From Grief to Grit: Healing Through Trail Running

Sharing how solo trail running, strength, and joining the trail running community helped me through unimaginable loss and why I'm a trail running coach.

The Due Date That Still Lives in My Body

July 28.

It’s just a summer day to most people.

But for me, it’s the due date I never got to meet.

My daughter, Gabriel, was delivered on March 1, 2013—18 weeks into my pregnancy. I was told she no longer had a heartbeat on February 26. I was induced on February 28. I held her tiny body without life, knowing I’d never get the firsts, middles, or lasts.

Six months later, I miscarried again.

And then I unraveled.

The Spiral That Followed

What came next wasn’t a beautiful comeback story. Not at first.

There was alcohol. There was overexercising. There were too many nights of hating my reflection and punishing my body because I thought it had failed me.I got divorced. I isolated. I faked my way through work, relationships, everything.I wanted to disappear—but I kept showing up, barely.

Eventually, I left St. Louis and moved to Arizona. Not because I had a plan, but because I knew I needed a reset before I self-destructed.

The First Trail Run That Felt Like Hope

It wasn’t a clean slate. But it was a start.

About three years after that move, I joined a group trail run.

And something clicked.

The dirt, the sweat, the community… it felt like a breath I hadn’t taken in years. It was the first time I wasn’t trying to perform or punish. I was just in it. Out there, on Arizona dirt, I finally let myself feel again. Grief. Grit. Gratitude.

That run helped me remember I wasn’t broken—just buried under grief, perfectionism, and pressure to keep it all together.

Why Solo Trail Runs Matter So Much to Me

Even now, with a life full of people I love, I still crave those quiet miles.

These days, I run with people and I coach women

But I still need my solo runs.

Because solo miles are where I process. It’s where I talk to myself about all the things including Gabriel. It’s where I ask myself hard questions and let the answers come without judgment.

Some people journal. I trail run.

How Strength Training Gave Me a Body I Could Trust Again

Solo runs gave me the space to feel again.

Strength training gave me the power to rebuild.

Trail running gave me space to feel.

Strength training gave me a body I could trust again.

After feeling like my body had betrayed me—twice—it took time to build that trust back. Lifting helped. Moving heavy weight showed me I could be powerful, stable, and present. I wasn’t just surviving anymore—I was building something new.

Why I Trail Running Coach Women Like Me

This is why I do what I do.

I coach women who feel like they have to earn rest.

Women who believe “strong” means “silent.”

Women who’ve spiraled.Women who are ready to come back to themselves—but aren’t sure how.

You don’t need to be perfect.You don’t need to do it alone.You just need a place to start.

For me, that place was a dusty trail in Arizona. For you, it might be right here.