LGBT Psychotherapy |

Resilience: The Client as an Active Agent of Change

Accepting we clinicians are not as mighty power as we , sometimes, want to believe, and as much of a blow to our egos, it can be, there is a fact we need to recognize as such: human resilience and people’s self-healing powers count for positive outcomes after traumas and strenuous circumstances, equally effectively or more than proven therapeutic approaches.

A very respected and renowned colleague of mine, Dr. Arthur Bohart always reminded me and anybody who wanted to listen to his revolutionary opinions in regards to the effectiveness of some therapeutic approaches or the best personality traits for a successful clinician, that human beings are more resilient that what we want to account for and that the theory of some approaches being more effective than others are more of a myth than a fact since for Dr. Bohart” the “client acts as a self-healer” and human resilience counts for more of the positive outcomes in therapy. So, what is the clinician’s role? In a way, we therapists are a catalyst or better said a witness to the self-healing process. A guide to educate and share the process with the client. In an article published in the Journal of Psychotherapy Integration, Vol. 10, No. 2, 2000, he describes the dominant “medical” or “treatment” model of psychotherapy and how it puts the client in the position of a “dependent variable” who is operated on by supposedly potent therapeutic techniques. Next I argue that the data do not fit with this model. An alternative model is that the client is the most important common factor and that it is clients’ self-healing capacities which make therapy work…” Read his article

The same concept works with the forgotten population, the older adults and elders. Resilience and aging: it’s a favorite theme of gero-psychiatrist Helen Lavretsy, MD, MS. It’s the subject of her new book, Resilience and Aging: Research and Practice and the theme of a symposium at the APA Annual Meeting in New York City. In a recent podcast, she talks briefly about interventions that can help bolster resilience and help older people recover quickly from adversity. Listen to her podcast

Resilience and aging: it’s a favorite theme of geropsychiatrist Helen Lavretsy, MD, MS. It’s the subject of her new book, Resilience and Aging: Research and Practice and the theme of a symposium at the APA Annual Meeting in New York City.Here, she talks briefly about interventions that can help bolster resilience and help older people recover quickly from adversity. – See more at: http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/apa2014/strategies-bolstering-resilience-older-adults#sthash.LuOVSHfT.dpuf

This entry was posted in Elders mental Health and Wellness, General, Mental Illness, Psicoterapia, Psychotherapy, Senior Wellness, Terapia en Español on August 5th, 2022.
Tags: Elder therapy, Healing the soul, Humanistic Psychotherapy, Hummanistic Psychology, LGBT Psychotherapy, senior and mental illness, therapy with seniors.

LGBT Youth and Conversion Therapy

Conversion therapy or restorative therapies are, ethically and intrinsically, wrong when trying to change an individual’s sexual preference based on homophobia and extreme religious beliefs. These types of treatment have been a source of controversy in the United States and other countries. The American Psychiatric Association has condemned “psychiatric treatment, such as reparative or conversion therapy which is based upon the assumption that homosexuality per-se is a mental disorder thus the need to revert the “disease” by changing your sexual preference.The issue is more serious when it comes to youth since they do no have the legal right to oppose their parents’ decisions. Well, for now a victory!

Samantha Ames, Esq. Staff Attorney & Born Perfect Campaign Coordinator for NCLR just announced, moments ago, the District of Columbia Council unanimously approved a bill that will protect LGBT youth from conversion therapy. When signed into law, Washington, D.C. will become the third jurisdiction—behind California and New Jersey—to pass legislation protecting LGBT youth from ineffective and harmful practices designed to change their sexual orientation or gender identity. Counsel Ames, explains “… today, the Council sent a powerful message to LGBT youth and their families that they are accepted, supported, and loved. It has used its power to protect the most vulnerable from a dangerous pseudoscience that tells them that who they are is wrong, and reaffirmed the consensus of every major medical and mental health organization in the country that all children are born perfect, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Earlier this year, NCLR launched the Born Perfect campaign to end conversion therapy across the country over the next five years by passing laws, fighting in courtrooms to ensure the safety of LGBT youth, and raising awareness about the serious harms caused by these dangerous and discredited practices Their site explains that in the past” …In the past, some mental health professionals resorted to extreme measures such as institutionalization, castration, and electro-convulsive shock therapy to try to stop people from being lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT). Today, while some counselors still use physical treatments like aversive conditioning, the techniques most commonly used include a variety of behavioral, cognitive, psychoanalytic, and other practices that try to change or reduce same-sex attraction or alter a person’s gender identity…” Learn More about the Born Perfect Campaign.

