My name is Lesley Kollikho, and I am a mixed-race Portuguese/Kenyan psychotherapist born and raised in London, UK. Being a psychotherapist of colour is a topic I have wanted to write about for a while. When I was approached to write a piece about myself and an aspect of my work, this idea was at the forefront of my mind, although it has been difficult for me to write about. Part of the resistance is that being a woman of colour shouldn’t matter, it shouldn’t take as much space as it does, it shouldn’t be a defining feature of my work, and in a way, it isn’t, and in another way, it is and always will be.
The topics we resist are often the most illuminating and painful. When working with clients, I wonder what they struggle to verbalise. What makes it a struggle? So I asked myself, why am I struggling to write this piece?
I felt pressure in writing this article, and upon reflection, I realised I was falling into that trap of thinking I needed to be a voice for women of colour as if I represented my entire race. This is something I felt during my training and in white spaces everywhere. The person of colour educates others on what being a person of colour is like. I know it is not my job to do that. It is not my job to represent my race. I do not have the answers; all I can say is about my experience as a woman of colour and a psychotherapist.
When I meet a client for the first time or have that initial point of contact in a telephone consultation, I often ask, ‘What did you see in my profile that made you contact me?’. This is an important question as it can give insight into a client's early projections on me, what they are looking for in a therapist or what they might need from one. When the client is a person of colour, more often than not, a part of their response is that they want to see someone who resembles them. What they mean is the colour of my skin, which translates as someone of colour who might have some understanding of what it means to a person of colour in the UK today. When a client says this, I know that they are also bringing racial trauma into the work, whether explicit racism or the more insidious sense of being different, of being othered, of feeling less than or fear of being stereotyped or judged. Even if a client doesn’t bring it up explicitly, there is often an unexpressed connection, similar to when I am visiting a town or city outside of London and I see another person of colour, and there is often a slight acknowledgement, a subtle nod, an ‘I see you; you are not alone’.
I remember a tutor once referring to me as a black person, and that bristled as I felt unseen as a mixed-race woman. He had never asked about my cultural background. I did not identify with many of the experiences a black person has had to endure as a light-skinned woman with the privilege associated with that; it also ignored my Portuguese heritage, which was prominent in my upbringing. Even deciding what term to use or what box to tick when referring to myself has been a minefield. Am I black? Mixed race? A woman of colour? How the world sees and labels me differs from how I see myself. When I got therapy jobs, I wondered if they had hired me to fill a diversity quota. Or was it because they believed I was the best person for the job?
As a supervisor, I do my best to model thinking about diversity and intersectionality and for it not to be an add-on but rather an integral part of every therapeutic encounter and practice. Every therapist needs to model this to the next generation of psychotherapists. I have mentored POC psychotherapist trainees, hoping to give something I unfortunately did not receive in my training, which was representation.
Recently, I was in a group of fifteen therapists and was one of three women of colour in the group, which I remember thinking was unusual; historically, I am usually the only one. I noticed it as I have become inclined to do. I voiced it, which historically, I never felt comfortable doing. Speaking up as a woman of colour has been difficult, as I've feared the judgments and assumptions made about me based on the colour of my skin. My voice is louder nowadays. I think voicing it mattered as it highlighted the lack of people of colour in these traditionally white, middle-class spaces. Even though this isn’t news and is a broader issue that will take many years and generations of therapists to rectify, I have noticed movement since I started in this field over ten years ago. I feel privileged to be a small part of that movement, simply by existing as a psychotherapist woman of colour.
As a child, The Little Mermaid was my favourite Disney film, and I used to dream of being a mermaid and living in the ocean (sometimes I still do!). A few years ago, when they released the trailer for the live-action version of the film, which featured a brown-skinned Ariel, I cried; representation matters.
My experiences as a woman of colour are inherent to the psychotherapist I am today. I cannot pluck out specifics, but being a therapist does not start with one’s training; it begins with one's life experiences, and my experiences as a woman of colour have coloured my practice and always will.
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