ON-DEMAND TRAINING
Working with Dysphoria
A Trans-Affirming Framework for Dysphoria Relief
Deepen your understanding of gender dysphoria and gain a clear framework for supporting your clients toward greater ease and wellbeing.
Most approaches to dysphoria start from two assumptions that are wrong.
This webinar begins there — unpacking the two most common myths and mistakes practitioners make in understanding dysphoria, and what they lead to clinically. From that foundation, it offers something most training doesn't: a clear explanatory model for why dysphoria happens, what sustains it, and what genuinely supports relief.
Grounded in minority stress theory and developed through over a decade of direct clinical work with trans clients, the Dysphoria Relief Framework changes what you can offer in the room, by giving you a clearer understanding of what is actually happening.
“Ari is a caring and thoughtful practitioner who I have known for many years. They’re someone I trust and highly respect. I’m so happy for our young people that they are doing this work.”
Starlady | Zoe Belle Gender Collective
What this webinar covers
Core content - 90 minutes
- The two biggest myths and mistakes that we make in understanding dysphoria
- What dysphoria actually is. The cause.
- A 3-part framework for dysphoria relief
This webinar is conceptual rather than technique-focused. Its purpose is to give you a clear, grounded model - one that will inform and deepen the clinical work you are already doing, and that makes sense of things that may previously have felt uncertain.
For the full clinical application of this framework, including practical intervention strategies and the broader scope of trans-affirming therapy, the Trans Healing course builds extensively on these foundations.
Q&A Videos
In addition to the core content, a series of Q&A videos addresses real clinical questions from practitioners, including:
- Does this model deny the need for medical transition?
- Client: "I will never be okay with myself because I was born into the wrong body"
- I'm cisgender. How do I help my trans clients feel comfortable to share?
- I struggle when parents see surgery/hormones as body mutilation
- Does passing equal less dysphoria?
- what can I do if my client is experiencing an instance of worsened dysphoria
- How to support young people who are not out to their parents?
- and more
"This has provided huge clarity as a frame for me to bring to my work with trans young people." - therapist, Australia
Why I created this training
This framework is the most important clinical contribution I feel I have to make. In this short video I explain how I came to develop it — through years of personal experience with dysphoria, and many more years of clinical work with trans clients who were struggling in ways I initially felt ill-equipped to address.
What trans people say about this framework
This webinar is designed for an audience of mental health practitioners, cis and trans. The responses below are from non-clinician trans people who encountered it independently.
From the chat during our live session...
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The framework… to have it all laid out like the whys and connections, it's so helpful.
- I feel this model really makes inherent sense, and put to words some feelings I have had doing this work. It was really great and put it all together so well!
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This was wonderful... Lots of lightbulb moments. I appreciate you!
- The reflection you shared where the external source of the dysphoria was highlighted was so helpful.
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This has been amazing! What an incredible contribution Ari, thank you!!
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That was fantastic, I learned so much and I know will really benefit from having that framework and enhanced language to draw upon. Thank you, your expertise, clarity and curiosity are all profound and so valuable
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Thank you so much! I truly appreciate your therapeutic perspective and approach!
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Powerful and meaningful work here. Thank you.
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Thank you! It's been so helpful and powerful to be able to reframe things
About the presenter
Hi, I’m Ari Heart (they/them).
I am a trans non-binary person, psychotherapist, educator, and co-founder of Trans Wellbeing. This framework emerged from years of personal experience with dysphoria, over a decade of clinical work with trans clients, recent research, and many hundreds of hours of reflection, supervision, and conversation with colleagues, mentors, and community.
It is the conceptual foundation underlying every intervention I use in clinical work with trans clients — and the contribution to this field I feel most called to make.
Want to go deeper? The Trans Healing course builds on this framework across five modules — covering clinical application, intervention strategies, and the full scope of trans-affirming therapy.
