Rock Bottom With Ned Fulmer

Divorce Rock Bottom: Her Mom Had a Stroke & Marriage Ended | Gabriella Pomare

Australian family lawyer and author Gabriella Pomare joins Ned for an essential conversation about rebuilding family life after separation. Five years ago, Gabriella experienced her own devastating rock bottom: navigating a messy separation with a one-year-old son while simultaneously watching her mother suffer a catastrophic stroke that left her paralyzed and without memory. Despite being a seasoned family law practitioner, she discovered that professional expertise doesn't insulate you from the raw grief, anger, and confusion of divorce. That double trauma became the catalyst for a profound realization: separation doesn't create broken families. It creates opportunities to rewrite the family story with intention, maturity, and collaboration. Her new book The Collaborative Co-Parent offers a practical roadmap for parents navigating the impossible terrain between ending a marriage and raising healthy, emotionally secure children together. Gabriella introduces her four pillars of co-parenting communication: listen, pause, reflect, and respond. This framework helps parents regulate their own triggered emotions, filter every decision through the question "would my child be proud of this message?", and slowly transform high-conflict interactions into functional partnerships. She emphasizes that collaboration doesn't require being best friends or taking family vacations together. For some, collaboration means simply being able to exchange text messages without explosive conflict. For others, it's attending school concerts side by side or sharing holiday dinners. The definition varies by family, but the core principle remains constant: put the child's wellbeing at the center of every decision. The conversation tackles the hardest moments in co-parenting: driveway handoffs where tension is palpable, introducing new romantic partners, navigating holidays, managing the impulse to make children into confidants, and the ongoing grief that resurfaces unpredictably even years after separation. Gabriella shares her own rock bottom moment as a co-parent: a Christmas Day five years ago when she let anger about her ex's new relationship prevent their son from spending time with his father. That moment of recognizing her own failure became the springboard for everything that followed. She breaks down why the family law system often fails families, how courts can't address the emotional trauma of separation, the myth of parental rights (children have rights to relationships with parents, not the other way around), and why slowing down prevents years of expensive litigation. As both a practitioner who sees the worst-case scenarios daily and a parent who has lived through the confusion herself, Gabriella offers a rare dual perspective. This episode also explores the concept of accountability as the essential ingredient for moving forward. Both parents must take responsibility for their role in the relationship's end and the hurt caused, not to assign blame, but to get on the same page about the past so they can build something new. Gabriella emphasizes that separation isn't failure. It's an opportunity to reclaim power, rediscover individual identity, and create a life aligned with your actual values rather than performing an increasingly hollow version of partnership. For anyone navigating separation, struggling with co-parenting communication, introducing new partners into blended families, or simply trying to understand how to protect children from adult conflict, this conversation offers compassionate, practical guidance. Gabriella's book and her free communication resources are available at thecollaborativecoparent.com, and you can follow her on Instagram at @thegabriellapomare.

My Rock Bottom

Marnie Breecker, from Helping Couples Heal, interviews Ned.

What's Your Enneagram Type? Understanding Your Rock Bottom | Courtney Smith

Fortune 500 consultant and celebrity Enneagram coach Courtney Smith joins Ned for an illuminating exploration of the ancient personality system that reveals why we get stuck, how we create our own crises, and what it takes to break free. Unlike typical rock bottom episodes focusing on one person's story, this conversation offers a practical framework for understanding your own patterns—whether you're the perfectionist leaking rage, the helper who can't stop giving until they collapse, or the achiever chasing external validation while feeling hollow inside. Courtney breaks down all nine Enneagram types and their unique pathways to crisis. Type One (The Reformer) obsesses over moral perfection until hypocrisy or bitter loneliness forces a reckoning. Type Two (The Helper) gives endlessly while denying their own needs, leading to depletion or empty nest identity crises. Type Three (The Achiever) conflates worth with performance, facing rock bottom when reputation crumbles or retirement strips away their identity (think Michael Jordan's crisis after his father's death, or Tom Brady's difficult broadcasting debut). Type Four (The Individualist) actually seeks suffering, believing depth comes from darkness, until they realize pain without purpose is just misery. Type Five (The Investigator) retreats into intellectual isolation, discovering too late that detachment erodes the mastery they sought. Type Six (The Loyal Skeptic) outsources authority to institutions or relationships, suppressing their own needs until explosive consequences force them to reclaim self loyalty. Type Seven (The Enthusiast) chases novelty and pleasure to outrun pain, hitting bottom when they can't escape grief or realize they're trapped in the "fun guy" persona. Type Eight (The Challenger) mistakes intensity for aliveness, using anger as cheap fuel until health crises or consequences force them to confront vulnerability. Type Nine (The Peacemaker) self erases to maintain harmony, leading to passive aggressive explosions or the ghost like realization that they've disappeared entirely (Michael Phelps' journey exemplifies this pattern). The episode takes an unexpected turn when Courtney analyzes Ned himself, identifying him as a Type Six with a Seven wing based on his public journey. She points to the language of betrayed trust in his original rock bottom episode, the pressure cooker dynamic of trying to hold everything together while acting out, and his courageous authenticity in the aftermath. The conversation becomes deeply personal as they explore how loyalty to external structures (marriage, work, public image) can lead to betraying yourself first, setting up the larger crisis later. Courtney emphasizes that personality starts as an adaptive survival strategy—traits and perspectives we develop to get our needs met—but becomes a trap when we mistake these patterns for our true identity. Rock bottom happens when the costs finally outweigh the benefits, when we can no longer deny our role in creating the crisis, and when we're forced to take responsibility instead of justifying, defending, or rationalizing. The path out varies by type, but often requires doing the opposite of your ingrained pattern: perfectionists must accept their flaws, helpers must become selfish, achievers must embrace authenticity over image, individualists must take action instead of wallowing, investigators must tend to their bodies, loyalists must trust themselves, enthusiasts must sit with discomfort, challengers must accept vulnerability, and peacemakers must risk conflict. This episode offers essential insight for anyone feeling stuck despite knowing what they "should" do, anyone whose greatest strength has become their biggest liability, or anyone ready to understand the hidden beliefs and motivations driving their behavior. Courtney's book Choosing Wholeness Over Goodness and her Substack "What We're Really Up To" offer additional tools for this transformative work.

