Negotiating Identities

Abstract

In this chapter Sandra draws on relational practices embedded in feminist therapy and relational-cultural therapy (RCT) to walk alongside Angéline (fictional client) as she finds her way in a world in which older women who love women and do not conform to gender norms are often invisibilized and marginalized. Sandra models how to hold cultural hypotheses tentatively, to amplify client strengths and acts of resistance against cultural oppression, and to engage in compassion-informed care. She synthesizes RCT principles to illustrate how the therapeutic relationship can provide a transformative experience in which possibilities for connection with others are opened and strengthened. Sandra draws on compassion-informed care principles to gently invite Angéline into a space of self-compassion where they can begin to dismantle Angéline’s multiple, intersecting layers of shame. Sandra challenges conventional stage models of cultural identity development, positioning the sexual identity development process as fluid, cyclical, recursive, and contextualized with different points of entry and no singular or right way of being. She offers a series of prompts for inviting conversation about clients’ identity development processes. The chapter concludes with suggestions for building social and systemic supports that reflect the inherent dignity and worth of older queer populations.

Author

Sandra Collins (she/her), PhD, is a co-editor of this book. She writes from the perspective of a feminist, lesbian, cisgender, woman with an invisible disability, who is a white, retired professor, and inhabits a privileged social class. Over the 25 years of her academic and professional career, she focused her research, writing, and teaching on cultural responsivity and social justice in theory, research, and practice. This is her fifth book on these topics, two of which were awarded the Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Counselling biannual book award. She also received a silver medal for best e-book design by the Independent Publisher Book Awards.

Citation

Collins, S. (2025). Negotiating multiple, intersecting, marginalized identities: Angéline et Marie against the world. In S. Collins and M. Jay (Eds.), Decolonizing health, healing, and care: Embodying culturally responsive and socially just counselling (Chapter 4.5). Counselling Concepts. https://doi.org/10.71446/mn96684783