Specialty areas.
gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered populations
Across the globe, individuals enjoy life as gay, lesbian, bisexual, and
transgendered individuals. In the midst of discrimination and homophobia, gay,
lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people thrive and live lives that are healthy,
productive, and important.
Growing up as a gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered individual is not without
its share of difficulties, however. While in recent years the world has come to
realize that being gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered is not disordered but
rather natural, expected, acceptable, and appropriate, many individuals grew up
in places and times that held different views. And while in many cities the
importance of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered populations is
acknowledged and embraced, there are geographical, political, and religious
differences across the globe that continue to dismiss, reject, and limit the
freedoms and rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people. For
these reasons, being a person who is gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered
can be challenging indeed.
Social ills, problems, and prejudices related to what it means to be gay, lesbian,
bisexual, or transgendered often trickle down from the societal level to the GLBT
person themselves. And while it is the unaccepting and ignorant society that has
the problem (due to its own lack of understanding and information, among other
things), and the society itself that precipitates and exacerbates these problems
(through legislation, hate crimes, discrimination, etc.), it is unfortunately the gay,
lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered individual who is left to experience and
navigate the understandable results of being poorly treated (depression, anxiety,
trauma, stress, internalized homophobia). It is the GLBT individual who is left
trying to cope individually with the problems of society as a whole.
It is therefore integral and essential that those individuals who bravely live being
the gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered people they are gain appropriate,
informed, and empathic support from a psychologist who can understand these
issues as a person and professional. Individuals who identity as gay, lesbian,
bisexual, or transgendered can benefit from the support of someone who
understands how society's issues are complexly intertwined with those
experienced by the individual.
Being gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgendered is something of which each
individual can and should be proud. And learning to live with pride despite a
world that is only beginning to understand its errors is not only a significant
accomplishment, but one that holds great reward.
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DR. ART BOWLER
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138 West 25th Street, Suite 618 646.823.5080
New York, New York 10001 drart@drartbowler.com