Just a few days before its “Silver Pride: Joy in Justice” event for seniors in DC’s LGBTQ community, Michael Mitchell, peer support coordinator for Whitman-Walker’s Behavioral Health department was interviewed by the Jeremy Conrad of the DC Bar about Whitman-Walker’s particular support and attention to LGBTQ+ individuals who are over 60… helping them to maintain their vitality, sex, dating, and leading fulfilling lives.
Excerpt:
“I started my career doing HIV/AIDS work in 1990, and that was still in the middle of everything. So, I have been in it for a very long time, and it has very much affected me, personally, and there is a whole level of people that’s missing above me,” said Michael Mitchell. “For a lot of our folks, they’re still grappling with that. They’re still grappling with the HIV/AIDS crisis. Women are still grappling with the fact that they stepped in and took care of gay men in a pretty profound way.”
That sense of history is so important, Mitchell says. It can be difficult for younger members of the community to grasp the tensions that existed during a period in which the LGBTQ+ community suffered staggering losses while their plight was largely ignored by the government. “It was a really horrific thing, and the stigma still hasn’t really gone away,” he adds.
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