The holidays can be beautiful—and deeply tender. In this episode of Not That Girl Anymore, Dawn Bouillion is joined by Dottie Griffin and Ashley Woodard for an honest conversation about braving the holidays with gentleness, presence, and self-compassion.

They explore grief, pressure, people-pleasing, and the longing for connection, while offering grounding practices and reminders that your worth isn’t earned through performance. This episode is a soft place to land—permission to slow down, protect your peace, and honor where you are.

You’re not alone. You don’t have to be perfect. And you’re braving this season in real time.

The holidays can magnify loss, heartache, and the lives we no longer have. In this episode of Not That Girl Anymore, Dawn Bouillion—trauma therapist and coach—speaks gently and honestly about grief during the holidays.

This episode is for anyone:

• Missing a loved one
• Grieving a relationship, marriage, or version of life that’s gone
• Feeling pressure to be “okay” when they’re not

Grief isn’t something we get over—it’s something we learn to carry. Together, we explore how to honor grief without judgment, create meaningful rituals, set boundaries, and care for your nervous system during a season that can feel overwhelming.

You are not broken. You are grieving—and that makes sense.

In this powerful episode of Not That Girl Anymore, trauma therapist and coach Dawn Boon unpacks why Christmas can feel overwhelming, heavy, or emotionally unsafe for survivors of narcissistic or dysregulated family systems.

If you feel that familiar knot in your stomach as the holidays approach, this conversation reminds you: you’re not imagining it, you’re not dramatic, and you’re not alone.

Dawn breaks down:

• Why the holidays activate old survival roles (caretaker, scapegoat, lost child, golden child)
• How narcissistic dynamics escalate around Christmas
• Why joy threatens a narcissist — and why your joy matters
• Trauma reactivation in the nervous system
• How guilt, confusion, and cognitive dissonance keep you stuck
• Real-life examples of emotional sabotage, chaos, triangulation, and boundary-punishment
• How to choose safety, boundaries, and self-care without apology

You’ll also learn practical tools to protect your peace this holiday season—lowering expectations, limiting exposure, regulating your body, and creating new rituals that honor your healing.

This Christmas, your healing, your peace, and your joy matter. And you're not that girl anymore.

IIn this episode of Not That Girl Anymore, Dawn Bouillon is joined by guests Ashley Woodard and Dottie Griffin for an honest, heartfelt conversation about why the holiday season can feel overwhelming for so many women—and what you can actually do about it.

Together, they unpack:

• How perfectionism gets activated during the holidays
• Why old family roles (the fixer, the peacekeeper, the helper, the scapegoat) resurface
• The pressure to create “magical moments,” match social media standards, and please everyone
• How guilt tricks you into overextending yourself
• Practical boundaries you can set around time, emotions, capacity, and family dynamics
• Why saying “no” (without explanation) is often the most loving choice
• How to honor your own joy, needs, peace, and traditions
• Permission to create a holiday that feels good to you, not just good for others

This episode is a guide to reclaiming your holiday from burnout, resentment, and pressure—and stepping into a season defined by authenticity, presence, and peace.

Because it’s your holiday, too. And you’re not that girl anymore.

In this powerful and deeply affirming episode of Not That Girl Anymore, Dawn welcomes Dottie and Ashley for a transformative conversation on one of the most life-changing mindset shifts in healing: Gap Brain vs. Gain Brain.

Dottie explains how “gap brain” keeps us focused on everything we haven’t accomplished—how far we still have to go, what’s missing, and all the ways we think we’re falling short. For trauma survivors especially, this mindset often comes from old survival strategies and perfectionistic patterns rooted in childhood.

But there’s another way.

“Gain brain” invites us to look backward instead of forward—to measure our progress by how far we’ve already come. To celebrate small steps. To honor resilience. To slow down, breathe deeper, and build confidence from the inside out.

Together, Dawn, Dottie, and Ashley unpack:

• The emotional and somatic differences between gap brain and gain brain
• Why perfectionism can’t survive inside a gain-brain mindset
• How celebrating tiny steps rewires self-worth and nervous system safety
• The role of community and supportive relationships in sustaining healing
• Real-life stories of how shifting this mindset transforms marriages, friendships, parenting, and self-trust

As the holidays approach, the trio invites listeners to reflect on who they were a year ago and recognize just how far they’ve already come.

This episode is equal parts grounding, inspiring, and deeply compassionate.

A reminder that:

✨ You matter. Your story matters. Your healing matters.

✨ And you truly are not that girl anymore.

As the holidays draw near, Dawn invites you into a gentle, honest conversation about gratitude — the kind that doesn’t ignore pain or demand performance, but the kind that heals.

If you’ve ever been told to “just be grateful” while you were grieving, overwhelmed, or holding yourself together, this episode will feel like a deep exhale. Dawn explores what true gratitude looks like when it’s embodied, compassionate, and safe.

Through powerful reflections and personal stories, she reminds us that gratitude isn’t about pretending everything’s fine — it’s about noticing the small, sacred threads of being alive: the warmth of coffee, laughter across a room, the light returning to our eyes.

✨ Listen when you need grounding, softness, or a reminder that joy grows right alongside the hard.

Plus, hear Dawn’s heartfelt invitation to join Wise Women Collective’s Celebration Fridays — a free global gathering where women celebrate life’s wins, big and small.

We’re taught to chase perfection—to get it right, to be good, to hold it together. But perfection is rarely about excellence. More often, it’s about fear: fear of being seen, fear of being judged, fear of being too much or not enough. In this conversation, we explore how perfectionism forms, how it shows up in our work, parenting, relationships, and self-image, and what it costs us emotionally and spiritually.

This episode is an invitation to soften.

To release the pressure to perform.

To return to your humanity.

To remember, you don’t need to earn your right to exist.

We talk about:

• How perfectionism forms in childhood
• Why “being perfect” is a survival pattern, not a personality trait
• The emotional exhaustion of constantly managing how others see you
• What happens in the body when we begin to let perfection go
• The freedom found in being seen as we truly are

If you’ve ever felt like you’re holding your breath in your own life, this conversation is your reminder:

You are allowed to exhale.

In this conversation, Dawn is joined by Dottie and Ashley for a deeply honest discussion about what it really means to grow up in a dysfunctional family system—and how we often mistake survival patterns for love.

Because when love is mixed with control, silence, caretaking, or unpredictability, we learn to protect ourselves in ways that once kept us safe—but eventually keep us small.

This episode gently names those patterns with compassion, curiosity, and clarity, so we can begin to heal without blaming ourselves or our families.

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