The Only One in the Room – Being a Minority in Counselling and Psychotherapy
- Brainz Magazine
- 8 hours ago
- 5 min read
Written by Param Singh Sahni, Humanistic Therapist & Coach
Param Singh Sahni is a BACP-registered Humanistic Therapist, Trustee at the Metanoia Institute, and founder of The Work. He works privately, supporting people with their mental health needs and specializes in emotional resilience, grief, identity, and trauma-informed care rooted in compassion and social justice.
There is a particular sensation that comes with being the only one of your kind in the room. It is not simply that you stand out, it is that your presence subtly disrupts the unspoken mould of who is expected to belong there. Before you speak, your identity has already entered the room for you.
This has been my experience in psychotherapy training and practice, a brown, turbaned Sikh man sitting in classrooms, supervision groups, and professional spaces that are overwhelmingly white and predominantly female. A neurodivergent trainee navigating systems built for neurotypical communication. A younger man in a profession that statistically skews older. Someone whose class background did not align with the quiet financial confidence common in the field.
I offer these reflections not to criticise individuals or institutions, but to illuminate the structures that shape so many trainees' experiences. Difference, whether visible or audible or embodied, becomes both a burden and a unique professional resource.
The gender paradox at the heart of psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is built on the contributions of men, yet today the profession is almost entirely sustained by women. The 2023 UKCP Member Survey reports that 73.5 percent of registered psychotherapists identify as women, 20.2 percent as men, and fewer than 2 percent outside the gender binary. This imbalance begins long before qualification. Across training programmes, including institutions such as Metanoia, far fewer men apply and even fewer complete their studies.
When gender intersects with race, class, or age, the numbers narrow even further. Younger men of colour are some of the most underrepresented people in therapy training.
Although men conceptualised much of the theory, women now shape the culture and relational norms of the profession. As a man in these spaces, you feel subtle projections gather around you. Will he dominate. Can he attune. Will he understand vulnerability. None of these questions are necessarily hostile, but they influence how you are met and how you must navigate the room.
Being a brown body in a predominantly white profession
The numbers become more stark when race is introduced. According to the same UKCP survey, 75.3 percent of psychotherapy practitioners identify as White, 3.7 percent as Asian or Asian British, and 2.8 percent as Black or Black British. Relative to population demographics, this reveals significant underrepresentation.
Being one of the only brown trainees brings a dual workload. The workload of training and the workload of translation. You quickly learn that some stories land easily, while others require careful explanation. There are also stories that are met with silence, not because they lack meaning, but because they fall outside the frame of shared cultural reference points.
The added weight of code-switching
You learn to code-switch. This means subtly adjusting your voice, accent, posture, humour, and emotional expression to feel less foreign, less “other”. It is the constant monitoring of how your words will be received through racialised filters. It is realising that your natural accent may be read as unrefined or exotic and adjusting accordingly. It is the quiet decision to soften parts of yourself, so the room feels more at ease.
Masking becomes the price you pay for belonging. And the energy required to do this sits on top of the emotional and intellectual intensity of psychotherapy training itself.
This is where Kimberlé Crenshaw’s concept of intersectionality becomes essential. Identity is not experienced in isolated categories. It is the combination of race, gender, class, age, and faith that creates a specific form of marginality.
Ultra-visibility without choice, being a turbaned Sikh man
My Sikh identity, marked visibly by my turban, adds another layer. Unlike many identities, mine is not something I can reveal at my own pace. The turban introduces me instantly. It announces a difference long before I speak. It reveals aspects of my faith and culture without any contextual explanation.
People read me before they meet me. In psychotherapy training, where self-disclosure is treated as a professional choice, I had no such choice. My identity was already disclosed. My presence carried meaning even before my voice had the chance to enter the conversation.
I did not choose this visibility, but I learned how to inhabit it. Over time, it became a source of connection for clients who had never seen a therapist who looked like them. For some, it created immediate safety and recognition. For others, it invited curiosity or challenged assumptions.
Visibility became a bridge.
Neurodivergence in a neurotypical training culture
Psychotherapy training often assumes a particular kind of learner, someone who can think linearly, sustain long periods of focus, engage comfortably in abstract reflection, and produce consistent academic work. Neurodivergent trainees may process, express, and understand internal experiences differently. They may be misread, misunderstood, or prematurely judged.
For me, neurodivergence brought strengths, not deficits. A more intuitive emotional radar, a capacity for deep focus on human experience, creative associative thinking, and an ability to perceive patterns rapidly. Yet the training environment was not designed to harness these strengths.
The challenge became twofold, learning psychotherapy and learning how to survive the structure of the institution itself.
The hidden class barriers to becoming a therapist
Therapy training is expensive. Course fees, therapy hours, supervision, academic materials, conferences, and unpaid placements create a financial landscape that quietly excludes people without economic safety nets.
Those who enter with financial ease often arrive with confidence and cultural fluency. Those who do not must navigate additional layers of pressure, insecurity, and sacrifice. It is no surprise that the profession is dominated by white, mid-life, middle-class women.
Access is not about capability, it is about cost.
The difficulty, and the opportunity
Holding minority identities within psychotherapy demands resilience that extends far beyond academic ability. Yet the very experiences that make the path harder also expand your therapeutic presence.
Difference sharpens empathy. The difference widens the room. Difference allows clients to see themselves in a space where they have historically been absent. Different challenges to traditions that have grown comfortable with uniformity.
My unchosen visibility became a quiet form of leadership. My code-switching taught me how people contort themselves to be accepted. My neurodivergence deepened my capacity to listen differently. My working-class background grounded me in the realities that many clients live every day.
A closing reflection
To be a minority in an industry, a country, and a training room is not a single experience. It is a layered negotiation with systems that were not originally designed for you. Yet meaningful change rarely begins with committees or policies. It begins with presence.
Every time someone who was never expected to be in the room enters it and stays, the shape of the room shifts. A margin moves. A doorway widens. A new possibility emerges.
I did not choose the visibility placed upon me, but I choose what I do with it. And in that choice, the room becomes a little larger for the next person who walks in, whether they are brown, Black, neurodivergent, turbaned, working class, accented, or simply different.
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Param Singh Sahni, Humanistic Therapist & Coach
Param Singh Sahni is a BACP-registered Humanistic Therapist and Trustee at the Metanoia Institute. He is the founder of The Work, a platform dedicated to supporting the mental health of men of colour through vulnerability, connection, and culturally sensitive care. With nearly a decade of experience, he has supported people through life’s challenges related to addiction, behavioural patterns, and relational difficulties. He also works privately with individuals navigating grief, identity, emotional regulation, and life transitions. His approach is rooted in compassion, justice, and creating spaces where people feel seen, heard, and supported.
