Speakers
CURRENT FEATURED SPEAKERS
Current Voices Leading the Next Phase
The current Thrivers Speak® platform centers the evolving work of Dawn McCarty, Dr. Alyse Price-Tobler, and Andrew Folkler: applied forensic intelligence, specialist clinical research, and reunified survivor education for understanding child psychological abuse related to “parental alienation” and abduction.
Their work connects lived experience, doctoral research, clinical practice, survivor testimony, threat modeling, reunification education, and professional survivor representation. Each speaker can be invited independently, and the three lanes can also be framed together when a program needs parent reconnection, forensic intelligence, and clinical treatment in the same conversation.
SURVIVOR-INFORMED TRIFECTA
A Three-Part Professional Bridge
Andrew Folkler brings the targeted-parent and reunification lens. Dawn McCarty brings forensic behavioral intelligence and crime-scene analysis. Dr. Alyse Price-Tobler brings clinical assessment, doctoral research, and treatment pathways. Together, they form a powerful survivor-informed team for parent education, professional training, clinical context, and public understanding.
Parent Reconnection
Andrew helps targeted parents understand the alienated child and the conditions that support safe return.
Forensic Intelligence
Dawn maps behaviors, evidence patterns, coercive control, predator red flags, and institutional blind spots.
Clinical Treatment
Alyse brings specialist clinical formulation, practitioner education, and Healing Qualia treatment research.
Dawn McCarty
Criminologist | Cybersecurity-Informed Threat Modeling | Forensic Behavioral Intelligence | Cult Dynamics | Survivor Advocate | #1 International Bestselling Author
APPLIED FORENSIC INTELLIGENCE
The Child’s Mind Is the Crime Scene
Dawn McCarty applies criminology, cybersecurity-informed threat modeling, forensic evidence management, cult-dynamics analysis, and survivor evidence to the mechanics of coercive control. Her work treats the alienated mind as an active crime scene where developmental dependency, attachment disruption, narrative control, identity erosion, and post-crime evidence can be mapped as observable patterns.
Her academic foundation includes an MBA in Cybersecurity, a Master of Science in Criminal Justice with a focus on Crime Scene and Evidence Management, and undergraduate work in Computer Science, Criminal Justice, and the psychology of victimology.
Dawn does not provide counseling or coaching. Her speaking and publishing focus on applied behavioral pattern recognition, forensic documentation, survivor intelligence, predator and institutional red flags, and prevention-oriented education.
Forensic Behavioral Intelligence
Dawn’s developing Forensic Behavioral Intelligence profiles orient evidence review around observable behaviors, risk indicators, grooming sequences, coercive control audits, narrative subversion, and indicators of compromise.
Protocols and Frameworks
She has developed DARE Frameworks™, the Predator Prevention Protocol™, Collaborative Family Online Safety Protocol™, PROTECT Protocol, and related tools for recognizing red flags and documenting patterns.
Predator and Institutional Pattern Analysis
Her current work examines predator behavior, behavioral profiling, institutional and cult-like control patterns, religious or ideological narrative capture, and the ways institutions can normalize or obscure harm.
Authorship and Survivor-Led Conference Work
Dawn is the author of Unsealing the Crime Scene: A Forensic Roadmap for Survivors of Child Psychological Abuse and Coercive Control, a #1 international bestselling and forensic psychology title that applies criminology and cybersecurity-informed thinking to child psychological abuse, coercive control, identity theft, and recovery.
She is also the publishing author of Warning! Children Are Not Weapons!, recipient of the James Madison Literary Award from the United States Presidential Services Center, and the forthcoming author of Sealed to My Abductor.
As founder of Thrivers Speak® Events and co-founder, with Dr. Alyse Price-Tobler, of the Nothing About Us, Without Us (NAUWOU™) survivor conference initiative, Dawn builds pathways for adult survivor intelligence to enter professional, legal, clinical, research, and public education spaces.
Dr. Alyse Price-Tobler
PhD (Twin) | MCAP | PACFA-Registered Clinical Psychotherapist | Specialist Trauma Clinician | Researcher | Clinical Supervisor | Author | International Speaker
CLINICAL RESEARCH AND TREATMENT
Healing Qualia Treatment Protocol
Dr. Alyse Price-Tobler is a PACFA-registered clinical psychotherapist, specialist trauma clinician, researcher, clinical supervisor, author, and international speaker whose work sits at the intersection of complex trauma, child psychological abuse, coercive family systems, adult survivor recovery, psychological safety, and survivor-informed clinical practice.
