Although, I enjoyed what I was doing, I always felt like something was missing. My day-to-day life in meetings and boardrooms had started to take a toll on me. One day after having a really long day in the office, I came home and sat down with a glass of wine (ok maybe it was a bottle LOL), trying to remember the last time I did something that I was passionate about and made me happy. The only thing I could think of was the last play I did in high school and how much I loved movies. So, I googled ‘acting classes near me’. The Actors’ Place with Keith Flippen (who is the most amazing actor, coach, and friend I have ever met) was the first website that came up and I immediately signed up for the beginning Meisner acting class. Within a couple of classes, I knew I had found what was missing in my life and my career. That was in 2013 and I have been acting professionally ever since. I expanded into doing voiceovers and this past year I started doing standup comedy.

It’s hard to describe ‘me’. I like to joke all the time about how I’m a complicated being, but in a good way. There are so many different sides of me but yet I think they all come together like some weird rubic’s cube. So, I’ll give you the full ‘who I am’ first and then I’ll break it down.

I am a dyslexic actor, standup comedian, voiceover actor, national speaker, DEI activist, transportation equity expert, and financial executive working on a Ph.D. in Public Administration and Policy at Old Dominion University, hoping to combine all of my careers, education and life experiences to entertain, educate and help make the world a better place.

I am an actor. Ultimately, I got into the business by putting all my fears aside and taking that leap. The first step to any career is believing in yourself enough to jump. Also, I was fortunate enough to land at The Actors’ Place learning from the great Keith Flippen. Honestly, had I not ended up there…with Keith as my teacher/coach/mentor, I’m not sure we would even be having this interview.

I started doing standup over a year ago. Enrolling in a class worked so well with my acting, I decided I would do the same with standup. I first enrolled in the standup class taught by the talented Hatton Jordan at the Push Comedy Theater in Norfolk, VA. I absolutely loved it. I then enrolled in the standup class at the Virginia Beach Funny Bone taught by the talented Tim Loulies. The experience of being on the stage at the Funny Bone where so many of the greats have stood before was euphoric. I can’t express how thankful I am to both of these two for their education, guidance, and continued support. I am forever grateful!

I think what sets me apart is just me being me. I’m naturally a storyteller and I find humor in everything.

I am most proud of the fact that I never give up. I’m always striving to learn more and be better than I was the day before. I also truly believe that I can do it all. Anyone can…if you believe you can and you want it bad enough.

I failed out of college the first two times I attempted to go. I had given into the fact the I was the ‘stupid’ one and my older sister was the smart one.

There was and still is a huge lack of understanding of exactly what dyslexia is. When I tell people that I’m dyslexic I typically get the same response of “oh you reverse your b’s and d’s”. That is so not even close. A person with dyslexia is neurodivergent…meaning their brain formed differently and functions differently than a normal person’s brain. We read words and not sentences. Therefore, we have no idea what the sentence actually says. We also read significantly slower, and we hear sounds differently. Dyslexic students in a classroom listening to the teacher lecture or give instructions, have difficulty processing and remembering what is being said or shown. As with any disability, a person’s dyslexia can range from mild to severe. Research provides that undiagnosed or untreated dyslexia can lead to low self-esteem, low self-worth, depression, and anxiety. An undiagnosed and untreated individual may never reach their full potential in life.

Unfortunately, I fall in between the moderate to severe range. I suffered from all of those things listed above. But worst of all, for most of my life I believed that I was stupid.

I didn’t find out I was dyslexic until I was in my mid-twenties. Although I was diagnosed, they still didn’t really offer therapy. At this time, I was working for the U.S. Coast Guard Exchange System as a civilian employee (NF employee) doing a basic accounting job. I worked for the Lieutenant that was in charge of that division named Doug Sabra, Lieutenant, US Coast Guard (Retired), or as I still like to call him “LT”. This man changed my life!!! He was the first person in my life who believed in me, and he was the first person to ever tell me that I was smart, and he genuinely meant. He wasn’t trying to get anything from me…if you know what I mean. He took the time to sit with me and teach me everything there was to know about accounting in a way that I could understand it. He promoted me into my first big financial controller position. I went on from that job to working my way up to holding some of the highest-level executive positions such as Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Vice President, and General Manager of multi-million-dollar corporations.

When LT promoted me, he made me promise that I would go back to school and get my bachelor’s degree. I kept that promise, I received a BS in Accounting in 2004 and I went on to earn a Masters in Accounting/Taxation in 2010, and of course now working on finishing my Ph.D. which has been one of the most challenging things I have ever done. It is estimated that only 2% of the US population holds a Ph.D. and less than 10% of them have a learning disability. To say I have struggled is an understatement…a Ph.D. is ALL reading, research, and writing. I have stayed up all night trying to complete what probably took the other students 1/4 of the time it took me to complete.