Growing Queer Eldership: Why Intergenerational Connection Matters in LGBTQ+ Identity and Healing

Mikie White, Resident Therapist

A person with long hair and a beard looks through a set of colorful translucent panels held in front of their face, creating multiple fragmented reflections in yellow, blue, and green. A hand with long pink nails supports the panels. The creative portrait symbolizes identity exploration, self-expression, and fluidity within the queer community.

Table of Contents

Understanding Queer Eldership and Representation
Intergenerational Gaps and the Evolution of Queer Identity
How Aging and Development Differ in the Queer Community
Common Emotional Experiences Across Queer Generations
The Role of Queer-Affirming Therapy in Identity Exploration
Building Queer Eldership Through Visibility, Storytelling, and Connection

Queer eldership, and the impacts on our community

Within the queer community, the topic of elders being positive figures to look up to can look quite different. When thinking about queer eldership, the considerations involve: The stories of queer people, our awareness of this, and continued effort to highlight this community. From my experiences, and through my work, I have seen many queer individuals struggle to identify elders in their lives, as queer representation and visibility are often not a given due to systemic discrimination and erasure. Leading to a common anxiety provoking question for queer people exploring their identities: “am I alone?”

Highlighting queer stories, sharing experiences and listening to others, and making the active effort to invite all queer identities into a space, without judgement and with the freedom to explore, all directly contribute to growing eldership. The queer community is also in a unique situation in what eldership can look like, as social contexts surrounding queerness are constantly evolving, given the very different experiences of queer generations, with unique positives and negatives throughout.

Eldership can be about age, but wisdom more accurately fits its function. From personal experience working with queer youth, I cannot express enough how much they have taught me about confidently owning my identity, expressing it authentically, and choosing to show up as me, regardless of opinions from others.

On the flip-side, bridging the gap between queer-youth and older queer-individuals is so valuable in growing queer eldership, specifically for younger queer individuals to understand historical queer experiences that led to this point. I’ve witnessed accounts from older queer individuals alluding to feeling devalued within the community, as conversations about the social contexts of queerness spotlight youth and shy away away from older generations. By bridging the gap amongst generations, we are better able to see the full scope of queer experiences, learn from each other, and promote a continued sense of eldership.

Diverse group of friends joyfully jumping outdoors by a lake, expressing connection, community, and celebration.

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How aging/development can look different in the queer community

For a lot of queer individuals, aging and development can look different! Those who discover their identities later in life may experience what feels like a “second adolescence” when exploring their newly claimed identity. Something I have noticed in the therapy room is the difficulty in navigating experiences that others have experienced at a younger age, giving an impression of being “behind” the norm. Highlighting this idea within the queer community as a common experience will directly support continued queer eldership. Not only can sharing these differences in development provide some comfort for those experiencing this, but also can give a foundation of hope that one’s identity can continue to grow and evolve.

I have also noticed how the language evolution that queer youth have engaged with is sitting with older queer individuals. Some have noted feeling like this language is not for them, but rather only for youth to identify with. I’ve also noticed how some queer adults hold shame in wanting to further explore their identities, even around other queer friends, for fear of judgment. It’s understandably led to many people holding in their thoughts, which can be a very lonely experience. Some statements I often hear in sessions include:

- “I didn’t think I would get to be this age”

- “If I was younger, I would probably explore this/I feel too old to explore this”

- “I can’t be (identity) because I don’t look/act like other people who are (identity)” -

-“I just know that (person) wouldn’t understand, so what’s the point of telling them”

I want to highlight how common these ideas are held by queer individuals of all ages, and how common it is for individuals to feel alone in these thoughts. In sharing these experiences and finding relatability in them, I hope to deconstruct the “timeline” of development, straying away from age-specific points, but rather non-linear stages, that can occur at any point in one’s life. Again, queer eldership is not necessarily about age, but rather wisdom and connection.

The role of a queer-affirming therapist in growing eldership

One of the major benefits of therapy is the ability to explore anything, without judgment, and have another human to witness and hold you through the exploration. Sometimes, therapy is the only space where people feel comfortable naming queer identities at all. A queer-affirming therapist directly supports one’s identity and confidence in claiming it, growing queer eldership by witnessing a client’s story. The idea of a “social transition” or “coming-out” can be jarring and scary for people exploring their identities, potentially not feeling ready for the whole world to perceive them in this light. Queer-affirming therapy can provide that space to explore, without the pressure of needing to immediately “claim” an identity.

Throughout my work with the queer community, I have witnessed so many individuals struggling as they explore their identity, feeling a pressure to “come-out”, and feeling additional pressure to do so with the “correct” identity. But as humans grow and evolve, identities grow and evolve as well. Therapy can remove a lot of this pressure, and remind you that you don’t have to hold this alone. Being in a space with just one other human being to witness your identity, is meaningful queer visibility. This is what contributes to growing eldership in the queer community. Witnesses to our stories, exchanged wisdom amongst those with shared identities, and authenticity with ourselves in at least one space… including the unglamorous, messy parts.

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