Straight Talk: My Gay Sister Won't Take My Advice on Her Cancer Treatment
Q: My lesbian sister is fighting breast cancer and trying to decide what kind of treatments are right for her. I feel very cut off from this process because she takes her longtime girlfriend's advice and opinions more seriously than mine. I'm her older brother and used to being leaned on. Don't I have the right to ask my sister to listen to me instead?
A: It sounds like you're feeling left out at an important time in your sister's life. But if your sister has been with her girlfriend for a long time, she may consider her a full-on partner or spouse, so it's probably a good idea if you try and think of her that way as well.
Even our federal government is beginning to catch up in the area of respecting LGBT partnerships on medical matters: In April, President Obama signed an executive order requiring hospitals to give gay partners hospital visitation rights, a pretty big step forward for a federal government that is nonetheless still behind on recognizing many other aspects of gay relationships.
Among the things you can do to help your sister is making an effort to support her relationship and their decisions, especially if they're getting flack from other family members. I also suggest doing your best to focus on your sister's immediate problem-her health condition-instead of on the details of her girlfriend's influence.
Of course, if you feel strongly that the girlfriend is influencing your sister to make bad decisions, you're completely within your rights to bring that up privately with your sister. As her sibling, watching her back is pretty much your job after all.
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Steven Petrow is a regular contributor to Shine and to the Huffington Post and the author of "The Essential Book of Gay Manners & Etiquette." He can be found on the web at www.gayandlesbianmanners.com. If you have a question for him, please send it to queeries@live.com.
