Hi, I’m Dr. Stella.

I grew up in Montreal, the first in my family to go to university.

After high school I went straight to work. By 22 I had been offered a management job in the public sector: permanent, secure, with a pension. It was a great offer, the kind many people would take without a second thought. But for some reason it didn’t feel quite right.

That same weekend I was in Boston. I wandered onto the grounds of Harvard with no real plan. Walking through that campus, watching students head to class, I knew. I wanted to be back in school. I wanted to study psychology. It was the scarier path, the less secure one. I had never been more sure of anything.

So I came home and turned down the management job. At 23, I registered in psychology at Concordia. I spent my days in the classroom and my evenings at work, supporting myself through school.

In my final year, I wrote my honours thesis on why some people are left with bitterness after a setback and others with regret. It came down to who we blame. When the university radio station asked me to come on air to explain it, it was absolutely terrifying. It was also absolutely exhilarating.

For the first time, my research became something anyone could carry home and use. That’s when I understood:

Knowing something is only half of it. The other half is giving it away.

Studying people’s experiences wasn’t enough. I wanted to help people through them. That took me to York’s Clinical Developmental Psychology program, where I completed my master’s and PhD.

I trained as a clinician-scientist. I’m curious about why things happen and what’s going on underneath. Then I carry that understanding through to the people it’s meant to help.

The last milestone on the way to “Dr.” was residency. It came with a new chapter: building a life with room for both work and family. I needed a place that fit my professional goals and still got me to daycare pickup by 5 p.m. I was fortunate to land a residency spot at The Hospital for Sick Children.

My first rotation had me everywhere: dialysis, burn recovery, inpatient units, families taking in a diagnosis that would change their lives.

Two questions stayed with me.

The first: why was I only discovering this area of psychology at the very end of my doctoral training?

The second came from watching how hospital care works. It’s time-limited by design. So where do kids and families go after discharge? Who in the community can hold that intersection of physical and mental health?

The second question became Whole Kids Health. The first is why I teach.

For seven years, most of my teaching was for other clinicians. Over time it widened to everyone around the child: educators, camp staff, parents and healthcare teams. These adults do some of the most meaningful work there is. It also takes a real toll. I know that from the inside. So I support them in the work itself and in sustaining themselves while they do it.