My journey toward becoming a psychoanalyst has not been a linear one. I originally started out in the theater as an actor and playwright. I got my MFA at the American Conservatory Theater, and embarked on my career in the theater. I loved the world of emotion that the theater provided, and the stories that were told about the human experience. Quite by chance, I saw an ad from an organization called Creative Alternatives of NY that was seeking actors to work therapeutically with psychiatric patients—they provided training. I worked with Creative Alternatives running therapeutic theater groups for 20 years. Later, I got certified as a creative arts therapist at the New School for Social Research, and I have used acting, poetry, dance and movement, music and writing as a therapeutic tool to help a variety of populations. I worked with adults, adolescents and children, as well as with recovering addicts at Mt Sinai Medical Center for 15 years, both outpatient and inpatient. I ran therapeutic theater groups with survivors of domestic violence at Sanctuary for Families, with teen mothers and at-risk youth at Bethany House, and with women and girls who had been sexually trafficked at RestoreNYC, to name a few.

In 2009, I decided to begin studying psychoanalysis. I had been in my own analysis for many years, and experienced first-hand how healing and transformative it was for me. I wanted to go deeper in my therapeutic work, and the field of drama therapy felt limiting to me. I enrolled at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies, where I found the theory and language to understand the deeper workings of the mind. I am currently an advanced doctoral candidate at the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis, and my doctoral dissertation is about the intersection between the creative arts and psychoanalysis. I view psychoanalysis as an evolving art as well as a science—a creative space in which to work together toward self-acceptance, purpose, and healing. 

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