Supporting LGBTQIA clients in relationship therapy requires more than adapting existing models — it involves queering our therapeutic practices and assumptions. Traditional ideas about sex, love, and gender are often shaped by cisnormative and heteronormative norms, which can limit the relevance and inclusivity of therapy for queer service users.
This self-access class considers how Psychosexual and Relationship Therapists can draw on queer theory, narrative therapy, and post-modern approaches to make therapy more responsive to current LGBTQIA lives and relationships.
You will learn:
- Queering therapy practices: Explore how dominant assumptions about gender and sexuality shape therapy and how to challenge them.
- Using theory in practice: Understand how concepts from queer theory and narrative therapy can inform relationship therapy with LGBTQIA service users.
- Therapist use of self: Reflect on how therapists’ own identities and practices can become valuable resources when working alongside queer couples, families, and diverse relational structures.
This is an edited recording of Amanda Middleton’s live presentation at the 2022 COSRT Conference; Gender, Sexual and Relationship Diversity in Modern Therapy.
About The Trainer
Amanda Middleton
Amanda is a white, queer, antipodean Systemic Psychotherapist and Supervisor. She has been a passionate fighter for putting queer lives at the centre of knowledge-making for more than 20 years. Initially qualifying as a Psychologist in Australia and then a Systemic Psychotherapist in the UK, Amanda has specialised in working with LGBTQIA+ people, families, and relationships.
Her clinical home is The Pink Practice, and she also delivers training and supervision for therapists and counsellors at Gendered Intelligence. A keen educator and supervisor, Amanda is the Theory Lead for the MA in Systemic Psychotherapy at the Tavistock and teaches on various therapy training courses. Her favourite things so far in 2022 are vegan ice cream, leaving the house and the disruptive potential of joy.
