For more information, or to schedule an appointment, call 323 422 2036
LGBTQQIP2SA+
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans+, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, Pansexual, Two-Spirit (2S), Asexual
SGM/SGD Sexual and Gender Minority and Sexual and Gender Diversity; AltSex
SGRM Sexual, Gender, and Relational Minority
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans+, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, Pansexual, Two-Spirit (2S), Asexual
SGM/SGD Sexual and Gender Minority and Sexual and Gender Diversity; AltSex
SGRM Sexual, Gender, and Relational Minority
Girlhood: Growing up closeted in the American South of the 20th Century
Out of the Closet and into the Streets
SELF CONCEIVED
In my life and work with sexually minoritized cultures since my own coming out, beginning at the age of 20 (4th, 5th and 6th photos), I have seen the challenges that arise with every kind of transition. Whether it's gender affirming surgery, the fluid nature of sexuality, blending families, seeking ways to maintain one's self esteem as we age, or struggling with deeply held religious convictions about sex; there is much beauty and growth to be found that comes out of these trials.
In my life and work with sexually minoritized cultures since my own coming out, beginning at the age of 20 (4th, 5th and 6th photos), I have seen the challenges that arise with every kind of transition. Whether it's gender affirming surgery, the fluid nature of sexuality, blending families, seeking ways to maintain one's self esteem as we age, or struggling with deeply held religious convictions about sex; there is much beauty and growth to be found that comes out of these trials.
🪲🪲🪲
As Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans+, and Queers we have been subjected to sexual and gendered hierarchical divisions of and between people whenever we encountered adversity, intolerance, and various other legal or social, personal or interpersonal challenges in our day to day lives; including, lack of support due to our queerness.
Divisions have been imposed By
Family, Partner's Families, Partners, Friends, Co-Workers
Federal, State and Local Governments
Social Media Comments, Symbols, Memes, Pictures, Stories
State and Religious Leaders, Local and National Businesses
Fellow LGBTQ and Dominant Cultural Folk.
I live, love, work, and politic as queer. And, I am a certified specialist who understands the value of Affirmative support and care.
Self Acceptance is Social Identity:
Affirmative therapy invites people to honestly express themselves as individuals in these hierarchies that have pre-dated all of us and spliced us into minorities (SGM).
In our work together, we explore how to update personal narratives more accurately, and then integrate these newly understood complexities with others when we engage them, or are engaged by them. We practice articulating self-affirming ideas, personal values, and pro-social behaviors at any given opportunity. This invites each of us to re-enter the broader hierarchical categories of diversities (SGD) as a more fully formed, expressive person who thinks and acts from a place of self-love, rather than from a place of self-loathing, self-promotion, or self-obsession.
To be subjugated by these hierarchies serves to sustain divisions -within us- internally, as we act from either a 'false self' thereby projecting superficial tolerance (conformity); or we act from fear- which looks like submissiveness or anger.
Affirmative therapy invites people to honestly express themselves as individuals in these hierarchies that have pre-dated all of us and spliced us into minorities (SGM).
In our work together, we explore how to update personal narratives more accurately, and then integrate these newly understood complexities with others when we engage them, or are engaged by them. We practice articulating self-affirming ideas, personal values, and pro-social behaviors at any given opportunity. This invites each of us to re-enter the broader hierarchical categories of diversities (SGD) as a more fully formed, expressive person who thinks and acts from a place of self-love, rather than from a place of self-loathing, self-promotion, or self-obsession.
To be subjugated by these hierarchies serves to sustain divisions -within us- internally, as we act from either a 'false self' thereby projecting superficial tolerance (conformity); or we act from fear- which looks like submissiveness or anger.
Our Internal Divisions can be identified in:
Body Responses
Sighing, Flinching, Bracing, Gripping
Thoughts
Negative Feedback Loops such as Rumination and Perseveration
Emotions
Unrelenting Despair, Agitation, Inability to feel Hope or Joy
Behaviors
Violence and Vitriol
Body Responses
Sighing, Flinching, Bracing, Gripping
Thoughts
Negative Feedback Loops such as Rumination and Perseveration
Emotions
Unrelenting Despair, Agitation, Inability to feel Hope or Joy
Behaviors
Violence and Vitriol
Minoritized Groups:
Historically, non-white and non-straight people have been 'grouped' and devalued in American society. This devaluing has encompassed how people in these apportioned groups get represented and the degree to which they (we) have access to resources. Basically, minoritizing people rationalizes unequal access. Traditionally, groups designated in this position have been referred to as a minority (n) group. Now, in the 2020s, accurate language usage encourages the term minoritized (v) to better capture the active dynamics that create and, therefore, attempt to assign lower societal status to specific groups.
