What Happens When a Ship's Officer Becomes a Maritime Therapist?
A conversation about trauma, identity, and finding your footing — at sea and on land
There's a particular kind of person who falls in love with the ocean before they even know what to do with that love. I was one of them — as a kid I plastered my walls with maps, I became a scuba diver at 12, went to the maritime academy on a whim, and spent nearly two decades sailing everything from fishing vessels in Alaska, to cargo ships in Antarctica.
And then I became a therapist.
I recently sat down with Cassie Mead on the Women at the Helm podcast to talk about my journey — and I shared a lot on how we understand trauma, identity, mental health at work, and what it means to finally ask for help.
The trauma hiding in plain sight
Early in our conversation, I describe being on a ship in early 2020 with a captain who had just come off a horrifying rescue — his crew had stumbled upon a car carrier engulfed in flames, with sailors jumping overboard into heavy seas. They pulled everyone out except one. The captain was still processing it.
Later that same contract, I recall learning about a union member who had died by suicide at sea.
We are pretty tight in this industry. You're probably one or two degrees removed from every other mariner out there.
We work in a professional culture with enormous trauma exposure and almost no infrastructure for processing it. For many mariners, the unspoken solution was alcohol. When that was taken away, nothing replaced it.
Many high-performing people — in demanding, high-stakes careers — carry years of accumulated stress and difficult experiences without ever having language for it, let alone a place to put it down.
"Just because something was traumatic doesn't mean you're traumatized"
I do my best to resist pathologizing. In the episode, when Cassie describes her own man-overboard experience and says it didn't really traumatize her, I don’t correct her or suggest she's in denial. I validate it.
"What happened to you could have traumatized somebody else. For you, you were like — OK, I've got to do what I've got to do.”
This is an important point. Two people can live through the same event and have entirely different responses — not because one is stronger or more broken, but because of everything that makes them who they are: their history, their nervous system, their support system, what the event meant to them, and what happened next.
Trauma isn't defined by what happened. It's defined by what gets stuck.
Identity and the cost of leaving something you love
There's a thread running through this whole conversation that will feel familiar to anyone who has ever built their identity around their work.
I talk about the "push and pull" of life at sea — missing home when you're out there, missing the ocean when you're back on land. I describe going back to school and working for the City of LA, but feeling like something was off: "I really missed sailing, it was just in my heart."
Eventually, I went back. And then life shifted again, and I built a new path — one that let me stay connected to the world I love while doing something entirely different.
For a lot of the clients who walk into therapy, this tension around identity is central.
“Who am I if I stop doing the thing that made me feel like myself?”
“What do I do with all the skills and instincts I built in a world where they no longer fit or aren’t needed?”
“How do I grieve a career, a role, a version of myself — without losing everything?”
There's no quick answer to these questions. But having a space to ask them, with someone who isn't going to rush you toward a resolution — it matters a lot.
On being a "terrible third mate" — and why that's fine
When cadets come to me anxious about not being good enough yet, my response is usually: "You're right. You are going to suck. And it's OK. I sucked too. We all do when we first start."
I’m not being dismissive. This is normalizing the gap between where you are and where you want to be — a gap that, in high-achieving people especially, tends to produce enormous shame. The internal monologue of "I should already know this" or "everyone else seems fine" is one of the most common things therapists hear, across every profession and stage of life.
Competence comes from repetition. Confidence comes from surviving the early stages. Neither can be skipped.
"I've been in therapy since 2013"
I’m a licensed therapist, a ship's officer, the chair of the union’s mental health committee, a counselor at a maritime academy — and I’m also someone who has been showing up for my own therapy for over a decade. I don’t present this as evidence of a problem. This is simply a practice.
"I just loved it. We talked about stuff, I could process things, I could figure out what I was going to do next…"
That framing — therapy as a place to think, not just a place to go when things fall apart — is one worth sitting with. A lot of people find their way to counseling only in crisis. But some of the most meaningful work happens in the quieter in-between times, when you have the bandwidth to actually look at things.
Now, I’m a Therapist for Mariners & Their Families
I’m now at Foothills Psychotherapy, working with mariners, their families, couples, and individuals. I also serve as a counselor on Cal Maritime's training ship each summer — which is genuinely joyful.
I serve as the chair of the mental health committee at Masters, Mates and Pilots, working to build better support structures for union members.
If my story resonates with you — whether you've spent time at sea, work in a demanding field, or are just someone trying to figure out the next chapter — that pull toward something more is worth paying attention to.
Get Matched With a Therapist at Foothills Psychotherapy
At Foothills Psychotherapy, we work with individuals navigating high-stress careers, life transitions, and the kind of accumulated weight that doesn't always have a name. If you're curious about whether therapy might be a good fit for you, we'd love to connect. Reach out to get matched with the best therapist.
