The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Exploring LGBTQ+ Identity in Psychology

Episode Date: March 11, 2024

Show Notes for The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast Episode 118: Exploring LGBTQ+ Identity in PsychologyThank you for listening to the Aspiring Psychologist Podcast. In this episode of the Aspiring Psychologist podcast, we speak with Phil Pampoulou, a trainee clinical psychologist in his third year where we speak about all things on LGPBTQ+ identity and mental health. You might remember Phil from a previous episode speaking about personal growth and self-discovery, so definitely check that out. Join us as we delve into why research matters, the experience of working in the mental health field as someone with an LGBTQ+ identity, the importance of understanding cross-cultural differences and how you can get involved in Phil’s fascinating research study!We hope you find it so useful.I’d love any feedback you might have, and I’d love to know what your offers are and to be connected with you on socials so I can help you to celebrate your wins!The Highlights: (00:00): Introduction(00:59): Welcoming back Phil(02:36): A little background on Phil – in case you missed it! (03:23): Exploring what your third-year research project may be (05:09): More about Phil’s research study (06:04): The current stage of the study (08:05): The experience of being a gay man whilst on training (10:47): Exploring the intricacy of relationships and what that means for sexually diverse people (13:23): On the difficulty of internal acceptance and guardedness(14:45): How are people culturally shaped in a society?(17:28): Research matters because it can transcend different cultures (18:53): Thinking beyond the surface on the flipside of those with an LQBTQ+ identity (21:00): Take part in Phil’s research!(22:18): Summary and close Links:📱 Connect with Phil here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philip-pampoulov-6666a740/🖥️ Check out my brand new short courses for aspiring psychologists and mental health professionals here: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/short-courses🫶 To support me by donating to help cover my costs for the free resources I provide click here: https://the-aspiring-psychologist.captivate.fm/support📚 To check out The Clinical Psychologist Collective Book: https://amzn.to/3jOplx0 📖 To check out The Aspiring Psychologist Collective Book: https://amzn.to/3CP2N97 💡 To check out or join the aspiring psychologist membership for just £30 per month head to: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/membership-interested✍️ Get your Supervision Shaping Tool now: https://www.goodthinkingpsychology.co.uk/supervision📱Connect socially with Marianne and check out ways to work with her, including the Aspiring Psychologist Book, Clinical Psychologist book and The Aspiring Psychologist Membership on her Link tree: https://linktr.ee/drmariannetrent💬 To join my free Facebook group and discuss your thoughts on this episode and more:

Hi there, it's Marianne here. Before we dive into today's episode, I want to quickly let you know about something exciting that's happening right now. If you've ever wondered how to create income that works for you, rather than constantly trading your time for money, then you'll love the Race to Recurring Revenue Challenge with my business mentor, Lisa Johnson. This challenge is designed to help you build sustainable income streams. And whether you're an aspiring psychologist, a mental health professional, or in a completely different field,

the principles can work for you. There are also wonderful prizes to be won directly by Lisa herself. And if you join the challenge by my link, you can be in with a chance of winning a one-to-one hours coaching with me, Dr. Marianne Trent. Do you want to know more? Of course you do. Head to my link tree, Dr. Marianne Trent, or check out my social media channels, or send me a quick DM and I'll get you all the details. Right, let's get on with today's episode. Coming up, we've got a special treat for you in this episode as we welcome back the

incredible Phil, a trainee clinical psychologist. We are unravelling the rich tapestry of LGBTQ plus identity and the crucial world of research into this space. Get ready for a candid conversation that goes beyond boundaries as we explore the intersectionality of LGBTQ plus experiences and dive into the importance of understanding cross-cultural differences. Whether you are a psychology enthusiast, an ally or just someone seeking fresh perspectives, this episode promises compassion, insights and a whole lot of heart. Hit that play button and join us in this illuminating exploration of the diverse and ever-evolving landscape of LGBTQ plus identity. Hope you will find it so useful. Welcome along to the Aspiring Psychologist podcast. I am Dr. Marianne Trent and I'm a

qualified clinical psychologist. I do try and keep my finger on the pulse and help you become aware of really important issues, whether or not you've got access to supervision, whether or not you've got access to people where you can ask questions and learn things about their lives. Dissectionality is a really big and important issue and our ability to reflect upon our own lives as well as being aware upon individual differences for other people's lives can be really, really important. Today's episode is going to be doing just that. We're welcoming back Phil, who is a third year trainee. And let's dive in and see what we have got to say and I'll catch you on the other side. Hi, just want to welcome back the wonderful Phil Pamperlove to our podcast.

