About Doré Frances

Doré Frances is a retired educational consultant, mental health advocate, and founder of Mental and Health Awareness—a platform dedicated to empowering individuals and families with compassionate, accessible resources. With decades of experience supporting young adults, caregivers, and behavioral health programs, Doré now focuses on community engagement and promoting meaningful change through education, storytelling, and collaboration. Known for her direct yet deeply empathetic approach, Doré brings a lifetime of lived experience to her writing, blending professional insight with personal reflections on resilience, trauma recovery, and personal growth. She is especially passionate about youth advocacy, emotional wellness, and amplifying the voices of those often unheard. When she's not writing or connecting with like-minded advocates, you can find Doré exploring the beauty of Colorado with her service dog, Aspen. Let’s build a more understanding, mentally healthy world—one story at a time.

Beneath My Silence: A Poem About Missing Someone in Silence – Series

Missing someone you cannot speak of is its own kind of silence. Not because the feeling isn’t real ~ but because it isn’t something the world would understand. So you carry it inward, like something sacred. No messages. No reaching out. No words to give it form.

Only the quiet dialogue that never leaves your heart. They return in subtle ways—
in a passing breeze, in dreams that linger, in the stillness of moments no one else notices.

You don’t miss them out loud. You miss them in the spaces between ~ between what is spoken and what remains unspoken.

And somehow, it is in that silence that they continue to exist.

The Girl Left Behind – Childhood Trauma Survivor – Series

Picture a girl sitting alone on a rock in a campground, her face streaked with tears. She is fourteen, though her thin frame makes her look even younger.

She could be pretty—with her green eyes and long blonde hair—but her face is dirty, and there is a taste in her mouth she knows she will never forget.

She has been hurt before, but not like this. A breeze passes through the oaks above her, and the dandelions around her stir. She wipes her tears, trying to steady herself.

What would it feel like, she wonders, to matter?

Then she sees the truck. White, worn, moving slowly toward her. She recognizes the man behind the […]

The Girl Left Behind – One Day She Was There, the Next She Was Gone | Series

It’s hard to comprehend how one day life can feel completely ordinary, and the next, everything is shattered. The people and places we love can be taken in an instant, while the world continues as if nothing has changed—the sun still rising and setting, unchanged.

It feels deeply unfair, even cruel. As an adult, I understand this in a way I couldn’t before. But as a child living through it, nothing about that day felt normal. We likely ate lunch after my father left. It was early afternoon, and my grandfather and the pastor remained in the house. I remember sitting at Aunt Connie’s kitchen table while Uncle Chuck silently prepared something for us, moving through the […]

Finding Joy in Simple Things: A Mindful Path to Everyday Happiness

Let yourself be moved by the quiet beauty of ordinary moments. Notice the way light shimmers across water, the stirring voice of the wind, the warmth of a friend’s embrace, the gentle joy in your dog’s eyes. There is a deep, sustaining energy in what is simple and sincere. When you learn to recognize the luminous in everyday life, happiness begins to feel less distant, more available. I’ve found this to be true.

There is something quietly sacred in paying attention—an aesthetic and spiritual reward that asks very little, yet gives so much.

You don’t have to search far for beauty. It’s already here. However, too often, we rush past it, preoccupied with what’s next, trading […]

Beneath My Silence: A Poem About Quiet Growth, Healing, and Self-Worth – Series

You’re allowed to grow in ways others may not notice or fully understand.

Not all growth is visible or celebrated.

Sometimes it lives in quiet decisions, in the healing no one sees, in the gentle way you begin to speak to yourself. Maybe you’re learning to rest without guilt, to set boundaries without explaining, or to trust your worth without needing it reflected back to you.

That is growth ~

steady, real, and deeply meaningful.

You’re also allowed to grow in ways that feel true to you, not just what the world expects. Growth doesn’t always look like achievement or forward motion. Sometimes it looks like slowing down, softening, or returning to what […]

Whispers To The Soul – The Threshold of Becoming: Choosing to Live Fully as Yourself – Series

As with many souls, I find myself repeatedly called to stop shrinking and to stand openly in who I truly am.

Again and again, life places me in circumstances that require the fullness of my being. Whether I am untangling an imbalance with a close friend, admitting my impatience with a stranger, acknowledging envy of another writer, or quietly noticing the disregard of someone who allows their dog to roam freely in public, I am reminded that presence is required of me. Even when I say nothing, I must remain fully myself.

When I suppress my nature, something in me contracts. My life feels smaller, less alive. What once felt like personal integrity now feels like […]

Beneath My Silence – Love That Never Dims – Series

Our loved ones do not leave us in darkness. They return to the Light ~
and in doing so, leave a sacred glow within us.

Their presence becomes a quiet flame, lit by heaven, kept alive by love. It does not fade with time, for it is not bound by time. It lives in the space where memory meets spirit, where the soul remembers what the eyes can no longer see. In moments of sorrow, that light warms us from within ~
a gentle reminder that love does not end, it transforms.

No matter where your journey leads, their spirit walks beside you. And when the night feels heavy, close your eyes […]

The Story After the Feeling

Grace lives in the space between the feeling and the story.

There is an important distinction between feelings and emotions — though we often use the words interchangeably. We experience a wide range of feelings every day.

Research suggests the physiological surge of a feeling lasts roughly 45 to 90 seconds — unless we continue fueling it with our thoughts.

The initial wave is brief. What extends it is the story we attach to it. It is entirely natural to move from one internal state to another within minutes.

Rapid shifts in feelings are part of normal regulation — not evidence that something is wrong with us.

Imagine this. A colleague says something at work that stings […]

Go to Top