally sought out laughter.

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I watched funny movies.

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I subscribed to the Disney

channel and watched like kid

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things because it made me laugh.

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Okay.

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I have to jump in and just say, how

soon did you do this in the process?

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I tried very soon in the process and

it was not very effective right away.

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Like I would try maybe two,

three weeks out and I was trying,

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I was trying for the tools.

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I knew these tools, I

was trying to use them.

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They weren't that effective, but I just

kept trying and it wasn't until a month

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or so that it finally started kicking in

and it was like, yes, I do feel better.

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Okay, I love that.

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It's so funny because when you

brought that up, one of my first

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podcasts ever, which my producer

said, take this off the sound quality

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so bad was the laughing love bugs.

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And they did yoga where they laugh

and it was funny because yeah.

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And so I love what you're

saying and it's so important.

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And so, um, you know, that laugh and they

talked about just laughing, even if it's

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not funny because your body is feeling it.

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Yes.

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So I love that.

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And I, yeah, I just had to bring that up

because you, you made me think of that.

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And so I'm going to, I'm going

to try to do that more as well.

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Yes.

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Good.

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It's counterintuitive, but you're right.

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Your body, it's a cathartic release.

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And if you think about laughing

and crying, it's the same

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physiological response, right?

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Tears over, I'd rather laugh.

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I was crying a lot.

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I didn't mean that.

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Bye.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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A U.

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Yeah.

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A U is the, what I call the

golden center of flaunt.

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And that is where I was, what I was

really talking about in my story.

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That stands for accept unconditionally.

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Do you know how hard it is to accept

that your partner has cheated on you

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for 15 years and you didn't know it?

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Yeah, there's a lot of

acceptance there, and I had to

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accept that I hadn't known it.

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I had to accept that I

couldn't go back and change it.

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I had to accept that he did it.

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I had to accept the impact

that it had on our kids.

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I have like all of these

things I had to accept

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that I can't help but ask you have kids.

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I do.

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And they found out about it?

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Yes.

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Sadly, they found out right away.

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Uh, they were in high school and

college, so they weren't young.

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Yeah.

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But it's still really, really

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okay.

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Um, the N in FLONT stands for navigate,

and in particular, navigate the negative.

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Because there's a lot of

negative that comes up, and

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it's so easy to get shut down.

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This happened to me, and he did that

to me, and we're not going to do this.

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Yes, you're right.

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Accept that.

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How are you going to move through it?

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Where do you want to be at the end?

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This was huge for me.

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Do I want to be a bitter old lady?

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No.

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Do I want to be a man,

hating, unforgiving?

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No.

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Do I want to be a pushover?

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No.

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Right.

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I want to be in my power and I want

to be clear and I want to have an

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understanding and how am I going

to navigate all of these roadblocks

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in order to get me to that space?

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And I, I mean, there's probably a wealth

of information navigating that had to,

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I mean, that had to take a lot of time.

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Was that maybe the longest step?

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Because things, even the best

laid plans don't work out and

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it's so hard to be defeated.

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And there was a lot of growth

that I needed to go through.

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And there was a lot of growth that

my husband needed to go through and

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change is slow and we act slide.

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And it's not like we go, Ooh, I've

got this and I'm just going to show

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up differently every single day.

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No, you show up differently

for a couple of days.

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Then you fall right back to how

you kept showing up in the past.

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Yeah.

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You go ahead.

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It's like, it's such a climb.

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So, I mean, and how do you keep?

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Because I know I was just talking

about how I've been trying to love

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bomb my husband, like just love him.

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And like you love your

kids and your grandkids.

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And um, I keep slipping

back and not doing it.

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And then I go, Ooh, I need.

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So how did you keep fighting

to navigate through this?

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I would let myself feel whatever

it was that I was feeling.

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If I was feeling some rage,

I would talk about that.

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I would feel it.

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I'm big at somatic processing.

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I'm a somatic attachment therapist.

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I dance, I move, I breathe, I write.

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I do whatever it is to feel what

I'm feeling so it can move through

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me so I can return myself to peace

and I don't force myself to peace.

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If I'm going to have a trash

can day, I can have one.

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I know.

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How many days do you allow yourself

to have a trash can day though?

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You know what I mean?

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Like, you know how you can, I can wallow.

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Um, so I like what you

said, trash can day.

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I get that.

