Portland Psychotherapy is committed to making this organization a welcoming place where diversity is celebrated, and all people feel welcomed and comfortable. We seek to remediate disparities in society and contribute to a more equitable, just, and inclusive society in our local community and internationally. We are dedicated to dismantling systems of oppression including white supremacy, heteronormativity, cisnormativity, and other forms of systemic discrimination that are pervasive in our society. Dismantling systemic racism, homophobia, transphobia, and other forms of oppression is a long-term project and we intend to be part of the movement by making necessary changes in our society.
What We Do: Our Core Commitments
Anti-racist practice. We commit to dismantling systemic racism and the ongoing impacts of white supremacy in mental health care. We embed anti-racist principles throughout our organizational culture, policies, and operations, engage in ongoing self-reflection and accountability measures, and participate in community engagement that centers the voices and experiences of BIPOC individuals.
LGBTQIA2S+-affirming practice. We commit to providing affirming care that recognizes and addresses the harms caused by heteronormativity, cisnormativity, and systemic discrimination against LGBTQIA2S+ individuals in the healthcare system. We hold specialized expertise in working with LGBTQIA2S+ people including care that is trauma-informed, minority-stress-informed, and incorporates comprehensive gender-affirming supports.
Evidence-based, culturally responsive, individualized care. We commit to ensuring that evidence-based care is culturally responsive and honors the intersecting identities of all those we serve. We deliver individualized treatment that adapts evidence-based therapies including ACT, CBT, and EFT to fit each client’s unique circumstances through shared decision-making, measurement-based care, and clinicians who bring both professional expertise and lived community experience.
Below we outline some of the concrete steps we have taken to honor these commitments and to move towards dismantling the intersecting systems of marginalization in our scientific research, educational and training services, clinical services, and operations:
Our Scientific Research
As an organization that conducts scientific research, we acknowledge that most of psychology has focused on the experience of white, relatively wealthy, college educated, and Western populations and therefore neglects the perspectives of the majority of people on this planet. Furthermore, we acknowledge that scientific research, including in the area of psychology, has a history of exploiting those in minoritized communities, especially BIPOC individuals, by not providing them with informed consent, adequate renumeration, safeguards to their wellbeing, or returning the benefits of scientific advances to these communities. This has resulted in historic harms as well as a limited and biased perspectives that have contributed to furthering inequities and devaluing experiences and perspectives not represented in scientific research.
To align our research with our core commitments, we:
Advance anti-racist research practices by:
- Developing study designs and recruitment strategies that center the perspectives of under-represented voices, particularly BIPOC communities
- Conducting research on racial identity, white privilege, and the effects of racism on mental health
- Speaking up in scientific societies about the ways research has failed to represent marginalized perspectives
Contribute to LGBTQIA2S+-affirming science by:
- Conducting research specifically focused on LGBTQIA2S+ mental health, including minority stress and intersectional stigma
- Planned clinical trial of treatments for social anxiety in gender diverse individuals
- Publishing research on stigma reduction and discrimination across multiple identities
Promote evidence-based, culturally responsive approaches by:
- Acknowledging that science is but one way of knowing and seeking to be humble in its application, particularly for groups less represented in research
- Engaging in contextual behavioral science (CBS) traditions that develop strategies to decrease stigma, prejudice, and “othering”
- Pursuing research that contributes to decreased suffering across all communities, not just dominant cultural groups
- Studying intersectional stigma to understand how multiple forms of oppression compound mental health challenges
Our Educational and Training Services
As an organization that provides training to mental health providers, we strive to foster inclusion, diversity, and equity in the larger mental health community. In keeping with our core commitments, in our educational and training efforts, we:
Support anti-racist practice by:
- Hosting community trainings specifically focused on issues related to racism, discrimination, and structural oppression
- Requiring all presenters to address issues related to race and diversity in their presentations
- Providing scholarships at all training events for people who work with or identify with BIPOC and other marginalized communities
- Seeking out trainers with lived diverse experiences to provide platforms for underrepresented voices
Advance LGBTQIA2S+-affirming practice by:
- Mandatory continuing education for all staff on LGBTQIA2S+ affirming care
- Hosting workshops that focus on specific services for LGBTQIA2S+ communities
- Supporting staff who regularly present at professional conferences and offer trainings on topics including minority stress, LGBTQIA2S+ youth suicide prevention, and gender-diverse healthcare
Promote evidence-based, culturally responsive care by:
- Hosting trainings on intercultural communication models and the ADDRESSING framework for understanding intersectional identities
- Offering workshops that integrate cultural responsiveness with evidence-based approaches like ACT, CBT, and EFT
- Maintaining a robust and extensive didactic program that combines advancing clinical skills with cultural competency development
Our Clinical Services
