When I was 18, I told my dermatologist, whom I expected to be sympathetic, that I feared I was lesbian. He practically raped me.

When treated recently for a viral infection, the health care provider based his diagnostic work-up on the fact that I was gay. I was unnecessarily tested for STDs [sexually transmitted diseases] because he assumed all gays are promiscuous—despite the fact that I told him I'd been monogamous for two years.

One psychiatrist led me into trying to convert from gay to straight for 13 years while I stayed closeted, anxious, and depressed.

I saw a male residnt at a North Carolina hospital three years ago. Said I was a lesbian. He couldn't deal with it. Got very embarrassed. Obviously wasn't ready to deal with it.

David H. Jolly, The North Carolina Lesbian and Gay Health Survey: Final Report, June 1985, pp. 32-34