Beyond Words Psychological Services

Webinar: Navigating First Family Connections in Adoption
2026-07-23 09:00 - 11:00 (America/Denver) | Virtual Webinar
A training for adoption and child welfare professionals, hosted by Foster Adopt Minnesota. Navigating the complexities of biological relationships can be a sensitive and challenging process for many adoptees. Adoptees may seek out connections with their first family members for a variety of reasons, and as adoption professionals, it is crucial to provide a safe and supportive space for the exploration of these relationships. Factors such as assessing safety, developing realistic expectations, gauging emotional preparedness, setting boundaries, planning contact, respecting privacy, and building open and honest communication will be discussed.

Webinar: From Struggles To Strengths: Reframing The Seven Core Issues In Adoption
2026-06-03 08:00 - 10:00 | Virtual Webinar
A webinar for NY psychologists seeking continuing education credits, hosted by Hudson Valley Professional Development. The seven core issues in adoption are often perceived as barriers to an adoptee’s ability to be healthy and successful. But what if we viewed these issues – loss, rejection, guilt/shame, grief, identity, intimacy, and control – on a spectrum that ranges from struggle to strength? Join Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker as she guides you into the extraordinary and often overlooked world of adoptee strengths and superpowers. Learn to support your adoptee clients’ natural tendencies, embrace their unique methods for problem-solving and navigating relationships, and empower them to feel proud of the remarkable ways in which they contribute to the world.

Virtual Support Group: Social Justice for the Sensitive Soul (Tuesdays or Thursdays)
2026-05-07 10:30 - 12:00, 2026-05-05 17:30 - 19:00 | Virtual Group
This 6-week virtual support group inspired by the book Social Justice for the Sensitive Soul by Dorcas Cheng-Tozun is for highly sensitive people (HSPs) who wish to connect with others who care deeply about the world and are seeking ways to sustainably engage in activism.
Conversations will reflect themes from the book to explore how sensitivity can shape the way we experience injustice, conflict, burnout, empathy, and advocacy. Participants will learn to enhance intuitive understanding and self-trust of their emotional, relational, and nervous system needs, honoring their sensitivity as a source of insight and strength, and identifying what they need to stay regulated and resourced within activist spaces. Empowering ways to engage in activism that feel aligned, viable, and authentic will be explored. This group will offer a safe place for compassionate self-discovery and connective reflection with others who feel deeply but don’t want to lose themselves in the process of contributing to the larger world.
This virtual group is open to individuals 18+ who reside in the United States. It will be limited to 8 members, plus the facilitator, Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker.
To engage meaningfully in the group, members are expected to purchase or borrow the book Social Justice for the Sensitive Soul: How to Change the World in Quiet Ways by Dorcas Cheng-Tozun.
Two Scheduling Options are Available:
Tuesdays 5:30-7:00PM Mountain (May 5-June 9) OR Thursdays 10:30AM-12:00PM Mountain (May 7-June 11)
Cost:
$55 per group, or pay a discounted fee of $300 in advance for all groups
Reading List:
Week 1 Reading: Introduction (p. 1-8) & Appendix: Your Uniquely Sensitive Self (p. 197-206)
Week 2 Reading: Chapters 1-3 (p. 11-39)
Week 3 Reading: Chapters 4-5 (p. 41-59)
Week 4 Reading: Ch. 6-10 (p.63-113)
Week 5 Reading: Ch. 11-17 (p. 117-185)
Week 6 Reading: Ch. 18 (p. 187-191)
ENROLLMENT CLOSED

Transracial Adoption Readiness: An Identity Needs Hierarchy
2026-03-04 08:00 - 10:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by Hudson Valley Professional Development for New York mental health providers seeking continuing education credits. Maintaining the racial and cultural identity of fostered and adopted youth of color in transracial placements is crucial to supporting their lifelong mental health, but it can be difficult to determine how those needs will be met by caregivers who do not share their racial or cultural background. This training will outline the Hierarchy of Racial and Cultural Identity Needs of Transracial Youth, a groundbreaking framework for understanding and defining the best ways to assess prospective caregiver readiness to parent transracially in a manner that communicates and centers the needs of transracial adoptees of color. General content areas to be assessed and specific interview questions for prospective parents will be explored.

