How Finding My Passion Helped Me Heal My Inner Child

At OCOA, we believe beauty starts within. That’s why this Mental Health Awareness Month, we’re holding space for the real stories behind our team—stories of growth, healing, and resilience. Because just like curls, no journey is the same… and everyone is worthy of love and care. 

Cory, our Co-founder and Hermana Mayor (Big sis), kicks us off sharing her healing hermana story:

Growing up, I was the shy girl who hid behind everyone. Literally.

I was so painfully shy, my parents worried. I couldn’t even introduce myself without shaking. Until one day, my mom saw a flyer: “Bring your daughter’s confidence back—enter her in a beauty pageant.”
We didn’t have the money… but my dad worked extra shifts, my family fundraised, and they made it happen.

And guess what? The shy girl with no experience… won “Miss Republica Dominicana Infantil 1998” (Little Miss Dominican Republic 1998)

That win changed everything. It opened doors to TV shows, commercials, and even led me to be part of a video with Juan Luis Guerra. (If you’re familiar with Merengue music he’s one of the most famous Merengue Artists from the Dominican Republic.)

But even then, I was the only girl with big curly hair. I still felt different. I still felt like I didn’t belong.

And then… life happened. My parents separated. My sister Nicol and I stayed behind (Our mom couldn’t bring us right away) in the Dominican Republic, bouncing from house to house, paying for our own school, taking care of ourselves. We brushed it off like it didn’t matter. We never talked about it. We just kept going.

When we finally moved to the U.S., I thought things would get easier. They didn’t. I didn’t speak the language. I was told to lower my standards. I stopped dreaming. I chose the “safe” path—accounting—because everyone told me it would guarantee a job.

But life had other plans.

Years later, now married and in my mid-twenties, after an emergency c-section that almost cost me and my son our lives, something inside me woke up. I realized… I couldn’t keep living for others. 

That’s when a conversation about curls with my sister sparked what would become OCOA. A brand I never imagined would be the very thing that healed the little girl inside me—the girl who just wanted to feel seen, heard, and enough.

What I’ve Learned About Mental Health Without Traditional Therapy

I want to be honest. I never went to therapy. I never sat with someone to unpack my childhood or the pain of moving to a new country.

But what I’ve learned is that healing can look different for everyone. For me, OCOA became my therapy. Creating something with purpose became the mirror that showed me I could bet on myself again. And in the quiet moments, I turned to self-help and personal development books—books like Break the Cycle by Mariel Buqué that helped me see the patterns, name them, and slowly break them.

But if you have the opportunity to seek therapy? Please take it. There’s no shame in getting professional support—it's something I wish I had access to earlier in my life.

3 Lessons I Wish Someone Told Me About Healing Your Inner Child (Without Therapy)

1. Find What Lights You Up (Even If It Starts as a Whisper)
   For me, it was a conversation about curls. For you, it might be art, writing, volunteering, creating. Healing doesn’t always look like sitting in a room, it can look like building something that means something to you.
2. Let the Hard Moments Fuel You, Not Define You
   My hardest moments, moving, struggling, feeling lost, became the soil that grew OCOA. What felt like endings were actually new beginnings.
3. Bet on Yourself, Even If You’re Scared
   Starting OCOA scared me. But betting on myself was the biggest form of self-love I could have given the little girl who stopped dreaming. Believing in your own voice might just be the healing your heart’s been waiting for.
   

Today, I get to run a brand with my sister that helps thousands of women and men embrace their curls and rewrite their stories. But more importantly…I’ve rewritten my own.

Because healing your inner child isn’t about staying stuck in the past. It’s about giving yourself permission to become the version of you that little girl or boy always dreamed of. I’m proof. And so are you.

Leave a comment or reply back to hola@ocoabeauty.com if my story resonated with you. I'd love to hear about your journey too. 

Con mucho amor,

Cory

Co-founder and la hermana mayor (Big sis)