Janet Park wanted to be cremated after her death. All the papers were in order. But the funeral home just assumed that Park's elderly aunt would make the decision about the disposal of her remains — not Ann Caldwell, her partner of 22 years.

Park died of colon cancer in August 2009. As the holidays were approaching, Caldwell joined a grief group offered by the Odyssey Hospice Bereavement Program in Santa Fe.

"It was a kind of uncomfortable, awkward situation," she recalled recently. "Everybody was sharing, and I felt very isolated. I had to explain too much about my background."

No matter how compassionate the other mourners, they are often oblivious to the legal, financial and emotional issues that make the death of a gay or lesbian partner different, and "in the middle of your grief, it's hard to be an educator," said Liz Graham, the group's facilitator.

"All suffering weighs the same, but (in the LGBT community) it has a particular bite," added Rose Gordon, manager of volunteer services for Odyssey Healthcare. For one thing, she said, "Nobody gets to have the title widow or widower; it's sort of an invisible loss."

Caldwell's less-than-happy experience resonated with the Rev. Peggy Patterson, Odyssey's chaplain, leading first to a focus group and then to plans for a new grief support group especially for the LGBT community. The six-week program begins next month at RainbowVision, the gay retirement community, and five of the eight openings have been filled so far.

On the periphery

When Tom Rotella's partner died in California in 1998, his family recognized Rotella as the decision-maker. But after Rotella's employer, the Los Angeles Public Library, announced the death in a newsletter, someone started subscribing to pornographic magazines in Rotella's name, and there was a "mass exodus" of friends, Rotella said. "I was alone." A contingent of colleagues did come to the funeral to support Rotella, he said, but his own parents declined, ostensibly to spare his father from learning that his son was gay. "That killed me," he said.

Lynne Roberts' partner fell seriously ill in 1988 after they had been together about eight years in New York City. The hospital waited for the woman's ex-husband to sign papers allowing treatment, although Roberts was the one who brought her partner to the emergency room. While Roberts had been invited to all the family gatherings, "I was put on the periphery," Roberts said. The family never called her with reports on her partner's condition, and when the woman eventually died (the two were separated at the time) the family didn't call Roberts or invite her to the cremation or burial.

Both Rotella and Roberts tried attending open support groups. But Roberts said, "I was invisible. They didn't understand how this relationship could be compared to what they experienced."

And although he's in a new, long-term relationship, Rotella still grieves his former partner "significantly. I'll hear some song and the grief just comes in a wave," he said.

A whole other layer to grief

From all accounts, people who have lost partners in Santa Fe in recent years report that they're treated well by staff at hospitals and nursing homes, but there are still recurring conflicts with funeral establishments.

Caldwell said caregivers sometimes asked if she was Park's sister. When she acknowledged they were partners, "they'd say, 'Great, how long have you been together?' Everybody here was wonderful." With the exception of the funeral home.

Caldwell never had to invoke things like her medical power of attorney, but savvy LGBT households like Caldwell's are now armed with the legal documents they hope will reduce the conflicts that could arise from the illness and death of a partner. In addition to medical powers of attorney, couples draw up advanced health directives as well as wills and trusts to ensure that property will be inherited by a partner instead of next of kin.

Roberts and her partner of more than 20 years were married in California in 2008, have a domestic partnership agreement in New York City and a civil union from Vermont.

But these aren't guarantees.

Janie Oakes and her partner travel everywhere with a copy of their medical powers of attorney in their suitcases.

"It's always in there," Oakes said. "In Santa Fe, we think of it as a nonissue. There would be no problems if one of us died (here). But if we were traveling, it could be an issue in some other state or country."

Even if you've crossed all the T's and dotted all the I's, however, the death of a partner is still different from the death of a spouse.

Although much of the mainstream culture is accepting that gay and lesbian people have long-term relationships just like married people — and the gay lifestyle is not all about risky sex and one-night stands — there are numerous unique issues LGBT people face beyond the need to legally identify themselves.

