Member at large
Dawn Lipkin, RN
I am a Certified Registered Nurse in Maternal Newborn Nursing with many years of experience with new mothers and new babies. I am a firm believer in the importance of breastfeeding for mother and for baby and I breastfed all my own children. Having done so, I know that sometimes things are not always easy, and I love teaching and supporting others to meet their breastfeeding goals.
Education Planner
Rosemarie Casillas, IBCLC
Rosemarie Arroyo Casillas has been supporting mothers and babies to reach their breastfeeding goals for 13 years. Pursuing her passion for educating and encouraging a better understanding of breastfeeding, she became a La Leche League Leader in 2010, offering free monthly mother-to-mother support meetings. In 2013, the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public and Behavioral Health asked her to be part of the program and offer IBCLC services. After serving for 6 years, she received a promotion to the State Peer Counselor Program Coordinator.
Rosemarie has held the credential of International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant, IBCLC since 2011. Her commitment to protect, promote and support breastfeeding is found in her volunteer work at the Southern Nevada Breastfeeding Coalition. She has served as a board member since 2012. Taking steps to a healthier Nevada, Rosemarie is using a Training Synopsis written to help make institutional changes in maternity care practices.
Motherhood has been her greatest accomplishment. As a Girl Scout Leader, she upholds the Girl Scout Law, to serve God and her country, be honest and fair, friendly, and helpful, considerate and caring, courageous and strong, to respect all people and authority, use resources wisely and make the world a better place. Raising 4 children has taught her agape love, laughter, and patience.
Nurturing Naturally Coordinator
Kayla Kirk, Doula, IBCLC
Kayla is an IBCLC, postpartum doula, and infant massage educator serving the greater Las Vegas valley. She is passionate about supporting early postpartum families through bodyfeeding challenges and helping them focus on the joyful aspects of parenthood. She also supports families at the systemic level by educating companies and other healthcare providers on the benefits of supporting bodyfeeding parents. Kayla is Las Vegas born and raised and currently resides in Boulder City, NV with her husband and two children.
Marketing Coordinator
Anita Momodu, CPC
Anita travels the world gathering communities, uplifting experiences and demolishing shame. Her passion is helping birthing individuals and their families redefine what parenthood looks like for them while helping them take back their power from shame in their journey to and through parenthood, and cultivating conversations that have been silenced for too long. Anita is a Clinical Professional Counselor, author, speaker, sleep consultant, full spectrum doula, and currently serves as the southern Nevada breastfeeding coalitions educational planner and marketing coordinator.
Anita currently works in her own mental health private practice, co-facilitates a black moms in loss group through Postpartum Support International, and is the central florida regional co-chair for the Perinatal Mental Health Alliance for POC.
Liaison Between Coalitions
Suzette Cruz, BSN, RN, IBCLC
Suzette is a Board Member of Southern Nevada Breastfeeding Coalition. Suzette is a graduate of Nevada State College, with Major in Nursing and an emphasis in Psychology. Suzette has been helping mothers, babies, and families to breastfeed since 2007. She has many years of experience counseling mothers in person and mother to mother in support groups, and mothers and infants in a hospital setting, including NICU preemies, late preterm infants, infants that are small for their gestational age, and many other unique needs. Suzette became an International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant, (IBCLC) in 2019.
On a personal note, while residing on the island of Oahu, Suzette’s deeper interest in Lactation came with the birth of her son. It was with guidance and compassion of an amazing friend at the time who inspired her own journey to breastfeed her son. Her name is Terri Rae Cardona. Suzette will forever cherish the time she gave her and her son Kalani, while Terri and her husband were on their Honeymoon in Hawaii.
Community Outreach
Maria Palapa, BPH
Maria is a recent graduate from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas with a Bachelor of Science in Public Health. She is a Community Health Worker, CPR Basic Life Support Instructor, and serves as the board secretary for the Flavors for Life non-profit organization.
She is currently a graduate assistant for the School of Public Health supporting a project involving household food insecurity and breastfeeding amongst mothers and infants. In this systematic review, she reviewed the literature for inclusion and exclusion data, extracted data from included studies, and assisted with the manuscript. She will also be supporting the EARN-FS project assisting with data collection.
Maria's passion is to educate, inform, and empower our communities to have opportunities for a healthier, better life. Her interests are to work with initiatives targeting childhood obesity, breastfeeding, and chronic disease.
Website Coordinator
Jacquelyn Bonde, MPH, CLE, CBS
Jacquelyn Bonde resides in Reno, Nevada with her two kids, partner and basset hounds, Mary and Gus. She became interested in lactation and community nutrition while completing her undergraduate degree in nutrition at the University of Nevada, Reno. In 2015, following the birth of her first child, she experienced many lactation challenges, which drove her to want to support other parents with lactation. After completing her degree, she became a Certified Lactation Educator (CLE), and her passion for lactation and nutrition led her to the Nevada WIC Program. In 2018, she became the Nevada WIC Program’s Breastfeeding Coordinator where she works to ensure WIC participants have the information and materials they need to meet their lactation goals. When she is not working, she enjoys reading, cooking and growing food, as well as spending time with her family and friends.
