Healing For Love – Details, episodes &amp; analysis

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Why do some people constantly put others first, struggle to say no, worry excessively about upsetting people, or feel guilty for prioritising themselves?

In this episode of Healing for Love, Dr. Gemma Gladstone explores the deeper psychology behind people pleasing through a schema therapy lens.

This is not simply about being “too nice.” People pleasing is often a learned survival strategy rooted in early relational experiences, attachment dynamics, fear, guilt, conditional acceptance and coping styles developed in childhood.

Gemma unpacks:

What people pleasing actually is
Why it develops
The difference between self-sacrifice, subjugation and approval-seeking
Why guilt and fear often drive people pleasing behaviours
How early family dynamics shape self-suppression
Why some women struggle to set boundaries or speak up in relationships
The connection between people pleasing and emotionally unavailable or narcissistic partners
How schemas influence dating, relationships and self-trust
Why people pleasing is often linked to survival, safety and connection
Small practical steps to begin changing these patterns

This episode also explores:

Self-sacrifice schema
Subjugation schema
Approval-seeking schema
Abandonment dynamics
Conditional parenting
Coping modes and “dating personas”
The importance of reconnecting with your own needs, preferences and authenticity

If you often:

Put other people’s needs ahead of your own
Feel guilty saying no
Worry excessively about upsetting others
Need reassurance before making decisions
Stay quiet to avoid conflict
Feel anxious expressing yourself
Struggle with boundaries in dating or relationships

…this episode will likely resonate deeply.

Mentioned in this episode

Gemma also shares details about her upcoming self-study program:
Love Wisely Foundations (coming soon!) - a schema-informed relationship program designed to help women understand and rewrite unhealthy relationship patterns and “love template.”

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Connect with Me

📩hello@drgemmagladstone.com 🌐 Website: drgemmagladstone.com
📷 Instagram: @drgemmacoaching

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139. Dating Apps: Why They Feel So Hard and How to Navigate Them

Tuesday, April 28, 2026 • Duration 49:14

Dating apps can feel like a bit of a horror show at times.

But underneath the frustration, the confusion and the endless swiping… there’s something much deeper going on.

In this episode, I explore how your schemas - particularly abandonment, defectiveness, emotional deprivation and people-pleasing patterns - can shape:

Who you feel drawn to
What you tolerate
And why you might ignore your own instincts

I also walk you through a more grounded, intentional way to approach dating apps - not as “dating platforms,” but simply as introduction tools.

Because real dating doesn’t happen on the app.
It happens in real life.

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

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✅Dating App Profile CHECK-UP

🎁 Dating With Insight - FREE Guide

💛 Elevate You Worth (50% off only for listeners) - Use coupon WORTHY

131. No Matches, No Dates - Is Something Wrong With Me?

Monday, December 15, 2025 • Duration 41:48

In today’s episode, I answer a short but powerful question that came in anonymously:

“Hi Gemma, I cannot even get a match, let alone a date. What the hell is wrong with me?”

If you’ve ever stared at a dating app wondering why nothing is happening and quietly concluded “it must be me”, this episode is for you.

I'll look at three key areas:

The reality of modern dating apps – why they create a distorted, “smorgasbord” environment where incredible, emotionally available people are often overlooked.
Other people’s issues – how emotional immaturity, avoidance and misaligned intentions show up on the apps (and why you can’t control that).
Your schemas and your “type” – how schema chemistry and rigid “type” criteria might be leading you towards emotionally unavailable partners and away from people who could actually be good for you.

I’ll invite you to:

Re-examine how you’re presenting yourself on the apps (without becoming a slave to what you think men want).
Widen the pool by giving a chance to the “6 or 7 out of 10” guys (ie, the level of chemistry you feel! I'm not rating people!) who feel kind, calm and safe – rather than only chasing the intense 10/10 chemistry.
Remember that your worth, lovability and desirability are not measured in matches.

If you’re feeling discouraged or asking “what’s wrong with me?”, I want you to know: you are not the problem. Dating apps are hard and your current results say nothing about your deeper value or your capacity for a healthy, loving relationship.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

Why so many wonderful women and emotionally available men get passed over on dating apps
How our throwaway, dopamine-driven culture affects the way people swipe
Why leading with highly sexualised photos can accidentally screen out good men
How schema chemistry pulls you towards what’s “familiar” rather than what’s healthy

43: The Mailbox: How to Avoid Becoming a Narcissistic Parent

Episode 43

Wednesday, February 16, 2022 • Duration 49:23

Welcome to another episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast!

Parenting is not easy. It is even harder for those raised by narcissistic parents because that is a particularly toxic way to rear a child.

In this episode, Gemma and Justine answer a mailbox question from a listener brought up by a mother with narcissistic traits. Even though the listener acknowledges that her mother loved her, and did her best, some of what she said and did still impacted her life and mental health. As a result, she sometimes lacks empathy for her children and finds herself saying or doing the same things her mother would have done. She feels a lot of guilt and shame because of that.

In this episode, we dive into what you need to do as a parent if you were raised by someone with narcissistic traits and want to avoid rearing your children in the same way. We take a close look at the things you have to be mindful of and do that narcissistic parents struggle with or tend not to do. Stay tuned to find out what to do and how to cope if you were under-parented or had narcissistic parents, and then become a parent yourself.

For confidential information, counseling, and support service go to https://1800respect.org.au.

Additional resource: John Gottman’s Emotional Coaching

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

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42: Dating with an Abandonment Schema: Part 2 - What is your Coping Style?

Episode 42

Wednesday, February 9, 2022 • Duration 44:33

Welcome to another episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast!

