I’m Struggling
Temporarily Not OK
Warning: You don’t normally read that about me.
Like everyone, I have my ups and downs and work hard to keep it to myself — except, I don’t mind people seeing my ups, and work hard to present a positive image of me. Don’t we all?
But sometimes, life just gets too hard and I so wish there was an easier path.
Sure, a lot of my current struggles are of my own making. With some friends, I chose to start a charity in 2020 to support queer refugees in East Africa. I wanted to be able to tell these despised people that someone cared for and valued them.
What a can of worms that has opened.
Every day my inbox has pleas for food, rent, medical care (sometimes urgent), and assistance with processes to achieve asylum.
It does my head in.
My own fault, I know. I could have just walked on by as some famous people were reported to have done in a story in that old black book. I didn’t, because I was aware hate preaching “inspired” by a dark reading of that book called for the abolition of people of difference.
I’m planning to stream a documentary made in 2013 as a discussion piece so that more people can be aware of the evil (I used the word carefully) promulgated by well-meaning but ignorant believers.
You don’t have to look far to find preachers shouting “Kill them”. Preachers? Preachers!
You can watch the documentary on YouTube “God Loves Uganda” or join me when we do it as a group.
God Loves, I like that. If he exists I do believe that he would, and does Love. The opposite is inhuman and definitely not divine. Just watch Putin at work.
I haven’t watched it myself. I have to wait till I’m strong enough mentally, to be honest. The anguish of too many people is breaking me.
Then this morning we hear of the sad deaths of those five people who spent big to travel in that submersible to see the Titanic. (Reported as $250,000 U.S. for each “explorer”). For me, knowing of children in Kakuma Refugee Camp who are forbidden school because they can’t afford schoolbooks, or young men doing sex work on the streets of Nairobi because they have no other way of making money to stay alive. Or Lesbians raped by police or gangs to “cure them”.
Christ, where are you?
The death of those people at the Titanic site is of course very sad. No doubt they were loved and their lives now wasted. But money spent in that way when people are dying for lack of just a morsel of the money they spent? Add to that the millions of dollars to try and save them from their folly.
Makes me sick.
So today I feel lousy, and I am really struggling. The good news is I’m resilient. I’ll get over it. I won’t have to beg for food or lodging, but I am so, so terribly sad and angry.
The injustice of it all.
If you can help us please do. Donation links are in the footnote.
Meanwhile, I’m grateful for those who have so kindly extended their hearts to tell these despised people, they are loved. Thank you. Your life is so precious, you have chosen to Love not Hate.
If my article causes any mental anguish to you please contact LifeLine or other helplines. Information here:
Please support us if you can.
www.patreon.com/nosexplease or Choose Love not Hate — Chuffed Appeal
My blog here, and my podcast @nosexplease on YouTube and giggling on audio apps like iTunes, Audible, Spotify, and others, tell the story of the abuse people have received through the church’s sex shaming that in recent years specialises in LGBTIQ+ people.
This blog and the podcast supports queer refugees in East Africa who need our help simply to survive. Many of them are killed or die from disease or hunger simply because homophobic cultures don’t merit them as human. So sad.
