A Rough Childhood

Growing up, I had undiagnosed learning disabilities and petit mal seizures (which created staring spells). I was the kid who couldn’t learn the multiplication tables or to tell time. I always seemed to be lost and was an easy target for bullies.

Mix in having parents with significant mental health issues, abuse, financial hardships and growing up in a rural, socially and economically, depressed area. Life was scary for me.  

In junior high, I signed up for Spanish and my guidance counselor said, “Honey, you don’t get good enough grades in English to take Spanish. But doesn’t matter anyway…you are never going to college.”

After I got my first job at 16 in a fast-food restaurant, a relative commented, “you better take good care of that job because you’ll never get a better one.” I felt ashamed because I didn’t enjoy the job and wasn’t grateful enough. 

The underlying messages played over and over again...
I wasn’t good enough.
I would never amount to anything.
I was a daydreamer who was lazy.
  
As a kid, when adults would talk about someone who had cancer and was fighting to live, I would wonder, “Why? What’s so great about life that anyone would fight for it?” I’d fantasize about getting a life-threatening illness and how it might make people want to love me and take care of me. I spiraled downward, making bad choices because what did I have to lose.

I thought depression, anxiety, and thoughts of suicide were a natural part of life. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I learned that wasn’t normal.
 

My Quest for a Better Life

At 19, I was pregnant and married. At 21, I was headed for divorce. It didn't look good for me. But sometimes, life has a way of changing.

Eventually my learning disabilities and seizures were diagnosed and controlled. I entered an adult college program, got remarried, and had a beautiful family that I wanted to give a better life than what I had. In short, I had a life that I would never have dreamed of as a kid. I should have been happy. I was not. I felt inferior to others, angry, depressed, stuck, and most of all ashamed that I wasn’t happy.
 
So, at the age of 30, I began a ten year quest of inner work. I learned what it meant to be confident, successful and happy. During those ten years, I worked on myself like a full-time job with conventional “talk therapy,” mediation, a wide variety of programs and seminars. You name it, I did it. While I was fortunate to have access to so many diverse resources, I spent years getting a little help here and a little help there…I cobbled together my healing.  

The Past Built a Better Future

Today, I joke, “I wouldn’t recognize the 'old me' if I passed her on the street.”

My life is full of happiness, loving relationships, and success in all the areas that are important to me. Sometimes, I marvel that I have a successful coaching and speaking practice where I can help people the way I was helped.
 
Life will always have challenges. Being the first person in my family to start and run a successful business has not always been easy. But here’s the difference; I am completely capable of facing my family. My sense of self is solid. I am resilient. I have gotten to a place where I am grateful for my earlier challenges, abuse, and pain because it has brought me to where I am today. I have learned to forgive myself and others, to meet people where they are instead of where I think they should be, to push myself past boundaries and limitations, and to let go and be forward facing and energized in my life. 
 
My family and the work I do with my clients are the reasons I’m here in this life. I understand overwhelming struggle, depression, anxiety, loneliness, pain, and what it takes and what it means to make long-term sustainable changes on the inside so that life can change on the outside.  

Professional Bio

C.HYP, CPPD, MPMH, CCH, Certified Emotional Intelligence Life Coach, Executive Coach, Performance Coach, Employee Training & Development, Rapid Transformational Therapy Hypnotherapist, Trainer and Author

Coach Monique first began using meditation, relaxation training, and thought awareness exercises for her own personal use 15 years ago. Because it had such a positive effect on her day-to-day life, she became trained to teach others.

Her interest in meditation, relaxation training, and thought awareness also grew to include EQ (Emotional Intelligence) and Energy Psychology. In the past 10 years, she has had formal training in several specific fields and has taken dozens of seminars, courses and workshops in a variety of related fields. In 2007, she became certified as an Emotional Intelligence Life Coach through CEO Partnerships, Inc. Coach Monique strongly believes in pursuing continued education to stay current with tools, information, and techniques in order to best support her clients. Utilizing skills and knowledge from all of her experience, education, and training, she has developed easy-to-learn and easy- to-use techniques, programs and seminars that produce rapid results and can be beneficial to nearly everyone, regardless of age.

Training & Certifications include:

+ Executive MBA with a Focus on Innovation from Carlow University
+ BA in Communications from Chatham College
+ Certified Emotional Intelligence (EQ) Life Coach
+ Certified Emotional Intelligence Profile
+ Graduate of Landmark Education’s Landmark Forum & Advanced Course
+ Certified Sylva Method Instructor
+ C.HYP, CCPD, MPMH, CCH, Certified in Advanced Hypnotherapy