Creating a “Third Place”: The Vision for Mending Connections
In sociology, the third place refers to the social surroundings that are separate from the two usual social environments of home ("first place") and the workplace ("second place"). Mending Connections is my iteration of that third place. The Beginning of a Long Journey
After receiving my undergraduate degree in Psychology from the University of Central Florida in 2015, I took a year off to focus on working full time, as I was a single mother to a 2 year old son. After that year, I applied to & completed my Master’s degree in Marriage, Family, and Couples Counseling at Stetson University in 2020, along with Graduate Certificates in Clinical Mental Health Counseling and Play Therapy & Creative Expression. But what happened to my evolution while in graduate school is where the story gets interesting.
When I was in graduate school, I learned about the ACEs study and it completely changed the trajectory of my education & mission in life.
ACEs stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences and there was a major study on them back in 1995 — by major, I mean it included over 17,000 participants over the course of 2 years. It was conducted by Kaiser Permanente in So Cal and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). There are 10 general questions and the updated version has 5 basic categories within the study which include physical, emotional & sexual abuse, neglect, household environment, community violence, and systemic factors such as racism. Many things were concluded from the study but some of the most cited findings were that:
almost all of the participants had experienced at least 1 ACE
nearly 2 out of 3 participants had experienced at least 3 ACEs
the more ACEs experienced, the worse future health & wellness outcomes were
People who have experienced 4 or more ACEs are at higher risk for:
smoking and smoking-related illnesses
substance use/abuse
alcoholism
depression and anxiety
suicidality/suicide attempts
digestive issues
heart disease
multiple types of cancer
obesity
There are multiple versions of the questionnaire online and in the class I took, we were able to do one. Guess how many I had? Ya girl had a total of 8 out of 10. The last 2 decades of my life suddenly made all the sense in the world. The depression, anxiety, constant stomach issues and chest pains/trouble breathing all made sense. When I applied this information to my mother’s story, I could understand why my childhood looked the way it did. Being in a constant state of stress is not only terrible for your mental health, it starts to break down your physical health as well. When looking back at my life, the higher the stress levels, the more health concerns I had and the more it would interfer with my overall quality of life.
The good thing is that they also found factors, called protective factors, that helped decrease future health risks and increasing these protective factors are what help in early prevention of the worsening health outcomes. The main suggestions are to decrease stress and increase coping mechanism to be able to deal with stress that does come. This realization fueled my passion for learning how to be well, both mentally and physically because in reality, the two are not separate. If not for myself, I was doing it for my son. It also fueled my belief in looking at a person’s upbringing and home environment as the foundation to their nervious system & its responses. Integrating the mind and the body are the only way to effectively bring long-lasting health & wellness to a body that’s been chronically stressed.
Click below to download the questionnaire and find out your ACEs score.
Life During and After the Pandemic of 2020
Fast-forward to 2020. It was an interesting year, wouldn’t you say? I’m sure you could say a few more words about that year but we’ll stick to interesting. I remember having bittersweet emotions about the whole thing. On the one hand, I’m thinking — what in the world is going on?! But on the other hand, I’m thinking — this is exactly what I’ve been praying for…I finally have an excuse to slow the f*#% down!
After graduating and life started slowing way down I had a sudden realization — I was extremely burnt out. But we live in a world that doesn’t slow down and it was now time to think about real-world applications of what I’d just learned. Due to my own upbringing, the goal was to work with supporting the emotions of children and educating the parents on how to help that process. I worked in community mental health, public & charter schools, and even a private practice specializing in Play Therapy. As I started to work with the families, I saw the same thing screaming at me: families as a whole were stressed & exhausted and parents had no idea how to manage it all, much less during a pandemic. They wanted help with their little ones but were finding it so hard to manage their own emotions long enough to be calm in their interactions. Although I saw the benefits of helping parents understand their children’s emotions, many times it wasn’t getting to the root of the issue because the problem was not with understanding what needed to be done, it was in actually implementing it. After meeting with dozens of parents, the conclusion was the same: they had no internal model of safety because they didn’t know what that felt like emotionally AND had been chronically stressed well before having children. They wanted so desperately to fix the problem but couldn’t slow down enough to be present with the solution. That realization hit me like a ton of bricks. Was I seeing a repeat of what I had grown up with? Were parents still struggling with their own emotional baggage & stress so much that it was cycling into the next generation? Absolutely.
I immediately committed to learning all I could about nervous system regulation and co-regulation. I had a special interest in the connection between plants & mental health throughout graduate school but put it aside to focus on the more “clinical” work that was emphasized. But when the Pandemic hit, it was almost a sign saying, “put it aside for what?” What did I find? A direct link between our gut health and our mental health; that what we engage with in our daily lives actually affects our mental and emotional health. So what did I do? I immediately started home cooking my meals more and becoming increasingly interested in gardening. And subsequently both providing me much needed recovery from the burnout. That year, I built my small front-yard garden and decided that getting my Health Coaching certification was the next step. I had no idea how health coaching would fit the ultimate goal but knew it was something I had to pursue.
