SHITSHOW SATURDAY #218 – Turning Toward Self: Inside Safe WithinSHITSHOW SATURDAY #218 – Turning Toward Self: Inside Safe Within
Adult Child
Andrea shares real audio moments from her seven-week somatic course Safe Within, highlighting how safety, body awareness and community support people healing from trauma and addiction. Participants describe powerful experiences with inner critics, chronic pain, inner children and self-trust as they simply keep showing up.
38:01•15 Aug 2026
Safe Within: Somatic Healing, Inner Critics and Showing the Hell Up
Episode Overview
- Safety and genuine acceptance are described as the foundation for healing, with no right or wrong way to participate.
- Somatic and nervous system work are shared as game changers after years of “all talk, no body” recovery efforts.
- Participants show that physical pain and tension can hold emotion and protection, and can be met with curiosity instead of just medicating or avoiding.
- Several people find new compassion for their inner critic and overthinking parts, treating them as tired protectors rather than enemies.
- Reconnecting with the body and inner child brings feelings of hope, wholeness, and the sense that simply showing up is a meaningful step forward.
“There is no right or wrong way to do this. There is no way that you’re supposed to be feeling. All I ask of you is just to show the hell up.”
How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety and healing childhood wounds at the same time? This Shitshow Saturday episode gives a behind-the-scenes look at “Safe Within”, Andrea Ashley’s seven-week live somatic healing course, created for adult children of dysfunctional families and those dealing with addiction, complex trauma, and toxic shame.
Rather than theory or lectures, you’ll hear raw clips from group sessions: people crying as they simply feel their bodies, laughing at their own “sabotaging” parts, and sharing memories they didn’t know were still stored in their nervous systems.
Andrea keeps repeating one core rule: “There is no right or wrong way to do this… All I ask of you is just to show the hell up.” That easy-going, sweary honesty is a big part of why so many say they feel safe with her. The episode follows participants as they experiment with breathwork, body awareness and somatic exercises.
One recovering alcoholic talks about feeling “an overwhelming sense of joy, an overwhelming sense of hope” as she reconnects to her body. Another finally befriends chronic physical pain and realises, “maybe this part even thinks that it’s trying to help.” Someone else meets their inner critic and sees it as “a sad, beleaguered, tired little thing” that deserves compassion, not war. There’s also moving talk about inner children, lifelong hypervigilance, overworking, and never feeling allowed to rest.
A standout moment comes when a participant realises their overthinking is actually their little girl begging to be heard and decides, “I’ve got you.” Style-wise, this is loose, unpolished and very human – more like sitting in a brave support group than listening to a polished self-help lecture.
If you’re curious about somatic work, tired of white-knuckling sobriety with “all talk, no body”, or just craving a space where you can be messy and still welcomed, this one might hit home. What if your only job in healing really was just to show up?
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