Living The Red Life - Pediatric Therapy Founders: Turning Compassion Into a Sustainable Enterprise

Episode Date: February 9, 2026

Lacy Helms and Krisitin Ceriani are dynamic entrepreneurs who bring a wealth of experience in pediatric therapy and a passion for addressing support services for families of children with disabilities. From modest beginnings in a basement, Lacy and Krisitin have grown Oasis Pediatric Therapy to an impressive team of 125 members and subsequently launched the Whale Respite Center to provide essential support for families with children with disabilities. They share their journey of growth, the challenges of balancing business and heart-led missions, and the wisdom they've accrued along the way.This episode delves into the entrepreneurial grit needed to expand from two-person operations to vast teams, emphasizing lessons learned in leadership and resilience. Lacy and Krisitin open up about the critical need for specialized childcare and how their business models serve this underserved community, bridging compassion with sustainable practices. They explore insights on nonprofit management, revealing strategies behind ensuring financial viability while staying true to core values. The episode is a rich source for entrepreneurs eager to make a social impact while navigating the complexities of scaling a business.Key Takeaways:Lacy Helms and Krisitin Ceriani have successfully scaled Oasis Pediatric Therapy from a basement startup to an impactful enterprise with 125 members, emphasizing strong leadership and continuous education.The Whale Respite Center was founded in response to a pressing community need for accessible, specialized childcare for families with children with disabilities.Strong personal development and commitment from entrepreneurs can drive impactful business growth but require ongoing learning and adaptation.Balancing the creation of meaningful change with financial sustainability demands a clear vision, strategic planning, and the ability to leverage diverse revenue streams.Collaboration with experienced boards and utilization of grants and donations can effectively launch and sustain nonprofit ventures alongside for-profit enterprises.Notable Quotes:"We've had many families that we could see how hard it was for them... seeing that need, we knew that we needed to take action." - Lacy Helms."When you see a single mom who really wants to go back to school or really wants to work outside the home but literally can't, and that is horrible for everyone." - Krisitin Ceriani."We have an ongoing joke about you. We push each other uphill, and you get to kind of the plateau where you think the top is to just figure out that there's more to go." - Krisitin Ceriani."It's like a barstool approach. You have earned income, grants, and donors." - Lacy Helms."Nonprofits still need to run as businesses... if you don't know how to run a business, then your pass.Connect with Lacy Helms and Krisitin Ceriani:WebsiteLinkedin

We've had many families that we could see how hard it was for them and parents who love their children very much, but you can see that sometimes it feels like there's a little bit of like resentment or these hard feelings. They're just so tired and they can't just hire the babysitter down the block like everybody else can because their child needs a feeding tube treatment and things like that. And seeing that need, we knew that we needed to take action. And when you see a single mom who really wants to go back to school or really wants to work outside the home, but literally can't, and that is horrible for everyone. It's horrible for the parents, obviously, but it's also horrible for the child because the parents can't be who they want to be and do what they want to do, which makes us all better parents. And how do you balance, you know, you're doing something that's so great in helping people, but it's still a business, right?

So how do you balance the charging, the finance to people in these tough situations and bridging that? I think that... My name's Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life podcast, and I'm here to change the way you see your life in your earpiece every single week. If you're ready to start living the Red Life, ditch the Blue Pill, take the Red Pill, join me in Wonderland and change your life. Hello and welcome back to another episode of Living the Red Life. Today we're going to dive into these guys' amazing journey. they built a company of 125 staff. Now they're working on a second company,

and we're going to talk about that journey, how they're managing both, how they're building big teams, but most importantly, how they're building a big impact. So Lacey, Kristen, welcome to the show, excited for this, and excited to talk, you know,

hopefully educate people on growing to a company of that size. Most entrepreneurs get freaked out when they hire one VA and then 10, 125s a lot. I agree with my company to 110. and it's a lot to manage. And then you're taking on multiple things. And I know the latest venture, I won't spoil what it is, but it's really impactful, right?

It's something that you saw a big gap in the marketplace. So you wanted to build a business to solve that. And that's what entrepreneurship at its core is, right, fixing problems. I love that. So let's kick off. Tell everyone who you are and what you do. My name is Kristen Suryani. I am the co-founder of Whale Respite Center and CEO of Oasis Pediatric Therapy.

I'm also a pediatric physical therapist. And I'm Lacey Helms. I'm a speech language pathologist and the co-founder of Whale and the president of OASIS pediatric therapy. Great. And then maybe take one business each. Tell us about the businesses. Sure. Yeah.

So OASIS started in the basement of my house in 2017 with just the two of us. And we moved out of there about two and a half years ago. We're up to 125 therapists. So the 125 therapists wouldn't fit in the basement? No. You had to expand sadly. And I guess it's team members, 125 team members of wonderful people who, yeah, provide P-T-O-T speech and a family CNA program in 10 counties in Colorado. Great.

