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Marginalized Couples in Therapy with Akilah Riley-Richardson · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Therapist Podcast. My name is Gaming Person.
0:04
Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping
0:07
Speaker 1: those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you
0:11
Speaker 1: to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this show.
0:15
Speaker 1: Five chief, ten one, our folks, welcome back to the podcast.
0:20
Speaker 1: I'm very excited to have back Akila. Riley Richardson Aequila,
0:24
Speaker 1: welcome back.
0:25
Speaker 2: Hye goodness, Hi all right.
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Speaker 1: Kila is a couple therapists, published researcher, and relational healing
0:34
Speaker 1: facilitator with over sixteen years of experience. She specializes in
0:38
Speaker 1: working with couples, including those practicing consensual non monogamy and
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Speaker 1: supporting sexual and racial minorities across the Caribbean and internationally.
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Speaker 1: She's a founder of bipoc Relational Healing Institute and creator
0:50
Speaker 1: of the Pride Model. She's the author of the recently
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Speaker 1: published Marginalized Couples and Therapy Interventions for Healing from Systemic Trauma,
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Speaker 1: which offers culturally responsive frameworks and practical tools for working
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Speaker 1: with BIPOP and LGBTQI couples impacted by systemic oppression. Articula
1:11
Speaker 1: obviously just a little bit about you. But before we
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Speaker 1: go and share with the listeners where you're from originally
1:16
Speaker 1: and where you are currently.
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Speaker 3: I am from Trinidad and Tobago and I'm currently still
1:22
Speaker 3: in Trinidad and Tobago.
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Speaker 2: Okay, this is right? How on where I currently am?
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Speaker 1: All right, So we're going to get into the book.
1:29
Speaker 1: Before we do, just give our listeners, maybe who didn't
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Speaker 1: hear the first episode you're on, just let's give them
1:39
Speaker 1: the nutshell how all this started for you? How you
1:42
Speaker 1: got into this field.
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Speaker 3: I got into the field so I was trained in
1:48
Speaker 3: both psychology and social work, and then after that I
1:53
Speaker 3: just did a lot of week and couples therapy and
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Speaker 3: trauma work. And I felt that as I was sitting
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Speaker 3: with couples and I was sitting with trauma and understanding
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Speaker 3: my background and social work, that there needed to be
2:06
Speaker 3: more space and more room for the reality of people's
2:09
Speaker 3: systems around them, not just their families systems, but the
2:13
Speaker 3: wider systems of racism, homophobia, xenophobia, ableism, all of these things.
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Speaker 3: So I noticing that that felt like, let's say a gap. Yeah,
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Speaker 3: I recognized I wanted to deepen my work there.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, And so that's why I got into it.
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Speaker 1: Let's go even a step back. How did therapy psychology?
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Speaker 1: How when did that pull you?
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Speaker 3: At the age of about eighteen, I was going to
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Speaker 3: actually head in the direction of business studies and business management.
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Speaker 3: And I remember just sensing at the age of eighteen
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Speaker 3: that I wanted to make a big shift. Yeah, I
3:01
Speaker 3: wanted to make a big shift because I felt in
3:04
Speaker 3: my life i'd be working with youth at one stage, Yeah,
3:07
Speaker 3: and doing therapy with youth, and that isn't a huge
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Speaker 3: part of my practice right now, it would be quite honest.
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Speaker 3: But I did make this pivot, this direct, this direct
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Speaker 3: turn into this, and I'm never very regreted it, you know.
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Speaker 2: And I think that.
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Speaker 3: Therapy as the years roll by, therapy became a deeper
3:30
Speaker 3: love for me. Yeah, as the years roll by, I think,
3:35
Speaker 3: especially let's say, late in my twenties, when I started
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Speaker 3: to get more into more the thirties, I should say,
3:41
Speaker 3: when I get when I started to get more into
3:43
Speaker 3: neuroscience and understanding the human brain. Yeah, I think I
3:47
Speaker 3: really I really appreciated that. I really appreciated being in
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Speaker 3: this space where I could support and help people with
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Speaker 3: an understanding of the human brain.
4:00
Speaker 1: So you're in the field, you're sitting with people, you're
4:03
Speaker 1: working with people, and at some point or over the
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Speaker 1: course of a period of time, you realize there's a gap.