This entry was posted in Lesbian psychotherapy, LGBT Psychological Issues, LGBT Psychotherapy, LGBT Rights, Psicoterapia on December 3rd, 2014.
Tags: Conversion Therapy, lesbian therapist, LGBT advocacy, LGBT Psychotherapy.

Latinas’ Challenges to Come Out of The Closet

In the Latin culture the role of women is sometimes defined narrowly and women are brought up to be “super” moms and dedicated wives. The family pressure to keep a clean home, raise well-mannered children and be fabulous cooks can be a little overwhelming. You can add onto that pressure that to be a good “wife” and “mother” implies being heterosexual, and find the right “husband” not the right wife.

Latinas, are professionals, blue collar workers, students, artists, and they all face their own struggles, successes, and secrets. For we Latinas are as diverse, as shallow, and as deep as our dominant-culture counterparts. Our stories of immigration and oppression are gripping, but they are not only stories of discrimination or acculturation to tell, we also have our gender struggle stories to tell. Some are wives and mothers, yet individuals, too and some of us are lesbians and proud of it. Yet our culture and family does not welcome, always, our “coming out of the closet”. Our stories are as wide and as varied as the hues we come in.

Even the Spanish language conspires against those women who called themselves lesbians or bi-sexuals, because most of the counterpart words in Spanish have a negative connotation. Activists at the Human Rights Campaign had written that “…Although “gay” has the same meaning in Spanish as in English, the word “lesbiana” still has negative connotations. Many Latina women who love women, however, are purposely using the word to reclaim it from those who would use it against them…” (Read More)

On another article HRC states “… Although Latina/o Americans come from various cultural backgrounds, many who come out as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender share similar experiences and challenges. Some, who were raised Roman Catholic, must reconcile themselves with the church’s teachings that acting on one’s homosexuality is sinful. Language differences often make finding resources and support difficult, and a lack of LGBT Latinas/os in media and entertainment perpetuates invisibility. Fortunately, however, anecdotal evidence suggests that a growing number of Latinas/os are coming out…”

Find more resources for Latinas y Latinos “coming out of the closet” on HRC: Guía de Recursos Para Salir Del Clóset

This entry was posted in Lesbian psychotherapy, LGBT Couples Counseling Therapy, LGBT Psychological Issues, LGBT Psychotherapy, Psychotherapy on July 22nd, 2014.
Tags: Latina, latina coming out, lesbian therapist, lesbiana, LGBT Psychotherapy, LGBT therpaist.

A Victory for Therapists and LGBT: U.S. Supreme Court Says No To Conversion Therapy

NCLR June 30, 2014

I was so happy when earlier today, I received, like many of us, an email from Kate Kendell, Esq, the fabulous executive Director for The National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) saying “…Earlier today, the United States Supreme Court declined to review a challenge to California’s law—which NCLR and Equality California helped draft, pass, and defend—that protects LGBT children from conversion therapists. The decision clears the way for enforcement of the first law in the nation that protects kids from unethical counselors and therapists who engage in these dangerous practices to try to change their sexual orientation or gender expression.

