The Identity Grief No One Warns You About
I need to share something with you that I wish someone had told me years ago when I first started transforming my relationship with food.
Someone should have warned me about this. Because if you're doing the deep work we've been talking about over these past weeks, if you're shifting your identity from someone who struggles with food to someone who naturally takes care of their body, you're about to experience something that almost no one in the wellness space discusses.
When it happens, you'll think something's wrong. You'll wonder if you're going backwards. You might even think you're broken.
What I'm about to share with you is actually a sign that the transformation is working. It's uncomfortable, it's confusing, and it's completely normal.
Today I'm going to tell you about the grief that comes with healing—and why no one warns you about it.
The uncomfortable truth
Here's the truth that no one wants to talk about:
To become someone who naturally takes care of their body, you have to grieve the loss of being "someone who struggles with food"—and that grief is real, necessary, and completely normal.
Let me explain what I mean.
For years, maybe decades, part of your identity has been wrapped up in struggling with food. You've been "someone who can't control themselves around cookies." "Someone who emotional eats." "Someone who's always trying to lose weight."
This identity, as painful as it's been, has also served you in ways you might not realize.
Being "someone who struggles" gets you sympathy. It gets you understanding from friends and family. It gives you something to bond over with other people. It explains why certain things are hard for you. It even gives you a sense of community—you belong to this group of people who "get it."
When you start to heal, you begin to lose that identity. And losing any identity, even a painful one, involves grief.
You might find yourself missing the simplicity of restriction. At least when you were dieting, you knew what to do, even if you couldn't stick to it. Now you have to trust yourself, and that feels scarier.
You might feel disconnected from friends who are still in diet culture. Suddenly their conversations about "being good" and "cheat days" feel foreign to you. You don't relate anymore, and that can feel isolating.
You might even miss the drama of the struggle. The cycle of restriction and rebellion, the constant mental chatter about food—it was exhausting, but it was also familiar. It gave your mind something to focus on.
And here's the really uncomfortable part: You might find yourself grieving the loss of the "someday" fantasy. When you were struggling, you could always tell yourself "someday when I lose the weight, everything will be better." That fantasy was painful but also comforting. Now you're realizing that the weight was never the real issue, and you have to face your life as it actually is.
This grief shows up in different ways for different people. Some people feel sad or nostalgic. Some feel angry or resentful. Some feel scared or anxious about who they're becoming. Some feel guilty for "abandoning" their old self or the people who are still struggling.
All of these feelings are normal. All of them are part of the process.
Why people avoid this truth
So why doesn't anyone talk about this? Why don't we prepare people for identity grief?
Grief feels negative when transformation is supposed to feel positive. We're told that healing should feel good, that change should be exciting, that becoming healthier should make us happy. So when we feel sad or scared or confused during the process, we think we're doing something wrong.
The wellness industry doesn't understand psychology. Most approaches focus on behaviors—what to eat, how to exercise, what habits to build. They don't prepare you for the psychological shifts that happen when you actually change your relationship with food and your body.
Focusing on the destination is easier than examining the journey. Everyone wants to talk about what you'll gain—confidence, energy, health. No one wants to talk about what you'll lose—familiar patterns, old identities, certain relationships, the comfort of struggle.
Admitting that healing involves loss makes the process sound harder. It's easier to sell "10 steps to food freedom" than "the complex psychological journey of identity transformation that includes grief, confusion, and letting go of who you used to be."
Here's what I've learned: When you don't prepare people for this grief, they get scared when it shows up. They think they're failing. They think something's wrong with them. And sometimes, they go back to their old patterns because the familiar struggle feels safer than the unfamiliar growth.
What this really means
So what does this mean for you practically?
If you're experiencing this grief, you're not broken. You're not going backwards. You're not failing. You're experiencing a normal part of deep transformation. The fact that you're grieving your old identity means you're actually changing at the identity level, which is the deepest level of change possible.
This grief is temporary, but it takes time. Identity shifts don't happen overnight. You might feel this grief in waves over several months. Some days you'll feel excited about who you're becoming. Other days you'll miss who you used to be. Both are normal.
You don't have to choose between your old self and your new self. You can honor what your old identity gave you while still growing into someone new. You can appreciate that "someone who struggled" was doing their best with the tools they had, while also choosing to become someone who has better tools.
You might need to find new ways to connect with people. If your relationships were built around shared struggle with food, you might need to find new common ground. This doesn't mean you have to abandon old friendships, but the dynamics might change.
Feeling scared about who you're becoming is okay. Growth always involves stepping into the unknown. The person you're becoming—someone who trusts themselves around food, someone who takes care of their body naturally—that person might feel foreign to you right now. That's normal.
This grief is actually a sign that the work is working. Surface-level changes don't involve grief. Only deep, identity-level transformation involves letting go of who you used to be. If you're feeling this grief, you're changing who you are at the core.
Action steps
So what do I want you to do with this information?
If you're experiencing this grief, name it. Say to yourself, "I'm grieving the loss of my old identity, and that's normal." Don't try to fix it or rush through it. Just acknowledge it.
Be gentle with yourself during this process. You don't have to have it all figured out. You don't have to feel positive about your transformation all the time. Mixed feelings about becoming someone new are okay.
Find support from people who understand identity-level change. This might not be your friends who are still dieting. This might be people who have been through their own transformation journey, whether with food or other areas of life.
Remember that grief and growth can coexist. You can miss your old self and still be excited about your new self. You can feel sad about what you're losing and grateful for what you're gaining.
This is deep work. This is real transformation. And real transformation always involves letting go of who you used to be to become who you're meant to be.
You're not broken. You're not failing. You're grieving, and that means you're growing.
I'll see you Thursday for our Q&A where we'll dive deeper into your questions about navigating this identity grief.
Until then, Keep winning!