We acknowledge the massive healthcare disparities that persist in our country, including in the area of mental health, which disproportionately affect BIPOC communities, LGBTQIA2S+ individuals, and other marginalized populations. In our efforts to help ameliorate those inequalities and aligned with our core commitments, we do the following with regards to our clinical services:
Support anti-racist clinical practice by:
- Hiring diverse mental health providers to better represent and serve our community
- Implementing the ADDRESSING model to systematically address multiple identities in treatment planning
- Training staff on the history of racism in Portland and its ongoing impacts on mental health
Provide LGBTQIA2S+-affirming clinical practice by:
- Offering specialized LGBTQIA2s+ services including gender-affirming surgery evaluations, letters, and support
- Partnering with community organizations that focus on providing holistic health and wellness care to LGBTQIA2s+ individuals including Prism Health, Outside In, The Q Center, TransActive Gender Project, SMYRC, Quest Center, Marie Equi Center, and others
- Creating a welcoming and inclusive professional home for our clinical staff, a large percentage of who identify as LGBTQIA2S+ themselves, bringing lived experience alongside professional expertise
- Only hire staff that identify as LGBTQIA2S+ affirmative practitioners in order to better serve the nearly ½ of our client population that identify as LGBTQIA2S+
- Offering systematic assessment and identity-based matching of clients with providers who share relevant lived experiences and identities
Promote evidence-based, culturally responsive, individualized care by:
- Tailoring ACT, CBT, EFT, and other evidence-based contextually-focused therapies to fit clients’ culture and identities
- Engaging in collaborative treatment planning that honors client expertise about their own identities and needs
- Offering ongoing assessment to ensure treatments remain effective and culturally relevant
Our Management and Operations
We acknowledge that Portland is the traditional land of the Multnomah, Kathlamet, Clackamas, Tumwater, Tualatin Kalapuya, Wasco, Molalla, Cowlitz and Watlala bands of the Chinook and many other nations who made their homes along the Columbia River. While Portland is one of the least diverse cities in America, Portland is home to the 6th largest urban Native American /American Indian population in the country. In addition, our center occupies land in an historically Black neighborhood. Gentrification, as well as overtly racist practices and policies have contributed to the inability of many of those Black residents to remain in their neighborhood and homes.
While this land acknowledgment is an important step in recognizing historical injustices, we understand that acknowledgement in the absence of concrete actions is hollow. This is an ongoing process and Portland Psychotherapy will continue to seek ways to both minimize the continued harms that we may be complicit in and take actions that promote equity and justice for Indigenous peoples and other BIPOC communities, as well as other minoritized groups, both within our work and in the broader society.
In order to become more diverse and just, and therefore also a stronger and more effective organization, we:
Support anti-racist operational practices by:
- Volunteering with local organizations, such as the Albina Coop, to address historical and ongoing harm that gentrification and race-based displacement has done
- Purchasing and displaying art from local BIPOC artists throughout our facilities
- Educating staff about the history of racism in Portland, particularly in our neighborhood
- Implementing comprehensive anti-discrimination and microaggression policies developed through consultation with DEI experts
- Annual diversity climate surveys to assess and improve organizational culture for all identities
Provide LGBTQIA2S+-affirming operational practices by:
- Having all gender-neutral bathrooms, inclusive signage and artwork, pride flags and affirming imagery throughout our buildings
- Requiring in all job postings that providers must demonstrate a commitment to “antiracist and culturally-informed therapy approach”
- Including comprehensive culturally-responsive and affirming assessment during all clinical staff interviews
- Offering, since our founding, domestic partner benefits regardless of gender
- Explicitly stating in our employee handbook all staff’s right to authentic self-expression in dress and presentation
Promote evidence-based, culturally responsive organizational practices by:
- Providing dedicated annual funding for all staff to pursue diversity-related continuing education beyond standard requirements
- Conducting an annual diversity climate survey within our organization that was developed collaboratively by staff rather than imposed by leadership
- Ensuring that our documentation is inclusive including using open-response options for identity information rather than limiting checkboxes and affirming language throughout all client-facing materials
Our Recognition and Commitment Moving Forward
Portland Psychotherapy’s commitment to LGBTQIA2S+-affirming care reflects more than a decade of specialized service, with nearly half of our clients identifying as LGBTQIA2S+, a majority of our clinical staff bringing lived experience within this community, and extensive partnerships throughout the LGBTQIA2S+ care network. This deep community connection has established us as a trusted resource while ensuring our services remain responsive to emerging needs and cultural shifts.
We also acknowledge that we are currently a largely White organization, and that White, middle and upper-class, American values and concepts will repeatedly create blind spots and biases that we need to continually strive to overcome. This recognition drives our ongoing commitment to expanding our anti-racist practice, deepening our LGBTQIA2S+-affirming care, and continuing to provide evidence-based, culturally responsive services that honor the full complexity of our clients’ intersecting identities.
True equity requires ongoing commitment across all the communities we serve. We remain dedicated to transparent practices, community feedback, and continuous organizational growth. This work is never complete, and we commit to remaining accountable to the communities we serve through sustained self-reflection, education, and action toward justice.