LGBTQ+ Couples Counseling in Columbus, OH
We provide affirming LGBTQ+ couples counseling in Columbus, Ohio, for partners who want to communicate more openly, work through conflict, strengthen their connection, or get support through relationship changes.
LGBTQIA+ Affirming Practice
Inclusive Relationship Counseling
In-Person & Telehealth
Serving Columbus & Central Ohio
Couples Therapy That Understands Your Relationship
You don’t have to spend your couples therapy explaining or defending your identities or relationship in our office. We create an affirming space where both partners can speak honestly and work toward the kind of relationship they want to build together.
When Should You Consider LGBTQ+ Couples Counseling?
You don’t need to wait until you’re considering ending your relationship to see a couples therapist. Consider couples therapy if you’re dealing with:
- Recurring arguments that never seem resolved
- Communication difficulties
- Emotional distance or disconnection
- Trust concerns or infidelity
- Differences surrounding intimacy or sex
- Gender or sexuality exploration within the relationship
- Coming out individually or as a couple
- Family rejection or lack of acceptance
- Stress related to discrimination or minority stress
- Different expectations for the relationship
- Boundaries with friends, family, or former partners
- Marriage, commitment, or separation decisions
- Parenting or family-building decisions
- Major life changes
- Grief or loss
- Mental health concerns affecting the relationship
- Questions about monogamy, polyamory, or consensual non-monogamy
Affirming Counseling for All LGBTQ+ Relationships
There isn’t one way to be an LGBTQ+ couple, and we don’t begin therapy with assumptions about what your relationship should look like.
City Counseling welcomes gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, nonbinary, and other LGBTQIA+ partners. Our clinicians also work with clients across diverse relationship structures and experiences, including polyamory, consensual non-monogamy, and kink/BDSM communities.
The goal isn’t to make your relationship conform to someone else’s definition of healthy. It’s to help you communicate honestly, establish boundaries and agreements that work for everyone involved, address problems when they arise, and create relationships grounded in mutual respect.
How We’ll Work Together
Schedule Your Appointment
We’ll learn more about what you’re looking for and help connect you with a therapist whose experience fits your relationship and concerns.
Meet With Your Couples Therapist
Your first appointment gives your therapist an opportunity to understand your relationship, what brought you to counseling, the concerns each partner wants to address, and what you’d like to be different.
Establish Your Goals
Your therapist will help you identify shared and individual goals and create a treatment plan around them.
Do the Work Together
As counseling progresses, you’ll begin recognizing patterns, practicing new communication and relationship skills, and addressing the concerns underneath recurring conflicts. Therapy evolves as your relationship and goals do.
Meet Our LGBTQ+ Couples Therapy Team
City Counseling was founded by psychologist Chad Corbley, PhD, whose clinical specialties include trauma recovery and LGBTQ+ populations. That commitment is reflected across a multidisciplinary team with experience in LGBTQIA+ mental health, couples and relationships, identity, trauma, intimacy, family dynamics, and diverse relationship structures.
When you contact us, we’ll help you find a couples therapist whose experience and therapeutic style align with your relationship and the concerns you want to address.
The City Counseling Difference
LGBTQ+ Affirming From the Start
You shouldn’t have to teach your couples therapist the basics of LGBTQ+ identity before you can work on your relationship. Affirming care is embedded throughout City Counseling’s work with LGBTQIA+ clients.
Support Beyond Couples Counseling
Sometimes an individual concern is also affecting the relationship. City Counseling’s multidisciplinary team provides psychotherapy for trauma, anxiety, depression, stress, substance use, identity, grief, and other mental health concerns, giving clients access to a broad range of clinical expertise.
No One-Size-Fits-All Definition of a Relationship
Relationships don’t all need the same boundaries, structures, roles, or goals. We work with couples to identify what healthy communication, intimacy, commitment, and connection mean within their relationship.
Let’s Work on Your Relationship, Together
If you and your partner are struggling to communicate, feeling disconnected, working through a major change, rebuilding trust, or simply want a stronger relationship, we’ll help you connect with an LGBTQ+ couples therapist in Columbus who understands your relationship and gives both of you room to be heard.
LGBTQ+ Couples Counseling: Frequently Asked Questions
What is LGBTQ+ couples counseling?
LGBTQ+ couples counseling is relationship therapy provided in an affirming environment that respects each partner’s sexual orientation, gender identity, and lived experience. Therapy can address the same concerns any couple may experience while also making room for issues such as coming out, discrimination, family acceptance, gender transition, identity, and other experiences that can affect LGBTQ+ relationships.
Do we need to be married to attend couples counseling?
No. Couples counseling isn’t limited to married partners. Dating, committed, engaged, married, and long-term partners can seek relationship counseling.
Does City Counseling work with transgender and nonbinary couples?
Yes. City Counseling provides LGBTQIA+ affirming care and works with clients across gender identities and expressions. Couples therapy can also provide support when gender exploration or transition creates new questions, emotions, roles, or relationship dynamics for partners to work through together.
Do you work with polyamorous or consensually non-monogamous relationships?
City Counseling’s clinical team includes therapists with experience in polyamory, consensual non-monogamy, and diverse relationship structures. Therapy isn’t designed to assume monogamy is the correct goal. Instead, your therapist can help you work through communication, agreements, boundaries, jealousy, trust, intimacy, and other concerns within the structure you’ve chosen.
Do you provide kink-affirming couples counseling?
City Counseling’s team includes clinicians whose specialties encompass kink/BDSM communities. When you contact us, let the team know you’re seeking a therapist with experience in this area so they can help identify an appropriate clinician.
What happens during our first couples therapy session?
Your therapist will begin learning about your relationship, what brought you to counseling, the concerns each partner has, and what each of you hopes will change. It’s also an opportunity to ask questions, learn how your therapist works, and begin establishing goals for counseling.
What if my partner and I aren't sure whether we want to stay together?
You don’t need to have that answer before entering therapy. Couples counseling can provide a structured setting for talking honestly about the relationship, understanding each person’s concerns, and considering what each partner wants moving forward.
Can couples therapy help after infidelity or a loss of trust?
Couples therapy can provide space to address breaches of trust, understand what happened, communicate about the impact, establish boundaries, and determine what rebuilding trust would require. Therapy doesn’t predetermine whether a couple should stay together; it helps partners work through the decisions and concerns in front of them.
Can we attend couples counseling if one of us is also in individual therapy?
Yes. Individual and couples therapy address different goals and can sometimes occur at the same time. Your providers can explain appropriate boundaries and how the different forms of treatment should remain distinct.
Does City Counseling offer virtual LGBTQ+ couples therapy?
Telehealth is available for many City Counseling services when appropriate. Contact the practice to discuss current availability and whether in-person or virtual couples counseling fits your needs.
Does insurance cover LGBTQ+ couples counseling?
Insurance coverage for couples counseling varies by plan, provider, diagnosis, and how services are billed. City Counseling works with several insurance providers, but you should contact the practice to discuss your specific coverage and self-pay options before scheduling.
To schedule an appointment fill out our contact form. Questions? Please text, call or email us.
- Hours
- Vary By Clinician
- Location
The building is located across the street from the Columbus Maennerchor and kitty-corner from the McDonalds on South High Street. We are located on the second floor.
If you are in immediate need of help, call 911 or call Netcare Access at (614) 276-2273. You can also reach out to a suicide prevention hotline.
Designed by Vivid Pine Design, LLC