This week on The Alternative, with Terry LeGrand, I chatted with Terry about whether a gay person necessarily needs to choose a gay therapist. We got a good discussion going. Terry, like many gay men, said off the top of his head that he’d prefer a gay man to be his therapist (if he ever sees a therapist) – but I made a pretty good case that times are changing, and if I, and other gay therapists, are going to continue to see straight patients, maybe gay people should give straight – gay-supportive – therapists a try. It might make the world a better place – who knows?
Here’s the link to hear the show. My segment starts about 2 minutes in.
Here’s the link to Terry’s website.
As usual, you’d be crazy not to stick around and hear the whole show. Terry interviews author Christopher Rice, followed by the legendary and very wacky comedians, Bruce Vilanch and Rip Taylor. The confetti flies! 
Here’s the link if you’d like to hear more shows from Terry’s archive.
I look forward to our Memorial Day show, when I’ll be discussing the Armed Services’ despicable “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy – not from a political or civil rights perspective, but as a cruel and potentially damaging attack on the psychological well-being of American servicemembers.
One of the great things about therapy is that it is an enlarging experience, and if we put too narrow a set of requirements on who our therapist must be, that can work against such enlargement. I’m gay and have had four therapists (three women, one man) in different situations — a couple privately and a couple in a workplace EAP. I think that all four were straight (although I didn’t really raise the question with the EAP therapists). They were all terrific and helpful. If I happened to find a great gay or lesbian therapist, that would be cool, too. Or a therapist from a different culture — which could happen shortly, since I’m moving to Korea for a teaching job — that could be a great relationship. I do ask that a therapist be gay-supportive, as you say — I don’t want to fight my therapist over a basic issue! But beyond that, what I ask of a therapist — or a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer, an accountant, a professor — is that they be good at what they do, and good for me to work with. Period.
I don’t know whether a particular sexual persuasion has anything to do with who you choose as your therapist as I think a persons sexuality is probably the least interesting thing about them. I don’t presume to tell people what they would want, but if I was to get a therapist their sexuality would play no part in my selection. Why should it? After all what I would need is perspective, that’s why I would be going to therapy, right?
In terms of being ‘gay-supportive’, I don’t know how that is a progressive term. A person’s not a football team. If a therapist is homophobic in any way or has any form of prejudice towards any group within society they simply should not be a therapist. I would hope that a therapist would essentially be simply, supportive as therapy is the last step if your problem cannot be remedied by friends of family.