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Hey, guys, I'm Kelvin. And I'm a sophomore at the University of South Florida, and I'm
currently studying biomedical sciences right now. And I'm also a student of the Student
Support Services Program. I'm here to share with you my story.
Throughout my life I have never had a positive homosexual male role model to tell me that
everything was going to be okay, to believe in me and believe that I was stronger than
I knew. And I remember dreading waking up every morning because I was an abomination,
nature's abomination, or I would go to hell anyways so what's the purpose of carrying
on. I was constantly surrounded in negative comments,
and I would constantly be harassed in elementary school and middle school and high school.
I was that kid that sat in the bathroom stall to eat their lunch. And my parents, my peers,
my family, people that were close to me expected for me to be straight and heterosexual. And
that's something, at the end of the day, I couldn't be no matter how much I hated being
gay and no matter how much harm I put myself through. Just to be heterosexual, I wanted
it so bad. I remember wishing every Christmas that, you
know, it would get better. And I always felt like I failed to give everyone what they wanted,
so I always felt like a failure. At the end of the day, I just didn't value myself. I
hated who I was. And just looking at everyone's face, I could tell they were disappointed.
I could tell they were ashamed to even be associated with me, to be called one of their
own. And coming to college I thought, you know, with the diverse campus things would
get better and people would be more mature and much more tolerant. However, people
unfortunately, that's not how it goes. People discriminate still. And I had to move around
seven different times in my freshman year and in one month. And out of that one month
I was homeless for a week. And to make things worse, I had financial
aid problems. My parents were relatively poor, so they couldn't put me through college. So
I depended on financial aid. However, financial aid lost some of my documents, so I had to
end up dishing money out of my own pockets to pay them back. And to top it off, throughout
my entire life I've been in and out of the hospitals, having to do surgeries or having
to undergo surgeries or running tests because I was a very sick child. And it happens that
that semester my eardrum just ruptured again. And I think that was my breaking point. I
went on a path of self destruction, and I set myself up for failure. So I viewed myself
as a failure, so I ended up failing my entire freshman year. And I think eventually we all
have that breaking point and that rock bottom. And I understand that I understand loneliness.
It's hard. It's the worst feeling ever. And it's it feels like it's never going to go
away and it's going to be there with you. But at the time when you hit rock bottom,
that's when you either decide to climb out of it or lay there and do nothing about it.
And the moment when I decided to climb out of it, I was stronger than I knew. And I reached
out to other people. I reached out to my counselor for help. Because she provided me with so
many of the resources. And despite the family troubles I've had,
my sisters and my family came around to support me, and I've had friends that were throughout
the experience I've met friends that put a shelter over my head and fed me and provided
me money and just kept me going. And it's these motivational people that keep me going.
And I honestly would say that the best advice I could give you is to believe in yourself,
to surround yourself with positive people, because positive people make you want to be
a positive person. And that moment when you start believing in yourself is the moment
when you get the passion to keep carrying on. You have you make yourself your own
purpose, and you you have a defined self concept of yourself.
And I mean, there is this quote from Mark Twain that says Stay away from people who
belittle your ambitions. Small people tend to do that. The really great, however, can
make you feel like you, too, can become great. And I might have messed that up a little,
but yeah. Honestly, I honestly believe that things will get better. And I believe that
you're stronger than you know. And so don't give up. Don't ever give up. Be persistent.
And believe in yourself. Because at the end of the day, you're the only person in your
way of being the better you. Thank you.