I started my career as a registered nurse and midwife in the Caribbean. My days were spent delivering babies, managing emergencies, calming anxious families, and doing whatever needed to be done. Nursing was hands-on and personal. I cared for people in some of the most vulnerable moments of their lives, and I loved that part of the work.

When I later moved to the United States, I continued as a nurse and eventually transitioned into hospital utilization management. That meant I was the person reviewing patient charts, speaking with physicians, and determining how long someone was allowed to stay in the hospital based on insurance rules. It required clinical judgment, and I often found myself advocating for patients, pushing for an extra day or two if I knew they weren’t ready to go home.

In those years, I began to see something that bothered me.

Patients were not getting better.

Medication would temporarily reduce a number on a chart. Then another prescription would be added to handle the side effects of the first. People left the hospital with a long list of instructions and very little understanding of how to support healing at home. They were managing disease, not reclaiming their health.

While all this was happening, I kept remembering my grandmother.

She was the natural healer in our family. She grew herbs, made teas, and used the land the way previous generations always had. As a young nurse, I brushed it off. I thought what she was doing was “old-fashioned.” I believed medicine was more advanced and therefore more effective.

But what I saw in hospitals kept bringing me back to her quiet, steady wisdom.