Questions to ask
before you start.
Finding a therapist who can work with your body, your mind and your access needs can feel like a job in itself. These questions are here to make it a little easier, and to help you notice how someone responds as much as what they say.
You don’t need to ask them all. Pick the two or three that matter most.
What does access
mean for you?
Access goes beyond physical barriers. It includes attitudes, practices and whether someone understands how disability and mental health intersect. It can help to have a rough sense of what matters most to you before you start searching.
- Physical access: accessible parking, step-free entry, lifts, suitable seating.
- Communication: closed captions in online sessions, or experience working with speech devices or AAC.
- Specialist understanding: familiarity with chronic illness, neurodivergence, trauma-informed practice, disability-related grief, advocacy or systemic barriers.
If you don’t know yet, that’s a workable starting point too. Sometimes all that’s clear is that the usual way of doing therapy doesn’t fit, and that can be worked out as you go.
Finding people
worth asking.
Specialist directories. Some online directories let you filter for disability-inclusive therapists. Examples include Inclusive Therapists, Therapy Den and Open Path Collective, though which ones cover your area varies by country. Professional bodies where you live may also keep lists of therapists who specialise in disability-related issues.
Online therapy. Working online removes many physical and transport barriers and lets you choose from a much wider area. If you go this way, it’s worth asking about the platform itself: captions, screen reader compatibility, and video adjustments for visual impairments.
What to ask,
and why it helps.
A first conversation is a chance for you to assess the therapist as much as the other way round. Asking early also means access doesn’t depend on explaining and justifying it later.
Do they know this territory?
You’re looking for real familiarity, and for someone who can say honestly where their experience runs out.
- “What is your experience working with clients with disabilities?”
- “How do you address unconscious bias in your practice?”
- “Are you familiar with advocacy or systems of support for disabled people?”
Can therapy be shaped around how you actually work?
Vague answers such as “yes, we’re accessible” are worth gently pressing on. Concrete detail is a good sign.
- “What accommodations can you provide to make therapy accessible for me?”
- “Could you tell me specifically what’s accessible here, rather than just that it is?”
- “Are you flexible about pacing, camera use, communication method and session length?”
- “If an accommodation stops working, how do we change it?”
Can you sustain it?
Accessibility includes affordability and a schedule that fits a body that isn’t always predictable.
- “Do you offer sliding-scale fees or reduced rates, and can you help me work out insurance or funding?”
- “How does your cancellation policy work if my condition fluctuates?”
- “Can sessions be by video, audio only or in writing?”
Community mental health centres and nonprofit organisations may also offer lower-cost therapy.
What happens if they get it wrong?
Every therapist misreads something eventually. What matters is whether disagreement can become useful information.
- “If I tell you an interpretation doesn’t match my experience, what happens next?”
- “How do you tell the difference between something psychological and something physical or environmental?”
What to notice,
beyond the words.
You’re paying attention not only to the answers but to how willing the therapist is to have the conversation at all.
Encouraging signs
- They’re open, curious and non-defensive.
- They give concrete detail about access.
- They take your account of your own body seriously.
- They can say what they don’t know.
Worth pausing over
- They minimise your experience or needs.
- They ask you to prove or justify an adjustment first.
- Answers stay vague or become defensive.
- You leave feeling you’ve had to educate them from scratch.
Ticking every box
isn’t the same as fit.
A therapist may check everything on paper and still not feel right. Therapy relies on a strong connection and mutual trust, so your own sense of whether someone genuinely understands and supports you counts as evidence.
Advocating for yourself can feel intimidating, especially if you’ve met dismissive attitudes before. Therapy is meant to be collaborative. You deserve someone who respects and accommodates you, and it’s reasonable to keep looking if they don’t.
Need help finding the words? The Self-Advocacy Script Library has language for requesting accommodations and saying “that doesn’t work for me.”
Where to go
from here.
Accessibility & Therapy
What can actually be adapted in sessions here, stated plainly.
When Disability Gets Misread as Psychology
The pattern behind feeling misunderstood in therapy, and how repair can work.
Accessibility in Psychotherapy Practice
The ten dimensions a service can be measured against.
Resources for Disabled People
The full section on getting ready for therapy.
You’re allowed to ask questions before you commit.
Access should make therapy more usable, not another test to pass. Asking is allowed, and so is choosing someone else.