Bob and Orlando
Bob (U.S.) & Orlando (Guatemala)
This story is located at:
http://www.out4immigration.org/immigration/page.html?=&cid=1198
The travail that Orlando and I had to go through was excruciating because our alternatives to him NOT getting asylum were (1) to fight it, which our lawyer said would end up putting us into bankruptcy and (2) if all else failed for both of us to leave the country and make a life somewhere else.
Orlando and I, at the time, had been together for more than 14 years.
Nevertheless, during those years we felt like fugitives because we never knew when the INS would call us in. When the dreadful letter appeared in the mail we both went into a depression. For Orlando, who is a shy man, the specter of being in front of an INS officer was very scary. Finally, we did appear and we were required to wait two weeks for the decision. Those two weeks were some of the most difficult we have ever endured.
The thought of uprooting ourselves was horrendous. I was angry because I would possibly have to leave my own country.
I felt like a second rate citizen. One of my best friends married a woman from Indonesia and he had no problem bringing her here legally. But for me I was not given the same right as straight Americans.
On our minds was losing the house, possibly all of our money, leaving the country and leaving our family and friends.
I don’t believe that any American should have to go through this!
I don’t think I have given service to the pain we went through; not to speak of the sleepless nights and the money we had spent to simply keep him here.
In the end we won and the nightmare was finally over.
This story is located at: http://www.out4immigration.org/
LGBT IMMIGRATION STORIES 
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