This terminology (shifting a noun to a verb) specifically signals that a group’s status is not necessarily related to how many or few in numbers there are of a given group in the population at large. It is used as a means to identify a dominant class subordinating persons as groups.
Historically, non-white and non-straight people have been 'grouped' and devalued in American society. This devaluing has encompassed how people in these apportioned groups get represented and the degree to which they (we) have access to resources. Basically, minoritizing people rationalizes unequal access. Traditionally, groups designated in this position have been referred to as a minority (n) group. Now, in the 2020s, accurate language usage encourages the term minoritized (v) to better capture the active dynamics that create and, therefore, attempt to assign lower societal status to specific groups.
This terminology (shifting a noun to a verb) specifically signals that a group’s status is not necessarily related to how many or few in numbers there are of a given group in the population at large. It is used as a means to identify a dominant class subordinating persons as groups.
QUEER HISTORY BEAT
Did you know:
The AIDS crisis is where the seeds of Marriage Equality begin...
The AIDS crisis is where the seeds of Marriage Equality begin...
We were losing our lovers and partners and had no legal access to them as they died or were hospitalized; we then had no rights to our own houses, our own monies, our joined keepsakes, our pets, or our dignity that we had created together
AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) 1987
Cleve Jones created the first panel for the AIDS Memorial Quilt (the Names Project) in memory of his friend Marvin Feldman. In June of 1987, Jones teamed up with Mike Smith, Gert McMullin and several others to formally organize the NAMES Project Foundation.
First showing of the Names Project in Washington, DC October 11, 1987
October 11th would become National Coming Out Day
This is an LGBTQIA+ and Sex Positive Space
Together, you and I explore how we in queer culture can begin to dismantle hierarchies that have oppressed each of us via sex, gender, class, race, disability and species. In our communities and in our country, these are borders that operate only to divide (yes, even within LGBTQIA+ cultures). Our work uncovers how we can shamelessly enter into new family situations as partners with children from previous relationships, emerge into more honestly understood versions of self, or communicate with new and old partners within dyadic, triadic, circle (Poly) relationships with integrity, consistency and reliability.
Our therapeutic discussions begin and end with a commmitment to non-violence (including self !) and harm reduction, as we strategize to sincerely communicate to be accurately heard and to genuinely listen to what another person is intending to have understood: be they on-line, in line, or in-person. We are interested in productivity that is not unmovingly invested in oppositional ideas, nor are we interested in policing each other's language.
We have got to pull it together, this country is ailing, and we as LGBTQIA+ are the people to practice tolerance as so many of us have a lived-understanding of what it means to be harmed.
Our therapeutic discussions begin and end with a commmitment to non-violence (including self !) and harm reduction, as we strategize to sincerely communicate to be accurately heard and to genuinely listen to what another person is intending to have understood: be they on-line, in line, or in-person. We are interested in productivity that is not unmovingly invested in oppositional ideas, nor are we interested in policing each other's language.
We have got to pull it together, this country is ailing, and we as LGBTQIA+ are the people to practice tolerance as so many of us have a lived-understanding of what it means to be harmed.
Our work together is disinterested in separation, borders, privileging, demeaning or degradating our lovers, neighbors, strangers, animals, environment, fellow travelers, or self. Simply put, this is anarchy without opposition; this is harm-reduction as activism. For one to be free we cannot solely rely on 'this-us|that-them,' as these opposites then require the very thing they are attempting to be rid of. Our work is to blur the lines, diffuse the rigid boxes, and not force ourselves to have to reconcile everything; but rather, begin to practice living with what actually occurs most frequently; the unresolved, the imperfect, and the failed attempt.
To truly feel well, we act with responsibility and, in turn, choices come about and then contexts begin to feel more available, less urgent, and spaciousness grows.
