Stripping Off with Matt Haycox
Welcome to 'Stripping Off with Matt Haycox,' where we bare it all on business, money, and life. Get ready to peel back the layers of success with entrepreneur, investor, funding expert, and mentor with over 20 years of experience building and growing businesses, Matt Haycox.
Tune into steamy conversations with industry titans, celebrities, and successful entrepreneurs as they strip down their stories of triumphs, setbacks, and the raw realities of their journey to the top. Matt is going down on business, money, and life, and will take DMCs to new heights!
Stripping Off with Matt Haycox
Domestic Violence is a Silent Killer: Natalie Russell’s Journey from Abuse to Empowerment!
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In this compelling episode of Stripping Off with Matt Haycox, Matt sits down with Natalie Russell, a self-esteem and relationship recovery coach whose incredible story is one of resilience and transformation. Facing a life of abuse, addiction, prison, and toxic relationships, Natalie has endured unimaginable hardship. But instead of letting her past define her, she’s used her journey to inspire others and empower herself to become a role model for breaking generational cycles of pain.
Natalie’s story will resonate with anyone who’s experienced adversity, whether it’s in relationships, personal growth, or addiction recovery. She shares the inner resolve it takes to walk away from toxicity and the process of healing that she calls “learning to love the woman that I am.” As Natalie so powerfully states, “If I can’t find a decent man, I’m sure as hell going to raise two.”
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- How to break generational cycles of toxic relationships and abuse: Natalie talks about becoming the “generation breaker.”
- The importance of self-love and self-worth: Why healing begins with our relationship with ourselves.
- How to build resilience in the face of overwhelming challenges: Natalie’s story shows how hitting rock bottom can spark transformation.
- Real-life tools for recovery and self-esteem building: Tips for anyone needing to rebuild from the ground up.
This episode will inspire listeners to re-evaluate their relationships, find their strength, and recognise the power of healing. It’s for anyone ready to make a life-changing shift.
Timestamps
0:00 - Intro
1:27 - Natalie’s Background
5:00 - Natalie’s Relationship with her parents
7:59 - Drugs & Sexual Abuse
14:45 - Pregnancy at 14 from S.A.
17:48 - Leaving her Dad's house
19:09 - In Prison 5 Times by 22
22:36 - Out of Prison and Swearing Off Drugs
26:09 - Moving into the YMCA
30:15 - Did You Fight Back?
35:08 - The Turning Point for a New Life
39:27 - Becoming a Relationship Coach
40:27 - Common Traits in Clients
45:46 - Toxic Relationships
50:34 - Client Stories
52:29 - My Mum, Your Dad - Dating TV Show
59:22 - The Future for Natalie
1:00:33 - Final Thoughts
Who Is Matt Haycox? - Click for BADASS Trailer
Are you ready to unlock your full potential and take your business to the next level? I’m Matt Haycox—entrepreneur, investor, mentor, and your go-to guy for no-bollocks advice on business and personal growth.
With over 25 years of experience building and funding businesses across industries, I’ve faced it all—wins, losses, and the ultimate comeback story. Through my podcasts, No Bollocks with Matt Haycox and Stripping Off with Matt Haycox, I cut through the bullshit to bring you real, actionable strategies and raw conversations with entrepreneurs, celebrities, and industry leaders.
Whether you’re looking to scale your business, secure funding, or avoid the mistakes I’ve learned the hard way, my goal is simple: to help YOU create YOUR success story.
Want more? Subscribe to my No Bollocks Newsletter and get weekly insider tips on entrepreneurship, strategy, and business growth—because learning in 10 minutes is way better than wasting years on an MBA.
Ready to make moves? Let’s go—your success starts here.
If you or someone else has faced abuse, toxic relationship or struggles with self-esteem, then this episode is for you, because Natalie Russell's story is one of survival and rebuilding. As a self-esteem and relationship recovery coach, she shares first-hand insights into breaking free from pain and finding self-worth. So get ready for a powerful conversation that could change your life. Welcome to Stripping Off with Matt Haycox, where we get straight to the point, and today I'm joined by Natalie Russell, who is a true force of nature. She's faced abuse, addiction and prison, but instead of letting that define her, she's turned her life around and she's empowering others to do the same. In this episode, natalie opens up about breaking free from toxic relationships and the real work of rebuilding your life. This isn't just for entrepreneurs. It's for anyone ready to escape the cycles of pain. So tune in for raw honesty, hard-earned insights and the inspiration you need to spark real change. Natalie Russell, welcome to the show. Thanks, matt. Self-esteem coach, relationship recovery coach.
Speaker 1:We were having a good chat before we started recording and, and I guess, talking a few things relationship and lifestyle, and monogamy and polygamy, polyogamy and you see, I can't say I'm so monogamous, I can't even say, I can't even say polyogamy, um, but um, I guess the the, the happy and coaching life that you live now, uh, is not where this story began certainly not I. I mean, I won't. I guess I'm just going to throw the mic over to you, to, you know, take us back to the beginning, and I'll probably ask some questions and do a few rude interruptions along the way. But yeah, I mean, when did your colourful background begin?
Speaker 2:I think with most people, when you delve into anyone who's had a really colourful background, when you delve into it is normally most of our issues stem from our formative years, like and science is proving that how our brain makeup is formed, our neural pathways are formed, our attachment bonds are formed. They're all from childhood and it's not necessarily just your parents. So this isn't saying that it's like all your parents fault, but those formative relationships and your developmental stages have a massive impact. So yeah.
Speaker 2:I like my dad wasn't present at all, he was. He came and visited here and there. My mum was left on her own and financially raising my sister and me.
Speaker 1:So forgive me interrupting already, but if we kind of start on a, let's say, a chronological age timeline or how this began, so you were one of how many kids?
