Rebuilding Self-Image & Self-Worth After Trauma – Strategies to See Yourself With Love & Respect Again
- Brainz Magazine
- Jan 8
- 14 min read
Written by Ylwa Woxmark, Equine-guided Recovery Coach
Ylwa Woxmark is a certified and accredited coach and the founder of The Horse Sanctuary in Sweden, where horses with mental and physical traumas are healed. After the healing process, the horses assist her in helping people with the same challenges. She is also the author of the Horsiquette book, published in 2023, together with her husband, Mats.
Have you ever felt like the person you see in the mirror isn’t the person you used to be, struggling to rebuild your self-image and self-worth after trauma? For a long time, I didn’t think I had experienced trauma. To me, trauma was something that happened to people in wars or catastrophes, not to someone who had simply learned to be strong, adaptable, and capable. It wasn’t until much later, when patterns kept repeating, and certain emotions felt out of proportion or completely unreachable, that I began to see the invisible threads connecting my reactions to old wounds. Some of them were my own, others didn’t even start with me. They were inherited, quiet echoes of pain and survival that had traveled through generations, shaping the way I saw the world and related to it.
The catastrophic end of a relationship with a psychopath became the breaking point and, unexpectedly, the beginning. It forced me to look deeper, to understand what had led me to him, and to recognize how unhealed pain and inherited patterns had shaped my choices. From that devastation grew the possibility to rebuild my life, piece by piece, as a healed version of myself, one who no longer confuses survival with love.
After traumatic experiences, our self-image fractures. We begin to doubt our worth, our abilities, even who we truly are. Sometimes it becomes hard to recognize ourselves at all. But even when self-worth feels broken, there is a way back, a way to rebuild the relationship with yourself through warmth, patience, and respect. For me, that path began among my equine companions. In their still presence, in meeting their honesty and boundless acceptance, I slowly found my way home to myself. The journey I’ve made alongside them is now the foundation of how I support my clients in healing their own self-images.
What happens to self-image after trauma
Trauma changes how we see ourselves. When something painful happens, especially when it involves betrayal, guilt, or abandonment, we often begin to see ourselves through the eyes of the trauma. Our self-image can become colored by shame, self-blame, and a sense of being “wrong.”
After being with him, I was no one. Everything that happened in our relationship was “my fault.” I began to doubt my own sanity. The constant gaslighting and emotional manipulation made me question every thought, every feeling, and every boundary I tried to hold. I lost trust, not only in others but also in myself. That level of psychological distortion doesn’t just break your heart, it erodes your sense of self.
So how do you start?
You begin by finding something, or someone, who sees you without the story. For me, that was Mats, my soulmate, who had been my best friend long before we became a couple. His steady presence helped me feel safe enough to begin trusting again. Nearby were my four-legged teachers, beings who didn’t care who I had been told I was. They responded only to what was true in that moment: my breathing, my heartbeat, my energy. Between Mats’ quiet faith in me and their wordless honesty, I slowly began to remember myself again.
You see, the things you have experienced aren’t the truth of who you are, they are protective layers. The body and mind are trying to make sense of what happened, and in that process, guilt can turn inward. That’s why healing is as much about transforming your inner story as it is about processing memories. These animals have taught me this on a deep level. They wear no masks, no stories about how things “should” be. They simply respond to what’s real in the moment, and that truth can become a mirror for healing.
Self-worth, more than just confidence
Self-worth isn’t about performance, it’s about relationship. It’s the quiet knowing that you are worthy of love, even when you’re not doing anything to earn it. After trauma, that relationship is damaged, especially if you’ve learned that love and safety are conditional. My time in the pasture helped me understand the difference. These beings don’t care about achievement, they care about presence. When I tried to “get it right,” they withdrew. But when I settled into myself, still, without trying, they came closer. It became a living lesson in what self-worth truly is: daring to be yourself in connection with another.
How trauma shapes the inner voice
After trauma, your inner voice can become harsh, critical, and suspicious. Many people stop trusting their own feelings or decisions. This inner split happens when survival strategies take over. The voice saying, “You should have known better,” is really trying to protect you from being hurt again.
When I began working with the herd in my own recovery, I noticed how clearly they mirrored my inner voice. A horse doesn’t react to your words, it reacts to the tone in your nervous system. When I spoke to myself with judgment, they grew restless. When I softened my breath, they relaxed. That reflection became a pathway back to self-compassion, a reminder that safety begins within.
