3 Things to Know About Sexuality and Intimacy: An Occupational Therapy Approach [New Textbook Announcement!]

"Sexuality and intimacy contain so much more than the act of sexual activity. Beyond the physical mechanics of “sexual activity,” sexual and intimate occupations encompass a broad range of personally meaningful activities for building intimate partnerships, developing a sense of self, actualizing desire, and experiencing pleasure.” - Ellis & Ungco, 2023.

TLDR: Love the quote, ready to order? Click here to order the textbook.

Want the back story? Read on...

In 2017, I sent the first email to AOTA Press pitching a new sexuality textbook. I wanted a sexuality textbook that infused OT’s moto of living life fully throughout the content. A textbook that celebrated and gave intervention strategies for thriving versus surviving. A textbook that wasn’t afraid to talk about pleasure and acknowledges OT’s role in intimate social skills. A textbook that offered a broad lens of sexuality reflective of our own personal realities and the realities we’d see in our clients.

So, co-edited with Dr. Joseph Ungco and joined by clinical and academic experts in the field of Occupational Therapy & Sexuality, we developed this resource for OT professionals: Sexuality and Intimacy: An Occupational Therapy Approach! 

I’m especially excited to share this new textbook with you all: fellow Sex & Intimacy Trailblazers shaking up the OT profession!

What's inside? The textbook is organized to give you prerequisite skills and perspectives for implementing sexuality and intimacy assessment and intervention, a review of sexuality throughout the lifespan, a deep dive into assessment and intervention, and tons of actionable case example reviews. I’m thrilled about the book from cover to cover, and while it’s nearly impossible to pick, I’ll share my top 3 favorite aspects that make this textbook both unique and landmark for the profession:

1. Dr. Ungco and I intentionally curated authors to be more representative of the United States demographics and the clients OT professionals will serve. 76% of authors are members of underrepresented groups in the occupational therapy demographics. In doing this we were able to show the expansive co-existing perspectives on sexuality by amplifying perspectives that did not reinforce heteronormativity, cisnormativity, White-centered narratives, and Western views of femininity and masculinity.
2. As you all know, I am an advocate for self-reflection of yourself as a sexual person as a precursor to addressing sex with your clients.  Chapter 3, “Guided Self-Reflection of Self as a Sexual Being,” takes you through a gently guided process for learning more about yourself as a sexual person.  I was fortunate to co-author this chapter with Occupational Therapist Sameera Qureshi, founder/CEO of Sexual Health for Muslims. I’m excited for readers to use this chapter as a resource to build their self-awareness, knowledge, acceptance, and maybe—just maybe—make their sexual expression or experiences better, comfortable, or more pleasurable for them.  Because, after all, OT professionals are sexual beings as well!   
3. The power of narrative is strong, yet our OT education often focuses on clinical case studies that have tight left and right limits.  The clinical case examples don’t really prepare us for a client sharing their actual story with us.  We dedicated a whole chapter to Personal Narratives which offers readers descriptive and creative personal accounts written from the heart.  These are the stories you’re likely to hear from across the hand-therapy table or in the bathroom working on showering and toileting ADLs.  Chapter 10, “Personal Narratives of Sex, Intimacy, and Meaning,” gives readers an opportunity to listen to stories, process what they’re reading, and practice empathy. It also provides prompts at the end of each story to practice the OT application.