And then this led to the second business. Yes. To Whale Respite Center, which is we help and love everyone. So we don't help whales. Yeah. Just so we're clear, we help children with delays and disabilities. We've started with the Child Care Center in Weld County. We currently have 35 kids.

We've just added a new classroom so we can expand up to 65. And we're helping families with daily child care five days a week. And those kids all have some type of delay or disability, which makes it so a typical child care center that doesn't have the one adult for every four kids or the trainings that we do or things like that. They can't care for the kiddos that we care for. And let's talk about that entrepreneur journey, right? I always love the basement to a hundred, but you know, to bigger company, right? What was some of the lessons and experiences going through that? Definitely hard work and going uphill all the way and having that grit and just sticking with it and persevering.

Do you think it gets easier or because I think a lot of people think that, right? No, it doesn't get easier. You probably used to think that too. I used to think one day, oh, one day I have 100 staff and it'll be easy, but actually no. We have an ongoing joke about you. we push each other uphill and you get to kind of the plateau where you think the top is to just figure out that there's more to go. It's like mountains.

When you hike mountains, sometimes you don't see the next mountain. Yep. You get to the top and you're like, I almost get steeper as you go. I say you just become more prepared as an entrepreneur. Like you're a more skilled hiker. So versus someone unfit or overweight hiking maybe. But the hikes do get harder for sure. So what were some of the lessons you learned during this growth?

Oh, I think definitely, you know, having hard conversations with people when it's necessary and having gratitude for every person who has helped us get to where we are. I'm extremely grateful for all of the support that we've received in our community and from our team members, from our families, professors, everybody along the journey. Well, and we've spent a lot of time, you know, we both went to school for therapies, whether it was speech or physical therapy. And so we spent a lot of time more than I would have ever thought. on leadership training, whether it's books, groups, conferences, things like that, because we didn't really go to school to run a business. We went to school to be therapists.

Well, I teach that. It's like every entrepreneur, like I started as a personal trainer and then got into fitness, and then I grew that company to 25 staff. It wasn't that big, but by the time at 25, I wasn't doing much fitness. I was doing marketing, sales, business, you know, and it's kind of the same for you.

You start, you know, one to one and get a couple of staff, And then now you do probably very little of the thing you practice and you're just managing everything, right? Yes. If anything, it's mentoring at this point. Training and education. Yeah. Yeah. So how would you teach, you know, a lot of people listening with their first few staff, how would you teach them to go through that transition?

Because I think what we're saying here applies to so many people, they're the expert, whether they're a counselor, a therapist, a personal trainer, a nutritionist, an artist, gosh knows what, right? making t-shirts are great and they have to one day stop making the t-shirts or personal training and build the team so what were some of the lessons from that i think what christin said about you know you have to educate yourself and and become better become a better leader every day and you can't stop with your personal growth and maturation that way yeah that's i mean the law of the lid right john maxwell that's so you become the lid and so you have to keep growing um And you have to be willing to make mistakes and get back up again. And put one foot in front of the other.

You need to be humble and you need to admit those mistakes and be able to push yourself and have the self-discipline even when it's hard, even when you don't want to. And even when it's going really well and you're super excited. You know, it's that journey where you just one foot after the other the same every day. You know, you don't want to get ahead yourself and race because the weather. is good, all is beautiful, and here we go, and then really slow down when it's really hard, you have to just stay consistent with it. And that, I think, is one of the hardest things. The other is, my dad has a saying about, don't tell me how shallow the water is, just get the boat ashore. And so it's going to be harder, take longer, and you're going to have to do more than you ever

thought you were going to have to do. And that's, I think there's a lot of people who are working a full-time job trying to do a side gig or something, and they want to jump ship before the boat is really close enough to the dock to make it so that it really is time, whether that's financially, whether it's where you are as a leader, whether any of those things, whether it's time management. Yeah. You know, we got up at 4 o'clock in the morning for many, many years and did meetings at 4.30 in our pajamas with our coffee cups to make sure that we were doing all of the things.

And so. Well, I think that's that, you know, I've been in business 15 years. You guys been in business a long time. That's the downside to social media is everyone wants to. And it's great that everyone wants to be an entrepreneur and start a company. But, you know, social media makes it look easy, right? Because you don't post the 4.30 a.m. picture all the time, you know? You post the ribbon ceremony or the award you won, right?

And that's really what entrepreneurship is. And that's why I love to talk about these things is, you know, now I've been doing this 15 years, have 110 staff. So I actually work the least now because I have the team running a ring. But for 10 years, it's nonstop 18 hours a day. of thing and it's fun journey but yeah the hard work can't ever be replaced and i know you to you you to pride yourselves on that and you're still doing that now yeah so so let's talk more about what you do now and how you're different right how have you created i know you did out of purpose and passion and helping people that you are the only one in your county and area too so what makes you guys

special in what you do i think you know being the first center we saw the need in the families that we served as therapists and we we've had many families that we could see how hard it was for them and parents who love their children very much but you can see that sometimes it feels like there's a little bit of like resentment or these hard feelings they're just so tired and they're just so tired and they can't just hire the babysitter down the block like everybody else can because their child needs a feeding tube treatment and and things like that and to just see how tired they are and even people who are still married to just go get your haircut or take care of your own medical needs is really, really hard. And so seeing that need, we knew that we needed to take action.