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Speaker 1: What did that feel like for you? When get specific
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Speaker 1: about I mean, obviously you're a person of color, one
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Speaker 1: would think this is easy for you. You're checking all
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Speaker 1: the boxes.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
4:30
Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: I think when I was being trained in various couple
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Speaker 3: of modalities and assumptions were being me that seem too
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Speaker 3: global and too universal. And as I was looking at
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Speaker 3: the various modalities, I felt that I was not hearing
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Speaker 3: enough about people's systemic realities, particularly marginalize people's systemic realities.
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Speaker 3: And I think it was during all of those various
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Speaker 3: trainings that I felt that that voice was missing. And
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Speaker 3: then when I thought about myself, especially as a black woman,
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Speaker 3: and the way that I present, I realize that, you
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Speaker 3: know what, some of my of what works in my body, yeah,
5:14
Speaker 3: doesn't show up, you know, or doesn't it's not made
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Speaker 3: present in the in the trainings. Yeah, I realized that
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Speaker 3: I needed to be vocal since I myself was having
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Speaker 3: my own experience of invisibility in these models.
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Speaker 1: When you say, assumptions were being made such as what.
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Speaker 3: That we also, for example, there's a understandings of what
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Speaker 3: intimacy looks like, or there's at understandings of of what
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Speaker 3: is healthy communication. Yeah, that does not take into consideration
5:52
Speaker 3: what we carry in our bodies. So for example, you know,
5:55
Speaker 3: there's this stereotype of the angry black woman. Yeah, and
5:59
Speaker 3: if you're if you're communicating in an aggressive way, right,
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Speaker 3: or in a very stern way, their assumptions me that
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Speaker 3: you're not being relational, you're not being caring, without an
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Speaker 3: understanding of our historical realities and the ways in which
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Speaker 3: aggression has been a tool of survival, the ways in
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Speaker 3: which systemic trauma right feeds aggression right in people, and
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Speaker 3: that could then cross over and spill over into relationship.
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Speaker 1: You know.
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Speaker 3: For example, I was also looking at things like, you know,
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Speaker 3: vulnerability and this assumption with what vulnerability means, right, without
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Speaker 3: an understanding of the fact that vulnerability looks different for
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Speaker 3: people of color, for us, sometimes vulnerability can put you
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Speaker 3: at severe risk, right, because in our systemic reality, vulnerability
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Speaker 3: can also be can be an opportunity for harm. And
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Speaker 3: I felt that these things were not being taken into account,
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Speaker 3: the ways in which having to present yourself in a
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Speaker 3: certain way to survive any wider system. Those things then
7:00
Speaker 3: crossover and come into the relationship. I felt that those
7:03
Speaker 3: things were not being adequately addressed right in our common
7:09
Speaker 3: or popular conventional models, and so I felt the need
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Speaker 3: to make space for that, you know. Interestingly enough, I
7:15
Speaker 3: was reflecting just now on a client of mine who
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Speaker 3: is LGBTQI, and that client was you know, talking about
7:24
Speaker 3: just and this client is mentioned in the book all right,
7:28
Speaker 3: because I so I have permission to share this person
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Speaker 3: mentioned just feeling this heightened sense of rejection in their relationship,
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Speaker 3: and that's this degree of rejection sensitivity was actually coming
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Speaker 3: from the wider system and sipping in and finding itself
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Speaker 3: sleeping in, sorry, into the relationship. So I felt that
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Speaker 3: these external realities were not finding themselves in the relationship
7:50
Speaker 3: in models, but our understanding of people and the simulation
7:55
Speaker 3: of patterns which were being seen as unhealthy that were
7:58
Speaker 3: just a reaction to historical and systemic trauma.
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Speaker 1: You you mentioned vulnerabile, vulnerability, and of course that is
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Speaker 1: kind of a buzzword in our culture right now, and
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Speaker 1: I think in therapy more specifically, and a lot of
8:15
Speaker 1: people use that in kind of a currency way we
8:21
Speaker 1: need to be more vulnerable. Specifically, how might that be
8:30
Speaker 1: tone deaf when used for marginalized people?
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Speaker 2: How can current therapist be tone deaf?
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Speaker 1: Is what you're asking the word vulnerability vulne vulnerability.
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Speaker 3: I think it assumes that vulnerability is a strength, yeah,
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Speaker 3: and openness is.
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Speaker 2: A strength, And.
