LGBTQIA+ Affirming Counselling: What It Is and Why It Matters

Couple Holding Hands

LGBTQIA+ affirming counselling, or queer counselling, is a therapy approach that acknowledges and validates the unique experiences and mental health challenges of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, asexual, intersex, and queer individuals. This includes anyone who identifies with the LGBTQIA+ community, but not with a particular label, including sexually or gender-fluid folk or those just exploring their identities.

Practicing from an affirming perspective means providing a safe, non-judgmental space where diverse individuals can explore their identities, relationships, and mental health needs without fear of misunderstanding or bias.

It’s not just about being “okay” with someone’s identity — it’s about actively striving to understand, affirm, and uplift each person in all their complexity and individuality.

Why Is Queer Affirming Counselling Important?

LGBTQIA+ individuals often face unique challenges such as discrimination, minority stress, internalised stigma, and systems not built with us in mind.

Queer affirming therapy supports:

• Identity exploration and development

• Guidance and support with coming out (or not)

• Coping with minority stress and trauma

• Navigating relationships and chosen family

• Building resilience and self-acceptance

Everyone deserves a space where their full self is seen and supported.

My Approach

Here at Vibrant Minds, I take a person-centred approach to counselling. Essentially, this means that I work collaboratively with my clients to understand each person’s specific needs and goals for counselling. I believe every person has unique strengths and the capacity for growth. Depending on your goals, I may draw on a range of therapeutic techniques, including but not limited to:

• Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy (CBT) – for understanding and shifting unhelpful thoughts

• Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) – for developing emotional regulation and distress tolerance skills

• Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) – to align with your values while making space for tough emotions

• Narrative Therapy – to explore and reframe the stories you tell yourself and that you have been told by the world

• Trauma-Informed Approaches – always prioritising safety, choice, and empowerment

What Does Queer Therapy Mean to Me?

I am an openly queer mental health professional, and I understand what it means to live as a visibly queer person in a world that often isn’t built for us. My lived experience deeply informs how I strive to show up in the counselling room: with empathy, humility, and authenticity.

But I also acknowledge that I don’t — and can’t — know everything. For that reason, I engage in ongoing professional development in:

• LGBTQ+ affirming practices

• Queer and trans theories

• Neurodiversity affirming practices

• Trauma informed practices

• Broader therapeutic approaches

Queering the Counselling Room

As Dr Julie Tilsen (2013) states, Queer is a critique of identities, not an identity of its own; it stands in resistance to fixed identity categories; it stands against “normal”; and it signifies resistance to regimes of normativity.

Viewing queer as verb from this perspective, rather than a noun and an identity, I actively strive to queer my counselling practice by:

• Making space for fluidity, nuance, questioning, and resistance

• Inviting your knowledge and expertise into the therapy room

• Valuing your lived experience, especially where it differs from mine

Working Together

Ultimately, counselling and therapy isn’t something I do to you — it’s an experience we co-create together.

So, if you’re looking for a counsellor who is committed to understanding the complexities of your life and willing to do the work with and alongside you, then I might be the person for you.

References

1. Tilsen, J. (2013). Therapeutic conversations with queer youth: Transcending homonormativity and constructing preferred identities. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefeld.