Resources for Sexuality Professionals and Emerging Professionals

An Intersectional Approach to Sex Therapy: Centering the Lives of Indigenous, Racialized, and People of Color

Published by Routledge Press

Edited by: Reece Malone, Mariotta Gary-Smith,  Marla Renee Stewart and James Wadley

Introduction:
When an individual, couple, or relationship extends their trust in the professional capacities of sex therapists and sexuality educators to help guide them through emotionally, psychologically, and physical difficult situations impacting their sexual health and sexual relationships, there is an unspoken expectation that our awareness and approach includes broad and social ecological insight and systemic determinants of health. As clinicians and educators, it is a privilege to witness our clients evolve and expressing feelings of enlightenment, empowerment, hope and better equipped with practical tools and strategies that can lead toward a healthier sexual and intimacy life.

Sex therapists, counselors and educators obtain knowledge and training on the most common concerns faced by clients including low desire and desire discrepancies, erectile dysfunction, rapid ejaculation, painful intercourse, anorgasmia, delayed orgasm, out-of-control, impulsive and compulsive sexual behaviours, sexual trauma, and concerns with sexual media consumption. Our treatment modalities include: CBT, DBT, ACT, EFT, EMDR, narrative therapy, sensate focus therapy, and psychoeducation. These approaches have been proven effective for some but not all clients.

While success rates vary depending on a host of circumstances, there has not been enough clinical consideration of the intersections and impact of race, culture, and ethnicity in client’s sexual health and sexual relationships.

This collection invites clinicians to think about if and how such treatment approaches integrate client’s relationship to their racial cultural, and ethnic identity as an integral part of our interventions including:

• What ethno-cultural competencies are needed in order to be better equipped while working with diverse cultures?
• To avoid a myopic lens of therapy, what social ecological and multi-cultural factors are missing in our inquiries?
• In treatment design, is intersectionality, including histories of colonization, included as contributing factors to sexual dysfunction and sexual relationship discord, and if so, how are current treatment designs adapted and utilized in treatment approaches?

Given the lack of awareness and resources that critically explore the impacts of racism, colonization, intersectionality and minority stress in sexual health and sexual relationships, this edited collection serves as a major contribution to the field of sex therapy and individual, marriage, relationship therapy.