My website gives you the highlight reel: Resilience + Reinvention Coach. Speaker. Podcaster. All of it is true, but also the polished version. The real story is a lot messier…

Here’s what you won’t see in my official bio:

• I’ve had my ass kicked by grief more than once.
• I hate cancer. It took both of my parents and my first two dogs. Cancer has left scars I’ll carry forever.
• I’ve been betrayed in ways that were designed to break me and nearly did.
• I’ve reinvented myself so many times that I’ve crowned myself the Comeback Queen.

I didn’t plan to become a Resilience + Reinvention Coach, nor did I ever imagine I would be the host of two podcasts. I planned to have a “normal” life. A safe life. For many years, I did all of the things I thought I “should” do. I checked the boxes. I bought the house. I built the career. I got the dog. I booked the vacations, many of them solo.

What I really wanted were the husband and kids. I wanted that more than anything. But despite how much I wanted it, it was not in the cards for me in that version of my life. The universe had other plans. It looked at my checklist and said, “Hold my beer…let’s give her a series of plot twists to see what she’s really made of.”

The Day My Old Life Ended

It wasn’t just one thing that blew my life apart. It was more like a ten-year WTF storm of sucker punches. An engagement that ended. An abusive relationship that left scars I’ll carry forever…emotional, verbal, financial, physical, and betrayal woven through every part of it. Toxic work environments that drained the life out of me and made me question my worth on a daily basis.

By the time I lost people I loved, I was already worn down. Then came the hit I never saw coming: becoming the target of revenge porn and death threats. That one didn’t just hurt…it destroyed me. It stripped away my sense of safety, crushed my confidence, and made me question everything about who I was and if I even wanted to continue going on.

Just when I thought I couldn’t lose more, the career I had dedicated 20 years of my life to disappeared too. Except here’s the truth. I had asked for it. I knew that job wasn’t good for me anymore. I manifested a layoff. It still felt like a loss, but deep down I also knew it was a huge release and exactly what I needed… one chapter closing so another could finally begin.

The grief, the betrayal, the abuse, the toxic work environments – all of it cracked me open. The revenge porn and the fallout burned it all to the ground. As brutal as it was, it forced me to get honest about who I was, what I wanted, and what I wasn’t willing to settle for anymore. That is the part that no one tells you. Sometimes your breakdown really is the doorway to your breakthrough.

The Messy Middle

Let’s get one thing straight. Resilience is not about bouncing back with a smile and a Pinterest quote. Screw that! Although I do love me some Pinterest quotes and have quite a collection!

Resilience is about facing the messy middle… the part where you are crying in the shower, eating nachos for dinner, or staring at the ceiling at 3 a.m. wondering how you’ll ever get through this. It’s not pretty. It’s not filtered. And it’s not about pretending you are fine when you are not.

For me, resilience looked like rebuilding from scratch. There was no bouncing back…because the “back” no longer existed.

It looked like therapy. Journaling. Long runs with my dog. Late-night soul searching. Saying yes to things that terrified me. Saying no to things and people that no longer fit this version of myself. Telling the truth when I wanted to hide. Slowly, piece by piece, I started to create a life that felt more like me than the one I had lost…

What Makes Me A Coach

Through it all, I learned more than I ever wanted to about loss, betrayal, healing, and starting over. I didn’t stop there. I trained under numerous coaching certification programs, including becoming an International Coaching Federation (ICF) accredited coach – which basically means I didn’t just live through my storms, I went and got trained by the gold standard of coaching so I could actually help people rise.

I am the last person who pretends to be perfect. I am overly honest for a reason. I own my sh*t, and in doing so I’ve heard from hundreds of people who feel seen and understood. People who tell me they finally understand themselves in ways they never knew they needed to.

That’s why I do this work. Not because I lived a flawless life…but because I didn’t. My credibility, experience and professional training…that’s what makes me a coach.

Where the Podcasts Come In

Somewhere along the way, I realized that my stories – the raw and unfiltered one I thought I had to hide were the very thing people connected to the most. So I started talking. First into a mic, then into the ears of strangers who had been through their own sh*t.

That became Sex, Lies & Tacos: the raw, unfiltered podcast about my personal betrayal, heartbreak and the plot twist that followed. Later, This Could Get Messy: the deeper dive into what comes after the plot twists….the resilience, reinvention and rebuilding.

The names are playful, but the conversations are real. They are messy. They are the kind of truths we all need but so rarely say out loud.

Why This Blog Exists

So why start a blog if I already have two podcasts? Because sometimes writing is the only way I can untangle the story for myself.

This space will not be about polished strategies or toxic positivity. It will be about real stories, lessons I’ve learned the hard way, and invitations to think differently about your own life. It will be the stuff that doesn’t fit neatly into an Instagram caption or Tik Tok video….

If you’ve ever thought, “I can’t believe this is my light right now,” wonder why “bad things always happen to you” I want you to know you are not alone. I have been there. I still go there sometimes. And I believe those moments are the starting point for something bigger.

So yeah. That’s me, Aly. Not the website version. The human version. If you’re sitting in your own messy middle right now, I’d love to walk with you. Coaching with me isn’t about dabbling or “seeing what happens.” It’s for women who are all in on themselves, ready to do the work and ready to invest in their growth. If that’s you, apply here and let’s start writing your comeback story.

Like what you just read? Don’t ghost me. Hit subscribe and come along for the ride – I promise it will be real, maybe a little messy, and may include cute pictures of my dog Poppy from time to time.