The Holiday Gift 2015

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

For the last twenty-four holiday seasons, John has searched for arrangements of O Holy Night which he believes will suit my musical tastes.  The hymn is one of our favorite songs, even though it is a traditional Christmas composition. The words share messages of hope, love, and peace. Those concepts can be understood by anyone regardless of their religious beliefs, or absence thereof.

In December, 1991, John and I shared our first Christmas together.  He gave me a cassette tape with a melody of holiday songs.  O Holy Night was among the tracks.  I still have that treasured gift.  Another is my partner’s words, two decades old, which live in my heart.

“Andrew, you’re my heart, my home, my Thanksgiving, and my Christmas.  When I was ranting at the table in the student union, asking you all those questions trying to get you to smile,  I remember the first question that you finally answered was telling me that one of your favorite holiday songs was O Holy Night.”

“The music is nice…but your love is the best holiday gift of all,” I replied.

John gave a young suicidal man hope, love, and peace.  That story can be read at:  The Holiday Gift.  Now, at forty-two John’s love is still the best holiday gift of all.

This year, John shared Il Divo’s rendition of O Holy Night. 

John and I would like to wish all of you Happy Holidays.  May you feel hope, love, and peace not only now, but throughout the new year.

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period.

       

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

A Thanksgiving Season of Love 2015

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

There have been a great deal of “thankful” posts circulating social media this last month.  From day-by-day acknowledgements of thanks, to overall feelings of joy and happiness in the lives of others.  Each holiday season serves to remind me of what I’m thankful for.

This year marks the twenty-fourth Thanksgiving with the man I love. John told me in November of 1991, he was thankful for my ability to see into his heart.  I in turn replied, “you saved mine.”  I was transformed from a suicidal transgender man, to one who wanted to live, because of John’s love.

Together we have a family—two teenagers we love dearly, my mother who came to live with us after my father passed away in late 2012, and three cats with their own distinct personalities.  John and I have much to be thankful for.

We’re also thankful for our extended family, friends, and my readers who have offered their support.  

The most important gifts in life cannot be materialized or purchased, they must be experienced with the heart.  Love is an incredible emotion, defined within many facets.  During this holiday season,  I’m most thankful for knowing love.  

As families and friends come together today, I would hope they remember what is really important. Love one another.  A Thanksgiving season of love is the greatest gift of all.  

I live a minimalist lifestyle.  Simplicity is the key to life.  When I ask myself  what is important? Love, peace, gratitude, and harmony are ideals which come to mind.  We’re all one.  

John and I would like to wish everyone  a Happy Thanksgiving!  

        

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

Father’s Day Reflections 2015

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

My Children and I

My children are the best part of me—my greatest accomplishment.  Jonah and Deven are the purest and sweetest evidence of the love I share with John. The father in me wishes to stop time.  Children grow up too fast.  Jonah graduated high school this year.  He turns eighteen in August.  Deven will begin the tenth grade, and turns fifteen. However, the man I am knows they have to spread their wings.  As they gain their own individuality, I’m comforted in part of me will live on.

This morning, Jonah and Deven greeted me with Father’s Day wishes.  I hugged and thanked both my children.   Moments like these remind me the most important things in life are love and the relationships we have with family and friends.  Wealth cannot be measured in materialism.  If you have love and friendship, then you are rich indeed.   

With each Father’s Day, I’m humbled to have been given a chance to be Jonah and Deven’s father.  They have brought great joy to the lives of both John and I.  I’m proud to call them my children.  

John and I would like to wish all the fathers out there a Happy Father’s Day!

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period.

           

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

The Holiday Gift 2014

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

For the last twenty-three holiday seasons, John has searched for arrangements of O Holy Night which he believes will suit my musical tastes.  The hymn is one of my favorite songs, even though it is a traditional Christmas composition. The words share messages of hope, love, and peace.  Those concepts can be understood by anyone regardless of their religious beliefs, or absence thereof.

In December, 1991, John and I shared our first Christmas together.  He gave me a cassette tape with a melody of holiday songs.  O Holy Night was among the tracks.  I still have that treasured gift.  Another is my partner’s words, two decades old, which live in my heart.

“Andrew, you’re my heart, my home, my Thanksgiving, and my Christmas.  When I was ranting at the table in the student union, asking you all those questions trying to get you to smile,  I remember the first question that you finally answered was telling me that one of your favorite holiday songs was O Holy Night.”