You and I can explore various strength-based avenues of the coming out process, or we can collaborate approaches for you and your partner to deepen your understanding of who you each are as a sexually mixed orientation couple. We can also discuss sex to assist you and a partner in communicating with greater clarity to increase satisfaction, or being GGG: Good, Giving and Game (Savage; 2007)
THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES
Safe = identifying risks to health
Sane = sensible mind frame
Consensual = full consent of all parties
Sane = sensible mind frame
Consensual = full consent of all parties
Emily Nagoski, Model of Consent
I am a Sex Positive and Poly Affirmative clinician.
Sex is never 'wrong' or 'bad,' when it is Safe, Sane, and Consensual
Sex is never 'wrong' or 'bad,' when it is Safe, Sane, and Consensual
I am queer, specialized and certified in LGBTQIA+, and am also an AAMFT member who enlists these guidelines
Gender Expansive Folk
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Gender Expansive Folk
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Authenticity is the Pilgrimage of Self-Fidelity
Affirmative therapy supports and engages the emergence from assumed/socialized identities; TGNB, TGD, AFAB, AMAB, UAAB, and/or MtX, FtX, XtX, non-cis, non-gender, or bi-gender individuals. It affirms trans youth by supporting kids who speak about and present themselves in ways that are insistent, persistent, and consistent. For people who want to explore transitioning, we work to come up with timelines, plans, financial costs and resourcing, such as, How to Come Out... to whom... when and what affordable support will be needed before and after coming out, or before and after surgeries. Of course, some clients do not feel a need to transition in any social or physical form, and this is fully respected and supported. For those who feel that more specific approaches better determine who they are, we explore Social (interpersonal), Legal (name, gender marker, government documents), or Medical*(hormones, electrolysis, prosthetics, surgery) transitioning. Some people call their transitioning a journey so as not to delineate any sections or linearity of time.
*Transmedicalism or transmed (noun) is a belief held by some trans folk that being transgender is contingent on experience and gender dysphoria, as well as undergoing medical treatment and transitioning. Trans Gender Diverse (TGD) communities are vast and varied. For those who hold this essentialist belief in gender dysphoria, they may be referred to colloquially by other TGD people.
Currently, 21 states restrict access to transcare as of July, 2023. The actual number of trans people in the United States is 0.6% of the US population, which is 1.6 million people according to Dr. Marci Bowers, MD, President (WPATH).
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I am certified in Affirmative Therapy with a Specialization in LGBTQIA+ populations and follow APA guidelines, the ALGBTIC competencies, and the WPATH Standards of Care. For clients who 'don't know' about their gender identity and are in the questioning position and interested in digging a little deeper, I might ask things along these lines: How do you embody and affirm gender? What makes you feel most like your fully embodied self? What forms of transitioning are part of your path?
Affirmative therapy supports trans gender diverse peoples' understandings of their own emergence, in part, with chromosomes as opposed to social constructs. For instance, the World Health Organization (WHO) has a number of chromosomal variation definitions: XX, XY; only X (monosomic); only Y (monosomic); and the polysomic categories of: XXX, XYY, XXY. Some females are born with XY and some males who are XX. The WHO specifies that 'there are 23 pairs of chromosomes in the human cell.' For more information, please read about monsomy and trisomy effects of sex chromosomes, their tolerances and inactivations.
*Transmedicalism or transmed (noun) is a belief held by some trans folk that being transgender is contingent on experience and gender dysphoria, as well as undergoing medical treatment and transitioning. Trans Gender Diverse (TGD) communities are vast and varied. For those who hold this essentialist belief in gender dysphoria, they may be referred to colloquially by other TGD people.
Currently, 21 states restrict access to transcare as of July, 2023. The actual number of trans people in the United States is 0.6% of the US population, which is 1.6 million people according to Dr. Marci Bowers, MD, President (WPATH).
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I am certified in Affirmative Therapy with a Specialization in LGBTQIA+ populations and follow APA guidelines, the ALGBTIC competencies, and the WPATH Standards of Care. For clients who 'don't know' about their gender identity and are in the questioning position and interested in digging a little deeper, I might ask things along these lines: How do you embody and affirm gender? What makes you feel most like your fully embodied self? What forms of transitioning are part of your path?
