From Florist to Therapist: La Salle’s Donna Tonrey Finds her Life’s Work

As the daughter of a rosarian, or expert in rose cultivation, Donna Tonrey was always surrounded by flowers as a child.  Her father often brought his work home with him, filling their house with beautiful flowers and plants. Growing up in this environment, it is no wonder that as a young adult Tonrey decided to open her own flower shop.

Tonrey owned and ran a successful flower shop in Montgomeryville, Pa. for 26 years. As a business owner, she learned a wide variety of skills—creativity, marketing, and profit building. It was in the florist business where she also honed her people skills. “I dealt with people during the most joyous times of their lives such as weddings and births, but I also met with customers in their most difficult times, like funerals” said Tonrey.

Although she was very good at her job and built a successful business with 10 employees, Tonrey felt something was missing from her life. Although she enjoyed her work as a florist, she realized that she wanted her life to have more meaning.

With the marketing skills she learned in the flower business, Tonrey often volunteered for a training institute for marriage and family therapists. It was at this institute that she was exposed to the training required to become a marriage and family therapist.  Tonrey realized that becoming a therapist would provide her with the meaning she was looking for in her life.

Being a business owner, Tonrey was able to adjust her work hours to pursue her master’s degree in psychology with a concentration in marriage and family therapy at La Salle University. In 1993, she earned her master’s degree and established a marriage and family therapy practice, and in 2001, she sold her flower business.

Tonrey completed her doctoral degree in psychology in 2002, one of the first students to graduate from La Salle’s doctoral program. In addition to her private practice, Tonrey teaches at La Salle, and, in 2004, she was named the Director of the Clinical Counseling Psychology Program, at La Salle’s Montgomery County campus at Gwynedd-Mercy College.

Tonrey was recently elected to serve as treasurer of the Association of Marriage and Family Therapy Regulatory Boards (AMFTRB), which oversees all the licensing boards for marriage and family therapists in the United States.  The AMFTRB also oversees the national marriage and family licensing exam which states use as one of the major criteria for a marriage and family therapist to obtain licensing.

As for her career change, Tonrey does not look back. “My work as a florist and business owner felt like an occupation. My work as a marriage and family therapist, and as a psychologist, feels like a vocation,” said Tonrey. “I am now in a field that suits me as an individual, and brings meaning to my work, which provides me fulfillment.”