Re-Imagining Intimacy

 Earn 1.5 CE Contact Hours

This experiential and clinically grounded training invites clinicians to re-imagine intimacy, sexuality, and pleasure through queer, kink-affirming, trauma-informed, and decolonial lenses. Drawing from sex therapy, queer theory, somatic awareness, and community-based knowledge, this workshop challenges genital-centric, heteronormative, and performance-driven narratives of sex. Participants will explore how colonialism, gender norms, sexual stigma, and trauma shape clients’ relationships to their bodies, desire, and erotic expression.

Through case examples, reflective exercises, and practical tools, clinicians will learn how kink, consent practices, and pleasure-centered frameworks can support healing, agency, and intimacy, particularly for queer, trans, neurodivergent, and marginalized clients. Emphasis is placed on moving from survival-based sexual narratives toward embodied curiosity, choice, and pleasure, while maintaining ethical, trauma-informed clinical care. This training supports clinicians in expanding their conceptualization of intimacy and integrating affirming, pleasure-positive interventions into therapeutic practice.

Learning Objectives:

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Identify the impact of cultural, historical, and systemic factors such as colonialism, heteronormativity, and sexual stigma on clients’ experiences of intimacy, sexuality, and pleasure.
• Describe trauma-informed and consent-based clinical frameworks that support agency, safety, and embodied awareness in work with queer, trans, and gender-diverse clients.
• Apply pleasure-centered and kink-affirming clinical tools, including consent negotiation strategies and de-centering orgasm-based outcomes, to support clients’ sexual well-being and relational goals within ethical clinical boundaries.

Who Should Attend:

Mental health professionals, sex therapists, trauma therapists, and clinicians interested in trauma-informed sexual healing, somatic interventions, and attachment-informed sex therapy.

Meet Nikita Fernandes:

Nikita Fernandes is a Licensed Mental Health Therapist and AASECT Certified Sex Therapist based in New York City. She earned her Master’s in Counseling in Mental Health and Wellness and a dual degree in LGBT Health, Education, and Social Services from New York University. Her academic background also includes a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with a focus on Women and Gender Studies from George Mason University. Nikita identifies as a queer South Asian immigrant woman and is both neurodivergent and non-monogamous. Beyond her clinical practice, she has dedicated her time to advocacy and community support, serving as a crisis counselor for the Trevor Project, a graduate assistant for the New York University LGBTQ+ Center, and an organizer for various social justice conferences.

Nikita’s dedication to her craft is the culmination of a lifelong journey. Raised in Bangalore, India, she experienced a culture where mental healthcare was heavily stigmatized and access to support was limited. In an environment where discussions regarding sex were often silenced by patriarchal norms, she faced significant challenges in finding inclusive care. Her commitment to the field was solidified during her young adult years when she struggled to find a counselor who understood the nuances of LGBTQ+ issues. After experiencing “one-size-fits-all” therapeutic approaches that failed to respect her identity or the complexities of being a queer woman in a conservative country, Nikita felt a profound calling to change the narrative. Today, she views it as her greatest honor to provide the genuine, inclusive support she once sought, aiming to uplift those who feel confused, alone, or marginalized by traditional systems.