Why I Created Well Tended

Because what we tend to in childhood matters for a lifetime.

For more than a decade, I've had the privilege of sitting with kids and the people raising them.

I've watched parents walk through my door carrying so many questions. Is this normal? Am I doing this right? Why is this so hard for them? Is there something more going on? What am I supposed to do when nothing seems to work?

And I've worked with incredible kids who weren't trying to be difficult or make life harder. They were communicating the only ways they knew how. Kids who needed someone to slow down, pay attention, and really understand what was going on.

Then I became a mom myself.

And suddenly I wasn't just the therapist who knew all the things. I was the one standing in my own kitchen with a dysregulated kid, a cold cup of coffee, approximately four ounces of patience left, thinking, I literally teach people how to do this for a living.

Turns out, knowing a lot about kids doesn't make raising them simple.

But all of it, the therapist years and the motherhood years, has made me believe something pretty deeply:

Children don't need perfect people raising them. They need people willing to keep knowing them.

To notice when something changes. To wonder what's behind the hard stuff. To ask questions when they don't have the answers. To repair when things go sideways. To get support when they need it. And to keep coming back to the relationship, again and again.

That's why I created Well Tended.

I wanted one place where families could come for more than one kind of support.

A place to bring your child when they're struggling. A place to ask the bigger questions and get a comprehensive assessment when you're wondering about ADHD or autism. And a place where parents, whether they ever walk through my office doors or live hundreds of miles away, can find practical education and tools for the everyday work of raising humans.

Because families don't fit neatly into boxes.

Sometimes you need therapy. Sometimes you need answers. Sometimes you need a different way of looking at what's happening at home. And sometimes you just need someone in your corner who understands kids and understands how freaking hard it can be to raise them.

Well Tended was created to be a place for all of it.

Because while we're raising children, we're also tending to something they'll carry with them long after childhood ends. Their understanding of themselves, their relationships with the people they love, and the foundation they'll continue to grow from.

And I think that's worth tending well.