I made it
To me, being a transracial adoptee, Afro-Brazilian, Black American, testifies to the enormous resistance of my enslaved African ancestors efforts to survive people and systems that had goals to strip them of their identity, heritage, and humanity. To strip all of us of our humanity.
I use liberation psychotherapy, social practice / multimedia art, writing and entrepreneurship as an act of my own humanity by refusing to be voiceless in a larger conversation on identity in the local, national and global arena.
I have worked with youth specifically high school for well over 20 years as a teaching artist at the intersection of antiracism and artistic practice.
I have spent the last 15 years training and workshopping with artists, teachers, therapists, organizations, and institutions on what a social justice framework looks like in those spaces with regard to growing and building emotional resilience.
Currently and most importantly I am settling into my role as a mother of two and a Clinical Mental Health Director/psychotherapist and owner of Transitional Characters, a group psychology practice located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I specialize in navigating and healing identity trauma, interracial relationships, antiblackness in kinship, liberation and am a published author on the subject in graduate level textbooks.
FOUNDER THE CENTER ON INTERRACIAL RELATIONSHIPS; PITTSBURGH, PA —
2013-PRESENT
Fostering Compassionate Intelligence through academic education - Anti-Racist Educator and Historian. I help people understand the past and present causes of systemic oppression and build capacity to be aware of, control, and express one’s emotions, and to face interpersonal interracial/power relationships judicially and empathetically. Notable and current clients include Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) School of Computer Science Department where I have had a contracted role teaching for over 7 years now
Work Experience
PENNSYLVANIA STATE LICENSED CLINICAL MENTAL HEALTH THERAPIST AND OWNER, TRANSITIONAL CHARACTERS; PITTSBURGH, PA — 2024-PRESENT
I work through a lens of structural oppression, racial formation, intersectional feminist theories, but primarily Liberation Psychology. I implement a wide variety of techniques based on client need. Radical-acceptance, self-love, mindfulness and a deep understanding of historical understanding and psycho-education center my work.
PENNSYLVANIA STATE LICENSED CLINICAL MENTAL HEALTH THERAPIST, FORWARD WELLNESS COUNSELING; PITTSBURGH, PA — 2019-2023
I worked a a psychotherapist with parents navigating child loss . I served many clients dealing with a range of diagnostic issues from depression, abuse, personality disorders and more. I implement a wide variety of techniques based on client need.
FOUNDER + SOCIAL PRACTICE ARTIST, ADOPTING IDENTITY; PITTSBURGH, PA — 2013-PRESENT
I have used a creative practice to explore my adoption. This multidisciplinary approach is know as social practice art. I have used this platform to further the conversations and nuances around adoption, interracial relationships, and what it looks like to navigate our identities on our own terms
SOCIAL PRACTICE ARTIST, NOTWHITE COLLECTIVE PITTSBURGH, PA —
2013-PRESENT
The #notwhite collective is a group of 13 women artists whose mission is to use non-individualistic, multi-disciplinary art to make our stories visible as we relate, connect, and belong to the Global Majority. We utilize our arts practice singularly and collectively to Excavate Histories, Expose Realities, and Exorcise Oppression.