7 strategies to rebuild self-image and self-worth after trauma
1. Removing yourself as a victim, stepping out of the story that keeps you small
There comes a moment in every healing journey when the story of what happened begins to loosen its grip. It’s not that the pain disappears or that what was done to you suddenly becomes acceptable, it’s that you stop letting it define who you are.
For a long time, I carried the identity of a survivor like armor. It protected me. It explained my fears, my reactions, the walls I built around my heart. But as time went on, I realized that the same armor that had once kept me safe was now keeping me small. I was no longer being hurt, yet I kept living as if I was.
Removing yourself from the role of victim doesn’t mean denying your pain or pretending it didn’t matter. It means reclaiming your power to choose who you are beyond it. Trauma can make us believe that our past holds the pen, that our identity is written in the language of what happened to us. But healing begins the moment you take that pen back.
When I finally stopped defining myself through my wounds, I began to see what else was there: strength, sensitivity, intuition, and an incredible capacity for love. All the things that had once been used against me were also the keys to my freedom.
Stepping out of the victim role is an act of deep self-respect. It’s saying, what happened was real, but it is not my entire story. It’s choosing to see yourself not as broken, but as becoming.
And it doesn’t happen overnight. Sometimes it’s one breath, one boundary, one honest “no” at a time. Sometimes it’s allowing joy to enter a space where only grief has lived. Sometimes it’s forgiving yourself for not knowing better before you did.
When you stop being the victim in your own life, you don’t erase the past, you transform your relationship to it. You move from being the one who endured to the one who creates. That shift doesn’t make you harder, it makes you whole.
2. See yourself through the eyes of compassion, remembering that you deserve the same kindness you offer others
Compassion is often something we extend easily to others, to a friend in pain, to an animal trembling with fear, to a child learning something new. Yet when it comes to ourselves, that same softness can feel unreachable. We turn inward with judgment, with expectations, with an unspoken belief that we should have known better or done more.
But healing asks for something different. It asks you to look at yourself not as a problem to fix, but as someone who has suffered and still chooses to grow. It asks you to witness your own pain with the same tenderness you would offer to another being in need of safety.
When I began to practice seeing myself through compassionate eyes, everything changed. I stopped fighting my emotions as if they were enemies. I started listening to them as messengers, signals from the parts of me that had once been silenced or shamed. Compassion didn’t erase the wounds, it created space for them to breathe.
True compassion is not pity, and it’s not indulgence. It’s the quiet recognition that you did the best you could with the awareness you had. It’s allowing yourself to be human, imperfect, growing, still learning.
If you find it hard to access compassion, imagine someone who loves you deeply, perhaps a friend, a horse, or even the Earth itself, looking at you right now. Notice the warmth in that gaze. The understanding. The lack of judgment. That is the lens through which you are meant to see yourself.
Each time you choose compassion over criticism, you are teaching your nervous system that it is safe to be you. That you no longer need to earn kindness or hide your tenderness. That love, in its purest form, begins within.
So today, pause. Place a hand over your heart. Breathe. Whisper to yourself:I see you. I forgive you. I love you. And let that be enough.
3. Identify and challenge old stories, rewriting the inner narrative that no longer serves you
Every one of us carries stories, quiet narratives that shape how we see ourselves and what we believe is possible. Many of them were written long before we were old enough to question them. They live in our nervous systems, in our habits, in the way we speak to ourselves when no one is listening.
Some of these stories come from moments of pain or rejection: “I’m too much.” “I’m not enough.” “Love has to be earned.” Others are inherited, passed down like invisible heirlooms through generations that learned survival instead of safety.
The problem is, when we don’t recognize these stories as stories, we begin to live as if they are truth. They shape our relationships, our choices, even the way we hold our bodies. We repeat patterns that keep us small, not because we want to, but because the story tells us we must.
Healing begins with awareness. The moment you pause and ask, whose voice is this, something inside you starts to shift. Is it the voice of a parent who couldn’t see your sensitivity as strength? The echo of a partner who made you doubt your worth? The whisper of an ancestor who believed safety meant silence?
Once you see the story for what it is, a survival pattern, not a reflection of your essence, you can begin to challenge it. You can say, that was then. This is now. I am allowed to choose differently.
