About Me

Academia was my home for the first portion of my career. I have worked as a researcher and data analyst in university settings and have published in peer reviewed journals. As a current instructor at a small liberal arts college, I still maintain one foot in academia. In these ways, I am familiar with the pressures--financial, academic, and otherwise--of being a faculty, staff, and student in such settings. Much of my therapeutic work has involved supporting young adults and other academics as they navigate the challenges of higher education. Moreover, as a first-generation college graduate and a social class straddler, I am also attuned to the unique challenges facing first-generation and low-income students.

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My path toward clinical work, admittedly, has been circuitous. I hold degrees in Political Science, Theology, Social Work, and Social Policy. While I was drawn to clinical practice early in this journey, I did not arrive there quickly. I avoided the call, preferring to operate at a distance based on a misplaced, albeit common belief so many  hold: that confidence would come with the accrual of more knowledge. Still, across each discipline, a consistent question has animated my work: What gives rise to human suffering, and how might it meaningfully be alleviated?

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It was my time spent finishing a dissertation that looked at diseases of despair among working-class men and the impact on political identity, that ultimately pulled me into the clinical setting. Still, my interdisciplinary training is not incidental but rather foundational to how I practice. I am as much a systems-level thinker and macro-level advocate as I am an individual-focused clinician. I believe much wisdom sits at the intersection of disparate lines of inquiry and much of what matters about human experience is best understood at the colliding and convergence of contrasting thoughts, ideas, and experiences.

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I have a particular passion for working with male-identifying clients around identity loss, life transitions, anxiety, depression, emotional vulnerability, and anger. Beyond this, I work with individuals and couples navigating infidelity, grief and loss, and the long-term impact of religious trauma.

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I hail from the rural Midwest but have lived for a short-time in ten different countries. These experiences ground my commitment to cultural sensitivity and have impressed upon me the value of quiet observation. Outside the therapy room, I am an avid cyclist, play both volleyball and softball, and am reliably excellent at contributing enthusiasm—if not always answers—to trivia teams.