The woman behind GRL.

I didn’t fit in in high school. Not really.

I wasn’t the girl everyone gravitated toward. I was the one on the fringe — present, but not quite in. Watching. Wondering if I was the only one who felt that way.

I thought it would get better when I found my thing. And it did — for a while.

Then I walked into a career in sports. And that feeling came back.

Tolerated. That’s the word. Not excluded, not attacked — just tolerated. In the room but not really heard. Saying things that got nodded at and then repeated by someone else five minutes later. Doing the work, carrying the weight, and still somehow feeling like a guest at a table I’d earned a seat at.

I kept thinking: is it just me?

It wasn’t just me. It’s never just you.

That’s why I built GRL Initiative. Not because I had it all figured out. Because I didn’t — and I needed a place where that was okay. Where women could stop performing certainty they didn’t have. Where the fringe girl finally had a front row seat.

GRL Initiative is for the woman who’s rising and leading and still, somehow, wondering if she belongs. The former athlete figuring out who she is off the field. The woman in the room nobody’s really listening to. The girl in high school who felt it first and the woman in the boardroom who feels it still.

You’re not broken. You’re not alone. And you were never just tolerated here.

You belong. Full stop.ED.D

of Southern Mississippi

ME.D Purdue University

B.S University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh

Executive Coaching Certification- Center for Creative Leadership

Level 1 Crossfit Instructor