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Speaker 3: It does not take in consideration that vulnerability in systems
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Speaker 3: that are designed to harm, yeah, can actually put you
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Speaker 3: at great deal of risk.
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Speaker 2: And I think that there are.
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Speaker 3: Understandings of what vulnerability looks like, and it looks different
9:21
Speaker 3: for different kinds of people.
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Speaker 2: Yeah. For some people, just naming and being brave is vulnerability. Yeah.
9:29
Speaker 3: For some people actually being able to actually withholding sometimes
9:35
Speaker 3: as vulnerability. I know that might sound strange, Yeah, but
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Speaker 3: there are different ways which it manifests for different kinds
9:41
Speaker 3: of people. There's no standard definition of vulnerability. Yeah, I
9:46
Speaker 3: can say for example, for me as a black woman,
9:50
Speaker 3: like I remember reading I can't about the text, but
9:53
Speaker 3: in this text talking about the ways in which black
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Speaker 3: women on the plantation were taught to interact with their children, right,
10:01
Speaker 3: and that on the plantation they felt that they had
10:04
Speaker 3: to be harsh and shame their children in order to
10:07
Speaker 3: protect them, because if they would criticize their children or
10:11
Speaker 3: demean them, it means that they protect them, to protect
10:13
Speaker 3: their trial from being.
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Speaker 2: Taken from mass by master.
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Speaker 1: Sorry.
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Speaker 3: And so we're seeing there that even the ability to
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Speaker 3: express love and the vulnerable about one's tender feelings, right,
10:26
Speaker 3: could be seen as being risky. Nor imagine that particular
10:30
Speaker 3: way of being being passed on from generation to generation
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Speaker 3: to generation. It would then mean that we have to
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Speaker 3: construct our own understanding of vulnerability, yeah, our own feelings
10:41
Speaker 3: around vulnerability. Yeah, And so I I conventional therapies sometimes
10:50
Speaker 3: don't take into consideration these historical shapings, yeah, and the
10:55
Speaker 3: way to which these things have to be me which
10:58
Speaker 3: these things are transformed time because of the reality of
11:01
Speaker 3: one's circumstances. So yes, I think for me, whenever I'm
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Speaker 3: sitting with people, especially people who experience historical trauma, right,
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Speaker 3: I am very mindful of what is their circumstance and
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Speaker 3: how do I really find the ask?
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Speaker 2: So, if I'm.
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Speaker 3: Talking about sharing vulnerability, bravery, unsetting boundaries, even setting boundaries
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Speaker 3: can be hard in a system where boundaries are not
11:30
Speaker 3: boundaries are a relational risk in the outside world, right,
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Speaker 3: Sometimes having a lot of boundaries keeps you safe. Sometimes
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Speaker 3: opening up yourself keeps you safe when you are a
11:39
Speaker 3: marginalized person, right, we don't have the ability to always
11:43
Speaker 3: live in our truth because times living in your truth
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Speaker 3: can get you killed. Sometimes standing up and saying no
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Speaker 3: one being assertive can get you killed literally. And then
11:53
Speaker 3: when a therapist is asking you to direct healthy boundaries
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Speaker 3: with your partner, you know they're making an assumption that
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Speaker 3: you you have a tool within you that is being
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Speaker 3: disrupted and discredited by the external system all of the time.
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Speaker 1: Wow, it's it feels like a whole shifting of not
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Speaker 1: just perspective, like a paradigm shift. Yes, how one needs
12:20
Speaker 1: a therapist needs to walk into the room with a
12:25
Speaker 1: worldview that needs to be rejiggered and reformed and reframed.
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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I mean that's.
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Speaker 1: That is what what does that mean to be? And
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Speaker 1: obviously this is different for different people, but I can imagine.
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Speaker 1: I can't imagine what it means to be a client
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Speaker 1: who maybe is marginalized and working with a therapists who
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Speaker 1: doesn't have this, maybe has quote unquote good intentions but
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Speaker 1: is not informed in this way.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I've so, and you know, I you know it's
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Speaker 3: I remember working with a client once and we were
13:06
Speaker 3: speaking about the goal setting and imagination, and she said,
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Speaker 3: I never thought I had space to imagine.
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Speaker 2: I was too busy trying to survive.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, and I'm using that as an example of the
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Speaker 3: ways in which sometimes when we make asks of clients
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Speaker 3: and they're like, but this is not a part of
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Speaker 3: my reality.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, this is.
