Navigating the Double Bind: A New Group for Early Career Survivor-Clinicians

This group is open to pre-licensed and newly licensed therapists who have been harmed by the mental health industrial complex and are interested in grappling with the complexity of having lived experience of therapy or psychiatric harm, while occupying a position where they themselves may cause similar or other harms.

Facilitated by Jess Gonzales, LMSW, and Tasha Chemel, LMSW, Navigating the Double Bind is a space for collective learning, reflection, discussion, and peer support. While the emphasis is on how our positionality as both care providers and survivors impacts our work, we do hope that the group will foster co-regulation and transformation as we lean into discomfort and uncertainty together. Therapy and psychiatric harm can function like intergenerational trauma, in that it can be transferred from supervisor to therapist to client. While these issues are systemic in nature, we believe that developing safety and capacity as careworkers is a pathway to disrupting patterns of harm.

We will discuss dilemmas such as: 

  • ​Being asked to collect data from our clients for documentation purposes, when we ourselves viscerally know what it is like to be subjected to the medical gaze. 

  • Holding the belief that the client is the expert in their experience, while developing an opinion that diverges from their self-understanding.  

  • Overcorrecting our approach to avoid coercion, resulting in a passive, inert approach. 

  • Feeling pressure to define the boundaries of the therapeutic relationship in ways that feel unnecessarily cold, punitive, or arbitrary. 

  • Feeling like we’ve abandoned or betrayed the extra-systemic community, and possibly parts of ourselves. 

This bimonthly group will run for 3 months, with the possibility of more cycles or meeting on an ongoing basis in the future. 

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Participation.

Participation in Group Consultation will Include:

  • Bimonthly group clinical case consultation and discussion

  • Asynchronous connection and shared resources through a lightly moderated Slack group

  • Optional journal prompts related to a dilemma or double bind in between meetings to facilitate reflection and discussion

Schedule.

  • The group will meet from 4 - 5:30 PM EST on the following dates: Thursday Sept 3, Sept 17, Oct 1, Oct 15, Oct 29, Nov 12 (2026).

  • Applicants are asked to make a three-month commitment. Following this three-month period, we may offer future cycles or continue meeting on an ongoing basis. 

  • 3 hours of group consultation and discussion each month.

  • Participants will either be preparing and sharing a case/clinical dilemma a week in advance of their turn to present and/or preparing to engage with the case(s) of others.

Finances.

The following payment structure is inspired by and borrowed from the model of Bayo Akomolafe’s class We Will Dance With Mountains: Into the Cracks and Skin and Spine with Joanna Hedva at Corporeal Writing.

This year-long program offers a sliding scale based on your relative financial standing. In an effort to reflect disparity in economic condition and access to wealth, the following payment system is designed for those with more wealth to help cover the costs of those with less access to wealth and resources. We trust your discernment of your current financial situation and how you fit into the global economic context.

As you decide what amount to pay, please consider your present-day financial situation governed by income, but also the following factors: historical discrimination faced by your peoples; your access to income and financial wealth, both current and anticipated (retirement, savings, investments, expectation of an inheritance; how easily could you earn more income compared to other people in your community, country, and world); people counting on your financial livelihood including dependents and community members; the socio-economic conditions of your locale (relative to other places in your country and in the world); your relationship to food & resource scarcity.

TBD - Solidarity

TBD - True Value*

TBD - Community Care

*This amount reflects the “real” value of the offering

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Please note:

This group is intended for pre-licensed clinicians and is a case consultation relationship, rather than a supervisory one. Services do not count towards licensure and unlicensed therapists will need to have a clinical supervisor in the state in which they are practicing.

You can contact tasha (tasha@ndtraumacounsleing.com) or Jess (jlg419@nyu.edu) with questions about the group.

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