You might well remember our chat in episode 113 of the podcast where Phil and I were talking about what you learn on the journey in psychology. And it wasn't our original A-plan to talk about that, but it was such an organic, fluid, lovely chat that we decided that we'd do what was our a plan as a follow-up episode because it's also such an incredibly important conversation to have so we first met on linkedin phil and it's fair to say that i'm now going to be your groupie and follow everything you do and like and comment and share even more because i'm like oh phil is

now my best friend so you're a trainee clinical psychologist and we first met on LinkedIn. Could you tell everybody a little bit about how it was that our paths crossed and what you were doing on LinkedIn? Of course yeah so as as you said Marianne I am in my final year of training now, and I'm currently conducting a piece of research as part of my doctoral thesis. Yeah, we met on LinkedIn because I was sort of in the middle of trying to promote and advertise my research study far and wide. And yes, I think you spotted it on there and you were like, yes, let's talk about that because this is an important topic. But going back a bit to my first year of training that's when we were kind of encouraged to start

thinking about what we wanted to do research-wise and to pick at least two supervisors for the thesis based on their research interests and yours. And the thing is that at the very beginning of my training I didn't really know what I wanted to do because there's so much you know out there that you can do and I think you know as the months kind of went went on I was sort of thinking to myself I want to do something on LGBTQ plus community and mental health and you know being being a gay man myself it's something that I'm probably very passionate about and biased in that sort of sense but I felt that it's a very important topic especially with the current kind of cultural,

social, political environment worldwide around this community. And I was thinking to myself, I want to do something for a particular population. But again, I didn't quite know in my first year exactly what I was doing. And I was thinking it was towards the end and the beginning of the second year

when I kind of had a more concrete thing in mind. So I'm not sure how it works with other courses, but in our course, the thesis is kind of broken down into two chapters or parts or sections, whatever you want to call them. The first one is like a systematic review that you do on a like literature, and then you critique that literature. And the second one is an empirical kind of study that you carry out, and then you write it up as a report. And ideally, both of these should be on a similar topic, not carbon copy of each other but you know similar sort of topic so my systematic review that i'm currently writing up is on the relationship between self-compassion and help seeking in men specifically so that's you know men worldwide but my study, the one that you saw Marianne online on LinkedIn,

that's specifically for adult gay men. It's kind of evaluating the effectiveness of a compassionate mind training, which is online on different sorts of psychological outcome measures, including help seeking, compassion, internalized homophobia, and shame. So yeah, it's like a randomized controlled trial. So it's open to any adult gay men over the age of 18. They don't need to be UK nationals. They could be from any part of the world as long as they have a sufficient level of English. Those are basically the only requirements for it.

And what they do is they all complete a set of questionnaires at the beginning, they're all online. And at the end of those questionnaires, they get assigned to one of two conditions. So the reader is going to be assigned to the Compassionate Mind Training condition or to Control condition. And if they're in the Compassionate Mind Training condition, they get sent daily links to different practices over the course of 14 days or two weeks the people in the control condition don't get sent anything during that period and then both of these groups complete the same set of questionnaires so two weeks after they've completed the very first set and then another two weeks pass and then completely the same questionnaires for

the third and final time so it's like a two-week sort of follow then completely the same questionnaires for the third and final time. So it's like a two week sort of follow up set of questionnaires. And the people who are in a control condition who didn't have access to those practices, they get access to all of them all together after they've completed the third and final set of their questionnaires. And at the very end, people can opt in for a prize draw. I'm trying to remember how many. So basically it's like, yeah, Amazon vouchers that they can opt in for a prize draw I'm trying to remember how many so basically it's like yeah Amazon vouchers that they can opt in for they can say yes or no to that and that's essentially it and I'm yeah I'm still in the recruitment stage of that I have started kind of writing up some of

the bits of the report that I can start writing up before I see the results anyway but hopefully I can get even more participants because I think I calculated I need around 140, 150 ideally. Yeah, and I'm still not very, very close to that. But getting there slowly. Okay, I will make sure that we tweak the dates when this is going to come out. So we bring it forward.