The death might not even be acknowledged by acquaintances, particularly if the surviving partner is closeted on the job. For this reason, gay grief is sometimes described as disenfranchised.

Patterson, Odyssey's chaplain, tells the story of a Santa Fe man who held a high-ranking job with a company. On the morning after his partner's death, the man attended a planned business meeting. "If his wife had died, he wouldn't have been expected to come," Patterson said, and if he had, everyone would have expressed condolences. But in this case, "no one mentioned the loss."

Oftentimes, people just don't know what to do. In the heterosexual world, "people have a context for a grieving widow. They put that compassionate container around her. But people don't know what container to put around a LGBT person," Patterson said.

The lack of support also can be related to what many gays and lesbians see as the trivialization of their relationships in the straight world.

Because a partner is in most cases not a legal spouse, the loss is regarded as less profound — like the breakup with a boyfriend or girlfriend. Serious, but not the end of the world.

In reality, however, the relationship might have been even closer in some sense than a heterosexual marriage because, as Patterson pointed out, "You've not only lost your partner, but you've also lost so much of your way of understanding yourself."

And unless your employer extends bereavement leave to same-sex partners as well as to spouses, you might be forced back to work too early.

Among the other issues LGBT people deal with upon the death of a partner is the unplanned outing of the survivor.

Caldwell, a former teacher, said she was not out in the workplace. And Park, a businesswoman and most recently the director of operations at the Legacy Heart Center in Albuquerque, had not been open with most of the people with whom she worked.

But after Park started chemotherapy and returned to her office with Caldwell's help, people "realized she doesn't just have a dog in her life."

Nothing was said, Caldwell noted, but "that all had to be dealt with. People from the office came to the house and realized I lived there. There were people who read her obit and learned I had been her partner."

Caldwell didn't have any arguments with Park's few surviving relatives over property (they had a trust protecting her right to inherit), but that is sometimes a painful issue for LGBT survivors.

"People can get in fusses with families who feel their desire for access to the financial holdings, if there are any, should override the partner's," Patterson said.

So many aspects of bereavement are similar, Graham stressed, "but there's a whole other layer on top in this community. There can be a lot of tension between the family of origin and the partner that hasn't come out until this event."

Patterson, an ordained Episcopal priest, admitted that the church has not helped. Traditionally a place where widows and widowers turn for support after the death of a spouse, the church has often provided gay and lesbian couples "another slap in the face" instead of succor, Patterson said.

Although this does not seem an issue in Santa Fe, health care staff can be insensitive, experts say, by, among other things, limiting the people allowed to visit during nonvisiting hours to blood relatives. And funeral homes are known to argue with surviving partners about whether or not they are authorized to sign cremation papers and pick up ashes.

Park appointed Caldwell her agent in control of the disposal of her remains, but "you would never have to have that unless you didn't want your spouse to do it," she pointed out.

Survivor guilt, particularly in cases where both partners were HIV positive, can be an extra burden for the grieving partner. But the flip side also is an issue. People who lose their partners — gay or straight — in their 60s worry about being alone in a two-by-two world. It can be especially scary for survivors in a gay world that "sometimes feels too young."

All these issues — and even deep-seated feelings about your own sexuality, Gordon said — can interrupt or delay the grieving process and perpetuate feelings among LGBT people that their relationships are less valued in the larger society. The new support group, Coming out to Grief, will explore these issues with those who are on a similar journey toward coping with loss.

Contact Anne Constable at 986-3022 or aconstable@sfnewmexican.com.



FREE GRIEF SUPPORT

Odyssey Hospice and RainbowVision are offering a free, six-week grief support group for the LGBT community. The group will meet from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Thursdays beginning Sept. 9 at RainbowVision, 500 Rodeo Road. Space is limited. Call co-facilitators Rose Gordon or Liz Graham at 988-5331 to register.