In our last podcast, we spoke about what an abandonment schema might look like generally when dating someone. In this episode, we follow that by taking a more specific look at the different coping styles people tend to use when their abandonment schema gets triggered in a dating situation.

Our schemas get triggered when certain things happen. When triggered, strong emotions arise, and we feel compelled to respond in a certain way to cope. Schema therapy clearly explains three common responses people have after getting triggered. One of them falls into the broad category of avoidance. Another is surrendering or resigning to what happened. The third is overcompensating, sometimes also referred to as counterattack.

In this episode, we discuss the three different ways people cope with the intense feelings that surface when their abandonment schema gets activated. We give some examples of what each response might look like, focusing particularly on those that come up when an abandonment schema gets triggered. We discuss ways to change your response patterns, explain the importance of learning to understand how you react and talk about the potential consequences of the different coping styles. Stay tuned for more!

For confidential information, counselling, and support service go to https://1800respect.org.au.

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

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41: Dating with an Abandonment Schema - Part 1

Wednesday, February 2, 2022 • Duration 29:24

Welcome to the first episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast for 2022!

When making new year resolutions, most of us tend to think about things we can improve in our lives and the patterns we would like to change. One of those patterns usually relates to relationships. Justine has already had several sessions this year with people who want to break their relationship patterns so that they can finally meet someone emotionally available and have a proper relationship.

Our schemas tend to hinder our relationship radar and keep us doing the same thing over and over. If you have an abandonment schema and would like to meet someone available, you have to take responsibility for the choices you make and look at how your schema impacts your choices. If you want to avoid becoming a victim, you also need to be accountable for the role you play in your relationships.

The abandonment schema is the oldest and most primal schema you could have. In this episode, Gemma and Justine dive into the abandonment schema and discuss how it affects people when they date. They explain how an abandonment schema develops, what it feels like, and what tends to activate it. Justine also talks about what she does to help her clients prevent their abandonment schemas from getting triggered when dating. Listen in today to learn how to take responsibility for your abandonment schema and find out how your abandonment schema could trip you up when dating.

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

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40: The Mailbox: The Self-Sacrifice Schema

Wednesday, December 15, 2021 • Duration 29:53

Welcome to another episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast!

Some of the ways we behave and think are known as schemas. Schemas could be described as a filter through which we view the world, and they are closely linked to our deeply entrenched core beliefs.

Recently, Justine and Gemma received emails from various listeners experiencing similar problems. One of the emails was from Harry, who explained that he has an empathetic personality and suffered from being in a relationship with someone narcissistic, which probably means he has a self-sacrifice schema and possibly some other issues as well. Sally also wrote in to say that she has a friend who is a big self-sacrificer, and it gets in the way of her life.

In this episode, Gemma and Justine look at Harry and Sally's situations and discuss schemas. They describe the self-sacrifice schema. They also describe the subjugation schema, which is different but often gets correlated with the self-sacrifice schema clinically. They discuss what those schemas feel like, what brings them up, and the kinds of problems they cause for people. They also give several tips for breaking out of self-sacrifice and subjugation schema patterns. Stay tuned for more!

Book mentioned in the show: When the Body Says No, by Gabor Mat

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39. The Anxious-Avoidant Love Trap: Schemas & Attachment Styles

Wednesday, November 10, 2021 • Duration 45:35

Welcome to another episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast!

Some of the ways we think and some of our behavioral tendencies are called schemas. Schemas could be described as the lens through which we see the world. They are closely related to our ingrained core beliefs but tend to be a little broader than those.

Schema therapy makes things very clear and gives us some easy-to-understand labels to describe our behavior. Justine and Gemma have found schema therapy useful for problem-solving and understanding what is going on beneath the surface in relationships.

In this episode, they dive into the area of relationships and look at how early schemas can overlap with people’s attachment styles to form the antagonistic push-pull relationships in which so many of us seem to find ourselves. They describe the anxious and avoidant styles of attachment and discuss some general terms that could help us think in terms of schemas rather than larger categories of behavior. Stay tuned for more!

For confidential information, counseling, and support service go to https://1800respect.org.au.

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

😊Love Wisely Foundations is here! Enroll now for this one of a kind guided program

✅Dating App Profile CHECK-UP

38: What Type of Inner Critic Do You Have?

Wednesday, November 3, 2021 • Duration 01:05:37

Welcome to another episode of The Good Mood Clinic Podcast!

Most people have an inner critic. Some are aware of it and acknowledge it, while others do not seem to notice the disparaging voice talking to them inside their head. The inner critic does not have to be a constant and deliberate internal narrative. It could also be a cluster of automatic thoughts or things you say out loud to yourself.

Gemma enjoys looking through the lens of schema therapy when she works with people because it provides a helpful language for learning to understand the inner critic. Schema therapy assists her in pulling the critical voice apart. That allows her to take a closer look at all the different types of critics and assess the various functions they might perform. It helps to know what triggers the critical voice, whether or not its messages are useful, and if it comes from anyone in particular.

In this episode, Gemma explores the inner critic by breaking it down, examining how the different elements play out, and discussing how to shift them, change them or shape them into something useful. Stay tuned for more!

For confidential information, counseling, and support service go to https://1800respect.org.au.

Book mentioned: Reinventing Your Life, by Jeffrey E. Young

🎓FREE LIVE MASTERCLASS - Why smart women override red flags in dating

😊Love Wisely Foundations is here! Enroll now for this one of a kind guided program

37: Mailbox: Co-parenting with a Narcissist Ex and Supporting your Partner with Their Schema Therapy

Episode 37

Wednesday, October 6, 2021 • Duration 54:48