April 18, 2024 • 27 mins
In this event, Caz Binstead chairs a discussion with Neelam Zahid and Rachel Cooke about editing and contributing to the book 'Therapists Challenging Racism and Oppression: The unheard voices'.
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Dr Peter Blundell (00:00):
Hello and welcome to another episode of
(00:01):
the Therapist Connect podcast.
Today, we are doing one of ourthrowback episodes where we
highlight some of our previouswork that you might not have
heard about.
So this episode is a shortenedversion of an event recorded for
the Therapist Connect birthdayin January.
If you'd like to hear the fullversion of this episode, then
you can search for us via ourYouTube account, where we have
lots of other discussions,debates, and interviews there
(00:23):
waiting for you.
In this episode, Caz Binstead,Therapist Connect co lead talks
to the editors and book chapterauthors of Therapists
Challenging Racism andOppression, The Unheard Voices.
And I'll let Caz do the fullintroductions.
Caz Binstead (00:36):
I'm blessed to be here with the editors of the
book Neelam and Rachel.
Hello.
Neelam Zahid (00:41):
Hi.
Rachel Cooke (00:42):
Hi.
Great to be here.
Thank you.
Caz Binstead (00:44):
To have you here.
I'm actually just going to startby reading the blurb.
for the book, for anyone whodoesn't have any idea of what
it's about.
So this book is about racism andits intersections with other
forms of oppression within thetalking therapist's professions,
told from the therapist'sperspective.
(01:05):
These rarely heard voices speakhonestly of the pain of being
silenced, shamed, excluded,violated, rendered invisible and
deeply wounded by theirexperiences in training and in
practice.
But there are also stories ofstrength, courage,
resourcefulness, and growth.
(01:28):
Some therapists may findrecognition and affirmation in
these accounts, as well as hopeand healing.
Others may better understand howtheir own fragility and bias
have led them to similarbehaviors and harmful mistakes.
This essential read bringstogether personal,
psychological, societal, andpolitical insights to better
(01:49):
imagine and further thediscourse around what might
facilitate meaningful change.
Just to properly introduce youboth I'm just going to read your
bios.
Okay Neelam Zahid is anIntegrative Counselor,
Psychotherapist and ClinicalSupervisor, accredited by BACP.
(02:11):
She has practiced as a therapistsince 2003, having previously
worked in higher education formore than a decade, and
currently has her own privatepractice.
She is also Deputy Course Leaderfor the Foundation Year at the
Minster Centre, and teaches onthe Introduction to Counselling
Skills course.
In addition, she is currently avisiting lecturer at the
(02:33):
University of Westminster,teaching on the BSc Psychology
and Counselling and Introductionto Counselling Skills courses.
Her area of interest areintersectionality, difference
and diversity, and she hascontributed to several
publications, including theHandbook of Transcultural
Counselling and Psychotherapy.
And black identities and whitetherapies, race, respect, and
(02:57):
diversity.
And we have Rachel Jane Cook,she, they, who's a queer
integrative psychotherapist,supervisor, and educator from
Ireland in practice since 2009.
She's based in London, runs anonline therapy platform,
consults to charities and socialenterprises.
(03:18):
And has a longstanding weeklyradio segment on sex and
relationships, where she oftendiscusses identity, privilege,
and oppression.
She regularly speaks on podcastsand hosts talks and workshops
for the public, for therapists,and for organizations on topics
such as intersectionality,trauma, attachment, health and
wellness under neoliberalism,embodiment, feminist therapy and
(03:41):
gender, sexuality andrelationship diversity.
Rachel is passionate abouttraining therapists committed to
social justice, particularlythrough embodied and relational
practice.
And you can read more about herwork at RachelJaneCookWithAnE.
com.
Neelam Zahid (03:57):
I thought before we start going into the book and
talking about our own chapters,as well as the other chapters, I
thought it'd be, or I felt itwas important to kind of name
the chapters, but also, name ourcontributors so that they kind
of have a space here, um, eventhough they may not be
physically here.
Um, so I'll read through thecontents page.
(04:19):
Um, and as I do this, um, I, I'malso mindful of the
pronunciation of certain namesthat I'm, um, unsure of.
So Rachel, do jump in if I'vemispronounced a name.
Um, and also if we collectivelymispronounce the name, then I
would encourage, um, thecontributor or someone else with
(04:40):
that name to tell us what theright, right, or correct
pronunciation is.
So I'll do my best here.
And I suppose I just want to saythat in context of my own
chapter, I think kind of thenames part is quite important.
So, uh, but I know we'll go onto talk about that in a second.
So, um, the first couple ofchapters is by myself.
(05:01):
Um, what's in a name, uh, why Imatter, why names matter.
The People of Colour, um, thesecond chapter is by Rachel,
Rachel Cook, cultivatingintersectional nuance, uh,
within the dissociative confinesof capitalism.
The next chapter is, uh, writtenby Ohema N.
(05:21):
Kansa.
Uh, Dwamina, hopefully Ipronounced that correctly,
attempting, attending to self,attending to others, the impact
on the black therapist of clientpresentations of racial trauma.
We then have Anita Gasper, CallMe By My Name.
That's the following chapter.
The one after that is by JoannaTrainor, A Need for Deep
(05:46):
Learning, Not Training.
Chapter 6, Racism and CoerciveControl in an NHS Counselling
Service, by Anja Amrith andRashmi Lovett.
Chapter 7, Confronting theColonial History of Transphobia,
by Sam Hope.
Uh, Inter, Chapter 8,Interracial Transference, a Case
(06:09):
of Projective Identification, byJaspreet Tihara.
Um, chapter nine.
