Gay Relatnship Breakup Can Be Problematic. Here's How to Avoid the Risks | Psychreg

Contents:

• HOW TO TACKLE GAY RELATNSHIP PROBLEMS
• GAY AND BISEXUAL MEN'S HEALTH ISSU
• GAY RELATNSHIP BREAKUP CAN BE PROBLEMATIC. HERE’S HOW TO AVOID THE RISKS
• GAY MEN’S FEARS OF LONG-TERM ROMANCE
• GAY COUPL CAN TEACH STRAIGHT PEOPLE A THG OR TWO ABOUT ARGUG

HOW TO TACKLE GAY RELATNSHIP PROBLEMS

Many health re and mental health anizatns foced on the lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr muny also offer substance e treatment or may be able to provi rmatn about lol rourc. Some mon dilemmas clu fay (particularly parental) disapproval, societal homophobia, pecially if you live a part of the untry where beg gay is perceived as abnormal, and discrimatn (overt or subtle) at the workplace.

Your partner may not agree wh the way you handle your parents’ attu towards your same-sex relatnship, or get irrated when you don’t stand up for yourself agast a homophobic slur or an act of discrimatn at the office. It is important to face the issu associated wh gay relatnship problems together and e up wh some productive strategi to manage them before they snowball to relatnship-damagg fights.

GAY AND BISEXUAL MEN'S HEALTH ISSU

Perhaps reachg out to your LGBT support groups, who have certaly been where you are now, for nstctive (and legal) advice on how to manage the and other problems wh gay marriage. It is important to put the child or children’s welfare first, and for that, you need to know that your new partner is on the same page as you early to avoid gay relatnship problems.

But wh good munitn, and a sire to fd meangful solutns, your gay relatnship problems n be utilized posively to strengthen your bond and, enhance the nnectn you have wh each other. There are a few optns for gay men and bisexual men same-sex relatnships who aspire to have children, cludg surrogacy, where sperm is ed to fertilize a donated egg, which is then rried to term by a surrogate mother. Although don’t get much airtime beyond queer unterpublics, there is an adamantly left-wg, progrsive and pro-gay perspective that suggts same-sex marriage is not a necsary good.

GAY RELATNSHIP BREAKUP CAN BE PROBLEMATIC. HERE’S HOW TO AVOID THE RISKS

Lbian and gay muni, and the femist muni wh which they have historilly overlapped, have long celebrated the valu of sexual diversy over the sexual nformy reprented by marriage and the ethil importance of sexual straight-talkg rather than the double-standards so equently observed marriage’s vicy. There’s a tenncy among s proponents to reprent same-sex marriage as the fal chapter the story of gay acceptance, “the last civil right” as has sometim exaggeratedly been lled.

GAY MEN’S FEARS OF LONG-TERM ROMANCE

It is large part bee of femist and gay novatns livg that marriage today is creasgly unrstood not as a relig but a social relatn; characterised not by male domatn but equaly and mutualy between the sex; valued not terms of s ntractual basis but terms of s ongog ntributn to a person’s sense of well-beg; and mataed not until ath-do--part but for as long as both parti fd satisfactn . In regnisg some gay and lbian relatnships as marriag, same-sex marriage emphasis the ntued illegimacy of other sexual arrangements and the ntued excln of other social actors.

Now this ragtag bunch might not seem as worthy of social protectn and prtige as the lovg, rg, long-term gay and lbian upl that are the shy new poster boys and girls for same-sex marriage. A profsnal mental healthre provir will be a sensive clician, fully aware of the pfalls of tradnal heterosexual bias, and will treat a lbian or gay uple an appropriate fashn.

Homosexualy has not been nsired pathologil by mastream psychiatry sce the 1970s, and the years that followed, gay upl have begun to acknowledge their partnerships publicly. Mothers who enjoy the sensivy and shared terts of gay sons may lean too much on them, g them to fulfill their unmet emotnal believ that the dynamics n prevent adult gay men om formg long-term romantic bonds. Many gay men seek affirmatn not through an endurg, lovg relatnship, he said, but cultivatg large works of iends, pursug transient sexual liaisons, focg on profsnal succs and creatg flawlsly appoted environments for his new book, Commment and Healg: Gay Men and the Need for Romantic Love, Isay scrib how therapy n help provi gay men wh sight to the effects of childhood fluenc on the pacy to m to a partner.

GAY COUPL CAN TEACH STRAIGHT PEOPLE A THG OR TWO ABOUT ARGUG

A clil profsor at Weill Medil College of Cornell Universy and a faculty member at the Columbia Universy Center for Psychoanalytic Trag and Rearch, Isay draws upon his experience as a Manhattan psychotherapist wh mostly gay published his first book, Beg Homosexual: Gay Men and Their Development, 1989, at a time when he was g out. His 1996 book, Beg Gay, outl the ways which gay teenagers and adults velop said that his new book has stirred up some ntroversy bee he argu that gay upl who tolerate sexual adventur outsi the partnership may do so out of an unnsc fear of closens rather than a sense of liberatn om tradnal heterosexual strictur.

“It ns unter to the prevailg doctr of the gay muny that mata that our relatnships are fe, more mocratic and better than heterosexual relatnships, ” said hop that his new book will help gay men to exame the patterns of their romantic relatnships and perhaps seek the guidance of a therapist attuned to gay issu. The term “homosexualy, ” while sometim nsired anachronistic the current era, is the most applible and easily translatable term to e when askg this qutn across societi and languag and has been ed other cross-natnal studi, cludg the World Valu Survey. Dpe major chang laws and norms surroundg the issue of same-sex marriage and the rights of LGBT people around the world, public opn on the acceptance of homosexualy society remas sharply divid by untry, regn and enomic velopment.