IHI Therapy Center celebrates Pride 2022 with expanded leadership, professional accolades, and increased growth and presence in the community
June 14, 2022 – NEW YORK. This Pride 2022, The Institute for Human Identity (IHI Therapy Center, IHI)—the nation’s first and longest-running provider of LGBTQ+-affirming psychotherapy—will celebrate forty-nine years of serving New York’s queer community as it continues to increase its growth and presence. The mental health services provider announced that, since June 2020, it has nearly doubled its clinical staff, significantly increased the volume of clients it serves, and continues to augment its diverse clinical and educational offerings. To mark this year’s Pride season, the organization has named a new associate director and IHI’s founder will be honored by the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT).
IHI Therapy Center names Eve Blazo, LMSW, RYT-200, as new associate director
IHI Associate Director Eve Blazo, LMSW, RYT-200
(Photo: Luis Burgos www.louiefromtheblock.com)
IHI has named Eve Blazo, LMSW, RYT-200, as its new associate director. Blazo, 32, started at IHI in 2017 as an advanced clinical intern and has served as IHI’s coordinator for its internship program and as a member of its steering committee since 2020. The appointment was announced by IHI Executive Director Tara Lombardo, LMHC.
“Over her tenure at IHI, Eve has emerged as an effective and steadfast leader in our organization,” remarked Lombardo, “We are delighted that she will serve as associate director and look forward to working with her in this new role.”
Blazo, a licensed master social worker with more than six years of clinical experience, is an alumnus of Fordham University’s Graduate School of Social Service. Prior to receiving her master’s degree in clinical social work, Blazo earned a bachelor’s degree from Brown University in modern culture and media studies. She completed her fellowship in psychoanalysis at the Psychoanalytic Association of New York, and is currently a candidate at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies.
“Moving into the role of associate director,” Blazo stated, “I am committed to upholding IHI’s mission of providing affordable and accessible LGTBQ+-affirming mental health care, as well as centering and advancing the aim of intersectional equity, for the most marginalized in our community. As a leader, I plan to uphold these values as well as bolster IHI’s organizational accountability in empowering QTPOC clinicians.”
IHI founder to be honored by the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies
IHI Founder Dr. Charles Silverstein, PhD
IHI also announced that the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT) will honor IHI’s founder Dr. Charles Silverstein, PhD, with the establishment of the Charles Silverstein Lifetime Achievement Award in Social Justice later this fall. ABCT cited Silverstein’s significant contributions in combating pathologization of LGBTQ+-identified people as integral to its decision to establish the new award in his name.
“We feel privileged to have the opportunity to honor Dr. Silverstein and his decades long contributions to our field,” remarked ABCT President Dr. Laura Seligman, PhD. “His words 50 years ago set in motion a process that engaged us in the important work of self-reflection. The lessons we learned from Dr. Silverstein are ones we try to heed to this day.”
Silverstein, 87, was part of a group of psychiatrists, psychologists, and other mental health professionals who, in 1973, persuaded the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality as a mental disorder from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the premier diagnostic manual for mental health professionals in the U.S. Following this landmark advocacy, IHI opened its doors to its first clients later that same year and became the nation’s first provider of LGBTQ+-affirming psychotherapy. In addition to Silverstein’s activism, he has also published seminal works of non-fiction about his lived experience as a gay man, including For the Ferryman, which is being re-released by LGBTQ+ publisher ReQueered Tales Los Angeles in early June 2022.
“This is obviously the greatest honor I have received in my career,” remarked Silverstein, “and especially so coming from the premier behaviorist organization in the world.” ABCT will present its high honor to Silverstein at an awards ceremony in November.
IHI Therapy Center continues growth and presence in New York’s LGBTQ+ communities
IHI also reported that, since June 2020, it has continued to grow in presence and impact in New York’s queer communities. Over the past two years, IHI has nearly doubled the number of its clinical staff, currently serves over 500 clients, and now averages 20,000 sessions annually, an increase of over 45 percent in two years. The organization also continued to augment its diverse clinical services and educational offerings.
“We’re continuing our focus on enhancing support groups and workshops to better serve the needs of our community, particularly for our transgender, gender non-confirming, and QTPOC clients,” stated Lombardo. “We’ve also almost doubled our clinical staff over the last two years and continue to enrich our therapists’ clinical competencies.”
As the organization prepares for its semicentennial anniversary next year, the non-profit remains largely self-funded and continues to train and educate New York’s mental health professionals in the most progressive and culturally-affirming practices. IHI offers LGBTQ+-affirming, culturally-responsive trainings to individual clinicians, private practices, and public mental health organizations via both online and live formats.
“Affirming queer experience is central to the good mental health of LGBTQ+-identified folks,” stated Lombardo, “As we continue to grow with the movement and community, we remain focused on centering our clients’ lived experiences as integral to increasing their mental and emotional wellbeing.”
About the Institute for Human Identity (IHI)
The Institute for Human Identity was founded in 1973 to fill an important need: providing affirmative professional mental health services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. After leading the successful struggle to remove homosexuality from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the founders of IHI recognized the need for a LGBTQ+ psychotherapy and clinical training center that could address people’s emotional problems while respecting and fostering their unique sexual orientation and gender identities.
Today, IHI Therapy Center provides over 20,000 sessions of psychotherapy annually to people of all sexual orientations and gender identities. IHI’s Advanced Clinical Internship program, a graduate-level training program for mental health professionals, prepares competent, queer-affirming therapists for future practice. IHI Competency Courses, the organization’s external educational initiative, provides continuing education and professional development to mental health professionals as well as cultural competency trainings for corporations and organizations seeking to better serve and support LGBTQ+ employees and clients.
For more information about IHI, visit: www.ihitherapy.org. Follow us @ IHITherapy on all social platforms: Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
CONTACT: Troy Vázquez-Cain, LCSW, outreach@ihitherapy.org