(Professional) Letters, Receipts, & Bio
What qualifies me to do this work on a personal level:
I’m qualified to do this work because I live the things I teach.
I love and embody who I am and who I’m becoming. Not who I should be according to my oppressors (colonialism, patriarchy, capitalism, and white supremacy).
I reclaim the beauty of my soul within systems that seek to erase me.
Rooted in my humanity and dignity, I practice liberation daily to shed labels from the gender binary, my immigration status, race, and class…
With each movement, divination, and meditation practice, I come back home to all that’s sacred: my body and my lineage.
In the light of my own truth, I honor my audacity to struggle, dream, and hope to re-imagine family building to be deeply decolonized and intentionally intergenerational.
It’s not oppression that qualifies me to do liberation work.
Rather, it’s my vow, as a Bodhisattva, to see the divinity in you, to see beauty in wounds, and to see wholeness in what’s fractured.
It’s also because I’m human, a work-in-progress, a side-eye afficionado, a Mortal Kombat pro, and a serenader of plants and animals.
I wish I could end the page here. But I know I have to play the capitalism game of “proving my worth” and listing all of my training and accomplishments. So here we go:
What qualifies me to do this work on a professional level:
I’m a dot connector, norm agitator, and practitioner of liberation who supports parents and caregivers in their efforts to make parenting political in practical ways while promoting their children’s development at the same time. I do so through the Come Back to Care Podcast and Raising Change Agents book.
Born in Bangkok and based in Chicago, I work as a nationally award-winning decolonized therapist, a keynote speaker, and a community organizer. I founded Come Back to Care for anyone who cares for children and raises them to be free.
Rooted in Healing, Transformative, and Disability Justice lineages, I weave play, embodiment, political education, and spiritual storytelling into experiential teach-ins for families, activists, and care providers raising and loving young children.
I believe 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.
Come Back to Care’s decolonized pediatric, family, and community mental health approach received a Congressional Commendation read into the Congressional Record by Rep. Delia Ramirez, was featured in Chicago’s WGN9, and was awarded the Zero to Three Award for Emerging Leadership.
My 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.
I’m a graduate of the Erikson Institute’s Social Work Program. I also hold another master’s degree in Infancy & Early Childhood Special Education from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
Outside of my clinical and psychoeducation work at Come Back to Care, I provide political education and healing support to QTBIPOC youth organizers around the stolen land of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations (Chicago). To embody joy in radical art making, I have performed and headlined premier burlesque shows across the USA and in New Zealand, Australia, Switzerland, Sweden, Germany, and Canada.
Regardless of the letters following my name, working with parents, caregivers, and young children is my highest honor.
My education, training, and professional qualifications are listed below:
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