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About Dr. D
Own Your Power.
Pave the Way.
Hi, I’m Dr. D!
One question drives my work at Badass University: What becomes possible when women own their power and pave the way for others?
That question has shaped my career as a university professor, nonprofit executive, advocate, entrepreneur, speaker, and coach. Across every chapter, the common thread has been advancing women’s agency and strengthening community.
Badass University grew from that body of work—and from my own experience of reinvention. After 20 years in academia, I left a successful career to begin an entirely new chapter. Since then, I’ve led organizations, navigated uncertainty, faced setbacks, and started over twice.
Through it all, I’ve learned that owning your power is not about being fearless or having all the answers. It starts with knowing who you are, what you stand for, and what matters most.
That is the foundation of Badass University: Own Your Power. Practice Integrity. Rise Together.
Badass University is for women who sense a gap between the life they are living and the life they know is possible. Maybe something no longer fits. Maybe they have outgrown an old role, expectation, relationship, belief, or version of themselves. Maybe they know they are not fully aligned with who they are or how they want to live and lead.
Through workshops, coaching, speaking, and building community, I create space for women to get clear on who they are, what matters most, what needs to change, and take action.
And we do it together. Because owning your power is not only about what changes in your own life. It is also about how you use that power to expand opportunity and possibility for other women.
That’s what it means to be a badass.
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My Background
I’m here to light a fire under women who are done playing small and ready to own their power. With a PhD in Human Development and Family Studies and a minor in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, I’m uniquely qualified to help you get unstuck, or live your truth, or chart a new path forward. When women rise, the world shifts.
For two decades, I taught university courses on family functioning, family stress and coping, healthy relationships, and individual development from birth to death. I’ve trained and mentored hundreds of students to think critically about parenting, trauma, grief, identity, gender, divorce, aging, violence against women, and the messy, beautiful work of becoming who we’re meant to be. I’ve also spent 15+ years in the trenches as a nonprofit executive and activist—so I don’t just know the research, I’ve lived the work.
You can read more about my career journey here.
My Approach
My coaching and BU Workshops are spaces built on science, soul, and strategy. They are designed to help you break free from the noise, reconnect with your truth, and take bold action for positive change.
In this work, I’ll meet you where you are—with warmth, care, joy, and energy for your journey. I will apply an intersectional lens to help unpack the complexities of your lived experience, and utilize a values-based, strengths-focused, trauma-informed framework to help you move forward with clarity, power, and a plan.
This isn’t about fixing you. It’s about helping you reconnect with the badass, powerful woman within.