Identity and Culture
What Does a Decolonizing Approach to Therapy Mean?
You may want therapy that does not ask you to separate your feelings from culture, identity, and the expectations around you. A decolonizing approach makes room to question whose assumptions are being treated as normal. In plain terms, you can discuss your experience without treating one way of living or relating as the only valid one.
Your Context Is Part of the Conversation
You can bring the meanings you give to family, belonging, responsibility, and connection. These may not fit the expectations someone else holds. Therapy does not have to begin by treating that difference as a problem inside you. Your own understanding matters alongside the pressures and relationships that shape what feels possible in your life.
Question the Assumptions, Not Your Worth
You might have been expected to explain yourself, adapt, or set aside parts of your identity. You can talk about those expectations rather than accepting them as neutral rules. This does not mean a guide can define your cultural experience. You remain the person who gives that experience meaning, including where your feelings are mixed or uncertain.
There Is Room for More Than One Truth
You may value connection with family while also wanting different boundaries. You may feel attached to familiar expectations and want to question them. Those feelings do not have to cancel each other out. You can discuss tensions without being asked to choose one simple account of your identity or one prescribed way of moving forward.
Ask What This Means in Therapy
Jazmine describes her approach as systemic and decolonizing, warm and collaborative. You can ask how she makes room for identity, relationships, and environment in the work. LGBTQIA+-affirming care is part of her practice. The term is not a promise of an outcome, and you do not need to use this language to bring your questions to therapy.
If You Want to Talk
This guide is not a substitute for therapy. You can bring these questions to Jazmine without having a finished explanation.
Sessions are 50 minutes by secure video, with you located in Maryland. Private pay is $200 per session. Individual and teen therapy are also available through Headway with Aetna, BCBS, Cigna, and Kaiser Permanente. Superbills are available for out-of-network benefits.
You can request a free 15-minute consultation by phone through the request form, and Jazmine personally confirms each request.
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