relationships
Sara Stanizai
Are Family Roles for Life?

By Sara Stanizai.

In my previous post, we explored how childhood dynamics shape our adult relationships, identifying common roles such as the Hero Child, Scapegoat Child, and Lost Child. Understanding these roles is the first step toward healing our relationships, but the real work lies in transforming these ingrained patterns into healthier relational dynamics.

Maybe you resonated with one or more of these roles. But now what?

What do you do when you feel stuck in these relationship patterns from your family?

According to Relational Life Therapy, understanding and using the basic concepts of the Adaptive Child, Wounded Child, and Wise Adult can help guide your journey toward healthier relationships.

Are Family Roles for Life?
relationships
Sara Stanizai
Heroes, Scapegoats, and Lost Ones: How ...

By Sara Stanizai

It might be a therapy cliche, but our family roles profoundly shape who we become as adults.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this (and sharing with my clients) especially recently. I’m making my way through a certification and training with my therapy hero, Terry Real, an LCSW and the founder of Relational Life Therapy (RLT).

In our trainings, he sheds light on the specific roles children often adopt within their families of origin. These roles—such as the Hero Child, the Scapegoat Child, and the Lost version of each of these—can have lasting effects on our behaviors and relationships as we navigate adulthood.

This especially resonates as I run the Eldest Daughters group and do more research on the impact of birth order on our mental health. It’s never as cut and dry as eldest/middle/youngest/only.

Understanding these roles can help us identify patterns in our romantic relationships, friendships, and professional lives, providing a pathway to healing and personal growth that we may not find in traditional therapies.

Which one are you?

Heroes, Scapegoats, and Lost Ones: How Childhood Dynamics Shape Adult Relationships
relationships
Sara Stanizai
No Contact: Navigating the Decision to Cut Ties

Like many pop psychology terms, people really throw around the idea of “going no contact.” It can be tempting to cutting ties with someone in your most heated moment — and it’s true, it can ultimately be beneficial to move on with your life.

But if you value community care, and wanting to do right by the people in your life, it can be confusing to figure out when and if it’s the right decision, and how to ethically do it.

What does going no contact actually mean and how can it help or harm you? How do you know if it’s the right decision for you? Have you truly done all you can - and should you?

No Contact: Navigating the Decision to Cut Ties
Sara Stanizai
What is Trauma-Informed Therapy?

The phrase “trauma-informed” is being thrown around all over the internet, but what does it actually mean?

Being trauma-informed goes beyond simply acknowledging the existence of trauma and its effects on mental health. Trauma-informed therapy is an actual approach to care that revolves around specific core principles. What a skilled therapist does with those principles, and how they implement them in the therapy room, will vary.

How we generate trust, safety, choice, collaboration and empowerment for our clients depends on what you have experienced in the past and what you might need now. (It’s those. Those are the principles.) This involves a deliberate and thoughtful approach to therapy that influences every choice we make as a therapist, both in session and when setting up our practice.

If you’re seeking therapy or if you’re a therapist yourself, it’s crucial to understand this concept so that you know how therapy works — and if it’s working for you.

What is Trauma-Informed Therapy?
Nik Stancil
"Therapy never worked for me": CBT isn't enough ...

Most of my clients have been to therapy before. Many have tried therapy several times over their life, but they never felt it was that helpful or they found it difficult to find a therapist who was a good fit. There are plenty of reasons why this might be the case, and this post aims to explore one of the main offenders: a very common type of therapy practiced is CBT, and using CBT alone may not be a great choice for neurodivergent brains. 

"Therapy never worked for me": CBT isn't enough for neurodivergent clients seeking long-term healing

trans affirming therapy

How Discrimination Affects LGBTQ+ Healthcare

How Discrimination Affects LGBTQ+ Healthcare

Everyone needs healthcare. Everyone gets sick and is vulnerable to illnesses or diseases, and everyone needs regular check-ups. Regardless of gender or sexual orientation, healthcare is essential for us all.

Discrimination in healthcare settings can endanger the lives of the LGBTQ+ community who don’t have access to or are denied adequate healthcare. The Affordable Care Act prevented healthcare providers and insurance companies from refusing someone healthcare based on discrimination. But, policymakers continue to add changes to this.

You never want to be in a situation where your relationship while being HIV+ is an excuse for your doctor to refuse you HIV medication. Trans men and women should not have their mental health issues ignored or routine medical care denied due to personal biases of providers. If things do not change regarding healthcare within the LGBTQ+ community, large portions of our communities will continue to be too exhausted, afraid, or at risk to seek treatment, or worse; entirely denied care.

Here is how discrimination affects the LGBTQ+ communities.

Coming Out Later in Life

Coming Out Later in Life

First of all, I don’t like the term Coming Out. I actually don’t like the term Later in Life either.

But I needed a pithy title for this post so here we are.

Coming Out implies there is a secret that you are revealing. But our identities aren’t “secrets.” They’re just things about us that are hidden behind other people’s assumptions. That’s on them, not you.

Later in Life implies there is a time to figure yourself out, and that time is the first 20 years of life. But anyone over the age of 20… or 40…. knows that we don’t figure a lot of things out before then.

Anyway that’s not what this is about.

The good thing about getting older is learning so much about yourself. However, understanding the difference between a change in your libido is totally different than questioning your entire sexual orientation. Self-exploration, especially about fundamental things about ourselves, isn’t a luxury many people feel they have the time and resources for. We are often not at the top of our own priorities list.

So what do we do with those nagging thoughts and feelings that just don’t seem to be going anywhere?

