Meet Nat Nadha Vikitsreth, LCSW (she/her)
I wholeheartedly invite you to come home to who you truly are, come back to your body, come back to your lineages, your communities, the land, and to Come Back to Care.
Nat Nadha Vikitsreth, LCSW (she/her)
…is a dot connector, norm agitator, and lover of liberation who supports social justice curious families in their efforts to practice social justice in their parenting while re-parenting their inner child. Nat works as a nationally award-winning decolonized therapist and facilitator, a trans rights activist, and a host of the Come Back to Care Podcast. She founded Come Back to Care for anyone who loves and raises children to heal as we get free.
Because knowing about oppression doesn’t automatically birth a revolution, Come Back to Care serves as a radical healing and (un)learning space. A space that nurtures experimentation which puts social justice awareness into action. A space that aligns social justice actions with clinical practices. A space that invites you to reclaim your whole self and bring it to our liberatory work.
Rooted in Healing, Transformative, and Disability Justice lineages, Come Back to Care weaves play, embodiment, political education, and spiritual storytelling into experiential teach-ins for families, activists, and IECMH providers raising and loving young children.
Nat believes that when parents and providers alike heal our inner child and internalized oppression wounds in a community, we put fragmented pieces of ourselves together to show up to both parenting and community organizing with our whole selves. Then, we can dismantle systemic oppression and rebuild a culture that's rooted in liberation for our future generations.
Her decolonized pediatric and family mental health approach received a Congressional Commendation read into the Congressional Record by Congresswoman Delia Ramirez, was featured in Chicago’s WGN9, and was awarded the Zero to Three Award for Emerging Leadership and the 2024-2026 Zero to Three Fellowship. Her most recent publications include an academic article in the June 2022 Zero to Three Journal and an op-ed piece in Condé Nast’s Them.
Nat is a graduate of the Erikson Institute’s Social Work Program. She also holds another master’s degree in Infancy & Early Childhood Special Education from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
Outside of her clinical and psychoeducation work at Come Back to Care, Nat provides political education and healing support to youth organizers around the stolen land of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations (Chicago). To embody joy in radical art making, Nat has performed and headlined premier burlesque shows across the USA and in New Zealand, Australia, Switzerland, Sweden, Germany, and Canada.
HONORS & AWARDS
2024 A Congressional Commendation read into the Congressional Record by Rep. Delia Ramirez
2024-2026 The Zero to Three Fellowship Program
2023 The Equity Champion Award from the National Training & Technical Assistance Center for Child, Youth, & Family Mental Health
2022 The Together We Heal Creative Place Program (CCP) Grant by the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE), in partnership with the Chicago Therapy Collective
2021 Zero to Three’s Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH) Emerging Leadership Award (Category: Practice)
2020 The Office of Special Education (OSEP) Grant
EDUCATION
Somatic Abolitionism Level II, Education For Racial Equity
Postgraduate Certificate in Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Level 1, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute
Postgraduate Certificate in Dynamic Attachment Re-patterning experience (DARe), Trauma Solutions
M.S.W. in Social Work, Erikson Institute
Mentorship Completion in Sensory Processing Disorders, STAR Institute for Sensory Processing Disorder
Postgraduate Certificate in Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders, Postpartum Support International
Postgraduate Certificate in Infant-Parent Mental Health, University of Massachusetts Boston
Ed.M. in Infancy and Early Childhood Special Education, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
B.A. in Business Administration- Marketing, Thammasat University
PROFESSIONAL QUALIFICATIONS
Licensed Clinical Social Worker, the Illinois Department of Human Services
Facilitating Attuned Interactions (FAN) Training Level II Certified Home Visitor, Fussy Baby Network, Erikson Institute
Developmental Therapist, the Illinois Department of Human Services
DIR/Floortime Advanced Provider, the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disorder
Certified NCAST Feeding Scale Examiner, University of Washington, School of Nursing
Certified Newborn Behavioral Observations Provider, the Brazelton Institute, Harvard Medical School
Certified Infant Massage Instructor, the International Association of Infant Massage
Registered Circle of Security Parenting Educator
Registered Gottman Bringing Baby Home Educator
NOTABLE SPEAKING EXPERIENCES
Politicizing Care: Using Power Analysis to Deepen Attunement. Keynote presentation delivered in-person at the 2025 Bank Street’s Infancy Institute Conference.
