My Story…

I grew up in Sacramento, CA raised by my mother, my grandmother, a first generation German immigrant, and grandfather, a Filipino-American air-force officer. By the time I was 3, I had already suffered sexual abuse, incest, and complex trauma, the immense consequences of which I’ve spent the whole first quarter of my life processing through. By the age of 17, I was severely depressed, had flashback memories, had little support, and experienced the loss of my best friend to suicide. My first attempt to get help from the mental health system left me with multiple diagnoses, a prescription for antipsychotics, and even more feelings of isolation along with a sense that there was something deeply flawed about our system for supporting people with mental health.

Changing The System

The emotional pain I felt motivated me to move out of my hometown and claw my way towards a better life. I was fortunate enough to become a scholarship recipient to NYU where I got a degree in Applied Psychology. Right out of school, I worked as a crisis counselor and junior clinician doing home crisis intervention visits for a New York mental health agency. I thought I would change the system from the inside and make it better, but what I saw shook me deeply. I witnessed people struggling with systemic problems like poverty, grief, loss, racial injustice, immigration, trauma, violence, and more. All of these experiences got obscured and re-labeled by a dysfunctional system that did very little to truly help people and was filled with harmful power dynamics, pathologization, risky and traumatizing 'treatment', and instilled shame around big emotions.

A Spiritual Awakening

Somewhere between processing my own trauma, an undiagnosed autoimmune disease, burnout, and feeling complicit in an oppressive system, I had my own mental breakdown and intense spiritual awakening. I began experiencing extreme and altered states – hearing voices, seeing visions, extreme sensitivity to everything around me, and so much more. It was a process, lasting around 3 months, that felt both deeply terrifying and also felt like a necessary spiritual transformation.

Having worked in the mental health system, I knew my experience would get defined as “psychosis” or some life-long illness that signified a broken brain and required a lifetime of medication and hospitalizations. Somehow I knew that I was experiencing was so much more meaningful. Through this process, I came face-to-face with my deepest shadows, purged old belief systems, gained amazing spiritual gifts and insight. What remained of me beyond this experience catapulted me into a whole new way of living, paving my own path to a life of joy and thriving that I never knew possible.

I changed my life, how I cared for my body, what I valued, my career, started studying holistic health modalities, and moved away from the city up to upstate NY to live in a simpler way. I shifted my spiritual practices, my hobbies, my communities and changed my very relationship to myself, my body, and my mind, by trusting this terrifying and rewarding process of deep transformation.  Pain became my oldest and wisest teacher leading me towards a deeper and fuller sense of self, profound spiritual transformations, an intimate connection with the natural world, a deeper intuitive capacity, and new meaning in all aspects of my life.

Activism and A New Mental Health Paradigm

I soon became an advocate working with local mental health communities and grassroots organizations such as The Icarus Project NYC , facilitating workshops on mental health alternatives and peer support. 

Continuing my education within a modality that supports self-determination and advocacy, I became certified as a peer specialist (NYCPS). I went back into the mental health system to work for The Parachute Program, based on the Open Dialogue Model, to support others suffering from extreme and altered states, trauma, 'psychosis', and other forms of emotional distress from a place of mutuality, compassion, and understanding.

Looking beyond the status quo as an avid whole-health seeker, I pursued my studies amongst incredible teachers, training in intuitive development, breathwork, energy work, meditation and embodiment practices, herbalism, and other holistic therapeutic modalities (See trainings and certifications below).

Through these initiatives, I met others who felt strongly about human rights and the complexity of mental heath as impacted by trauma, socio-political factors, physical health, spiritual wellbeing, and so much more. What surfaced was the dire need to go beyond an old outdated biomedical paradigm and into an understanding that each person has the right to define their story and determine their future.

The Institute For The Development of Human Arts

In April of 2016,  I founded an organization called The Institute for the Development of Human Arts with Dr. Peter Stastny, MD and a community of incredible leaders in the mental health field each with over 30+ years of experience as activists, researchers, and clinicians. Our goal is to advance critical dialogue between mental health professionals and the people most impacted by the mental health system - peers, family members, and those with lived experience. We lead, design, and facilitate mental health trainings and events that challenge the current paradigm within a supportive learning community.  You can find out more about the Institute and our upcoming continuing education trainings, community events, and other opportunities at IDHA-NYC.ORG

Underneath it all, I can say that all difficult and painful experiences also hold deep wisdom. It is our willingness to dive into the unknown that allows us to heal and to make amazing leaps forward.