I’ve met a myriad of challenges on this journey. None important enough to discuss. My greatest success is not being closeted, followed by the friendships and relationships I have built with people from across the globe, across all classes of the social spectrum, from across all races, religions and genders, from across all sexual orientations. With an exception of two stray individuals who are no longer a part of my life, there is not one person that I ever called friend or family that deserted me when I came out.

(My coming out) story is a bit of a legend among my loved ones. I had told two or three very close friends I was gay but when I was 17 mother and I had a ridiculous fight and she threw me out. As it turns out, when she was tossing my shit out the day of my forceful eviction, she found my stash of Gay Times, lube, condoms and some articles I had been writing on being a gay teen in Nairobi. Two weeks later I was summoned before her terrifying presence. She confronted me and asked if I was gay so I came out with it. In the two weeks that I was away, my ninja mum had gathered so much intelligence about where I hang out, with whom etcetera. I have never known how. Coming out was the best thing I have ever done. I become a man and I became independent and more confident than I ever was. Mum and I are now super buddies. She doesn’t directly approach the subject because it is not her thing really but I make sure she is well aware even when she slips and mentions girlfriends to me that I am her beloved GAY son.

Well (the gay community in Nairobi) is gloriously gay, I’ll tell you that much. We have a whole bunch of cross-dressing gays, we have butch gays, professional gays, rural gays, expatriate gays, professional gays, blackmailing gays, thieving gays….the whole ten yards. It is growing rapidly and it is vibrant and getting bolder. I much prefer to stay away from all of it though. Quite a lot of man stealing, backstabbing, hearsay, character assassination and mudslinging. It’s like an animal pen.

I really try to focus on not complicating myself, so that I have a more clear since of who I am at all times.
So I guess, being gay means being completely honest with myself.

The only challenge I can say I have encountered was my struggle with balancing religion and homosexuality. I used to lay in my bed as a child at night, every night praying to be “straight”. I just wanted to be normal; accepted both in society’s eyes and God’s. However, age taught me that I could be both gay and accepted and loved by my maker. I learned to keep my faith in God, while remaining the way He created me. His love for everyone, homosexuals included gives me a never ending peace.

There is a line from the Tony Award winning musical “RENT” that always came to mind while struggling with acceptance.

“To sodomy. It’s between God and me.” -Jonathan Larson

Being gay is mine and God’s business. It took me a while to not let other people make it their own.

Unlike most gay men, I don’t really have a coming out story. I am very fortunate to have a very “out and proud” uncle. My dad’s brother, cleared a nice big path for me to act and be who I was every step of my journey to adulthood. Not once was I ever ridiculed in my own house for playing with Barbie or dressing up and pretending to be Dorothy from “The Wizard Of OZ.”

After meeting and getting serious with the first guy I ever dated, I wanted to introduce my family to him. So to bring it up, I just started using masculine pronouns in conversation with them. “Mom, I’ve been dating someone, and HE is so amazing. You’re gonna love him!!” And, she did. She still does.

I had it easy. Thank you Uncle Jim.

Apart from 3 or 4 guys on Grindr, there is no gay community in Batesville, MS that I am aware of.

This would be my advice to my younger self:

Challenge or success of being gay? I think we only have challenge being gay! All of the people around us think about our sexuallity or our homosexuality, and rarely we hear good things from them. All the time we have to prove we are not pathetic or promiscuous.

“Coming out” was not very easy. Even hard! I think it was a process I took some time to complete. It was not very easy to accept myself but keep secrets is very exhausting. The first step of my “coming out” was accept that I am gay, then was easier to tell my sons and my family.

I keep having a challenge, cause my family “don’t know” about my sexuality, or they pretend to… but it’s ok, because we live too far. I’m being successful about my friends, I’ve never had any problem with then about this. They are my family in Rio.

The gay community in Rio is really bad… we have always the same things happening, same parties, same places, same people…. same blah blah blah. I love the gay community at São Paulo, there’s a lot of differences from here!

(With regards to coming out) I’m still in the closet…to my family! hahahhaha But in Rio, everybody knows, and it happened in the most normal way:
– Hi Carol, I’m gay.
– Ok. lets go drink!