Her twin doctoral research at the University of the Sunshine Coast examined adult survivors of child psychological abuse related to severe “parental alienation” and the mental health practitioners who work with them. That research forms the empirical foundation of the Healing Qualia Treatment Protocol.
With more than 30 years across mental health, disability, forensic, community, crisis, emergency response, and trauma settings, Dr. Price-Tobler brings a rare combination of higher degree research, specialist clinical practice, frontline service, lived experience, supervision, and authorship to her speaking, training, and clinical education work.
Specialist Clinical Scope
Dr. Price-Tobler works clinically with targeted parents, adolescents, adult survivors, and families affected by familial abduction, concealment, reunification disruption, coercive family systems, attachment disruption, and complex intergenerational relational trauma.
Bowral Road Counselling
As founder and principal clinical psychotherapist of Bowral Road Counselling and Retreat Centre, she provides specialist counselling, psychotherapy, trauma-informed treatment, and clinical supervision.
Emergency Response and Frontline Care
Her background includes work with first responders, emergency service personnel, critical incident counselling, EAP support, disaster response, and long-term volunteer service with the NSW State Emergency Service.
Authorship and Survivor-Led Conference Work
Dr. Price-Tobler is the author of Disrupting the Intergenerational Trauma Cycle of High Conflict Divorce and Navigating the Maze During Treatment of Adult Survivors of Child Psychological Abuse, both developed from her twin doctoral research and published by Inspiring Publishers.
She has contributed to collaborative works including Building Bridges of Hope and Warning! Children Are Not Weapons!, and co-organised, with Dawn McCarty, the Thrivers Speak® NAUWOU Survivor Initiative Conference.
Andrew Folkler
Reunified Adult Survivor | Writer | Alienation Expert | Red Thread Educator | Targeted Parent Education | Contributing Author
REUNIFICATION AND RECOVERY EDUCATION
Shortening the Red Thread
Andrew Folkler is a reunified adult survivor, writer, alienation expert, and parent-facing educator. His work helps targeted parents understand the mind of the alienated child and create the conditions that make reconnection possible.
He was alienated from a parent for thirteen years, later reconnected, and has now been reunified longer than the alienation itself lasted. His work translates survivor experience, attachment theory, trauma research, and reunification literature into usable education for families and survivor-informed professional spaces.
Andrew is the author of the Shortening the Red Thread newsletter and forthcoming book, a contributing author in Warning! Children Are Not Weapons! and Building Bridges of Hope, Volume 2, and an aligned voice in recovery, reconnection, and survivor-led education.
View Andrew’s ProfileInvite Andrew to SpeakRead the Red Thread
Targeted Parent Education
Andrew helps targeted parents understand why an alienated child may reject contact, what kinds of responses increase pressure, and how a parent can become a safer place for eventual return.
Reunified Survivor Insight
Because Andrew has lived both alienation and reunification, he can explain the child’s internal bind, the fear of reconnection, and the long arc from rejection to repair.
Red Thread Frameworks
His Red Thread work gives parents and professionals language for the bond that remains under rejection, including the 5-Stage Healing Cycle and the Nine Cultivations.
Authorship, Coaching, and Survivor-Led Contributions
Andrew’s work sits in the parent-reconnection lane of the Thrivers Speak® trifecta. He supports targeted parents with education, survivor-informed insight, and coaching-oriented frameworks that focus on regulation, patience, reality-based understanding, and safe reconnection.
He is the author of Shortening the Red Thread, a forthcoming book and newsletter, a contributing author in survivor-led collaborative books, and a voice for understanding the alienated child without collapsing into panic, pressure, pursuit, or despair.
FORENSIC, CLINICAL, AND RECOVERY BRIDGE
From Survivor Evidence to Professional Practice
Together, McCarty, Price-Tobler, and Folkler help professionals recognize that severe CPA-PAA does not end when childhood jurisdiction ends. It can persist into adulthood through narrative control, loyalty pressure, identity disruption, relational threat, treatment misalignment, and the long work of repair and reconnection.
They are available as separate speakers. Dawn and Alyse are also available as a coordinated applied-and-academic presentation pair, while Andrew adds the reunified survivor and targeted-parent education lane when recovery and reconnection are central to the program.
Thrivers Speak® and Nothing About Us, Without Us (NAUWOU™) Conferences exist to bring adult survivor evidence into the rooms where these issues are researched, treated, litigated, and discussed.
2024 SPEAKER ARCHIVE
Past Voices Helped Build the Foundation
The original 2024 Thrivers Speak conference included a broader roster of survivor-informed speakers, advocates, authors, clinicians, and aligned professionals. Selected conference recordings and related survivor-led conversations are available in the 2024 Thrivers Speak video archive.
