Priya Chandra, MSW, has been a licensed clinical social worker for the past two years but has worked in the field of crisis counseling for almost 12 years. Following the sexual assault of a friend, she began looking for volunteer opportunities as a sexual assault counselor and domestic violence survivor advocate in New York City hospitals. While her passion and work previously has been with survivors of trauma, Chandra currently sees patients of all backgrounds and ages, and her patients include those facing all types of mental health issues. Chandra works with the community health center at the Institute of Family Health. There, she focuses on integrative practice. “I have to say, that [New York] is a city I swore I would never live in,” Chandra says. “But it is now the city I have lived in the longest, and now it’s hard to see myself anywhere else. We went to Montreal for a weekend, and I was like, ‘This is beautiful, there is great food, but people stare at me.’ I want to be so abnormally normal in New York. Nobody stares at you because they are like, ‘What? You are like one of 10 million to stare at. You are nothing unusual.’ And that is nice. It is a city where I can be me. In Michigan, I felt like I had to be white, and I can’t be white. But New York is home for now.”