Speaker 2:So me and my sister, we both have the same mum and dad. And she's an older sister yeah, she's a year and four months older and my dad left when I was 18 months old. So my mum was left very young. My mum's mum had died when she was 14. Her dad had gone off and started a new family, so my mum was living on her own from 16. She met my dad. How old was she when she had you and your sister? 22 and 23. And my first child was at 23. We play out patterns, quite often subconscious patterns. From what we've seen, I was saying monkey sees, monkey does, stuck in my brain because we do, it's learned behaviour, it's learned patterns and some of them are so deeply unconscious. So, yeah, my dad left at 18 months. We did see him a little bit.
Speaker 1:I was going to say when he left, was that gone?
Speaker 2:Not completely gone, but it was very sporadic and my dad there wasn't engagement he would pick us up. He took us to the park a bit I remember little bits like that but he'd take us to the pub and then he'd go drinking with his mates and we'd sit in the pub garden.
Speaker 1:Right three, four, five years old.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or he'd take us to our nan's, he'd drop us off for the whole day, come back and get us and take us home, and so, yeah, there was very little engagement and definitely a lack of connection. My mum then got remarried a few years later, when I was about six or seven. To my stepdad had a younger brother and sister to my stepdad had a younger brother and sister, and then he ran off and had an affair and my mum was left again and there was always like financial pressure constantly.
Speaker 1:Hey, matt here thanks for listening to stripping off with Matt Haycox, but did you also know I've got another podcast, no bollocks, with Matt Haycox, both of these very different. If you're enjoying the deep dives with the guests that I have every week on Stripping Off, then you're going to love the quick, short business tips, strategies and tactics I give you on no Bollocks. This comes out nearly every day. Make sure you go and check it out on iTunes, spotify, youtube, wherever you listen to your content, and I'll see you in a future episode. Before your stepdad left, how had your relationship with him developed?
Speaker 2:At first there was a lot of attention, but he was. I look back now. Obviously, from looking through a child's eyes you see the world very differently and you relate everything to you. So I internalised every behaviour, every action. It meant something about me. So there was a connection.
Speaker 2:For a while he in and then they have financial pressures. My brother and sister came along and I could see the difference in the connection and it was I was reaching, probably me and my sister were reaching the age where we were difficult, like 11, 12, hormones are kicking in and I had experienced sexual abuse at the age of four or five From who? It was an extended family member outside of the family home. So, yeah, at the age of 11, 12, that's when I started to come into the realisation of that that had happened. Family life was breaking down at that point, um, financial pressure was high and so it was just a very stressful environment and I felt very like dropped and abandoned by my stepdad at the time. I think he was just struggling to cope. He was quite young when he took us on um dealing with his own stuff and my mum not having anyone to lean on, not having family um really present.
Speaker 1:I think, yeah, she was dealing with her own demons and traumas how, how was your relationship with your mum being well, all of that kind of first 10 or 12 years of your life, you know, whilst your dad had left, whilst your stepdad was on the scene?
Speaker 2:If I'm honest, I don't really remember much. I know that my mum loved me but I don't know whether I believed that from when I can remember. But she worked a lot. She was trying to survive, like and we were living on the breadline Like she was financially struggling and trying to survive and working all the time so was exhausted with that, had her own internal stuff going on. So I just remember a lot of conflict.
Speaker 2:But when we have strong emotions attached to stuff, it resonates deep in our brain, right it sticks. Attached to stuff, it resonates deep in our brain, right it sticks. So I remember a lot of experiences that just stuck and they were the negative ones. And I know that there were positive experiences. I know that. And my mum worked on horse stables so we got to have a little pony on loan and I used to go riding across the fields. It that you know we had experiences. It wasn't all horrific, but there was. From the age of 11. All I can remember is conflict like it. It was just a conflict at home and that wired my nervous system in a certain way and and when did you become naughty then?
Speaker 2:at the age of 11, I started smoking cigarettes and that was the first time I remember self-harming. So I was trying to process what had happened to me. I hadn't told anyone, only my sister had I confided in. This is a sexual abuse. Yeah, the sexual abuse.
Speaker 1:How long did it go on for?
Speaker 2:I only remember, and this is it. Memories came very hazy in terms of how many times it happened. I remember at least four or five times, but what happened is very deeply ingrained. I was able to. I obviously won't share other people's journeys, but there was someone else who experienced it alongside me and they remembered exactly the same stuff as me.
Speaker 1:So it's, it's but did you forget about it effectively, or let's hide it potentially from the years of you know, from four or five years old until 11 or 12, or was it always there in the back of your mind?
Speaker 2:Well, I don't, because I guess, as a four or five-year-old, you might not think it's not acceptable at that point.
Speaker 2:I don't think I did.
Speaker 2:I knew that I didn't like it, but I was told it was a secret game and I didn't know any different. And it's not like we're in today's society where we're constantly exposed to, you know, people being sexually abused and that's a common thing and speaking out is a common thing. We didn't have that awareness at that age, so it was just me coming to my own conclusions and obviously at 11, 12, then you start to understand a bit more about sexuality and stuff like that and that's when I started to realise, hold on, that that wasn't right and I went for a real confused stage of why did I not ever say no If I didn't like it? Why did I let it happen? Did I enjoy it happening? Is that why? So then I turned it internally, because as a child again, you interpret and feed everything back to yourself. You, you're the center of your universe, right? So, um, yeah, I became very confused and I think it just blurred my sexual boundaries. So I became promiscuous from quite a young age because there were no sexual boundaries.
Speaker 1:With people of your own age.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, because when I was 14, the person I lost my virginity to was 21. So, yeah, I think I yeah. And then I ran away from home at 14 and a half and that person was 21 and that ended up in a sexual assault and I ended up pregnant from that um, that's when I'd left home completely. At that point I was picked up by police about five days after running away and I refused to go home. By that point I had so much deep anger with the world my mum, my home, myself, just everything and I'd started abusing substances by this. So I was abusing cannabis from 12 and then, approaching 14, I was starting to do acid and um and then, approaching 14, I was starting to do acid and um, approaching yeah, and then after that, after running away from home and having that experience, and then has a termination at 14 and a half, I moved.
