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Mind & Emotions, Personal Development Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions, Personal Development Gabby Heley

Why so many women feel like they’re “losing their mind” during perimenopause

Many women entering perimenopause begin experiencing brain fog, overwhelm, forgetfulness, anxiety, and emotional exhaustion, often wondering, “What is happening to me?” Emerging neuroscience research suggests menopause is not just a reproductive transition, but also a significant neurological one. This article explores the latest research on oestrogen, brain function, nervous system overload, and why so many women suddenly feel unlike themselves during this stage of life.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

Dressing yourself: A shift from performance to feeling

Getting dressed can quietly become an act of performance—shaped by how you think you should look, rather than how you actually feel.

This article explores the psychology of body image and self-objectification, and offers a gentle shift: what if you began with the question, “how do I want to feel?”

If you’re feeling disconnected from yourself more broadly, it also links to a guided reflection designed to help you reconnect and explore your next chapter.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

How EMDR helps the brain repair trauma: A neuroscience perspective on memory, safety, and the body

Trauma is not just about what happened, it’s about how the nervous system adapted in order to survive. Sometimes those adaptations slowly pull us away from our own inner sense of safety. This article explores how EMDR helps the brain repair trauma and what neuroscience is revealing about healing in the brain and body.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

Addiction isn’t about substances. It’s about connection.

This blog explores addiction through a different lens, one that shifts the focus away from substances and toward connection.

Drawing on the Rat Park study and modern neuroscience, it examines how environments of isolation, chronic stress, and disconnection shape nervous system regulation, and why substances can become a stand-in for safety and relief. It also looks at what happens when we change the conditions around addiction, including real-world examples where connection, dignity, and community led to better outcomes.

At its core, this blog invites a reframe: Addiction is not a moral failing or lack of willpower, but often a nervous system adaptation to unmet relational needs.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

You’re not going backwards, your nervous system is responding: Understanding plateaus, flare-ups, and “regression” through a nervous-system lens

“I thought I was past this.”
When old patterns resurface, it can feel like failure, but from a nervous system perspective, it’s often a sign of response, not regression. This blog explores why healing isn’t linear, why flare-ups happen, and how understanding your nervous system can reduce shame and support sustainable change.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

Why safety comes before change: A nervous-system explanation for why pushing harder often backfires

Why doesn’t change happen, even when we know what we want to shift?
This blog explores why safety, not effort or motivation, is the foundation for change, and how the nervous system prioritises protection over growth. A neuroscience-informed look at why pushing harder often backfires, and what actually helps change unfold.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

Your brain is an algorithm: A neuroscience-informed take on change

Change doesn’t happen because we think harder, it happens when the nervous system updates what it expects.

This blog explores a neuroscience-informed perspective on change, reframing “manifesting” as the brain’s adaptive algorithm rather than a mindset problem. A compassionate look at why insight alone isn’t enough and what actually supports sustainable change.

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

How trauma corrupts our brain + body: The real score

Trauma is ubiquitous in our society. It is estimated that 75% of Australians will experience a potentially traumatic event in their lifetime. That 1 in 4 Australian women will experience violence by an intimate partner, and that 1 in 5 women will experience sexual violence. It’s estimated that up to two thirds of young people have been exposed to at least one traumatic event by the time they turn 16! And that 1 in 8 Australian’s have experienced child abuse. 

These statistics are alarming and what many of us don’t realise is that these experiences leave traces on our biology and identity, with devastating social consequences. In fact, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention calculate that childhood trauma is our single largest public health issue—more costly than cancer or heart disease—and one that is largely preventable by early prevention and intervention. So what is trauma? And what is its true cost?

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Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley Mind & Emotions Gabby Heley

Burnout: It's more harmful than you think!

Have you suffered from burnout, or do you feel like you’re on the cusp of it? I know that I’ve definitely been there. And the questions we need to ask ourselves is this: If we keep making the same choices, returning to the same stressors that led to burnout in the first place, will we ever truly recover? And what is the real price that burnout is costing us?

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