Different Ways of Knowing: The Complexities of Therapist Disclosure

ABSTRACT

This article offers a discussion of complexities associated with the unintentional disclosure of a therapist's sexual orientation to a client in ongoing psychotherapy. A case involving a lesbian therapist and a heterosexually married woman with a female lover is described and discussed. The case highlights the distinction between overt and dialogic communications between a client and therapist. It also emphasizes how changes in the client's relationship with her therapist intersect with her therapeutic work, including both work specifically related and that only tangentially related to sexual orientation.

KEYWORDS:

• Bisexuality
• dialogic communication
• heterosexism
• homophobia
• homosexuality
• lesbians
• mutuality
• political activism
• psychotherapy
• self-disclosure
• sexual orientation