Supporting recovery, resilience and reconnection
after major body change

... because healing is more than just skin deep

After major body change — whether through weight loss, body contouring, gender-affirming, or reconstructive surgery — healing goes far beyond the surface. It’s not only physical; it’s emotional, mental, and deeply personal.

This guide was created to help you feel safe, informed, and empowered every step of the way. It’s about learning to trust your body again, to feel at home in your new form, and to reconnect with the life that’s waiting for you beyond recovery.

support your journey now

A new kind of recovery guide

Created from lived experience and over 20 years of professional expertise, this companion sits at the intersection of science, soul, and embodied healing. It bridges the gap between what your medical team provides and more of what your body and heart truly need for the fullness of recovery.

Inside, you’ll find over 70 pages of wholistic support to walk beside you through every phase of your journey — including fascia and lymph care, food as medicine, nervous system repair, scar and tissue healing, emotional integration, and embodied rituals for self-trust and renewal. You’ll also discover evidence-based insights woven with mindfulness, somatic awareness, and nourishment from the inside out.

This is more than a guide — it’s a map for returning home to yourself.

Who is this book for?

• Anyone preparing for or recovering from body contouring, weight-loss, reconstructive, or gender-affirming surgery

• Those healing after skin removal, cosmetic procedures, or postpartum restoration (“mommy makeovers”)

• People feeling disconnected, anxious, or unsure how to support healing beyond standard medical advice

• Anyone seeking a mind-body-based, trauma-sensitive, and holistic approach to recovery

• Individuals ready to reconnect with their body, rebuild trust, and nourish long-term resilience

• Practitioners, caregivers, or partners who wish to better understand and support the deeper layers of post-surgical healing

“Healing doesn’t begin and end with surgery - it continues with every breath, every choice. You’ve reshaped your body - now let’s help you feel at home in it.”

Download “Body Contouring Surgery: An Integrative Healing Companion” for only $22 AUD 

Empower yourself through every phase of recovery.

Purchase & Download

Inside these pages

•  Calm and regulate your nervous system so your body can repair efficiently, reduce inflammation, and rest deeply.

•  Support fascia and lymphatic flow with simple rituals, hydration, and nutrition practices that accelerate recovery and ease swelling.

•  Care for scars and skin in ways that honor both science and self-respect — turning self-touch into an act of healing and reconnection.

•  Understand what your body communicates through sensations, emotions, and subtle cues, and respond with curiosity instead of fear.

•  Rebuild strength and confidence through mindful movement, breathwork, and grounded awareness.

•  Address the emotional layers of surgery — grief, vulnerability, identity, body-image changes — and move toward compassion and self-acceptance.

•  Bridge medical care with integrative wisdom, blending functional medicine, nutrition, somatics, and nervous-system repair into one coherent path.

•  Reclaim a sense of safety, trust, and belonging — the true foundation of lasting recovery.

Included also: A 3-phase integrative healing protocol, menu plan and pantry guide, journaling prompts and self-care reflections.

PURCHASE & DOWNLOAD THE GUIDE

A note from the author

After years of working with people on the path of embodied transformation — and walking it myself — I created Body Contouring Surgery: An Integrative Healing Companion to bridge a gap I saw everywhere: the space between the science of the body and the lived experience of healing.

I created this guide because I know we are not meant to navigate great change alone — that true support is needed not just medically, but emotionally, nutritionally, and spiritually.

I created this guide for myself as I prepare for my own body contouring surgery after significant weight loss.

I created this guide for anyone learning to feel at home in their body again — those preparing for and recovering from weight loss, skin removal, transition, or reconstructive surgery.

It’s a companion written with empathy, evidence, and embodiment — blending science, nourishment, and gentle wisdom. My hope is that these pages help you return home to yourself with tenderness, trust, and renewed faith in your body’s innate healing capacity.

Nourishing Ways

MEET LINDA

Linda Ross is an educator, mentor, facilitator, and wholefood chef devoted to the art of embodied nourishment and integrative healing. Being a fellow traveller on the path of self-love, health and transformation, her own healing journey has become her greatest ally and inspiration. Having released over 70kg (150lb) and living through the vulnerable and tender realities of chronic illness and body image struggles, she brings both lived experience and professional expertise to support others in healing, reclaiming connection, and feeling at home in their bodies.

Learn more about Linda’s journey here 

A gift from my heart to yours

Whether purchasing “Body Contouring Surgery” today or not  I would still love for you to receive this gift – “Healing at Home – A Guided Healing Journey” – A Free 20-minute Guided Audio created to support you through the delicate season of post-surgery healing. It is designed to calm your nervous system, nurture inner trust, safety and presence and bring you back into connection during recovery.

Healing at Home - A Guided Audio Journey

* indicates required

When receiving this gift you will also join the Nourishing Ways community. You are welcome to unsubscribe at any time.  I appreciate your trust and respect your privacy. I promise not to spam.

Healing after surgery is not just about scars or shape — it’s about remembering the wholeness that’s always been there.

Take your time. Be kind to yourself.

Your healing is a rite of passage, and you don’t have to walk it alone.

