PRESENTATIONS FOR HEALTHCARE CONSUMERS

Kelli has been designing health-related workshops using harm reduction and trauma informed principles since 2009 and is a frequent presenter to the Five College Gender and Sexuality Conference, Philly Trans Wellness. Transcending Boundaries, the New Jersey GSA Forum, True Colors Conference, Butch Voices, Creating Change, Fantasia Fair and many many other community based gatherings. All the presentations and workshops were developed in response to a specific request for support in that area.

Many health and wellness related presentations and workshops are included here, and presentations with the EDU indicator are especially suited for college audiences. But if you don’t see what you’re looking for, you can check out our specific COLLEGE BOOKING page and you can also find content targeted for health science students–especially nursing students– here.

Kelli has worked in a New York City public high school for a decade; she enjoys teenagers and –like many folks assigned female at birth who shop off the sale rack in the Old Navy Boys’ department–is still sometimes mistaken for a 9th grader. All that to say, workshops can be customized for high school or middle school audiences.

YOU DON’T HAVE TO LOVE YOUR BODY TO TAKE CARE OF IT: BRAINSTORMING THE WORK AROUND [KEYNOTE PRESENTATION WITH OPTIONAL GUIDED DISCUSSION]

Traditional trans/queer health wisdom and even a twisting of body positivity has insisted we must love our bodies so we can take care of them. However, for many of us who have a difficult relationship with our bodies, gender, and the way these things complicate our daily life, asking us to “love” our bodies is something that may or may not happen sometime in the future, and there are situations where we need to take of our bodies NOW. Kelli presents “you don’t have to love your body to take care of it” as a viable harm reduction strategy. A talk back/guided discussion after the keynote includes brainstorming ways to participate in our own healthcare and read our bodies’ cues even if we aren’t always BFFs with all of our parts. EDU

TALK THE TALK: IMPROVING MEDICAL SELF ADVOCACY BY LEARNING THE VOCABULARY OF HEALTHCARE PROVIDERS [WORKSHOP]

Healthcare providers are fluent in their own healthcare language that most of us don’t speak and this leaves us at a tactical disadvantage in communicating about and advocating for our needs. In this interactive discussion, a registered nurse with twenty years experience in community health will share the top ten phrases that can make your healthcare experience better and lead participants in role-playing using their newfound knowledge.

IMPROV MEETS ACTIVISM:THE NUTS AND HEALTHCARE ADVOCACY [INTERACTIVE WORKSHOP]
What do a successful world wrestling federation tag team match and a successful interaction with the health care have in common? No, not a sleeper hold (at least not usually) but rather team-work. In this workshop participants will share either examples they’ve had of interactions with the health care system that had a less than ideal outcome and/or situations they can anticipate being in. The gathered participants will then use equal parts improv, brainstorming, and cheerleading to role play positive and creative tactics to help health care consumers take back power in the described situations. This workshop was developed to help traditionally underserved consumers (eg consumers with chronic conditions, gender variant consumers etc) but with current difficulties in the health care system, will be equally applicable for all healthcare consumers. EDU

CREATIVE SELF SOOTHING FOR THE MODERN QUEER [WORKSHOP]

Calling all queer and trans trauma survivors! If you’ve gotten this far, you’ve developed some amazing self-help strategies for dealing with post-trauma symptoms, most of which probably involve some form of self-soothing. But you might have found that in particularly stressful situations: seeking healthcare, going through TSA, dealing with families of origin,  negotiating the dominant culture’s limited view of gender, etc you could use some more tools. In this workshop nonbinary nurse, comedian and all-around gentlenurturer human Kelli Dunham will lead participants through brainstorming new and novel ideas for self-soothing activities and strategies and we’ll also experiment with some of the strategies. You’ll leave with downloadable worksheets to help you develop your own self-soothing toolkit even further, and a downloadable / printable coloring sheet Kelli created just for this event! EDU. Want to see this a webinar? Check it out here.

WHY ISN’T MY BODY SPEAKING TO ME? MENDING PAST/PRESENT RELATIONSHIPS WITH OUR PHYSICAL SELVES [INTERACTIVE WRITING BASED WORKSHOP]

As LGBT people many of us have made hard choices in order to survive.  The results/proof of our hard won survival may be in the form of cutting scars, HIV seroconversion, injuries long ignored and health problems long untreated.  This workshop is for folks who 1. Are experiencing grief and frustration from the past that is making a present day relationship with their bodies seem even more complicated 2. Are ready to spend some time exploring this challenge through writing and mutual support.