Uh, and I can, I cannotpronounce this word.
Uh, do you want to go on Rachel?
Healing.
A multidimensional approach totherapy by Uy Egoro.
(06:34):
And the final chapter, um,chapter 10, my journey to
visibility using congruence toexplore racial microaggressions
within the supervisoryrelationship by Rajita
Rajeshwar.
Caz Binstead (06:48):
Thank you.
Thank you.
And yeah, we're not going tohave a lot of time in this
discussion to touch on all ofthe chapters, but we do want to
acknowledge all those authors.
To get started, you talk in theintroduction in the book about
the reasons for writing it andyour own individual processes in
that.
So would you just for theviewers say a little bit about
(07:10):
that.
Neelam Zahid (07:13):
Should I jump in first?
Rachel, take us off.
Neelam, please.
So for me, I think really thisbook has been a culmination of
years and years of racism withinthe field of therapy.
And, from the time of mytraining up until now, there
(07:33):
have always been different formsof experiencing racism within
the field, whether it's as aclient in the kind of client
chair, whether it's.
as a therapist and the therapistchair in training my initial
training with other peers ortutors or work colleagues.
(07:54):
So it for me, there's just beena list of one thing after
another.
And I think within the last kindof five or six years for me
after having attended someworkshops where that happened
again, I felt like I reallycouldn't keep silent anymore.
And yeah, it was just comingfrom that place of, I really
(08:17):
want to speak up about theracism within our field.
And I don't think it gets talkedabout enough for me.
It's, racism is out there.
And it happens out there in theoutside world.
And it's only now recently thatwe started thinking about it in
terms of, and in context of ourtherapeutic work.
And I think that's why I wantedto break the silence around
(08:39):
that.
So for me, that's what the bookhas been really about and to
give a voice not only to givemyself a voice, but to give all
of the other contributors andhopefully other people who will
be reading this a voice To breakthe silence around racism within
the field.
Rachel Cooke (09:00):
Rachel.
Yeah, follow on from that.
I was, really flattered anddelighted to be asked by Neelam
to support her in this project,and to be yeah, to co edit.
It felt like a verysynchronicitous sort of timing
very kind of rousing, it waswhat, 2019, 2020.
(09:20):
We both had separately, beforewe knew each other, just a lot
of experiences, a huge amountfrom what Neelam has shared of
experiences of trainings thatwere just poorly held in terms
of like intersectionality anddifference in general, but
particularly around race.
And so it felt like that wasjust incredibly needed.
Far too many trainings that werejust woefully ill equipped in
(09:42):
holding, yeah, diversity really,and approaching training with
kind of true intersectionality.
What it's really made me thinkabout is how therapy is
political.
It feels like we're onlystarting to really touch on what
that means, that kind ofeverything is political or can
be political and how therapy hasstayed apart from that for a
long time in many ways,particularly white Western
(10:04):
therapy and through.
Speaking to people and delvinginto this kind of area and
topic, we discovered just somany therapists who've had
horrific experiences in trainingin organizations and
institutions, organizations thatthey work with in private
practice with their own clients.
in their own therapy andsupervision.
(10:25):
And so what we thought was goingto be more of a, let's say,
maybe handbook, I think to beginwith ended up being a collection
of stories because it felt likewe recognized that there are
more spaces now for People totalk about race and racism, but
there we don't really know ofany books and not many kind of
podcasts or resources wheretherapists, particularly
(10:48):
therapists of color have theopportunity to really speak
about their own personalexperiences on their kind of
professional experiences withrace.
So it felt like, my involvement,I really wanted to use my
privilege and power to supporttherapists of color to be heard
and to be published.
We wanted to get as many.
People on board who haven't beenpublished before, although some
of them have been and to justshare the platform with
(11:10):
different and similar kind ofmarginalizations.
And because I guess through thiswe've also recognized that
nearly everybody has some aspectof their identity that is
marginalized, and but thatdoesn't make them more equal.
And yeah, it was a real.
Yeah, pleasure and honor to beable to be part of this project
with em.
And, the amazing contributorsthat we have met, both the, all
(11:33):
the people who've been publishedand also the ones who have
didn't end up making it into thebook.
Caz Binstead (11:38):
Neilam, what you say there about the silence.
I think that's such an importantpoint.
We were talking about it offscreen a moment ago.
We are a talking profession andactually being able to.
talk about these things andshare stories and be human
beings and share our stories.
One thing I really love aboutthis book, the fact that, like
(12:00):
you say Roche, you decided to godown the, people's actual
accounts and stories.
I think it makes it a reallypowerful book.
Neelam Zahid (12:10):
Yeah, I think so.
And I think It's a daring book.
I was thinking about this just acouple of days ago how much
courage it takes to speak outand speak out within a
profession where, although weare told to speak out and to be
(12:31):
congruent and authentic andreal.
But actually there were certainthings that we.
Encouraged almost not to and I'mjust thinking about the
traditional quite traditionalpsychotherapeutic model where it
just focuses on the internal,the internal system and internal
(12:53):
yeah, our kind of internal spaceand really divorce it from the
external world.
And as Rachel said, therapy ispolitical, and it is really
important to bring that into theroom, and I feel like there's a
lot of fear, there's a lot offear within the therapy world
of, what if we get found out,what if I say the wrong thing
(13:15):
what if, there's lots of whatifs, I've had conversations with
lots of people who, We'll say,I'm really afraid, I'm really
afraid that I'll get it wrongand that somebody will call me
racist.
And I think that's what preventsus from speaking out.
And it feels like a realrepresentation of kind of what
happens in the outside world.
(13:37):
That, that fear of speaking outand breaking the silence.
