Peace with Self, Peace with Food: A Trauma Healing Approach to Emotional Eating

I was looking for something different when addressing emotional eating that made sense to me. I found a wonderful resource/workbook. It is one of those items that has been a life changer for me. I realize that I still have a lot of internal work to do, but now have the tools and direction to be successful.

At long last, I have a book to recommend to my clients who want to have less distress and shame around their relationship with food. Galina provides a wealth of knowledge and practical tools to help people understand how food has been a way to support and regulate ourselves during challenging times in our lives and to use that understanding to create positive change. It has been an incredible resource for me personally and as a therapist, it's been a great resource to use in my work with clients. There are many practical exercises and journal prompts that support the integration of the material. My clients report having new insights and understanding that have led to less shame and more compassion. I highly recommend this gem of a book!

This is a beautiful, creative and brilliant book. The author has a way of explaining difficult concepts simply. She's very generous with her knowledge, offering a free 2 hour workshop where she goes deeper into the science of why we eat the way we do. Also great accompanying videos to demonstrate exercises that are in the book. I recommend this to my clients who use food to self-soothe

This book is filled with many complex concepts broken down into simpler pieces. As a trauma therapist myself, this will definitely be a resource I use to help clients reduce their shame in eating & understand the missing needs they seek. A beauty of a book and author!!

The font was too small for me to comfortably read.

To my therapist peeps--I'd put this book in the neighborhood of Internal Family Systems + Polyvagal theory + Somatic Experiencing + restorative yoga + NARM.To everybody else--I've had a complicated relationship with my body since childhood (haven't we all)? Early on I thought that happy=skinny (spoiler alert---FALSE!). I steadily gained weight through the years and did a point counting program a couple dozen times plus other programs. I'd watch Biggest Loser (barf) with a bag of cookies. I thought that I lacked the capacity for an uncomplicated relationship with food I blamed my ADHD. Fast Forward to the pandemic. A couple things happened. The world shut down and so did I. I kept working from home but I barely moved. I also leaned heavily into intuitive eating and body positivity. If diet culture was restriction then Intuitive Eating (in my application of it) was 'go nuts'. Want a cookie? great. Want 12? Rock on. (To be fair this is not what IE is but rather is how I approached it). I don't know how much weight I gained in the pandemic but it was a lot. I got winded super easily and none of my clothes fit.Self-loathing and judgement didn't make me lose weight and Intuitive Eating/Body positivity did not make me love and accept my body.I love Galina's work because it is practical and accessible and presents an entirely different way to conceptualize what our needs are. (Not just hunger). She is gentle, kind, clear headed and this book is just a deep well of compassion. I think this book can provide practical tools but also can open a window to a whole new landscape. This is not a weight loss book. Its not a book of 'shoulds and should-nots'. It is more like an invitation to encounter yourself in an entirely different way and to begin to notice whats happening inside instead of trying to address our needs in other ways. She teaches ways to settle our bodies and systems so we can begin to really connect. Peace doesn't come from losing 50 pounds. It comes from transforming our relationship with how we nourish ourselves, in all senses.I would encourage anybody who has 'tried everything' to consider this book. I'm on the author's email newsletter list and the steady messages in there are supporting me. This book is a gem and frankly, I think will become a seminal work in regards to understanding ourselves and our true needs.

This book and guidance from Galina enabled me to understand, feel, and nurture what was going on in my body. With gratefulness to past, unhealthy copy habits that allowed me to reach this day, I have a new respect for my nervous system, and the how's and the why's I resorted to them. Now, I have the knowledge, AND the wisdom to embody what I've learned. I can feel, and live with my feelings. I can interpret what's going on in my body. I can accept...and be authentic, a true container of all that I am, for the first time in my life.

Galina's PWF method is absolutely life changing. This book is a must read if you've ever felt crazy for struggling with food or your body. This book is a beautiful, thorough introduction to more deeply understanding what your nervous system is doing and how trauma and food/ body struggles and intersect ....and more importantly, she guides you through very simple somatic practices to begin to come back home into your body.. Can't recommend Galina and her work highly enough! She is ahead of the curve by decades.

Love it! So insightful. Things I have never heard before about food, soothing ourselves, addiction and the possible relationship we can have with ourselves and food that is about joy and life and love rather than guilt, frustration and shame. If you need to undo all of the damage that multiple diets and social commentary on weight has done to you, this book is incredibly gentle and helpful.

I have been struggling with my weight and body image for more than 30 years and thus was absolutely thrilled to find Galina's book. Since I have been doing therapy based on Somatic Experiencing and NARM for 3 years, the book hit the mark. Especially since I am currently going through another crisis regarding my eating behavior. The book has given me hope to be on the right path and it is absolutely great and empathetically written, both the theoretical and practical parts are very understandable, practical and written with great understanding of the complexities of trauma. I would immediately and without hesitation recommend it to anyone who has been affected by trauma and is struggling with their eating behaviors. A big thank you for this great book, which I will definitely pick up again and again and recommend to others.

I have been struggling with trauma-related emotional eating all my life. Galina’s books have changed the way I look at my constant battle with food! Still long way to go, but I am more than grateful for her amazing work ❤️

Very good resource for getting to the core of eating issues and strategies for healing and letting go.

This book is life changing if you allow it be. Really amazing tools that changed my relationship to food. SomeOf the changes I am just relaxing months later. This book works deep! Such a wonderful application of polyvagal theory.The book not only invites us to deep listening and compassionate care. Reading it already gives you the full experience what ventral activation feels like. Galina’s love is poured into every single word, and you can feel your body soften along them. The peace is in the experience.I reread chapters every now and then, and they always take me deeper.A true gift! Thank you for creating this 🙏🏻