Speaker 2:I actually ended up living with my dad and step-mom, um, because I was going to be put in a children's home, but far away, and I basically refused and said I'd keep on running away because I wanted to go in a children's home just around the corner from my mum, because I didn't want to be at home, but I didn't want to be completely alone either, but yeah, so they took me in. However, it's very different. My mum was very strict with boundaries that I fought against consistently, um, and that home there were none, so I went from having to fight against it to being able to do what I wanted. Um, my dad I probably in the whole year that I lived there. I spoke to him maybe three times in a whole year, that's that's the only and one of them was on my birthday, where he gave me a pack of king-size Rizzler, a bag of weed and a box of bags.
Speaker 1:But what would happen in the house? I mean, you'd see him in the house.
Speaker 2:Very rarely. He was a heavy weed smoker. He drank every day. Yeah, there was very little engagement. My stepmom, um, I talked to she was mainly the one I mean he cooked a few meals but yeah, he was just he. He wouldn't engage in conversation. I never had a hug from my dad. He never said I love you. There was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there was very little there just go back to the uh, but to the self-harming. A minute, you know, I think, when you're 11 or 12, what, what goes through your mind in in that self-harming kind of process? You know, like what are you thinking? Why do you start to do it? What are you looking to achieve?
Speaker 2:I think there's a combination of things. There's two and now, like as an adult and I've done extensive research into trying to understand human behavior and why we do what we do and I think it was a two-pronged thing. One is, um, it's called the games that we play. They're subconscious games that we try to do to get our needs met. We don't realize we're playing games, but we are, because we're trying to get needs met that we can't vocalize or don't know how to vocalize. So we go about maladaptive behaviors to try and get that need met.
Speaker 2:So one of it was to go show to other people, like my mum and I'm in pain, I'm hurting and I need a need mare, um, but my mum didn't know how to navigate that at that point. And I think the other bit was I just felt so much rage and anger and it was turned inwards. So I think it was a combination of those two. I wanted other people to come and soothe my pain and I wanted some other form of distraction from my pain, other form of distraction from my pain, so that it was a kind of, I guess, a release of that deep internal rage. Um, and I just found over the years different ways to try and um soothe that deep, gnawing rage filled desperation inside of me.
Speaker 1:What happened with the pregnancy when you were 14? So it was, yeah, a sexual assault, and Sexual assault from, but he was the guy that you were with at the time.
Speaker 2:Well, I'd run away from him. I wasn't with him, I'd run away from home with him. I mean, again, my memory is so hazy and I don't remember anything over those four, five days that I was missing, apart from this one incident, the one incident, because I couldn't I couldn't walk. Well, afterwards it was, yeah, I was in a lot of pain, so it was very embedded in my mind. Um, and didn't see the guy again. After that, um, the police came and picked me up. He was living in a hostel and when we got back to his hostel, the police arrived and that was it and I just didn't ever say anything to anyone.
Speaker 2:I felt like I'd put myself in that circumstance. Had I called it on? Had I was it my fault? Again personally internalized it, um, yeah, and had the termination and no one ever spoke to me about it. Again, I never spoke to anyone about it. So again, I felt shame.
Speaker 2:I felt you know it's a lot to go through as a 14 year old without having anyone to communicate all of this stuff with. So I just looked for ways to self-soothe, to try and avoid my pain, and drugs became my best friend. You found they helped. I found that it allowed me to escape reality completely and not have to feel, um, and for those moments I was happy and joyful. You know, I started doing pills and coke and and things like that and, and I at the time I thought I was having a well of a time and I probably did some of the times.
Speaker 2:I'm not gonna lie, I probably did have some amazing times on there, um, but in between, most of that, I just allowed myself to get used and abused, and sexually, yeah, I guess I just the amount of times that I I had interactions where I didn't even want to have them but I just didn't have the self-esteem to say no, I didn't care about myself, I didn't have regard for myself and I had such a desperate because the self-hate was so deep, I had such a desperate need for validation from anybody and whatever validation and form that came in. So, um it, yeah, it was like I was like an energy vampire. I needed something of you giving me some sort of attention or affection for me to kind of feel a little bit okay with myself. But the fact is it perpetuates the cycle, because as soon as you've got that, then you feel used and then you feel even more shit about yourself.
Speaker 1:And then the cycle, yeah, repeats where did you go to after you left your dad's house?
Speaker 2:so my sister was in a bm um, had a bnb, a bedsit, and I stayed with her um. Then we got a flat together, um, and within a year we were made homeless. Because I started dating a guy. There was domestic abuse involved. All of his mates would come there. It became kind of where everyone went and the place got absolutely trashed. We were attacked, we had the door kicked in and were attacked by some girls that were attached to him. It was just utter chaos. So by yeah, 16 and a half, I think, I was homeless for the first time. She moved away. At that point, your sister, my sister moved away. At that point, your sister, my sister, um, and my life just absolutely nosedived into addiction. Um, with heavier substances. I just think the more trauma I experienced, um, the deeper the pain got, the wider the soul hole got. I guess that that that void and yeah.
Speaker 1:So when, um, you've done some prison time as well, I have when. When did that come into things?
Speaker 2:so by um the age of 22, I'd been to prison five times. The first time I was 17. I went to five rehab centres.
Speaker 1:What were these five offences?
Speaker 2:They were all a lot of them. I was on remand so I'd commit an offence. I'd not turn up for court. Or I'd commit, I'd get caught for like 10 offences. So checkbook and cards, and they got me on handwriting samples for like 20 plus offences. Or I stole a prescription pad from a doctor's surgery and wrote myself prescriptions.
Speaker 1:But it was typically stuff related to theft that was either to get money or to further a drug habit.
