About Me

About Me

My name is Jennie. I am a case manager that works with people with severe mental health in Iowa. I am currently thinking about applying to graduate school to get my MA in Mental Health Counseling. I love working in the mental health community~!!

My husband and me at our wedding reception.

I had a long and winding road to get where I am today. I originally went to school and got my BA in psychology. That should have been my first clue I wanted to work in the mental health field. Jobs where hard to find in my hometown, so I did what my Japanese professor suggested, I went and taught English in Japan through my city's sister city program. Prior to living in Japan, my experience with Japanese culture came through anime or manga. I lived there for two years and I fell in love with the language and the culture.

I returned to the United States. I floundered again. I thought that I wanted to go back and get my elementary education degree but I did not want to go back to school. I was older by then, 27 and starting over seemed like a poor choice. I worked as an assistant manager at GameStop. Here I met my husband. He was a store manager at another store but he lived in the city where my store was so he did hand carries from his store to my store often. With his encouragement, and the closing of my store, I decided to go back to school.

I started out in elementary education and I did like it. I liked everything but the lesson planning. For me it was torture. I didn't make sense.I talked to my Kindergarten to 3rd grade reading methods professor and she encouraged me to switch to human services, after hearing me talked about how much I enjoyed working with the low income population during my practicum. I switch and I took as many classes as I could, so that I could finally graduate. I graduated in 2015 and immediately started looking for a job that better fit my interests. I saw that a local mental health non-profit was hiring and applied, remembering my original love for psychology.

Ken and Aya (Weiss Kreuz) flower shop cosplay.

I love what I do. I love getting to know the members on my team. I am still in direct support, but I have times where I am in the office. My clients live independent from me and contact me when they need my help, but I can always reach out to them. Their diagnoses range from anxiety to borderline personality disorder to schizophrenia. I love my clients. I truly do want the best for them and will do whatever is in my power to help them achieve their goals.

When I am not working, I enjoy reading, writing, playing video games, running, spending time with my husband and fixing up my house - that was built in 1860! I am also a dedicated life long learner. I love to learn new things. I am also a cosplayer and some of that may or may not appear here.