We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Erica Sandoval. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Erica below.
Erica, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Was there a defining moment in your professional career? A moment that changed the trajectory of your career?
More than a decade into my career as a professional healer – a social worker – I discovered a new avenue for healing: ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP). KAP is shown to lessen the symptoms of anxiety, depression, and trauma for many people more effectively than talk therapy alone. I saw that for myself when on my first KAP journey I discovered the self-love I had been searching for my entire life, a radical self-love that reshaped how I live.
As I processed my journey in the following days, I felt more rooted in myself and my power. American psychedelic healing spaces are overwhelmingly white and disconnected from ancestral practices, and while I wanted my community to experience the transformative effect of KAP, I also saw the potential to integrate taking this western drug and including healing rituals. That realization empowered me to become trained in KAP so that I could bring a version of psychedelic healing to the majority-brown, -immigrant, -women, and -working class clients I serve and network I have.
Now, I lead individual KAP sessions and KAP community healing circles that allow participants to transcend the capabilities of the sober mind while also reclaiming the centuries-old holistic healing practices. This is not a plant medicine, but it does tap into your subconscious mind and allows for ego dissolution. Many participants have shared this experience had helped them tap into their roots and see or hear their ancestors. Together, we create a culturally humble space, one that honors participants’ entire personhood, including the systemic trauma that is inextricable from their lived experience, and this is how Soul Immersion healing circles came to life Our retreats help us gather and connect with ourselves and tap into our soul work CommUNITY is healing.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I was four years old when I arrived in New York City from Ecuador with my mom. I didn’t know I was going to face some of the hardest experiences in my life in my quest for success or that I would become who I am today. All I knew was my desire to make an impact in my community and connect deeply with others. And I did. Now, I’m a healer by heart and someone with the mission to guide and support others in their healing journey. After more than a decade in the social work field, I founded Latinx/e in Social Work with the dual mission of building community among Latinx/e social workers and calling attention to the urgent need for cultural humility in the profession. I united a growing collective of authors to address the field’s entrenched discrimination and provide hope for the next generation of Latinx/e social workers. Together, we’ve published two anthology collections of essays written by Latinx/e social workers about their professional and personal journeys. We’ve also released a companion journal, which has more than 150+ excerpts from the books and journaling prompts to guide readers’ healing journey. Our work has been received incredibly positively, from Latinx/e social work students deciding to stay in school because they finally saw themselves reflected in the profession to established Latinx/e social workers finding community to social workers of all backgrounds reckoning with the oppression they perpetuate and being motivated to make systemic change.
Around the same time as Latinx/e in Social Work launched, I was inspired to start my own wellness and cultural humility practice – Sandoval CoLab – which offers talk therapy and psychedelic therapeutic experiences, as well as diversity, equity, and inclusion trainings to corporate, nonprofit, academic, and medical institutions. Our team of eight clinicians – majority bilingual women of color – guides therapy clients in understanding their emotional selves, navigating identity, healing from trauma, and moving through life transitions. After transformative experiences with ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) myself, I became trained in the modality so that I could bring this breakthrough approach for improving symptoms of anxiety, depression, and trauma to communities who have had the least access to psychedelic healing journeys – people of color, immigrants, working-class New Yorkers. I am one of the few therapists in New York leading individual KAP sessions and KAP community healing circles that meld this western method with the healing practices of our indigenous ancestors.
Sandoval CoLab has also trained more than 10,000 people on wellness and cultural humility in the workplace and communities. Our backgrounds as social workers of color position us as trusted messengers with lived experience and professional expertise. We have worked with everyone from a major New York City church serving low-income community members to leading financial service institutions on topics ranging from emotional resilience to identifying toxic stress in the workplace and more.
