Should You Ask Your Therapist About Their Disability Training?

Can I Confess Something?

Can I confess something?

When I first heard about disability-affirmative therapy, I wasn't interested.

Honestly, I assumed it wasn't for me.

I pictured therapy where difficult experiences would be explained away instead of worked through. Where disability would become an excuse instead of something I learned to navigate.

I wanted therapy that would help me cope.

What I didn't realize was that I had already spent years coping.

Like many disabled people, I had become incredibly good at adapting.

Planning ahead.

Problem-solving.

Masking.

Advocating.

Pushing through.

Managing other people's discomfort.

I thought that was simply what life with a disability looked like.

What I didn't realize was that many of those ways of coping had developed in response to barriers, inaccessible environments, medical trauma, and years of navigating systems that weren't built with disability in mind.

What Disability-Affirmative Therapy Changed

For years, I assumed those experiences were simply part of being disabled because no one had ever offered me a different framework for understanding them.

I didn't realize disability-affirmative therapy wasn't about lowering expectations.

It was about changing the way I understood my experiences.

It gave me a different framework.

A framework that helped me recognize when I had mistaken survival for personal failure.

It helped me understand that constantly scanning a room for barriers wasn't simply anxiety.

It was the result of years spent navigating environments where accessibility could never be assumed.

It helped me recognize that not every emotional response needed to be treated as a symptom.

Sometimes it was a reasonable response to living in an inaccessible world.

It taught me how to advocate for myself without believing I had to earn the right to be heard, and how to build boundaries that protected my energy—including in healthcare.

My disability didn't change.

The way I understood my experiences did.

That Made Me Curious

That experience made me curious.

If learning about disability-affirmative therapy changed the way I understood myself so profoundly, I started wondering:

How much do therapists actually learn about disability before they're licensed?

The answer surprised me.

Across Canada, therapists receive extensive education in areas such as human development, assessment, ethics, trauma, mental health conditions, and evidence-based therapeutic approaches.

What they are not consistently required to learn is disability studies, disability theory, the social model of disability, Disability Justice, or what everyday life with a physical disability can actually look like.

That doesn't mean therapists aren't compassionate or skilled.

It doesn't mean they can't become excellent therapists for disabled clients.

Many do.

Some seek out additional education, supervision, consultation, lived experience, and disability-specific training because they recognize these gaps and want to provide better care.

But unless a therapist has pursued that learning independently—or has lived experience themselves—they may never have been invited to question the framework they were originally taught.

Why Frameworks Matter

And frameworks matter.

Because therapists don't just bring techniques into the therapy room.

They bring ways of understanding disability.

Those frameworks shape the questions they ask.

What they notice.

What they normalize.

What they see as a symptom.

What they see as resilience.

And what they see as the problem.

If disability is understood primarily through a medical model, emotional distress may be interpreted as something happening solely within the individual.

Disability-affirmative therapy asks another question:

What role might inaccessible environments, ableism, medical trauma, chronic pain, advocacy fatigue, or the constant need to adapt be playing here?

Sometimes the work isn't helping someone adapt better.

Sometimes it's helping them recognize they've been adapting all along.

It's Not About Blaming Therapists

Research suggests that therapists, like everyone else, are not immune to unconscious bias.

Studies have found that healthcare professionals and mental health providers can hold implicit assumptions about disability that influence expectations, decision-making, and interactions with disabled people—even when they genuinely want to provide equitable care.

This isn't about blaming therapists.

It's about recognizing that we all learn from the cultures, systems, and professional education around us.

If disability isn't meaningfully included in that education, those gaps don't disappear.

They simply become invisible.

So, Should You Ask?

I think it's okay—and often important—to ask a therapist about their experience working with disabled clients, their understanding of disability, and how they think about the relationship between disability, mental health, and the world around us.

You're not looking for the "perfect" answer.

You're trying to understand the framework they're bringing into the room.

Because sometimes the most meaningful change doesn't come from changing who you are.

It comes from finally having a framework that helps you understand why you've been surviving the way you have.

And sometimes that's where healing begins.

Notes

1. Based on a review of entry-to-practice requirements for Registered Psychotherapists (CRPO), Registered Clinical Counsellors (BCACC), Canadian Certified Counsellors (CCPA), and Registered Social Workers educated through CASWE-accredited programs. Across these professions, disability-specific coursework, disability theory, and education focused on counselling people with physical disabilities were not identified as consistent mandatory entry-to-practice requirements, although broader competencies such as ethics, diversity, and, for social work, social justice and anti-oppressive practice are required.

2. VanPuymbrouck, L., Friedman, C., & Feldner, H. (2020). Explicit and Implicit Disability Attitudes of Healthcare Providers. Rehabilitation Psychology, 65(2), 101–112. https://doi.org/10.1037/rep0000317.

3. Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital. Clinicians Who Report Low Disability Bias Score High on Ableism. Interview with Dr. Laura VanPuymbrouck discussing the implications of the study, aversive ableism, and the importance of disability education.

If you're looking for disability-affirmative therapy in BC, I provide virtual counselling for teens and adults with physical disabilities, chronic illness, medical trauma, and advocacy fatigue. Learn more about Disability-Affirmative Therapy