Speaker 2:That's all it was. Yeah, so it was mainly theft and then fraud I did, yeah, extensive amounts of fraud. There was fighting in there and carrying a bladed article and threatening to endanger life. So, yeah, I was pretty chaotic and pretty prolific. Yeah, I've got a 14-page charge, like like. It's like a little booklet. My charge sheet is nothing that I'm proud of because it just shows I was a pretty crap criminal, to be fair.
Speaker 2:But, um, yeah it, uh, it just all amounted out because my whole world was sucked into. And the first time I tried heroin I I didn't even know it was an addictive substance. That's how naive I was. It was, um, I thought people got addicted to it because they were weak or they just weren't like me and someone gave it to me for two weeks. They stayed in my house and then disappeared and I woke up um two days later after they'd gone home and I literally thought I was dying and it was the most intense, intensely physical pain, to the point I thought I was actually dying.
Speaker 2:And then someone gave me a bit and the relief that I felt in that moment. You just become so gripped in, never wanting to feel like that again. But it's insane because you go through this cycle in prison the amount of times I wanted to. If I had something to kill myself, I probably would, because you're you're sat there with the first few times I went in no tv, no radio, no book, no nothing. 23 hour, bang up in a cell with just your own mind, and when you have spent a lifetime trying to run away from your own mind, that's torture.
Speaker 1:Were you getting drugs in prison?
Speaker 2:Not until the sentence. The sentence was my last time in prison and then I got drugs brought in a few times but I kept on getting extra time because they'd catch me through urine tests. And then I get and it was the second time that I got extra time. There was something in me that just snapped and woke up and I just thought I I need to do something different. I um, I was so fearful at that point of coming out and going back into. I would have rather have died. It was either I need to come out and something needs to shift or I'm just done with life because I can't live in that cycle anymore and you say you came.
Speaker 1:So you came out there when you're about 22, 23, yeah, which is around the time you had your first child as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I fell pregnant the day I came out of prison.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, celebrating.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so his dad I had been in a chaotic dynamic with before we went in. He had addiction issues and I mean I got together with him the day I got released from psychiatric hospital after trying to kill myself, so you can tell where my state of mind wasn't my choice making um and he clearly had a certain type too yeah, so um, I said I guess where I was going with that question was.
Speaker 1:so when you came out of prison, you said that something had snapped inside you and you knew you needed to do something different. Had your chaotic stories, as you call them, had they then ended at that point, or are we going to still go on to more problems? Well, yeah, we've not even begun. I'd better cancel my next appointment.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'd love to say that it was over In terms of drug taking. I only ever used two more times, and those two times took me to the most chaotic nights of where I risked. I was with someone who dragged me into something and I could have got four or five years for what that person drugged in just one night. It was just insane and I I was suicidal the next day what drugs were you taking?
Speaker 2:heroin and crack, um and um, there was one night that someone, um, had given me a whole load to test, to try, and I put it in my cupboard and I didn't know I was pregnant by this point. But I was so desperate that I got on my hands and my knees and I didn't have a faith. I didn't have, and if God did exist, exist then he could go screw himself, basically, um, but I was so desperate I knew if I, if I picked up that bag of gear, I was going to kill myself. I was done. I just I didn't want to use that desperately because I knew where it was going to take me and I couldn't do it anymore.
Speaker 1:Um, did you manage? You managed to get off the drugs almost, almost like that. You know you didn't wean off. You had to wean off when I went into prison.
Speaker 2:At first I had to do a detox, but when I came out I'd only used twice, so there wasn't any weaning off to do. But the psychological is just as powerful as the physical. Um, like draw and um, but I had, I don't. I can only put it down to like a spiritual experience. But whatever that looks like or whatever people want to make of it, there was something that shifted inside of me and every desire to use that drug just completely disappeared. I was on my knees for about half an hour, praying, just like if there's anything just shift something in me, and I had some sort of experience where I felt the most immense peace that I've ever felt in my life. And that was the point. It shifted and I gave the drugs back and I said don't ever bring it around me again. And that was it. And then I found out I was pregnant, moved to Bournemouth and started to rebuild my life moved to Bournemouth with the guy you were pregnant to no I moved away from him.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, I I needed to get away from him. He was still in chaos.
Speaker 1:It was a very toxic he was a drug user who's abusive yeah.
Speaker 2:So, um yeah, moved and moved into the YMCA, started in a hostel with my pregnant belly and a couple of bin bags and a hi-fi stack system.
Speaker 2:That was where it began um, I remember the hi-fis yeah, I can't remember which one I had, but yeah, it was a good little system, uh. So, yeah, it from there it started and I started to rebuild my life. In many ways. I did a lot of the recovery 12 step recovery for many years and found faith and started seeking that and started getting therapy and started training in therapy and did voluntary work and worked in addiction centres and with mental health, and so I've worked in that field of human behaviour for years and people with trauma. So that was all good.
Speaker 2:My relationship to myself and depression and anxiety and picking toxic relationships still had so such a long way to go.
Speaker 2:My choice in men had, um, caused me so much suffering, um, in terms of, but really, ultimately it's the relationship with myself, the how I see myself in the world, how um unlovable I felt, how um low my self-esteem was.
Speaker 2:I thought that, you know, if I could just get someone to love me and I could get someone to choose me and we could build this nice little family and buy the house and the white picket fence and have nice money and and then life would be perfect and um, that was so far from the truth and so far from my journey. It's unreal because I still had a deep level of self-hatred, like there was so much shame that I carried because of my story and and the experiences that I'd gone through. I didn't think I was worth um more than someone who came from equally as much chaos as me, and I also had probably a bit of a rescuing part of me as well, like desperate need to be rescued, but went on a attempt to rescue myself and in that let's say the time from 23 onwards, let's call it you know so.
Speaker 1:so when you moved to the YMCA and, you know, started to rebuild, obviously, like you and we'll talk about it in a minute you had a lot of work to still do on yourself. But was that the end then of the drugs, of the prisons, of the abusive relationships, domestic abuse?
