My journey in the "spa world" started in 1998 when I got my manicurist license and a job at Beyond Beauty in Mashpee, MA (it still has an original owner and is an excellent salon & spa).  But I had wanderlust and in 1999 I moved away from small town Cape Cod living and down to Memphis, TN (what a culture shock that was).  I waited tables and attempted to get my cosmetology license but hated it and dropped out (yep I am a beauty school drop out).  In the summer of 2000 I moved to Michigan, I just wasn’t ready to go home.  I landed a job as a manicurist at a spa just outside of Detroit and attempted to apprentice for cosmetology (no I do not learn lessons easily) I lasted about a year and I decided that I really hated hair and doing manicures and pedicures really wasn’t  that fulfilling so I quit  and went back to waiting tables and enrolled in the massage program at Baker College of Clinton Township.

I knew that my wanderlust could take me anywhere and this amazing program offered a 1000 hour of training which left me compliant with every state in the country, plus it was tied in with an associate’s degree.   Massage school was the best thing I ever did, I was lucky to find one of my true gifts early in my life.  A few semesters into my program at Baker College I met John Gifford one of my amazing instructors at Baker college.  John was everything I wanted to be, professional, successful and incredibly knowledgeable.  I made it my mission to learn everything that I could from him and after I received my certificate and was into my associates program I became Baker College -massage therapy program’s first student teacher.  I did my externship at John’s business Motionwise and after graduation I worked in his office for over a year, where I learned so much about the mind body connection, trigger point work and professionalism.  About 6 months after graduation Baker College called me and asked me to be adjunct faculty and teach for them.  I was ecstatic and jumped at the chance.  Teaching was so rewarding and I believe it is what helped to give me such extensive knowledge of massage and the human body.   After 2 years of teaching, my sister had brain surgery and I found myself back in Massachusetts.

I still wasn’t ready to come back to the Cape so we moved closer to the city and I found myself a job at the Bella Boutique (formerly Bella Skin) in Newton.   This is when I learned that I wanted to be an aesthetician… the girls at Bella are some of the best in the business as is clear from their yelp page and I saw them turning business away as I was struggling to start up as a new massage therapist in the area, so I decided to get my Aesthetics license in 2008 and add facials and waxing to my every growing list of services.  I worked at Bella until I moved with my military husband to Fort Bragg North Carolina in 2009, where I opened Cross Therapies.   In April of 2012 we moved back to Massachusetts, I changed my business name and here I am.

Massage therapy is one of the greatest loves of my life.  It is truly a gift to be doing what I love each and every day and I strive to advance my profession.  Over the past few years I have as a volunteered in many facets for the Massachusetts Chapter of the American Massage Therapy Association.    I am currently taking a break while I finish my Whole Health Education but I plan to return to this wonderful association very soon.