Lori Bell was conceived when her father got drunk at a traveling circus, wrestled an anteater, got fired, and was dropped off in the next city — Kansas City, where he wandered into the unemployment office where her mother worked.
Her dad was a third-generation Italian Vietnam veteran with PTSD and an eighth-grade education, and her mother was a Midwest farm girl with abandonment issues. Lori grew up in the chaos that followed — kicked-in walls, constant fighting, and a father who eventually disappeared back to California and landed in Folsom Prison.
Her mother worked two jobs. Lori essentially raised herself. By high school she was already on the path her father had walked, getting expelled for keeping orange juice and whiskey in her locker. She joined Civil Air Patrol, then enlisted in the Air Force at seventeen to escape her mother. Stationed in Guam, she did airfield management — including running wild boars off the runway so planes could land — and started getting blackout drunk. She had her son at nineteen and came back to Kansas City to raise him alone.
She poured herself into work: twenty years in banking and four degrees, capped by an MBA in finance and a master's in social work. Her second marriage, fourteen years to a police officer, ended when she realized he had been masking the entire time they dated and was actually autistic.
What pulled her out wasn't a treatment program. It was her father dying of COPD — and the hospice nurse who told her to start planning the funeral while he was still sitting up talking. He was gone within days. Lori spent the next year and a half just sitting, pulling apart every thought as it came: was that her mother, her father, her ex, or her? So she went back to school again.
Today she runs Renaissance Mental Health, her private practice in Houston, where she works with adolescents and adults healing from childhood trauma, abuse, addiction, and the kind of relational damage you don't notice until you're forty and exhausted. She'll tell you she's not in recovery from substances — she's in recovery from relationships.
LORI BELL is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Certified Clinical Trauma Professional, and Certified Addiction-Informed Mental Health Professional with an MBA in finance and a twenty-year career in banking before she became a therapist. She founded Renaissance Mental Health in Houston, where she works with adolescents and adults healing from trauma, abuse, addiction, grief, and relational damage — including survivors of abusive relationships, veterans, and first responders.
She uses an eclectic, evidence-based approach including EMDR, the Flash Technique, CBT, DBT, mindfulness, and parts and memory work, and serves clients in Texas and Kansas.
Learn more about Renaissance Mental Health
Connect with Lori on LinkedIn
Matt Handy is the founder of Harmony Grove Behavioral Health in Houston, Texas, where their mission is to provide compassionate, evidence-based care for anyone facing addiction, mental health challenges, and co-occurring disorders.
My Last Relapse explores what everyone is thinking but no one is saying about addiction and recovery through conversations with those whose lives have changed.
For anyone disillusioned with traditional recovery and feeling left out, misunderstood, or weighed down by unrealistic expectations, this podcast looks ahead—rejecting the lies and dogma that keep people from imagining life without using.
Got a question for us? Leave us a message or voicemail at mylastrelapse.com
Follow Matt on Instagram @matthew.handy.17
About Harmony Grove Behavioral Health
Harmony Grove delivers outpatient addiction and mental health treatment focused on wellness, creativity, and authentic human connection—providing a supportive space for healing that extends beyond traditional clinical care. Find out more at http://harmonygrovebh.com/
Harmony Grove's IOP in Houston, Texas, is more than a program; it's a lifeline for those ready to take the next step in their recovery. We are ready to meet you where you are and find your unique path to change.
If you're feeling overwhelmed or struggling, you don't have to face it alone. Reaching out for support is a sign of strength, and help is always available. If you or anyone you know needs help, give us a call 24 hours a day at 844-430-3060.
Host: Matthew Handy
Producer: Eva Sheie
Assistant Producers: Mary Ellen Clarkson
Engineering: Chris Mann
Theme music: Survive The Tide, Machina Aeon
Cover Art: DMARK