And it is an incongruence withinour field of, as you say, it's.
It's a talking profession andyet there's certain things that
we were bracketing and notreally being really tentative
with.
Rachel Cooke (13:55):
Hugely.
And I suppose, yeah, adding intothat, but the kind of the
hierarchy that exists and howthis book really made us look
at, I was already interesting,interested in the concept of
decolonizing therapy.
In fact, I felt passionate aboutit.
But again, it's something thatonly over the past few years,
are we really looking at how thekind of Western medical model
(14:16):
has placed people sufferingwithin the individual in kind of
faulty Neurochemicals and brainsnot working kind of thing, as
opposed to being able to reallylook, which is not the same as
saying that everything is aboutthe fact that you grew up, poor
or working class or black orwhatever it is, but it's
recognizing that.
(14:37):
the context, the social context,your environments are going to
have a huge impact on your wellbeing, what you believe is
possible for your life, all ofthose things and how, you're
what we call mental health, butI personally prefer psychosocial
well being or biopsychosocial,in order to really look at that
context, because even the termmental health, Makes us think
(14:59):
about that being localized inthe individual which we've
discovered through thesechapters and other, the research
that we've done through this,that it's just, it's not helping
us and it's very part of a kindof capitalist and very kind of
white historical culture,cultural approach towards yeah,
being and the kind of lack ofcommunity or separation from
(15:19):
community in thatindividualization that has
occurred.
Caz Binstead (15:24):
I know you're going to say more about that,
Rachel, when you talk about yourchapter in terms of the other
authors I know this has beenquite a long process, actually,
because obviously it happenedover the pandemic period.
How did you go about findingcontributors?
How did that kind of play out?
Neelam Zahid (15:43):
I suppose contact the networks, certainly for me
the kind of networks that wewere.
Or I was part of and reachingout to people calling for
chapter contributions personalnetworks as well.
So it's really tapping into thekind of people I know and.
people that they know and reallytrying to get people who, as
(16:07):
Rachel said earlier, hadn'tcontributed to, hadn't written
anything before, hadn't beenpublished, but really wanted who
felt like they wanted to telltheir story.
And That felt like a reallyimportant part that this wasn't
actually just an academic pieceof work because we had lots of
people wanting to just writeabout theory.
(16:29):
And this isn't just abouttheory.
This is about real life.
And this is about ourexperiences.
So it was really yeah, findingpeople who wanted to do that,
wanting to really be vulnerableand what we asked people to do
wasn't easy.
And I really recognize the, howmuch we asked from our
contributors.
The amount that they had to gointo their own trauma, their own
(16:53):
racial trauma, as well as othertraumas.
So the vulnerability, thecourage that it took it just
felt yeah, it was a reallyimportant part of this book is
being able to tell that story.
Yeah, but I think that's the howwe did it and we had lots of
people drop out as well alongthe way.
For some people it was thingsaround practicalities.
(17:15):
It didn't work out for otherpeople, it brought up lots of
things for people.
And I know for myself, itbrought up lots of things for me
and it was just too difficult todo.
I'm sure Rachel will say a bitmore about that, but yeah,
that's how we went about tryingto.
to find people.
Rachel Cooke (17:34):
My process was a little bit different in that I
was also reaching out to mynetwork, but I also did quite a
social media drive on that whereI approached some people usually
not cold but there were a fewpeople where I heard that this
person might be interested andthen I approached them and said,
hey, this is something thatwe're doing.
And ended up with a lot of kindof conversations and contacts
(17:56):
through that, but, as Neelamtouched on there or mentioned,
we had to try and balance that.
How much are we going to be ableto have the time, how much time
and energy are we going to haveourselves with, our own private
practices and different, Neelamteaches and the different things
that we're doing, supervising,having, our lives, Neelam's got,
children and, Just being able toreally do justice to the
(18:18):
contributors where we could havea really full mixture where it
wasn't about having, a kind oftick box of, every kind of
marginalized identity, but westill wanted it to be as diverse
as possible.
But we had to recognize that wewere as Niamh said, asking a lot
of these, of the contributorsAnd also we wanted to be able to
support them as much aspossible.
(18:39):
So there was this big process ofhow much do we share each time
that we make a change with thebook, each time that someone's
chapter changes, or, we had arough idea of how many people
from different particularbackgrounds we would like, but
that shifted over time.
Some people dropped out becauseof, yeah, the timing for them
because the project went on forNearly three and a half years in
(18:59):
total and we thought I certainlyoptimistically thought in the
beginning that we would probablyManage to get it published
within about 18 months.
I think Neelam was much morerealistic than I was but that
was also something where somepeople had written something
earlier on and then as time wenton that You know ended up being
published being they were in adifferent place at that time.
(19:20):
Later on for other people, theycame in right at the end and
didn't have anywhere near asmuch time to be supported by us.
And so each of those had a lotof kind of complexity and
required having, what I've cometo see as having both thick skin
and thin skin at the same time,like needing to be thin skinned
in, in remaining sensitive andreally listening and being
(19:41):
attentive to people's feedback.
And also not wanting toovercrowd them with how much
communication we were having orthe way in which we were
editing.
But then also needing to bequite thick skinned in how
people, both, contributors, Orpeople who even put in kind of
proposals were sometimes havingreactions to, it could be me
being involved as a white personor what they felt that the book
(20:05):
constituted before knowing moreabout the book.
So we had to really span that aswell, which, yeah, took that
kind of time and energy andbeing as conscientious as we
could be.
