About

I grew up being taught I was worthless. Not loudly — just as quiet background fact, installed by the people and systems around me. It took a long time to understand that was a lie, and even longer to stop believing it.

The first crack came at 21, when I walked away from the strict religion I'd been raised in. It was the first decision I'd ever made entirely for myself. What followed were decades of slow, nonlinear reclamation — small advances and hard resets. Relationships that cost me. A gradual, stubborn refusal to stay small.

Eventually it wasn't enough to dismantle the old story. I needed to leave it behind entirely. So I did. I walked away from my former life and started moving — through France and Spain on the Camino de Santiago, 800 kilometers on foot, then through Portugal, Scotland, England, Hawaii, Mexico, Japan, Italy, Thailand, and now Cambodia, where I'm writing this.

What I was looking for was a version of myself that existed outside other people's expectations — without being known, without needing to perform for anyone I'd long felt beholden to. What I found was simpler and harder than that: I am capable on my own. I can trust myself. The original story was a lie.

Why Lion Tamer?

My inner lion tamer emerged during a massive personal transformation during which I was at the epicenter surrounded by chaos. A particularly difficult chapter — the kind that asks everything — forced me to stop betraying myself, put the lies in their place, and love myself enough to stand up and say Back.

What I didn't know until later was that I'd been using the same philosophy as Claire Heliot, one of the most famous female lion tamers of the early 1900s. Her act relied on mental dominance rather than physical force. She walked into the ring and made the lions back down through sheer clarity of will. That's the only way I know how to describe what I did too.

I came out the other side wiser, more creative, and all around better for it. Lion Tamer Studio is named for that moment — and for every woman who has used her wits to move through something that should have taken her down.

The Work

I have a formal design education — an AA in graphic design and illustration — and have woven creative work through my adult life alongside other careers. I'm also genuinely, incurably curious. I find almost everything interesting and I go deep when something catches my attention — history, science, culture, language, craft, people. I've come to understand this is an asset, not a distraction. When I take on someone's project I care about it almost as much as they do, because I can't help it. That kind of investment shows up in the work.

I'm currently writing a memoir and building Lion Tamer Studio into a full creative practice: design, writing, illustration, a podcast dedicated to women whose stories deserve to be heard, and a particular interest in helping women tell their stories.

If you're here because you need someone who can make something and mean it —
let's talk.