Individual coaching session
$145
60 minutes · life coaching · Canadian dollars · one-to-one
One 60-minute individual coaching session by video (coaching sessions are currently held online). The fee is paid after each session.
Queer-affirming life coaching · online (Ottawa-based)
Asher Lacho, BA, MA Life coach for queer relationships, coming out, open and closed agreements, non-monogamy, gender, work and study, and intimacy
They / Them
Individual life coaching (you and me, one-to-one) for queer relationships, coming out and same-gender attraction, open and closed relationship agreements, non-monogamy, gender, work and study, desire and intimacy — with warmth, clarity, and respect for how you live and love.
Practice
I offer individual life coaching: each coaching session is you and me, one-to-one, so the time stays fully focused on your goals. I work with adults who want coaching around connection, boundaries, identity, and desire—including coming out at any stage, living discreetly or partly closeted, and new or returning attraction toward your own gender, alongside themes that often come up for gay, bisexual, and MSM clients. My approach to coaching is collaborative: you bring your lived experience; I bring training, presence, and questions that help you move toward what matters to you.
Confidential and discreet: What you bring to our coaching work stays between us in ordinary course. I treat your circumstances with discretion and do not discuss our work with third parties except where a legal obligation or an imminent safety risk requires action—in which case I will be direct with you about limits and next steps.
Life coaching is forward-looking, goal-oriented, and centred on your agency. In coaching we focus on goals, choices, and next steps in your life. If you are in crisis or want clinical mental health treatment, I will gladly help you connect with regulated therapists, physicians, or crisis services that fit that scope of care, in addition to or separate from our coaching work.
Areas of focus
These themes often overlap in queer-affirming life coaching. We can explore them broadly or zoom in on what is most alive for you right now.
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Queer relationships
Coaching can focus on navigating family, community, and partnership from a queer-centred lens—including when those ties sit alongside dating, sex, and identity for men who partner with men.
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Open, closed, & non-monogamous relationships
Open relationships, polyamory, and other non-monogamous shapes—alongside monogamous or explicitly closed agreements you want to honour with clarity. In coaching, we can work on jealousy, time, disclosure, and boundaries, and revisit what fits when your context or values shift.
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Gender
Exploration and clarity around gender identity and expression—how you want to be seen, named, and understood—whether you are questioning, naming something new, living between or beyond binary categories, or integrating a change that is already underway. We can work on pronouns and names, how you present in different relationships or spaces, and what feels steady versus experimental for you right now.
Disclosure and boundaries with family, partners, friends, or community when gender is what is shifting or what you are careful about sharing; pacing choices about social or medical transition when those are part of your story; and the mix of pride, fear, or grief that can sit alongside gender expression in close relationships or day-to-day life. Coaching here stays goal-oriented and practical—what you want next and what supports you—not a substitute for medical or mental health care when that is what you need.
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Work, study, & public life
Disclosure and boundaries at work or school; stress when your public role does not match how you live privately; and career or study choices you want to line up with your values as a queer person.
When disclosure in those spaces touches any part of your queer life—for example gender or transition, who you date or how you partner, or other dimensions of identity and desire you keep more private—we can work on timing and boundaries with colleagues, managers, or classmates; what to share and when; and how pride, fear, or grief move through you as visibility or expectations change in public life. Coaching here stays about your goals in each environment and the steps that fit you—not legal advice, HR representation, or medical care, which other professionals can offer when you need that layer.
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Desire and intimacy
Coaching can make room for wanting, negotiation, shame, pleasure, and weaving erotic life into the rest of who you are. When kink is part of your world, we can work on consent and communication, scenes and limits you want to hold with care, identity alongside what you practise, and the feelings that surface around risk, pride, or ambivalence.
Coaching can also include resourcing so you can move toward like-minded communities tied to your interests and desires: for example leather, rubber, puppy play, or other BDSM corners of the scene, whether you are experiencing this for the first time or going deeper. We can clarify what you are hoping to find, safety and vetting questions, first steps toward munches or events, and how to stay clear on your boundaries while you explore.
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Coming out, discretion, & same-gender attraction
Coming out over a lifetime, staying private or partly closeted, and new or returning attraction toward your own gender. I often coach gay and bisexual men and men who have sex with men (MSM) around dating and apps, sex and identity, masculinity, discretion when you need it, and finding belonging in queer community—on your terms and toward what you want next.