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But sometimes it's hard to get out of

that feeling when you, when it's something

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so traumatic and so, so hurtful, it's

hard because you're feeling my feelings.

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This is how I feel and you're

trying to move through it, but it's

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sticking around for a long time.

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How long do you let it stick around?

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Yeah.

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Not really an answer.

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I can't say like 20 days.

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That's it.

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Um, but that's where the F and

the L and flaunt find your fetish.

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I would make it a point to do something

every day to do something fun every

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day, whether it's going like we

have a lake that's a mile around,

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I'd go walk around the lake, right?

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I would go to the bookstore.

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I would go grab a coffee, like

just do something every day.

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Just find one thing to laugh at every day.

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Yeah, because you know how, like

you said, wallow, we wallow in

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bad, but we can wallow in good too.

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And sometimes, you know, you're

shopping and you're wallowing and you're

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shopping, but it's a positive way.

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Right.

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And it's.

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And it can shift the energy.

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Yes, shifting that energy.

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And I feel like when you talked

about movement and dancing, I

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could just see that happening too.

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So I love that analogy.

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I like that idea.

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Okay.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And another thing around that, that I'm

just going to jump in on, is they say, The

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experts say, whenever you have a feeling,

it really only lasts 90 seconds, that it

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takes 90 seconds for that thought, that

feeling to process through the body.

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So sometimes I would time myself.

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I would literally take

the timer on my phone.

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And I would identify that feeling, grief,

rage, ticked off, hatred, whatever it is.

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And I would set that timer and I

would try to feel it as fully and as

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powerfully as I could for 90 seconds.

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Can you keep that rage

scream up for 90 seconds?

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That's hard.

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Can you feel crushed for 90 seconds?

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That's hard.

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And then when it's over,

the timer says it's over.

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Your brain says it's over your body.

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Done with that.

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Kind of like the duck who

lets it roll off their back.

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Right?

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Yeah, that's good.

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That's good.

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I'm going to try that because I can,

I think I can get stuck and kind

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of, um, circle in some of those.

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It's feelings of sadness

or, and it's big stuff.

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It's not little stuff.

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Um, so I'm going to try that.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And the last step in flaunt, cause that

was the only one we didn't talk about

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is T and that's for trust in your truth.

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And this really goes to

what you were saying.

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How long until your heart knows,

until your body knows, until your

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mind knows, until your soul knows.

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When you start identifying all

the different parts of you,

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it's so much easier to trust.

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My heart is still broken.

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My head is understanding this.

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My gut tells me I can't trust.

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My mind says I should.

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Like start identifying all of those parts

and trust what they're all telling you.

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And they don't have to be congruent.

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When you can name what each part

is feeling, it really helps.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Okay.

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So you, how long did it take you?

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And I know it's different for

everyone to heal through this.

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That's hard because it's not like you

wake up one day and say, bing, I'm healed.

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Yeah.

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The whole first year was a year

of anniversaries and it was a year

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of processing and was a year of

understanding and was a year of

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just being in that tenderness.

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It wasn't really until the next year

out that I think that's where the

378

healing takes place because that

first year you're still in trauma.

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You're still in shock.

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Second year, I felt like the healing

really kicked in a lot because I

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had already been through it once.

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Yeah, I already cleaned out the muck

and it was time to heal and I was

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really conscious of that Yeah Well,

I want you to know you're inspiring

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me because I don't think that it was

probably Really maybe easy for you to

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stay and there were probably people

saying what the hell's wrong with you

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and And you, and you did the work on

yourself, um, what a, what a great, um,

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I mean, that's love, Laura, that's love.

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That's unconditional love that you

showed to your ex and, and I'm sure

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that these steps that you gave work

and that, you know, there's sometimes

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people that do decide to leave.

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Totally.

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Totally.

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Let's talk a little bit about that

before this is all over because in

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your situation, you probably were both

working on it together, but sometimes

395

maybe you can do everything you can do.

396

Yes.

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Okay.

398

And we were not working

to save the marriage.

399

We were working to save,

you know, we really weren't.

400

Um, he's got a background

in trauma, a lot of trauma.

401

He is good.

402

He is good.

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A foster kid lived in poverty,

like trauma impacts people.

404

He did not understand the

impact of trauma on him.

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He didn't know what healing that

trauma was going to mean for him.

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I didn't know what it was going to

mean either, but we were willing.

