For older and old LGBT+ people, the things they’ve experienced over the decades might look really different to your own life. After all, many of them will have lived in a time when it was illegal or dangerous to live authentically as themselves.

Which means that if you're a service provider, they might not interact with you or your service in the same way your other clients do, or they might need different support than you usually offer.

So to help you understand where the people you interact with now are coming from, we’ve produced this video series - mirrored in podcasts, Hearts & Histories.

Over the next five episodes, we'll be speaking to six incredible older and old LGBT+ people who currently live in Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin.

They’ll be openly sharing their own personal stories; reflecting on how those experiences have made them the person they are today; and considering how that might alter how they interact with the world.

Our hope is that by listening to this, you’ll be able to better understand the older and old LGBT+ people you interact with as part of your work.

If you'd prefer to watch the episodes rather than listen, you can do that on our EMBRACE Inclusion YouTube channel.

We hope you find these conversations insightful and engaging, and we’d encourage you to share them with other service providers you think would benefit from understanding how the lives of older and old LGBT+ people might look different from our own.