So it will probably, I guess, yeah, it's going to. So our first one was 113. I'll make this one shortly after that so that we can hopefully yeah maximize people listening being able to take part or mention it to people in their teams or their families and is it uk is it potentially international what what are the limits anyone so the as long as they're above the age of 18 or above the age of 18 and identify as a gay man, that's basically it. Yeah. So they don't need to be living in the UK. They don't need to be UK nationals as long as they have a sufficient level of English to engage with the questionnaires and the practices.

That's basically it. Yeah. Thank you. And you told me yourself before the recording and obviously during this recording that you are a gay man yourself how how is that in psychology and how does that crop up with clients or does it not crop up with clients you know I wear a wedding ring but I could be married to a woman you know it doesn't you know it doesn't necessarily mean that I'm heterosexual or I'm gay but how has that been for you? Yeah good question I guess I'm just sort of thinking in terms of the training the clinical training

from an academic point of view as a course and as a cohort we've often sort of thought about the social graces so sort of gender and sexual orientation etc and what that means in terms of you know who you are but also how that affects and influences the way you work with other people so I've often sort of thought about that you know we've been fairly open within the cohort when we've had discussions like that within clinical practice let's say on placements I have been open with my colleagues about it when it has you know come I'm just sort of trying to think when it would have come naturally let's say if we've talked about kind of the topic of LGBT in some sense or another I wouldn't just sort of say by the way you know I'm I'm a gay man so this is yeah

so um yeah I don't think it's not like you need to come out to each place yeah it's just that you say you know in the same way that I would say my husband's name, you would say your partner's name. And it's, you know, it's up for them to join up the dots. It's not for you to help make that process easier. You know, it is what it is. You are who you are. And these are the facts of you. with your colleagues and hopefully form lasting therapeutic working relationships and sometimes even friendships you know you absolutely should feel hopefully empowered to just be yourself

exactly yeah and as you said yeah I might just say oh yeah my partner and I went to whatever and he did or said this and you know they can then guess from the context but yeah I don't feel obliged to be saying it to people if they're curious and they want to learn more about my partner then I might kind of expand on that or oh when did you guys meet or where did you meet that sort of thing in terms of patience yeah I think that's a bit trickier because obviously in there you've got sorts of ethical considerations around that and you know even you know would it be appropriate to even mention that why why would I mention it in the first place and I'm just sort of thinking the placements I've had so far haven't been kind of in the most diverse areas so I have

reflected on that as well what that's meant in terms of me not having seen a lot of the sort of LGBTQ plus community that I might have been working with but yeah I don't think I have you know mentioned my sexuality my sexual orientation to uh to any clients and again I'm sort of thinking to myself is it because you know I'm not sure what sort of context it would have come up I could come up anyway but yeah I think I'm a bit sort of more guarded in terms of that with clients. And I think probably the same would have been true of me during training as well. I think it's only probably since being qualified that I probably do occasionally mention husband, you know, and, you know, thinking of just about the intricacies of relationships, you know,

and I'm obviously not talking in great detail, but just, you know, when you do live with someone, it can be tricky sometimes, you know, because you might want different things, you have different expectations and, you know, and just to mention in that sort of context, but I absolutely know that that's, you know, especially if someone is in a dynamic service, that ain't happening, you know. But it's as you move forward in your career and as, you know, you may end up working with families who have experienced stillbirth or late miscarriage or pregnancy or even child loss. And that was purely because that's something that she experienced, you know, I think it was seven years ago. And so it may shape you. It may be relevant in future, even if it's not now. But I love that it's something, it's just part of you, you know, I hope you feel proud of yourself. And there's so much to be proud of. So I really hope you do. And that, you know, hopefully you're surrounded by people who also feel proud to be your colleague and your friend and your partner too. Thank you yeah and I'm really blessed in that sense that you know everyone's been really accepting of me because it wasn't until you

know later on in life when I did come out both to myself and to other people and I've said so many times to other people that coming out to myself is so much harder than coming out to other people and I know then the previous podcast we sort of spoke about where I come from and you know kind of the cultural mentality around certain things. So, you know, I come from Bulgaria, where people still hold, quite a few people still hold a very sort of homophobic, you know, racist, sexist sort of views, which, you know, growing up in that environment as a child, you might not really think it's anything sort of, you know, harmful, and it could get easily sort of normalized within that culture. But as growing up as an adult, I'm sort of realizing, gosh, none of this was,

