It was all about the counterculture, and going to love-ins.” “Those were the fun days, oh my goodness. “We were infallible,” Ban said with a grin. “I never really felt vulnerable back then, because we were just tough, you know? I mean I was like 5 foot 5 and a half, and just had a demeanor that was kind of strong.” Heaven forbid that Ellen passes… That’s the biggest rock to carry, for me.”īan came out when she was 18, right into the counterculture movement of the ’70s.

I don’t know how I would have handled it without her. When my brother passed away, Ellen was my rock. “When my mother passed away, I had my brother and Ellen. “When my father passed away, I had my brother and mother and wife, and it wasn’t so hard because of them,” said Ban. Ban, whose nuclear family immigrated from Israel, cared both for her mother until she died in 2020 and her brother who died in 2021. While both Ban and Brunot’s families have been supportive, Brunot’s relatives are spread across the U.S., with no kin nearby. And so as they age, they don’t have the supports that a typical heterosexual person may have.”

“Many also don’t have children to rely on. “Several of our LGBT seniors, who came out in an era when they weren’t allowed to be open about their sexuality and gender identity, lost a lot of their important relationships, family systems,” said Yelba Carrillo, the former senior program manager of LA LGBT Center’s Senior Services. “If we had like aunts, uncles nearby, grandkids, and kids, that’d be a whole different story,” said Ban.Ībout 75% of LGBT adults 45 and older reported concerns about having enough support from family and friends as they age, a 2018 AARP report found. The aloneness of caregiving and the stress of decision-making, Ban shares, weighs on her. ‘Please take me home’: The heartbreaking rubric of dementia and COVID.‘I felt so caught in between’: Older, LGBT+ caretakers face special challenges.

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