About Joy

I began my career in Korea in 2003 as a musculoskeletal physical therapist. My early years in clinical practice led me to pursue a master’s degree and PhD in physical therapy, where I developed a deeper appreciation for research and the questions that arise when clinical experience and scientific evidence do not always fit neatly together.

A defining moment came in 2015 at the World Physical Therapy Congress in Singapore, where I attended a session on sexual health in physical therapy. It opened my eyes to how profoundly pelvic and sexual health can influence movement, relationships, confidence, and quality of life—and how often these concerns remain unseen or unspoken. That experience changed the direction of my professional journey.

I later moved to Galveston, Texas, for postdoctoral training in women’s health at the University of Texas Medical Branch. Alongside research, I served as a teaching assistant in anatomy with cadaver dissection, an experience that deepened my understanding of the human body beyond textbooks and strengthened the anatomical foundation of my clinical reasoning. It also reinforced something that has stayed with me throughout my career: research and clinical practice should not exist in separate worlds. Each should continually inform the other.

My clinical journey then took me from Texas to New York, Pennsylvania, Korea, and back to New York. Each place taught me something different. Working in Korea, within a relatively culturally homogeneous population, and later caring for people in New York from widely different cultural backgrounds, lifestyles, beliefs, occupations, and life experiences expanded the way I understood health and rehabilitation. The same symptom—or even the same diagnosis—does not necessarily mean the same thing in two different lives. Effective rehabilitation requires understanding not only the body, but also the context in which that body moves and lives.

Along the way, I have worked as a clinician, researcher, and educator. Moving between these roles has made me increasingly interested in building bridges: between research and everyday clinical decisions, anatomy and movement, pelvic and sexual health and musculoskeletal rehabilitation, and scientific knowledge and the realities of a person’s life.

JoyPL grew from these experiences. It is my way of bringing those worlds together—not to treat a diagnosis in isolation, but to help people understand their bodies, restore meaningful function, and build the confidence and capacity to return to the lives they want to live.