Values

Context to My Approach

My path to this work is informed by my experiences growing up in a working class family, with early experiences of poverty, and the support of extended family and community. Growing up in Northern Ontario, Toronto, and Vancouver I have called many places home. My earliest memories include living within an activist community on the west coast, Kensington Market in the late 70’s and early 80’s, and my hometown of Sault Ste. Marie, where I spent many years, before returning to Toronto on my own as a young adult in the mid 90’s.

Questions of home, family, belonging, love and community have been important to my experience and important to my therapeutic work. My experience in family and community have been formative to my values including an attention to the interconnection between individual and collective well-being. As a young adult attempting to make my way in Toronto, I did a variety of jobs including work in hospitality, labour and carpentry, and I found purpose within multi-racial, working class, 2SLGBTQ+ communities and engagement in social movements. 

For several decades I worked in both direct service and supervisory capacities in non-profit organizations, assisting multi-racial working-class communities and homeless and street-involved youth. Advocacy and support offered focused on issues including poverty, anti-racism, housing and homelessness, harm-reduction, sexuality, education, labour, and collective trauma. I have also worked extensively in academic settings supporting mature and first generation post-secondary students.