From Survival Mode to Self-Worth: How Therapy, Boundaries & Choosing Yourself Changes Everything with Rhona Vega Pt. 2

Podcast
Written By Liv Lewis

What does it actually look like to do the work after leaving? Not the leaving itself, but the long, unglamorous, necessary process of figuring out who you are, what you want, and why you kept choosing the wrong thing in the first place?

In Part 2 of this two-part episode, Rhona Vega picks up where she left off and takes us deeper into the healing side of her story. After two marriages, two divorces, and a cross-country move to safety, Rhona finally sat down with a therapist and started peeling back layers she did not even know were there. What she found was not weakness. It was a woman who had never been taught how to date, never been given a checklist, never been shown what a healthy relationship actually looked like, and who had been quietly assigning meaning to trauma and calling it normal her whole life.

This episode gets into the real work of post-divorce healing and what it takes to break generational patterns in relationships. Rhona talks about joining a community that introduced her to self-worth and self-value in a way no one had before. She shares what it felt like to meet a man who was genuinely kind and why that scared her. She opens up about her daughter asking why he was so nice to her mother, and what that question revealed about the damage that had quietly been done.

Rhona also shares the unexpected discovery at 50 that reframed her entire sense of identity, why she still considers herself a work in progress, and what boundaries, self-care, and grace have come to mean to her now.

If you are somewhere in the middle of starting over and wondering when the hard part ends, this episode is your permission slip to go slower, go deeper, and choose yourself first.

If you have not listened to Part 1 yet, start there. This story is even more powerful from the beginning.

You'll walk away understanding:

  • Why healing after divorce or an abusive relationship requires going back to childhood, not just addressing what happened in the marriage

  • How not knowing how to date or vet a partner is not a personal failure but a gap in what we were never taught

  • Why a healthy relationship can feel unfamiliar or even suspicious when control and chaos have been your normal

  • How therapy, community, and self-awareness work together to break relationship cycles and rebuild identity

  • Why boundaries are not just a buzzword but the actual foundation of choosing yourself and protecting your peace

  • How grace, not anger, can become your most powerful tool for moving forward after being hurt

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Liv Lewis
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How I Left an Abusive Marriage Twice: Survival, Patterns & Choosing Peace with Rhona Vega Pt. 1