It took an entire year of research & soul searching before I fully committed to that vision. In the meantime, I dove into herbalism, polyvagal theory, gut health, gardening, homesteading, permaculture, grounding/earthing, learning about indigenous plant medicine traditions from around the world, yoga, ayurveda, functional medicine, listened to all the health podcasts (shout out to The Model Health Podcast for being such an integral part of my growing more confident in my perspective), and watched all the health documentaries I could find. I was hooked on learning about the connection between mental/emotional health & our nutrition/diet!! When thinking about my own wellness journey, my physical health & mental health were always connected, I just never knew how or why! I knew that talk therapy was helpful but for my clients who had deeper emotional and attachment issues, talking just wasn’t doing it. Learning about the inherent connection we have to nature and how modern society has deviated away from that made it all come together. The farther we are from nature and its cycles, the more dis-ease we will experience, both in our inner world and our outer world.
In March 2022, I obtained my certification as an Integrative Nutrition Health Coach from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition (IIN) with a specialization in Gut Health.
How Mending Connections Came to Be
When looking back at the common thread between my mother’s story, my story, and the story of my clients & their families, it all went back to nervous system (dys)regulation, the lack of internal safety and not knowing how to really cope with all the stress, both past and present. And that’s where my work took form! When I think back to the ACEs and what they told me about people’s mental and emotional health, I realized that when it comes to chronic stress, it’s no longer a game of “willpower”. Experiencing chronic stress literally alters the way the brain and body function, always in a state of hyperalertness. Talk therapy does amazing things for some but for those with chronic stress, a more body-based, heart-centered approach is needed. To understand your emotions is not the same as feeling them. It’s only the first step.
When looking at chronic stress and it’s effects on mental and physical health, I’ve come up with some simple equations:
unprocessed trauma or hurts + unhelpful/outdated coping mechanisms + time = chronic physical pain and illnesses
unprocessed emotions + poor coping skills + time = substance use/abuse or other addictions
unprocessed emotional trauma + avoidant coping skills + parenting = continuing of the cycle
poor emotional regulation = poor gut health = poor nervous system regulation
Honestly, I could write another 20 equations but I think you get the point. The common denominators that I found were: unprocessed emotions and poor coping strategies. That’s exactly where my idea for creating Mending Connections came from. I realized that people, especially those in the traditional mental health spaces, weren’t talking about the fact that body-based techniques (somatic therapy) were the way to go when processing and releasing old emotional baggage, and ultimately healing from chronic stress. The problem was never talking about the emotions; the problem was with feeling them. The solutions are not just writing affirmations and staying away from negative thinking (again, no shame for doing these). The solution is integrative. We live in a world that’s disconnected — from ourselves, from our family & friends, and from the world around us. We must begin to see the body as a whole and understand that if the mind is not well, its because the rest of the body isn’t well (and vice versa).
The main aspect of Mending Connections that’s different is the emphasis on SUSTAINABLE WELLNESS — unlike some approaches that work in the short-term but eventually stop working, regardless of if you’re seeking coaching or therapy, we focus on finding what blocks are holding you back from reaching your goals and help you cultivate peace and intention in your daily life. The ultimate goal is to help you find what brings you true joy so that you can actively participate in your life. No more zombie-version you. How do we do that? By helping you reconnect to your internal knowing, targetting the mind-body connection. There is no mental health without physical health so we tackle each issue from the foundation of the human body: the nervous system, the brain and the gut.
Modern Western medicine is all about managing the symptoms — and when it comes to post-surgery pain or a broken limb, I’m all for that approach! But when dealing with chronic lifestyle issues and chronic diseases, it’s worth digging a little (or a lot) deeper to get to the root of the “chronic” part of chronic issue. My philosophy is that anything that was created through lifestyle can also be reversed through lifestyle and awareness of self is where we begin. That’s another reason Mending Connections is different than most, both for wellness coaching and therapy. Unlike others that only focus on the mind or the body, Mending Connections approaches healing by integrating mind, body, heart and soul. We will investigate your issues through the lens of biology, ecology, neuroscience, attachment theory, functional nutrition (on a very basis level), psychology, and spirituality. Together, we will formulate your unique blueprint for health and happiness, that’s both comprehensive and sustainable for YOU. Using the wisdom of the body and the Earth’s natural gifts, let us help you mend the connection to yourself, to others, and to the world around you.
If you need more information about each service type offered, click here!
If you’re ready to dive into your mental wellness journey with me by your side, schedule a free consultation today!