you know, really okay. And I think that's probably where I mentioned that guardedness earlier with sort of clients where part of me isn't 100% sort of comfortable. So let's say holding hands with my partner, you know, where would I feel comfortable doing that? Something that lots of straight couples might not even think about at all. For me, all of a sudden it becomes quite a sort of looking at is kind of measuring different types of shame so both external and internal shame but also internalized homophobia which I know some people might not quite know what that is but I guess people know what homophobia is but internalizes when it's kind of you are turning it towards yourself and you are sort of feeling that being gay or being who you are isn't really okay that there's some sort of moral wrong about it or that you're ashamed of it not just of yourself but of the kind of wider community and you know that can have a big effect on people's

mental health but I think as I grow older I'm sort of thinking to myself I can be bothered with some of this stuff you know about controlling myself everywhere I'm just going to be me older, I'm sort of thinking to myself, I can be bothered with some of this stuff, you know, about controlling myself everywhere. I'm just going to be me. You know, I'm not going to just tell willy nilly about who I am. I'm still probably going to have some of that gardeness, which is, you know, kind of understandably come from that past and from that sort of cultural mentality. But I'm also going to look towards being happy and true to myself rather than kind of concealing all the time. Absolutely. And it made me reflect upon a time that my husband and I were thinking about going to Dubai, but we weren't married at the time. And that, you know, we wouldn't necessarily have been able to walk hand in hand because we weren't married. And, you know,

different cultures have different levels of acceptance and different standards. And, you know, you can absolutely be, you know, you can get in trouble for that and that's my only real experience of that being a heterosexual woman having grown up in England and as you know now Wales but it's yeah it's being yourself but being in trouble for being yourself which is really tricky I'm reading a historical fiction book at the moment that's set before the Second World War, and there's split narratives for different countries. And to me, this sounds fascinating. To anyone else listening, that sounds really weird and boring. But it's looking at how in the post First World War period, Germany, why fascism became so appealing and acceptable to the German people, why they were so welcoming of Hitler.

But as part of that, all of the kind of attacks against people by different factions who were signed up to the fascist movement included kind of hurting and sometimes murdering gay men in really horrendous ways. And that was making me think, gosh, I'm so pleased that we don't have that currently and that there's been more inclusion and that people can hopefully feel more comfortable being themselves. And then I was on my phone and I was on Twitter and I saw that someone had posted a photo of their friend, of a man who had been viciously and savagely beaten in the UK for being gay. And I was like, God, we made me feel really sad.

Like, things haven't moved on in so many ways. And, you know, that's just me from an outside perspective. And, you know, it's just not fair and it's not right Phil. It's really sad isn't it and as you were saying earlier like you could get in serious trouble just for just for being who I am I could be locked up or killed in certain countries legally so according to their law that thought in itself just terrifies me, but also makes me sad about all these people who might be living in environments in countries like that. You know, what do they, what does their day-to-day life look like? You know, if I have that level of gardeners in the UK

about holding hands with my partner down the street, you know, what, I can't even begin to imagine what that would look like if I were living in one of those environments it's it's really really sad it is and I think this is why research matters you know it's because research can transcend different cultures different countries I hope that this goes far and wide for you. I hope that you disseminate it really widely and that people start to begin to think about the importance of compassion, the importance of acceptance, the importance of just allowing people to be who they are, regardless of who you are. That makes no difference. You know, you allow someone to be themselves and just, you know, get on with their life, which has no bearing on yours. It doesn't matter what you believe. It doesn't matter what you feel. It doesn't matter who you are sexually attracted to and what you want to do, what you don't want to do. If someone else wants to do what they want to do, just that's fine. As long as it's legal and not harmful to someone and it's consensual,

you know, let's caveat that. But, you know, you make a really good point that actually in certain countries it isn't legal. But I guess what I'm meaning is for this purpose is UK, it is legal. And just leave people alone to live their lives, you know, and be a good person. be nice find you know or like when we when I was growing up in the UK it's like if you haven't got anything nice to say say nothing at all yeah it really makes me think as a psychologist what's going on behind those people's lives the ones who

are attacking bullying assaulting members of the LGBTQ plus community, because I always keep saying that people don't wake up one day feeling or doing something like, do you know what I really feel like beating, you know, a gay man up today? Like, it's always interesting, especially as a psychologist to see, well, how come they are thinking that or doing that? You know, what kind of environment did they grow up in? What kind of narratives and values have they endorsed just for example i'm working in a forensic setting at the moment working with adults and i think you know some of the people we work with there have forensic histories they've committed crimes and i think people could often think you know just brand them as criminals like they're bad people they chose to do that and you know it's brand them as criminals, like they're bad people, they chose to do that. And, you know, it's really helpful, actually, in displacement to kind of unravel what's been