“The music is nice…but your love is the best holiday gift of all,” I replied.

John gave a young suicidal man hope, love, and peace.  That story can be read at:  The Holiday Gift.  Now, at forty-one John’s love is still the best holiday gift of all.

This year, John shared Home Free’s rendition of O Holy Night.  The group is a country a cappella band, and the Season 4 winners of NBC’s The Sing-Off.

 

John and I would like to wish all of you Happy Holidays.  May you feel hope, love, and peace not only now, but throughout the new year.

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period.

                    

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

A Thanksgiving Season of Love 2014

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience.

Since turning forty in 2013 , I’ve have adopted the minimalist lifestyle.  Simplicity is the key to life.  What the heart experiences trumps materialism. I ask myself  what is important? Love, peace, gratitude, and harmony are ideals which come to mind.  We are all one.  

In addition to being a ManLove erotic romance author, I am a LGBTQ rights activist, humanitarian, and freelance journalist/photographer.   I support a variety of social and humanitarian programs.  Often, I am asked my political and moral viewpoints.  I am not affiliated with any political party.  My humanity supports the disabled,  homeless, incarcerated, poor, veterans, and women and children.  

All holidays, including Thanksgiving, have been commercialized.  A trip to any retail establishment lures customers with items believed to provide happy holidays. Don’t get me wrong, I do purchase holiday items.  My family will have a Thanksgiving dinner, but many will not.  The Huffington Post published an article, October 23rd, on the rise of  poverty in America.  No one is immune. With one in seven hungry, it becomes a Thanksgiving just to have anything to eat.  

This year marks the twenty-third Thanksgiving with the man I love. We have a family—two teenagers we love dearly.  John and I have much to be thankful for.  As families and friends come together today, I would hope they remember what is really important.  Love one another.  A Thanksgiving season of love is the greatest gift of all.  

John and I would like to wish everyone  a Happy Thanksgiving!

                       

photo credit: WELS.net via photopin cc

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

Coming Out One Year Later as a Gay Transgender Man

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience.

One year ago today my partner, John, and I came out together.  I made the announcement we were both gay, and I was a transgender man.  As a couple, we shared our now twenty-three year love affair with family, friends, and readers.  In addition, we allowed our private relationship  to become part of our public lives.  For those who have not had the opportunity to read my original coming out story, the post can found  at:  Coming Out as a Gay Transgender Man.

I still believe as I approach forty-one,  we have to be true to ourselves and openly live the life we are given.  As a writer and LGBTQ rights activist, I strive to be open and honest with my friends and readers across social media.  I am a direct and straight forward man who believes LGBTQ topics should be openly discussed.  Throughout this year, the words of Kurt Cobain still have had special meaning to me:  “I would rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not.”

For  over two decades, my partner and I lived in fear.  We both had circumstances where coming out was impossible.  The fact we lived in a conservative part of the South contributed to our decision to remain in the closet.  In addition, we had a young family  which have always come first. John and I love our son and daughter dearly.  They are our biological children, conceived through artificial insemination, and I gave birth to them by C-section.  

Over the past twelve months, John and I have experienced many changes as a couple.  The first, and most important, was my legal name change to Andrew Kyle Jericho.  I will never forget my partner’s response, on September 5th, after I got off the phone with the circuit clerk’s office.  He put his arms around me and wept.  I am a firm believer that men can cry. While I don’t shed tears very often, I had a few that afternoon. After forty years, I can finally be recognized everywhere by a name that represents my gender identity. Others, outside of those who already called me Andrew, have to now by law. Also, whenever John and I are together in public, we are Andrew and John Jericho.

The name change also meant I was able to update my driver’s license at the DMV.  In Arkansas, residents can choose their gender without a legal gender change.  So, now I have a M on my license.   Elsewhere within the state, and on a federal level, that is not the case.  I quickly found out Social Security would update my name, but in order to change my gender marker I was handed a piece of paper with several requirements.  SSA requires either a passport with the new sex, amended birth certificate with the new gender, court-ordered gender change, or a letter from a doctor stating he believes the person in question is a transgender individual. Right now the most important thing is my name has been changed, and my gender marker is updated on my driver’s license. Soon, I will address changing my gender marker’s elsewhere.