Speaker 2:No, so it was the end of the drugs, it was the end of the prison. Like when I say I completely transformed that around. Um, yeah, like I've never looked back with that stuff. I do socially drink now. That was after 10 years of being completely sober. Within the the span of between, um, I think it was just before I I started moving over socially drinking, maybe a year before I had one night where I I used drugs. It was just before I started moving over to socially drinking, maybe a year before I had one night where I used drugs.
Speaker 2:It was with my youngest son's dad, who had gone back out into addiction. The moment I'd found out I was pregnant and I had been left financially ruined just about a baby that we'd planned and I was left with that. I was robbed. It stole a lot from me. Yeah, there was, yeah, a lot of toxic behavior towards me within that relationship and my reactions. I will never sit here and go. It was all them, these toxic men. I chose them and I stayed and I tried to force people to change who weren't ready to change.
Speaker 1:So I played my part in those toxic dynamics, but the abusiveness was definitely directed at me and and when you're in these or when you were in these abusive situations, you know, I guess, physical violence, mental violence, you know, mental violence, etc. Was it when I know you say you played your part in in terms of picking them and stuff. But I mean, were you also, were you also fighting back physically and mentally and verbally? You know, were you? I'm not going to say were you the victim, obviously you were a victim to it, but but was it? Were these two-way barnies that got out of control, or were you meek and mild and getting a good kicking?
Speaker 2:No, I think I mean my first abusive relationship, absolutely. I just got the kickings. I was very meek and mild. The other ones quite often I would take and I would take Like not all of them were only physical in parts. It's not like it was a weekly beating or anything like that. There was a lot of verbal abuse, like so much gaslighting making me think I was crazy because there was infidelity running rife.
Speaker 1:From him.
Speaker 2:From the three partners that I've had since sorting my life out, there's been infidelity. I've had infidelity in nearly every relationship, bar one.
Speaker 2:I don't think a man has ever stayed faithful to me were you faithful yeah, yeah, I, I don't have the capacity to spread my attention and for me and this is just for me is if I'm done with someone, I'm done with them and and and then I'll walk away. But I um, it causes a lot of destruction to someone. I would never want to destroy someone's self-esteem like that. Because it does it. It mentally broke me at points and those relationships left kind of me as a shell of myself and again I can't put all the blame on other people because I stayed. I stayed constantly trying to prove myself or beg for them to be different or beg for them to love me. Right, and no amount of begging or loving someone enough will ever get a man to change.
Speaker 1:What were the breaking points on each of these relationships where you gave up on the begging and had to leave?
Speaker 2:I think the first one, when I first came down here, I ended up in the relationship. This is how I had such a lack of the ability to say no or speak my truth or have my voice is that I ended up in the relationship with him completely by mistake, because he'd started hanging. We were friends. He started hanging out with one of my friends. I said to him that it made me a little bit jealous because I was basically trying to say I don't want to lose the friendship with you. He started crying, said oh my gosh, I've been in love with you. I'm so glad you feel the same. Like amazing, and before I knew it we were living together and I didn't.
Speaker 2:But I accepted because I didn't want to be abandoned, because I didn't want to be alone. I just had a baby. I, like I was. I had severe postnatal depression. I mean really severe postnatal depression, to the point like I'd punched myself and given myself black eyes and just yeah, I was very unwell, I'm very fearful, like I hadn't even learned to live like and look after myself. And here I am having to care for a child. I'm on my own. I don't have money like my family aren't around me.
Speaker 2:I, yeah, so it was a scary time, so I stayed a lot longer, um, in that one, but I think it was, yeah, continuously catching with infidelity. And then I caught that he'd been seeing prostitutes and there was something that just snapped in me. Funnily enough though it was, he'd, uh, asked me to marry him and I accepted the ring because I didn't have the heart to say no. And then, a month later, I just thought what the hell are you doing? And that was that was the trigger for that one. The third relationship was the ring as well. That triggered the relationship. Um, my youngest son's dad, his addiction, um me trying to rescue him again and again and detox him again and again and just realizing he was never going to get it, and it absolutely nearly broke me, um, and I think, to the point where I literally had nothing left. Um, something in me just snapped and so I left that one, but I entered into a relationship a year later that was very similar. It was literally like I was going to different people with the same characteristics.
Speaker 1:What was the turning point for you when whether it was a snap turning point or a change where you had to gradually work away from it. But what made that recovery happen in that new life?
Speaker 2:I think the last relationship. It was at an age where my kids were old enough to be able to see what was going on, kind of understand little bits of what was going on. How old was that? My eldest was maybe 12. So the youngest would have been five and they were seeing the emotional fallout.
Speaker 2:And obviously I continued to do self-development and work on myself and have therapy the whole way along. So it wasn't like I just waited till crisis points. I carried on working on myself. But I think I just got to this point where again, he'd asked me to marry him and I'd accepted the ring and it was a couple of months later and I just woke up one day. I continued to do work on myself, so I think it was a gradual thing, but I woke up one day and I just thought I can't let my boys see me settle for this and live within it.
Speaker 2:I don't I. I need to be the generation breaker. I need to break the pattern. It needs to be different. They need a different environment and they need me present and they weren't getting what they needed from me because I was so mentally broken and suffering from depression all the time and they may not have seen the constant dynamics between me and those relationships, but they were dealing with the fallout and they weren't getting what they deserved.
Speaker 2:I just made an absolute commitment to myself that until I learned why I kept on picking these men, till I healed the relationship with myself and learned to love the woman that I am, I'm not getting into any relationship and I'm never doing that to my kids again. They've you know effectively they've had lots of loss as well and I don't want them to grow up I wanted. One of the biggest things was, if I can't find a decent man, I'm sure as hell going to raise two. Monkey sees, monkey does. If I have toxic dynamics in my life, then they're going to watch it and they're going to play the same patterns. So yeah, I think that was a massive shift for me.