Would like to explore working together one-on-one?

Lets work together

Client Testimonials

What an incredible journey, diving deeply into the many layers of wellness and healing that encompass a return to wholeness. This is one of the most informative and supportive containers I have experienced and highly recommend Linda as a mentor and guide for anyone who is either beginning the journey, or for those looking to explore wellness on a deeper and wholistic level.
~ Suzanne Willson
Linda is simply amazing at what she does, it goes far beyond her knowledge with Nourishing through food, it’s a nourishment of your soul. Over 1 month in journey with her atm and getting my life, health and real me back. It’s a very personal journey. Linda is knowledgeable, patient and loves what she does. Highly recommend if you want to get your health back, physically, mentally and spiritually. Thanks Linda.
Rick Turnbull
Linda is an exceptional human with a passion to shift the paradigm around food and health. Her sessions are grounded in knowledge, intuition, presence and devotion. She keeps me on track and invites me to go to places where I feel uncomfortable or shame. With Linda’s support, I feel inspired by food, curious about my relationship to my body and am choosing new beliefs to receive support and nourishment from life. She is a game changer for anyone who wants a guide that has lived experience, walks with compassion and knows the power of transformation.
Raquel Woods

Collaborators

Alais Clay – Design & Multimedia

Avishai Barnatan – Sound Journey Music Composition

Founder/Designer @ Critical Mass Media Design

Alais Clay is a multidisciplinary artist and creative visionary known for transforming ideas into immersive visual experiences. With roots in Videography, Multimedia, and Fine Arts, Alais blends technical mastery with soulful design—bringing stories to life through film, digital media, and dynamic brand expression. Beyond design, she channels her diverse skills into grassroots community activations, empowering individuals and communities through inspiring music, inclusive events, and creative tools for resilience and transformation. Her work consistently evokes a sense of unity, purpose, and possibility across all her creative endeavours.

Work with Alais HERE

Composer, Musician, Producer & Sound Alchemist 

Avishai Barnatan is a composer, musician, producer, and sound alchemist devoted to the art of connection through sound. Blending ancient wisdom with modern science, his work explores how vibration restores harmony, eases pain, and awakens presence. For over three decades, he has guided individuals and groups through transformative sound journeys and produces music for other artists from his studio in the Byron Bay hinterland, where he also performs with his band, Hamsa.

Explore Avishai’s music HERE

Deepest Gratitude to Alais & Avishai for their contributions in bringing this offering to the world

TOP

A GIFT FOR YOU

savour

Your Guide to Mindful Nourishment. Receive "Savour" & Join the Nourishing Ways Community.

I appreciate your trust and respect your privacy. I promise not to spam. If it doesn’t align, unsubscribe at any time.

A GIFT FOR YOU

savour
Awaken a greater awareness and capacity for deep presence and relaxation through mindful breath, mindful eating and mindful digestion.

Receive “Savour” & join the Nourishing Ways Community – updates, nourishing wisdom, invitations and love notes to your inbox!

I appreciate your trust and respect your privacy. I promise not to spam. If it doesn’t align, unsubscribe at any time.

HerStory

I was born and raised in Aotearoa, NZ – a dairy farmer’s daughter. There was a lot of love and a lot of hard work. Despite the rise of environmental toxins, prescription drugs like birth control medications, and junk foods of the 80s – our family was wholesome, ate relatively well, and in connection to the land.

I was a highly sensitive and expressive little girl who was deeply connected to the natural world. My parents taught me many good things to guide my way, yet my soul’s experience in this life and the journey of coming back home to my body would not be the easiest road to walk.  It is only years later that I understand and trust that the hardships of my lived experience were to be the medicine and wisdom to offer back to others.

At age 7 I developed Epilepsy and was heavily medicated for 10 years. At that time, we didn’t understand anything about how Epilepsy affects the rest of the body let alone the damaging effect of the medications on my health or the emotional/spiritual understanding of such an illness.

The years that followed carved an arduous road of inner turmoil, insecurity, and physical symptoms. Through my pre-teens and up till my early 20’s I struggled with a very negative sense of self and of my body. I experienced a cascade of symptoms like depression, fatigue, PMS, digestive issues, headaches, and weight gain. I never felt like I fit in and believed I was not good enough. For many many years, I didn’t know how to access the knowledge, support, and courage to overcome – I felt overwhelmed, alone, and scared, so I chose to numb out in various unhealthy ways to escape my reality – seeking to feel worthy, validated and good in my body.

At 22 I had hit rock bottom and wanted to end my life. I was 120kg, sick, and very sad.

I remember the day it all changed. I was sitting on the beach contemplating my purpose, praying for a better life, wondering if existence was meant to be this way – when I felt (consciously) for the first time – an energy and presence beyond my disassociated physical prison. I sensed a shimmering light in the heart of my being emerging – a light of hope, of choice, of remembering. This was my awakening and I am eternally grateful beyond measure.

While my course had been redirected I still had to start walking the path of unravelling deeply ingrained patterns and mental, emotional & physical imbalance. Yet as each day passed my whole perspective began to realign, offering my body and being what it needed to flourish. I was being shown the parts that needed my love and attention to heal. My heart and inner compass were guiding me, and all aspects of my life began to transform. All the beauty of my being that I had abandoned at such a young age began to seep into all the darkened places.

