A Mental Health Educator and Trauma-Sensitive Life Coach Inspiring Growth, Belonging, and Social Change
I’m Dr. Cynthia Garner, adoptee, survivor, disruptor, teacher, writer, and solo mom.
I speak and write about boundaries, nervous system health, single parenting, mindful leadership, stopping emotional violence, and the courage to live fiercely in challenging times. With a background in trauma-sensitive mindfulness, education, somatic therapy, and narrative medicine, I believe in our innate capacity and human nature to belong—to our bodies, to our hearts, to each other, and to the earth.
My soul-offerings as a therapeutic guide and mental health educator are shaped by adoption, motherhood, divorce, addiction recovery, and an ongoing generational trauma healing journey. Whether on stage, on the page, or in community, I invite people into a deeper conversation with their own truth—one rooted in presence, integrity, mind-body holism, and radical compassion.
I give people the skills they need to…
Interrupt
Interrupt cycles of burnout, anxiety, toxic stress, and emotional violence so they can connect with what truly matters
Investigate
Identify self-limiting beliefs, habits of mind, core patterns, and protective strategies that are keeping them stuck
Restore
Build self-trust, embodied confidence, attentional control, agency, and equanimity so they can rewrite their stories of belonging
Repair
Create boundaries, skills, and practices that enhance wellbeing, improve relationships, impact communities, and ripple healing across generations.
I Work With Leaders of Trauma-Impacted Organizations, Adoptees Interrupting Generational Cycles, and Sober Women Healing from Narcissistic and Emotional Abuse
I partner with those committed to healing, teaching, and leading with integrity—from classrooms to boardrooms, and from media platforms to dinner tables. Whether you're building a culture of care or stopping relational violence, I bring presence, clarity, and depth to the work of embodied change.
Through speaking, storytelling, workplace wellness consulting, 1-1 coaching, and custom workshops, I help individuals and teams regulate stress, restore boundaries, and reconnect with purpose. My work is especially attuned to those breaking toxic cycles—in their families, schools, and systems—and is rooted in the belief that when we reclaim our attention and take up residency in our bodies, we can flip the script, rewrite the narrative, and be empowered agents of healing and change.
Let’s do it together.
Emotional abuse is relational trauma.
Voice notes, emails, and text messages don’t leave purple marks that can be covered up with makeup or disguised with sunglasses. But when you are in a power-under relationship with a family member, friend, or co-worker, episodes of emotional violence can leave you trembling, hyper-vigilant, rattled, and afraid, just like a physical attack.
The damage may be hidden, but the trauma is real. There may not be eyewitnesses, video footage that would stand up in court, or a single, identifiable incident of acute threat, but ongoing psychological maltreatment is a legitimate cause of complex post-traumatic stress disorder that can leave deep scars.
Turning Poison into Medicine: My Journey through Relational Violence
There was a time when I felt like a volcano ready to erupt every day. After my divorce, I faced panic attacks, overwhelming chronic pain, and a simmering rage that threatened to consume me. The constant triggers, the toxicity around me, and the chaos of breaking free from narcissistic abuse left me emotionally drained and utterly exhausted.
Eventually, I hit a deep low—a dark night of the soul where I came face to face with my shadows, the tremors of ancestral rage, and the grief of a planet in crisis. Post-traumatic growth is real, and the darkest hour heralds the dawn.
From the muck blossoms the lotus. Training in mindfulness and somatic psychotherapy helped me learn and apply practical skills for setting effective boundaries around my mental real estate, reclaiming my time, tending to my heart, and nurturing my creative spirit.
Through it all, I’ve written and meditated… Every… Single… Morning… as a non-negotiable and radical act of self care. I do this as an investment in my future self and in my entire family and community system. I sit so that I can be steady and grounded enough to be responsive and available when I am called to service. I spend time actively tending to my heart, so that I can connect deeply with my daughter and be the mother to her that (as an adoptee), I did not get to have.
Along the way I gained a toolkit of skills that I have been fortunate to share with hundreds of educators, students, school leaders, and helping professionals, and I have seen the ripple impact spread far and wide.