The Origin Story

How “Much love, Shaudeh” all started…

Freshman year of college, I created a “foodstagram” on Instagram, @biteswithshaudeh. The first few posts, I would merely list my order in bullet points with the location’s name… short, sweet, bland. Soon enough, I uncovered that every dinner table has a story. Every restaurant has an experience. Every experience has a memory to be shared. With that revelation and an ongoing passion for journalism, the account evolved. The reviews began with a hook, ended with a pun, and painted a sensational picture of beautiful meals. Within 2 months, the account rallied up 1,000+ followers. Through Bites with Shaudeh, I found a genuine love for writing personal memoirs and creative journalism. I explored my creative side, my networking sphere, and multi-media outlets beyond Instagram.

An example of the “bland” list style caption on the first post I made on @biteswithshaudeh Instagram.

Example of the creative, personable captions on @biteswithshaudeh at its peak on Instagram. From this caption, the tension between food and mental health is apparent with “HELLO PELOTON”.

Let’s talk about Instagram… a flawless public facade. A mask that every adolescent utilizes to adorn their reality. There were countless times where I would go out to eat for “the content”, “do it for bites”, or get a meal “On. Bites.” Routinely, I felt like absolute trash a few hours later. A bloated failure — discouraged. I went through the same cycle that most teenagers are familiar with: I over ate, I under ate, I went keto for 3 days, I went pescatarian for a month, and then I stopped restricting with no structure at all for months. In the end, I found myself more uncomfortable and unhappy with myself then I was the year before.

Cut the keto, weight watchers, intermittent fasting, calorie deficit, juice cleansing, “fruit has too much sugar”, portion weighing, trending diet culture BS. Do not resign to the pull of this downward spiral influenced by TikTok or social media. The spiral leads to a toxic relationship towards food with a bounce back worse than you started with. They are short term wins with long, long term losses. You should never miss out on making memories with those you love because of food. you should not “save calories” for a social event.

Here I was raving over meals and dishes that were extremely difficult for me to endure. Slowly, I came to realize that the account was a cover up for my not so hot relationship with food. Despite the fact that the Instagram page made it seem like I had a great relationship with food, it was really difficult to motivate myself to go out to dinner instead of counting my calories.

In the spring of my sophomore year, I opened up to my followers about my struggles. I publicized and vocalized my hardships with food and lack of motivation to eat. The joy and passion that comes along with writing a review for a post is what kept me going. However, it felt hypocritical and immoral to continue the account on this road. After drawing encouraging and heartwarming reactions from my followers, friends, and family, the account made a full 180°. I uncovered the benefits of journalism as a tool for self-care.

The new, improved, and matured version of @biteswithshaudeh has transformed into @muchloveshaudeh. To highlight my self-growth and the origin story of my blog, I decided to keep the initial posts. While I have lost a following from the “food critics” and fellow “foodstagramers”, I have received mounds of support from my family, friends, and accounts similar to that of my own.

I continued to write full-hearted accounts on the Instagram profile, now known as “Much love, Shaudeh”. Eventually, I hit a roadblock the summer of 2022 when Instagram continuously flagged my word count on posts as “too long” for its liking. Instead of continually forfeit content to narrow in on the word count, I created my own website platform. The blog focuses on how daunting and overwhelming the nature of the early twenties are, featuring stories like Drafting a PlayBook for Success: Back to School Habits, and 20 Things I Learned in my 20s, Embracing Loneliness as an Extrovert, and Simple versus Guilty Pleasures.