The ""Handbook of Counseling and Psychotherapy With Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Clients, Second Edition"" significantly builds upon the areas of knowledge mapped in the award-winning first edition and explores the practical ramifications of recent changes regarding therapy with this population. In this thoroughly updated edition, the editors focus critical attention on the need to enhance our understanding of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender clients. They incorporate new and emerging areas of scholarship and reflect on implications of recent changes in our society, including political struggles for gay civil unions, marriage, and adoption rights. This volume focuses on the complex cultural contexts of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals and explores how to provide them with effective psychotherapy across a range of presenting concerns. The authors stress the importance of affirmation with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender clients throughout. This second edition of the Handbook will be an essential resource for all therapists, counselors, and researchers.

Scholarship on sexual minority (SM) and transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) psychology has exploded in recent years, with unprecedented impact on practitioners and researchers, as well as the social and political compass of the nation. At the same time, best practices for mental health professionals who work with SM and TGNC clients continue to evolve rapidly.This volume builds on the editors' 2007 Handbook of Counseling and Psychotherapy With Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Clients to explore the challenges faced by SM and TGNC clients today. Experts in the field examine how the concepts of gender and sexual orientation are both socioculturally-constructed and can be informed by biologically-focused research, thus setting the stage for flexible, affirmative mental health services. Chapters cover a range of practice-focused, theoretical, and empirically-based contemporary perspectives, while highlighting themes that include an appreciation for complexity in identity, minority stress, and stigma management. With concise summaries of research findings and detailed case studies, contributors provide an intersectional understanding of how practitioners can work within rapidly-changing political and legal contexts to uncover and affirm clients' multiple social identities, and build resilience.