EP139: Healing After Betrayal, with Dr. Debi Silber

Perfect Practice

In this episode, Sachin interviews Dr. Debi Silber, founder of the Post Betrayal Transformation® Institute about her journey from television production to coaching people to post betrayal transformation. She shares the problems that grow from past betrayals relating to emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual issues that remain unhealed until the betrayal is faced and dealt with. She shares examples from life and even from her family life and career. Listen in for insight on how your clients’ betrayals or your betrayals may be causing issues for them or you.

Key Takeaways:

[:59] Sachin introduces Dr. Debi Silber, who joins us for a conversation about our business, our emotional health, integrity, and betrayal. [1:42] Betrayal is something we deal with constantly. It likely happened to us many years ago and it currently impacts the way we operate. It may impact our nervous system, our relationships, and the dreams and aspirations we reach for; certainly, it impacts our self-worth.

[2:17] Dr. Debi Silber has developed a very successful business following her passion and her mission, speaking to people about betrayal and the trauma that it causes, the impact it has, and the breakthroughs that can come as a result.

[2:35] Sachin thanks Dr. Debi for being here on Perfect Practice.

[3:34] Dr. Debi followed her gut. She had graduated from college with a double major in TV production and broadcast journalism but she learned that production wasn’t rewarding or fulfilling her. Debi didn’t immediately give up production, but health was what was calling to her.

[4:32] Eventually, Debi became an NSRD and a holistic dietician with a Master’s in nutrition. From there, Debi became a personal trainer. That business took off. Although Debi was eating well and exercising, she realized she was sick. She was anything but the picture of health.

[5:13] Debi studied to become a whole health coach. She learned that the thoughts she was thinking, the stress she was under, and the relationships she had were at the root of her sickness.

[5:30] Debi cut the ties and healed from all of it. That was the beginning of this new health journey. Years later, her traumas from betrayal led her to the Ph.D. program, the studies, and where she is now.

[5:51] Dr. Debi founded the Post Betrayal Transformation® Institute. She is a holistic psychologist with a health and personal development mindset. She is a two-time bestselling author. She has a popular podcast. She gave two TEDx talks. She’s been on the Dr. Oz Show.

[6:40] About toxic relationships. Dr. Debi says you’re in a toxic relationship when you start questioning and doubting yourself, when you stop believing in yourself and you figure that someone else knows better than you, and when you don’t realize your value and worth.

[7:21] Often, it starts with an early betrayal. A child is shushed by his mother and starts to think he doesn’t matter. If that’s his belief, it will affect his choices, the work he would do, and the people he would date, if it doesn’t get looked at.

[9:10] The second of Debi’s three discoveries is that post betrayal syndrome has symptoms. It shows up in health, work, and relationships. It can show up as a repeat betrayal. The faces change but it’s the same thing. You go from boss to boss, friend to friend, partner to partner.

[9:40] It’s not your fault, it’s your opportunity: There’s a profound lesson waiting to be learned! You are lovable, worthy, and deserving. You need better boundaries in place. Whatever it is, until and unless you get that, you will have opportunities in the form of people who teach you.

[9:56] A repeat betrayal means it is unhealed.

[9:59] The second way betrayal shows up in relationships is the big wall keeping everyone at a distance. It comes from a place of fear. Our trust was so shattered that we would rather keep everyone at bay than risk vulnerability and feel that pain again. That’s an unhealed betrayal.

[10:24] At work, your confidence was shattered so you don’t have the confidence to ask for a deserved raise or promotion, and you’re bitter and resentful instead. Or you want to be a team player but the person you trusted the most, or your boss, proved untrustworthy.

[10:47] In health, people go to a well-meaning doctor, coach, healer, or therapist to manage a stress-related issue. At the root of it is an unhealed betrayal.

[11:06] Dr. Debi founded National Forgiveness Day, September 1. If you’re working on forgiveness for the wrong reasons, it backfires every time. Move toward acceptance first, it’s an easier reach.

[12:26] Withholding forgiveness only hurts us. In the betrayed community, we feel the rug has been pulled out from under us and we barely have any control over our lives. Granting or withholding forgiveness is something within our control and we are hesitant to give it back.

[12:52] Debi shares a story of the power of forgiveness for an elderly woman with an old family betrayal. She also had digestive issues. She participated in a 21-day forgiveness journey. Two weeks into her forgiveness journey, she healed from her digestive issues.

[14:36] Dr. Debi says 95,000-plus men and women have taken the Post Betrayal Quiz from many countries. Of respondents, 78% constantly revisit their experience, 81% feel loss of personal power, 80% are hyper-vigilant, and 94% deal with painful triggers.

[15:08] Physical symptoms reported are low energy (71%), sleep issues (68%), extreme fatigue (63%), weight changes (47%), and digestive issues (45%). Mental symptoms reported are overwhelm (78%), disbelief (70%), shock (64%), and inability to concentrate (62%).

[15:42] You can’t concentrate, you have a gut issue, you’re exhausted, and you still have to raise your children; you still have to work.

