Jenny B. Smith
Psychotherapist and Author
Drawing upon her compelling personal trauma and 25 years of professional experience as a mental health professional, Jenny Bilskie-Smith helps countless people heal and transform.
About the Author Jenny B. Smith
Jenny B. Smith is an accomplished psychotherapist and operates a busy private practice in Peoria, Arizona called Wise Body Therapy, where she specializes in trauma, anxiety, and eating disorders. What makes Jenny’s practice so successful is that she not only has lived through the experience of trauma, but also has specialized academic knowledge on the impact of trauma on the nervous system and how to heal it.
Jenny also has a way with words and has great insight and perspective. Body image and self-confidence were a huge struggle for me my entire life. With Jenny’s help, I can now look in the mirror, like what I see, and appreciate who I am.
– Current Client
While her work-in-progress, I’m Not a Bad Person, is about her lived experience, what makes this work unique is the fact that her specialized knowledge informed the writing. Jenny’s writing has particular appeal to mental health professionals who grapple with how to best care for those struggling with generational trauma, addiction, and eating disorders, three of the themes in I’m Not a Bad Person. Stories of personal narratives help professionals cultivate a deeper sense of empathy for the clients they serve.
Jenny’s writing represents something rarely seen in the industry; first-hand knowledge of addiction and recovery, through the lens of 25 years in the mental health field.
As a dedicated mental health professional for over 25 years, Jenny understands firsthand how mental health professionals can suffer from addiction, depression, anxiety, and mental health conditions. Often feeling pressure to “have it all together,” Jenny knows how hard they try to hide their own suffering at all costs. She observed and experienced the impact of the trauma of the profession as well as the shame that can destroy those who do their best to help.
Jenny led me to some insight and shared other points of view that I could consider. She was just plain amazing and helped me through a difficult time.
– DCS Employee
To help, Jenny created a statewide peer support program for the Arizona Department of Child Safety, which gained the attention of legislators, other states’ child welfare systems, and the media. Featured prominently in the media, that program is still in use even now, years after Jenny’s departure from the agency. Jenny’s personal story will help mental health professionals soften toward and tend to their well-being, ultimately making their work more fulfilling, sustainable, and successful.
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About the Book
I’m Not a Bad Person: A Therapist’s Memoir of Transforming Trauma
I’m Not a Bad Person: A Therapist’s Memoir of Transforming Trauma follows Jenny from an alcoholic to a healed and successful therapist. The book explores Jenny’s relationship with emotional abuse, paralleled by the psychological abuse of the system of patriarchy. While Jenny thought her sensitive nature was a curse that made her more vulnerable to abuse, ultimately, she discovers that with refinement, her empathy is her greatest strength.
Jenny asks the right questions and creates the safest, most affirming environment for maximum growth and healing. I’ve had lots of therapists, coaches, and counselors over the years, and I know I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating that you have such a gift.
The book is delivered with a punchy irony that gives levity to the dark subjects. I’m Not a Bad Person will have book groups everywhere asking: Are our thoughts our own, or the programming of a person or system of power? And how do we find our way back to our intuitive wisdom?
Media and Guest Appearances by Jenny B. Smith
Jenny has been interviewed in the media and on a number of podcasts for her expertise on healing one’s relationship with food and their body. She uses a unique healing approach that employs an unusual social justice and trauma-informed lens.
Love Your Food, Love Yourself, Love Your Life Podcast
Body & Food Shaming Can Be Traumatic, Embody Healing with Jenny B. Smith
Host Tammy Lantz interviews Jenny to uncover various forms of trauma, which include food and body shame. They dig further into what exactly trauma is, the impact of trauma on our nervous system, and three super tangible tips for regulating our nervous system.
Level Up Tribes Podcast
Find Food Freedom & Body Peace with Intuitive Eating Coach Jenny B. Smith
Host Agnes Goodwine interviews Jenny about a book she is writing that explores the relationship between disordered eating, addiction, and generational trauma. Curious about how to heal your relationship with food and your body?
Feature in AZ Central
Peer-support program works to keep DCS workers from burning out.
Jenny discusses the program she created for a statewide peer support program for the Arizona Department of Child Safety, which gained the attention of legislators, other states’ child welfare systems, and the media. Years after Jenny’s departure from the agency, the program remains.
Publications
- 2021: Awarded The Most Insightful Stories About Binge Eating by Medium for the essay, “Intuitive Eating: What Your Body is Trying to Tell You.”
- 2021: Quoted in Fitbit Blog called, “There’s No One-Size-Fits-All Definition of Healthy”
- 2021: “I’m The Tomato, And the Tomato Plant” was featured in the 2021 Roots, Shoots, and Blooms anthology published by Phoenix Oasis Press.
- 2022: “Thomas Grant Bilskie,” a memoir essay about the healing power of a cat, was published in an award-winning anthology Beyond Boundaries: Tales of Transcendence.
- 2024: Feedspot Top 30 Arizona Mental Health Blogs
Who Would Benefit From
I’m Not a Bad Person
I’m Not a Bad Person is multifaceted and covers a variety of themes, allowing for appeal to a broad range of readers. Those most likely to gravitate toward this story include:
People who struggle or have struggled with addiction
The honest and raw storytelling helps readers pierce through layers of shame, helping them reconnect with their inherent goodness. From that place, the reader finds hope that healing is available to them too. In all, it is a solid reminder that for those struggling with addiction, you are never alone in your pain.
People who struggle or have struggled with an eating disorder
This memoir helps readers make the crucial connection that eating disorders are a symptom of trauma. The book explains how an eating disorder is something a person uses to cope with trauma, particularly when that person did not have the resources to deal with that trauma at the time it occurred.
Psychotherapists, psychologists, and other mental health professionals
With over 25 years of social work experience, Jenny has forged connections with a vast network of mental health professionals. Jenny’s stories of personal narratives help professionals cultivate a deeper sense of empathy for the clients they serve. Mental health professionals can suffer from addiction, depression, anxiety, and other mental conditions. Their job is extremely stressful but they often feel pressured to “have it all together,” so they hide their own suffering. This story will help mental health professionals soften toward and tend to their well-being, ultimately making their work more successful, fulfilling, and sustainable.
Social justice advocates
I’m Not a Bad Person offers a unique examination of the system of patriarchy. It recognizes that we may adopt harmful narratives and internalize them to feel safe and seen by our tribe. This book invites the reader to deconstruct the origin of these narratives and determine if the stories serve the person’s best interest.
Anyone interested in personal growth and healing
This memoir highlights how unresolved trauma gets stuck in the mind and body and can wreak havoc on a person’s well-being. Trauma is not necessarily just one terrible event. It can be the culmination of many small, more subtle events. If left unresolved, this suffering is passed down from one generation to the next.
Anyone who has been or is being controlled by a toxic person or system of power
Emotional abuse can be hidden in subtle implications of guilt and manipulation. The crippling impact of emotional abuse lies in its deconstruction of a person’s humanity so that they no longer see themselves clearly. This book helps readers transform the self-defeating beliefs they may have adopted about themselves into life-affirming truths.
People interested in meditation, mindfulness, and yoga
This book demonstrates the power of meditation and yoga to reduce feelings of anxiety and strengthen the part of the nervous system that sends messages of peace and calm. With consistency, the nervous system can be rewired so that the person sees their world more and more through the lens of joy and tranquility.
Those interested in intuition
I’m Not a Bad Person shows how the body communicates boundary violations and how cultural narratives often train people to override those intuitive cues.
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