Shine and Shadow, LLC
Collective Liberation | Decolonizing Therapy | Healing Justice
Get to know...
Kulkiran Nakai, Psy.D., LP
Identifying as first-generation, fat, tattooed, neuroEMERGENT queer femme from South Asian/East Indian immigrants, Kulkiran (pronounced Cuul-KEER-ren | they/them) brings a well-rounded, creative, synergistic, vibrant, and grounded energy to the therapy room.
As a fellow human in today's day and age, they have direct experience with marginalization, discrimination, and oppression for these intersecting identities throughout their life, and they understand the deep impact that prejudice and stigma has on one’s mental health and wellbeing. They value actively working on their own traumas and biases, unlearning colonial paradigms and practices, and dismantling all systems designed to oppress the marginalized. After years of professional training and personal exploration, they are not only fulfilling their calling but are also building their legacy.
They are committed to socio-political and cultural change in efforts towards thriving in a world of loving justice, equality, and sovereignty. As such, Kulkiran is intentional about helping to cultivate meaningful, reparative, and transformative therapeutic relationships so that their clients may become their own compassionate caregiver and agent of change to resource how to live an authentic, value-guided, and worthwhile life.
More about their work:
Kulkiran operates within a relational-constructivist foundation of humanistic, systemic, multicultural, intersectional feminist, decolonial, and abolitionist frameworks. They value being a grounded mirror and humble model who co-creates a safe and secure therapeutic atmosphere for providing customized, holistic, and evidenced-based individual, couples, and group therapy. Kulkiran practices multi-theoretical, trauma-informed, and multiculturally competent care, and they enjoy specializing in liberation-focused, strengths-based and indigenous-oriented practices working with marginalized and oppressed communities.
They specialize in complex trauma, perfectionism, codependency, leadership, and relational conflict. They prioritize space for immigrant, BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+, fat, and neurodivergent communities.
Their main treatment approaches include Hakomi, Internal Family Systems, third-wave Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Mindfulness Self-Compassion (MSC), and Shame Resilience (SR). They also incorporate brief-psychodynamic, creative/alternative therapies in treatment including map conceptualizations, positive psychology, tarot card interpretations based in depth and spiritual psychology, and narrative and play therapies including psychodrama and improv.
Kulkiran is kink/polyamory and neurodivergent aware, aligned, and affirming.
They also provide psychedelic integration support and clinical supervision.
Their professional and clinical background:
Kulkiran became a fully licensed psychologist in 2019. They earned their doctorate in clinical psychology at Adler University in Chicago, IL in 2016, and their masters in counseling psychology at Argosy University in San Diego, CA in 2010. They completed their internship at Florida State University's Counseling Center and their post-doctoral residency at the University of Michigan's Counseling and Psychological Services.
They are trained in Level 1 of Internal Family Systems, and Level 2 specializing in relationships with Intimacy From the Inside Out (IFIO). They are also trained and certified in Level 1 and 2 of Liberation Reiki, and are trained to practice Systemic Trauma in Couple's Therapy and Embodied Conflict Transformation.
In the therapy room:
Alongside their heartfelt therapeutic style, Kulkiran takes a collaborative, encouraging, and empowering approach that is consent-based and feedback-oriented. They hope to demonstrate how to slow down and be present, access and anchor to our inner light, to befriend our shadow and let go of unnecessary suffering, to forgive ourselves for our past transgressions, to learn how to unapologetically be and love ourselves for who we already are, to believe in our worth and our potential, to belong to ourselves and wholeheartedly trust our intuitive wisdom, and to have faith in the process of healing and transformative growth, personally and collectively. Above all, it is of the utmost importance that folx who work with Kulkiran leave treatment having felt heard, seen, valued, understood, inspired, and Loved.
More about them:
Kulkiran is also a performance artivist (artist + activist), through improv and drag, a community organizer with Ypsilanti Pride, a healing justice practitioner with Sarasota's Theater for Social Justice, and Detroit's Healing by Choice!, as well as a teacher's assistant for QTIFS.
They love spending quality time with their chosen family and pup, dancing and going on walks in nature, cooking nutritious and delicious meals, playing on swings or with bubbles, and doing crafty or meaningful things for others. What’s more, they have directly experienced the transformative power of therapy and they understand the courage it takes to step into their own light, to reclaim their voice, and to live out an authentic, wholesome, and meaningful life. They look forward to holding divine sacred space for others to do the same.
Kulkiran's Professional Boundaries
1. Availability and Fit
Kulkiran will see clients at most once per week, will earnestly consider all options around goodness-of-fit, and make final decisions that serves the best interest of all.
4. Therapeutic Match and Liability
Kulkiran will notify client of their boundaries around their role as therapist and scope of practice, and they will document everything factual to protect themselves from litigation and to keep their license and private practice in good-standing.
They will only offer virtual sessions when clients are calling in from a safe and private location.
7. Financial Responsibility
Kulkiran will pause therapy services if client balance is greater than a reasonable amount. Therapy will resume once the balance is reasonably met.
Clients are responsible for submitting payment at the time of service and are responsible for requesting payment plans to help support their livelihoods while also honoring their payment agreement.
2. Service Expectations
Kulkiran's private practice is not designed for crisis counseling or case management but they will offer support around those services as needed in session, however referrals will be made if crisis and case management support needs are prioritized over therapy services.
5. Crisis Expectations
Kulkiran will call the Mobile Crisis Unit for a wellness check and coordinate with the client's emergency contacts for immediate crisis support, while reserving calling the ambulance as last resort for possible admittance into the nearest psychiatric hospital, if safety is compromised and support is unavailable.
8. Scheduling
Kulkiran will offer sessions on a first-come-first-served basis, and will cancel and reschedule sessions in advance if needed.
If clients choose to pause therapy services for whatever reason, they will forfeit their regular appointment time and are responsible to reach back out to resume services when the schedule has availability.
3. Self-Agency
Kulkiran will continue to work with clients who are willing and able to practice skills and advocate for their life, and they will refer out to appropriate resources if clients are unwilling or unable to practice skills or advocate for their care.
6. Communication
Kulkiran will only respond to messages within business hours; they will not engage in communications outside of email and within the client portal, and they will not accept social media requests. They may nonchalantly and politely acknowledge clients if noticed in public.
9. Billing
Kulkiran will bill a client's insurance on file according to the amount of time spent in session, including time missed for when clients are delayed to start. Exemptions are made when clients communicate their delay in advance. Kulkiran will not bill insurance for services that were not rendered.
Clients are responsible for keeping track of any insurance changes including co-pays and deductibles.
If out-of-network, clients are responsible for requesting and submitting Superbill documentation to their insurance provider for reimbursement.