Alex is a psychotherapist turned banker and a North Carolina native who has lived in Wilmington for ten years. She is driven by her fierce desire to help make the world a better place in her personal and professional worlds. At Live Oak Bank, she works daily to help small business owners across the country achieve the American Dream. Before joining the bank in 2014, she was a practicing clinical social worker with a career that began in the public mental health field, led her to manage a therapeutic foster care program, and ended in private practice where she focused on treating eating disorders and trauma. Alex is trained in EMDR - a therapeutic technique specialized for trauma treatment - and provided individual and group therapy to female survivors of sexual abuse. Umstead-Wrenn spent time as a therapeutic foster parent and is a certified yoga teacher. She serves as a Board Member for A Safe Place, an organization focusing on prevention, advocacy, and restoration to assist victims of commercial sexual exploitation and domestic sex trafficking. She is a Guardian Ad Litem volunteer for the NC Court System. Alex graduated from Smith College with a BA in Biochemistry and a minor in Women’s Studies and obtained her MSW from the joint program between UNC Greensboro and NC A&T State University.