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WELCOME TO THE FOOD ANXIETY MINI SERIES Part 3!

These conversations are based around food fear, anxiety, disordered eating, intuitive eating, and changing our relationship to food.

Find Part 1 Here

Find Part 2 Here

Find Part 3 Here

Find Part 4 Here

Find Part 5 Here

In this episode, we discuss:

Bri Hanson, a female empowerment coach who helps women find their voice and leave self-sabotaging behaviors behind for good.

She is the founder of Tiger Stripes Earned and believes everyone has a story to tell, and a story to learn from. We should never be ashamed of the story our pages tell or the scars we may have from what we have been through.

• Bri’s personal healing journey with  food
• Limiting beliefs around food fear
• Chronic illness and emotional trauma
• Eating intuitively and healing the relationship with food
• Food judgment, body dysmorphia, and food anxiety

Additional Resources:

FREE OPT IN: 30 Tips for Healing Chronic Illness

Discover some not-so-average tools for cleaning up your lifestyle, ditching toxic thoughts, and bringing more love into your life!

BOOK: 21 Days of Healing

21 Days of Healing was created out of my own desire to go beyond food and heal on a deeper emotional and spiritual level. I curated the most loved content based on hundreds of live students experience in the course, and created this self guided workbook to help you navigate chronic illness, release emotional inflammation, and find the medicine woman within.

PRODUCT: Let’s Get Checked

LetsGetChecked is all about personal health testing, making healthcare and health screening open and patient-led, empowering people to use technology in a simple but powerful way and giving greater control of their personal health. Use code EMPATH for 20% off.

Episode Transcript:

Welcome to the Healing Uncensored podcast. My name is Sarah Small, and I’m a health and mindset coach for women with autoimmune disease just like you. I absolutely love helping you tap into your self-healing power, uncover the energetic side of healing, and release limiting beliefs around your body and your life. Think of this podcast is everything you wouldn’t hear at your doctor’s office. It’s a place for empowered souls to move beyond food and heal themselves on a soul level. I hope you enjoy today’s episode. Now let’s begin.

Welcome to part three of this miniseries on food anxiety. Today I’m going to be talking with Bri Hansen. She is a female empowerment coach who helps women find their voice and leave self-sabotaging behaviors behind for good. She also has a very powerful story to share with you all today. I can’t wait for you to hear it. So let’s get started.

Bri’s personal healing journey with  food

Sarah: Hi, Bri, welcome to the show. You are a female empowerment coach, and you help women find their voice and release their self-sabotaging behaviors, but I would love to start with your own story around food. So can you share with us what you’ve personally experienced in your own healing journey with food?

Bri: Sure, thank you, Sarah, for having me. I greatly appreciate it. Yeah, so I’m Bri, and my journey with healing my relationship with food started about eight to nine years ago. I’m a short little gal, I’m about five foot zero, and at the time, I weighed 265 pounds. And that weight was extremely painful to carry around. It limited life in general, it made working hard, it made making friends difficult because I was very shy and very introverted. But most of all, I really was very unhappy with myself with all of that weight. I came from a history of being bullied as a child. I came from a history of kind of feeling alone as a child. And I feel that the weight was really kind of a mask to hide myself from the world. And I was actually on a journey to become a police officer and so I decided I need to figure this out. I have to be able to help other people. And if I can’t even help myself, how am I supposed to help other people?

So I started the really long journey of turning my life around when it came to food and fitness, and I got in CrossFit for a while. That was my exercise regimen for about six years, and I slowly started losing the weight. And in the process of losing, I lost 135 pounds, and I’ve been able to maintain that. So it’s been about eight years from start to now. And throughout that process, I learned that I could lose the weight, but I still wasn’t exactly healing my relationship with food. And it actually took many years of some therapy that I had to go through in order to realize that food was my crutch when it came to emotional trauma. Food was what I turned to when I was stressed out, when I was upset, when I was being abused by different people in different relationships. There were just things in my life that I always turned to food for. And it really wasn’t until my ability to eat food was taken away from me before I figured out that’s what was going on.

Sarah: Yeah, so it was like that was a coping mechanism for you was the food, emotional eating?

Bri: Absolutely.

Sarah: And do you feel like at any point, the weight that you were carrying, physically and emotionally, as we learn, was protecting you from anything in your life?

