Does the sky fall . . . when you're old and g(r)ay?

There are two million LGBT seniors in America who are over age 60; and every year an estimated 400,000 turn 50. According to the Policy Institute of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, that number will double by 2035.
Be prepared. Your turn will come. (Sooner or later.)
While LGBTs have made visible strides since Stonewall,1969 — and moreso since the American Psychiatric Association dropped homosexuality as a sickness in 1973 — little mainstream research has been done on LGBT aging, with negligible data on minorities, bisexuals and transgendered persons.
LGBT seniors, mostly invisible in America, face medical, social service, and retirement options that are, with few exceptions, primarily oriented to the psychological, physical, social, and religious needs of their straight counterparts (of which 13 percent of the total population is now over 65).
"The limited research . . . on long-term care services to [LGBT] elders documents a significant prevalence of homophobic attitudes on the part of staff, heterosexist assumptions about everyone, and a general sex phobia to older people that plays out particularly with old gay people," says NGLTF New York City Policy Institute on Aging director and author, Dr. Sean Cahill.
According to Cahill — as quoted in the American Medical Directors Association publication Caring for The Aged — LGBT seniors fall into two groups: those who are out (many since Stonewall) and those who — because of family, location, work, privacy or fear — remain closeted. Both groups, says Cahill, face unique challenges when seeking health care support and/or medical services and benefits [and, one might add, some 1,046 proverbial perks of civil marriage].
"A lot of gay people who are entering long-term care have lived their lives openly as gay people and don't want to go back in the closet," says Cahill. "But if they don't go back, they face certain very real dangers that are the products of homophobia."
Amber Hollibaugh, advocate for New York's Senior Action in a Gay Environment, also quoted with Cahill, agrees. "An old man who enjoys dressing in drag will not be able to do it in a long-term care facility. So what happens to any outrŽ behavior? What happens to the gays who are not 'nice'? What happens to the feminine man and the masculine woman? How does the range of gay people exist in long-term care?"
Cahill adds, "One researcher reported on an older woman resident of a nursing home whom staff refused to bathe because they did not want to touch 'the lesbian.' In another situation, a home care assistant threatened to 'out' an elder gay male client if he reported her negligent care.
"Seniors report being unwilling to display photographs or other signs of their gay identity for fear that their care will be compromised. And so gay people in long-term care shy away from self-identifying as gay.
"In addition to discrimination,[LGBT seniors also] face unequal treatment under Social Security, pensions, and 401K plans," continues Cahill. "Even federal programs that are designed to help elder Americans are often either ineffective or irrelevant to the lives of gay elders.
"Social Security does not pay survivor benefits to the same-sex life partner of someone who dies. Medicaid regulations offer no protections to the home or other assets when a same-sex spouse must enter a long-term care facility. Tax laws and pension regulations discriminate against same-sex partners. Thus, laws that protect and cushion the harshness of old age for heterosexuals are denied gay elders.
"Quite shocking, too," says Cahill, "same sex couples are not protected against seizure of their home by the government in the same way married couples are. In terms of disruption of people's lives — that's the worst.
"If your partner goes into long-term care and dies there, the government can take your house to pay the bill. You have no rights if there was no specifically stated share in the mortgage. The policies protect married couples, even if the house is in one person's name. Those policies are not in place for same-sex couples."
Other considerations not addressed by Cahill — but certainly worth mentioning here — include health considerations unique to LGBT seniors: lesbians encountering clueless straight physicians; elderly gay patients requiring closely monitored HIV medications; black LGBTs facing two-fold discrimination, and trans people who must share living, dining, and bathroom facilities with straights. BTL readers, young and old, are encouraged to improvise this list.
Cahill concludes, "The elder services infrastructure needs to be brought up to speed, to catch up with other aspects of society that have been confronted with issues of sexual orientation early on. Senior services are no more homophobic than any other institutions [!] but they haven't really thought through the particular needs of gay seniors."
Can we wait til 2035? Not I, said the Little Red (65-year-old) Hen. The sky is falling, a decade at a time.