About me

I could probably talk about myself ad nauseam. But, I won’t do that here.

What you would probably like to know is something like why I might have anything to “say” about anything. Perhaps I don’t, honestly. That is completely up to you to decide.

That said, here is the long and short of who I am now and who I have been so that you have some context for the blogs you may choose to read here.

I am a mother to a 14-year old severely autistic son. I am also a developmental psychologist with a PhD from Cornell University. I most recently worked as a professor at a prestigious private graduate university, and I have worked in consulting for over 20 years. My life’s work up to recently (2022 or so) was entirely focused on evaluation and applied research methods that honored and centered issues like culture, inclusion, and diversity. I taught workshops and courses on being culturally responsive and equity focused in applied research methods for nearly 20 years. I also focused on systems thinking in applied research, since cultures are social systems.

Ok, enough of that. My work was long decided before my son was even a thought in my mind. As a Latina born into poverty on a Texas border town, I married my high school sweet heart at 18 years old. And we embarked on life as a military family, also for 20 years. But all of that is a story for another day. The point is that I almost had no choice but to work in advocacy, even as a researcher. However, when my son was diagnosed with autism at 18 months old, things like equity, inclusion, and diversity took on different undertones. As my son grew older, the extent of his autism became synonymous with disability, and I had to take his future more seriously than my own.

So, I abandoned everything that I had built in my own career. After all, with a PhD in developmental psychology, how could I possibly keep handing my son off to other therapists and professionals? No, he needed me, and I needed him.

So here we are now. I work incessantly on understanding him, connecting with him, and figuring out what it means to parent a disabled child that will one day be a disabled man. I grapple with how to prepare him and myself for that future while enjoying as much as I can about who he is now. And as we journey together, I learn things that I want to share. And I question things that I want to learn from others.

Thus, I started this blog, an Instagram account, and am launching a YouTube channel (July 2025). My son sits with me creating posts and watches me record my videos, and we bond in an unexpected way through the process. We get to use these antics to maintain connection. I also hope that these efforts will help build community with other families and, mostly, help parents and their children with autism grow even stronger more joy-filled relationships.

I hope that knowing more about me will help you stick around and join in some community-building, too. Drop comments on these blogs or on my socials. Let me know you are out there, too.