EMERGENCY! PLANNING FOR UNPLANNED HEALTHCARE [INTERACTIVE WORKSHOP]

The LGBT, genderqueer, kink, polyamorous and other communities traditionally underserved by our health care systems are often particularly—and understandably– wary of seeking emergency care, even when care is badly needed. In this interactive workshop, genderqueer nurse and comic Kelli Dunham walks participants through a visit to the emergency room, presenting information about general ER infrastructure and leads participants in brainstorming and role playing ways in which they can be empowered to facilitate relatively positive endings to various ER scenarios. Also included will be a discussion of picking an ER buddy and developing a written ER plan. 60-120 minutes in duration. You can see a related video Kelli developed here..

GETTING IT ON AND ON: SEX AND PHYSICAL INTIMACY IN CHRONIC ILLNESS [WORKSHOP]

When a person is struggling with health problems, whether it be acute or chronic, often sex takes a back seat to more pressing concerns, thus eliminating a source of both pleasure and connection for the person struggling. Is this inevitable? Is there a way sex can be a part of life for single or coupled people despite physical and logistical challenges? In this interactive workshop, Kelli Dunham  RN who has been a caregiver for two ill partners and who deals with severe arthritis herself, helps participant brainstorm ways to build capacity for physical connection, develop workarounds and build communication skills around sexual needs and desires.

A CASSEROLE IS NOT ENOUGH: BUILDING TEAMS OF CARE IN NON TRADITIONAL COMMUNITIES (INTERACTIVE PRESENTATION)

Family caregiving is in a crisis, team caregiving and mutual aid are the answers, but unfortunately care provided by these non traditional support systems doesn’t always easily mesh with current healthcare and social welfare systems. This is particularly true if there is no one designated primary caregiver, and the person in need of care lives alone. This presentations draws on Kelli’s more than twenty years as a community health nurse, her experiences during the early years of the AIDS crisis as well as her lived experience of two partners with cancer.

TEAM CAREGIVING: BUT WHO WILL BE ON MY TEAM [WORKSHOP]

In this workshop we’ll talk about caregiving by and for queer trans or other  communities and share tips for building a sustainable positive caregiving team, with a special emphasis on troubleshooting for folks who are geographically, socially or otherwise isolated. 

THE RAINBOW MEETS THE WHITE COAT: ADVOCATING FOR CHANGE IN AT THE COLLEGE RUN HEALTH CENTER [WORKSHOP]

LGBT healthcare college students have sometimes found misunderstanding or worse within the campus healthcare system and providers can be frustrated too with lack of information and systems that don’t bend with individual patient needs. In this workshop, Kelli Dunham, a bachelor’s prepared registered nurse with more than 20 years of experience in primary care and public health and an out queer/nonbinary gender nonconforming person, will facilitate a problem solving discussion for college students on how to advocate for change within their college health care systems. The discussion will focus on two main questions: How does the system need to change to provide more culturally competent care for LGBT* people and how can LGBT people best advocate for themselves within the system that currently exists. EDU SPECIFIC

CROWDSOURCING HEALTH CARE: IF SOCIAL CAPITAL IS THE ANSWER, WHAT’S THE QUESTION? [WORKSHOP]

Although trans and queer healthcare is becoming more accessible to more people through insurance, many of us are still raising money for surgery and other types of care through crowdsourcing. But in a community with limited economic capital, often those who are richest in social capital are the first to have their needs met. What does this mean for those of us with more social capital? And those with less? We’ll discuss how we can address this inequity as individuals and as a community.

SURVIVING AND WRITING QUEER TRANS GNC GRIEF [INTERACTIVE WRITING WORKSHOP]

As trans and gender nonconforming people we often have grief experiences that are not acknowledged or understood by the dominant culture. In this interactive writing workshop we’ll discuss the unique nature of our grief and spend time responding to grief and loss related writing prompts and (optionally) share our work. We’ll begin with a discussion about the nature of grief in general and our specific experiences of grief. We’ll respond to prompts which deal with three different areas of grief: grief in the body, the nature of unacknowledged grief and what healing grief looks like.

THE  RADICAL POWER OF QUEER STORYTELLING [INTERACTIVE WORKSHOP]

This workshop will introduce participant to the concepts of radical queer storytelling as used by the founders of Queer Memoir in their events. Participants will have a chance to participate in a radical storytelling mini workshop and story share and will leave with the skills needed to apply the tenets of radical storytelling/listening to their own activism and cultural work. [60-90 minutes in duration as workshop, with interactive storytelling can be longer]  EDU

THOSE DARN BIRDS, THOSE DANG BEES: HOW TO TALK TO YOUR KIDS ABOUT PUBERTY BODY CHANGES AND SEX (WITHOUT REINFORCING THE RIGID GENDER BINARY) [WORKSHOP]

Kelli Dunham is the nurse author of the best-selling Boy’s Body Guide and Girl’s Body Guide, funny approachable guides to puberty’s body changes for kids 8-12. In this interactive, fun and funny workshop Kelli helps parents and other caregivers tasked with this important task plan, brainstorm and even rehearse how they talk to their kids about body changes and sex.