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Natasha Helfer

@natashahelfermft

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Healing sexual shame & religious trauma 🧠❤️ | Licensed Sex Therapist | Speaker | Podcaster | ⬇️ Free resource below

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Faith transitions are NO JOKE!

From figuring out how to parent without a rule book, to finding new community that aligns with your values, to navigating your relationship, or personal identity, or sexuality?!…WE GET IT.

The first Wednesday of every month is available in-person at our office, as well as online.

Every third Wednesday will be online only.

You don’t have to navigate this alone! We’re here to help you find your best path forward🫂

www.symcounseling.com

#faithtransition #faithtransitionsupport #utahtherapist #exmormontherapist #exmormoncommunity

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Have you ever meet someone who just gets you and you get them? These two are some of those people for me. I had the beautiful gift of witnessing their commitment and love for each other a few weekends back and it was inspiring to say the least.

Thank you @natashahelfermft for including me in this moment and for being a dear trusted and inspiring friend. Also, thanks for putting up with my goofy ass and encouraging me achieve my dreams, while allowing me to witness yours.

Love you and Joe!

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Was that smooth or what?!😎

#utahtherapist #symmetrycounseling #therapyhumor #mentalhealthmatters #shenanigans

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🌿 Sacred Remembering: Cultural Reclamation and Spiritual Resistance in Latinx Mental Health

How do cultural identity, ancestral traditions, and spiritual experiences shape mental health?

Join Emilee Henriquez, LCMHC on FRIDAY for an continuing education course exploring the intersections of colonization, religious oppression, intergenerational trauma, and cultural resilience.

✨ Explore how these histories and experiences show up in therapy—and how clinicians can respond with greater cultural humility and understanding.

📅 Friday, October 16, 2026
💻 Live via Zoom
🎓 1.5 CE Credits
💲 45
🔗 Register today: Link in bio

Can't attend live? A recording will be available for asynchronous CE credit!

#ClinicalTraining #learnreligiontherapy #CulturallyResponsiveCare
#SacredRemembering #LatinxMentalHealth #ContinuingEducation #MentalHealthProfessionals #CulturalHumility #ReligiousTrauma #TherapistEducation

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Live today at 5:30!! Link in stories🔗

#lds #ldsconf #mixedfaithmarriage #couplestherapist #exmormontherapist

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Therapists do not need to become experts in every spiritual or ancestral tradition their clients may practice.

They do need the skills to ask respectful questions, understand clinical boundaries, and know when consultation or referral may be appropriate.

In this course, participants will learn to apply a cultural humility framework when assessing and exploring spirituality and ancestral practice with Latinx clients.

REGISTER TODAY:

📅 October 16
💻 LIVE via Zoom
🎓 1.5 CEs | $45
📝 (link in bio)

#CulturalHumility #LatinxMentalHealth #EthicalPractice #MentalHealthCE #TherapistTraining #learnreligiontherapy #SpiritualityInTherapy #ContinuingEducation #mentalhealhtprofessionals #LatinxMentalHealth #CulturalHumility #CulturallyResponsiveCare #ClinicalEducation #LiveCE #MentalHealthProfessionals #ClinicalTraining

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What do you do when you’re hiking Grandeur Peak all alone one summer morning and you get an idea for a book?

You run down the mountain, drive home, and begin emailing powerhouse women—authors, poets, artists, activists, therapists, life coaches, community builders, historians, professors, and mothers—asking: Will you share your story of healing and growth beyond religion?

Then you realize you are a part-time elementary school PE teacher and a mom to four kids and you don’t really know how to create an anthology, so you ask your brilliant friend Sue Johnson for help.

Sue says yes—bless her—and for the next two years, you quietly, joyfully gather essays, knowing deep within that discussing the church can be complex. And the book’s intentions may be misunderstood.

So you wake up at 1:00 am too many nights to count, and feel your heart beating frantically long into the night.

And you meet with your therapist and cry as she reminds you that everything is going to be alright.

And you sit in your car while your youngest child is at soccer practice, writing a poem about your fears of social division, wondering: Does it have to be their integrity or mine? Their peace, their beliefs, their testimony or mine?

But you burn with conviction that you were not born to live in fear. Fear is a feeble, fragile life—an insult to the God who created you.

So when every last edit is finally complete, you take a deep breath, stand up strong, and bring this book into the light where it belongs.

***

The Book of Once-Mormon Women is a beautiful, hopeful anthology meant to support women leaving religion—the most heartbreaking, most disorienting experience of my entire life.

