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Most people know Healey for her longboarding style that merges a confident fierceness with dancers-esque grace. She’s a fixture at Steamer Lane and refuses to let any negative comments slide from others in the water who question whether she’s “good enough to be surfing without a leash”. Watch her catch one wave and that’ll tell any passersby that she doesn’t just belong in those lineups, she owns them.

But what many people don’t readily know about this wunderkind queen is that as a young child growing up on the westside of Santa Cruz, Healey hated the ocean. That’s right – couldn’t stand it.

“The waves scared me, I hated boogie boarding, I hated all things water,” she said with an easy laugh.

She joined junior guards when she was 7 and slowly the water started to spur more curiosity than fear. The encouragement of the instructors aided her in that journey, as well as being surrounded by friends who spent most of their summer days at the beach.

Healey tried surfing once when she was younger but had such a frightful experience it nearly scarred her for life. She was 9 and caught a wave at Cowells when she did a nose dive, leading to water shooting up her nose. As she was trying to get up the stairs, the tide was surging and she struggled to make it out of the surf.

“That was my first memory of a wave and it traumatized me,” she said. But as much as she feared it, she also couldn’t stay away from it.

It was in middle school that Healey took her first steps towards becoming a surfer, at the beckoning of her best friend.

“I had gotten close with a lot of girls who said they wanted to go surfing at Cowells and so I went along with my friends,” she said. “But I still didn’t really like being on a board in the water, and was more into cross country at the time.”

Not yet convinced, Healey continued tagging along with friends to the beach and occasionally joined them in the surf on a foam top – but her heart wasn’t in it.

Then the pandemic had hit and there wasn’t much else to do. Her best friend, leaning into the ample time to surf, kept inviting Healey to Cowells everyday during the early days of Covid. Slowly, surfing and Healey fell in love.

Now, that’s all 17-year-old Healey can think about – truly living the mantra of “all I do is dream of surf” – and she tries to go surfing everyday. Longboarding has become her obsession and she is a regular fixture at competitions across the California coast, as well as one international contest: the coveted Mexi Log Fest.

“It's such a big thing in my life now. If I were to wake up one day and not surf, someone would ask me what's wrong, that’s how serious I am about it,” Healey said. “I think the only reason I would stop pursuing it is if I died.”

She launched herself onto the competition circuit in numerous ways: middle school surf team, the National Scholastic Surfing Association and the Santa Cruz Longboard Union.

She competes in one of the toughest age divisions, 16-19, and has steadily won many of them. One of her favorite competition memories was an event hosted by Malibu Surf Association last year, when she rode one of the best waves she’s ever caught in a heat.

It was a huge confidence boost for her, especially since she was coming off of a tough competition season.

“I had a really bad season in comps, last year and my sophomore year prior to that, and I wasn't doing well or consistent,” Healey said. “I was not very happy about it so when I showed up in Malibu I was very nervous.”

She needn’t be – she caught an overhead wave, hung five and got barreled. She advanced to the finals where she placed fourth and that weekend propelled her to new heights competitively.

“It is a wave I will remember for the rest of my life,” she said. “It was a restarting point for me.”

Healey has matured through surfing, which she said has been an anchor in preserving her mental health as she navigates young adulthood.

It’s helped her become more independent, self-assured and humble, and it’s given her something to look forward to each day.

“It made me stay out of trouble because it’s something I could do instead of going out and partying with other people from school or staying at home scrolling on my phone,” she said. “Drugs were a big thing my freshman year of high school and my parents were really nervous about that scene, but surfing was my outlet and it’s given me such a strong connection to community.”

Community is one of the core reasons Healey loves surfing in Santa Cruz. After she joined the longboard union, she said she was immediately welcomed into a legendary group of surfers she had only ever heard stories about. She felt like they were an extension of her family and were going to look out for her, in-and-out of the water.

Now her goal is to give back to younger surf girls and be a mentor to them – something she wishes she could’ve had as a surfer.

“I wish I would’ve had a girl surfer guide who was older and already starting to compete to show me how it’s done,” Healey said. “But now I can be that guide for other young girls.”

One of the highlights of competing is helping groms before their heats – she said they always come up to her and ask for advice, which brings a lot of gratitude and joy to Healey.

“It makes me so happy that they ask me questions about something I love, like which wave should I go for and what to know before a heat,” Healey said. “That they trust me with my answers is something I am grateful for.”

That’s why she loves Women on Waves so much, because it’s so focused on girls and women who love surfing just like she does. Healey also dominates in competitions, and won her division last year at WOW.

“I meet a lot of girls there who I didn't realize loved surfing and I relate so much because that was me when I was younger, unsure of surfing, and I see so many versions of myself at WOW,” Healey said. “When I am competing I like to set that example to others of ‘you got this’ and ‘you’ll be okay’, to remind the younger girls that surf comps don't define who you are.”

Surfing is more than a hobby for Healey, it’s given her ways to cope with the stress of life, connect deeper to her family in Hawaii who she visits during summers to surf together, and has taught her to be present in every moment. She’s found independence through packing up her car and going out to local lineups alone. She’s found strength in her voice in talking to new people in the water. And so, so much more.

“It’s my whole life – it’s taught me patience because you have to be patient in the water, it’s also taught me to be a good person,” Healey said. “When you're surfing, you’re never going to surf the same waves, or the same body of water. You’ll never see the same sunset or same morning again, so you have to live in the moment. I would be a very different person if I didn't have surfing in my life.”