Olivia grew up in the Chicago metropolitan area, where her interest in the human condition first took root. Guided by a simple belief — treat people with compassion no matter their life circumstances — she helps others navigate hard times and find some peace in the present. These values sit at the heart of her practice. She listens to her clients not just as a doctor, but as someone who knows adversity is part of life.

Olivia hit the grind early. She’s put in time in retail, management, healthcare, and education. She started her own tutoring business at age fourteen, spending her time after class helping kids younger than her through their math and science homework. At age fifteen, she started working for cash mixing olive oil and balsamic vinegars in the basement of her neighborhood spice shop. Some of her other early employment includes vendor positions at Home Depot, unloading truck deliveries, retail as a cashier, and traveling throughout the Chicago suburbs to teach afterschool classes for elementary kids.

Having graduated high school early, she opted to spend the majority of what would have been senior year working and attending community college. She then moved to Central Illinois and knocked out her bachelor’s degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in three years. While in college, she worked weekend night shifts at nursing homes, acting as a housekeeper and caregiver. During the week, she taught chemistry and cadaver dissection labs. She later took on a regional supervisor role for a Walmart greenhouse vendor before heading to Iowa for medical school.

At twenty-one, she enrolled in graduate school at Des Moines University (DMU), where she simultaneously earned both her Master of Healthcare Administration and Doctorate of Osteopathic Medicine, becoming the only physician in her family. While attending DMU, she led medical outreach in underserved areas of the country, mentored local youth, and continued her private tutoring business for supplemental income.

Upon medical school graduation, Olivia moved to Detroit to study adult psychiatry with clinical interests in substance use, trauma, and psychosis. In residency, her colleagues quickly identified her as a natural leader; Olivia was nominated as class representative for two consecutive years, followed by associate chief resident of the psychiatry department. Olivia was invited by community partners to attend Incompass Michigan’s Re:Con, an annual event focused on removing barriers, restarting lives, and restoring community. Her post-doctoral studies were accompanied by continued undergraduate mentorship through the University of Illinois MCB Career Mentorship Program and as an editorial review group chair, where she coordinated the publication of expert reviews in psychiatry, therapy, and public health. To this day, she continues to work closely with undergraduate and graduate students seeking guidance on navigating the intricacies of higher education.

Early in her career, one of her young patients told her that to be a good doctor, she has to “always keep it one-hundred.” She took that advice to heart, and it’s probably why she’s known for her down-to-earth, no-bullshit practice style. Exhausted by the red tape in big hospital systems, the politics in medical associations, and the pretentious side of academia, she built her own clinic to offer something more genuine. The “Dr. Colombo” clients meet in her office is synonymous with who Olivia is in her everyday life. She carries a cohort of pro-bono clients to fulfill her own sense of compassionate responsibility to her community.

Olivia sees treatment as a partnership and rejects paternalistic approaches that reduce healthcare to prescribing medications. She believes the individual knows their own life best, and her job is to help turn that understanding into meaningful change. She finds immense satisfaction in helping her clients thrive in the community. Olivia’s professional network that spans southeast Michigan, including connections with a range of therapy practices, group homes, and substance use resources to facilitate clients’ recovery. She often quips that her primary goals are to 1) help people function at their best and 2) keep them safely free from psychiatric hospitals and correctional facilities. Her commitment to helping people live a free and fulfilling life is deeply personal. She recognizes that mental illness does not discriminate. Like many, she has people in her personal life who have faced challenges like suicide attempts, panic attacks, legal issues, psychosis, trauma, and substance use. She is also transparent about her own journey with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Olivia’s practice is built on the belief that those seeking help deserve a human-to-human connection with a knowledgeable professional. Inspired by a mentor from Chicago, she has heartfelt conversations with every person she has the privilege of working with. Her most rewarding moments come from supporting others through life’s most challenging times, and watching them (as the great Frank Sinatra once said) pick themselves up and get back in the race. That’s Life.