Our winning wedding couple
by Rev. Kamrin Carver
As a minister, I am frequently gifting couples with my services when they cannot afford officiator costs within their meager budgets. I envy these unions and find it ironic that I am in the position I am, having yet to go through this life-changing ritual myself.
Seven years ago I met a man who would change my life forever. Had I known then what I know now, I would have fallen to my knees and bathed Manuel’s feet in my tears. This single individual has done more to transform my world than any other person or event. He has taken me from a self-loathing train wreck to an empowered success with nothing more than his unconditional love. The man I dedicated my life to all those years ago is still the one I love, cherish and honor above all else. He has made my every dream into a reality and has blessed me in ways that will live on forever.
Throughout our journey together we have been called to face many challenges and hardships that would have instantly destroyed the average couple. Countless times along the way I have wondered what kept him around when most people would have immediately fled at the first sign of struggle and sacrifice. We’ve somehow been able to successfully maneuver through immigration, adoption, custody, and financial and relationship issues with strength, courage and determination. Each and every time we’ve come out on top. Regardless of the seeming impossibility of the hurdle before us, we have pulled together and created a stream of miracles in our wake.
Had we been a heterosexual couple, these issues would have been accommodated for and supported by local and federal legislation which would have aided us in our various processes. As it was, we actually had laws and propositions preventing us from maneuvering through the gauntlet with any semblance of ease or grace. It was an uphill battle from the beginning.
Getting my partner his U.S. citizenship took years of unnecessary struggle to see it through to completion. We were forced to dismantle our entire lives in an effort to grow and expand our family through adoption, and then we were openly judged and condemned by the legal system as unfit and inappropriate parents within a custody dispute simply for being together.
We are now on the other side of a three-year custody case for my biological son; Manuel is officially a U.S. citizen; we all legally have the same last name; we’ve adopted two beautiful children and our financial lives are back in the black. We are moving into this new year under the rainbow of hope, peace and endless possibility. May you take all of this into consideration when you decide to remove the last and final barrier on our way to becoming a family — sealed under the sacred umbrella of matrimony and thus turning our children’s Daddy and Papi from ‘partners’ into ‘husbands.’