Rewriting your story doesn’t mean pretending the past didn’t happen. It means taking the pen back and writing a new chapter from a place of awareness and truth. It’s standing in your own power and declaring, I am not who I was taught to be. I am who I am becoming.
Every time you respond with kindness instead of fear, set a boundary instead of collapsing, or allow joy instead of guilt, you are editing the script. You are becoming the author of your life again.
And in that rewriting, you discover what was always waiting beneath the old stories: your freedom.
4. Reclaim your body: Coming home to the place where your truth lives
Trauma doesn’t just live in the mind, it settles in the body. It hides in the muscles that stay tense, in the breath that doesn’t go all the way down, in the heartbeat that quickens for no visible reason. For many of us, the body stopped feeling like a safe place long ago. It became something to control, to escape, or to silence.
But your body has never been your enemy. It has always been your ally, doing everything it can to protect you, even when that protection came through numbness or tension.
Every ache, every shutdown, every wave of anxiety is your body’s way of saying, “I’m still here. I’ve been holding the story for you.”
Reclaiming your body is not about forcing it to change. It’s about listening. It’s learning to meet your sensations with curiosity instead of judgment, to ask, “What do you need?” rather than, “What’s wrong with me?”
For me, this journey began through presence, standing quietly beside a horse, feeling the rhythm of my breath find its way back into sync with another living being. They live entirely in their bodies, free from shame or overthinking. In their company, I could feel what it meant to simply exist, to inhabit my own skin without performance or apology.
When you begin to reconnect, even in small ways, stretching in the morning light, placing a hand on your chest and feeling it rise, breathing through a moment of tension instead of pushing it away, you start to re-establish trust. Your body begins to believe you are no longer abandoning it.
This is how healing happens, through returning, again and again, to presence. Through softening your grip and allowing yourself to feel. Your body is not a battlefield. It’s a home, sacred, intelligent, resilient. The more you listen, the more it will tell you what it needs to heal. And slowly, as you reclaim it, you also reclaim your power, your boundaries, your joy, and the deep knowing that you are safe within your own skin.
5. Create safety through routine: Building trust in life, one small rhythm at a time
When the world has felt unsafe, chaos becomes familiar. The nervous system learns to anticipate threat, to stay alert, to brace for what might come next. Even in moments of calm, there can be a hum of tension underneath, as if the body no longer trusts peace to last.
This is why routine matters so deeply in healing. It isn’t about control or perfection, it’s about teaching your body that safety can be predictable. That nourishment, rest, and care will come again tomorrow. Routine becomes a language of reassurance, quiet, consistent, and profoundly healing.
For me, this understanding deepened through the rhythm of the herd. Their days unfold in patterns shaped by the sun, the weather, and the seasons. There is no rush, only flow. Watching them graze, rest, and move together taught me something essential: safety is born from rhythm, not rigidity. It’s the trust that needs will be met in time.
Creating safety through routine can be as simple as having tea at the same hour each morning, lighting a candle before bed, or walking in nature on the same path each week. These acts tell your nervous system, “I am here. I am safe. Life continues.”
If you’ve lived in survival mode, consistency might feel uncomfortable at first, even boring. But beneath that discomfort lies the medicine. Predictability gives the body permission to exhale. It lets you anchor in the present moment rather than waiting for what might go wrong.
Safety doesn’t arrive all at once, it grows through repetition. Through feeding yourself when you’re hungry, resting when you’re tired, honoring your limits without shame. Over time, these small rhythms become a sanctuary, a living structure that holds you steady when life feels uncertain. Routine is not confinement, it’s freedom. It’s the quiet promise you make to yourself: “I will keep showing up. I will keep myself safe.”
6. Seek reflections of respect: Finding mirrors that see your true worth
After trauma, the world can feel like a hall of distorted mirrors. You see yourself through fractured reflections: harsh judgments, unmet expectations, voices that whisper you’re not enough. The problem isn’t you, it’s the mirror. You’ve been looking for validation in places that cannot reflect your true self.
Healing begins when you seek reflections of respect, people, animals, and spaces that meet you without demanding performance or perfection. These mirrors don’t ask you to prove your worth, they simply see it, and in that seeing, you can start to see yourself again.
For me, the herd became that mirror. They never cared about my mistakes, my insecurities, or the masks I once wore. They responded only to the authenticity of my presence. Slowly, through their steady, nonjudgmental gaze, I began to remember what it felt like to be respected, not for what I could do, but for who I am.
