About Me 

In the 1980s, the Farm Crisis hit Iowa harder than any other state in the Midwest. My parents lost everything. But their lessons of tenacity, resourcefulness and creativity gave me hope for my future.

I survived with the help of a strong public school system, a land-grant university and belief in myself. But as I have grown up and gained perspective, I have an urgent desire to better understand what happened to my parents and so many like them and to take away the most important lessons from love, loss, leaving and coming back to my roots.

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I was born on a farm in Decatur County, Iowa just a few years before my parents lost our farm to bankruptcy. They were some of the first in the community to go through what would soon become an urgent economic disaster for thousands.

Our family moved to Carroll County, Iowa where my parents worked various jobs and tried their best to recover including getting deep into multi-level marketing with Amway, a scam that drove us further into poverty.

In 1986, my parents bought a farm near Orient, Iowa. We moved when I was a 3rd grader to the place I consider “home” and I fell in love with almost every part of farm life, even some of the chores!

In 1995, I graduated from high school and was chosen for a full-tuition scholarship to Iowa State University in the inaugural class of Christina Hixson Opportunity Award Winners. I became the first person in my family to attend and graduate from a 4 year college, earning a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism.

Over the next 25 years, I spent time working in higher education at the University of Missouri, raised three children, became a yoga instructor, got involved with the local foods movement, became a volunteer with Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, ran for Iowa Senate, and in 2019, went back to school to earn my Master of Arts in Communication, Public Policy and Advocacy from Drake University, graduating in 2021.

After graduation, I went to work for a progressive public policy think tank, Common Good Iowa, where I worked until 2024 when I stepped down to care for my aging mom.

Since that time, I have worked as a freelance fundraising professional for various nonprofit organizations and in 2025 turned my full time energy towards writing my book about surviving the Farm Crisis of the 1980s and the cult of multi-level marketing.

I am a member of Public Relations Society of America, Association of Fundraising Professionals, National Writers Union and Kappa Tau Alpha National Journalism Honor Society.

For the last 20+ years, my husband and I have made our home on five acres outside of Ankeny, Iowa where we have raised three children, two cats and three dogs.