Affirmative therapy supports trans gender diverse peoples' understandings of their own emergence, in part, with chromosomes as opposed to social constructs. For instance, the World Health Organization (WHO) has a number of chromosomal variation definitions: XX, XY; only X (monosomic); only Y (monosomic); and the polysomic categories of: XXX, XYY, XXY. Some females are born with XY and some males who are XX. The WHO specifies that 'there are 23 pairs of chromosomes in the human cell.' For more information, please read about monsomy and trisomy effects of sex chromosomes, their tolerances and inactivations.
Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR)
STAR was a gay, gender non-conforming and transvestite street activist organization in New York City for drag queens of color.
Founders: Marsha P Johnson, Sylvia Rivera
1970 - 1973
STAR was a gay, gender non-conforming and transvestite street activist organization in New York City for drag queens of color.
Founders: Marsha P Johnson, Sylvia Rivera
1970 - 1973
Marsha P Johnson March, 1970
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MJP with Sylvia Rivera, circa 1989.
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Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera. NYC City Hall Rally for Gay Rights, 1973 (center)
Gender Expansive Youth
Affirmative therapy also collaborates in ways for us to responsibly reach out, support, and advocate for youth who isolate or withdraw due to safety and shaming concerns at play and at school because they are LGBTQIA+. For instance, the normative developmental tasks of many transgender or non-binary folk may be complicated or compromised by self identity and/or sexuality confusion, anxiety and depression, suicidal ideation and behavior, non-suicidal self-injury, substance abuse, academic failure, homelessness, internalized transphobia (cissexism), STD/HIV infection, addiction, and other mental health challenges.
Transgender Seniors
Affirmative therapy understands that the typical developmental tasks of transgender seniors are often complicated or compromised by social isolation and invisibility. In addition, medical problems, transgender-related health concerns, family-of-origin conflicts, and limited career options, especially for those with developmental disabilities are often present for Elder trans+ folk (ALGBTIC 2009).
Letters of Support for Gender Affirming Surgery
For clients with whom I have been working and know their triumphs, struggles, goals and self-regard, I am available to offer these. Why trans+ clients are subjected to this level of scrutiny and oversight when other people having physiologically affirming surgeries do not require a letter, is unconscionable. Period.
However, until we can eliminate trans bias in the medical field, I'm happy to write GAS letters with enthusiasm, sincerity, and conviction.
Affirmative therapy also collaborates in ways for us to responsibly reach out, support, and advocate for youth who isolate or withdraw due to safety and shaming concerns at play and at school because they are LGBTQIA+. For instance, the normative developmental tasks of many transgender or non-binary folk may be complicated or compromised by self identity and/or sexuality confusion, anxiety and depression, suicidal ideation and behavior, non-suicidal self-injury, substance abuse, academic failure, homelessness, internalized transphobia (cissexism), STD/HIV infection, addiction, and other mental health challenges.
Transgender Seniors
Affirmative therapy understands that the typical developmental tasks of transgender seniors are often complicated or compromised by social isolation and invisibility. In addition, medical problems, transgender-related health concerns, family-of-origin conflicts, and limited career options, especially for those with developmental disabilities are often present for Elder trans+ folk (ALGBTIC 2009).
Letters of Support for Gender Affirming Surgery
For clients with whom I have been working and know their triumphs, struggles, goals and self-regard, I am available to offer these. Why trans+ clients are subjected to this level of scrutiny and oversight when other people having physiologically affirming surgeries do not require a letter, is unconscionable. Period.
However, until we can eliminate trans bias in the medical field, I'm happy to write GAS letters with enthusiasm, sincerity, and conviction.
✩
Queer Culture
Competent Care is Orientation Affirming
Queer Culture
Competent Care is Orientation Affirming
Naming Practices:
Historically sexual, gendered and relational minorities (SGRM) have been named by the medical and scientific fields in terms that promoted pathology. As SGRM people, we have fought many battles for our right to determine the names by which we call ourselves, in public discourse. Self-labeling is an important aspect to determine one’s own community, social network, and relationships in which same-gender or multi-partner pairing is shared and supported. It helps ensure purposeful meaning, empowerment and group affiliation and, in turn, results as political action.
