Adar’s experience in public health 

Adar is a cancer survivor who has lived & worked in the Four Corners area on and off since 2012. She now lives in Mancos with her Belgian Shepherd Kaya who is a certified therapy dog with the American Kennel Club, and she is passionate about addressing rural health disparities, chronic illness, disability, mental health through creative approaches and community-based projects. Adar completed a Master’s in Public Health at New Mexico State University with an emphasis in Health Behavior & Health Promotion. During her M.P.H. program Adar had the opportunity to participate in a two-week intensive focused on racial disparities in cancer outcomes, and has since taught classes in Social Determinants of Health and Health Communications at Fort Lewis College. She is also a trained yoga instructor with years of experience designing therapeutic yoga classes targeted to address specialized needs like accessible yoga for people with disabilities, trauma-sensitive yoga, and yoga for people in recovery.

A little bit more about Adar: befriending grief 

Adar is working towards a license as a mental health counselor, and her personal experience with cancer and chronic illness has led her to focus her training on coping with grief, loss, disability, chronic pain. Rather than treating grief and pain as problems to fix or eliminate, Adar embraces approaches that support individuals and groups to be with suffering and find meaning and purpose through grief.