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Sexual and gender minority youth (SGMY) experience higher rates of various harms than their cisgender and heterosexual peers. Foster care system involvement elevates these rates of harm, destabilizes family structures, and disrupts the relational support and continuity critical to SGMY wellbeing. In the face of familial rejection, neglect, and abuse related to their sexual orientation, gender identity, and expression (SOGIE) identities, SGMY demonstrate strength and resilience by actively cultivating alternative support sources. Aligned with research to center youth agency and voice, this qualitative analysis investigates how SGMY describe affirming supports across a wide range of actors, including biological kin, fictive kin, romantic relationships, and system workers.
METHODS
Data are from an NIH-funded pilot study of social support and mental health among current and former foster youth residing in Cuyahoga County, OH, who self-identified as SGM (N=35). Youth were recruited via DCFS caseworkers and supervisors, and community-based organizations between October 2018 and February 2020. Sample mean-age was 19 years; 57% identified as Black; 17% Multiracial; 14.5% White; and 11.5% other race. 45.7% identified as cisgender; 54.3% transgender. 42.9% identified as lesbian or gay; 37.1% bisexual or pansexual; and 20% heterosexual. Open-ended qualitative questions were analyzed by four researchers with diverse backgrounds using consensus coding. Relational coding was applied to identify co-occurence of themes (support and harm) by relationship type (e.g. biological family, foster parent, system worker).
RESULTS
Silence and rupture and repair were identified as subthemes of support. Silence surrounding SOGIE identities was an avoidance tactic employed by both SGMY and their caregivers – reflecting denial and rejection on the part of caregivers. SGMY named ruptures with family due to rejection and harm in early adolescence, and, in several cases, their ongoing attempts to repair these relationships. Religious rejection was a salient subtheme of harm, in addition to physical, emotional, and sexual neglect/abuse. Caregivers used religion to justify harm, rejection, and shaming, contributing to verbal abuse and humiliation.
SGMY engaged siblings, grandparents, cousins, friends, romantic partners, community figures, and system workers as social supports. Affirming support from these networks – especially grandparents, who had only positive, supportive relationships with the youth – included unconditional acceptance, gender affirmation, and advice on aspects of SOGIE culture.
CONCLUSION/IMPLICATIONS
The current political climate significantly hinders the ability of child welfare systems to enact SOGIE-affirming policies and practices. Gains made in the past ten years – safe identification, matching SGM youth with affirming foster homes, and tailored interventions to build stronger, more affirming relationships between youth and their parents/caregivers – have either been disrupted or entirely erased. The role of non-systems support for SGM youth in systems is even more pronounced. Youth need tailored therapeutic interventions to assist in navigating repair in familial relationships, especially around SOGIE identities. Grandparents, in particular, were widely supportive of their grandchildren’s SOGIE identities, and may be an underutilized resource. Community-based supports, including peer mentoring or peer navigator services may be especially helpful in building the relational capital of SGMY in foster care.