[15:52] Emotionally, 88% experience extreme sadness; 83% are very angry. Think about what your nervous system is doing when that’s happening.

[16:07] Eighty-two percent are hurt; 79% are stressed; 84% have an inability to trust; 67% prevent themselves from forming deep relationships for fear of being hurt again; 82% find it hard to move forward, and 90% want to move forward but don’t know how.

[17:01] This betrayal could be from a parent when you were a child or the boyfriend or girlfriend who broke your heart in high school. They may not know, care, or even be alive and you have these symptoms from something years ago. You can heal from all of it.

[17:34] People typically go to therapy, where they feel heard but also retraumatize themselves, solidify their story, and make it who they are. They are stuck with repeat betrayals.

[18:32] Some people numb, avoid, and distract. They use food, drugs, alcohol, work, TV, or more to numb, avoid, and distract themselves. In PBT, people learn to face it, feel it, and heal it. That’s how to move through it. You can’t move through it if you're numbing or coasting.

[19:03] Some people join a support group and are miserable together. They sabotage their healing because they don’t want to outgrow their people.

[19:28] Numbing, hanging onto your story, or seeking people with the same story is like Krazy Glue® keeping you stuck in one spot, preventing you from moving through the five stages from betrayal to breakthrough.

[20:35] We can stay stuck for decades but if we’re going to fully heal from post betrayal syndrome to a completely rebuilt space, post betrayal transformation, (Dr. Debi’s first discovery), we’re going to move through five proven, predictable stages (Dr. Debi’s third discovery).

[20:58] We know what happens physically, mentally, and emotionally, at every one of the five stages and what it takes to move from one stage to the next. Healing is entirely predictable.

[21:18] Stage 1 is before it happens. Imagine four legs to a table, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. People lean heavily on the physical and mental and neglect the emotional and spiritual. A table with only two legs topples over.

[21:40] Stage 2 is shock, trauma, and discovery day. It’s the scariest, by far of the stages. It’s the breakdown of the body, mind, and worldview. You ignite the stress response. Your mind is in total chaos and overwhelm. You can’t wrap your mind around what you just learned.

[22:39] Stage 3 is survival instinct. You grab hold of anything or anyone to stay safe and alive. This is the most practical stage. It’s the most common place to get stuck. Once we’ve figured out how to survive our experience, as it feels better than shock and trauma, we plant roots.

[24:25] Because we don’t know there’s anywhere else to go, but it still feels bad, we start numbing and distracting. This can go on for years and we’re stuck in Stage 3.

[25:19] If you are willing to let go of your story, the benefits you’re receiving, grief, and more, you move to Stage 4.

[25:31] Stage 4 is finding and adjusting to a new normal. You acknowledge you can’t undo what happened but you control what you do with it. That turns down the stress and stops the damage you’ve been accumulating in Stage 2 and Stage 3. It feels like you’ve moved to a new place.

[25:55] When you move, you don’t take things with you that don’t represent who you are ready to become. Old relationships that were not there for you or don’t change with you are left behind. You’ve outgrown them.

[26:26] When you settle into your new space that you have made mentally home, you move into Stage 5. Stage 5 is healing, rebirth, and a new worldview. Your body starts to heal. Self-love, self-care, eating well, and exercising. You didn’t have the bandwidth for that before; now you do.

[26:44] Your mind is healing. You make new rules, set new boundaries, and you have a new worldview, based on everything you’ve been through. The four legs of your table, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual, are solidly grounded. You are focused on all four legs.

[27:04] Sachin relates his life’s growth to the five stages and speaks of a big shift when he moved away from a bad job. He considers his clients as possibly going through betrayal. He considers his relationship with his son and asks how to break the ice if he may be the betrayer.

[30:22] Debi’s betrayal came when she had four teens. It was the biggest wake-up call. They are so close now, like having been through a war together. At the time, she told them how she loved them and was not at her best, but was giving them the best she could. They supported her.

[31:07] Debi finds that nothing beats honesty. She explains how that would work in a conversation with a child about falling short in dealing with that child. When in doubt, honesty wins every time. Sachin recommends you play this part of the episode back and practice it.

[32:25] Debi adds advice for a betrayer who wants to be accountable and repair trust in a relationship. Your honesty is not supposed to flow out of you beautifully. That doesn’t build trust. It’s supposed to be awkward. You’re not supposed to be smooth at this. It’s unfamiliar to you.

[33:08] It’s OK. You’re learning something new because that person is worth it. Instead of trying to get the words right, just tap into your heart. Conversations go wrong when we go from our head to reach someone’s head or to reach their heart. Go from your heart to their heart.

[34:24] Debi has always gone by her intuition. Early on, with four kids, six dogs, and a thriving business, it was all about holding it together. Her advice is to be careful what feeds you. To keep it going, Debi was sacrificing sleep and cutting corners on herself, and that caught up quickly.

[35:15] The lesson learned led Debi to leave health in that way and move toward something that involves what stress is doing and what your lifestyle is creating. From there, Debi realized that toxic family relationships were at the root of her issues.