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We were friends.

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We've been together forever.

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We do love each other, whether we want

to be in a marriage relationship or not.

410

We still love and like each other.

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So it was the willingness to,

well, I'll support you through

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understanding your trauma.

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You're going to support me through

healing from this trauma, even

414

though you caused this trauma.

415

And let's, let's just be where we're

at and let's just see what happens.

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There's no agenda.

417

Let's start talking.

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We started talking about the things that

we were unhappy within our marriage.

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We all settle for things.

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You know, we all get complacent.

421

We all settle for things.

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We started talking.

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I'm no longer willing to have

certain things in my marriage.

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And he would say, I'm no longer willing

to have certain things in my marriage.

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Well, let's see if it works out together.

426

Let's see if we're now

as these new people.

427

And if we're not bless and

release, because we still

428

have to co parent together.

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Yep.

430

Amen.

431

Yeah.

432

And that's so important.

433

So, um, it could have gone either way.

434

And I think that's kind of your message.

435

Yeah.

436

For people is to do this work for yourself

and you'll see where, where it leads you,

437

I guess, is that, yeah, yes, absolutely.

438

And you know, are we

committed in our marriage?

439

Of course we're committed, but at

the same time, we're more committed

440

to ourselves, even going forward.

441

If we need to separate,

we need to separate.

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If we will experience more growth apart

than together, we're okay with that too.

443

It's really all around that unconditional

acceptance of where we're at and what

444

we need to do to take care of ourselves

and what we're willing, and we were

445

both willing at the same time, and that

happens a lot to one partner's willing.

446

The other partner's like not there yet.

447

Not there yet, right?

448

Okay, so it's almost we're almost done.

449

This has gone so fast, but I just

have to lean in a little bit more

450

to the unconditional acceptance.

451

That's probably, was that, I

mean, that's got to be so hard.

452

I said the navigating probably

took the longest, but maybe is

453

that part of the navigating?

454

It is part of it.

455

It is part of it because in

order to navigate, you have to

456

be honest about what's there.

457

And so many of us like to pretend,

Oh, that's not really what happened.

458

That's not really what I need to work on.

459

Yeah.

460

Yeah.

461

So I, I just can't imagine.

462

I can't, I can't imagine that being easy.

463

I feel like you'd have to be a very

strong person, very strong willed

464

to be able to go in and, and, and

to have unconditional acceptance.

465

Is that true?

466

And how can people tap into that?

467

Yeah.

468

That's a great question.

469

I, yes and no.

470

Like we're all strong.

471

We are all strong because

it's, what do you want?

472

How do you want to feel?

473

This is your life.

474

You get this one life.

475

What are you going to

do with this one life?

476

Yeah.

477

Do you want to be broken?

478

So many people come to me

and they're like, I'm broken.

479

Well, do you want to stay broken?

480

Because you can.

481

Yeah.

482

Or do you want to be

cracked open and grow?

483

No, because you can do that too.

484

That's such a good quote.

485

Thank you.

486

And that's part of like coaching.

487

I, you know, when I do myself

coaching, you get up in the morning

488

and you decide how you want to feel.

489

Yes.

490

And that's what you're saying.

491

And so that's when you start doing

the unconditional acceptance.

492

That's so, so good.

493

This has been amazing.

494

Now I feel like we've covered a lot.

495

We've covered the five steps.

496

Is there anything else that we're

missing as time is ticking and

497

we're almost going to say goodbye?

498

Is there anything else that

you want to leave people with?

499

I want to leave people with the

reminder to be gentle, to be

500

really gentle with themselves.

501

It's a journey.

502

You will not get there overnight.

503

You will change your mind and it's okay.

504

Just be gentle with yourself.

505

That's so good.

506

So, so good.

507

Laura, it was such a treat to get to

know you and to hear your story and

508

I know it's going to help people.

509

So I thank you and I'm going to kind

of stay in touch with you because

510

I want to maybe connect again.

511

Um, I think this was extremely

helpful and, um, I so admire that

512

you went through something hard.

513

And now you're sharing, cause it's not

easy to share that stuff all the time.

514

So thank you.

515

I want you to know, I see you

doing that and I appreciate it.

516

I'm getting teary eyed.

517

So thank you so much.

518

That means the world to me.

519

Thanks for being here.

520

You take good care.

521

You too.