I am a human trafficking survivor, educator, author, speaker, and founder of the Survivor-Informed Learning Institute.

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I was groomed at 15 years old and trafficked for seven years. Today, I use my lived experience to help others understand what grooming, human trafficking, and exploitation can actually look like, not just from the outside or through a textbook, but through the eyes of someone who lived it.

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During those years, I crossed paths with people from many different professions and industries. Some interacted with me only briefly. Others were in places where pieces of what was happening were visible, but without the right education, they may not have understood what they were seeing.

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Years later, that realization became part of the inspiration for the Survivor-Informed Learning Institute.

I believe parents, grandparents, educators, professionals, businesses, and communities can all play an important role in prevention. But first, we have to know what we are looking for.

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Through my survivor-led courses, I provide an inside perspective into the subtle behaviors, circumstances, interactions, and warning signs that can surround grooming and exploitation. My goal is not to teach people to suspect everyone. It is to help people become more informed about what they might encounter, what may deserve a closer look, and how to respond appropriately.

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Lived Experience. Professional Impact.

I have spent years turning my lived experience into education, advocacy, prevention, and systems-level change. This work has taken me from classrooms and community organizations to courtrooms, the Arizona Legislature, and the national stage.

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My experience and accomplishments include:

• Testifying before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee on human trafficking

• Being invited to attend the White House signing of the TAKE IT DOWN Act

• Contributing to efforts that have resulted in human trafficking prevention and survivor-focused legislation being signed into law in Arizona and at the federal level

• Serving as a lived-experience expert witness in human trafficking cases

• Founding the Survivor-Informed Learning Institute

• Serving as Founder & Executive Director of Pearl at the Mailbox

• Serving as President of the Arizona Human Trafficking Survivor Coalition

• Working as an author, speaker, educator, and founder and host of the Let's Talk About It podcast

• Author of eight books and counting

 

Why I Created the Institute

This work is deeply personal to me. I know what it is like to be surrounded by people while carrying a reality they cannot see. I also know that many caring people simply have never been taught how grooming develops or what exploitation can look like beyond the stereotypes. I created the Survivor-Informed Learning Institute to help change that.

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Every course I create has a purpose: to take what I learned through lived experience and turn it into practical education for parents, grandparents, professionals, organizations, and others who may one day find themselves in a position to notice something someone else missed.  Because sometimes one informed person can see what dozens of others have walked past.

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What I lived through became what I now teach others to see.

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