connect with Shannon
Relationship Gardening with Shannon, and Spouses Resource Center
  • Couples
    • Antiracism Groups
    • Walk & Talk
    • Black, Trans Authors
    • About >
      • Shannon
      • Rates
  • Spouses Resource Center
    • Couples and Families of Trans >
      • Transgender >
        • Trans Quotes
        • Trans in Couples
        • Gender Letters Portland
    • Spouses Group
    • Spouses Stories >
      • Partners of Trans Online Support
  • Reviews
  • Telehealth
  • Resources/Events
    • Events for better relationships >
      • Retreats for couples >
        • workshops for better relationships
    • Rethinking Psychiatry-alternatives >
      • Coming Off Psych Drugs
  • Store
    • Free Gift
  • Blog
    • IRL Misfit Mom Over 50
  • HIPAA
  • Hypnosis
Antiracism for White Folks' Group offers a series of weekly gathering which guides exploration of members' everyday white supremacy and racism, to grow better allyship.
Send me (Shannon) an email to the address at that "connect with Shannon" at top of this page and include which group you are interested in, which day/times of the week you are available for a 3-4 month stretch, for an hour a week and when you can start. 
Include your name, preferred email address and phone number.

Invite friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, fellow activists to sign up with you if you would like to grow better allyship and unify for change in your own community. We can also do this accountability work one on one in walking sessions or by zoom.

​Accountability Friends Group, Pilot completed in 2020.
 
Accountability Friends Couples' Group for Transgender and Cisgender Folks in supportive relationships to attend as a couple.  Registration open. 

Accountability Friends Couples' Group for LGBTQi? in supportive relationships to attend as a couple, and open to allies in couples. Registration open.
​

Accountability Friends, Customized for your group or workplace.
​Email your requests.
      "I was suprised to think of myself as one of the good white people and then learn all the ways that racism hides and bubbles out of me. Others in the antiracism group are finding the same thing, 'I'm not racist" our common belief until we consider all the self examining questions from the Black authored books we are steeping ourselves in. Considering the questions, sitting with them, journalling about them and then discussing them, opens up our bubble even from ourselves.

   "Before this Accountability Group I have interrupted Black women because I thought my thoughts or input might get left behind and I just couldn't imagine it (white centering). I had many interactions with Black friends and coworkers not considering that race is ever a consideration, a factor in anything between us. I hadn't thought yet that I could have been mindful about leveraging white privilege for good. The things I did do felt like enough, that it was just a fact that I was not racist.

   "This work has taught me that I cannot separate myself out from being white and all the baggage with it. Being antiracist isnt just a label, it has to be intentional effort every day to educate myself, to seek out ways to repair the harm of antiblackness, and lack of equity in our systems, to pry open the hidden bias, and to show others how to do the same. 

​   "My new label is work-in-progress, always trying to do better. It is unsettlling which makes more sense than the white bubble I was in even when in the company of BIPOC."     Shannon Batts (your Relationship Gardener!)
Hi! Shannon here, filling you in on Accountability Friends Group. 

​The groups are small with 4 to 10 members plus me as your co-host.  Groups have a written agenda (an easy to follow script) for each meeting that I update weekly and provide for rotating hosting among the members.

We discuss assigned antiracism readings and what you learned about yourself in explorations written about each topic between meetings. Each group ends with members stating intentions for inner work and actions to change systems towards racial justice (work, education, government, police, media, entertainment, etc).  We talk about specific steps and make them happen.

Accountability is nurtured through check-in buddies which are fellow members of the group.  Check-ins are 5 to 10 minute calls once a week between meetings that focus on progress towards your inner work goal and outer goal for actions for systemic change. Even our most dedicated diversity and equity proponents respond well to the mentoring that unfolds through check-in on action and goals by phone conversation. I know it helped me to push aside all life's demands and background stress to focus on my antiracism work knowing I would have a phone call with that week's check-in buddy.

Groups are by donation. Your donations support many pro bono services that I provide every month to unhoused as well as low or no income transgender clients who need medical assessments and gender letters for their surgeons.  Donations also support my Reparations offer that allows Black clients to obtain my expertise in marriage repair at no cost.  