Bri: Oh, yes, absolutely. I feel like the weight was always keeping me safe from revealing my true self to the world. And I say that because I didn’t feel comfortable with who I really was. I didn’t feel comfortable. I didn’t feel like I was enough. And so if I was to be my full self around people, and then that’s becoming quite vulnerable, and that also means that I would potentially fail at something in front of them. So I didn’t want to try anything new. I didn’t put myself out there. I wanted to just hide under that veil of 265 pounds because that kept me comfortable and safe. Not comfortable physically because it was very painful, but emotionally comfortable because I knew what life felt like at 265 pounds. I had no idea what life would feel like healthy because my entire life since age nine, I was obese.

Limiting beliefs around food fear

Sarah: Yeah. I just want to honor and acknowledge you for a moment because that’s such an amazing accomplishment. But like you said, it’s like, you can lose weight, and you can still be unhappy. And so it sounds like what you discovered was, “I can go to CrossFit and I can sweat buckets, and I can lose this weight”, but there are still some deeper layers that were there for you. Can you talk a little bit about, number one, what inspired you to actually go on this journey, and also kind of what was below the surface as far as some limiting beliefs as well?

Bri: Yeah. What inspired me to first go on the journey was a desire to do more with my life. I wanted to give back to people. Throughout my childhood, my family had been a victim of a really devastating crime and it actually never really got resolved. And I felt that something has to be done for people like us, people who never really get the justice that they need for their family. And so I felt like I was being called to be a police officer at one point in my life. I have a criminal justice degree now and that’s what I went to school for. So I was like, “Well, if I’m going to be a police officer, I have to be healthy. I got to figure this out.” So that’s what initially started it, but then it really transformed into “What is my life’s purpose? And what am I really doing here?” It became more of a bigger picture scenario for me. And also, I was a new mom at the time. My daughter was almost two when I started my weight loss journey, and I realized I really want to be around for her. I don’t feel comfortable playing with her on the floor. I can’t chase her around the house now that she’s walking. I was in pain all day long and I couldn’t be present with her. So I really wanted to get better for her and for me.

Chronic illness and emotional trauma

Sarah: And so you also struggle with some chronic illness issues. Did that play a part in you making some of these changes in your life as well?

Bri: It did, but it got worse before it got better. So I’ve been hypothyroid since I was nine years old, and I had been on the traditional Western medicine regimen of Synthroid medication, different T3 medications, and it all of a sudden just stopped working. I was really fatigued, I was really sick, they thought I had Fibromyalgia at one point, they thought I had rheumatoid arthritis. It’s like all these random pains within my body. And I was extremely foggy with memory and with brain [fog]. I couldn’t concentrate. I was always forgetting things and started losing my hair more, my skin was really dry. So typical symptoms of your thyroid being completely out of whack. And then, in the midst of that, I started getting a lot of GI issues and they thought maybe I was developing Crohn’s at one point. And it was just kind of snowballing into a big mess. But what people didn’t realize is in the midst of all of that, I was actually going through some really intensive trauma therapy for sexual abuse.

So I had hidden that part of my life because, again, you don’t want to be vulnerable with your story sometimes. But I was actually sexually abused by a boss, and I also went through a period in my former marriage that involved that as well. And so while I’m sitting here trying to fix my weight, and have a better relationship with food, have a better relationship with my body, I’m also opening up the door to a lot of emotional trauma by getting sexually abused and having these issues. And meanwhile, my health is spiraling out of control. So it was just a big cluster of things happening all at once. And I finally found some practitioners that would help me. I decided the Western medicine doctors were not listening, they didn’t understand. So I went to a naturopath and had a bunch of tests done, and he’s the one who found out that I was autoimmune thyroid, that I had leaky gut, I had all of these things that I know you’re quite familiar with. And I started to try to really look at my relationship with food even further because I knew what it was like to cut calories and lose weight, but I also learned that I was doing it in a very unhealthy way. And I started to develop a lot of anxiety over what I was eating, and I had to track everything. I had to know what I was eating, and it was this major panic if I couldn’t figure out whether I was fitting into the box of the calories I was supposed to eat that day. I’m sorry. I don’t know where I’m going with this.

Sarah: That’s okay. So autoimmune – so many people say food is medicine, food is medicine, and I truly believe that food is medicine, but with a history of emotional eating, have you done any elimination diets now since then?