Training & accreditation
I trained as a professional life coach through a program accredited for CPD by the CPD Standards Office. I hold Certified Professional Life Coach certification.
My preparation also includes training in body-based nervous-system awareness and pacing: noticing how activation and settling show up moment to moment while we work, in service of coaching goals.
I bring that preparation into individual (one-to-one) coaching for queer relationships, coming out and same-gender attraction, open and closed relationship agreements, non-monogamy, gender, desire and intimacy, and work or study, with warmth, clarity, and respect for how you live and love—including questions that come up often for gay, bisexual, and MSM clients. The skills, processes, and modalities below are what I draw on in coaching when we work on connection, boundaries, identity, or desire in those spaces.
I can coach you with:
Each topic expands for a short note on what the term means and how it can show up in coaching.
Foundational life coaching skills
How we build trust, listen at a pace that fits you, and turn what you are noticing into clear goals and steady follow-through when your questions sit in queer, monogamous, open, non-monogamous, gender-related, kink-aware, coming-out, same-gender attraction, or work or study lived experience—including for many gay, bisexual, and MSM clients.
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Communication + questioning
Open, precise questions and clear back-and-forth so you can hear your own reasoning. In coaching this usually means less advice from me and more dialogue that sorts values, options, and what you want to try next—including around relationships, identity, or agreements.
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Reflective listening
Naming themes in your words so you know you have been heard and can adjust or go deeper in the conversation. It slows the pace when urgency, shame, or conflict is loud, and keeps the focus on what is true for you in coaching.
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Establishing rapport
Building enough trust and safety in the coaching relationship that you can say what matters. Rapport is groundwork for honest coaching work on intimacy, disclosure, boundaries, or parts of your life you rarely voice aloud.
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Setting achievable goals
Outcomes that are specific enough to notice progress and realistic enough to build momentum. We shape them so they fit your context, then break them into steps you can actually take.
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Action planning
Turning decisions into concrete actions with timing, resources, and checkpoints so intentions become movement between coaching sessions—not a rigid to-do list, but a plan you own.
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Providing accountability
Following up on commitments you chose: what happened, what got in the way, and what to adjust. The tone stays curious and respectful, not parental or shaming.
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Emotional intelligence
Noticing and naming feelings so they inform choices instead of derailing them. That skill shows up in coaching around jealousy, coming out, conflict, desire, or any topic where the emotional charge is high.
Coaching activities, processes, & modalities
In coaching, we can work with self-talk, fear, and decision-making when you are navigating agreements, evaluating open versus closed structures, disclosure, shame, identity shifts, or claiming more of what you want in relationships and erotic life. We can use language-based tools and attention to body state and pacing within a coaching scope.
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Positive self-talk
Paying attention to inner narration and shifting it toward language that is accurate and self-respecting, without forcing fake cheer. The aim is a voice in your head that helps you act in line with your values.
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Developing a growth mindset
Treating skills and patterns as learnable and setbacks as information. That frame reduces shame when something does not land yet, and keeps room to experiment with new agreements or ways of showing up.
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Overcoming fear
Naming what you are afraid of, separating realistic risk from old stories, and choosing small steps or supports so you can move at a pace that still honours safety and consent.
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Powerful decision making
Clarifying criteria, trade-offs, and alignment with what matters before you choose—especially when the stakes touch relationships, privacy, identity, or erotic life.
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Creating lasting change
Linking new behaviours to routines, reminders, and review so change survives the first burst of motivation. We look at what has worked before and what environment you need for the shift to stick.
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Finding passion and purpose
Exploring what feels alive and meaningful in love, work, and community so goals point toward what you actually want, not only what you think you should want.
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Neuro-Linguistic Programming techniques
Language- and pattern-based tools from NLP training (for example reframing, outcome questions, or anchoring a resourceful state), used with your consent and in service of your coaching goals.
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Body-based pacing & nervous-system awareness
A body-oriented way of noticing activation, settling, and pacing moment to moment in how you feel. In coaching I use that awareness to help you stay within a range that supports clear thinking and choice.
How sessions work
Where
Coaching sessions are currently online by video from a private space wherever you are. Each booking is individual (one-to-one): you and me for the full hour. I am based in Ottawa, Ontario; when in-person coaching sessions here reopen, this page will list both options. Until then, video keeps coaching accessible wherever you can connect safely.