And that part has been a hard journey. And, you know, we're in a place where we've started a campaign of Save the Whale and we're working through some hard things right now to make sure that we can continue to provide this service in our community. Well, and when you see a single mom who really wants to go back to school or really wants to work outside the home, but literally can't and is stuck under the poverty line, just trying to make ends meet because their child has so much going on that no one else can take care of them. And we had a family in that situation, and the mom actually tried to go back to work and have a couple of different family members watch her daughter, and she was flight for life

twice because of seizures. And so you see those things where people are trying their best and and not being able to move forward. And that is horrible for everyone. It's horrible for the parents, obviously. But it's also horrible for the child because the parents can't be who they want to be and do what they want to do, which makes us all better parents when we're able to have that breath and have some balance and equilibrium there. And that's where that passion.

And how do you balance, you know, you're doing something that's so great and helping people, but it's still a business, right? So how do you balance the charging, the finance to people in these tough situations and bridging that? I think that that's part of why with Whale, where we've started with it is as a child care center because there are, we have donations, we have grants, and then we also have some earned income through some sources that we can bill out so that it's not all just based on the donations or the grants because of the, I guess, the way that we've started the structure of the company. It was also very much meant to be that OASIS was started first,

and we learned a lot about running a for-profit before we got into a nonprofit where you do have these things with grants and donations that we hadn't experienced her before. But nonprofits still need to run its businesses. They still have to make ends meet. We just say it's a different tax code, but it's the same. We still have to make payroll on Friday. There's a lot of people with a great heart and wonderful motivations and passions and love what they do. But if you don't know how to run a business, then your passions and motivations and your great heart are not really going to get you very far.

So that's what I was kind of going to lead into is, you know, there's a lot of entrepreneurs out there, myself included built big companies. They want to go and do this. Like we've wanted, my big passion is animals. So I wanted to start an animal sanctuary these things. and it's like, it's very much similar. So like how do you cash flow it, right? When I'm looking at it and making, we've talked about it as a company. So how would you advise someone to start?

If there's someone listening, they have a good business, maybe like you and they see this gap or like me, they have this passion, how do they go and build the nonprofit in a smart way? Well, so I think joining nonprofit groups starting to get educated. There's a joke about the first nonprofit, of Colorado group I went to was the development group and I got into it and I couldn't figure out why everyone was talking about money instead programming. I was like, I don't understand. There's a finance group already. Why am I here? What is happening right now? So that's how little, right? I knew about it at the

beginning. And so you have to start surrounding yourself with people who are educated about nonprofits because there's a lot of things that are the same, but the things that are different are very, very different. And so, and then you need to start getting the money in the bank and the savings so that you can pay really experienced people to start coming in to help you get it off the ground so that you're running the board meetings correctly and you're handling the finances correctly. Getting your board first and foremost, I mean, our board is amazing and fantastic. And so they've really been able to come in and advise us on different aspects, whether it's finance or insurance or different things like that,

but we also needed to have somebody who could come in and teach us all how to be board members. And so really that education piece, just like we spend so much time working on leadership, to run a nonprofit, it starts with that education so that you even understand the terminology. And then we were able to start applying for grants

based off of that business plan that was part of that funding to get it going as well. A whole sector of your business is just grant applications, right? Absolutely. Yeah. It's like a barstool approach you have earned income, grants and donors. Yeah, yeah. Love that.

Good. So, well, as we come to the end, I want, you know, just a way that people, if they want to learn more about either side or follow you guys in this journey on the nonprofit side, where do they start to learn about you and the businesses and the nonprofit? Well, you definitely can visit our website, well, respite.org. And that's a really great place to learn about what we do. Yes. And we also have, you know, our social media handles.

Oh, yes. Of course. And, you know, if people are willing to help us with donations, we do have a Venmo for We Help and Love Everyone. Yes. And as Effie. And, you know, you can see our cute little logo with the whale with the heart coming out of the out of the water spout and things like that.

But yeah, that's. Those are the best places and ways to, I'd say, learn about us is through, whether it's Instagram the website. But we're always happy for people to, if they wanted to tour, even if they live in another state, we've had people call us and ask us if they can come to or whether whale and oasis, like we're happy to help others out there trying to do something similar. Love it.

Well, it's great. It's been super valuable to talk about building the business side, the teams, the leadership, the nonprofit and awesome to hear about the mission you guys are on and how you're making a difference. excited for more of it to come and see more of it. And yeah, guys, if you're listening, check out the website, socials. If you're in town, visit and, of course, support the nonprofit if you can in any way, whether it's connections, donors, etc.

That's what it's all about here is helping others and learning at the same time. So thank you guys so much. And keep living the red life. I'll see you guys soon. Take care.