Navigating the Seven Core Issues in Play Therapy with Adoptive Children (co-presenter Sabra Starnes)
2026-02-26 09:00 - 11:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by Foster Adopt MN. Adoption weaves layers of emotion and experience into a child’s play and relationships, often in ways that can be both challenging and deeply meaningful. In this session, you’ll uncover how the Seven Core Issues in Adoption—loss, rejection, guilt/shame, grief, identity, intimacy, and mastery/control—show up in the play therapy room. Through practical tools and strategies, you’ll learn to spot these themes as they unfold, guide adoptive children in expressing complex feelings through play, and collaborate with caregivers to nurture their child’s healing and strengthen identity development.

Webinar: From Blow-up to Bonding: Finding the Balance of Attachment-Focused Discipline in Adoption
2026-01-29 10:00 - 12:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by Foster Adopt MN. How can you turn moments of struggle into moments of connection? Discover how brain development, implicit memories, and the “6 F’s” (Fight, Flight, Freeze, Friend, Fidget, Flop) can influence your adoptive or foster child’s reactions to traditional methods of discipline, and develop compassionate, creative, and effective strategies for limit-setting and consequences that simultaneously enhance healthy attachment patterns in the child-caregiver relationship. Tools to cope with common struggles will be addressed, including separation anxiety, transitions, homework, aggression, lying, stealing, hoarding, argumentativeness, and sleep anxiety.

Transracial Foster and Adoption Placements: Assessing Prospective Parents for Fit with the Racial and Cultural Identity Needs of Youth in Care
2025-11-13 10:00 - 12:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by the Catalyst Center to offer continuing education credits to California mental health providers. Maintaining the racial and cultural identity of fostered and adopted youth of color in transracial placements is crucial to supporting their lifelong mental health, but it can be difficult to determine how those needs will be met by caregivers who do not share their racial or cultural background. This training will outline the Hierarchy of Racial and Cultural Identity Needs of Transracial Youth, a groundbreaking framework for understanding and defining the best ways to assess prospective caregiver readiness to parent transracially in a manner that communicates and centers the needs of transracial adoptees of color. General content areas to be assessed and specific interview questions for prospective parents will be explored.

Bringing Race Into the Room: Supporting Racial Attachment Needs with Transracially Adoptive Students and Families
2025-10-31 09:00 - 11:00 | Virtual Webinar
Virtual training event for Sonia Shankman Orthogenic School staff members. Join Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker for an enlightening discussion addressing the complex dynamics of transracial adoption. Through the lens of the seven core issues in adoption combined with her groundbreaking model of the racial and cultural identity needs of transracial adoptees, she will provide compassionate and comprehensive support to professionals who work with transracially adoptive families. Grow your awareness of the internal and external experiences of adoptees of color as they strive to build a positive racial and cultural identity, enhance your understanding of the role race plays in parent-child attachment patterns, learn to discuss race and racism using developmentally appropriate language, identify strategies to guide adoptive caregivers’ understanding of their own racial biases, and build the confidence to bring race into the room in a manner that promotes safety, empowerment, and connection.

UMOJA MN: Blow-Up to Bonding: Trauma, Behavior, and Attachment-Focused Discipline
2025-10-18 09:30 - 11:00 | Bloomington, Minnesota
Keynote for UMOJA MN hosted by EVOLVE Family Services. How can you turn moments of struggle into moments of connection? This session will unpack how the brain, implicit memories, and the “6 F’s” (Fight, Flight, Freeze, Friend, Fidget, Flop) shape a child’s trauma reactions. You’ll learn simple, compassionate strategies to turn challenging moments into opportunities for bonding, while setting limits in ways that build trust and strengthen attachment. Practical tools will also be shared for common struggles such as homework, lying, and sleep difficulties. Learn more at UMOJA MN Programs | EVOLVE Family Services.