Speaker 1:And what did you do? Did you get up and walk out of the house and move on?
Speaker 2:It was my house. We'd actually never lived together the last two relationships. I hadn't ever lived with them because I picked really non-committal men who wouldn't commit to living with me. So, yeah, so there wasn't that. There was financial with definitely my son's my youngest son's dad. There was a lot of financial. I was left in thousands and thousands worth of debt because he didn't have the ability to access debt and I did, and I was helping him set up his business and used all of my access to finance and then was left potless and penniless. So, yeah, it was with this time, penniless. So, um, yeah, it was with this time.
Speaker 2:It was quite a clean, clean break in terms of when I was done. I was, I was done and there weren't financial implications, so it was just left for me to recover. But I had a car crash very shortly afterwards, um, which triggered off a severe chronic pain condition, fibromyalgia. So for the next year then I couldn't even properly walk or put my shoes or socks on properly. Yeah, so it's been one thing after the other, but it gave me the space to do real deep work on me. It slowed my life down because at that point I was 100 miles an hour survival mode for women puts them in like real drive mode. I've got to succeed, I've got to achieve, but you're 100 miles an hour and you can't be good at everything. You can't nurture your children and be at home and be present if you're out at work all the time. But it's so hard to find that balance because I am someone who wants to succeed and achieve and finances do help but they don't help a broken home and when did you become a relationship coach?
Speaker 2:I started training about seven years ago around a year or so after this has ended yeah, yeah, and I I'd already studied in counselling, so I've worked in mentorship and and doing counselling within organisations before. So it's it's something that, like, I'd already had a lot of experience with, but I was knew it was the way to go if I wanted to actually get into a place where I had financial prosperity. Um, working for the local authority, which I did at the time for years, wasn't going to bring me that, um, and I certainly wasn't going to sit around and wait for a man to rescue me anymore because I kept doing that and it was completely the opposite effect that I got. So I thought, yeah, I've got to do this for myself, and that that sent me on the path. And and they say, coach people with with you know what your younger self would have needed so.
Speaker 1:So let's, let's talk about the coaching business, let's talk about some of the um, I guess, the, the common problems, or or the the potential solutions. When you see clients, do you have I was gonna say, do you have a typical client? I mean, obviously your typical client is someone who's from a toxic or abusive relationship, but do they tend to be, you know, a particular age range or a particular geographic area, socioeconomic background, you know, are there core traits that you know that tend to lead to an abused? And I presume we're talking women here, not men.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I mean, I do work with men and I think it's really sad that actually there aren't, because I used to run domestic abuse programs for the local authority. There weren't programs for men and men do experience it. But I tend to draw and attract towards me more women and I run women's retreats and I have a women's Facebook group that's just for women. I think probably um a lot to do with you know, I focus on women because, firstly, I understand them better, but secondly, um, I wanted to protect myself in terms of boundaries.
Speaker 2:In the past, one of the relationships I had worked in a treatment center and that person had been a client and a few months after they'd left and I'd left the job, I ended up getting together with them. So for me, obviously, boundaries were blurred. So I think I wanted to protect myself from that as much as possible until I'd grown enough myself and healed enough myself that I wasn't attracted to broken men anymore. So I think it's partly that, but yeah, I'd say mostly women from 30s to 50s. That's my normal demographic. I do I have worked with some younger girls that's more focused on the self-esteem stuff um, but definitely in terms of unhealthy relationships between 30 and 50 women start really waking up to the patterns that and what they've allowed in their lives and they start to find their voice a little bit, or really want to find it, um, so yeah, so.
Speaker 1:So why do girls pick the wrong guys and and that kind of habitual thinking? I mean, I know we're obviously talking about it on a on a large scale of of abuse and violence and everything, but I guess, even even on the, the non, the non-abusive non-toxic, because I work with a lot of women who haven't been necessarily abused.
Speaker 2:But they pick the bad boy.
Speaker 1:So many times girls will say oh well, you know, I know I should be going down that route, but you know I can't resist the bad boy.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, or non-committal men, or men who aren't at where they're at. I think there are so many because we're complex as human beings, right? So it would be easy for me to say, oh, it's absolutely this and that's exactly why they do it. But there's so many complex reasons. A lot of it is to do with our formative years. They really do form how we attach with our caregivers and like the network that's closely around us and the relationships we have, even dynamics, with friends in schools all form how we view ourselves and how we see ourselves in the world and how we see relationships done and how we interact with people. So that's a massive thing.
Speaker 2:But self-esteem and how the relationship a person has with themselves is, I'd say, the core, core issue and that can be affected by, you know, our caregivers and those other relationships. But the relationship people have with themselves determines the relationship that you will have with everything in your life food, sex, money, men, women, whatever. It all stems back to the relationship with yourself and the core, core thing at the heart of every single person I've ever, ever worked with and that's men as well is am I enough like and not feeling enough? And that core, root story. And you have so many stories attached to it that feed that belief. We have a lot of our our mind has a lot of automatic negative thoughts and if we allow them to run without interrupting them and changing them, they will run and dictate our whole life and our choices.
Speaker 2:So it's the core story that we have with ourselves, but also there's the we have addiction to the dopamine hits. So if there's a man who's noncommittal, who's a bit of a bad boy, and you manage to captivate his attention and he doesn't always give it to you, it's not a consistent, steady love which is safe and sometimes a little bit boring the dopamine hit you get from when you get that bit of attention. It's like a drug, it is. They've showed scans of the brain and and your brain like lights up, like it's taken crack, so it's the same sort of thing. So people get addicted to the cycle of that. People get addicted to the cycle of the drama. You add on that low self-esteem and you combine that together and that's a big part of it.
Speaker 1:How often do people not even realise that they're in a toxic or abusive relationship? I mean, I'm obviously sure they realise they're arguing, or I'm sure if someone's been hit, for example, they know they've been hit, but how many people just think it's normal and acceptable and don't even want to escape that?
