Wow, me too, super intellectual outsider parents who got divorced - my mother was like a lesbian without actually being one. Even though I grew up mostly in NY, we didn’t fit in... later I had a gay male friend (a widower, who became gay after his wife’s death) who was raising a daughter. They had all the money in the world, but it was rough going for her. People don’t know what the gay lifestyle is like - I’ve seen it from the inside - a level of promiscuity that cannot be imagined.
**************************
I did not grow up in a gay or bi household, but I am the product of two (hetero) artistic, atheistic intellectuals who did not relate well to outsiders....
Against my better judgement, I let my naïve mother compel me to go to art college in the 60s, where most of my associates were either gay or plain crazy, and 90% were liberals. I learned things about the lives of gays and lesbians I'm still heartsick about.
So when I say homosexuality is a disorder, I'm not just spouting bigotry. I'm saying it with all compassion for the wounded souls I met and befriended and who confided their traumas to me -- many of whom have been in early graves for twenty years or more by now.