Chapter Three: Internal and External Ageing LGBTQ+ Lives

In the preceding chapters, the LGBTQ+ history of the UK from the years following the Second World War was examined with reference to the invisibility and visibility of sexual and gender minority populations. The intention of exploring LGBTQ+ history was to identify the population-specific social determinants (Dahlgren and Whitehead, 1991) of current ageing LGBTQ+ populations over the life course, so that the relationships between these determinants and health outcomes could be ascertained and examined.

Comprehending the nexus between queer bodies and heteronormative environments (Ahmed, 2006) is crucial to the understanding of how ageing LGBTQ+ populations navigate society, and of how society has influenced their lives and health outcomes in turn. From this point, it is possible to explore the internal and external mechanisms that ageing LGBTQ+ populations employ to guide themselves through living in a society which is not wholly conducive to their well-being. As previously discussed in the preceding two chapters, sexual and gender minority populations have learned how to conceal themselves in successive environments and social occasions throughout their lives – home, school, work, and so on – creating an adverse mental pressure on a longitudinal basis.