For therapists all around the globe these are GREAT NEWS, as NCLR picture shows “…you can not switch off who you are…” While as many as 1 in 3 LGBT people have been subjected to conversion therapy, whether by a licensed clinician, a religious leader, or another trusted adult, the trauma of these experiences can make it difficult to come forward. (Read some survivor stories)

It is really scaring to think that professionals who had studied the harmful effects of pushing a personal agenda into a psychotherapy client can be unethically oblivious of the devastating effects of conversion therapy (Read More About Conversion Therapy

What is next? Converting people of color into white or converting right brain people onto left-brain for the sake of somebody’s new agenda or bias? Give me a break. We therapists are supposed not to harm and be the catalyst for our clients’ process, it is not our place to change anybody but help them to explore their path and desires.

NCLR has launched the project NCLR has launched Born Perfect: The Campaign to End Conversion Therapyin the next five years by passing laws across the country to protect LGBT kids, fighting in courtrooms to ensure their safety, and raising awareness about the serious harms caused by these dangerous practices.

This entry was posted in Lesbian psychotherapy, LGBT Couples Counseling Therapy, LGBT Psychological Issues, LGBT Psychotherapy, LGBT Rights on June 30th, 2014.
Tags: Conversion Therapy, LGBT Psychotherapy, LGBT therapist.

Psychological Issues for LGBT Sexual Orientation

When discussing psychological issues involving our LGBT folks, we want to depathologize those issues and assure our clients, there IS NOTHING WRONG with them. The issues of sexual orientation, homosexuality, coming out, stigma, family rejection, homophobia are at the forefront when working with LGBT people. Even traditional organizations as the American Psychiatric Association, founded in 1844 – the world’s largest psychiatric organization that is a medical specialty society representing growing membership of more than 35,000 psychiatrists and the voice and conscience of modern psychiatry, works together to ensure humane care and effective treatment for all persons with mental disorders states that being part of the LGBT spectrum is not a mental illness…. THANK YOU, What a concept!

Talking about a concept, the APA states that “…the concept of sexual orientation refers to more than sexual behavior. It includes feelings as well as identity. Some individuals may identify themselves as gay lesbian or bisexual without engaging in any sexual activity. Some people believe that sexual orientation is innate and fixed; however, sexual orientation develops across a person’s lifetime. Individuals maybe become aware at different points in their lives that they are heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual… Read More

This entry was posted in LGBT Psychological Issues, LGBT Psychotherapy on June 28th, 2014.
Tags: Lesbian Psychotherpay, lesbian therapist, LGBT Psychotherapy.

Gay and Lesbian Couples Counseling

I am always looking for the latest, the newest article or event related to LGBT well-being or LGBT rights, just a passion of mine, and part of my practice. However, some things like the Iliad by Homer and the Bible are timeless. Not always the newer is the better. For instance, I ran into a wonderful article by by Michael C. LaSala, Ph.D., LCSW in Gay and Lesbian Well-Being for Psychology Today where he addresses the issues of “Helping Same-Sex Couples Who’ve Lost That Loving Feeling”

Dr. LaSala stresses the importance -in the midst of our fight for same sex marriage, he addresses how to avoid same sex divorce, and said “…What about couples’ therapy? If your relationship is having problems and you are pursuing this step, that’s a good sign–the prognosis for your partnership is good because people who take action to save (or improve) a troubled relationship often manage to do so. However, if you’re looking for someone to referee your conflicts, or to finally convince your thickheaded partner of your unassailable sense of fairness and the truth, you’ll be sorely disappointed. Over the past 25 years, I have done quite a bit of relationship therapy and here is some of what I have learned that you should keep in mind as you move forward…”

Sometimes, I think couples, LGBT or others just wait too long to seek therapy and sometimes it is too late when they come to see me for help. Perhaps this article will help you to do the right thing in a timely manner (wink-wink). Read Dr. LaSala article

This entry was posted in LGBT Couples Counseling Therapy, LGBT Psychological Issues, LGBT Psychotherapy on June 28th, 2014.
Tags: LGBT Psychotherapy, LGBT therpaist.

Doris Bersing, PhD
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Tag: LGBT Psychotherapy