What If Your Therapist Doesn’t Know They’re “Unsafe”?

In this powerful conversation, Janina Fisher is joined by therapists, educators, and longtime collaborators Debra Chatman-Finley and Gliceria Pérez to explore the intersection of trauma, race, identity, and clinical practice.

Reflecting on a collaboration that began during the upheaval of 2020, the three discuss how experiences of racism, discrimination, and systemic inequity create ongoing conditions of threat that can profoundly shape the nervous system. Drawing parallels between chronic childhood trauma and the hypervigilance many Black and Brown individuals navigate every day, they examine how trauma is often rooted not only in discrete events but in environments where safety can never be assumed.

Together, they explore implicit bias in psychotherapy, the importance of therapists doing their own self-reflective work, and the ways race and culture are always present in the therapy room—even when they go unspoken. With honesty, warmth, and mutual respect, this conversation offers an invitation to move beyond good intentions toward deeper awareness, curiosity, and genuine connection.

Whether you're a clinician, student, or someone seeking to better understand the impact of race on lived experience, this episode offers valuable insights into what it means to create safety, build trust, and engage in meaningful conversations across difference.

Key Takeaways

1. Trauma can be an ongoing condition, not just a single event
2. Living under chronic threat changes the nervous system
3. Implicit bias affects every therapist
4. "Doing the work" starts with self-reflection
5. Race is always in the room
6. Safety cannot be assumed
7. Curiosity matters more than perfection
8. Honest conversations create connection

About the Guests

Debra Chatman-Finley is a Licensed Professional Counselor in private practice in Montclair, NJ, and a former Adjunct Professor at New York University, where she taught Racial and Social Microaggressions in Clinical Practice. She previously served as Director of Clinical Services for a domestic violence agency and is a graduate and former Associate Faculty of The Multicultural Family Institute. Trained in EMDR, Brainspotting, and Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST), with a Certification in Traumatic Stress from the Trauma Center at the Justice Resource Institute, Debra has devoted her practice to the impact of race in the therapeutic process and the effects of racial trauma—particularly on African American women and their parenting. She co-facilitates a monthly BIPOC Safety, Belonging and Dignity Gathering for The Academy of Therapy Wisdom, provides clinical consultation for BIPOC clinicians, and has led numerous workshops on racism, dissociation, implicit bias, and racial trauma in clinical practice.

Gliceria Pérez is a bilingual/bicultural therapist in private practice in New Jersey, working passionately with BIPOC and other marginalized communities from a social justice perspective. She is trained in EMDR, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (Levels One and Two), and Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST), completed the Certificate Program in Traumatic Stress Studies at the Justice Resource Institute, and is currently pursuing Brainspotting certification. A former Director of Residential Services at a domestic violence program and Adjunct Faculty at NYU's Silver School of Social Work, Gliceria currently runs two support groups for Women of Color, co-facilitates the monthly BIPOC Safety, Belonging, and Dignity Gathering for the Academy of Therapy Wisdom, and co-leads the Awesome Clinicians of Color Book Club.

Together, Debra and Gliceria are developing a podcast and writing about their non-Eurocentric facilitation of a support group for Women of Color.

Janina's Links
Website: https://janinafisher.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drjaninafisher/?hl=en-gb
New book: https://www.amazon.com/Embracing-Our-Fragmented-Selves-Therapists/dp/1683738918