Neelam Zahid (20:21):
And actually it just to add on to that as well
that some of our requests werereceived with some annoyance and
some anger that we were askingpeople of color to write about
their racial trauma or theracist experience racist
experiences that had beenthrough for essentially not a
(20:43):
fee.
And as we all know.
writing books, these kinds ofbooks, academic, books, there is
no money to be made in this,we're not making millions at
all.
And there was that kind of, andrightly I think in some ways of,
you're asking us to write aboutour own, our racist experiences
and we're not getting anythingin return for this.
(21:06):
Which I really do understand.
And I suppose it, it, for me,it's like yeah, actually that is
a massive thing to ask somebody.
So I suppose someone had to bein a, I was going to say.
In the right time in their lifewhere they were able to share
(21:27):
that part of themselves for thegreater good, so to speak,
rather than being a place maybemore fragile or delicate place
or.
Wherever they may have been.
Yeah, that's, that, those weresome of the challenges as well
that we came across when callingout to people and asking them
to, to write.
Caz Binstead (21:48):
Actually, as you both know, one of the reasons I
really this book is because it'svery like community, it's
community activism in a book,which I think is just amazing.
But as a community lead myself,I really identify with a lot of
the things that you're sayingthere, Neelam, asking people, do
you want to do things, but wecan't pay you.
And, but there's the pros tothat, but then, cons like that
(22:12):
asking people to give their timeand things.
But it also strikes me thatthere's a lot of difference
between a book and your job.
As editors, we're actually, aseditors, you have to be, because
it's a book you're producing,you have to Rachel, you were
saying the thick skin, thin skina bit of a yeah, holding,
wearing lots of different hatsand things.
So in some ways that's even moreof a challenge then because
(22:36):
you're giving space to people,but like you say, you, it's not
a closed space, it's an openspace for the world.
Rachel Cooke (22:45):
Yeah, totally.
We were trying to be everythingto all people in some ways and
also having to manage that inourselves because it, we were, I
think, certainly for me, I feltincredibly lucky that the way,
even though Neelam and I workedquite different ways and had
different, we had differentperiods over the three and a
half years where one of us hadmore availability and more
(23:05):
bandwidth than the other.
And we worked quite differentlyin terms of how we edited.
But for whatever reason,certainly speaking for myself, I
feel incredibly grateful andappreciative that it overall
felt like we really gelled.
It doesn't mean there weren'ttimes where we disagreed, but it
felt like we were able toreally, be responsible for
(23:26):
ourselves and to each other.
Which was an amazing part of theprocess because considering we
were having to have so manyconversations about how much we
would include contributors indifferent decisions and changes
that were being made to the bookand holding, all of those things
around people dropping in anddropping out and all of that,
that we were really lucky, Ithink, that would have been A
(23:48):
mentally different process tonot have a co editor or
something like that.
Caz Binstead (23:53):
Okay.
I'm mindful of time.
So is there anything else thateither of you want to add
anything we haven't talked aboutthat you'd really like to
mention or.
Rachel Cooke (24:05):
Yes, the final just note that I wanted to share
was about, it goes back to thepolitical aspect of this,
something that I've reallynoticed is the the reticence of
a lot of practitioners, andunderstandably, for many
different reasons.
For some people, it'sfrightening in private practice.
For some people, it'sfrightening working for people,
it's frightening.
the NHS or differentorganizations, but around
(24:27):
speaking out against injustice.
And I've seen that particularlywith what the kind of therapist
silence around Palestine overthe last few months, that it
feels as though it's nowbecoming more accepted to call
what's happening a genocide.
And also it's been, really quitestriking how little I've seen
practitioners, now, maybethere's a lots of private
(24:48):
discussions going on, butpublicly there's been very
little so far, and I'm guessingthat a lot of that is out of
fear but I think we're onlybeginning to find the language
after three months of what'sbeen happening there to be able
to say that, critiquing agovernment's choices is not the
same as casting discriminationon a whole people or the people
who, who live in that place.
(25:10):
And, that this is something thatI really hope that we are going
to be talking more about becausethe silence has been pretty
deafening.
Caz Binstead (25:20):
Such important points.
It comes back to, let's talk toeach other.
It's open.
Neelam Zahid (25:27):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I suppose for me, and thankyou, Rachel, for saying that.
I think that's been a reallyyeah, I feel deeply moved by
what's happening in the world.
And I think, yeah, it goes to aplace of real hurt and upset.
(25:48):
And I think for me, the workthat we are doing have done.
If it's a stone in, in, in apebble in that sea, that, that
vast thing, then actually it's.
It's worth it.
So for me, the vulnerability,the pain that we go through in
(26:09):
the Western world in kind ofthis, the UK that we live in,
despite the choices of ourgovernment it that, that makes
it worthwhile for me to open upand put this kind of piece of
work out there.
And so really a heart.
Heartfelt thanks to all thecontributors for putting
(26:29):
themselves out there for doingsome of this kind of, and again,
I'm struggling to say the wordsbecause I think it's brilliant.
It's important.
It's difficult work.
It's vulnerable work.
And actually, yeah, I just wantto say thank you to everyone for
doing that.
(26:50):
Yeah, I think that's what I wantto end with.
Caz Binstead (26:55):
tHank you so much for joining us, everyone.
Here's the book.
Go and buy it.
You're going to definitely learnsomething.
Thank you so much, Rachel andNeelam for joining me today.
Yeah.
Neelam Zahid (27:07):
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Thanks for inviting us to speaktoday.
Dr Peter Blundell (27:17):
We hope you enjoyed this episode.
It is a shortened version of anevent recorded for the
therapist.
Connect birthday in January.
So, if you'd like to hear thefull version of this episode,
then you can search for at viaYouTube account, where we have
lots of other discussions,debates, and interviews waiting
for you.