What we call ourselves, has implications for political practice. Ask any cis or transgender female regardless of ethnicity or sexuality who was coming up in the 1970s what her honorific was and then became, through daily conversations with family, church, temple, school or institutions. This naming practice was repeatedly stated and established specifically by each person from Miss or Mrs. to Ms for those whom this variation felt more textured.
As an LGBTQIA+ affirmative clinician and queer elder, I am here to help support, acknowledge, and assist people who subscribe to any number of the Umbrella Identities, and who actively and continuously redefine current ways of sense-making within the realm of queering.
Historically sexual, gendered and relational minorities (SGRM) have been named by the medical and scientific fields in terms that promoted pathology. As SGRM people, we have fought many battles for our right to determine the names by which we call ourselves, in public discourse. Self-labeling is an important aspect to determine one’s own community, social network, and relationships in which same-gender or multi-partner pairing is shared and supported. It helps ensure purposeful meaning, empowerment and group affiliation and, in turn, results as political action.
What we call ourselves, has implications for political practice. Ask any cis or transgender female regardless of ethnicity or sexuality who was coming up in the 1970s what her honorific was and then became, through daily conversations with family, church, temple, school or institutions. This naming practice was repeatedly stated and established specifically by each person from Miss or Mrs. to Ms for those whom this variation felt more textured.
As an LGBTQIA+ affirmative clinician and queer elder, I am here to help support, acknowledge, and assist people who subscribe to any number of the Umbrella Identities, and who actively and continuously redefine current ways of sense-making within the realm of queering.
Cultural identity... is a matter of 'becoming' as well as of 'being'. It belongs to the future as much as to the past. It is not something which already exists, transcending place, time, history, and culture. Cultural identities come from somewhere, have histories. But, like everything which is historical, they undergo constant trans-formation
-Stuart Hall
-Stuart Hall
Here are some of the Possibilities:
The Progress Flag
Lesbian, WSW, Gay, MSM, Aro/Ace, Gray, Allosexual, Ambiamorous, Asexual, Ace Spectrum identities (see aphobia below), Queerplatonic/qpp (qpr), Bisexual, Transgender, Metagender, Transsexual, Queer, Queer People of Color (QPOC), BlaQ/BlaQueer, Questioning, Queen, Intersex, Androsexual, Ally, Aspec, Butch, Boi, Feminine of Center (FOC), Femmesexual, Gynosexual, Masculine of Center (MOC), NB, Enby, Non-binary, Non-Cis, Neutrois, Trans*, Transmasculine, Transfeminine, Transfag, Trans Gender Non Binary (TGNB) community, Tryke, Demi (Middle English/Anglo French meaning half/partial/mid; both and only): sexual, gender, boy, girl; Homomasculine, Heterosexual (Latin for combine the other); Ceterosexual (Latin for other; for the rest); Skoliosexual (Greek for bent); Twink, Bear, Dyke, Soft Butch, Pan-Sexual, Solo Polyamory, Singleish, Single & Poly, Pan-Romantic, Poly-Gendered, Pan-Gendered, Bi-gender, XTX, Two-Spirit (winkte or bloka egla wa ke among the Lakota and the nadleeh among the Navajo people), John-Sexual, PoMoSexual, Gender Non-conforming (GNC), Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC), Genderqueer, Genderfluid, Genderfxxk, Gendervague, Fellagirly, Ladyboy, Cisgender, Cissexual, Fluid, Heteroflexible, Girlfag, Guydyke, Slash, Butch, Stud, aggressive/AG, Dom, Macha, Tomboi along with the varieties of personal pronouns: They, Them, Their; or neo-pronouns: Xie, Xim, Xie; Zie, Zim, Zir; Fae, Faer, Faers, Ey, Em, Eir; Ne, Nem, Nir; Zie, Zem, Zir or Mr., Ms., Miss., or Mx. just to name a few.
The term FOC indicates a range of terms of gender identity and gender presentation for folk who present, understand themselves, and/or relate to others in a more feminine way, but don’t necessarily identify as women. Feminine-of-center individuals may also identify as femme, submissive, transfeminine and more*
The term MOC acknowledges all breadth and depths of identity for lesbian or queer women, who present with masculinity. It scales and establishes ranging identities, such as: butch, stud, aggressive/AG, dom, macha, tomboi, trans-masculine and more*
Aphobia is prejudice against asexual and aromantic people. It is unfortunately extremely common in all groups of people from heterosexual and queer folk.
