Feminist Therapy isn’t Scary

The holiday season is upon us. Food, celebrations, and music bring people together, and I am confronted with the “How’s work going?” question for what feels like the fifteenth time. Perhaps you also understand the tedious task of explaining your position, and given the nature of my work, I obviously keep my statements very brief. Most people asking are simply being polite and want a polite answer back. However, I am sometimes reminded that not everyone understands the role of a mental health counselor, especially not a feminist one.

You too may be sitting here wondering what makes someone a feminist therapist and how that differs from other types of therapy. You might be wondering if I only see women as clients. You may even be wondering what feminism has to do with therapy at all. These are all valid questions.

Unlike most of the theories applied to psychotherapy, Feminist Therapy has no “father

figure.” Psychoanalysis has Sigmund Freud, Person Centered has Carl Rogers, but Feminist

Therapy has none. This isn’t surprising. It’s by design. Feminist Therapy grew out of grassroots movements that worked to ensure equitable access to many institutions such as voting rights, child labor laws, and legal protections from sexual violence. This lens was then expanded to therapy. One of the most profound of these changes brought by feminist therapists was through the integration of informed consent practices to ensure clients and patients were educated on and can consent to treatment. This may be considered standard practice now, but for many of the earliest decades of therapeutic practices this was not even a blimp on the radar.

However, this history does not explain the uniqueness of feminist therapy. The crux of

feminism is equity as it applies to all relationships and institutions. Unlike many of our earliest

theories in therapy, feminist therapists work as co-collaborators on treatment with clients – not just the “worried well” clients, but all clients. Like Rogers and other person-centered theorist, the relationship between client and counselor must be one built on mutual trust and respect. The feminist therapist does not force; she collaborates. She is patient, imaginative, and thoughtful.

In contrast to a purely person-centered approach, the feminist therapist also looks at a

client’s social context. Whether it’s psychoanalysis, CBT, DBT, or person-centered, these

therapies tend to only look at a client’s internal world or family system as the root of the

presented issues. The feminist therapist will look there, but she does not stop there. Two big

principals of feminist therapy are power and control, so the feminist therapist analyses how these are used in client’s everyday lives. The feminist therapist is not afraid to call out the exploitative and abusive elements of a client’s social world. She thrives in acknowledging that clients are having normative responses to inhumane environments.

Who is a good fit for feminist therapy? Everyone – not just those who identify as women. All can benefit from feminist therapy, given they are in the right frame of mind for exploration of impact of a patriarchal society. This does not mean a client must enter therapy with a college education on gender dynamics or women’s studies, but rather the client must be curious about their own position in society. Curiosity about power, control, gender roles, and the political structure are all valuable, but truly the only thing necessary is willingness to examine the impact of living in today’s times.

Based, on my clinical experiences, clients who have experienced sexual violence and

gender-based violence are particularly primed for feminist-based work given the societal

conditions necessary to act with this type of violence are based in patriarchal values. However, some of the best feminist therapy work I have ever completed has been with clients who identify as cis men who are work on improving their interpersonal relationships. Much like with attachment theory and person-centered theory, there is an emphasis on the relational dynamics between therapist and client and here-and-now presence which provides unique opportunities to develop healthy social and coping skills.

Feminism often gets a bad connotation as being “man-hating,” but feminist therapy is far

from that. It seeks to improve the relationships between people and their environment by

acknowledging the everyday inequalities we have become accustomed to and challenging us to choose differently. As a therapist, I tend to use an integrative approach that encompasses feminist theory as well as others such as existential (see my previous blog posts for more on that), person- centered, and attachment to ensure my clients receive the care best suited for their case. Should you be interested in working with me, book a consultation today and we will discuss exactly how I can best meet your needs.

-Autumn Hutto, MS, LPC, NCC