For many lesbian, gay bisexual or transgender (LGBTQ) older adults the thought of moving into a long-term care facility means denying your identity and going right back into the closet. One person working to change that is Cliff Alburger, the first LGBTQ Chaplain Resident at Hebrew Senior Life (HSL), which provides daily care for 3,000 elders across nine campuses in the greater Boston area. Cliff tells us about his groundbreaking work at HSL.
For many lesbian, gay bisexual or transgender (LGBTQ) older adults the thought of moving into a long-term care facility means denying your identity and going right back into the closet. One person working to change that is Cliff Alburger, the first LGBTQ Chaplain Resident at Hebrew Senior Life (HSL), which provides daily care for 3,000 elders across nine campuses in the greater Boston area. On the show Cliff talks about how he and his team carry out their mission of creating a welcoming environment to ensure LGBTQ residents are able to live out their golden years on their own terms. He talks about training staff who genuinely want to know how to respectfully interact with LGBTQ elders, and about the surprising conversations he’s had with folks in their 80s and 90s in HSL’s pre-dominantly straight population. Cliff also talks about some of HSL’s senior initiatives, and he provides tips on what LGBT elders and their family members should look for when researching long-term care facilities. Cliff Alburger has a Master of Divinity degree from Harvard Divinity School.
Learn more about HSL’s LGBTQ Seniors Initiative: https://bit.ly/2y1Zc5s
HSL Blog on the Spiritual Care of LGBT Elders: https://bit.ly/2IEu5Be
Music: “I Can See Daylight Again” by Dlay | CC BY NC ND | Free Music Archive