How a long distance relationship doomed me

Interview by Ndanji

I’m only 27 years old and coming from a Christian family of six, I’m gay and I realized this when I was 14 years, I went out with a missionary catholic priest that came to Nigeria years ago and he was the only person I ever had intimacy with.

It was then that he had to go back to England and I had to move on, but ask did I have luck to deserve the guy to go on loving me or it was just a punishment that I was gay? I still ask myself this all the time because I really want to get an answer out of it before I die.

At the age of 19 I was invited to London to visit him and I was excited in my whole life, not that I was thinking of migrating no but just the whole thing of having been seeing him for a while and still wanted me to visit him and continue our relationship that was a blessing for me and to just to get out there and have a different king of life and environment for 3 months it was a big challenge.

My invitation to London did not come as a surprise to me, but it was for my family here in Nigeria and for my boyfriend out in the uk but this was to be kept discreet, I was warned about this from his side all because of his post in the church. I did not like the idea but I had to go along with if because I was also trying to respect him, its not very usual that us Africans are easily invited out there just to go and feed the pigeons in Trafalgar square although the mayor of London has burned it, its either you have gone for school and work part time or you have relatives that live out there.

When I got to London my boyfriend had arranged for me a place to stay this was at the B&B I don’t know how much he paid but he somehow managed to pay for the three months I was there. He always came to see me and took me out for sight seeing showing me London, if at all me bumped into his friends or relatives he would say I was a brother from church soon becoming a priest too, I know this was not good but did it save me or it proved shame for me?

Looking at out relationship while I was there it was growing but obviously not going anywhere with all the lies it had in it, we had good time and I mean from going around seeing London together and in bed too, but what I did not know was that the priest was HIV positive and I was getting it all from him, I did not even realize that he was on medication because he never took it in my presence, and yes when someone has loved you so much and you know that you love him there is less reason to think of bad like Hiv for instance.

It was time for me to go back to my country and with all the nice time and good presents he got for me little did I know that’s I was going to be regretting the whole time I spent in England. It was after two month when I returned home and I started feeling so sick and tired, my friends were saying its probably the change of climate it would soon go and I would be ok but that never went away, then took myself to see the doctor and they run a couple of tests but there was not much they could find.

Then the doctor suggested if I could take an HIV test, I must say that I was a bit scared it being the first time and still had hope of knowing that I would never test positive, shockingly the results came positive, I was confused I could not even look at the doctor because I was embarrassed, I was at one point asked if I was married I said no, did I have more than one sleeping partner I said no, so all this came back as false, how was I going to start asking my boyfriend in UK about it and knowing back home that these people in the church are so holly and would have nothing to do with diseases like these.

Eventually I had to start writing a letter to my boyfriend about what I had discovered from my side, it was hard for me in a way that I did not even know how he would well I went ahead and wrote him the letter and he had no choice but to read and for the first time I thought he would be that kind to me he was not but instead he lashed out on me and said I was unfaithful to him, that really disturbed me so much that I could not even ask him to go for his test. It took him three months to come back to me and tell me that he tested positive too.

During that period England had passed a law of not all Nigerians would be allowed to come into London that easy its either one had to have a serious reason to come in or you were a confirmed student, and my boyfriend clearly said it that if I could have a chance of going back there then I would be able to be on medication but then he would still not declare me as his partner because of obvious reason that are there. So here I am now thinking life is all about me and having a boyfriend in my mind but that has just come to pass because it would never happen out here.

I have a lonely life here in Nigeria and its so hard for me to come to terms that my parents are now thinking they should find me someone to marry but how should I go about that? If at all they realize that I’m HIV, what would come into their mind first? Do I have a girlfriend out there that I have not told them about? If not then who would that person be? They will by all means want to know about that person and if they also realize that I’m infected they would like to know who?

I suppose this is when I get to say about my HIV status and if anything I mentioned about my sexuality that would be the end of me, its not that I’m trying to find a place to run to no. I just don’t know how to go about these issues I know it was a huge mistake but how long will I dwell on that and how will it help me? Out here in Nigeria it not easy to come out, yes there are a lot of cases out here that we have head relating to homosexuality, people can easily talk about it, but you ask yourself is it good that they talk about?

Its now 13 months and my ex boyfriend has come to confess it to me that he had HIV, he actually got it from my country, even if I would start going on to sue him it would do me nothing in the end my family will know about my sexuality and then that will not be worth suing him, so all I can say is that I can never change what has happened to me and if anything I’m having a worse time out here for we all know that antiretroviral are not cheap in Africa.

My advise to all young gay people out there is that please try not to be so excited about who you meet it might be my situation and if at all its like mine you would suffer, I still have not come to terms with how I live out here I just wait to the day that I will die and that will all that I will ever look forward to.

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