going on for this person. Because, yet again, they didn't wake up one day just feeling like they wanted to commit this crime or do whatever. And it's fascinating, it really is. And there's something very de-shaming, I'm not sure how to kind of verbalize it about being able to talk about that especially in an inpatient environment where they see kind of staff the same staff day in and day out for most of the time and yeah and it's really really powerful so similarly yeah with these people I'm very curious to know why are these barriers still there and as you said yeah this is where research can really really help. It. And there's so much trauma in forensic services. And all of my assistant work was in forensic services.

And, you know, whilst we can't redo what we've already done, I wish I'd had more of a trauma-focused lens and understanding when I was in those settings. Because I think that without trauma, I think a lot of our forensic settings would probably be empty. You know, it so so powerful and predictive it permeates and so many mental health settings trauma it really does phil thank you so much again for your time and i know i've taken up more of it than than i advertised on the tin i enjoyed every minute of it thank you it's been such a pleasure and a privilege. And if people did want to get in contact with you to kind of think about

an interest in taking part in your research, I'm presuming it's all online. They don't need to meet you in person. No, it's all online. That's the beauty of it. Yeah. And where's the best place for them to do that? Is that LinkedIn or is there somewhere else you'd rather direct people to? Yeah, they can reach out to me on LinkedIn if they want to.

It might be easier if they do it on my university email address. I'm not sure if you're able to put stuff underneath your podcast. I absolutely will. Yes. So if you tell me what that is, we'll make sure it appears on screen as we're saying it. What's your email address, Phil? phil it's p.d.pampalove at soton s-o-t-o-n dot a-c dot uk perfect thank you so much and you are i believe you're philip pampalove on linkedin if that's easier for people as well yeah because i called you philip you were like you're like i think i'm in trouble. Can I be Phil? Of course you can be Phil. Definitely call me Phil. Yeah. Okay. All right. It's been so lovely to speak with you and wishing you well with your research. Please let me know if I can be of assistance with anything in future. And yeah,

it's just been a real privilege. Thank you so much. Likewise. Thank you very much, Marianne. So welcome. Oh, I just love Phil. I honestly just think he's so interesting to speak to. And I did have to say to him off camera afterwards, don't worry, I'm not going to suddenly turn up like at the end of your street, like you are safe. It's okay. I'm really excited to see where his career goes and to hear how his research does. And obviously, if you do want to get involved with that research, please do consider reaching out to him. The details will be in the show notes or you can also find him on LinkedIn.

If you have got any topics that you think might make brilliant podcast episodes, please don't be shy. Do come and get in contact with me. The easiest way to do that is via my social. I am Dr. Marianne Trent everywhere. There will be a QR code on screen if you are watching on YouTube. For everywhere else, literally just type in Dr. Marianne Trent into socials of your choice. I do believe I'm everywhere. So yeah, come and subscribe. Follow me on TikTok. Follow me on Facebook. Follow me on Instagram.

Do all those good things. Whilst you're at it, if you are listening on MP3, Spotify or Apple, please do consider leaving me a review or rating if if you've only got a short moment that would be so gratefully come and join the free psychology facebook group the aspiring psychologist community with dr marianne trent check out the books the aspiring psychologist collective and the clinical psychologist collective they can both be really reflective tools for you at interview time of year, or whenever you're listening to this, it might be application time of year as well. They're just really good for helping you think about your own developments across your lifespan. They can provoke interesting food for thought and personal reflections for you. So do check them out.

Check them out on Amazon. All these details in the show notes. Thank you so much for being part of my world. I will look forward to catching up with you for our next episode, which will be along from Monday at 6am. Take care. with this podcast i feel sad to be on your way to being qualified it's the aspiring psychologist my name is yana and i'm a trainee psychological well-being practitioner. I read the Clinical Psychologist Collective book. I found it really interesting about all the different stories and how people got to become a clinical psychologist it just amazed me how many different routes there are to get there and there's no perfect way to become one and this kind of filled me of confidence that no I'm not doing it wrong and put less pressure on myself so if you're feeling a bit uneasy about

becoming a clinical psychologist I definitely recommend this just to put yourself at ease and everything will be okay. But trust me, you will not put the book down once you start.