Bri: I have. Yes. I went through a pretty strict, I want to say four months of doing Whole30 for a while to try to really understand what was triggering some of these symptoms of pain and inflammation in my body and the thyroid function. And while I learned a lot going on various elimination diets – I did paleo, Whole30, Zone, all those types of things – it really got me into kind of a dark place with food. Because I felt like if I was not completely conforming to this list of do’s and don’ts when it comes to food, that I was going to fail, that I was going to get sick again, that it wasn’t going to work, but yet I felt completely smothered under this elimination diet protocol. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. And every single time I went to go eat, whether I went to a grocery store, or– Oh, goodness, eating out was like a complete panic trigger because I felt like I couldn’t do anything. I felt like I was a prisoner in my own body. And if I wanted to feel better, I had to eat this way. And if I didn’t, then I was going to get sick.

And I feel like that actually continued, even after I wasn’t physically affected by the food. And because at one point, my doctor said, “Well, maybe you’re celiac, or you’re at least non-celiac gluten sensitive.” So I would almost panic anytime I thought that there was gluten in something I was eating. And it became a problem with relationships, became a problem with just relaxing as a mother with my daughter. Meal prepping was a nightmare because I always had to make special food. And it just felt like I had no control over it. It just would really trigger me into a panic attack almost constantly.

Eating intuitively and healing the relationship with food

Sarah: Yeah. I think that some practitioners might miss that, in that there’s obvious benefit in the elimination diet and Whole30. And you read all the testimonials and the amazing transformations that people have had on social media and everything. And there’s a purpose behind these ways of eating, but there’s also, I think, this unintended effect that they potentially can have for some people, which is then it creates all this anxiety around food. In a previous conversation, I was saying that, in my personal experience, it was like I labeled nightshade vegetables as evil and inflammatory. And inherently, there are nutrients in those vegetables but because AIP says don’t eat them, it’s like, “Okay, never eat them ever again!” when that’s not really the point of an elimination diet, right? It’s not meant to be forever unless you have an allergy. So this history of emotional eating, and then losing a lot of weight and having that amazing accomplishment for you and your health, but then having these autoimmune issues and symptoms that then are partially treated with food is this really complicated web of your relationship with food. And so Bri, how have you navigated some of that? Because I know you’re not the only person who’s experienced that. I’m sure people listening are saying, “Yes, that’s me, too. I struggle with this relationship with food when it feels like I’m trying to eat only certain things or I’m trying to lose this weight.” So what are some of the ways that you’ve healed your relationship with food or maybe began to eat more intuitively?

Bri: So the way that I can best describe it is that every single morning, I wake up, and I set my intention for the day, and food is always a part of that intention. This has become something I have to be very disciplined at because it’s still not second nature. As much as I have healed my relationship with food and I don’t view it as an enemy anymore, my default in my mind is that food is a crutch, food is evil, food is going to make you feel bad. And even if I’m talking about fruits and vegetables, there are still things in my mind that are just twisted because of this journey, that I have to bring myself back to my truth. And my truth is that the food is just almost like a positive energy that I’m bringing into my body. And if I am making healthy, clean-ish choices with my food, it’s going to serve me well.

And so every day, I have a list of truths that I tell myself, and I have a list of items that I forgive myself for. So I basically go through a list, and I’ve actually recorded myself doing it because I’ve heard that if you hear your voice talking to yourself it’s more effective. But I basically say, for example, “I forgive myself for viewing food as evil. My truth is that food is nourishing me today.” And things like that every day remind me that it’s okay to partake in these things. It’s okay to want to celebrate with food, but I do it in a different way now. Food is just food. It’s not a crutch anymore. And the hardest thing about that was giving up the feeling that food would give me that I knew was constant. Because I know how I’m going to feel after I eat a doughnut, for example. I don’t always know how I’m going to feel if I choose not to eat the doughnut. And that uncertainty can be very scary for people when they’re on their journey, and they’re learning how to reinvent the relationship with food. You have to become content inside and know that you’re going to be okay making those choices that are better for you, than what you’re familiar with, that are comfortable.

Bri: Two things are coming up for me right now. The first is just this control, and so has to do the certainty you were just talking about. It’s like, I know the way that the doughnut is going to make me feel, therefore I can control the feelings that I get from it. I can control the way I feel. And I think so many of us are simply seeking control over something in our life, when probably a lot of things, depending on your family history, just your life up until this point have maybe felt out of control? And the other one, I just completely lost my train of thought on but I want to talk a little bit about that control because I think that– Oh, I know what I was going to say.

So I think oftentimes then, also, the food is then replacing something like control. So when we eat the doughnut, and we know it’s going to make us feel satisfied or whole or complete or happy or whatever that feeling is, the food is that emotion for us. So I see it oftentimes as like, “Okay, what are the things that we’re not receiving in our life, like control or love or happiness or acceptance that we’re trying to get from food that we can get from other places in our life?” Can you talk a little bit about that? What are the things – a void – that food was trying to fill? And do you have any examples of your own in your own story of where you then found that same emotion or feeling or fulfillment in a different way?

