Pride month is about celebrating the LGBTQ community and bringing light to the issues the community still faces, ranging from homophobia and transphobia to economic insecurity to civil rights and liberties. Today, we’re highlighting another set of issues: something that members of the B in LGBTQ struggle with: biphobia, or bi-antagonism, and bi-erasure. Many people in the bi-plus community – which includes bisexual, pansexual, omnisexual folks, among others – feel invisible, invalidated, and dismissed by members in and outside of the LGBTQ community. Pressured to “choose a side” –  in other words, to identify as straight or gay–many bi-plus people find themselves in limbo when it comes to finding acceptance and understanding, and as a consequence, can struggle with adverse physical and mental health issues. In fact, according to the Bisexual Resource Center, bi-plus people face even higher rates of depression and anxiety than lesbians and gay men.

For more on this we speak with Belle Haggett Silverman, President of the Board of Directors of the Bisexual Resource Center.