FOR THERAPISTS & OTHER SERVICE PROVIDERS

We often reduce mental health to diagnostic labels, wellness to the absence of symptoms, and queer men's health to prevalence rates. If we take an exploratory approach to mental health and wellness we can begin to unravel some of the specific determinants of mental health concerns that nurses, social workers, and educators see in their work with queer and trans guys. As a racialized queer psychotherapist, Rahim Thawer will seek to examine the issues queer men come up against that impact their well-being. Specifically, this workshop will explore the concepts of internalized shame, body image, substance use, and conflicting relationship scripts as specific determinants of queer men's mental health.

Schedule and Learning Outcomes

Mental Health 101

• Explore our own relationship to mental health as service providers

• Reflect on the impact of culture and language when conceptualizing mental health concerns

• Identify areas where mental health stigma and challenges come up in our work with service users

Internalized Shame

• Describe the concept of shame and differentiate it from other experiences

• Explore where shame originates for most people

• Identify ways people respond to entrenched shame

• Examine the specific cultural sources of shame for queer guys

• Analyze 3 case scenarios and relevant clinical questions

• Illustrate how shame shows up in queer men's culture and relationships

Body Image

• Reflect on cultural messages around ‘good’ bodies, food, fatphobia and thin privilege 

• Examine what body image challenges look like in queer men's communities

• Explore and discuss counselling/clinical questions and approaches to addressing body image

• issues with queer men drawing on cognitive behavioural, Gestalt, and psychodynamic tools

Substance Use

• Explore queer men's relationship to substances and distinguish how it operates compared to other communities

• Conceptualize "problem substance use"

• Review use of common "party drugs" and specific harm reduction strategies and messages for each

• Discuss various views on crystal meth use and present-day contentions between 'prevention' and harm reduction

• Evaluate utility of Structured Relapse Prevention tools to support clients who identify problem substance use

Relationships

• Consider the conflicts that arise in mixed messages ("scripts") gay men have internalized from mainstream/straight and gay communities

• Conceptualize the "traps" that arise when the clinical issues that arise from navigating casual sex and relationships are not fully processed

• Re-frame gay men's mental health concerns as products of (or adaptations to) casual sex and relationship pressures/scripts

• Re-Imagine the nuances and relationship permutations needed for more useful cultural representations of gay men's lives in order to foster more reconciled scripts

Duration: Full Day
Fees: CAD $3,000 + HST
Additional: Travel & Accommodation, if applicable