In human relationships, this looks like choosing companions who honor your boundaries, friends who listen without trying to fix you, and mentors who guide without controlling or pushing you beyond your boundaries. It’s the people who reflect patience, kindness, and truth who remind you of your worth simply by being present with you.
Respect is not earned through achievement, it is recognized in the essence of being. And when you surround yourself with mirrors that hold you in respect, your self-image begins to heal. You learn that you deserve care, attention, and validation, not because you must perform, but because your existence matters.
Look around. Who reflects your worth back to you? Who reminds you that you are seen, valued, and enough? Seek those reflections, nurture them, and allow yourself to be shaped by their quiet, unwavering affirmation.
7. Write your new story: Reclaiming your narrative and your power
Trauma tells a story for you. It whispers that you are broken, unworthy, or defined by what happened to you. But that story is not your whole truth, it is only a fragment of your life, shaped by fear and survival. Healing begins when you take the pen back into your own hands.
Writing your new story doesn’t mean erasing the past, it means reclaiming the meaning of it. It means seeing yourself not only as the one who suffered, but also as the one who survived, the one who resisted, the one who has grown stronger in ways invisible to the world. Each word you write, each memory you process, becomes a stitch in the fabric of your renewed self.
You can write in any form that speaks to you, journaling, painting, poetry, storytelling, or even creating rituals that mark your growth. The act itself is a declaration: “I am more than what happened to me.” It is a way to witness your courage and acknowledge your capacity to shape your own life.
The animals I worked with offered a quiet lesson in this. Their lives are stories of trust rebuilt, of boundaries learned, of connection earned through presence rather than control. Observing them reminded me that stories can be rewritten, gently, patiently, and with deep respect for each step of the journey.
Your new story is your claim to freedom. It is the narrative that affirms your worth, your resilience, and your right to live fully. When you write it with honesty and compassion, you no longer carry the past as a weight. Instead, it becomes a teacher, a guide, and a part of the whole self that you are learning to love.
Can you truly love yourself after trauma?
Yes, but not through perfection. Self-love after trauma isn’t about always feeling beautiful, strong, or happy. It’s about daring to stay with what is, and choosing kindness anyway. Love stops being an ideal and becomes a way of breathing through the pain.
After trauma, receiving love can feel risky. You may hesitate, fearing that accepting care means becoming vulnerable, dependent, or exposed. You may instinctively feel the need to give back immediately or prove that you are worthy. But self-love begins with learning to receive, fully, gently, and without guilt.
Receiving love is not a weakness, it is an acknowledgment that you deserve kindness, attention, and presence. It is a way to tell yourself: “I am worthy of care just as I am.” Start small. Let someone hold space for you without expecting anything in return. Let yourself rest while others support you. Let compliments or acts of service pass through without filtering them through a lens of doubt or obligation.
Practicing self-love through receiving transforms the relationship with yourself. You learn that love is not a transaction, nor something you must earn. It is an inherent right. Each time you allow yourself to be cared for, you strengthen the belief that you are whole, deserving, and enough. To receive is to trust life and your own heart. It is an essential step in reclaiming your worth, rebuilding your inner safety, and creating a life where love is both given and welcomed with ease.
Healing takes time, but you can begin now
Rebuilding self-image after trauma is a slow, spiral-like process. It doesn’t move in straight lines, but each time you choose gentleness over self-criticism, something deep within you begins to heal.
The horses we once helped heal continue to walk beside me through this process, showing every day how healing can happen in silence, through presence and respect. That experience is what I now share with my clients: that safety, self-worth, and love are not things we have to earn, they are things we gradually remember.
You deserve to see yourself with the same love and respect you offer others. And if you feel you need support in finding your way back to your inner worth, reach out. Help is available, and you don’t have to walk the path alone.
Read more from Ylwa Woxmark
Ylwa Woxmark, Equine-guided Recovery Coach
Ylwa Woxmark, certified and accredited coach and equine-guided recovery coach, has healed from childhood traumas and abusive relationships. She is today dedicated to helping people change their perspective on traumas to be able to see their strengths and to find their life purpose. She is the founder of The Horse Sanctuary in Sweden, where former traumatized horses assist her in coaching people with the same challenges. Her mission: Allow yourself a second chance.
