200 | Leadership and Advocacy in Neuropsychology – A Conversation With Dr. Antonio Puente

Ryan Van Patten (0:17)

Welcome, everyone, to Navigating Neuropsychology, a voyage into the depths of the brain and behavior. Brought to you by INS.

I'm Ryan Van Patten.

John Bellone (0:26)

And I'm John Boulogne, and we are board-certified neuropsychologists. Today, we talk about Leadership and Advocacy with Dr. Antonio Puente. Tony is a Professor of Psychology at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, and he has been a giant within psychology and neuropsychology throughout his career. We'll talk about some of his accomplishments during the conversation. So with that, we give you our discussion with Dr. Tony Puente.

All right. Well, Dr. Tony Puente is really nice to have you here with us in Navinero.

Antonio Puente (1:05)

Welcome. Glad to be with you.

John Bellone (1:08)

To start out, we'd love to hear your story if you're comfortable sharing it, what it was like growing up in the aftermath of the Cuban Revolution, then immigrating to the US and adjusting to the culture here, the language. How did your early life then shape your perspective as a neuropsychologist? Wherever you want to take this question.

Antonio Puente (1:28)

Sure. My son, who is also a neuropsychologist, which basically has someone's same name as myself, says, Papa, there's no such thing as research, it's me search. And in many ways, it's maybe my story that's got me to where I'm at. It's not like I searched neuropsychology, neuropsychology found me.

I come from a very privileged background in Cuba. My own nanny, my own chauffeur, people in positions of power were friends of the family and their children were people I interacted with. So imagine that lifestyle.

And then when you're eight and a half pushing nine, all of a sudden, you find yourself not having any of that. In fact, we ended up in a small one-bedroom apartment in Miami Beach with my aunt and uncle. They're four children, my mom and dad and my brother and I. And I remember telling my brother, because we sleep in the kitchen floor, a tiny little space. I said, man, we're so lucky. We're the only ones that have a private room. So he's got looked at me like what is wrong with you? And this is where the sort of the story of psychology came. I think if I had discontinued living in Cuba, I probably would have gotten into some kind of politics or something of that nature.

Maybe some family business, which was associated with ROM among other things. And I just never would have, I think, pursued psychology. And when I was placed in that situation, I never honestly felt much like a victim. I felt more like curiosity was really a big deal. For example, my dad just sort of stayed on the couch and wouldn't get up. And I didn't understand what was going on in school. They spoke a different language and they played football at recess. And they, quote, heard each other. They tackled each other. So it's like, what a bunch of heathens going on here. They speak a weird language and they heard each other for fun during recess. And there was not enough food. To this day, for example, we ate bologna and peanut butter that was given to us by the refugee center. And when I go by the grocery store in the bologna section, I fall to the ground and have a psychogenic seizure. It's like, oh no, no more bologna. Because I eat bologna for every meal after a while. I just kind of like don't want to eat it anymore. We had a really tough time in Miami, as I shared. So my father had gotten a job with International Harvester Tractor Company that was in Cuba. He had really worked for a while. And that's when we really hit rock bottom. That's when we became functionally homeless and foodless.

And people were very, very nice to us. Somebody gave us an attic. They gave us coats, food, and they gave us free tuition at a Catholic school. And that's when stability in some way started. Soon thereafter, unfortunately, my dad got super sick and ended up with tuberculosis and many other things along those lines. So lost him for a couple of years before he returned from all these interventions. And all that was in my head through that time was basically what's going on, what's happening.

For example, in Texas, we discovered that there were white people, and then there were black people, and there were brown people. And it's like, why is that? Why is there what today we call discrimination?

Again, never feeling like I was in trouble or victimized. I think my mom and dad felt terrible, but not so much for me. Because it just opened up a venue of thoughts and questions and answers. And I don't know, you know. It wasn't until really late in high school that my father started making money, and we had a regular stream of income and food and security. And that's when I started reading things that seemed related to psychology. I did not have money to go to college or didn't have resources or direction. My high school counselor suggested I should go into the physical labor workforce. I'm glad to report that he ended up in jail. So for other reasons besides bad counseling.