Bri: Yeah. For me, food was fulfilling the desire to feel loved. And I think that’s very common for many people who are emotional eaters because there’s something that is familiar with food and something that’s always constant about food. Those emotions that it gives you are always going to be there because it’s like a trigger to your brain. It’s like drugs. It’s exactly like drugs.

Sarah: Especially sugar, right? Sugar is a huge one.

Bri: Yes. And it actually wasn’t until the ability for me to eat and drink was taken away from me by a disease called achalasia, where I was forced to truly get down and dirty with my relationship with food on a whole other level. It was past the ability of weight loss and fitness and getting healthy. It was more on the terms of survival. It was, “I can’t eat these things that I used to want to eat, and I can’t drink the things that I used to want to drink. So what am I going to do with those emotions?” And I felt completely lost. I felt like my identity was gone. I didn’t understand how to deal with these emotions because there was a huge void. And when I realized how big of a hole food was filling for me, it was almost a shame– I felt ashamed. And because I had put so much stake into food for me, and because I wasn’t willing to deal with the emotions that came behind it, and that was just me not loving myself. I really felt like I was not good enough. I felt like I was not going to be loved by someone who loved me for who I was. And I guess you just want to hide and so food helped me hide. But then I got to a point with this disease that I couldn’t hide anymore. So I was able to heal those feelings by turning to inner work. Things like your Intuitive Soul School, things like meditation and yoga, and understanding more on the emotional side of essential oils, things like that that brought me peace, that is what has filled that hole now for me.

Sarah: Yeah, so there are other things that can bring you that same feeling of love or peace, self-love, that are outside of food, but your body literally forced you to learn that, right? By saying, “Hey, if you want to live, if you want to be alive for another 50 years, you have to start changing the way that you eat.” And I think it’s just very– The words aren’t coming to me to describe this. But it’s complicated, I guess, because food, unlike an addiction to a drug is something that we still have to eat every single day.

Bri: Yes. And I actually have some private clients of mine who, unfortunately, have gone through a life of addiction. And now we’re working on their relationship with food because that’s the other addiction in their life that they can’t quite kick. But you can’t just stop eating, right? It’s not like drugs or alcohol where you can stop cold turkey. You say, “No, no more. This is it.” Food as you’re livelihood. Food is what keeps you moving. How do you be disciplined but loving towards yourself with something that can be just as bad if not worse than these other things? It’s a very complex dance that you have to do every single day. And it’s a choice that we make every single day on if we’re going to nourish our body or continue to punish it.

Sarah: Yeah. In my case, I feel that I’ve had to release this attachment to food. I was definitely a sugar addict. And you’ve heard my story in pieces, but I no longer eat sugar. And I learned a lot through the process of removing the sugar. It was like, “What is this sugar doing for my brain that I am so addicted to? What is it filling within me? And then where can I find that in another way?” But in the people that I know personally in my life who are recovering, either alcohol or drug addicts, it’s interesting that then they’ve said this to me, it’s not just something I observe, that then they really love dessert, or they really love sugar, or they really love pop or soda. And it’s different and it’s not necessarily as harmful depending on what it is, but I think that then there’s still something deeper under that layer that is not being confronted.

And this is a hard conversation to have. This is a heavy conversation to have, but there is still something that’s not being fulfilled within the soul, within the energy body that then foods, drugs, alcohol, whatever it is, is just filling that void for now temporarily, that we may be able to find in this other way. And I think for a lot of people, it’s really fucking scary. Really, really scary to be like, “Oh, yeah, sure, I’ll just peel back the layers of my soul to figure out what is it that I’m not receiving in my life. Do I not love myself?” So I think it’s definitely like something that requires courage and bravery, but can you speak a little bit to that, Bri, as far as like, I know part of it was your body was like, “Hey, girl, you got to make some changes if you want to live and to be healthy.” But was there anything else that really rustled up some of that bravery and courage for you to peel back the layers?