Webinar: Navigating First Family Connections in Adoption
2025-10-16 10:00 - 12:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by The Catalyst Center for California mental health providers seeking continuing education credits.
Navigating the complexities of biological relationships can be a sensitive and challenging process for many adoptees. Adoptees may seek out connections with their first family members for a variety of reasons, and as adoption professionals, it is crucial to provide a safe and supportive space for the exploration of these relationships. Factors such as assessing safety, developing realistic expectations, gauging emotional preparedness, setting boundaries, planning contact, respecting privacy, and building open and honest communication will be discussed.

Webinar: Navigating First Family Connections in Adoption
2025-08-20 08:00 - 10:00 | Virtual Webinar
Hosted by Hudson Valley Professional Development for New York psychologists seeking continuing education credits.
Navigating the complexities of biological relationships can be a sensitive and challenging process for many adoptees. Adoptees may seek out connections with their first family members for a variety of reasons, and as adoption professionals, it is crucial to provide a safe and supportive space for the exploration of these relationships. Factors such as assessing safety, developing realistic expectations, gauging emotional preparedness, setting boundaries, planning contact, respecting privacy, and building open and honest communication will be discussed.

Workshop: Launching: Supporting Your Teen Through Early Adulthood
2025-08-01 16:15 - 17:45 | PACT Family Camp, Riverhouse Lodge, Bend, OR, United States
PACT Family Camp Breakout Presentation.

Adoption is a lifelong journey, and adopted individuals face different challenges during each stage of life. The late adolescent and early adult years offer unique opportunities for growth, independence, and identity formation, but also create new obstacles as life experiences expand beyond the shelter of the familiar. Build your knowledge of the common developmental struggles of adoptees in this age group through the lens of the seven core issues in adoption and learn the best ways to offer support and guidance as a parent, caregiver, or professional. Warning signs of more serious issues requiring professional intervention will also be described.

The mission of Pact Family Camp is to provide a safe, honest, child-centered, anti-racist space where adopted children and youth of color can connect with peers and mentors who share their identities and experiences, and where their parents can dig deeply into not only the joys but also the challenges of adoption, race, and family. Through a week-long immersive program, we set in motion a transformative experience that continues to impact families long after camp is over. Children and parents come away with a deeper understanding of the complexities of adoption, new language they can use to talk about it, and the knowledge that they are not alone on the lifelong journey of adoption.

Keynote: From Struggles to Superpowers: Reframing the Seven Core Issues in Adoption
2025-08-01 10:00 - 11:30 | PACT Family Camp, Riverhouse Lodge, Bend, OR, United States
PACT Family Camp Keynote Presentation.
The seven core issues in adoption are often perceived as barriers to an adoptee’s ability to be healthy and successful. But what if we viewed these issues – loss, rejection, guilt/shame, grief, identity, intimacy, and control – on a spectrum that ranges from struggle to strength? Join Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker as she guides you into the extraordinary and often overlooked world of adoptee strengths and superpowers. Learn to support your adoptee’s natural tendencies, embrace their unique methods for problem-solving and navigating relationships, and empower them to feel proud of the remarkable ways in which they contribute to the world.
The mission of Pact Family Camp is to provide a safe, honest, child-centered, anti-racist space where adopted children and youth of color can connect with peers and mentors who share their identities and experiences, and where their parents can dig deeply into not only the joys but also the challenges of adoption, race, and family. Through a week-long immersive program, we set in motion a transformative experience that continues to impact families long after camp is over. Children and parents come away with a deeper understanding of the complexities of adoption, new language they can use to talk about it, and the knowledge that they are not alone on the lifelong journey of adoption.

Colorado Department of Labor & Employment: Lunch & Learn Panel Member
2025-07-10 12:00 - 13:00 | Colorado Department of Labor & Education
Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker will be featured as a panel member during the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment’s Employee Lunch and Learn event. The discussion will focus on the topic of anger with questions addressing stereotypes, impacts, and healthy ways to manage anger in BIPOC populations.