If you'd like to support thepodcast and please leave us a
review on your favorite podcastplatform.
Hello and welcome to another episode of
(00:01):
the Therapist Connect podcast.
Today, we are doing one of ourthrowback episodes where we
highlight some of our previouswork that you might not have
heard about.
So this episode is a shortenedversion of an event recorded for
the Therapist Connect birthdayin January.
If you'd like to hear the fullversion of this episode, then
you can search for us via ourYouTube account, where we have
lots of other discussions,debates, and interviews there
(00:23):
waiting for you.
In this episode, Caz Binstead,Therapist Connect co lead talks
to the editors and book chapterauthors of Therapists
Challenging Racism andOppression, The Unheard Voices.
And I'll let Caz do the fullintroductions.
Caz Binstead (00:36):
I'm blessed to be here with the editors of the
book Neelam and Rachel.
Hello.
Neelam Zahid (00:41):
Hi.
Rachel Cooke (00:42):
Hi.
Great to be here.
Thank you.
Caz Binstead (00:44):
To have you here.
I'm actually just going to startby reading the blurb.
for the book, for anyone whodoesn't have any idea of what
it's about.
So this book is about racism andits intersections with other
forms of oppression within thetalking therapist's professions,
told from the therapist'sperspective.
(01:05):
These rarely heard voices speakhonestly of the pain of being
silenced, shamed, excluded,violated, rendered invisible and
deeply wounded by theirexperiences in training and in
practice.
But there are also stories ofstrength, courage,
resourcefulness, and growth.
(01:28):
Some therapists may findrecognition and affirmation in
these accounts, as well as hopeand healing.
Others may better understand howtheir own fragility and bias
have led them to similarbehaviors and harmful mistakes.
This essential read bringstogether personal,
psychological, societal, andpolitical insights to better
(01:49):
imagine and further thediscourse around what might
facilitate meaningful change.
Just to properly introduce youboth I'm just going to read your
bios.
Okay Neelam Zahid is anIntegrative Counselor,
Psychotherapist and ClinicalSupervisor, accredited by BACP.
(02:11):
She has practiced as a therapistsince 2003, having previously
worked in higher education formore than a decade, and
currently has her own privatepractice.
She is also Deputy Course Leaderfor the Foundation Year at the
Minster Centre, and teaches onthe Introduction to Counselling
Skills course.
In addition, she is currently avisiting lecturer at the
(02:33):
University of Westminster,teaching on the BSc Psychology
and Counselling and Introductionto Counselling Skills courses.
Her area of interest areintersectionality, difference
and diversity, and she hascontributed to several
publications, including theHandbook of Transcultural
Counselling and Psychotherapy.
And black identities and whitetherapies, race, respect, and
(02:57):
diversity.
And we have Rachel Jane Cook,she, they, who's a queer
integrative psychotherapist,supervisor, and educator from
Ireland in practice since 2009.
She's based in London, runs anonline therapy platform,
consults to charities and socialenterprises.
(03:18):
And has a longstanding weeklyradio segment on sex and
relationships, where she oftendiscusses identity, privilege,
and oppression.
She regularly speaks on podcastsand hosts talks and workshops
for the public, for therapists,and for organizations on topics
such as intersectionality,trauma, attachment, health and
wellness under neoliberalism,embodiment, feminist therapy and
(03:41):
gender, sexuality andrelationship diversity.
Rachel is passionate abouttraining therapists committed to
social justice, particularlythrough embodied and relational
practice.
And you can read more about herwork at RachelJaneCookWithAnE.
com.
Neelam Zahid (03:57):
I thought before we start going into the book and
talking about our own chapters,as well as the other chapters, I
thought it'd be, or I felt itwas important to kind of name
the chapters, but also, name ourcontributors so that they kind
of have a space here, um, eventhough they may not be
physically here.
Um, so I'll read through thecontents page.
(04:19):
Um, and as I do this, um, I, I'malso mindful of the
pronunciation of certain namesthat I'm, um, unsure of.
So Rachel, do jump in if I'vemispronounced a name.
Um, and also if we collectivelymispronounce the name, then I
would encourage, um, thecontributor or someone else with
(04:40):
that name to tell us what theright, right, or correct
pronunciation is.
So I'll do my best here.
And I suppose I just want to saythat in context of my own
chapter, I think kind of thenames part is quite important.
So, uh, but I know we'll go onto talk about that in a second.
So, um, the first couple ofchapters is by myself.
(05:01):
Um, what's in a name, uh, why Imatter, why names matter.
The People of Colour, um, thesecond chapter is by Rachel,
Rachel Cook, cultivatingintersectional nuance, uh,
within the dissociative confinesof capitalism.
The next chapter is, uh, writtenby Ohema N.
(05:21):
Kansa.
Uh, Dwamina, hopefully Ipronounced that correctly,
attempting, attending to self,attending to others, the impact
on the black therapist of clientpresentations of racial trauma.
We then have Anita Gasper, CallMe By My Name.
That's the following chapter.
The one after that is by JoannaTrainor, A Need for Deep
(05:46):
Learning, Not Training.
Chapter 6, Racism and CoerciveControl in an NHS Counselling
Service, by Anja Amrith andRashmi Lovett.
Chapter 7, Confronting theColonial History of Transphobia,
by Sam Hope.
Uh, Inter, Chapter 8,Interracial Transference, a Case
(06:09):
of Projective Identification, byJaspreet Tihara.
Um, chapter nine.
Uh, and I can, I cannotpronounce this word.
Uh, do you want to go on Rachel?
Healing.