Bri: Yeah, I was sick and tired of feeling like a victim all the time. For me, it was, I never had a voice. I felt like it was time for me to finally be vulnerable, and peel away the weight in a way that was scary as hell all the time. I was terrified because I didn’t know what it was going to be like. And it wasn’t like I was a college athlete and I knew what it was like to feel healthy and good in my skin, I had no idea. But I knew that I was very, very passive in life. I was very quiet. I never used my voice. And food was what I returned to when someone would hurt me, when someone would abuse me, when someone would neglect me, and I was sick and tired of that feeling of not being enough. And while my body was completely fighting me, it really was a decision in my mind that I deserve better than this, and I’m just going to do the hard work. And I hated every minute of it.

I did some intensive trauma therapy. I have done so much inner work to just really trust that I can be who I am and it’s perfectly fine and I don’t need to hide behind anything. And throughout this journey, so many people have watched my transformation and have been influenced by it at a level that I never really expected. And so now it’s given me the tools to really help teach them how to be brave, too. But for me, it was I was sick and tired of feeling like a victim. I was tired of being hurt. And until you learn to use your voice, you’re going to continue to get hurt, you’re going to continue to have these things happen to you in life.

Sarah: I love that. I think that’s really powerful what you just said, and for so many of us to realize, so thank you. You also wrote that we should never be ashamed of our story. And so we know you’re a coach now, too and so how can we as men and women really start to own our story and find gratitude for it and what it’s taught us, instead of feeling ashamed of it like some of us may feel that way?

Bri: Yeah, that’s a great question because I see so many people try to hide behind their stories. And what people need to realize is that, while they may be a victim of something bad that happened to them, they don’t have to use that as a crutch to stay hidden. They need to use that as a tool to speak up because there are so many people in this world that have been through the exact same thing or similar that they have, and they’re just waiting for someone to come along with them and say, “I’ve been there too. Let me help you.” But we feel so alone and so ashamed when bad things have happened to us, whether we’ve been bullied, we’ve been abused or neglected. And we feel like we did something wrong to cause those things to happen. And until you release yourself from that guilt, and you give yourself permission to say, “No, I did not do anything to cause this”, then you’re really going to continue to stay hidden under that situation that happened to you.

Sarah: Yeah. I’d love to bring the conversation back a little bit to the PTSD and sexual abuse too because I know, and I haven’t shared too much of this publicly, but I have shared some extent of sexual assault that I experienced. And I know that when it first happened and I first started to process and heal from it, I was so embarrassed. I was just so embarrassed. I thought it was all my fault. I put myself in a situation that I shouldn’t have put myself in, and all these things. I’m like, maybe I’m interpreting this the wrong [way]. I just thought, “This is all my fault.” And so I was ashamed and I was embarrassed about it. And as a result, number one, there was PTSD to follow that as well, but also, it changed my relationship to the world in some ways, because I thought, number one, I’m embarrassed. I shouldn’t show this part of who I am. And it reinforced this belief that the world was a scary place and that I should always be afraid and always have my guard up around people. I think it can also dictate and change your relationship to food after you’ve experienced trauma like that. So Bri, can you share a little bit about that experience that you’ve been through if you feel comfortable? And just how that shaped you moving forward, potentially in a negative way, but then also in a positive way?

Bri: Sure. Yeah. It’s interesting. So back in 2010 when I started on my journey, I was married at the time. And I went through a transformative journey and lost about the first 100 pounds while I was still married. And I tested for the police department, I got through to the interviews, and my husband at the time told me, “I never thought you could do it. And I don’t think I can be married to a police officer because it’s emasculating. And so I had just done so much work to make myself better and to try to heal what I thought was a bad relationship with food and fitness, and then my husband doesn’t love me enough to stay with me, right? So while I was going through a divorce, I then became victim to my boss, who was basically trying to console me over this divorce I was going through, and he played on that. He groomed me and I did not know what was going on when it was happening. But he was this older successful salesman who had fancy cars, fancy house made a lot of money and I’m like, “Why is he paying attention to me? Little old me”, right? And I continued to lose weight, I continued to get healthy, and then he sexually abused me many, many times. And I was stuck in this hole because he told me I’d lose my job if I told anybody. I believed him. Then when I finally did tell somebody, they didn’t believe me. And this was back before the whole big “Me Too” movement. If only this happened this year, right, not eight years ago.

And so there, my husband didn’t love me, my boss took advantage of me, then after that, I went into a long term relationship for about three years. A man I loved to pieces, I thought I was going to marry, who cheated on me and left. So I’m going through these series of events in my life, where I’m getting healthier, I’m doing things for me, I’m starting to speak up and use my voice, and it seems like right when I get to the peak of another step, another hurdle that I’m going for, something bad happens. So it would be very easy for me in the life that I’m in now to say, “Nope, I’m not going to keep working on this relationship with you and I’m not going to keep making this daily choice. And I’m just going to go back to being heavy because that kept me safe.” Nothing changed in my life until I started working on my relationship with food. So it can be a total like mindfuck sorry for the word, but it can totally screw with your mind because you think “I’m going to go back to what’s safe.” Well, I don’t play safe anymore because being safe does not keep me happy.