[35:52] When Debi cut those ties, her mentor told her it was like she had traded an anchor for a pair of wings. She healed from everything. Debi wrote her first book in two-and-a-half weeks. It flew out of her. She wanted every mom to know the “secret to everything” she thought she had.

[36:18] Debi became an FDN. Then Debi’s betrayal came, from her family and her husband. She enrolled in a Ph.D. program in transpersonal psychology and did her study on betrayal, to get herself out of the jam and understand how the mind works and why we do these things.

[37:05] When the discoveries in her study showed up, Debi was on a Zoom call with a mentor talking about the discoveries but not sharing her story. Her mentor told her to stop hiding behind her study. She knew he was right.

[37:45] She sat down with her children and her husband, as they were working on reconciliation, and told them she was going to write their story in a book. Her children approved. Her husband got emotional and said, “You’re going to help so many people.” So it was in the book.

[38:30] Debi gave two TEDx talks. In the first one, “Stop Sabotaging Yourself,” six weeks after her betrayal, she hinted at her story. In the second one, “Do You Have Post Betrayal Syndrome?” she talked about her betrayal for one of the first times. It’s changed her life.

[39:24] Debi describes how people move through the stages at the PBT. She also offers two certification programs: Certified PBT Coach or Practioner and Certified Support Group Host. The intention is for people to get the right kind of support to lift and inspire them.

[40:15] Support groups are going up around the world, the PBT is growing and certifying more coaches and getting more members, especially corporate employees with fear, who are acting from unhealed betrayals of years ago. PBT is approaching corporations to help address this.

[41:58] Debi loves speaking and would like to do more of it. In the beginning for her, speaking was a means of imparting information. Then she realized it’s not about information but about sharing a special experience with the audience, as though telling them about a great book.

[42:34] When Debi changed her speaking to sharing what excited her, she began to love speaking. Her favorite parts are the book signing or getting to hug people afterward. Her talks sometimes shock people to prod them out of numbness.

[43:32] When it comes to sharing your message, share it in a way that feels really good for you. If blogging feels natural and comfortable, do that. If podcasting feels great, do that. Or being on stages. The world needs what you have in the specific way you have it.

[44:01] Don’t try everything. When you’re doing what you do best, it’s effortless and you love it. Why not just do more of that?

[45:26] Debi describes the Hero’s Journey, going about their business, then there’s the big trauma, and then the part where they start to rise and realize their worth and value. The trauma starts to subside and they ask “What can I do with this and use it to my advantage?”

[46:18] That’s what excites Debi, because that’s when you’ll see new levels of health, new relationships, new passion projects, new businesses, and endless possibilities.

[47:26] The PBT offers two tracks for certifying PBT coaches. One is for coaches and healers and the other is for doctors, therapists, counselors, psychologists, and psychiatrists. It’s the same training of the five stages, it’s just a difference in the title and pay of coach or practitioner.

[47:50] The ideal candidate is a coach who has experienced betrayal and wants to serve this niche. As 45% of betrayed people have digestive issues, a digestive doctor would be a perfect candidate. How much more effective would they be if they got to the root cause of the issue?

[49:05] If a practitioner wants to refer to Dr. Debi Silber, start at ThePBTInstitute.com. The PBT can work remotely. They have clients and coaches all over the world. There’s a recent coach from Dubai and one who’s starting from Kenya. Members are from all over the world.

[49:45] Dr. Debi Silber shares her one message with the world: “As it relates to betrayal, even though it happened to you, it’s not about you. Say that to yourself a million times until you believe it because that’s absolutely true. There’s a roadmap. Healing has become a choice.”

[50:03] “As far as business goes, follow your gut. If you feel called to do something, it’s because you’re supposed to. And do it boldly, and proudly, and don’t give up, ever.”

[50:32] Sachin thanks Dr. Debi Silber for being such a source of inspiration on Perfect Practice. Sachin would love to hear about breakthroughs his listeners have as a result of listening to this conversation. Listeners, please check out the links in the show notes.

[51:39] Dr. Debi Silber thanks Sachin.

Mentioned in this episode

Perfect Practice Live

“Debi Silber: Stop Sabotaging Yourself” TEDx

“Debi Silber: Do You Have Post Betrayal Syndrome?” TEDx

More about your host Sachin Patel

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Books by Sachin Patel:

Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth

The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Tweetables:

“You’re in a toxic relationship when you start questioning and doubting yourself; when you stop believing in yourself and you figure that someone else knows better than you; when you don’t realize your value and your worth.” — Dr. Debi Silber

“A repeat betrayal means it is unhealed.” — Dr. Debi Silber

“Withholding forgiveness only hurts us.” — Dr. Debi Silber

“Stage 5 is healing, rebirth, and a new worldview. Your body starts to heal with self-love, self-care, eating well, and exercising. You didn’t have the bandwidth for that before; now you do.” — Dr. Debi Silber

“We just want to get the Five Stages into as many hands as possible.” — Dr. Debi Silber

Dr. Debi Silber, WBENC Certified WBE The PBT® Institute