Our team

Growing up in rural Johnson County, Iowa, I was privileged to live close enough to Iowa City that I could be immersed in the music, arts, literature and science of the college town, while also having the benefits of living in the woods, on the lake, connected to the earth and natural world that sustains our human existence.

Both of my parents were educators, my mother a 50+ year Montessori preschool teacher, and my father a Geography professor. Education and learning were the foundations of my sisters’ and my childhoods. Education continues to be an integral part of our lives in adulthood. My sisters are both professors, and I have, and continue to, teach part time at the Montessori Children’s Garden in North Liberty. Additionally, I am trained to be a presenter for a number of different mental health related trainings, and have developed trainings for social workers, teachers, and community members.

Teaching and education also show up in my clinical practice. I strive to always be learning and gaining new skills that will help me serve my clients. I also bring education into the therapy room, teaching about how stress and trauma affects our brains and bodies and how we can take care of ourselves to best heal and grow.

My approach to education with my clients is a strengths based, collaborative one. You are the expert on your own experiences. I bring my scientific knowledge, my clinical skills and education, to help you make sense of your own experience. It is my belief that the most growth can be achieved when we work as partners in your healing.

Another part of my childhood that I bring to my practice is my focus on human rights, the inherent worth and dignity of all human beings. My father studied human rights in his work as a Geography professor. His research took him, and our entire family, all over the world, exposing us, at young ages, to the vast diversity of the human experience. We spent extended periods of my childhood in the Middle East, Oceania, and Africa, where our lives were enriched by the cultures and people of those parts of our world.

These experiences taught me unquantifiable lessons about our world, our earth, and human nature. Some of those lessons are that there is no one right way to live in this world. That human connections and empathy for the experience of others, is far more valuable than anything that we can buy. That every single human on this planet has worth and dignity, and that it is my passion to help people recognize that in themselves and others.

From a young age I knew that my path forward would be different from my parents. As a young child, I was the kid trying to help people when they were sad or scared, child or adult. I was deeply saddened by the suffering in the world and knew that I would focus on somehow decreasing that suffering.

When it came time to choose a major in college, I had a hard time. I wanted to study everything and immerse myself in all the classes to learn about the human experience. I studied biology, philosophy, political science, art history, music, anything that helped me to understand better why human beings are the way that we are.

Eventually, I chose psychology and therapeutic recreation for my majors. Psychology provided me with a good base understanding of what makes people act the ways that we do. Therapeutic recreation was important to me, because I understood the value that sports, music, art, and many other creative pursuits had on my life and on the lives of people around the world. While I tend to be a rather serious person, therapeutic recreation served as a reminder that it is important to have fun and to find ways to enrich our lives that don’t have to be serious, that there is value in letting go and finding joy.

Throughout my college years, I volunteered at United Action for Youth (UAY), a youth serving agency in Iowa City. My Therapeutic Recreation internship was completed at UAY as well. It was there that I learned that I loved working with adolescents as much as I love working with preschool and elementary school aged kids.

Because I thought I needed to be a professor like my father and sisters, I embarked on a PhD in psychology when I graduated from college. I quickly learned that I was too much of a systems thinker for psychology and researched what other options might be a better fit for me. Social Work seemed to make the most sense.

The two years I spent at the University of Missouri, in Columbia, Missouri, are two of my favorite years of study. Being immersed in the Bio-Psycho-Social framework of Social Work validated what I already knew about human beings. That we are not just individuals, surviving on our own. We are part of a vast universe that is interdependent. The systems around us cannot be unwoven. When working with an individual, we must also remember to look at the systems that person is involved with. We do not exist in isolation. Isolation is actually far worse for our health than smoking and other risky behaviors, because humans are social beings. We must be connected to others in order to thrive.

Following my Masters in Social Work, I continued my graduate studies at the University of Iowa. There I took classes in Sociology, Nursing, Public Health, Human Rights, Global Health, History, and writing. I investigated the treatment of people with disabilities and mental illness around the world. My learning included looking at how war, discrimination, climate chaos, poverty, and other traumas affect those with disabilities and mental illness. I explored how these traumas intersect and compound their impacts on those experiencing them. I also studied how our systems can better meet the needs of those who have experienced trauma. Those studies culminated ina Masters of Arts in Health and Disability Rights.

My clinical experience spans the age groups. I worked with adults on disabilities due to their mental illness, with youth and children on the mental health waiver, hospital social work with older adults, and with all ages with mobile crisis.

My four years leading the mobile crisis response team were some of my most rewarding and challenging on my clinical experience. Working with people in some of their darkest times is such an honor and a responsibility. Leading a team of clinicians, training them, organizing them, and supporting them, taught me about myself and gave me confidence in my skills to embark on the path to my dream career.

In 2019 I started the intensive training for Internal Family Systems therapy and then in 2020 in the midst of the COVID 19 pandemic, I began working as a therapist at Family Wellbeing Associates. At this time, I was also working on the FEMA grant, COVID Recovery Iowa, providing free counseling and resources to anyone in the state of Iowa impacted by the pandemic. I continue to volunteer my time as part of the Disaster Behavioral Health Response Team that sends counselors out to disasters to help provide emotional support to those impacted by the disaster.

The populations I primarily work with are those who have experienced trauma. Trauma, in this case, is meant in very broad terms. Trauma occurs when the situation we find ourselves in is overwhelming for our capacity to cope. This can occur during war, climate disasters, child abuse, domestic abuse, developmental trauma, discrimination, bullying, pandemics, health crises, and so many other experiences. Trauma can also occur from working with those who have been traumatized, such as with first responders, teachers, social workers, and caregivers of people with disabilities and chronic health issues.

As part of the LGBTQIA+ community, I am passionate about serving this population and creating a safe environment for healing, growth, and celebration of who we are and what we bring to our community.  

My goal is to strengthen resilience and to assist people on their healing journey. This happens through creating safety and trust, collaboration is key in the work that we do. When we work together, we are a team, a partnership, and I look forward to working with you towards achieving your goals.