And so no matter what I went through, and no matter how many times it happened, I am so much happier in life right now than I ever was before. And no matter what happened to me then, I just know every day I’m going to make the choice to keep working on that. And my relationship with food is continual. It’s going to continue to be a daily choice. It’s going to continue to be something that I have to remind myself that this is not a thing for me anymore. When you go through PTSD or any kind of trauma, the way you work to heal that is recognizing what’s past and what’s current. And I have to stay in the present otherwise your mind just plays tricks on you. I hope I answered your question

Sarah: No, it does. Like, you said, you’re in this amazing place in your life now. And when I look back, I’m like, “I actually learned a lot.” I also learned frickin’ forgiveness. Like my experience with that this man, I never called him up on the phone and said, “I forgive you, but I energetically forgave him for what he did. And that was a huge lesson for me to learn how to truly forgive one of those people who’s done the worst to you in your life. And that was a hard lesson but it’s also something I’m really, really grateful for. I think I’m better at forgiving the small things now as well. So there’s this good that did come from something that seemingly is really horrible.

Bringing it back to food a little bit, too. So I think that probably the people listening can resonate at least just to part of one of our stories, whether it’s the anxiety around food after elimination diet, or not loving ourselves and using food as this protection blanket or not wanting to be seen and so carrying weight in that sense. And whatever your story is whoever’s listening, whatever your story and your unique story is, I think that there are ways for all of us to heal from this food anxiety. So Bri, when you start to work with some of your clients now and in your work today, where is the starting point for you? Or what advice would you give to someone listening who is seeing themselves in your story today? And where would they start?

Bri: So I think starting with a commitment to being honest, and being vulnerable with me, as their coach, or whoever they’re working with, is kind of the expectation upfront. They have to be willing to be vulnerable because we’re going to work on a lot of inner demons that are inside that are keeping them stuck in this roller coaster of emotions with food. And many of them ask me, “What’s different this time? Why is this going to work this time, because I’ve tried a million diets under the sun?” And I think, and this isn’t going to me, but it’s going to the situation, I’ve been where they’re at. I’ve tried everything under the sun and continued to basically sabotage myself into failing every time over and over. And it’s because you’re scared. You’re scared of the unknown. You’re scared of what’s going to happen. And you don’t trust it yet because you don’t know how it’s going to go. So you have to release control, you have to be vulnerable. But one thing that I incorporate into my practice that may be a little bit different from others is I do help them replace the emotions that they have with the food attachment with blends for essential oils.

So I custom make blends for them based on their journey, based on what emotions they’re dealing with. And it’s a practice that I teach them that I say basically, “If you’re having a stressful day, if you’re in tears over something, normally you would go to food. What is that food for you?” We define it for them. Usually, it’s chocolate or diet cokes, or doughnuts or something, right? “Instead of going to that item, you’re going to go someplace quiet, you’re going to sit down, you’re going to do some breathing exercises, and you’re going to use your oils.” It’s a beautiful journey that I see all of them go on. And every time it happens, and it clicks for them and they realize that they can control this craving with something that’s healing for them, I mean, it almost brings me to tears every time when they finally get it, and they trust the process. And then they can move on to the next step in the program. But they first have to trust the process, and this is kind of the door that opens that up for them.

Sarah: I have that tattoo on my arm, it says, “I trust the process.” It’s in my brother’s handwriting from one of his journals that we found. So it’s a really special tattoo, but it’s also just a guidepost in my life, right, trusting the process, trust, trust, trust, trust. Because when we’re not trusting, we’re oftentimes in that fear state and we’re trying to control every fucking little thing in our life. And control is an illusion anyway, we don’t actually have control. So, Bri, I’d love for the people who are visual and listening, including myself, I’m a visual learner here. Can you give us a little bit of a snapshot of your personal journey with food? So starting with like the pre-weight loss, what did your food look like? And then maybe when you were kind of in the midst of this anxiety after food elimination diet, and then what does it look like today, so we can get a sense of how that’s changed for you with the disclaimer that every body is unique and has unique needs. But just as an example of kind of the journey you have come from and through, and then where you are now with the way you eat or how you choose your food today.

