GSRD

Gender, Sexuality, and Relationship Diversity

Gender

More than just male, female, cisgender, and transgender

The question of gender can be a complicated one! So much so that, when taking basic information at the start of working with someone, I don't ask about gender, instead just going for "What pronouns do you prefer?"

Because someone's gender isn't basic information - for every one of us, our gender identity is part of our rich history, experience, and beliefs. And I look forward to learning about you and your own relationship with gender, if you would like to share. If not, so long as I know your pronouns, the rest can be left at the door!

For myself, I really value the experiences I have and, feel that knowing that whether or not the person you're talking to has those experiences in common can be really helpful - it lets you know where you're starting from. So for me;

I have the experience of having been raised and socialised as female.
I have the experience of being perceived and responded to as an adult male.
And I have the experience of identifying as nonbinary - my own identity not being perceived and having to spend a lot of time questioning my own gender.

Sexuality

LGBTQIA+ more

Counselling may or may not include exploration of sexuality, and when it does, that can come in many different forms. It can be a sensitive topic, and many of us were raised with it being taboo. Sexuality can refer to sexual orientation, such as the genders we are attracted to - if any. But it also often includes semi-related topics like romantic orientation, and who we feel most connected to.

And sexuality also refers to our relationship with sex and sexual activity in ways that aren't just about the gender of our partner - kinky or vanilla? Fantasies? How do we feel about ourselves and our bodies as sexual beings?

There's a whole universe of topics under this one word, and yet this can be really hard to explore, in the counselling room but also within sexual relationships themselves. And sexuality can be drastically impacted by our past experiences.

Sometimes this topic can feel like the main focus, but sometimes - if it feels relevant and the counselling space feels safe enough - it can be just one aspect of the big picture to be explored.

As always, this is in your hands.

Relationships

Beyond monogamy, nonmonogamy, and polyamory

Relationships and relationship styles is a huge and diverse topic, and yet many of us have learned a similar template that's very much tied in with gender, sexuality, monogamy, and relationship hierarchy.

This can make trying to figure out what's truly right for us very tricky. Do we want to live with our sexual and romantic partner, or alone, or with someone else? Do we want to be sexual with our romantic partner? How much of our lives do we want to share with them? Does it feel right to have sexual or romantic relations with more than one person? How do we feel about our partner(s) having other relationships?

We try to figure all this out as we go through life, gathering more and more information about the world and ourselves along the way, while at the same time being aware of the social norms and how much they do or don't match up with how we feel. And on top of all that, we then need to figure out how to align that with whatever the other people we are in relationships with feel!

There's a whole world to be explored here, and hopefully I can provide an environment where you can do that with less worry about judgement or expectation.