After the Uncollaring: Surviving the End of a Power-Exchange Relationship - Part 1

This might surprise you, but I didn’t always want to be a sex therapist when I was growing up.  I actually wanted to be a dolphin trainer.  When that didn’t pan out, I found my career path as a social worker by volunteering for the Court Appointed Special Advocates of Baltimore, then went on to work with traumatized kids at Johns Hopkins Bayview. I found that work to be much more meaningful than my original career choice, so I stuck with it.  In graduate school, I realized that I wanted to be a therapist, so I expanded my experience and education to make that happen.

I’m Heather M. Garner. Since 2011, I’ve worked in my own practice, Garnering Change Psychotherapy, in Towson, Maryland.   What I’ve found is that the reason most people come to therapy is grief and loss.  It may disguise itself as another problem, but grief and loss are usually behind the issues we encounter in life.  These days, I work as a sex therapist with two main areas of focus; consensually non-monogamous, and kink-identified individuals and partners.

In the kink community, it is often difficult for members to find a therapist who will not make their lifestyle choices an issue when it is not one. I maintain my practice as a sex-positive, affirming mental health practice dedicated to intimate relationships and sexual health.  I ensure that my associates are like-minded therapists who create a comfortable environment for those who identify as part of the kink and consensually non-monogamous community.

I help foster healthy relationships in kink and help explore better ways to maintain open relationships.  We’re better as a society than we were in the past about kink and polyamory, but we still have a way to go.  People continue to experience discrimination, judgment, and persecution for having a non-traditional view of sex. The stigma remains.  In addition to seeing patients in my office, I am also a speaker at local kink community and group events.  I’m a firm believer in educating mental health professionals in this area and often facilitate training sessions and supervision.

The intersection of mental health, kink, and polyamory mirrors the intersection of art and science when it comes to therapy.  The science is easy to teach people.  The art, empathy, intuition… are all there to be developed in certain people.  Figuring out how to do the work has to combine skills, knowledge, experience, and innate gifts.

I’m a straight shooter with an engaging sense of humor. I’ve done many different things in my career as a mental health professional, and I’m ready to do more. Outside of work, I have many interests.  I love spending time with my partner, my “little person,” and our two lab-mix rescues, Manny and Dante.  I love traveling and have a deep appreciation for architecture.  I love creating….food, painting and restoring furnature, and photography.  I love drive-in movies and hate modern art, in case you’re wondering about that.