The term FOC indicates a range of terms of gender identity and gender presentation for folk who present, understand themselves, and/or relate to others in a more feminine way, but don’t necessarily identify as women. Feminine-of-center individuals may also identify as femme, submissive, transfeminine and more*
The term MOC acknowledges all breadth and depths of identity for lesbian or queer women, who present with masculinity. It scales and establishes ranging identities, such as: butch, stud, aggressive/AG, dom, macha, tomboi, trans-masculine and more*
Aphobia is prejudice against asexual and aromantic people. It is unfortunately extremely common in all groups of people from heterosexual and queer folk.
"Every Dyke is a Hero, Just Being Herself." A comic drawn by Leslie Ewing published in the program guide for the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation, 1990
▫️Queer Commentaries depict Devoted Caring Relationships▫️
non exclusive, non amorous, queer platonic, adult care networks that challenge Amatonormativty
Xena and Gabrielle
Spock and Kirk
Celie and Shug
Akira Hino and Taeko Nagafuji
Holmes and Watson
non exclusive, non amorous, queer platonic, adult care networks that challenge Amatonormativty
Xena and Gabrielle
Spock and Kirk
Celie and Shug
Akira Hino and Taeko Nagafuji
Holmes and Watson
Harold Norse says, “Poetry meant being a sissy and worse. A fairy.
A friend of mine once asked me why all poets were fairies. Well, I answered, that's because they can fly”
🔰
A friend of mine once asked me why all poets were fairies. Well, I answered, that's because they can fly”
🔰
Companioned Cultures
As queer folk we choose to ‘couple’ in variations from monogamy to open relationships to being non-monogamous to having our place in polycules, constellations or webs. Additionally, language is a vital piece in designing sexual and companioned cultures. Language (queer linguistics) is dynamic and enlists identification of agreed roles and understandings.
Terms such as: significant other, husband, wife, partner, nesting partner, metamour, to more structural terms such as primary, secondary tertiary, quad, circle... all convey who we are in relation to the system we have chosen. And in all of these system designs- ethics- are always recommended. Practicing agreements along with boundaries helps to soften jealousies and envy. When practiced honestly, an internal sense of safety becomes more accessible and manageable. We remain invested in treating others better than we would want to be treated; leading us to find joy in our partner(s) joy. It’s playfully adult, it’s honest and it magnifies a prism delightfully twisted with humility and pride.
I am poly and altsex affirmative and can help with clarifying limits and consent, time management, self care for monos, being solo, discussing boundaries with consent, such as, sobriety; talking respectfully through jealousy, etc.
Starting our own Biological Families:
For many of us, starting our own families is now the focus for lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people. Queer Donors and partners have been coming together in our community for years. This kind of family building requires education, strategy, and commitment. If you are partnered, or a donor who knows partners with whom you may be teaming up with together, I'm pleased to let you know that for over ten years I have worked with a dozen combinations of folk who collaborated to create family. For LGBTQIA+ people this decision is never taken lightly and requires extensive research, flexible planning, money for procedures that may require multiple attempts; tenacity, and a large degree of tolerance and readiness with some less than progressive medical staff, schools, and insurance companies.
Please click the link below for more details:
Queer Partner Assisted Reproduction (Q-PAR) sessions
Companioned Cultures
As queer folk we choose to ‘couple’ in variations from monogamy to open relationships to being non-monogamous to having our place in polycules, constellations or webs. Additionally, language is a vital piece in designing sexual and companioned cultures. Language (queer linguistics) is dynamic and enlists identification of agreed roles and understandings.
Terms such as: significant other, husband, wife, partner, nesting partner, metamour, to more structural terms such as primary, secondary tertiary, quad, circle... all convey who we are in relation to the system we have chosen. And in all of these system designs- ethics- are always recommended. Practicing agreements along with boundaries helps to soften jealousies and envy. When practiced honestly, an internal sense of safety becomes more accessible and manageable. We remain invested in treating others better than we would want to be treated; leading us to find joy in our partner(s) joy. It’s playfully adult, it’s honest and it magnifies a prism delightfully twisted with humility and pride.
