Supporting Your Mental Health

Being a person who identifies as LGBTQ+ comes with unique challenges that can impact your mental health. You might face discrimination, prejudice, rejection, or erasure, and as a result you may have felt the need to hide your identity, internalized negative views of yourself, or faced social isolation or even violence. For many people, these experiences can lead to anxiety, depression, PTSD, emotion regulation difficulties, and other problems. It is important to address these unique challenges in order to support your mental health and overall well-being.

How NYCBT
Can Help

Whether or not your sexuality or gender identity and expression relate to your mental health difficulties, NYCBT strives to create an inclusive, affirming, and culturally sensitive environment for LGBTQ+ people, while attending to each person’s unique circumstances. Additionally, several of our therapists specialize in working with queer, questioning, and trans clients. We can help you navigate your sexual or gender identity-related struggles, including:

Coming out and/or transitioning

Questioning your sexuality or gender identity

Overcoming trauma

Improving self-esteem and combating shame

Coping with discrimination and invalidation

Navigating stigma specific to your intersecting identities

Increasing assertiveness, building social support, or ending harmful relationships

Balancing your queer or trans identity with your religious, racial, or other cultural community

Reducing substance use, self-injury, unsafe sex, and other unhealthy or problematic behaviors

What We Offer

Cognitive-Behavioral
Therapy (CBT)

CBT can be especially effective in addressing the unique mental health challenges faced by LGBTQ+ people. CBT helps you learn to identify and challenge negative thought patterns and beliefs, including those that have developed as a result of discrimination, rejection, or internalized stigma. In CBT you’ll also learn healthy coping strategies for managing anxiety, depression, and other emotions, which can empower you to navigate the world with greater confidence and resilience.

Dialectical Behavior
Therapy (DBT)

DBT is uniquely well-suited to the specific emotional challenges faced by LGBTQ+ people. DBT combines CBT with mindfulness practices to help you better regulate emotions, cope with distress, and improve relationships. DBT can also help you build a stronger sense of self, which will allow you to navigate your identity and relationships with greater ease and confidence. At NYCBT, we also offer an LGBTQ+ DBT skills group within our comprehensive DBT program.

Find an LGBTQ+ Affirmative Therapist Now

Contact Us

Please let us know how we can help.