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Speaker 3: Not a part of In fact, your ask is even
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Speaker 3: violating me. And make no apology, I mean, make no mistakes. Sorry,
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Speaker 3: I myself as a because I'm a su stender person.
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Speaker 3: I work with the LGBT community, but i'm cisgender and
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Speaker 3: I too have made errors coming from a very privileged
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Speaker 3: SIS place. Yeah, there are certain I remember once working
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Speaker 3: with a trans woman who was and this too is
13:54
Speaker 3: part of in my work, I do a lot of
13:56
Speaker 3: recordings of videos, et cetera. But people who give full
13:59
Speaker 3: permission to recorded given formed consent for teaching purposes. And
14:03
Speaker 3: in one of my videos, I was working with a
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Speaker 3: couple a trans woman and a non binary and a
14:13
Speaker 3: non binary partner, and in order to hold space with
14:16
Speaker 3: a non binary partner wrong issues surrounding race, I asked
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Speaker 3: a trans woman to just contain a bit, and because
14:22
Speaker 3: they were emoting a lot and the non binary partner
14:26
Speaker 3: felt that they couldn't share. So we're just working on
14:28
Speaker 3: containment a little bit, and not realizing after that I
14:33
Speaker 3: had wounded that person because they felt as a trans woman,
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Speaker 3: they had experienced so many times in their life when
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Speaker 3: they were told that they could not emote, or they
14:42
Speaker 3: should not emote because only women, only SIS women could emote.
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Speaker 3: And there I was blind to what I was asking,
14:49
Speaker 3: not taking into consideration this person's reality.
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Speaker 2: So I want to say that it's.
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Speaker 3: Not bad, evil or or ill intentioned therapists who have
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Speaker 3: blind spots.
15:00
Speaker 2: We all do your privilege.
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Speaker 3: Right, what I call your relational privilege, inevitably creates blind spots,
15:08
Speaker 3: and so your own humility and openness becomes imperative. As
15:13
Speaker 3: a result of that, your willingness to listen and not
15:17
Speaker 3: just tolerate but accept include that becomes necessary.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
15:27
Speaker 1: You in the in the some of the beginning pages
15:29
Speaker 1: of this book, you ask some amazing questions. One is
15:34
Speaker 1: one is fill in the blanks here, correct me if
15:37
Speaker 1: I'm wrong. But you start to say, you know, many
15:43
Speaker 1: many therapists begin from a very uh you know, beneficial
15:49
Speaker 1: way asking questions such as, you know, it's not what's
15:55
Speaker 1: wrong with you, it's but what happened to you? And
15:59
Speaker 1: there's you you say, there's a kind of a more
16:02
Speaker 1: pertinent question than that, and it's what's continuing happening to you?
16:09
Speaker 1: Talk talk to us about that difference.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's the wisdom of FEMA Bryanta, And yeah,
16:18
Speaker 3: I'm so glad you raised that because I'm thinking about
16:20
Speaker 3: it now. You know, sometimes when we're working in therapy
16:23
Speaker 3: with couples or individuals, we work with them as if
16:27
Speaker 3: the thirty trauma has passed, it's done, and you know,
16:33
Speaker 3: we want to we act like it's finished. And the
16:38
Speaker 3: thing with systemic trauma is that it's continuous, it's pervasive,
16:41
Speaker 3: it's chronic, and that has to be taken into account
16:47
Speaker 3: because as I work with someone that I might see
16:50
Speaker 3: a shift and then the week after this person is
16:52
Speaker 3: back in the same place because the system is continuing,
16:55
Speaker 3: it's onslaught. And I think that means we have to
16:59
Speaker 3: really in how we do trauma work. There is no
17:02
Speaker 3: endpoint and completion. And I know, for for a product,
17:07
Speaker 3: I think one of the things about our industries are
17:09
Speaker 3: a very product oriented as opposed to process oriented. Yeah,
17:13
Speaker 3: we want we have all these models and things that
17:15
Speaker 3: we do, and then we assume at the end of
17:17
Speaker 3: it we should see less of this and less of that,
17:20
Speaker 3: and we have always indicators and markers. And I have
17:23
Speaker 3: to say, for me, I've struggled in various settings with
17:26
Speaker 3: that kind of way of understanding human beings that you know,
17:29
Speaker 3: if the work is done quick a bit, well there
17:31
Speaker 3: there'll be less reports of this and less reports of that.
