Clinical Boundaries

Boundaries operate on many levels, including physical, emotional, energetic, and sexual, and managing these consciously are essential to healthy functionality and successful therapy.

The following boundaries are upheld in Psychosexual Somatics® Therapy

• Touch is one-way from practitioner to client and always within consent.
• There is no genital touch, although clients may be invited to hold their own genitals where appropriate to connect with them.
• Any bodywork requires client consent in advance of the session and there is no renegotiation of agreed boundaries within a session
• The client pays the agreed fee for the session, upfront, with no exchanges or gifts
• Sexual energy is welcome and there is no sexual contact between client and therapist at any time
• All sessions are conducted with clothes on at all times, for client and therapist.
• The therapist holds unconditional positive regard for the client at all times and stays in their own centre
• The therapist and client work to the same agreed and shared therapeutic intention and purpose
• Any physical touch is conducted with the intention of increasing the clients capacity to hold and release suppressed emotions and not with erotic intent.
• Both therapist and client work within their own personal boundaries at all times and are responsible for vocalising any adjustments needed during the session to maintain this.
• There is no social interaction between client and therapist.
• If client and therapist meet outside the therapy space by chance, acknowledgment of each other’s presence and then returning to their own space is appropriate. (There is a high risk of the client projecting parental issues onto the therapist unconsciously and so social distance must be maintained between sessions and for 1 year subsequently).
• Client and therapist are not to connect and communicate via social media.
• Communication between sessions is minimalised and as agreed between therapist and client as needed to maintain appointments.
• The therapist can be contacted by arranged phone call, text, or e-mail only, using email as the primary communication mechanism aside from last minute appointment changes or travel notifications. For all communications within 1 day of an upcoming appointment please text and ensure the communication is received.
• The time boundaries of the session are agreed upfront and maintained.
• The therapist reports with regularity to a supervisor, as meets the criteria of ASIS (registered body: The Association of Somatic and Integrative Sexologists) and will share client session information as required. Otherwise client confidentiality will be maintained at all times.
• The client is welcome to bring a chaperone to the session for additional support.
• Any additional psychotherapeutic support the client is undergoing should be disclosed to the therapist in order a communications approach can be established that avoids splitting during therapy.