Since all my group meetings are now done from home by Zoom video conference, we have most days of the week to choose for our meeting dates. This is a 3-4 month weekly meeting commitment, expanding your growth and action as an antiracist beyond the surface.

email Shannon
New Enhanced Relationship Check-Up now available with streamlined 30% less questions, an easy way to reassess progress if we'd like, and plenty of information about strengths and what to repair. Available for $39 (to Gottman Institute) for clients of Approved Member therapist Shannon Batts.
DONATE to Relationship Gardening by clicking here to go to the checkout Square site where you can enter your donation of any amount and support resource redirection of free services to
​marginalized clients. 

​Or donate via Paypal.me/shannonbatts
​Thank you!
 
Gottman Approved Member



​TESTIMONIALS. WOWEEEEE!
(results not guaranteed)
 http://relationshipgardening.com/couples-therapist-reviews-portland.html
Proud Member of TherapyDen
Picture
How to find a good marriage counselor?  Ask Shannon Batts in Portland, Oregon.  Note from Shannon: Make sure they have advanced training (not just degrees and licenses) with couples, can describe what they learned and how they deliver it to you, and are also HAPPILY married!

​Can they speak to their privilege or marginalizations and how they impact counseling with you?


​

1. Oppezzo M, Schwartz DL. Give your ideas some legs: the positive effect of walking on creative thinking. J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 2014 Jul;40(4):1142-52. doi: 10.1037/a0036577. Epub 2014 Apr 21. PMID: 24749966.

​2. Calogiuri G, Evensen K, Weydahl A, Andersson K, Patil G, Ihlebæk C, Raanaas RK. Green exercise as a workplace intervention to reduce job stress. Results from a pilot study. Work. 2015;53(1):99-111. doi: 10.3233/WOR-152219. PMID: 26684708.

3. 
What moves you? Physical activity strategies in older women
Marily Oppezzo, Lauren Wegner, James J Gross, 
Daniel L Schwartz, Tessa Eckley, Abby C King, Sally Mackey, Marcia L Stefanick
First Published May 18, 2021 Research Article Find in PubMed
https://doi.org/10.1177/13591053211014593
Picture
  



​



​Shannon Batts, Licensed Professional Counselor of Portland, Oregon, lic# C2379, and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist for Californians, lic# MFT 34477, is Marriage Friendly, with better than neutrality toward the outcome of your life long love commitment. Shannon Batts is a Portland, Oregon counselor, with advanced skills, education and training in assisting couples (extremely rare among counselors). Lesbian, gay, trans, mixed gender identity, questioning gender, nonbinary, and straight couples of all ages seek out tools and support for their relationships from Shannon Batts. Shannon trains ongoingly to be antiracist and is a facilitator and consultant at Race Talks PDX. Transgender, Black Americans, or unhoused clients will find amazing flexibility in counseling rates if you need it because you've been through enough!


​

www.couplesintransition.com
www.spousesgroup.com
www.spousesresourcecenter.com
www.spousesresourcecenter.org
www.relationshipgardening.com
all arrive at Relationship Gardening and Spouses Resource Center so as to increase options for couples facing gender transition to have excellent support for making it through transition together.
Couples with no LGBTQ identities also benefit by Relationship Gardening.


verified by Psychology Today
Electronic/internet based communication is not a guarantee of privacy as it is always subject to security breach or hacking. You do maintain the right to email, text or video chat regardless of the risk.
 Shannon is the counselor's counselor where couples go to grow a happy marriage, with Gottman research based relationship and marriage help and telehealth video sessions. Clinical hypnosis available as Shannon completed the 100-Hour Comprehensive Training in Applying Clinical Hypnosis in Strategic Psychotherapy intensive by Dr. Michael Yapko. Marriage Counseling, marriage therapy, couple's therapy, couple's coaching, premarital counseling, help for transgender or non binary coming out in marriage, support for spouses of transgender or non binary partners, couples group for transgender partners and cisgender spouses, questioning gender in your marriage, gender affirming referral letters, marriage retreats, marriage workshops, antiracist coaching for engaged couples, antiracism groups for white people, antiracism couples groups, antiracism groups for professionals, custom antiracism groups, marriage affairs or adultery, porn or sex addiction or compulsion in your marriage, couples communication training-whatever you call it-make sure your best marriage counseling choice in CA, or in Portland, Oregon has Advanced Gottman Institute aka Relationship Research Institute training.  A Gottman trained therapist like Shannon Batts knows how to move couples from sticky negativity to a garden of new possibilities from the very first couples' session.  Services available by Zoom for all of CA and OR. Walking sessions for individual meetings. relationshipgardening.com spousesresourcecenter.com