Consultation, Please
February/March 2001 

Dear Consultant: 
I am an openly gay group therapist who does individual psychotherapy. I am planning to lead a 12-week, closed men’s short-term group. Most of the group members will be my own patients. Some will be gay/bisexual, and some will be straight. Not all my patients know that I am gay, although I have no problem disclosing this information. I have several questions: Do you see any problem with this? Should I come out to all the members prior to the group experience, or should I let it be processed within the group? Do you think this would be any different in a long-term therapy group which includes both men and women? How would it be different if it were a short-term women’s group with the same characteristics run by a lesbian?

Sincerely,
Anonymous

Dear Anonymous:
You describe yourself as an "openly" gay therapist, which means that you do not try to hide this fact. This group has no apparent specific focus, such as a coming-out group, or a gay men’s relationship group, that would make the leader’s sexual orientation relevant. Thus, I see no specific reason to disclose, nor do I see a particular problem here with not all the members knowing. I would allow the issue to arise naturally out of the group process. Similarly, I do not see a difference if it were a short-term women’s group led by a lesbian. I do think that when interviewing members for the group, either men’s or women’s, the therapist should make them aware of the mix of sexual orientations in the group. I believe that the sexual orientation of the group members makes more of an impact upon the members than that of the leader.

I think there are a few differences in a long-term mixed gender psychotherapy group. Again, being "openly gay" does not mean the leader has to make a point of it to the group members, and prospective group members need to know that they are joining a group that is mixed by gender and by sexual orientation. Members who are in individual therapy with you will have to deal with why some know and some do not, how they know, and how that makes some feel; this will raise issues of jealousy and envy. The leader can invite heterosexual members’ feelings about a gay or lesbian leader and can help the gay or lesbian group members explore their heterosexual feelings or past experiences. It is easy for the group to splinter into subgroups based upon gender or sexual orientation, but the leader can usefully address the group’s needs for such sub-grouping.

Although the country seems to be in a political struggle regarding the normalization of homosexuality, my experience is that not many psychotherapy patients have a significant problem here. They see people as more similar than different, generally know someone in their lives who is gay or lesbian, and realize that the real focus is upon the development of the capacity for deeper intimacy.

Joel Frost EdD, CGP, FAGPA
Boston, Massachusetts

Dear Anonymous:
Your question brings up several issues about self-disclosure. We self-disclose to clients on many levels. Some disclosures are beyond our control (race, gender); some are passive (personal style, sense of humor, language idioms); and some are deliberate choices we make (sharing personal stories or information). Therapist self-disclosure should happen in the context of relationship, and if we are genuine in therapy, our self-disclosures will naturally occur, with timing that matches clients’ desires to know something about us along with their readiness to integrate such disclosures. They can then process this information with other members of the group.

Disclosure can either impede or facilitate group process, depending upon the particular composition and the developmental phase of the group. In your group, members will have different relationships with you. My guess would be that those clients who know you are gay discovered it through passive disclosure as you worked with them. In the same way, your genuineness and your sensitivity in the group can allow necessary disclosures to evolve in a way that facilitates the group process.

So there is no need for you to come out to all the members in the pre-group interview since such a declaration would take self-disclosure out of context. Your task in the interview is to explain the makeup of the group. This offers potential members the opportunity to explore their comfort level with the group’s gay/bisexual/straight membership and their potential role in the group. There will always be some members who know more about the leader, but that would be true in any group where some of the members are also your individual clients. 

You asked, “or should I let it be processed in the group?” I wonder if you are assuming that it is inevitable that you must come out to the group at some point. There is a difference between personal discretion and keeping a secret. It is good self-care for us to understand the difference and to provide role models to help clients learn when it is appropriate to share personal information and when it is better to keep things private. Your being a gay therapist may come up in the group, but it may or may not call for any disclosure on your part. The fact that you are comfortable with clients knowing you are gay does not indicate whether a client wishes to have that information about you. My answer would be the same for a long-term group, women’s group or a mixed group, whether a lesbian or a straight man or woman led it. In a long-term group, however, it is likely that more passive self-disclosure will take place over time for both the leader and the group members.

Joanna Colrain, LPC, CGP
Atlanta, Georgia

Editor's Note: The question for this Consultation, Please column was presented by AGPA's Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual SIG. Members are invited to contact Barbara Turner, PhD, CGP, Editor of the “Consultation, Please” column, with questions that arise in your group psychotherapy practices. They may be presented anonymously, as in the question above, and two members of AGPA will be asked to respond to your dilemma. In this way, we all benefit from members’ consultation from an objective point of view. Dr. Turner can be reached by phone: 404 320-7874; fax: 404 633-7848; or e-mail: renrutphd@aol.com.

This Consultation, Please column appeared in the February/March 2001 issue of The Group Circle.