Trauma-Informed Me: Finding My Light

A memoir by Chantel Morin, MScN, RN

What happens when the ways we learn to survive become so practiced that they begin to look like strength?

Trauma-Informed Me: Finding My Light is a memoir about prematurity, maternal illness and loss, caregiving, nursing, burnout, identity, and healing. Drawing on both lived experience and Chantel Morin’s work as a nurse educator and trauma-informed developmental care specialist, the book explores the quiet ways survival can become disguised as competence — being capable, dependable, productive, and “fine” — and what can change when we begin to understand our own patterns with greater curiosity, compassion, and trauma-informed awareness.

About the Book

Chantel’s story begins with prematurity and early loss, but Trauma-Informed Me is not simply a story about what happened.

It is a story about what we learn to carry.

Through reflections on family, caregiving, nursing, motherhood, burnout, identity, and healing, Chantel explores the ways adaptation can become woven into who we believe we are — and how greater understanding can create space for something different.

Part memoir and part invitation to reflection, Trauma-Informed Me asks what can happen when we stop seeing our patterns as flaws and begin meeting them with curiosity.

Praise for Trauma-Informed Me

"Captivating in its first-hand exploration…"

“I am blown away by this beautifully written, candid, and introspective memoir by a former preemie who has given back so generously through her work as a neonatal intensive care nurse, educator, and leader in compassionate care for mothers and infants.”

- Dr. Saroj Saigal, O.C.

Author of Preemie Voices

" Courageous vulnerability and poignant introspection

“With courageous vulnerability and poignant introspection, Chantel Morin offers a deeply personal memoir that invites readers to explore the enduring impact of our earliest experiences and the healing that becomes possible through curiosity, compassion, and understanding.”

- Mary Coughlin, MS, NNP-NCC-E

Trauma Informed Professional™, Caritas Coach®

"A must-read"

“A must-read for healthcare professionals, caregivers, and especially women who have spent their lives learning to be the ‘good girl.’ Trauma-Informed Me is honest, raw, and deeply personal.”

- Fabiana Bacchini

Executive Director, Canadian Premature Babies Foundation

About the Author

Chantel Morin, MScN, RN, is a Canadian nurse educator, trauma-informed developmental care specialist, speaker, and author with more than 20 years of experience across neonatal, maternal-child, pediatric, clinical education, and quality-improvement settings.

Born at 27 weeks’ gestation, Chantel later became a NICU nurse, educator, and former NICU parent herself. Her professional work and lived experience come together in Trauma-Informed Me: Finding My Light, her first memoir.

She is also a founding partner of T.E.N.D.E.R. Services and co-author of two chapters in the third edition of Transformative Nursing and Interdisciplinary Care in the NICU: Trauma-Informed, Age-Appropriate Care.