Over the next 6 years, I let go of 60 kg (130lbs) and numerous layers of discomfort and dissonance. It began with obvious simple changes to my diet and lifestyle. I brought more intention and connection into my life and began to inhabit myself once again. I embarked on a passion-filled journey of learning about the body, food, alternative therapies, self-care and spiritual connection – teachings and tools I carry with me today.

When I was 30, I was diagnosed with Hashi Moto’s Thyroiditis (an autoimmune disease). I believe this had been going on for a long while, driving many of the symptoms I had been traversing. I felt deeply knocked down by this diagnosis as I had given so much time and energy to “fixing” what I deemed broken.

While so much healing and transformation had taken place, I was now being asked to journey deep within and explore the origins of my suffering. The more curious and compassionate I became, the more I opened to the messages and call the fragmented parts of myself home. I started to understand that I was never broken to begin with – wholeness was always there. 

This diagnosis was an opportunity and a gift.

The decade that followed was all about coming into right relationship with myself, with others, and with the world around me. It was a deep dive into trauma, limiting beliefs, root cause medicine, and the systemic nature of chronic stress. I was shown that I still had much work to do around my inner narratives and the lack of trust I held for my body. As each season of healing unfurled I came to understand that the source of my suffering was disconnection and my quest was to return home to myself.

I know what it is like to live in a body that doesn’t seem to work properly, that doesn’t seem to match your heart’s desires. I understand what it’s like to feel trapped in symptoms you don’t know how to shift and spend much of your precious time and energy trying to fix what feels broken. I know what self-abandonment feels like.

 

Yet through it all, somehow I still sit here – grounded, vital, present – feeling immense gratitude for the abundance of beautiful blessings that have graced my days. The many landscapes I have traversed have not always been easy but they have always and in all ways supported my reconnection.  I am grateful for this opportunity to participate in the evolution of our collective consciousness.

So here we are – learning, growing, and healing together.

… And the journey continues …

To life…

Linda xo

After leaving high school at 16 to pursue her dream; at that time, of becoming a Chef – Linda graduated with a distinction from culinary school and additional hospitality/customer services-based trainings in Canterbury, NZ. Over the next 10 years, the diversity of her work within these sectors evolved to roles focused on health food, wellbeing, and support services.

In 2007, after some years upon European soil remembering the nourishing ways of her ancestral roots, she explored Asia and India, immersing herself in the Healing Arts of the East – Traditional Medicine, Yoga, Philosophy and Spirituality. From there she journeyed to the Americas and opened to the teachings of Native American and Shamanic Medicine Ways.

Heeding the call, her walk led her to Colorado to begin studies with the Seven Bowls School of Nutrition, Nourishment and Healing, diving deep into many modalities of healing and completing her training as an Integrative Nutrition Practitioner specialising in Food, Energy and Earth Medicine.

In 2010 and after being away from her islands of birth for almost a decade she returned to Aotearoa, NZ to reconnect to the medicine of Polynesia and Rongoa (indigenous plant medicine) for what was to be a majestical commune with the Ngahere (Forest) and wild places, guided by her teacher, Pa Ropata.

With a yearning to find stillness and grow deep roots into the earth, Linda poured her love and energy into growing food, living simply and regeneratively and building community. Crystallising in 2012, from her humble bush shack in the rural coastal paradise of Golden Bay – Nourishing Ways was born.

Mirroring the evolution of her work and research as well as her own personal healing journey, Linda returned to study at the Institute for the Psychology of Eating in the USA, delving into teachings of Eating and Nourishment Psychology and Body Mind Nutrition.

In 2019 she relocated to the Northern Rivers of NSW Australia, Bundjalung Country.  Alongside the flourishing of Nourishing Ways’ many expressions, Earth Kitchen was established to hold the bespoke Catering and Food Medicine Education branch of Nourishing Ways’ tree.

Linda has offered workshops and talks on many subjects ranging from mental health to mindful eating, from autoimmunity to positive body image. She created the popular 21-day cleanse programme “Rejuvenate”, ran healing food cooking classes, and co-created retreats offering wisdom on nutrition, nourishment, plant medicine and spirituality. Linda has mentored people around the world, created in-home wellbeing programmes, consulted cafes on menu development & eco initiatives, offered wholefood catering and workshops for young women’s rites of passage programmes, conscious festivals, yoga retreats/trainings and other wellbeing and transformational events.

Linda has worked in treatment facilities for addiction and disordered eating and has been recruited to cook and teach nutrition, eating psychology, body/mind nutrition and mindfulness to the Sydney Roosters NRL team. She has presented at “The Real Food Revolution”, Mental Health Awareness week, has been featured in newspapers throughout New Zealand, as well as Australia’s “That’s Life” magazine. She has written for Happyzine and Healthpost sharing her story and nourishing wisdom.

Having been a teacher and guide to many over the years, it is not till now, in 2023 that a readiness to fully step into the online world has aligned.