A multidimensional approach totherapy by Uy Egoro.
(06:34):
And the final chapter, um,chapter 10, my journey to
visibility using congruence toexplore racial microaggressions
within the supervisoryrelationship by Rajita
Rajeshwar.
Caz Binstead (06:48):
Thank you.
Thank you.
And yeah, we're not going tohave a lot of time in this
discussion to touch on all ofthe chapters, but we do want to
acknowledge all those authors.
To get started, you talk in theintroduction in the book about
the reasons for writing it andyour own individual processes in
that.
So would you just for theviewers say a little bit about
(07:10):
that.
Neelam Zahid (07:13):
Should I jump in first?
Rachel, take us off.
Neelam, please.
So for me, I think really thisbook has been a culmination of
years and years of racism withinthe field of therapy.
And, from the time of mytraining up until now, there
(07:33):
have always been different formsof experiencing racism within
the field, whether it's as aclient in the kind of client
chair, whether it's.
as a therapist and the therapistchair in training my initial
training with other peers ortutors or work colleagues.
(07:54):
So it for me, there's just beena list of one thing after
another.
And I think within the last kindof five or six years for me
after having attended someworkshops where that happened
again, I felt like I reallycouldn't keep silent anymore.
And yeah, it was just comingfrom that place of, I really
(08:17):
want to speak up about theracism within our field.
And I don't think it gets talkedabout enough for me.
It's, racism is out there.
And it happens out there in theoutside world.
And it's only now recently thatwe started thinking about it in
terms of, and in context of ourtherapeutic work.
And I think that's why I wantedto break the silence around
(08:39):
that.
So for me, that's what the bookhas been really about and to
give a voice not only to givemyself a voice, but to give all
of the other contributors andhopefully other people who will
be reading this a voice To breakthe silence around racism within
the field.
Rachel Cooke (09:00):
Rachel.
Yeah, follow on from that.
I was, really flattered anddelighted to be asked by Neelam
to support her in this project,and to be yeah, to co edit.
It felt like a verysynchronicitous sort of timing
very kind of rousing, it waswhat, 2019, 2020.
(09:20):
We both had separately, beforewe knew each other, just a lot
of experiences, a huge amountfrom what Neelam has shared of
experiences of trainings thatwere just poorly held in terms
of like intersectionality anddifference in general, but
particularly around race.
And so it felt like that wasjust incredibly needed.
Far too many trainings that werejust woefully ill equipped in
(09:42):
holding, yeah, diversity really,and approaching training with
kind of true intersectionality.
What it's really made me thinkabout is how therapy is
political.
It feels like we're onlystarting to really touch on what
that means, that kind ofeverything is political or can
be political and how therapy hasstayed apart from that for a
long time in many ways,particularly white Western
(10:04):
therapy and through.
Speaking to people and delvinginto this kind of area and
topic, we discovered just somany therapists who've had
horrific experiences in trainingin organizations and
institutions, organizations thatthey work with in private
practice with their own clients.
in their own therapy andsupervision.
(10:25):
And so what we thought was goingto be more of a, let's say,
maybe handbook, I think to beginwith ended up being a collection
of stories because it felt likewe recognized that there are
more spaces now for People totalk about race and racism, but
there we don't really know ofany books and not many kind of
podcasts or resources wheretherapists, particularly
(10:48):
therapists of color have theopportunity to really speak
about their own personalexperiences on their kind of
professional experiences withrace.
So it felt like, my involvement,I really wanted to use my
privilege and power to supporttherapists of color to be heard
and to be published.
We wanted to get as many.
People on board who haven't beenpublished before, although some
of them have been and to justshare the platform with
(11:10):
different and similar kind ofmarginalizations.
And because I guess through thiswe've also recognized that
nearly everybody has some aspectof their identity that is
marginalized, and but thatdoesn't make them more equal.
And yeah, it was a real.
Yeah, pleasure and honor to beable to be part of this project
with em.
And, the amazing contributorsthat we have met, both the, all
(11:33):
the people who've been publishedand also the ones who have
didn't end up making it into thebook.
Caz Binstead (11:38):
Neilam, what you say there about the silence.
I think that's such an importantpoint.
We were talking about it offscreen a moment ago.
We are a talking profession andactually being able to.
talk about these things andshare stories and be human
beings and share our stories.
One thing I really love aboutthis book, the fact that, like
(12:00):
you say Roche, you decided to godown the, people's actual
accounts and stories.
I think it makes it a reallypowerful book.
Neelam Zahid (12:10):
Yeah, I think so.
And I think It's a daring book.
I was thinking about this just acouple of days ago how much
courage it takes to speak outand speak out within a
profession where, although weare told to speak out and to be
(12:31):
congruent and authentic andreal.
But actually there were certainthings that we.
Encouraged almost not to and I'mjust thinking about the
traditional quite traditionalpsychotherapeutic model where it
just focuses on the internal,the internal system and internal
(12:53):
yeah, our kind of internal spaceand really divorce it from the
external world.
And as Rachel said, therapy ispolitical, and it is really
important to bring that into theroom, and I feel like there's a
lot of fear, there's a lot offear within the therapy world
of, what if we get found out,what if I say the wrong thing
(13:15):
what if, there's lots of whatifs, I've had conversations with
lots of people who, We'll say,I'm really afraid, I'm really
afraid that I'll get it wrongand that somebody will call me
racist.
And I think that's what preventsus from speaking out.
And it feels like a realrepresentation of kind of what
happens in the outside world.
(13:37):
That, that fear of speaking outand breaking the silence.
And it is an incongruence withinour field of, as you say, it's.
It's a talking profession andyet there's certain things that
we were bracketing and notreally being really tentative
with.
