Disability 

As a young man living with a disability, I was held to expectations I simply could not meet. I have Mitochondrial Myopathy, a rare genetic disease that causes chronic fatigue alongside a wide range of complex systemic impacts. For a long time, I tried to hide, avoid, and push through bodily limits that were never meant to be forced. Rebuilding my life has been a long relational process of learning to let myself be cared for, accepting that reliance on others is not weakness, and recognizing that through receiving care, I gain the meaningful capacity to give back to others. Without care, my world does not go around. This is social work, not isolated mental work. In my own life and practice, I have learned that true capacity is not built through isolated self-reliance, but through the relational process of allowing oneself to be cared for, supported, and sustained by others. In my work with Disability, I approach physical impairment, chronic pain, and neurodivergent access not as individual pathology to be cured, but as a collective, relational reality. Drawing on Critical & Theoretical Frameworks like Crip Theory and the Social Model of Disability, I offer a space where individuals navigating Invisible Disablities and Physical Disabilities can step away from internalizing systemic ableism, honor their body's actual pacing, and process the complex shifts that accompany Becoming Disabled or Living with Disability.

This reality constantly overlaps with Neurodivergence, where physical impairments, sensory friction, and profiles like ADHD and Autism meet environments built for neither. When an inaccessible world demands constant masking and forced compliance, the toll shows up in the nervous system as intense friction around Demand Avoidance, or body-focused distress like Tourettic OCD. I hold a specific clinical specialty in supporting individuals who experience chronic fatigue, energy fluctuations, or dystonic experiences, including those navigating conditions like Mitochondrial Disease. Because of my time working at Boise State University in the Educational Access Center alongside autistic folks and students with physical and invisible disabilities, as well as my hands-on experience navigating K-12 school systems, IEP meetings, and 504 plans, I bring extensive, practical knowledge to removing real-world friction. I work directly with you on Accommodations & Inaccessible Systems, helping you identify, request, and secure the structural access you need in schools, workplaces, and healthcare settings. Whether you are managing energy limits, navigating medical dismissals, or living with persistent Pain, we focus on tangible advocacy that protects your energy and honors your boundaries.

To back up this practical advocacy, I draw on collaborative frameworks like SFBT Solutions Focused Brief Therapy and MI Motivational Interviewing to map out immediate goals and decisions, alongside relational and somatic tools from Relational & Sytems models and Person Centered & Existential therapy. By keeping care, advocacy, and human connection at the center, I help you build a life sustained by mutual support, self-compassion, and uncompromising access.

In my work with chronic illness there is no self-blame or productivity shame. We adress the relentless physical toll, supporting your choices around prescription medications, managing side effects, and working directly with specialists and prescribers, and structuring daily life around actual capacity rather than forcing your body to meet ableist expectations.

More about my work here:

• Invisible Disabilities (navigating non-apparent physical and neurological realities, unlearning performance demands, and managing environmental friction without constant justification)

• Physical Disabilities (honoring bodily difference, navigating structural barriers, and rejecting medicalized deficit frameworks in favor of physical autonomy)

• Chronic Illness (managing ongoing complex conditions, fluctuating metabolic capacity, and the relentless administrative burden of healthcare systems)

• Becoming Disabled (processing identity shifts, grief, loss of function, and structural friction when health or capacity degrades)

• Living with Disability (building sustainable support, protecting autonomy, and structuring daily life around actual physical and energy limits)

• Mitochondrial Disease (navigating metabolic fatigue, cellular energy limits, high lactic acid pain, and ongoing medical management)

• Crip Theory (dismantling mandatory cure narratives, rejecting compulsory normativity, and reclaiming disabled life, pace, and resistance)

• Social Model of Disability (framing access barriers as structural and environmental failures rather than individual medical defects or internal flaws)

• Autism (understanding intense world processing, hyper-perception, and rule-based integrity while rejecting compliance-based interventions and deficit frameworks)

• Neurodivergence (honoring non-normative nervous systems, unmasked processing, and interest-based capacity while dismantling deficit-based psychiatric models)

• Tourette's / Tic Disorders (navigating premonitory urges, hyper-synaptic processing, motor storms, and sensorimotor states without forced behavioral suppression)

• Pain (navigating chronic physical pain, somatic distress, and bodily strain)

• Accommodations & Inaccessible Systems (securing formal structural support and addressing systemic friction)

Military service, veteran status, and growing up in a military home touch every part of life. In this practice, military experiences are kept completely off-the-record - separate from VA red tape, chain of command, and civilian assumptions - with real, lived-experience support under Military.