Lonels and Self-Rated Physil Health Among Gay, Bisexual and other Men who have Sex wh Men Vanuver, Canada - PMC

Contents:

• HOW TO COPE WHEN YOU'RE GAY AND LONELY
• LONELS AND SELF-RATED PHYSIL HEALTH AMONG GAY, BISEXUAL AND OTHER MEN WHO HAVE SEX WH MEN VANUVER, CANADA

HOW TO COPE WHEN YOU'RE GAY AND LONELY

In our lifetime, the gay muny has ma more progrs on legal and social acceptance than any other mographic group history. As recently as my own adolcence, gay marriage was a distant aspiratn, somethg newspapers still put sre quot.

Still, even as we celebrate the sle and speed of this change, the rat of prsn, lonels and substance abe the gay muny rema stuck the same place they’ve been for s. Gay people are now, pendg on the study, between 2 and 10 tim more likely than straight people to take their own liv.

LONELS AND SELF-RATED PHYSIL HEALTH AMONG GAY, BISEXUAL AND OTHER MEN WHO HAVE SEX WH MEN VANUVER, CANADA

In a survey of gay men who recently arrived New York Cy, three-quarters suffered om anxiety or prsn, abed dgs or alhol or were havg risky sex—or some batn of the three. “Marriage equaly and the chang legal stat were an improvement for some gay men, ” says Christopher Stults, a rearcher at New York Universy who studi the differenc mental health between gay and straight men.

In the Netherlands, where gay marriage has been legal sce 2001, gay men rema three tim more likely to suffer om a mood disorr than straight men, and 10 tim more likely to engage “suicidal self-harm.

TTravis Salway, a rearcher wh the BC Centre for Disease Control Vanuver, has spent the last five years tryg to figure out why gay men keep killg themselv. By the late 2000s, he was a social worker and epimlogist and, like me, was stck by the growg distance between his straight and gay iends. When the dispary first me to light the ’50s and ’60s, doctors thought was a symptom of homosexualy self, jt one of many maniftatns of what was, at the time, known as “sexual versn.