Who We Are
Laura has always been pulled to Earth Medicine. Since she was a child, she would ask questions to the Earth, press her ears to the ground waiting for the answer. The answers came on the wind, with the insects, birds and animals, with a cloud cover or burst of rain or the serenity and stillness of the stones. Her grandfather showed her how to listen to the tomatoes grow, and to note the changes in bird activity and how the audible creak in his knee meant a storm was coming. One grandmother showed her how to forage and listen to the land; the other, a nurse, taught her about woman’s wisdom and to never diminish it as just “an old wive’s tale”. Growing up in a very tough neighborhood in a declining steel city in Northeast Ohio, she learned to look through the bleakness and witness the magic all around her. She knew from a young age her body was simply an extension of the surrounding landscape.
Disease and discomfort happen on many levels. Symptoms in our physical bodies are what most often get our attention; however, these symptoms are often rooted in disruptions in our Mental, Spiritual and Emotional landscapes and are often overlooked or dismissed. Laura has always been drawn more to the shamanic roots of Chinese Medicine that explore these landscapes. She draws on her own personal path of healing and the medicine that has been passed down from her own ancestors as well as the body of information passed on from her incredible teachers.
Laura was one of the original founders of the Neighborhood Acupuncture Project in Austin TX and has logged over more than 50,000 treatments working to help patients navigate their landscapes to get to a place of healing. N.A.P was an incredible opportunity to sharpen her skills thanks to the diversity and richness of the many people who walked through N.A.P.’s doors each day.
Laura’s strengths include her ability to listen to her patients with compassion, quickly getting to the root of the issue, and drawing on a wide variety of tools that she has acquired over the years to help transform pathological issues and bring lightness and movement to where one is stuck.
Laura graduated AOMA in Austin, TX in 2006. While in school, she did a lot of extracurricular studies in Japanese Style Meridian Therapy, Qi Gong and Classical Chinese Medicine. She was influenced early on by Koei Kuwahara, Claude Larre and Elizabeth Rochet de la Valle, Phillipe Sonneau, Mikio Sankey, Kiiko Matsumato, Lonnie Jarrett, Junji Mizutani, and Jeffrey Yuen
In addition to being an avid reader and seeker, Laura has had the fortune to study and train with: Koei Kuwahara, Murata Murihiro, David Euler, Master Li, Jampa Stewart, Sharon Weizenbaum, and Heiner Freuhauf
She most recently spent 4 years studying with Christina Pratt as well as being in enrolled in the Graduate Mentorship Program with Sharon Weizenbaum continuing her studies in the classical applications of Chinese Herbs. She practices Primordial Qi Gong as well as Qi Gong forms learned through the Last Mask Community on a daily basis.
In 2023 Laura moved to NW Pennsylvania to return to the woods that formed and nourished her animistic beliefs and to be closer to family. She has been on sabbatical for 2023 setting up her new life and taking time to reacquaint herself with her roots.
She has bought the old Mountain Mercantile on Rt 36 in Leeper, PA and is working towards building her new clinic on the property while keeping it an antique/vintage/dry goods store and a fun place to gather!