Speaker 2:I think a lot of people. I think a lot of people, I think a lot of people. I think because as society you know social media, everything is so accessible and information is accessible and we're speaking about things more. Then people start to go well, hold on a minute, that's going on in my relationship. What that's toxic? That's dysfunctional. So I think until then you just think it's your norm, because you know a family environment can be as toxic as they come. But if they're not exposed to really healthy environments, how are they going to know that's toxic? You're not going to know any different Cannibals like in you know out back. Going to know any different cannibals in, like in. You know out back in. Wherever they found the cannibals, they thought that was perfectly normal to them, that's just what you do, right, but to the rest of the world that's really dysfunctional. So it's only when you get exposed to other ways of doing things that you start to realize how, yeah, how impactful it is, how toxic it may have been.
Speaker 2:And I think because you know self-esteem is a massive one and I think women live with low self-esteem for so many years. Um, so they don't question, they don't use their voice to try and get their needs met. They don't challenge because they're scared of losing or abandon. And there's so much to lose, isn't it? When you're attached to someone, if you've got kids with them, if you've got finances attached to them, there is so much to lose by speaking up and using your voice and saying this isn't OK because it's going to rock the boat.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, there's so many complexities, but, yes, there are a lot of people. You know we've got women or I've had women come to me, have been in relationships for 20 plus years and never started questioning that there was anything wrong with it until about a year ago. And then listened to one podcast and thought hold on a minute, my husband does that. Then listen to something. Hold on a minute, my husband does that. I don't have this need met. I don't have that need met. So I think there's a massive shake-up going on in society about people not just women, men, men are waking up to in terms of um, getting their needs met. Yeah, I think there's definitely a massive shake-up.
Speaker 1:And how would you advise someone escapes from a toxic relationship?
Speaker 2:It's not easy to escape. They say that it takes it's between five and 13 times, I think, on average, to leave an abusive relationship.
Speaker 1:well, because the partner or the toxic dynamic yeah and and there is the toxic cycle.
Speaker 2:You think, oh, maybe this time he'll change, maybe this time or there is. It takes a lot of energy to be in a toxic relationship. If you are in toxic stress day in, day, day out and this isn't just where men are hitting women, this is just where it's a toxic dynamic between the two You're in high stress all the time. That leads you to complete burnout. It takes a lot of energy to leave. And if you don't have good self-esteem either. So I always say just start working on yourself. Go and get some coaching, go get some therapy, put yourself in environments where you can speak honestly and and be nurtured and feel safe and feel seen and feel heard. The more you expose yourself to that and the more you do little things to increase your self-esteem and the more you start to nurture yourself a little bit, the more your self-esteem grows. That will build inevitably to the point where you have enough strength to leave.
Speaker 2:But if you aren't doing anything to to change what's going on internally and your nervous system, right, we talk about changing the mindset a lot, but our, our nervous systems, the body, keeps the score. So if our nervous systems are in a heightened state all the time. You're not going to take much action if you're in survival mode. So it's about doing the work to try and do things to calm your nervous system so that you can get clarity of thought, because your brain can't even process if you're in constant state of survival. So, yeah, I'd say, find environments where you can get out of survival mode and start to build on your self-esteem and heal.
Speaker 1:Have you got any particularly memorable and inspirational stories of certain clients or people that you've helped?
Speaker 2:I've seen some of the most incredible transformations. One I've worked with recently when she came to me she was at the end, tail end of another broken marriage Another one of hers Hers had broken, yeah, and she was absolutely broken and questioned every single thing that she said, Apologised for every single thing that she said, apologised for every single thing that she said. Couldn't navigate her emotions was just an absolute shell and after working with her for 12 weeks, I still work with her now like the transformation in her. How quick is that? In 12 weeks? Yeah, not everyone is like that, because someone has to be really invested. I'm not a miracle worker. Right was?
Speaker 1:she still with the guy at this point, or she she'd left him they were living together but um had separated.
Speaker 2:So she was going through that emotional process and I've never seen someone glow so flipping much how she carries herself, how she's walking, how she talks but she did the work as well. It's yeah. So I'm not professing to be some miracle worker. I'd love to be. I'd love to have a cure that sorted someone within a few weeks, like I would love that if I could give that to everyone, I would, but that's not the reality. I would love that If I could give that to everyone, I would, but that's not the reality. A lot of it comes from us. We have to do the work. Just as, like I can have a coach that coaches me in the gym, but if I only show up on the days that he's coaching me and the rest of the week I'm not doing anything, I'm not going to get the progress, I'm not going to see the change. So it's exactly the same when we're working with our mind, our emotions and yeah, our mental well-being tell me about the um, the tv show you went on.
Speaker 1:It was called find someone and be happy and my mom, your dad. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah oh no, in my, in my um, what do you word speech marks marks here, but I know that was your son's words.
Speaker 2:He wanted you to find someone and be happy. My mum, your dad, I was like what show is that?
Speaker 1:No time for me to go on? Go on, tell me, I've not seen English TV for a long time.
Speaker 2:Oh, have you not even watched it?
Speaker 1:No, I haven't. I'm very sorry.
Speaker 2:I'm so poorly researched here but go on tell me all about it. Missing out. Yeah, so it was a dating show. We didn't even know the kids were going to be involved actually, on the TV show. We were told that they were going to be doing social media and podcasting whilst we were on the TV show and the whole time they were watching us. So it was this concept that they were watching us on screens and playing a part in who we matched up with, et cetera.
Speaker 1:And what was the premise of who you were matching up with?
Speaker 2:In terms of so it was all people who had kids that were 18 years or older. Okay, so it's midlife dating, you have?