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Speaker 2: And you know it is.
17:40
Speaker 3: It's important, I think for us to reimagine trauma therapy.
17:46
Speaker 3: And you know, I was a center Robert Schwartz the
17:48
Speaker 3: other day in a trauma training with therapy with them,
17:50
Speaker 3: and he was saying, you know, we have to this
17:54
Speaker 3: is a paraphrase, but we have to give up the
17:55
Speaker 3: need to be helpful. And that provocative statement stayed with
17:58
Speaker 3: me because we're so preoccupied with being helpful and getting
18:02
Speaker 3: outcomes and getting results that over time we myself included,
18:07
Speaker 3: I'm not I'm certainly not excluded from this. Over time
18:12
Speaker 3: we forget how to just be with people in the
18:14
Speaker 3: reality in which they live. Yeah, and to not see
18:19
Speaker 3: a person as something to shift and retool, but a
18:22
Speaker 3: person to just be with and support. And support takes
18:26
Speaker 3: different shapes, especially when you're working with trauma therapy, and
18:29
Speaker 3: we have to remove and see notions of things like
18:31
Speaker 3: resistance and all these different things. Those things have to
18:35
Speaker 3: shift and change when people are continuously being affected. In fact,
18:40
Speaker 3: when people I think one of the reasons we need
18:42
Speaker 3: to shift this is because when persons see themselves being
18:48
Speaker 3: affected in this particular way, Yeah, you will see that
18:53
Speaker 3: Today's if they're not changing or they're not feeling better,
18:56
Speaker 3: they might begin to think, oh, they're not working hard enough. Yeah,
18:59
Speaker 3: And I have to say to people, it's not that
19:01
Speaker 3: you're not working hard enough. You're being affected by a
19:03
Speaker 3: wider system continuously.
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Speaker 1: Right right when you sit down, when you sat down
19:12
Speaker 1: to write this book, what did you want to say?
19:17
Speaker 1: How did you put it together? What was important for
19:19
Speaker 1: you to get into this?
19:22
Speaker 3: What was important for me to get into this? If
19:25
Speaker 3: I'm doing very transparent, I didn't want to put forward
19:31
Speaker 3: something that seemed like the answer.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I.
19:38
Speaker 3: Want to be very honest, guy, this is my understanding
19:42
Speaker 3: of how to do this work. But I am not
19:44
Speaker 3: proposing that this is the way to do the work.
19:47
Speaker 3: I don't think we can reduce human beings to just
19:51
Speaker 3: being amenable to our ways of working. And I wanted
19:55
Speaker 3: to make sure that in this work I held I
20:01
Speaker 3: continue to help it, I continue to hold sorry a
20:03
Speaker 3: curious position, yeah, and it I wanted it to be
20:14
Speaker 3: accepted that this work is hard, and as I rumble
20:19
Speaker 3: with people through the work, I take my time and
20:25
Speaker 3: take a not knowing stance, take a power with stances,
20:29
Speaker 3: as Julianna Taylor Show will talk about often in her
20:32
Speaker 3: own work. Because it feel like I'm rambling a little bit,
20:38
Speaker 3: But what I'm trying to say is that a huge
20:41
Speaker 3: part of my ethos is liberation and I cannot hope
20:46
Speaker 3: for liberation without practicing liberation in a therapeutic space. And
20:50
Speaker 3: the way I practice that is with being curious seen
20:54
Speaker 3: in an egalitarian relationship, just being in that.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, when you began work seeing clients, talk about how
21:08
Speaker 1: your perspective has shifted now with the knowledge that you have,
21:14
Speaker 1: and you put into this book how you would sit
21:18
Speaker 1: with clients.
21:20
Speaker 3: I sit in the liminal space better. The liminal space
21:23
Speaker 3: is the between space, and in the book I talk
21:26
Speaker 3: about that, right, I talk about grief and liminality. I
21:30
Speaker 3: talk about the ways in which when you've put forward
21:32
Speaker 3: all the best efforts and it's not finding, it's not
21:37
Speaker 3: taking shape, it's not taking whole. Because of the wider
21:39
Speaker 3: system and what it's doing.
21:41
Speaker 2: I've learned to.
21:44
Speaker 3: Sit in that grief with tendinness for myself and tenderness
21:48
Speaker 3: for the person. I think my clients have taught me that.