I am poly and altsex affirmative and can help with clarifying limits and consent, time management, self care for monos, being solo, discussing boundaries with consent, such as, sobriety; talking respectfully through jealousy, etc.
Starting our own Biological Families:
For many of us, starting our own families is now the focus for lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people. Queer Donors and partners have been coming together in our community for years. This kind of family building requires education, strategy, and commitment. If you are partnered, or a donor who knows partners with whom you may be teaming up with together, I'm pleased to let you know that for over ten years I have worked with a dozen combinations of folk who collaborated to create family. For LGBTQIA+ people this decision is never taken lightly and requires extensive research, flexible planning, money for procedures that may require multiple attempts; tenacity, and a large degree of tolerance and readiness with some less than progressive medical staff, schools, and insurance companies.
Please click the link below for more details:
Queer Partner Assisted Reproduction (Q-PAR) sessions
I am queer, specialized and certified in LGBTQIA+, and am also a GLMA Member
GLMA
is a national organization of Health professionals advancing LGBTQ+ equality.
We are committed to ensuring health equity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals, and to
advancing equality for LGBTQ/SGM health professionals in both our work and learning environments
is a national organization of Health professionals advancing LGBTQ+ equality.
We are committed to ensuring health equity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals, and to
advancing equality for LGBTQ/SGM health professionals in both our work and learning environments
Whether you are Seeking Therapy to Discuss:
Exploration of Compulsory Sexuality in Western Cultures that lack genuine Cultural Sensitivity
Heterosexism and its younger sibling Cissexism
Ostracism related to the Charmed Circle queerly known as Mononormativity (Rubin, 1984).
Amatonormativity (link) which prompts the sacrifice of other relationships to romantic love/marriage. It relegates friendship and solitudinousness to cultural invisibility
Previous Homonegative Diagnostics
Shunning
Pursuit of Orientation Affirming Services
Self-Disclosure as trust building
Coming Out as safety building
Safety Planning: discrimination, risk for HIV infection, suicide, or homelessness
The Variations of Queer Experience circulating in Cultural Historicity
Queering
Identity Formation and Identity Foreclosure with sex and gender
Ambiamory
Poly or ethical non-monogamy (ENM)
Need to Know vs. Need to Share: finding the sweet spot between sharing and protecting information in Poly/ENM agreements
Languaging (queer linguistics and socio linguistics)
The Pros or Cons of Marriage Equality or the profound comprehension of Misogamy (link) --ask a divorcee!
LGBTI and Queer History and How Race and Sexuality have been intricately tied since Cultures began
Lack of Support: the Null Environment (link).
Queer Parenting and Institutional Bias
Or our Gay devotion to Betty White (Rest In Peace Queen)
Exploration of Compulsory Sexuality in Western Cultures that lack genuine Cultural Sensitivity
Heterosexism and its younger sibling Cissexism
Ostracism related to the Charmed Circle queerly known as Mononormativity (Rubin, 1984).
Amatonormativity (link) which prompts the sacrifice of other relationships to romantic love/marriage. It relegates friendship and solitudinousness to cultural invisibility
Previous Homonegative Diagnostics
Shunning
Pursuit of Orientation Affirming Services
Self-Disclosure as trust building
Coming Out as safety building
Safety Planning: discrimination, risk for HIV infection, suicide, or homelessness
The Variations of Queer Experience circulating in Cultural Historicity
Queering
Identity Formation and Identity Foreclosure with sex and gender
Ambiamory
Poly or ethical non-monogamy (ENM)
Need to Know vs. Need to Share: finding the sweet spot between sharing and protecting information in Poly/ENM agreements
Languaging (queer linguistics and socio linguistics)
The Pros or Cons of Marriage Equality or the profound comprehension of Misogamy (link) --ask a divorcee!
LGBTI and Queer History and How Race and Sexuality have been intricately tied since Cultures began
Lack of Support: the Null Environment (link).
Queer Parenting and Institutional Bias
Or our Gay devotion to Betty White (Rest In Peace Queen)
You first need a therapist who not only relates to you but one who fully understands the dynamics of
queer language, vibrancy of culture, and subcultural nuances and contexts that come with
LIVING AS AN LGBTQIA+ PERSON.
I Do. Because I Am.
