Gay and lesbian couples Archives - Gay Couple Counselling (UK)

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Does a Counsellor’s Sexuality Factor in Couple Counselling?

Thu, 06 Sep 2012 10:12:59 +0000

Regarding the Gay Counsellor’s Sexuality: influential, detrimental or neutral?

"Rainbow" © Bensa Kua

Does the sexuality of the counsellor make a difference to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered couples when they all work together in couple relationship therapy?

In this post I will discuss briefly my experiences working as a gay counsellor working with LGBT couple clients in my private therapy practice.

Sexuality Differences – alliance or disunion?

Although differences between the counsellor and the client do not have to come into play during therapy, many clients seek therapists (at least initially) with a view that the therapist has to have some form of understanding or experience of the client’s complaint.

A gay male or lesbian female couple may chose to find a gay male or lesbian female therapist – and although the similarities in the therapist’s & the couples’ sexualities should not matter… it does to the couple.

In other words, as a couple counsellor, I do not have to be female to empathise with a female couple and their situation. Although I cannot know what it is like for them from a personal perspective, it is my my training that I can ask the most effective questions so that I can learn what it is like to be this couple in their situation.

Interestingly, a number of gay and lesbian couples who I have worked with have, in varying degrees, expressed dissatisfaction of their previous relationship therapists – citing that the couple should have found someone of the same sexuality instead.

(Male gay couple) “When we told him [the counsellor] about the difficulties in our sex lives, we noticed him shift in his chair noticeably-uncomfortable. We decided not to work with him due to this reaction.”
(Female lesbian couple) “We didn’t understand how an old, little, grey-haired lady could really understand what was happening to our failing sex lives. She was very pleasant, but still…”
(Gay male couple) “Wanted to talk about use of gay saunas for sex (open relationship) but we were too embarrassed to bring it up with our [female] psychotherapist.”

Whilst I’m less convinced that it was the actual sexuality of the therapist (as opposed to, say, the couple’s projection or their reaction to something they might have misunderstood about the therapist) – we must be mindful that the therapeutic alliance between client and counsellor is one of the most effective relationships in therapy. It is within this therapeutic alliance that the therapy work is done and if there is little or no alliance then the couple must be expected to find someone else.

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Systemic Couple Therapy and Depression

Fri, 15 Jun 2012 13:00:10 +0000

“Systemic Couple Therapy and Depression”.

Authors: Elsa Jones, Eia Asen.

ISBN: 1-85575-221-2

In 1991 The London Depression Intervention Trial (LDIT) set out to compare three treatments for depression of individuals: CBT (cognitive behaviour therapy), Systemic Couple Therapy and Anti-Depressants. All approaches were to be manualised (i.e. the intention and approaches by all therapists were documented). This book is mostly the product of the Systemic Couple Therapy portion of the trial (whilst adding appropriate findings from the trial).

The trial concluded that Systemic Couple Therapy achieved better results when treating an individual’s depression than CBT or by anti-depressants.

The CBT patients dropped out (8 out of the first 11) so the CBT arm of the trial had to be stopped at an early stage.

The book is a good review of the therapist’s approach to Systemic Couple therapy.

One should note, however, that the systemic approach was the only one that was treating the depressed in individual in the context of a couple-relationship (ie treated a relationship), whereas the CBT approach and the drug-treatment approach treated the individual. If one were to compare a CBT-couple therapy approach or even an drug-treatment for a couple relationship approach comparing such findings might be interesting.

NB the system couple approach is the main approach practised by our therapist: Dean Richardson.

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Handbook of Structured Techniques in Marriage and Family Therapy

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 12:06:08 +0000

“Handbook of Structured Techniques in Marriage and Family Therapy”.

Authors: Robert Sherman & Norman Fredman.

ISBN: 0-87630-424-2

In couple therapy it’s important that the couple be encouraged and assisted in coming up with their own perturbing solutions to their restricting relationship problems. The therapist “prescribing” courses of action may be helpful, but without the couple’s own investment in their own recovery, prescriptive advice can become like school homework: it has to be done (or avoided) rather than the couple wanting to do it. Some couples struggle to be creative, though. Having behaved how they believed they should have been doing (some for decades), being invited to do something different will be a struggle.

In this book – the authors describe excercises that may give the couple inspiration about what they might invent for themselves.

Each excerise takes the following format:-

A theoretical base (eg Rationale)
An overview of the exercise.
A description of the procedure (how to do the exercise)
An example.
Suggested uses – where this exercise might help
A brief bibliography of resources that cover this exercise.

There are 59 in total.

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Relationship Therapy with Same-Sex Couples

Sun, 10 Jun 2012 16:25:21 +0000

“Relationship Therapy with Same-Sex Couples”.

Editors: Jerry J. Bigner, Joseph L. Wetchler.

ISBN: 0-7890-2555-8

This book is a collection of sections written by therapists who work in therapy with gay and lesbian intimate couple relationships. The book is divided into larger sections, each encompassing two to five articles written by different authors.

This book is therefore useful to refer to when a particular topic comes up in therapy (or in a relationship).

The sections are:-

Clinical Issues with Same Sex Couples.

Clinical Issues with Same-Sex Couples – a review of the Literature.		Colleen M. Connolly
Clinical Issues with Gay Male Couples.		Gil Tunnell David E. Greenan
Identity and Cultural Narrative in a Lesbian Relationship.		M. Theodora Pintzuk
Bisexual Issues in Same-Sex Couple Therapy.		Mary Bradford
Supporting Transgender and Sex Reassignment Issues: Couple and Family Dynamics.		Gianna E. Israel

Sex Therapy with Same-Sex Couples.

A Systems Approach to Sex Therapy with Gay Male Couples.		Michael Bettinger
Resolving the Curious Paradox of the (A)Sexual Lesbian.		Marny Hall

Special Issues with Same-Sex Couples.

Working with Gay and Lesbian Parents		Jerry J. Bigner
Paths and Pitfalls: How Heterosexual Spouses Cope When Their Husbands Or Wives Come Out		Amity Pierce Buxton
An Interpersonal and Intercultural Embrace: A Letter of Reflection on My Gay Male relational Connections.		Eric Aoki

Training Issues for Working with Same-Sex Couples.

The Sexual Orientation Matrix for Supervision: A Tool for training Therapists to Work with Same-Sex Couples.		Janie J. Long Elizabeth Lindsey
A Heterosexual Therapist’s Journey Toward Working with Same-Sex Couples.		Joseph L. Wetchler
Resource on Same-Sex Couples for therapists and Clients.		Debra Wallace Kevin P. Lyness

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