Bri: Yes, an absolute disclaimer on bio-individuality here. We’re all very different human beings. And so what works for me, I always tell my clients will not necessarily work for them.

Sarah: Exactly.

Food judgment, body dysmorphia, and food anxiety

Bri: But oh, goodness, so I am a Texas girl. I grew up in the South. I now live in Washington in like, hippie town, USA but I grew up in the South. And so everything we ate was covered in butter, fried five times over and you’ve never had a meal without a coke in your hand. So I kid you not, I didn’t know how to cook until I was probably 25. Everything was fast food. That’s just how I grew up. That’s how my family grew up. Most of my family’s diabetic, obese, overweight, very sick. And so I didn’t even know, and I actually became quite angry at one point in my life throughout this journey. Why didn’t I know how to eat right? I didn’t know any better. And that sounds so ignorant, but it’s true. And so when I started having to lose weight, I didn’t know where to start, so I did what my trainers told me to do. And most of that had to do with– It was a CrossFit world, so it was paleo diet. That’s typically what they make you go on, or they suggest that you go on. They don’t make you do anything. And so I went from eating fried foods, fast food all the time to a very strict paleo, almost Whole30 regimen. And so, of course, the weight came off, right? I mean, that’s just kind of logic. But throughout that process, that’s when a lot of the food anxiety came because I felt like if I ever go off of that, then I am going to gain all the weight back. I was always scared of gaining all the way back.

I also went through major body dysmorphia, so I didn’t see my body in the mirror the way that everybody else did. So it was really messed up in your head. So I went on to paleo, then I decided I was having all of these hormonal issues and the thyroid issues so I’m going to do an AIP for a little while. And that just about made me go crazy because it’s so freakin’ strict. I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t and so every time I’d cycle through trying something new, I would also be triggered into binges. So I’d do paleo for a while, then I would freak out, get exhausted, and I would just eat like shit for like, a week. And then I would feel like I need to go to the hospital because I feel so bad. So I wasn’t until my achalasia diagnosis in January of 2017, where I was forced to basically not eat anything or drink anything that I had control over, when I realized, “Why am I following all of these plans that all these people who are not me are telling me to follow?” I know that they mean well, but they truly believed that the only way to be a good crossfitter is to be paleo. Or the only way to lose all this weight is to go Whole30. Well, they don’t know what’s going on in my life. They don’t know the stresses I have. They don’t know the abuse I’ve gone through. They don’t know the trauma I’m dealing with. So why am I taking their word basically as principal when they’re not me?

So I started to really reflect inside and listen to my body. And when do I feel the happiest? What am I eating when I feel content and calm and I don’t have any inflammation in my body? What is that for me? What does that look like for me? Is that salads? Is that juices? Is that smoothie bowls? I mean, what is it for me that makes me feel happy, but does not cause any negative effects? So the way I eat today is very intuitive. I eat when I’m hungry and I eat things that I find happiness in. And it’s not happiness like a sugar happy. It’s not like a crutch happy. It’s like, “I’m going to spend 10 minutes making the most glorious looking smoothie bowl because it’s cold and I like cold food and it tastes good and it looks pretty”, right? But it’s full of superfoods and vitamins and minerals, and all these things that my body needs. Plus, I can eat it and swallow it well, because it’s soft and it goes down easy.

So I know that I need to focus on a balance between fats and carbs and proteins, but I don’t focus on that stuff anymore, because that will stress me out. And that will trigger the food anxiety like nobody’s business. And so now I listen to my body. And some days, maybe I’m eating all chicken and rice. And the next day, I might be eating smoothie bowls for a few days, because that’s just what feels good and that’s what tastes good. So I know that people probably are listening and they want a cut and dry plan on what they should do, and I’m here to say that I can’t give you that because we’re all different, but it’s also okay. And I had to become okay with being someone in the fitness industry and saying, I don’t eat like you and that’s okay. That doesn’t make me wrong.

Sarah: Definitely. And there’s so much judgment. That’s a whole other conversation, but there’s so much judgment around food, and “Oh my god, you’re eating that?” or “I would never eat that.” And it’s just absurd, right? All the judgment around what other people are eating when we truly have unique needs. And I know my experience right now in my life is that I’m on this low oxalate diet and there have been zero people who have said, “Oh, yeah, oxalates I know what those are.” Because what the heck, right? That’s like the weirdest word. No one knows what an oxalate is. And so I’m like, “I’m on a low oxalate diet and they’re like, “What?”, but I have to just let myself still choose that diet because I know that based on my lab testing, I have high oxalate levels, and I personally do well on a low oxalate diet. Does that mean that you can’t eat chocolate and spinach and all these things? No, it just means that I can’t eat them right now. So there can oftentimes be a lot of judgment around that.