Politicizing Care: Using Power Analysis to Deepen Attunement. Keynote presentation delivered in-person at the 2025 Infant, Child & Youth Conference, University of Alaska Anchorage.
Applying Adult Attachment to Our Partnerships with Families. Keynote presentation delivered in-person & virtually at the 2024 Oregon State University’s Oregon Parenting Educators Conference.
Power Play: A Play-Based Approach to Equity, Belonging and Leadership. A Pre-Conference Forum Full-Day Facilitation at the 2024 Zero to Three LEARN Conference.
Walking Each Other Home: Holding Hope in the Here and Now, Developing Resilience through Challenging Times. Closing Plenary Facilitation delivered virtually at the 2024 IECMH Technical Assistance Center’s Annual Virtual Grantee Convening, Georgetown University.
The heart of Reflective Supervision: Attunement, Reflection, and Togetherness. A virtual featured workshop funded by the University of Texas Austin and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).
The (R)Evolution of Infant and Early Childhood. A panel discussion at the 2024 Professional Development Network (PDN) Meeting, Irving Harris Foundation.
Transformative Justice and Decolonized Somatic Practice. Keynote presentation delivered virtually at the 2021 Northwestern University Law’s Black Law Students’ Association.
Land & Lineage Acknowledgement
Because the work we’re about to embody together involves the past, present, and future, I would like to extend my wholehearted gratitude to the luminaries whose work I’m building upon and the beings who teach me to serve with unconditional love and courage.
I’m deeply grateful to be pouring my heart into Come Back to Care as a guest in the stolen land of the Objibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations (Chicago).
It’s both a blessing and a dream come true to infuse my ancestral & cultural knowledge with my Eurocentric & institutionalized training in order to inform my liberation practices.
This list is evolving as I’m a lifelong learner, mistake maker, and norm agitator.
My ancestral traditions:
Traditional Thai Medicine and bodywork in the lineage of Shivagakomarpaj and Wat Phra Chetuphon Wimon Mangkhalaram Rajwaramahawihan
Theravaya Buhddhist teaching, meditation, and animism
Daoist energy cultivation practice, such as Qigong
Classical Chinese Face Reading
Traditional Thai dancing and Muay Thai
My liberation practices…
…began with the transgender sex worker community in Thailand. These fierce and beautiful beings first taught me how to practice transformative justice and mutual aid before I even learned the formal definitions of the terms. They taught me to survive and thrive outside the dominant system without losing my integrity and with a lot of lip liner (remember those overdrawn lips days?). The more contemporary influences include the following:
Transformative and disability justice: Patty Berne, Mia Mingus, Mimi Kim, Mariame Kaba, Staci Haines, Stacy Milbern, and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha. Their work guides me to center the humanity of the families with infants and toddlers with special needs I work with.
Healing justice and harm reduction: Prentis Hemphill. adrienne maree brown, Cara Page, Erica Woodland, and Shira Hassan. Their work guides me to remember the importance of joy, pleasure, connection, and community.
Education: bell hooks, Paolo Freire, Leticia Nieto. Their work guides me to weave truth, courage, and equity in everything I do, most of the time.
Somatic Abolitionism: Resmaa Menakem and the Education for Racial Equity team. Their work guides me back to the liberation that’s been in my body, heart, soul, and spirit.
My Eurocentric & institutionalized training:
Interpersonal Neurobiology
Polyvagal Theory
The Neurosequential Model in Education
Circle of Security
Infant-parent psychodynamic psychotherapy
DIR/Floortime
Sensorimotor Psychotherapy
The Newborn Behavioral Observation
The Gottman Institute’s Bringing Baby Home