Nonbinary is Not "Woman Lite": What Ally Language Gets Wrong

Nonbinary is Not "Woman Lite": What Ally Language Gets Wrong

To avoid misgendering someone or coming off as behind-the-curve, I feel like I’m seeing more and more allies (ahem, especially therapists) overcompensate. No one wants to be cancelled or seem out of touch. But how many of those people are actually invested in changing the way they view the world, and using language to reflect those changes?

While it’s great that you want to learn about people who have a different gender identity than you, let’s be clear. A person’s ability to be inclusive is not directly correlated with how many buzzwords they can memorize. Plus, if that’s all you rely on, your clients will see right through you and notice your bias when they interact with you. Regardless of how many rainbow flags are on your website.

Principles of Transgender and Nonbinary Affirming Therapy

Principles of Transgender and Nonbinary Affirming Therapy

Therapy is never “one size fits all.” Just as every single person who comes in to see a therapist has their own unique experiences, ideas, and background, so should every therapy session. And this may come as a surprise, but so should every therapist. We are people too!

Therapists come with our own set of ideas, types of baggage, levels of education, and varieties of experience. But it is our job to create an inclusive, open, welcome, and safe space for everyone who comes through our door or joins our secure, encrypted, HIPAA-compliant, Fort-Knox-level-security video calls.

Affirming therapy goes beyond simply tolerating or even celebrating queer + trans identities and experiences. Affirming therapy centers these identities. To be affirming means we are consistently working to divest ourselves of holding cis-het-mainstream culture as the default, as the basis on which truth is measured, or as an aspiration for everyone.

Affirming therapists are able to help our clients with any issue that brings them to therapy. AND we are able to help our clients work through issues that queer + trans people specifically face, including homophobia, transphobia, heterosexism, cissexism, and more.

There are many different ways we can educate ourselves on affirmative therapy, from listening to people with lived experience (and compensating them adequately for their labor), to seeking formal training and education, to committing to mentoring from others in the field, to understanding queer communities through our art, media, and culture. There is always room for education and growth in a variety of ways. But there are also some key principles that therapists, can keep in mind while we create a safe and inclusive space of affirming therapy for our LGBTQ+ clients.

By the way, being part of a marginalized or oppressed community doesn’t automatically guarantee that we know what we’re doing. Just like being a therapist doesn’t guarantee it either. It’s everyone’s responsibility to engage in the deliberate practice of active allyship and affirming therapy.

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My Loved One is Transgender

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My Loved One is Transgender

When someone important to you reveals this part of their identity, it’s normal to experience a wide range of emotions - from elated to terrified.

Though you may want to be supportive, you might also harbor feelings of rejection, worry, or even anger. Like every other emotion, these feelings aren’t forever. That said, it can certainly feel that way when you’re right in the middle of it.

Although this is new to you, it is not always new to your loved one.

So, how do you cope with these feelings? How can you get to a place of acceptance and understanding instead of fear, anger, or confusion? Depending on your specific situation and relationship to the person, there are different options to help you make sense of your feelings.

Why Do Pronouns Matter?

Why Do Pronouns Matter?

For many people, this is a topic with which they have a little familiarity, but want to know more. Why do pronouns matter? And why is it essential to refer to people with their pronouns?

We use pronouns in place of someone’s name. If you wouldn’t want to get their name wrong, you wouldn’t want to get their pronouns wrong either.

When a Loved One Comes Out to You

When a Loved One Comes Out to You

Not everyone in the LGBTQ+ community feels the need to be open about who we are, to make a social media declaration, or even wants to put a label on our identity.

The term "coming out" isn't for everyone. It reinforces the default of cisgender and heterosexual, as though people are assumed to be that unless we are "revealed" to be otherwise. It also implies there is something secret and shameful about who we are. Some people prefer to say "being open" about our identity.

For many, many people it is not safe to do so. It can lead to loss of relationships, employment, financial and housing stability, legal standing, access to basic care and services, social support, safety, and loss of life.

However, many people find a greater sense of freedom and congruence when we are open about who we are. It makes a big difference when we are accepted, respected, and literally allowed to go on about our daily lives.

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Why It Matters: Three Ways LGBTQ+ Affirming Couples Therapy is Different

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Why It Matters: Three Ways LGBTQ+ Affirming Couples Therapy is Different

Couples counseling can benefit any couple, of any age, at any time. But doing therapeutic work with the LGBTQ+ community is different. And I believe it should be.

The representation of couples counseling in mainstream media has focused heavily on cisgender, heterosexual, and monogamous couples. But what about the rest of us? The lack of representation shouldn’t dissuade you from getting the help your relationship needs.

What Does "Affirming" Mean?

What Does "Affirming" Mean?

A number of therapists and other professionals describe ourselves as affirming. But what exactly does that mean? Affirming an identity means we recognize that no matter how much we embrace it, understand it, or participate in it,  we’re still part of a mainstream culture that tries to erase it.

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Being Seen For Who We Truly Are

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Being Seen For Who We Truly Are

When you’re dismissed, erased, ignored, attacked, or denied - it can cause you to question yourself. It can cause you to feel angry, to feel defeated, to get overwhelmed, to test people, and to feel like you have to prove who you are to yourself and others every day.

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Am I Ready to Start Therapy?

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Am I Ready to Start Therapy?

For people who are used to handling things alone, it can be difficult to know when to seek professional therapy. Like most folks, you probably brush off your problems and wait for them to go away on their own. And that seems to work most of the time.

Convenient to Long Beach and Seal Beach at:

4510 E Pacific Coast Hwy, #540, Long Beach, CA 90804

contact@prospecttherapy.com | (562) 704-4736