21:51
Speaker 3: My clients have taught me humility. Yeah, they've taught me
21:55
Speaker 3: this thing may not work and it's okay because there's
21:58
Speaker 3: something else happening. And they've taught me and you know,
22:01
Speaker 3: I've spoken before a little bit about this, but they've
22:04
Speaker 3: taught me the reality of discovery. Yeah, that therapy is
22:09
Speaker 3: a place to discover. Therapy is a place to learn.
22:13
Speaker 3: Therapy is not just a place to take models and impose.
22:16
Speaker 3: Therapy is a learning space.
22:18
Speaker 2: Yeah.
22:19
Speaker 3: So even I'd say I published this book and then
22:22
Speaker 3: there's some ideas that came to me after that I
22:25
Speaker 3: wish I had there before, Because as I meet with
22:27
Speaker 3: people and I think through the work, I'm constantly learning.
22:30
Speaker 3: So therapy and living and teaching and training helps me
22:35
Speaker 3: to update. And so my clients, being working with marginalized
22:39
Speaker 3: people has.
22:40
Speaker 2: Taught me to update.
22:42
Speaker 3: It has taught me curiosity, humility.
22:47
Speaker 2: It's not me bravery.
22:50
Speaker 3: I've had to say in some instances, you know this
22:53
Speaker 3: is a system right, you know this is not you right,
22:56
Speaker 3: And I've had to be brave about that.
22:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, what mean you? Why?
23:02
Speaker 2: Because one of.
23:04
Speaker 3: The things I say about systemic trauma is that systemic
23:07
Speaker 3: trauma is often disenfranchised, it's invisibilized. That when persons experience
23:13
Speaker 3: acts of racisms and the phobea, et cetera, they often
23:16
Speaker 3: find it very difficult to be able to have that
23:22
Speaker 3: be heard because persons around them try to dismiss it.
23:26
Speaker 3: And so it is my responsibility in the therapeu takes
23:29
Speaker 3: space to name it. It's my responsibility to let you
23:33
Speaker 3: know that you're not making this up. What you as
23:35
Speaker 3: Rasmomnechem says, what you think is happening, really is happening.
23:38
Speaker 2: This is real.
23:39
Speaker 3: And that takes courage. That takes a lot of courage.
23:42
Speaker 3: Part of the reason it takes courage is because I
23:46
Speaker 3: too am a black woman, and I am feeling the
23:49
Speaker 3: helplessness sometimes of not seeing things shift, especially in these times.
23:53
Speaker 3: And it takes courage for me to name the thing
23:56
Speaker 3: that my nome might not shift because as I need
24:00
Speaker 3: the system. I'm actuallying domains of powerlessness and helplessness as
24:04
Speaker 3: well that exists so many of us. So it takes
24:07
Speaker 3: bravery for me to name it, and it also takes
24:10
Speaker 3: bravery for me to face the helplessness and the powerless
24:13
Speaker 3: is that you naturally feel when you realize that this
24:16
Speaker 3: is a thing bigger than you.
24:21
Speaker 1: When you think of this book, I mean, obviously everything
24:25
Speaker 1: you're saying is vitally important. What are you hoping therapists
24:32
Speaker 1: will get from this work?
24:38
Speaker 3: I am hoping that there are few things I'm hoping.
24:45
Speaker 3: I'm hoping that when they see dynamics between couples that
24:49
Speaker 3: they ask themselves what else is in the room. It
24:52
Speaker 3: isn't always systemic trauma. It isn't, but sometimes it's really
24:57
Speaker 3: important for you to ask yourself what else is in
24:59
Speaker 3: the room. I'm hoping that when they realize what else
25:04
Speaker 3: is there, they're brave enough to name it for the couples.
25:07
Speaker 3: I'm hoping that they support couples in normalizing their tensions
25:13
Speaker 3: that result from systemic trauma, that they don't pathologize the couple,
25:17
Speaker 3: that they pathologize the system that they assign they blame
25:20
Speaker 3: what they blame is to yeah, And I'm hoping that
25:25
Speaker 3: they support There's a part of my work that I
25:27
Speaker 3: call relational declarations. I'm hoping that they support clients in
25:31
Speaker 3: creating relational declarations that are rooted with an understanding of
25:35
Speaker 3: the systems that they occupy.
25:40
Speaker 1: What might be an answer to the question what else
25:44
Speaker 1: is in the room?
25:47
Speaker 2: System?
