We Lose Parts of Ourselves With Grief and Trauma


October 17, 2022

We lose parts of ourselves with grief and trauma.

It’s not always as simple as “you’re not that person anymore.” Sometimes it’s that you’ve gone into survival mode.

Before my loss, I loved nutrition.

I read books and studied whatever I could. I learned clean, healthy, vegan, and allergen-free recipes for everything and ate it all with delight. I was training for a half marathon, playing with supplements, and was healthier than I’d ever been in my life.

And then my world turned upside down.

Grief shifted the ground beneath my feet.

I was operating solely on anxiety and adrenaline, clawing my way through each day, all of which felt muddled and impossible. I couldn’t eat anything other than a few foods, and I had to literally run my body into the ground every night so that I’d sleep just a little bit. My brain slowly stopped working from PTSD, and my life began spinning into perpetual chaos.

Nutrition was nowhere on my radar.

My passion for clean, healthy living—among so many other things—vanished overnight.

I tried to bring it back at times.

Fighting to reclaim that aspect of self.

But the losses and traumas continued stacking, one on top of another, and my self-worth plummeted. I went from loving the process of creating vibrancy in my body and being to hardly caring for myself at all. My adrenals tanked repeatedly. I stopped swallowing, causing eating and hydrating to become a serious struggle. I was always tired and in pain, frustrated and angry, and my body broke down further and further.

I’m genuinely grateful to be reclaiming this part of myself now—working with Kara Sorensen to uncover what my body truly needs from food and healing the last bits of my dysphagia.

What used to feel unimportant…

What used to be a struggle…

What used to be a way to punish myself…

…has finally returned to being fun and fulfilling—something I want to do, learn about, and deepen into every day. Making my beautiful, colorful, hearty metabolic meals and drinking more water than I have in years is awakening this long lost part of truest myself.

We lose parts of ourselves with grief and trauma, but not all are lost for good.

Some are still embedded into the deepest cells of our being, woven into the fabric of our soul, just waiting for their time to re-emerge.

Grief and trauma are intense.

Navigating the aftermath is messy and hard.

Healing is a journey… but it’s one I’m always grateful I chose (and continue choosing) to walk.



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