The Founder
Nancy’s career in the helping profession began when she, as a high school drop out and single mother of two young sons, put herself through college and graduate school. She earned a B.A. in Psychology from the University of California at Santa Cruz and an M.S.in Clinical Psychology at California State University at Hayward. Nancy worked many years counseling drug addicts and alcoholics before going to work as a vice president for a San Francisco based corporation.
In 1985 Nancy developed an internal employee assistance program (EAP) for the corporation and under her direction and supervision the department grew to include managed mental health care, health promotion, volunteer programs, pre-retirement services,child/elder care, commute alternatives and other employee services.
In 1990, Nancy founded her own business, Employee Health Plus, to provide EAP services externally to a variety of corporations. During Nancy’s tenure as an EAP professional, she was elected to serve on both the national and local EAP professional’s board of directors.
In November 1992 Nancy’s life changed dramatically when she visited an orphanage in the Western Highlands of Guatemala. She found 45 children, ages 2-12, with little adult supervision and no play activities. The children were needy – just wanting to be loved and held. Quickly Nancy found herself covered with dirty, runny-nosed, lice infested kids that found their way into her heart. She promised to come back and visit but nobody believed it. The kids had been visited by many people who made the same promise, but never came back. But Nancy did come back; every three months for a period of four weeks, for the following 18 months. She brought medicine, toys, clothes, and art supplies for the children. After several trips she realized that these visits could never provide the type of help these kids so desperately needed. They needed consistent, constant, limit-setting, loving adults in their lives. They also needed activities to stimulate their learning and creativity. Nancy then decided to come and spend a year developing an enrichment program for the kids in February 1994 and, within a few months of arriving in Guatemala, she knew she would not the leave the kids after a year and return to the United States.
In October, 1995, a young man carrying a tiny bundle wrapped in towels arrived at the orphanage. Thinking it was a loaf or bread, Nancy peeked inside and instead found a baby girl. The baby was four-days old, weighed only four pounds, and was barely clinging to life. Nancy agreed to take the child since the orphanage was not equipped to care for such a fragile child. The doctor told Nancy that the baby was barely alive and would not survive. She took the baby home and fed her with an eyedropper. Within a few days the baby started to come around. Nancy adopted the baby girl and named her Gabriela Maria. Gabriela is Nancy’s constant reminder of the tremendous potential of the children in Guatemala and is one of the reasons she founded Semillas de Amor and decided to build the Children’s Village. The Village is a place where children will be loved, nurtured, given proper medical care, and allowed to blossom.