I pray it finds its way to those who need to know they are never alone in their trials, their joys, or their pain.

Published by @signature.books
Available for preorder now. Links in bio.
Release Date: November 30th.
Details on events to come!

@tialevingswriter
@drjuliedeazevedo
@kingsenglishbookshop
@folkloremidway
@utahstories

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Attended the #AFAN black and white gala this weekend which is always a straight (hehe) up good time!! My sister texted me that she had gone to the temple with her kids while I was there… I should’ve sent her a picture of me with a drag queen 🤣🤣🤣 love my life!! So many things I would’ve missed out on if I had stayed member of #churchofjesuschristoflatterdaysaints also…. @natashahelfermft inadvertently helped me decide to wear this outfit lol she doesn’t know, but being in her group helped me decide that I should just wear the thing!!!!! #dragqueen #exmormon #mormon

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When a client brings spirituality, ancestral traditions, or cultural identity into therapy, how prepared are you to explore those experiences without dismissing, pathologizing, or appropriating them?

Sacred Remembering examines ancestral and spiritual practices—including curanderismo, espiritismo, and ancestor veneration—within their cultural context and considers the roles these practices may play in resilience, identity, connection, and resistance.
REGISTER NOW

DATE: Friday October 16, 2026
TIME: 9:30AM-11AM MT
ZOOM*
1.5 CES for $45
*A recording will be available for asynchronous CE credit. Video processing may take up to 14 business days.

#SpiritualityInTherapy #LatinxMentalHealth #CulturalHumility #ClinicalTraining #TherapistEducation #LearnReligionTherapy #CulturallyResponsiveCare #mentalhealhtprofessionals #MentalHealthCE #LiveCE #ContinuingEducation #MentalHealthProfessionals

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“An initiative called the Idaho Reproductive Freedom and Privacy Act will be on the November ballet seeking to amend Idaho laws related to abortion,” begins the letter. “The church’s long-held stance on abortion has not changed: we oppose any laws yielding additional agency or autonomy to women.”

The ballot measure, which organizers say is designed to begin rebuilding Idaho’s reproductive healthcare system, would prevent the government from imposing restrictions on a woman’s right to contraception, fertility treatment, and abortion prior to the point of fetus viability.

“As a church that allows abortion in cases of rape or incest and also supports IVF, we clearly don’t consider the loss of every fetus to be murder,” continues the letter, which is signed by the church’s regional area president Brigham Smithofferson. “You also might have noticed that rejecting this ballot initiative means denying women the level of choice even afforded them by the church’s stance on abortion. There’s a simple reason for these discrepancies: we haven’t really considered the facts around this and we don’t plan to. You don’t rise to this level in the LDS church hierarchy by wasting your mental energy on women’s issues.”

While experts agree that laws restricting abortion access increase maternal mortality rates even when theoretical exceptions exist to preserve the life of the mother, Smithofferson says a bit of maternal mortality is small potatoes next to the chance to continue dismantling Idaho’s healthcare system.

“Idaho has already lost more than a third of its OBGYNs in the last couple years thanks to its abortion bans,” he points out. “It’s time to finish the job and give the rest of them the boot, rising maternal mortality rates be darned.”

The LDS mothers who will die if the ballot measure fails were unavailable for comment.

———

For legal reasons, we feel impressed to reiterate that this is obviously satire.

Click the link on our bio to donate to Idahoans United For Women & Families, the organization promoting Idaho’s ballot measure 1.

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How long does it actually take to deconstruct from high-demand religion?⁠
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This clip is from episode 256 of the Playing With Fire podcast - Leaving High-Demand Religion and Exploring Non-Monogamy with Natasha Helfer. Listen to the full conversation now (you know where to find the link 😉)!⁠
⁠
#nonmonogamy #consensualnonmonogamy #monogamish #polyamory #ethicalnonmonogamy #openrelationships #creativemonogamy #consciousrelationships #relationshipanarchy

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Deconstructing from high-demand religion AND reaching midlife? That can be... a lot all at once. ⁠
⁠
~⁠
⁠
This clip is from episode 256 of the Playing With Fire podcast - Leaving High-Demand Religion and Exploring Non-Monogamy with Natasha Helfer. Listen to the full conversation now (you know where to find the link 😉)!⁠
⁠
#nonmonogamy #consensualnonmonogamy #monogamish #polyamory #ethicalnonmonogamy #openrelationships #creativemonogamy #consciousrelationships #relationshipanarchy

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