Kristal Castillo serves as the Peer Specialist Lead at Austin MHC, where she integrates lived experience, professional expertise, and visionary leadership to strengthen peer services and advance systems change. Kristal identifies as a person in long-term recovery and as someone with lived experience navigating mental health challenges and justice involvement. Her journey through recovery and system contact informs her unwavering belief that healing is possible and that systems must evolve to truly support it.
As a Certified Peer Support Supervisor (PSS), Recovery Support Peer Specialist (RSPS), and Certified Family Partner (CFP), Kristal is committed to elevating lived experience as a critical form of expertise. Her leadership centers recovery, mental health wellness, and self-determination, with a focus on dismantling stigma and addressing the structural barriers that disproportionately impact justice-involved and marginalized communities.
Kristal approaches her work through a systems transformation lens — intentionally creating environments and organizational cultures that foster hope, inclusion, accountability, and empowerment. She believes that peer services are not simply supportive roles within existing structures, but powerful drivers of cultural change. Through mentorship, workforce development, and values-based leadership, she works to ensure that peer professionals are equipped, supported, and positioned as essential partners in behavioral health.
An experienced training facilitator, Kristal designs and leads learning spaces that promote awareness, challenge bias, and encourage reflective growth. She is passionate about building cultures where people feel seen, heard, and capable of defining their own recovery pathways.
Outside of her professional role, Kristal is a proud mother to five incredible human beings. She finds restoration in nature — hiking, camping, and exploring bodies of water — and is a lifelong learner who enjoys researching healing practices, engaging in creative expression through art, and spending time with animals.
