LGBT Issues therapists in Santa Maria, California CA
LGBT Issues
Erik Edler
Counselor/Therapist, MA, LMFT
This is an important time for LGBT people, one of great opportunity but also one of great challenge. When gay, lesbian, and bisexual people are looking for a therapist, they're looking for someone who really gets them. It's so much easier and you cover a lot more ground a lot faster when you have a therapist that really understands the issues specific to the LGBT community. I have a special calling and dedication to helping gay, lesbian, and bisexual people truly thrive.
23 Years Experience
LGBT Issues
Jonathan Kruger Therapy
Marriage and Family Therapist, LMFT
Members of the LGBT community face unique and multifaceted challenges that add additional layers of complexity to the therapeutic process. It is vital that therapists working with LGBT clients have a deep understanding of these challenges in order to serve as an effective partner in the journey of self-discovery. My work with LGBT clients, as well as my own personal experience, have taught me that throughout each stage of life, LGBT persons are confronted with issues and prejudices that can be easily internalized, resulting in a profound struggle within themselves trying to maintain a healthy sense of self, self-confidence, and self-acceptance.
Indeed, for many LGTB persons, these issues begin early in youth: a significant portion of the LGBT community have faced down unaccepting parents and families, bullies, and, at times, a deeply prejudiced society that teaches from birth that LGBT persons are defective and unworthy. These are messages that wound at a fundamental level and, unfortunately, can reinforce an internalized message of unworthiness and defectiveness. Left unexplored, these external attacks on the self can manifest in many ways: shame which leads to substance abuse, reckless sexual behavior, an inability to sustain long-term intimate relationships.
Another unique aspect of my work with the LGBT community is the continued reverberation of the AIDS crisis that swept the community in the 80s and 90s. While we have made enormous strides in both understanding and the treatment of the HIV virus, learning of an HIV positive diagnosis remains a traumatic life event, where one’s sense of self may become gravely damaged or perhaps even destroyed. In addition, a large portion of the LGBT community directly experienced the peak of the AIDS crisis, and faced the untimely loss of beloved friends and colleagues, leading to intense bereavement, grief, and the relentless death of entire communities. The effects were and are ravaging; the trauma intense and enduring.
Furthermore another challenge facing this generation of openly gay men is that they are the first entering old age openly gay and out of the closet. How to not become invisible to the community, disappear and lose all sense of oneself becomes a vital priority. There have been few role models, no one demonstrating how to age in a successful, happy, purposeful way. So with age comes the loss of physical vitality and attributes, which for many gay men has been the leading currency of their lives. How does one reinvent oneself so as to stay vital and relevant, or risk slipping into the invisibility cloak that old age often brings upon gay men and people in general?
In treating the LGBT community, I strive toward creating and fulfilling a sense of completeness and wholeness within the self. Working empathically, slowly and deliberately to heal old wounds, and eradicate the innate sense of defectiveness. Always seeking to understand the sources from which that sense of defectiveness derived. With insights, understanding, processing and evaluating we then begin to reinstate a sense of enough-ness, perfection (even where there may be imperfection), wholeness, and completeness within and unto the self. It is a journey of self discovery which I have lived, understand and continually work on healing.
Slowly building understanding and conviction that the LGBT person is as complete and perfect as any other differently sexually identified person. The goal is to create and improve a strong, authentic sense of self, not one that needs to be propped up by the creation of a “false self” in order to be loveable or to feel adequate and enough.
11 Years Experience
LGBT Issues
Renée Rising Sun Peyton
Licensed Clinical Social Worker, LCSW
My practice is welcoming, accepting and affirming of the unique struggles of the LGBT community.
24 Years Experience
LGBT Issues
Christina L. Gietzen-Haraden
Psychologist, Psy.D
LGBTQIA+ ally. Dr. Christina Gietzen has experience working with individuals in various stages of LQBTQIA+ sexuality and identity development. Dr. Gietzen is client-centered, meaning that she is open and accepting of her client’s identity and sexuality and does not judge or shame her clients.
23 Years Experience
LGBT Issues
Provia Psychology
Counselor/Therapist, LMFT, LCSW, AMFT, APCC
Many of our team's clinical training has been with the LGBTQIA communities. We specialize in helping clients navigate coming out experiences, anxiety, depression, trauma, and bereavement. We also recognize the ways societal oppression impacts marginalized voices. In therapy, we value creating a safe, warm, trusting environment where you will develop new insight into your life and cultivate new strategies to meet your goals. You are not meant to do this alone and we would be honored to help you along your journey!
7 Years Experience