Speaker 2:to and the kids were setting the parents up to go on it to go, yeah, go on the show and go on dates and try and pair, pair them up. So we were told there were experts that have been were watching and it turned out the experts were our kids. So, um, yeah, I just think, do you know what? Life is so short? I quite enjoy being in front of a camera, as you can tell. I enjoy talking too, and I think life is so short. I hate dating apps and I haven't met anyone for years. I've been single seven years You've been dating during that time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've dated on and off, but I think I got to a place where I raised my standards so much that people would have had to have got a pole vault to get over my standards and now, kind of the pendulum has swung back to a bit of a state of balance.
Speaker 1:Oh, you're lowering your standards.
Speaker 2:I'm not lowering them, but I'm not. As I'm not as rigid, I think, to protect myself and give myself time to heal, um and start to, I'd settle for, like when I say crumbs it was. It would have been like someone who's homeless and hasn't eaten for days digging out a bin. That's the standards that I went for, so I definitely probably before the drugs.
Speaker 1:Lots of them. That was it, yeah before the drugs were.
Speaker 2:They were yeah, um, so yeah, I guess. Then I started like I'm having caviar and I had nothing else, but whereas now you know as long as, you'll have a burger now and again. I don't know about a burger. Yeah, no, I will eat a burger, but not a burger in terms of people, but I think it's more.
Speaker 2:There's something you know, when you eat something and it feels really crap for you, like then you don't want to eat it that much, like I'll pick someone that feels good for the palate and good for the body, um, and until I meet that, yeah, I'm. So. It was just an experience and a chance to do something I love to do do it with my son. That was an amazing experience. It really bonded us so did you?
Speaker 1:did you meet anyone on the show?
Speaker 2:yeah, for three months we dated and just wasn't aligned with what I know that I want or need in my life.
Speaker 1:And did you get to tell your backstory and everything as kind of part of the set-up to the show? Did the public know who you were?
Speaker 2:A little bit, yeah, a snippet, yeah, well, it came out in actually the um, all the papers um my mom, my mom, your dad has been jailed for. It was front page, what what was the public perception?
Speaker 2:do you know what? I've had? The most incredible response, the only place I got the worst response, because I still worked for the local authority at that point, delivering. I was the lead delivering domestic abuse programs and I haven't really spoken about it much publicly. But, um, how they handled me. My bosses all knew my history, but the bosses above didn't, and how they handled that stuff coming out in the papers was absolutely shocking. I ended up leaving in the end because it was disgusting. What did they do? They? Basically I was dragged into a meeting as soon as it all came out, told I was not allowed to do frontline work, that I should have told them they should have known my history. They never would have let me go on the show.
Speaker 2:It's bad for the council's image. I'm a woman who's 23 years away from it 23, 24 years or like. I've done extensive work on myself. I've done extensive healing. I'm impacting on people and you think that that's a bad thing. But so I gave my notice in and the next day they made me hand my keys, my laptop and my phone out the back of my car. I wasn't allowed to see any staff. I wasn't allowed to. It was like I was, I'd just committed the crime yesterday, so, um, that was a bit of a challenge to to walk through and navigate through, but it's was there any follow-up from then?
Speaker 1:you know, um as in, not I don't know, blow back, you know, did they just draw a line and forget about it then, as did you?
Speaker 2:Yeah well, I put a complaint in just because of how it was navigated, because I think it's important how like to not be short-sighted. Some of the people who've had those experiences well, it was evident I'd had some of the most incredible feedback out of any teams there for the work that I was doing with women who'd had domestic abuse issues. So I just wanted them to learn to not be so short-sighted and to understand that you know what they do impacts on people. But yeah, apart from that, I've had the most incredible response from public. I think I don't hide from it and for me, when you don't hide and you know you're quite open about stuff and you own your crap because you know I've got my issues just like everybody else, I think when you do that, there's nothing much people can use against you. Really, but yeah, so far it's been amazing.
Speaker 1:Did you get a response on that complaint?
Speaker 2:I did. It was not quite an apology, it was a roundabout apology without them apologising.
Speaker 1:So that's the counsellor. Yeah, that's it so what does the future hold then? You want to find that partner, you want to settle down.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Like 100%. I think we're all wired for connection. We are, it's part of our nature, and I'd love to experience what it's like to be loved well, looked after well, like I've had to do it all on my own.
Speaker 1:Where are you going to find it? From this podcast, my? Audience is entrepreneurs and business owners, any handsome rich men that just want a good woman on their arm.
Speaker 2:Yeah, send them my way, yeah. So yeah, I'd absolutely love that. What's beautiful is I've learned to love my own company. I've loved to learn who I am and be on my own. So I'm not coming from a place of my own, so I'm not coming from a place of lack anymore, not coming from a place that I've got this void that needs filling and a vacuum that needs to fill. I'm good by myself, but would I love to meet someone? Absolutely, have I got a lot to bring to the table? Absolutely, I am never going to settle again for something that isn't good and nourishing for both parties. Do you know what I mean? So, yeah, I'd love that, but we'll see.
Speaker 1:Well, Natalie, it's been a pleasure having you here. It's been, I guess, interesting and shocking at the same time to hear the story and, I guess, great to see how you've come out the other side and the advice and the work that you're doing with others. We'll put some links in the show notes on the podcast. But just you know, for anyone who wants to reach out for work with you or any guys who want to reach out and date, you just give yourself a little shout out and tell us where you can find you.
Speaker 2:I am Natalie Russell on Instagram. That's my home. Instagram's my home. It's where I prefer to be. I am on TikTok, but I don't really use it that much. My website is Natalie Russell. I've got a Facebook page, natalie Russell, and for any women, I'm also. I've got a few tickets left for the retreat I'm running next year called Find your Feminine, and it's about kind of coming out of survival mode and learning to let go of the control and letting go of unhealthy attachments. So that's for anyone who wants to heal with that. Or, yeah, I do one-to-one coaching Links in my bio on Instagram or on my website.
Speaker 1:Perfect, yeah, well, thanks again, natalie.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me Matt, for me man.
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