Born in New York, raised between the island rhythms of Puerto Rico and the energy of the city, I've been telling stories for as long as I can remember.

As a teenager I competed on stage as a storyteller — it was never a choice, just how I understood the world. I found my way to Columbia College in Chicago, the storied theater troupes of that city, the first staged production of Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street that earned rave reviews from the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune.

Chicago. New York. Los Angeles. The story kept evolving.

In Los Angeles I became part of the live storytelling community, writing and performing under the guidance of Paula Killen for the Write Club and with True Story at the Ensemble Studio Theatre.

On television and film I appear under my stage name, Rosemary Dominguez. Most recently I've been recurring on Taylor Sheridan's Landman on Paramount+, alongside Billy Bob Thornton, Paulina Chavez, and Jacob Lofland. Over the years I've appeared on Grey's Anatomy, Criminal Minds, Better Call Saul, Everybody Hates Chris, and in films including Instant Family and Papi Chulo. I was hired for my first television role by John Wells. That part of my life has been a gift.

But in June of 2022, things changed.

My husband, Eric Werner, died suddenly from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) — a rapid and brutal illness that took him before any of us could fully understand what was happening. I was left to find my way forward, raising our teenage daughter Sofie, rebuilding a life that looked nothing like the one I'd planned.

What came out of that time was not what I expected. I thought I might write essays. Instead, I wrote poetry. And kept writing until I had a book.

When I Press Stop: A Memoir of Loss will be published by Finishing Line Press in October 2026. The manuscript was named a semifinalist for the Donna Wolf Palacio First Book Poetry Prize. It is the most honest thing I have ever made.

I share all of it here. The grief, the reinvention, the humor, the healing. Because if my story helps even one person feel less alone in theirs, it was worth telling.

— Rosemary Vaswani