Outside Looking in: Gay Male Psychotherapists Making Meaning at the Intersection of Identity

ABSTRACT

A gay identity offers a perspective outside heteronormative narratives characterized by exclusion as well as a radical position of difference. Being a psychotherapist, too, holds complex implications for identity. This paper explores the lived experience of gay male psychotherapists, a group whose voice is seldom heard. Based on interviews with six White South African gay male psychotherapists, a narrative analysis explores their experience of identity and voice. This paper highlights the ways in which the journey to occupying oneself as gay and the journey of becoming a therapist are intertwined. The complex power relations evoked in this experience are explored, and the position of the gay male therapist as “outside looking in” is interrogated as a position of marginality that both excludes and provides a unique vantage point from which to challenge exclusion.

KEYWORDS:

• Gay identity
• psychotherapy
• journey of identity
• professional and personal
• sexual stories

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The term “psychotherapist” is employed in this paper to refer to professionals who conduct psychotherapeutic interventions. In this instance they are registered as professional psychologists because South Africa, unlike some other countries, does not have a separate training for psychotherapists.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.