Bri: There definitely is, especially if you’re trying to bring on new business and new clients, and you coach friends and they’re like, “What are you recommending?”

Sarah: Well, so that structure that people maybe are craving right now is a very masculine energy. It’s like, “I wanted to do this.” Give me the 123, meal plan recipes, blah, blah, blah” and that works for some people. And for other people, you need that feminine touch, that feminine energy that is flowing, that is organic, that is intuitive, that is listening to your body, and asking your body what it wants instead of what that book says that you should have. And I have found personally that that’s also worked better for me. But also, you can blend them. And you kind of were describing this where it’s like you have probably your no-no list like you said. Like you don’t eat gluten.

Bri: Gluten and dairy I stay away from.

Sarah: Those are no’s

Bri: And high sodium foods I stay away from because I retain water because of how much weight I’ve lost. I have edema in certain areas of my body.

Sarah: So there’s like this kind of overarching structure, but then within the foods that you can eat, it’s like, “I’m going to eat what I want to do today. I don’t have to follow any certain structure.” So I think it’s beautiful to kind of blend that masculine and feminine energy into the way we eat and in intuitive eating as well.

Bri: So I was going to say I do think it’s important for people to remember that their body changes. So it gets very frustrating for clients sometimes when they’re like, “But this worked for me and this is how I lost all my weight. I want to go back to this.” And it’s like, “Well, what has happened in your life the last five years since then?” What used to work for you then might not work now and that’s okay.

Sarah: Yeah. And our gut bacteria is always changing. Our nutritional needs are changing. It’s like so you know I do business coaching too. And they say in business and like when you’re building a business, what got you to where you are today is not going to get to you to where you know, say it got you to a five k month, it’s not going to get you to your 10k month. Well, what made you lose your first 50 pounds might not be exactly what you need to lose the additional 50 pounds and so it is. Our needs are really unique. And I think that we go back to trusting the process, right, and allowing it to change and evolve as our bodies change and evolve as well. So we’re at the top of our time, but I would love to open the floor to you, if there’s anything you feel like you weren’t able to speak on today that you want the listeners to know, to hear, you think they need to hear, or anything else that you might want to add.

Bri: I think that I just want people to hear that they don’t need to be afraid of facing whatever it is that food is keeping them safe from because it’s so scary to start peeling away those layers of emotional eating because you are perhaps and probably likely opening up the door to past traumas in your life, you’re opening up the door to perhaps a lot of need for self-love. And it’s not the easiest work in the world to do. It’s not always pretty. But if they really are ready to change, that’s what you have to do. If you really want to break this emotional eating cycle, it’s time to just dive in and figure out what it is that you’re lacking because the food, while it’s always going to be there, it’s also going to be what eventually kills you. You need to live a happy and fulfilled life and not constantly be thinking about what you’re going to put in your mouth next.

Sarah: Yeah. I love that. Release that control of food over you. Bri, how can people find you, work with you, follow you?

Bri: I have a website. It’s tigerstripesearned.com. I’m also on Instagram, same handle, tiger stripes earned, and they can find all of my information on there. I do have some resources for trauma recovery, the Achalasia Foundation, and different parenting resources as well for people who have children with anxiety like I do.

Sarah: I love that. Thank you so much for your time and your knowledge and just sharing your story and being vulnerable with all of us today. I appreciate it so much, Bri. Thank you.

Bri: Thank you, Sarah.

Thank you so much for tuning into today’s episode. I am beyond honored to hold this space for you, to create this content for you, and to stimulate our brains and make us think in a different way, including me. This podcast has shifted the way I have thought as well. And if there’s anything that you took away from this episode or any other episode, I would be so honored and grateful if you would share that with me on social media, either through a personal message or put it in your Instagram story, tag autoimmune tribe. And know that we’re in this together, that this is truly a community, that our paths are interwoven for a reason, and that we get this beautiful opportunity to come together for the greater healing of all of our unique bodies. So if you loved this episode or any of the other episodes of the Healing Uncensored podcast, please share them with a friend, a loved one, an acquaintance. You never, never know whose life you might be impacting or changing with just a simple share. That’s all for now tribe. I will see you next time. Have a beautiful rest of your day. I love you so much.

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