Benefits & reimbursement
Many extended plans prioritize regulated clinical services first. You can still ask whether your employer’s health benefits plan (HBP) or a related flexible spending account can reimburse life coaching—for example fees for professional, individual life coaching sessions (not therapy or clinical counselling). Check with your plan administrator and read your summary of benefits to see whether life coaching is described as an eligible expense and what documentation they need for claims.
Payment
I welcome payment by Interac e-Transfer or cash. The individual session rate is paid after each coaching session; the three-session bundle is paid in full before the first session in the bundle. Invoices and receipts for life coaching are available whenever you need them for records or benefits paperwork.
Cancellation
Please give at least 24 hours’ notice before your scheduled coaching session start time if you need to move or cancel. With shorter notice, or if you miss the coaching session without rescheduling in time, the full coaching session fee applies so reserved time stays fair for everyone.
Pricing
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Three coaching sessions
$399
3 × 60 minutes · life coaching · Canadian dollars · one-to-one
Paid as a bundle — about $133 per individual coaching session — for steadier progress. The bundle fee is paid in full before the first coaching session in the bundle.
Payment: Interac e-Transfer or cash. Individual sessions: fee paid after each coaching session. Three-session bundle: paid in full before the first session in the bundle. Invoices and receipts for life coaching are available on request.
Sliding scale
Sliding scale means the same 60-minute individual coaching as above, but at a reduced fee we agree together: lower than the standard single coaching session or bundle prices, because paying those rates would be a hardship for you. It is a deliberate structure so coaching stays financially reachable. The exact amount depends on what you can pay and on how many reduced-fee spots I have open at a given time; we settle the number before we book paid coaching sessions.
I reserve a portion of my client spaces at sliding scale for full-time students and for people from historically marginalised groups who can demonstrate financial hardship (for example through a short conversation about what you can afford; private financial records are optional). If that describes you, say so in your first message; I trust self-identification. We can then talk about what fee would work on your side and what I can offer on mine so the arrangement stays sustainable for both of us.
I welcome a limited number of sliding-scale coaching relationships at a time. When those spots are full, I may offer a waitlist until one opens.
Historically marginalised groups are communities or populations that have been systematically excluded, oppressed, or disadvantaged due to factors such as race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status, religion, disability, or sexual orientation. These groups often face structural barriers to equal opportunities in areas such as education, employment, healthcare, and political representation.
Frequently asked questions
Short answers to common questions. Details also appear throughout this page in each section.
What is the difference between life coaching and therapy?
Life coaching is forward-looking, goal-oriented, and centred on your agency: in coaching we focus on goals, choices, and next steps in your life. Clinical mental health treatment and crisis support belong with regulated therapists, physicians, or crisis services. I am glad to help you notice when adding those resources would support you, alongside or separate from coaching.
Are coaching sessions in person, online, or both?
Coaching sessions are currently online by video
I am based in Ottawa, Ontario. I am currently meeting coaching clients online by video from a private space wherever you are. When in-person coaching sessions here reopen, this page will list both options alongside video.
Do you offer sliding scale fees?
Yes. A portion of client spaces are offered at a reduced fee for full-time students and for people from historically marginalised groups who can demonstrate financial hardship. I welcome a limited number of sliding-scale coaching relationships at a time; when those spots are full, I may use a waitlist until one opens. Say so in your first message; we agree the fee before paid coaching sessions are booked. See the Pricing section for how sliding scale works in this coaching practice.
What payment methods do you accept?
I welcome payment by Interac e-Transfer or cash. Invoices and receipts for life coaching are available on request.
What training or accreditation do you have?
Professional life coach training through a program accredited for CPD by the CPD Standards Office, leading to Certified Professional Life Coach certification, plus training in body-based nervous-system awareness and pacing as used in coaching. I apply that preparation in individual coaching for queer relationships, coming out and same-gender attraction, open and closed relationship agreements, non-monogamy, gender, work and study, desire and intimacy (kink-aware), including themes that often come up for gay, bisexual, and MSM clients, using foundational skills (for example communication, questioning, listening, rapport, goals, action planning, accountability, emotional intelligence) and activities and processes (self-talk, growth mindset, fear, decision-making, change, purpose, Neuro-Linguistic Programming techniques, and body-based pacing within coaching scope). See Training & accreditation on this page for how that maps onto coaching sessions.
Contact
Send a message to start a brief email exchange about fit and next steps for coaching. Fields open your email app with a pre-filled message to asher.lacho@gmail.com.