Certifications

I have always been a mover. And for as long as I can remember I have had an interest in movement and the human body. I began dancing when I was five years old, I played several different sports, did gymnastics, and I generally never stopped pushing my body in some way throughout my entire life. I have also felt a constant and strong pull to help others. In my younger years I defined that pull as a desire to be a doctor. From at least a high-school age, I have consistently had people reach out to me for help with their aches, pains, and movement difficulties, and I have found genuine and great joy in helping them. Though my specific career fields have fluctuated throughout my working life, each pathway I have explored has shared the common theme of helping others. During all of my explorations I also continued dancing, and though I was able to achieve professional performing status, I still sought to identify a “real career” that could satisfy my desire to help others and sustain independent life. In 2007 that search led me into nursing, and I dove in head first. I came alive while actively learning about the human body and how it worked, and it felt like the perfect fit.   

In March of 2009, just after being accepted into a program for nursing, I was in a devastating snowboarding accident that rendered me incapable of speaking and walking in addition to affecting my cognitive function. I suffered a traumatic brain injury and spent nearly a year solely focusing on recovering as fully as I could. During this process I had to learn how to work with a different brain and a different body than those I grew up with, and I discovered techniques to develop new neural pathways and a new understanding of my brain-body connection. I also worked to identify and correct significant imbalance throughout my entire body, and I became aware of just how many things we take for granted. Because of my experience in retraining my own body and mind to function, both separately and together, I have gained a significant understanding of how movement works from mechanical and somatic perspective, along with our mind’s role in that movement. This process combined with my lifelong experience in various forms of movement has allowed me to acutely hone my ability to identify movement patterns in others. While the initial phase of recovery was long, the accident and its lifelong effects are one of the most beneficial happenings of my life.

Following my initial recovery, I attempted to resume my education and career goals in the medical field, however, it was no longer the best fit for me. Instead, I chose to focus on furthering my recovery through dance with hopes to increase my cognitive function and endurance (at the advice of my neurologists) and wound up with a whole new perspective on dance and movement. While I was working on my BA in Dance, I taught classes at local studios and assisted at the university, performed in the community, and felt so happy in the field. Even still, a piece of my puzzle was missing. I poured over what I had been doing and what felt like it was missing and I made two specific discoveries: First, I am always more focused on my students understanding HOW their bodies are achieving their steps from an anatomical and kinesthetic perspective more so than teaching the general technique, and second, I have connected with the powerful therapeutic benefits movement has to offer, and desperately want to ensure that all humans have access to this resource. Despite researching an overwhelming amount of different, pre-defined career fields, I just couldn’t find one that allowed me to use both of these base components together in a way that made sense. So instead, I created my own.

Here, with Body Balance, you are getting more than a personal trainer. You are getting a Movement Specialist that is educated from medical and functional perspectives, with decades of training and direct practice in the science and art of movement, and with a true passion for helping you to move with safety and efficiency. My goal is to teach you how to help yourself to have the mobility you need for the life you want. I look forward to working with you!