Are You Gaslighting Yourself? Nir Eyal on Limiting Beliefs | Rock Bottom

Author and behavioral designer Nir Eyal joins Ned to explore the hidden beliefs that keep us stuck—whether it's the diet that never works, the dream trip that never happens, or the chronic pain that won't go away. Nir's journey began with a devastating personal rock bottom: 30 years of yo-yo dieting, clinical obesity from childhood, and the shame of being the kid who never took his shirt off at the pool. After cycling through every diet imaginable—low fat, vegetarian, keto, intermittent fasting—he discovered the real problem wasn't finding the right diet. It was his limiting belief that there even was one "right" way. This realization unlocked a deeper truth: perseverance and adaptability matter more than intelligence or luck. But there was another rock bottom moment that changed everything. While spending quality time with his daughter, Nir checked his phone and missed her answer to a simple question. When he looked up, she was gone—he'd sent a clear message that his device mattered more than she did. This pattern of distraction extended to every area of his life, and he realized he needed to become "indistractable." His new book Beyond Belief: The Science-Backed Way to Stop Limiting Yourself and Achieve Breakthrough Results introduces a revolutionary framework: beliefs are tools, not truths. Through a powerful four-question process adapted from Byron Katie's work, Nir demonstrates how to identify limiting beliefs, examine them from multiple angles, and develop a "portfolio of perspectives" that unlocks motivation instead of destroying it. This episode covers essential concepts everyone needs to understand: why motivation isn't a straight line but a triangle (behavior, benefit, and belief), how all human behavior is actually pain management, why distraction comes from internal triggers 90% of the time (not your phone), the difference between traction and distraction, and how chronic pain often has nothing to do with physical damage but everything to do with fear-pain-fear loops. Nir also breaks down the real psychology of addiction (it's never just about the substance—it's the person, the product, and the pain), why to-do lists sabotage productivity, how making a $10,000 bet helped him finish his manuscript, and the liberating mantra that puts everything in perspective: "It's all prom." If you've ever felt stuck despite knowing exactly what you should do, this conversation offers practical, science-backed tools to finally break through.

Why Prenups Matter & Financial Rock Bottoms | Your Rich BFF Vivian Tu

Financial educator and bestselling author Vivian Tu (Your Rich BFF) sits down with Ned to share the devastating rock bottom moment that changed everything: discovering her New York City apartment was infested with thousands of German cockroaches. Breaking her lease cost $8,000—wiping out every dollar she'd saved from her grueling 70-80 hour weeks as an equity trader on Wall Street. After a year and a half of work, she had less money than when she'd arrived in the city. This financial catastrophe came on the heels of workplace harassment from a new manager who made racist comments and belittled her daily, ultimately pushing her to leave Wall Street entirely for a career pivot to BuzzFeed. What seemed like total failure became the launching pad for building one of the most influential personal finance platforms in the world, with millions of followers learning accessible money management from someone who truly understands struggle. Vivian breaks down why financial literacy education has failed so many people—it's not the message that's wrong, it's the messenger. For decades, money advice has come from "tall, handsome white men in Patagonia vests" or judgmental figures who treat debt as moral failure. She offers a radically different approach: practical, shame-free guidance that recognizes money as a tool, not a measure of your worth as a human being. This episode covers essential money topics everyone needs to hear: why prenups are actually romantic (the government writes one for you whether you like it or not), the "Is It Worth It?" equation that helps you understand purchases in terms of hours worked instead of dollars, why budgeting actually increases joy rather than restricting it, and the uncomfortable financial conversations couples must have at every stage—from the first date through marriage, kids, aging parents, and estate planning. Vivian also tackles the myth that small luxuries like lattes are keeping people poor (spoiler: $1,800 a year won't buy you a house), explains why 50% of Americans have credit card debt and shouldn't feel ashamed, and shares why asking for help from actual humans—not corporations and apps—is the missing ingredient in both financial health and mental wellbeing. Her new book Well Endowed hits shelves February 3rd and offers a comprehensive guide to building a life where your finances support your actual goals and values—not someone else's definition of success.