25:48
Speaker 3: The history, the invisibilization, the therapist ignorance is in the room.
25:58
Speaker 3: Sometimes therapist biases a therapist, or on privilege and positionality.
26:04
Speaker 3: All of those things are shaping how the therapy takes
26:07
Speaker 3: space is emerging, but as you can feel and couples
26:11
Speaker 3: are debating with each other in the room, and all
26:16
Speaker 3: that's needed is a therapist understanding and a communication of
26:19
Speaker 3: that understanding. That could be a safe container. And sometimes
26:23
Speaker 3: when we don't communicate the understanding or name the system,
26:27
Speaker 3: it doesn't create the safe space for them to be
26:29
Speaker 3: able to pivot and look at what's happening.
26:31
Speaker 2: So all of those things are in the room and
26:34
Speaker 2: shaping the experience.
26:37
Speaker 1: In the book, you have quotes from some people you
26:43
Speaker 1: worked with. I'm wondering if you can share one of
26:49
Speaker 1: those or some of those ones that stood out to you.
26:53
Speaker 1: A client who stood out to you who kind of
26:56
Speaker 1: in an emblematic way, symbolizes the work and this.
27:00
Speaker 3: Book, there's a quote very early and I think the
27:07
Speaker 3: person says, it's a system of questions. And that always
27:10
Speaker 3: stood out to me that when you are an LGBTQI
27:16
Speaker 3: person on your bipop, that you're always in a system
27:20
Speaker 3: of questions, always wondering, wondering, am I being harmed by
27:24
Speaker 3: not being harmed? Oh, how should I navigate this? Or
27:26
Speaker 3: how should I do this to keep myself safe? You
27:29
Speaker 3: just can't walk through the world comfortably and confidently. You
27:33
Speaker 3: always have to be questioning what's happening to you and
27:37
Speaker 3: how you're going to navigate that, and living and questioning.
27:41
Speaker 3: Living and questioning then becomes your motives operandi. Yeah, and
27:46
Speaker 3: I want you to think about how living and questioning
27:49
Speaker 3: then shows up in relationships.
27:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, it almost feels like they're not playing with the
27:59
Speaker 1: same of cart or they're com swimming in a completely
28:03
Speaker 1: different ocean, very different ocean, which in and of itself
28:07
Speaker 1: is like a mind fuck. How do you be yourself?
28:12
Speaker 1: How do you that just be authentic? That even seems
28:19
Speaker 1: like like be vulnerable, be more vulnerable. What do you
28:23
Speaker 1: mean be myself.
28:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right, and this isn't the experience of every
28:30
Speaker 3: single marginalized person, right. I want to be clear that
28:33
Speaker 3: and I'm not making generalized statements. Everybody's having different experiences.
28:38
Speaker 3: But you're right, you know, I think, But I really
28:42
Speaker 3: want to stress that these conventional definitions of intimacy and relationality,
28:47
Speaker 3: I we really need to tailor them to hold space.
28:51
Speaker 3: We really need to account for what I call relational privilege.
28:55
Speaker 3: That the ability to live in your truth, the ability
28:58
Speaker 3: to feel safe, the ability have a sense of self worth,
29:02
Speaker 3: the ability to feel belonging in the world. All those
29:05
Speaker 3: things affect your ability to navigate relationships. And those things
29:09
Speaker 3: are not only shaped by your family of origin, they
29:12
Speaker 3: also shape at the wider system. So I can't abide
29:16
Speaker 3: by your definition of connectedness if it is that I
29:20
Speaker 3: have these circumstances that shape relational themes in my body
29:25
Speaker 3: or every day.
29:29
Speaker 1: Well, as we kind of wind down here, when you
29:32
Speaker 1: were working with couples, a couple walks into your room,
29:38
Speaker 1: What are you doing? What are you looking for? Are
29:41
Speaker 1: you not looking for anything? You're just being What's going
29:47
Speaker 1: on for you?
29:48
Speaker 3: I'm curious, I'm sitting I am you know in the
29:52
Speaker 3: book I talk about using the biome right. I am
29:55
Speaker 3: sitting from a place of openness, so openly and buiness
30:00
Speaker 3: is a part of the biome right. I'm sitting from
30:02
Speaker 3: a place of openness, being willing to hear. I'm mapping
30:07
Speaker 3: and looking at relational patterns, right, and then I'm considering where.
