I’m Dr. Grace, founder of The Rooted Institute. My work sits at the intersection of pelvic healing, trauma, and embodiment—shaped by both my professional training and my lived experience of growing up in a body marked by pelvic pain.

My early experiences with chronic pain, digestive distress, and nervous system holding led me to understand how deeply physical symptoms, trauma, and relational wounds are intertwined. Although Western medicine often separates Physical Therapy from psychotherapy, my healing and clinical work revealed how inseparable the body, emotions, and nervous system truly are. My own healing journey intertwined with unlearning internalized systems of harm including White-Narcissism, Colonialism, Capitalism, Christian Nationalism, Homophobia, Transphobia, Ableism, and Patriarchy. Much of this deconstructing and liberation work continues to be shared through studying Black, Indigenous, Asian, Disabled, Immigrant Artists and Activists and Nature. The trees are my eldest teachers and much of my work is guided through them. My on-going commitment is oriented towards collective healing, which centers those most oppressed. As a child of second generation Italian and Irish immigrants, I work on holding my inner colonizer parts intentionally, so that I may continue to work in harm-reduction, nuance, creation, consequence, and repair.

A bit about my professional training-- I hold a Doctorate in Physical Therapy and am a Board-Certified Women’s Health Specialist, with advanced certification in Pelvic and Obstetric Health through the American Physical Therapy Association. My work is further informed by extensive training in trauma-specific modalities, including Compassionate Inquiry®, Somatic Experiencing®, Psychedelic Somatic Institute®, and Finding Solid Ground®. Central to my work is InnerEthics®, a framework that has shaped my capacity to hold inclusive, safe, ethical, and deeply attuned containers for others to engage in their own inner healing. I now practice under my Somatic Certification as it is the closest to reflecting the way I offer care now-- Whole Body Consenting and nervous system lead.

Some of my identifiers include: non-binary (they/them), queer, Autistic, ADHD, orphan, and an endometriosis warrior. I’m happily partnered, share my home with our dog and cat, love ocean swimming and hiking, and continue to learn from grief, rage, joy, and play.

My work is about coming home to the body.

I believe the pelvis holds deep wisdom—connecting us to ourselves, to the earth, and to one another. Pain, grief, and rage are not problems to fix, but intelligent, protective responses to violence, rupture, abandonment, domination, and boundary crossings. When we listen to these signals rather than pathologize them, the body begins to reorganize toward safety and connection.

Healing is both personal and collective. My work engages the decolonizing process of reclaiming pelvic sovereignty while naming how white body narcissism, ableism, transphobia, homophobia, patriarchy, capitalism, binaries, colonialism, r*pe and purity culture, and religious control shape our bodies and beliefs. Much of my learning and unlearning has been guided by the teachings, art, and labor of Black, Asian, Brown, Queer, Disabled, and Indigenous folx, whose wisdom informs my understanding of healing as relational and interconnected.

I am committed to offering a corrective experience—one rooted in consent, reciprocity, and relationship rather than fixing or directing. I can only accompany others to depths I have first encountered and worked with in my own system, which is why my own healing remains an ongoing priority.

As Fannie Lou Hamer said, “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.” This work is one way I respond to that call—by supporting embodied healing as part of our collective liberation.