# The Seven Stages of Queer Love: Therapy with Queer Couples, Queer Sex, and the Developmental Model - An Interview with Tom Bruett, LMFT

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-modern-therapist-s-survival-guide-with-curt-widhalm-and-katie-vernoy-410171/the-seven-stages-of-queer-love-therapy-with-queer-couples-queer-sex-and-the-developmental-model-an-interview-with-tom-bruett-lmft
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Podcast: [The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide with Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy](https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-modern-therapist-s-survival-guide-with-curt-widhalm-and-katie-vernoy-410171)
Published: 2026-06-01T07:00:00+00:00
Episode link: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/HEGNI1001120850.mp3
Audio file: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/HEGNI1001120850.mp3
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Duration seconds: 2460

## Resource

The Seven Stages of Queer Love: Therapy with Queer Couples, Queer Sex, and the Developmental Model - An Interview with Tom Bruett, LMFT Tom Bruett, LMFT on the seven stages of queer relationship development, the Developmental Model, queer couples therapy, and queer sex. Curt and Katie talk with Tom Bruett, LMFT, founder of the Queer Relationship Institute, about what therapists most often get wrong when working with queer couples, why queer sex is still treated as an asterisk in most sex therapy training, and how the Developmental Model of Relationship Therapy can be expanded to better reflect queer experience. Trained under Drs. Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson, Tom adds two stages to the five-stage Developmental Model: Second Queer Adolescence and Agreement. The expanded seven-stage model gives therapists a clearer way to track differentiation, autonomy, and connection in queer relationships that do not fit the standard "relationship escalator." Tom is the author of The Go-To Relationship Guide for Gay Men: From Honeymoon to Lasting Commitment (Jessica Kingsley Publishers). This is a useful conversation for therapists working with queer couples, sex therapists, couples therapists trained in heteronormative models, and queer therapists looking for better tools and community for this work. In this episode, we discuss: - What therapists most often get wrong with queer couples and queer sex - The Seven Stages of Queer Relationship Development, including Tom's two additions - Why a "second queer adolescence" matters clinically - Mutual interdependence versus codependence in gay male relationships - Minority stress, the relationship escalator, and queer identity formation - How the current political moment is showing up in queer couples therapy - Trauma activation, nervous-sy…

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