🦚
Self-Acceptance
Is a beneficial topic, as well as, one of the keys along the journey and this establishes a true sense of pride where social bonds are made and maintained even when conflict occurs from time to time. Shame and hurt, on the other hand, are what we live with when relationships are at risk, and these maintain their hold when we are not interested in cooperation, but rather, are beholden to declaring and enforcing opposites, supporting divisions, and using separation as a boundary instead of agency and insight.
The resulting pain serves as a reminder of what was and is authentically desired.
I am here to help you invest in your own potential and well-being and to celebrate the unique individual that you are. If you are LGBTQQP2SIAA+ or even if you're SOFFA (significant other, friend, family, ally) you are both the source and a resource to your own happiness and rightful potential.
Together, you and I can reduce concerns, improve your sense of self, and deepen your understanding of who you envision yourself to be as a healthy, informed, and contributing youth, adult, or senior member of the Southern California LGBTQQP2SIAA+ communities.
I look forward to talking with you.
Affirmatively yours,
kj
Is a beneficial topic, as well as, one of the keys along the journey and this establishes a true sense of pride where social bonds are made and maintained even when conflict occurs from time to time. Shame and hurt, on the other hand, are what we live with when relationships are at risk, and these maintain their hold when we are not interested in cooperation, but rather, are beholden to declaring and enforcing opposites, supporting divisions, and using separation as a boundary instead of agency and insight.
The resulting pain serves as a reminder of what was and is authentically desired.
I am here to help you invest in your own potential and well-being and to celebrate the unique individual that you are. If you are LGBTQQP2SIAA+ or even if you're SOFFA (significant other, friend, family, ally) you are both the source and a resource to your own happiness and rightful potential.
Together, you and I can reduce concerns, improve your sense of self, and deepen your understanding of who you envision yourself to be as a healthy, informed, and contributing youth, adult, or senior member of the Southern California LGBTQQP2SIAA+ communities.
I look forward to talking with you.
Affirmatively yours,
kj
The first official Gay organization founded March 12, 1987 to bring attention to the AIDS epidemic
Postcard advertising ACT UP’s same-sex kiss-in event to challenge homophobia during the AIDS crisis, created by Gran Fury, May 1988
LGBTQ activist organization founded in March 20, 1990 in New York City, by HIV/AIDS activists from ACT UP
Since the 1980s, one of my sisters was concerned that I would get 'gay bashed.' I naïvely believed that lesbians were not so much at risk for this. Her abiding disquiet eventually proved correct. I was attacked and severely beaten very late one night in the early aughts. After the assault, I was full of paralysis and fright. I agonized over a vexing question, who am I now? The shrill hate filled howl in my attacker's voice and his intemperate fists had turned me into a chattering knot. From that life altering experience, I knew there was no great place to get to. I was already here, feeling every moment which had taken me from severity to sensitivity and from action to inaction. Twenty something years later, I genuinely understand that we lose from time to time ...and that viability is legitimacy, itself. I am still a pacifist, although this trudging endurance has forged a champion inside of me.
Kristin F Jones, LMFT (Clearing: PTSD and Elsewhere, 2023)
joie de vivre
Queer Nation, "Take Back the Night March" NYC, 1990
The Department of Homeland Security warns that violence against LGBTQ+ people is on the rise and intensifying, resulting in members of our community being 9 times more likely to be victims of violent hate crime (and see the actual data in the research link below)
Hate crimes against LGBT people: National Crime Victimization Survey, 2017-2019
Hate crimes against LGBT people: National Crime Victimization Survey, 2017-2019
Being 'Queer' and 'Hollywood' are the same, they're each a shorthand for 'specifically anything'
-kj's tip to some exceptionally invested parents of a non binary teen
QUEER ELDER: I lost countless friends during the AIDS crisis, and to drugs and alcohol, and sadly to suicide. Being queer in this country has brought immense pain to nearly everyone of us who are LGBTQIA. I am a proud lesbian and certified Affirmative Therapist, who works in honor of those beautiful lives lost and with whom I had the luck to live among when they roamed. May every LGBTQIA+ child, adult, and elder stand tall. PRIDE is something you carry in your body when you have had to survive and beat the odds on a daily basis, As to wearing Birkenstocks... well, I've been doing that since 1979. It was a clue that even my mother picked up on.