Rachel Cooke (13:55):
Hugely.
And I suppose, yeah, adding intothat, but the kind of the
hierarchy that exists and howthis book really made us look
at, I was already interesting,interested in the concept of
decolonizing therapy.
In fact, I felt passionate aboutit.
But again, it's something thatonly over the past few years,
are we really looking at how thekind of Western medical model
(14:16):
has placed people sufferingwithin the individual in kind of
faulty Neurochemicals and brainsnot working kind of thing, as
opposed to being able to reallylook, which is not the same as
saying that everything is aboutthe fact that you grew up, poor
or working class or black orwhatever it is, but it's
recognizing that.
(14:37):
the context, the social context,your environments are going to
have a huge impact on your wellbeing, what you believe is
possible for your life, all ofthose things and how, you're
what we call mental health, butI personally prefer psychosocial
well being or biopsychosocial,in order to really look at that
context, because even the termmental health, Makes us think
(14:59):
about that being localized inthe individual which we've
discovered through thesechapters and other, the research
that we've done through this,that it's just, it's not helping
us and it's very part of a kindof capitalist and very kind of
white historical culture,cultural approach towards yeah,
being and the kind of lack ofcommunity or separation from
(15:19):
community in thatindividualization that has
occurred.
Caz Binstead (15:24):
I know you're going to say more about that,
Rachel, when you talk about yourchapter in terms of the other
authors I know this has beenquite a long process, actually,
because obviously it happenedover the pandemic period.
How did you go about findingcontributors?
How did that kind of play out?
Neelam Zahid (15:43):
I suppose contact the networks, certainly for me
the kind of networks that wewere.
Or I was part of and reachingout to people calling for
chapter contributions personalnetworks as well.
So it's really tapping into thekind of people I know and.
people that they know and reallytrying to get people who, as
(16:07):
Rachel said earlier, hadn'tcontributed to, hadn't written
anything before, hadn't beenpublished, but really wanted who
felt like they wanted to telltheir story.
And That felt like a reallyimportant part that this wasn't
actually just an academic pieceof work because we had lots of
people wanting to just writeabout theory.
(16:29):
And this isn't just abouttheory.
This is about real life.
And this is about ourexperiences.
So it was really yeah, findingpeople who wanted to do that,
wanting to really be vulnerableand what we asked people to do
wasn't easy.
And I really recognize the, howmuch we asked from our
contributors.
The amount that they had to gointo their own trauma, their own
(16:53):
racial trauma, as well as othertraumas.
So the vulnerability, thecourage that it took it just
felt yeah, it was a reallyimportant part of this book is
being able to tell that story.
Yeah, but I think that's the howwe did it and we had lots of
people drop out as well alongthe way.
For some people it was thingsaround practicalities.
(17:15):
It didn't work out for otherpeople, it brought up lots of
things for people.
And I know for myself, itbrought up lots of things for me
and it was just too difficult todo.
I'm sure Rachel will say a bitmore about that, but yeah,
that's how we went about tryingto.
to find people.
Rachel Cooke (17:34):
My process was a little bit different in that I
was also reaching out to mynetwork, but I also did quite a
social media drive on that whereI approached some people usually
not cold but there were a fewpeople where I heard that this
person might be interested andthen I approached them and said,
hey, this is something thatwe're doing.
And ended up with a lot of kindof conversations and contacts
(17:56):
through that, but, as Neelamtouched on there or mentioned,
we had to try and balance that.
How much are we going to be ableto have the time, how much time
and energy are we going to haveourselves with, our own private
practices and different, Neelamteaches and the different things
that we're doing, supervising,having, our lives, Neelam's got,
children and, Just being able toreally do justice to the
(18:18):
contributors where we could havea really full mixture where it
wasn't about having, a kind oftick box of, every kind of
marginalized identity, but westill wanted it to be as diverse
as possible.
But we had to recognize that wewere as Niamh said, asking a lot
of these, of the contributorsAnd also we wanted to be able to
support them as much aspossible.
(18:39):
So there was this big process ofhow much do we share each time
that we make a change with thebook, each time that someone's
chapter changes, or, we had arough idea of how many people
from different particularbackgrounds we would like, but
that shifted over time.
Some people dropped out becauseof, yeah, the timing for them
because the project went on forNearly three and a half years in
(18:59):
total and we thought I certainlyoptimistically thought in the
beginning that we would probablyManage to get it published
within about 18 months.
I think Neelam was much morerealistic than I was but that
was also something where somepeople had written something
earlier on and then as time wenton that You know ended up being
published being they were in adifferent place at that time.
(19:20):
Later on for other people, theycame in right at the end and
didn't have anywhere near asmuch time to be supported by us.
And so each of those had a lotof kind of complexity and
required having, what I've cometo see as having both thick skin
and thin skin at the same time,like needing to be thin skinned
in, in remaining sensitive andreally listening and being
(19:41):
attentive to people's feedback.
And also not wanting toovercrowd them with how much
communication we were having orthe way in which we were
editing.
But then also needing to bequite thick skinned in how
people, both, contributors, Orpeople who even put in kind of
proposals were sometimes havingreactions to, it could be me
being involved as a white personor what they felt that the book
(20:05):
constituted before knowing moreabout the book.
So we had to really span that aswell, which, yeah, took that
kind of time and energy andbeing as conscientious as we
could be.
Neelam Zahid (20:21):
And actually it just to add on to that as well
that some of our requests werereceived with some annoyance and
some anger that we were askingpeople of color to write about
their racial trauma or theracist experience racist
experiences that had beenthrough for essentially not a
(20:43):
fee.
