![]() Radical Therapy, housed within the Honeycomb Network located on Paseo Boricua in the heart of Humboldt Park. “In early 2020, I started a private practice named F.L.Y. True to our pattern and form, early this year Dorian came to me again, this time with a different announcement that not only was she returning to The Honeycomb after having her first child, but she was expanding the practice.Īllow us to re-introduce our resident mental health therapist Dorian A. She also co-founded and piloted a young adult wellness program called “The H.E.A.L (honey, education and love) Unacademy in 2021, an initiative that aims to center BIPOC youth and young adults to learn wellness education and practice that expose young people to not only emotional, physical, and spiritual wellness education and tools, but also cultural, community and financial wellness. We had no idea just how important having mental health accessibility would be, especially when two months after acquiring the space we were plunged into a global pandemic and shut down across the country.ĭuring the pandemic Dorian hosted virtual therapy, workshops and poetry circles still going on today. Of all of the community members I approached initially (and there were quite a few) offering a partnership within this newly acquired space to do work in, she was the one who said yes and showed up from day one, committed.ĭorian has been a major player at The Honeycomb for two years now. To my excitement she said she was down for the challenge and freedom of running her own practice within our vibrant walls. ![]() Especially in the communities we served and the work we were embarking on. This approach that acknowledged the systemic impact on the mental and emotional bodies of Black, Indigenous, People of Color including all sexualities and genders in a real way was the gap I felt needed to be filled. (First Love Yourself) radical therapy inspired by liberation, feminist and multi-cultural psychology. I had no solid game plan or strategy on how to make it work but I knew out the gate that an on-site bi-lingual Puerto Rican femme therapist was exactly what needed to be solidified as a rooted service at The Honeycomb. She had just left the organization she was practicing at and was trying to decide her next move. I told her I had just acquired a space and wanted to bring her on in partnership as the resident therapist. ![]() This time in 2020 we met so that I can propose an offer. We also connected in our dismay of the socio-political issues we faced as a diaspora and our critiques of the cultural incompetency of modern western therapeutic practices when treating BIPOC patients. We connected almost instantaneously on our values around wellness for BIPOC and the inaccessibility of care for our community. I had met her a little over a year earlier when she asked to meet with me to discuss a possible collaboration for the passion project I was a co-founder of at that time called “Books, Brunch & Botánica”. I met up with The Honeycomb’s resident mental health therapist Dorian for lunch at “Nellie’s” restaurant on Division St. ![]()
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