Trainings
Navigating sex and Intimacy In clinical practice: 101
Join Emily Pilowa, LICSW for 3 zoom trainings to support your growth as a clinician. Each training will utilize theory, psycho-education, personal reflection, and numerous case examples to help clinicians to develop a sex-positive practice.
Session 1:
Sex ed class: For clinicians and other adults
Arousal and desire
In this training, we will cover all the functional biological information that you need to know to demystify sexual organs and unpack the origins of confusions related to genitals and their functioning. Most adults will report that they do not need this education; however, we were NOT taught the vast majority of what will be understood in this training. This information will help clinicians and clients unpack a massive amount of shame.
We will then move to a conversation about the difference between arousal and desire and how understanding these neurological and physical functions in the body helps us to inform our clients around dysfunction (or so-called dysfunction) and keep them empowered in the bedroom. The neurological functions of arousal and desire and their developmental paths are key to helping MANY of our clients to navigate complicated relationship dynamics around sex, trauma, power, and consent.
This training is an absolute MUST to help us guide our clients towards deeper understanding, insight and negotiations in their sexual lives. It serves as a very important foundational understanding that greatly exceeds what most of us were taught or even have sought out as advancing information.
Session 2:
Orgasms: Facts and fiction
Masturbation
The pursuit of the orgasm and the misunderstandings around it present in therapy all the time. Clients attribute relationship structures, strengths, and failings to the presence, pursuit, or lack of an orgasm. Helping to develop language and understanding around what an orgasm is, how many ways a person can experience one, and how to find new and exciting orgasms will be part of this training.
This training will support you in opening up a space in therapy where clients can feel empowered to discuss: low orgasms in relationship, difficulty communicating about preferences, or misunderstandings about how to collectively work to experience more pleasure.
Hand in hand with the topic of orgasm is the topic of masturbation. The latter half of this training seeks to open up an empowered dialogue around what we have been taught or conditioned to believe about masturbation. We learn structurally how culture and society have always been in discussion around masturbation and how that impacts our clients. We learn to broaden our discussions with clients about their experiences of learning about masturbation, their current relationship to it, and how it impacts their relationships. We will seek to expand our clients’ capabilities to bring this topic into their relationship negotiations, and will discuss the many ways that masturbation can be the source of relationship growth and/or conflict.
Session 3:
Conducting a sexual health history
The role and meanings of sex
The therapeutic skill of conducting a sexual health history is rarely taught. This third training will help you to have a clear map of the specific questions that move you and your clients through a comprehensive sexual history. This is a health survey that will teach you to assess risks and clients’ levels of education, as well as an emotional and physical sexual history. All throughout this history you will learn to utilize inclusive language, educate around and model consent, and demonstrate how to value many different kinds of relationships and sexuality.
We want to end these trainings with a clear reminder that conversations about sex are really conversations about the role and meaning of sex for our clients. The meaning making our clients do has everything to do with how they feel about themselves and how sexuality fits into that self-definition. Helping our clients to clarify the meaning they have made goes a long way in supporting them to ask for what they need from partners and prepare them for the type of sexuality that most meets their needs.
Our clients find so many interpretations- and when we tune into those, we show how much we value them as individuals. I will talk through clients I have had in my practice and how these meanings have participated in relationship issues and how we worked through those issues. We will end the trainings by opening up the dialogue about the beauty of the meanings our clients make in their lives.
———
Each of these trainings will have an over-arching focus on consent, shame reduction and many relationship structures will be represented. You will find monogamous, polyamorous, queer, heterosexual, trans, and same-gender relationships represented: as they certainly populate my therapy practice.
Cost:
$120 per session OR
Register for all 3 sessions for $300
You may register for individual sessions or all 3 sessions.
CEU's
This program has been approved for 9 Social Work Continuing Education hours for relicensure, in accordance with 258 CMR. NASW-MA Chapter CE Approving Program, Authorization
Number D-80890.
*In order to qualify, you must attend all 3 sessions and complete a post-survey.*
THIS REGISTRATION IS CURRENTLY CLOSED - STAND BY FOR THE NEXT TRAINING!
CLICK HERE TO ADD YOUR NAME TO THE EMAIL LIST SO WE CAN KEEP YOU INFORMED
Navigating Sex and Intimacy in CLinical Practice: 201
Join me for a 3-session zoom training to further skills for navigating sex and intimacy in clinical practice.
In this training we will expand our knowledge base and get into some more ‘intermediate’ topics.
This training will build on the foundational skills in Part 1 and will continue to support your development as a sex positive therapist.
Session 1
Sunday, May 16th. 10 am- 1:15 pm EST
-Trauma/ Neurobiology of Trauma
-Theory and treatment direction/restorative treatment trajectory
Session 2
Sunday, May 23rd. 10 am- 1:15 pm EST
-Trans and gender diverse identities
-Navigating changing bodies in couples,
-Navigating shifting identity: Identity embodiment / identity erasure, identity development
Session 3
Sunday, June 6th. 10 am- 1:15 pm EST
-BDSM/ Kink/ Fetish/
-Pornography 101 (working with couples around consent as it relates to pornography, pornography literacy, addiction)
Cost:
$120 per session OR
Register for all 3 sessions for $300
You may register for individual sessions or all 3 sessions.
You will receive a copy of training recorded with your registration
Navigating Sex and Intimacy in clinical Practice: The work Group
This group will join Emily Pilowa, LICSW for 3 interactive working groups to support your growth as a clinician.
These workshops will invite participants to reflect on theory from Emily's training while practicing creating and utilizing clinical skills that can be put directly into practice.
These will be capped at 30 participants and you must be able to attend all 3 sessions in person to participate.
Work Groups:
Friday, April 9th, 6:30-8:30pm EST
-Modeling and Incorporating Enthusiastic and Expiring Consent
Friday, April 16th, 6:30-8:30pm EST
-Practicing Taking a Sexual Health History in the Clinical Interview
Friday, April 23rd, 6:30-8:00pm EST
-Interrupting Dissociation
Participants will be asked to complete short writing assignments before each training to prepare to implement skills in small practice groups.
Cost:
Register for all 3 sessions for $180
You must register for all three of these sessions, no partial registrations allowed.