From Blow-Up to Bonding: Finding the Balance of Attachment-Focused Discipline in Adoption
2025-06-12 10:00 - 17:00 | Our Savior’s Lutheran Church, 909 W. 33rd Street, Sioux Falls, SD, 57105, United States
Keynote speaker for conference hosted by Lutheran Social Services of South Dakota. How can you turn moments of struggle into moments of connection? Discover how brain development, implicit memories, and the “6 F’s” (Fight, Flight, Freeze, Friend, Fidget, Flop) can influence your adoptive or foster child’s reactions to traditional methods of discipline, and develop compassionate, creative, and effective strategies for limit-setting and consequences that simultaneously enhance healthy attachment patterns in the child-caregiver relationship. Tools to cope with common struggles will be addressed, including separation anxiety, transitions, homework, aggression, lying, stealing, hoarding, argumentativeness, and sleep anxiety.

PESI 2025 Play Therapy Summit: Play Therapy for Adoptive Children and Families: Navigating the Seven Core Issues in Adoption to Create Healthy Self-Expression, Attachment &Trauma Healing
2025-06-05 14:00 - 16:30 | Virtual Webinar
Adoption introduces unique emotional and behavioral complexities that significantly shape a child’s needs and experiences. For clinicians working with adopted children, understanding the Seven Core Issues in Adoption—loss, rejection, guilt/shame, grief, identity, intimacy, and mastery/control—is essential for effective intervention.
Join Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker, PsyD, a licensed psychologist, international/transracial adoptee, and adoptive parent, alongside Sabra Starnes, LCSW, a transracial adoptee and adoptive mother with over 24 years of experience as an adoption therapist, as they bring unique perspectives and extensive expertise in adoption-related issues. They’ll offer vital insights and practical tools to address these seven core issues within the context of play therapy.
You’ll learn how various adoption types—foster, domestic, kinship, and international; same-race and transracial; open, semi-open, and closed—can shape the content and dynamics of your play therapy sessions and influence how children express themselves and navigate their relationships.
Attendees will leave with actionable insights, enriched therapeutic techniques such as bibliotherapy, backstory exploration, Theraplay and more, and discover a deeper empathy for the unique experiences of adopted children.
Don’t miss this session to enhance your clinical skills and support the well-being of adopted youth and their caregivers in meaningful ways. Register through my affiliate link at the PESI website.

Supporting Racial Attachment Needs with Transracially Adoptive Families
2025-05-09 08:00 - 10:00 | Virtual Webinar
Virtual training hosted by Hudson Valley Professional Development for New York Psychologists seeking continuing education credits. Join Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker for an insightful and enlightening discussion addressing the complex dynamics of transracial adoption. Through the lens of the seven core issues in adoption combined with her groundbreaking model of the racial and cultural identity needs of transracial adoptees, she will provide compassionate and comprehensive support to professionals who work with transracially adoptive families. Grow your awareness of the internal and external experiences of adoptees of color as they strive to build a positive racial and cultural identity, enhance your understanding of the role race plays in parent-child attachment patterns, learn to discuss race and racism using developmentally appropriate language, identify strategies to guide adoptive caregivers’ understanding of their own racial biases, and build the confidence to bring race into the room in a manner that promotes safety, empowerment, and connection.

Gross Global Happiness Summit 2025: Embrace All Parts: From Struggles to Strengths
2025-03-09 | University for Peace, San Jose, Costa Rica
“Embrace All Parts: From Struggles to Strengths” is a dynamic motivational talk aimed at recognizing the adaptive, resilient, and self-protective nature inherent in all behaviors. Our world has developed binary categories of “good” and “bad” and “right” and “wrong” that are not sufficient for reflecting the complexity of human experience, and their simplicity limits our ability to understand and appreciate all aspects of ourselves. Emotions such as guilt, anger, and fear…thoughts that promote anxiety, insecurity, and struggle…body cues that cause us discomfort, avoidance, and suppression…what would happen if, instead of expending our energy battling these parts of ourselves, we viewed them as opportunities to develop greater self-awareness and self-compassion, on a spectrum from struggle to strength? In this workshop, I will guide attendees in the conscious effort to reframe the parts of ourselves we perceive as most difficult into assets that empower a sense of pride for the remarkable ways we engage with the world.