My calling is to dismantle the status quo, empower the most marginalized to own their healing journeys, and inspire entrenched systems of power to rebuild themselves through a social justice lens.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
At age 29, I was a newly single mother of a toddler, ready to try college for the third time. The first time, I left college after the trauma of sexual assault. The second time, I couldn’t afford the bus fare to get to campus. The third time, this time, I was ready to go back to school so that I could give my Isabella a better life. But being the mother I wanted Isabella to have didn’t come naturally to me. I was raised by a mother who loved me deeply but whose trauma manifested through her anger. A young undocumented immigrant teetering on the edge of financial stability with a small child to provide for, my mother had a lot to be scared of and angry about. She didn’t have the capacity to mother me in the way she wanted, and her emotional and physical exhaustion drove her to punish and this left me feeling shame and guilt. The only way I knew to cope was by wearing two pairs of pants on days I thought she might be upset. I didn’t want to instill that fear in Isabella, but years of conditioning couldn’t be undone overnight. I love my mother, I have forgiven her and I see her enormous beauty and kindness in her heart now. It took time to heal.
My first step in breaking that cycle of trauma was joining a support group for students who were also parents. We commiserated about the difficulties of raising children while putting ourselves through school and somehow keeping it all together. It was transformative to have an affirming outlet for my experiences. So then I started my own therapy, knowing that what seemed like an astronomical expense was an investment in a better future. These experiences taught me to channel my daily frustration at the challenges of parenthood, student life, and working as a waitress not through anger or violence but instead through screaming into pillows and similar techniques. I learned to both honor my emotions and regulate them so that I could provide a safe home for Isabella and make it through the education that I knew would be key to furnishing a stable, successful life for us.
That group and individual therapy led me to my purpose. It helped me learn about family dynamics and human behavior. I found the tools that helped process my trauma fascinating. I was drawn to helping others heal. Eventually, I earned an associate’s degree from a community college, a bachelor’s degree in adolescent development, and a master of social work. Now I operate a successful mental health and wellness practice and I am starting to form a nonprofit and this spring, I watched Isabella graduate from college.
Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?
The way to build a successful and meaningful career in social work and mental health is to build community. The early years of my career were lonely. I was often the only person of color or immigrant or Latina among my social work colleagues, and the constant microaggressions and systemic discrimination were draining. It was clear this field wasn’t built for people like me. But slowly, I began to connect with other Latinx/e social workers across the profession. Together, we unburdened ourselves of the invisible load we carried in the workplace. We affirmed both the million little cuts we suffered daily and the immeasurable value we brought to social work precisely because of our marginalized backgrounds. It filled my cup to see my experience reflected in others’, and so I began to intentionally seek out and cultivate the community of other Latinx/e social workers. After several years of seeing how being in community nourished me and the others in my network, I began to think about scaling up this healing. Thus, the Latinx/e in Social Work book series was born. I organized and brought together nearly two dozen Latinx/e social workers to write about their experiences at the intersection of Latinidad and social work, and together, we published the first volume of what has become not only a book but a movement. We are sharing stories that heal, inspire, and connect communities, helping other Latinx/e social workers see themselves in our field and highlighting for social workers of all backgrounds the urgent need for cultural humility in the profession. Shortly after the book was released, I recruited more Latinx/e social workers to share their stories in a second volume. Additionally, we’ve created a companion journal that invites the reader to explore the themes of each chapter and interrogate their own positionality and potential for healing. Our books are being read in schools of social work, by leaders of major social work organizations, and all stripes of social workers in between.
I consider building this community core to my success in several ways. Having a large network of Latinx/e social workers of different backgrounds and specialities with whom I can collaborate has greatly increased my ability to attract mental health and diversity, equity, and inclusion training clients. We are also leaving a legacy and we take pride of how we are strengthening the pipeline of Latinx/e social workers and influencing who the social work profession. Finally, my community has made this profession sustainable for me; instead of burning out from the discrimination intrinsic to this field, I have accomplices with whom I can share this load and create a more just social work future. This community is my professional home, and no matter where my career takes me, I’ll always have my Latinx/e in Social Work family to lean on for support, wisdom, and love.
Contact Info:
- Website: SandovalColab
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erica-priscilla-sandoval-lcsw-483928ba/