When Isabelle Gray Allowed Herself to Sink into Pain, Fear, Doubt and Discomfort, That Was the Moment She Changed and Reclaimed Herself

Isabelle Gray is driving a female empowerment movement. Her programs, courses and therapeutic sessions through her business A Touch Of have helped many heal from past trauma, connect to their deeper selves and unleash the potential to live happier, more fulfilling lives. 

“Sometimes we have to just break down the armor that has kept us from being who we are—our true selves.”

At age 26 Isabelle moved from Belgium to the United States with her American husband. In her home country, she had a cozy life, living in an apartment in an old abbey above a bakery. She would wake to the comforting smell of bread baking before heading off to work. Yet she was independent, openhearted and ready to spread her wings. 

The young couple first moved to the Bay Area, then to Spokane, Washington, and then finally to Los Angeles. Getting a green card was difficult, and she inadvertently became dependent on her husband and his family. This dependency became compounded when she got pregnant with her first son after their move to L.A. 

On the weekends she and her husband would venture from their home in Pasadena to the South Bay. Captivated by the lifestyle, the young expectant couple felt inspired to live near the water and bought a house in Hermosa Beach two months before Isabelle gave birth to their first son, Finn. She remembers feeling very lonely at the time, but that was also the genesis of her awakening process. 

“I went to a doctor for a checkup, and she asked me, ‘How are you doing?’ And I just started bawling,” Isabelle shares. “She said, ‘You’re postpartum.’ And I’m like, ‘I’m not postpartum. I work out. I get dressed up every day. I throw the best parties. I’m good.’ But I was not. I was dying inside. It makes me almost want to cry just thinking about it.”

For Isabelle, having her son was pivotal in her journey to self-realization. “There was so much love that came in, that the love for myself had no room,” she says. “There was such a big clash that I started developing obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) behavior, and I had nightmares and fears that just were not relevant.” Though she wanted to forge her own path as a new mother, she found herself repeating the same patterns as her mother had done. 

Bewildered, she delved deeper and awoke to the realization that she was codependent on her husband. “This kind of made me dim my light,” she shares. “Not necessarily by him, but just me not being in my full self.” 

After years of moving around, the South Bay finally provided Isabelle with the feeling of community she craved. So when she had her second son, Noah, she had a support system in place. But Isabelle was still unhappy, and her marriage was not like it was before. Knowing she had to once again be the cocreator of her existence, she took the step to enroll in intensive hypnosis sessions.

Growing up, Isabelle had a great sense of intuition. When Noah was 2, she found the deep urge to get back to that “magical self” and tap back into that deeper sense. Isabelle believes that hypnosis was the gateway to reopening her spiritual connection, and she went on to study hypnosis through intensive training workshops in Texas. 

She never thought she would practice hypnosis as part of her work, but a whole new world opened up to her, inspiring her to share the gift. “Doing what I do in my work is like a superpower,” she says. “It’s like I can literally feel what my client is feeling. It’s through this that I can help them process what they are going through.”

As Isabelle continued on her spiritual path, she studied Reiki at Amaloa Healing Arts in the South Bay. “I remember walking by that store so many times. When I finally went in, I started opening up again, and that’s when I began getting back to who I really was. Unfortunately, my marriage didn’t survive that part of my development. He’s an awesome person, but I just didn’t feel aligned anymore.” 

Isabelle separated from her husband during the pandemic lockdown, moved into a new place and started focusing on building her clientele. Her goal is to help other women “find their own light.” 

“COVID gave me the time to sit with myself and do the healing that I needed to do on my own and figure out what it is that I want to do,” she says. “From that place, what I learned is that we can be the cocreators of our lives and be intuitive, but we have to look at what’s weighing us down. Sometimes we have to just break down the armor that has kept us from being who we are—our true selves. And that’s how my business started. The more I discovered all parts of me, the more my business grew.”

Isabelle has also focused on healing women “through the womb.” She explains: “Through this type of healing, we release the energetic blockages a woman holds in that part of her body. These blockages can be noticed as physical manifestations such as fibroids, infertility, low libido or any issues related to that area of the body. Mentally and emotionally, it shows up as women not feeling good in their bodies, not dreaming big, literally being turned off.”

Isabelle helps women be comfortable in their bodies, trust their intuition and find their purpose. Her passion is to empower women. “We’re all powerful. We’re all intuitive. We’ve just closed it off. We can all live how we want to live.”