30:14
Speaker 2: You are, your social location.
30:18
Speaker 3: All these things that I'm looking at, And when I'm
30:20
Speaker 3: thinking through the lens of the work of wicked marginalized people,
30:24
Speaker 3: I'm asking myself about what are the habits of survival?
30:27
Speaker 3: And that's mentioned as well in the book. What are
30:28
Speaker 3: the habits of survival that exists outside that are probably
30:31
Speaker 3: showing up here. Yeah, I'm asking myself where does this
30:36
Speaker 3: person sit in terms of their degree of relational privilege?
30:39
Speaker 3: Like I actually have a scoring thing that I can use. Yeah,
30:41
Speaker 3: where does this person sit and how does it shape
30:45
Speaker 3: their current reality? So all of these little things are
30:48
Speaker 3: things that I am thinking about and shaping and being
30:53
Speaker 3: aware of.
30:54
Speaker 2: And I'm also it.
30:58
Speaker 3: Contain Man's necessary as well, because I don't want to
31:01
Speaker 3: Russian to diagnose, so because I think that becoming over
31:05
Speaker 3: diagnostic is not emancipatorial liberatory. When I spoke about the
31:08
Speaker 3: fact that the couple's space, the therapeutic space, sorry, should
31:12
Speaker 3: be a space of liberation. So not being not rushing
31:15
Speaker 3: to diagnosis and that kind of thing becomes even becomes
31:20
Speaker 3: more important there as well. So I'm looking at dynamics
31:23
Speaker 3: and I'm mapping, and I'm thinking about habits of survival
31:26
Speaker 3: and relational privilege.
31:28
Speaker 1: What is relational privilege.
31:31
Speaker 3: It's the ability to navigate relationships from a place of
31:34
Speaker 3: self trust, yeah, and a place of safety. Those are
31:38
Speaker 3: two things I talk about a lot. Yeah, that ability
31:43
Speaker 3: to do that in itself is relation is relational privilege.
31:46
Speaker 3: And for me, that ability comes from the wider system.
31:49
Speaker 3: So when I talk about what is relational privilege, it
31:52
Speaker 3: is the ability to navigate intimate partner relationships that is
31:56
Speaker 3: affected by your social location historical reality and not your
32:01
Speaker 3: personal historical reality, the historical reality of your people and
32:05
Speaker 3: the wider system. Yeah, So it's the themes of relationality
32:10
Speaker 3: that the wider system sows in you.
32:14
Speaker 1: The book is called Marginalized Couples and Therapy Interventions for
32:18
Speaker 1: Healing from Systemic Trauma. It is out you know kill
32:23
Speaker 1: When I remember when I first interviewed you, and I
32:28
Speaker 1: was blown away by you and your just your your
32:37
Speaker 1: you have. You exude this humanness, this this human kindness
32:44
Speaker 1: that is so inspiring. And I remember getting off that
32:50
Speaker 1: interview and I was like, oh my god, you know
32:53
Speaker 1: this is what it's about for me. You know this, this,
33:00
Speaker 1: this presence you have that you bring into your work
33:03
Speaker 1: is very inspiring. I love it.
33:06
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you, thank you.
33:09
Speaker 1: It's amazing. All right. How do people learn more about
33:12
Speaker 1: you and the book? It's the best way.
33:15
Speaker 3: Oh well, they can check me out on my website
33:18
Speaker 3: Keiler Riley Richardson dot com.
33:20
Speaker 2: There is a link there.
33:21
Speaker 3: You could buy it as well off of bookshop Amazon,
33:25
Speaker 3: go straight to Norton's website.
33:28
Speaker 2: It's available. Once you google it, you can definitely find it.
33:31
Speaker 3: And as I said, if you want to learn more
33:33
Speaker 3: about me, you can find me at Tekileriley Richardson dot com.
33:37
Speaker 3: You can shoot me at email infu at Tequila Rally
33:40
Speaker 3: Richardson dot com as well. Also on my website. You
33:43
Speaker 3: could also click that little contact me button and keep
33:47
Speaker 3: in touch.
33:48
Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have all that link up here at the
33:50
Speaker 1: show notes page at the Trauma Therapist podcast dot com.
33:53
Speaker 1: Killer love It, Love you Love Love having you on
33:56
Speaker 1: here pleasure.
33:58
Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
33:59
Speaker 1: All right, take care, okay, bye back