And as we all know.
writing books, these kinds ofbooks, academic, books, there is
no money to be made in this,we're not making millions at
all.
And there was that kind of, andrightly I think in some ways of,
you're asking us to write aboutour own, our racist experiences
and we're not getting anythingin return for this.
(21:06):
Which I really do understand.
And I suppose it, it, for me,it's like yeah, actually that is
a massive thing to ask somebody.
So I suppose someone had to bein a, I was going to say.
In the right time in their lifewhere they were able to share
(21:27):
that part of themselves for thegreater good, so to speak,
rather than being a place maybemore fragile or delicate place
or.
Wherever they may have been.
Yeah, that's, that, those weresome of the challenges as well
that we came across when callingout to people and asking them
to, to write.
Caz Binstead (21:48):
Actually, as you both know, one of the reasons I
really this book is because it'svery like community, it's
community activism in a book,which I think is just amazing.
But as a community lead myself,I really identify with a lot of
the things that you're sayingthere, Neelam, asking people, do
you want to do things, but wecan't pay you.
And, but there's the pros tothat, but then, cons like that
(22:12):
asking people to give their timeand things.
But it also strikes me thatthere's a lot of difference
between a book and your job.
As editors, we're actually, aseditors, you have to be, because
it's a book you're producing,you have to Rachel, you were
saying the thick skin, thin skina bit of a yeah, holding,
wearing lots of different hatsand things.
So in some ways that's even moreof a challenge then because
(22:36):
you're giving space to people,but like you say, you, it's not
a closed space, it's an openspace for the world.
Rachel Cooke (22:45):
Yeah, totally.
We were trying to be everythingto all people in some ways and
also having to manage that inourselves because it, we were, I
think, certainly for me, I feltincredibly lucky that the way,
even though Neelam and I workedquite different ways and had
different, we had differentperiods over the three and a
half years where one of us hadmore availability and more
(23:05):
bandwidth than the other.
And we worked quite differentlyin terms of how we edited.
But for whatever reason,certainly speaking for myself, I
feel incredibly grateful andappreciative that it overall
felt like we really gelled.
It doesn't mean there weren'ttimes where we disagreed, but it
felt like we were able toreally, be responsible for
(23:26):
ourselves and to each other.
Which was an amazing part of theprocess because considering we
were having to have so manyconversations about how much we
would include contributors indifferent decisions and changes
that were being made to the bookand holding, all of those things
around people dropping in anddropping out and all of that,
that we were really lucky, Ithink, that would have been A
(23:48):
mentally different process tonot have a co editor or
something like that.
Caz Binstead (23:53):
Okay.
I'm mindful of time.
So is there anything else thateither of you want to add
anything we haven't talked aboutthat you'd really like to
mention or.
Rachel Cooke (24:05):
Yes, the final just note that I wanted to share
was about, it goes back to thepolitical aspect of this,
something that I've reallynoticed is the the reticence of
a lot of practitioners, andunderstandably, for many
different reasons.
For some people, it'sfrightening in private practice.
For some people, it'sfrightening working for people,
it's frightening.
the NHS or differentorganizations, but around
(24:27):
speaking out against injustice.
And I've seen that particularlywith what the kind of therapist
silence around Palestine overthe last few months, that it
feels as though it's nowbecoming more accepted to call
what's happening a genocide.
And also it's been, really quitestriking how little I've seen
practitioners, now, maybethere's a lots of private
(24:48):
discussions going on, butpublicly there's been very
little so far, and I'm guessingthat a lot of that is out of
fear but I think we're onlybeginning to find the language
after three months of what'sbeen happening there to be able
to say that, critiquing agovernment's choices is not the
same as casting discriminationon a whole people or the people
who, who live in that place.
(25:10):
And, that this is something thatI really hope that we are going
to be talking more about becausethe silence has been pretty
deafening.
Caz Binstead (25:20):
Such important points.
It comes back to, let's talk toeach other.
It's open.
Neelam Zahid (25:27):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I suppose for me, and thankyou, Rachel, for saying that.
I think that's been a reallyyeah, I feel deeply moved by
what's happening in the world.
And I think, yeah, it goes to aplace of real hurt and upset.
(25:48):
And I think for me, the workthat we are doing have done.
If it's a stone in, in, in apebble in that sea, that, that
vast thing, then actually it's.
It's worth it.
So for me, the vulnerability,the pain that we go through in
(26:09):
the Western world in kind ofthis, the UK that we live in,
despite the choices of ourgovernment it that, that makes
it worthwhile for me to open upand put this kind of piece of
work out there.
And so really a heart.
Heartfelt thanks to all thecontributors for putting
(26:29):
themselves out there for doingsome of this kind of, and again,
I'm struggling to say the wordsbecause I think it's brilliant.
It's important.
It's difficult work.
It's vulnerable work.
And actually, yeah, I just wantto say thank you to everyone for
doing that.
(26:50):
Yeah, I think that's what I wantto end with.
Caz Binstead (26:55):
tHank you so much for joining us, everyone.
Here's the book.
Go and buy it.
You're going to definitely learnsomething.
Thank you so much, Rachel andNeelam for joining me today.
Yeah.
Neelam Zahid (27:07):
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Thanks for inviting us to speaktoday.
Dr Peter Blundell (27:17):
We hope you enjoyed this episode.
It is a shortened version of anevent recorded for the
therapist.
Connect birthday in January.
So, if you'd like to hear thefull version of this episode,
then you can search for at viaYouTube account, where we have
lots of other discussions,debates, and interviews waiting
for you.
If you'd like to support thepodcast and please leave us a
review on your favorite podcastplatform.
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