The second change occurred in February.  I had a hysterectomy.  The  surgery was not only medically necessary, but  a procedure I needed to have done in order to feel more comfortable in my own skin. In addition, my reproductive history failed itself from the beginning.  The two children John and I created are true miracles.  I still firmly believe everyone transitions in their own way, and at their own time.  Gender and sexual orientation are not defined by surgeries and / or hormones, or the lack thereof.  Also, it has been almost eight months since the surgery, and there has not been a day gone by where I have not been thankful I made the decision to have it done.  The only good thing the deformed, misplaced organ ever gave me was my children.  The rest of it’s existence in a body it did not belong in was filled with pain.   

The final change is I have been consulting with a plastic surgeon regarding top surgery.  The most recent visit was on September 9th.  We are on the same page in our definitions of “flat.”  He understands I desire a masculine chest.  While he is qualified to perform the procedure, he has not done any top surgeries on transgender men.  However, he believes he can do the surgery, and is going to consult with his colleagues on the matter.  I have another appointment on December 16th to hear his final thoughts.  If everything goes as planned, he would like me to have the surgery at the end of January, instead of early to mid-February.  My insurance prior authorization expires at the end of February, and he feels I need to have the procedure complete and on the road to recovery before that time.  

John and I are excited to live the second half of our lives openly as a gay couple. We are also thankful for the opportunity to share our story.  In addition, we hope our message will help others who might find themselves in similar situations.  I have always wanted to make a difference in the lives of others.  If I have touched the life of just one person, then my efforts have been worthwhile.  I can say from experience it does get better.

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails.  Remember Love is Love…Period.

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at: authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

Life With Baby Doll: Men in Love

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

Due to the fact that this week's Life With Baby Doll post contains adult language and themes, I am only posting a summary on this blog.  The full segment can be viewed in it's entirety on my Website at the following link: Men in Love.  

With each day that passes, I feel small pieces of intimacy attaching themselves to my relationship with John.  Touch is an important part of that history.  Two men, connecting their souls defines ManLove.  

The Life With Baby Doll series is  free weekly M/M romance read on my Website that shares my relationship with John Jericho.  

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period. 

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-BookStrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at:  authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

Life With Baby Doll: The ManLove Connection

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience. 

Due to the fact that this week's Life With Baby Doll post contains adult language and themes, I am only posting a summary on this blog.  The full segment can be viewed in it's entirety on my Website at the following link: The ManLove Connection.  

In the ManLove connection that I share with my partner, John, I have learned it is more than just the physical joining of bodies, but the emotional union of men sharing their love. 

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period. 

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-Bookstrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at:  authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.

Life With Baby Doll: My Taste of Heaven

WARNING:  The links contained within this post will take you to sites with content for mature readers only.  However, this post is suitable for a PG audience.

On March 25th, I shared on my Facebook Timeline that John was scheduled for an appointment with a rheumatologist. During the visit, he had a physical evaluation, blood work, and X-rays. Due to the fact that he has a non-specific autoimmune disorder and psoriasis, his GP suspected psoriatic arthritis last fall, prompting the visit to the specialist.

While the rheumatologist suspects that he has psoriatic arthritis as well, there is no definitive test for it. X-rays will only show damage to his joints. She believes that he will benefit from a low dose of  Methotrexate (chemo-med) in combination with a prescription dose of folic acid. Neither John, nor I, are comfortable with the drug, as we don’t believe the benefits outweigh the risks.

His blood work and X-Rays revealed everything that we’ve already known about his chronic conditions.  After viewing the test results, the doctor formally prescribed the Methotrexate and Folic Acid combination this past week. I have not picked the prescriptions up from the pharmacy, as they were called in by her nurse.

There is an “alternative medicine” that has worked in the past, 100 percent, in clearing John’s psoriasis and helping with his pain. However, certain doctors that he now sees for other conditions require urine tests. Arkansas is not a liberal state, such as Washington and Colorado, on such matters. John and I are both supporters of Medical Marijuana.

On the same day that we received the call concerning the new medications, the rheumatologist also wants to schedule John for an MRI.  Baby Doll hates that test, as he does not like to be in small spaces and lying flat on his back for long periods of time is uncomfortable.  Luckily, Hot Springs has an open facility.

I wrote about one of John’s flares in an April 6th, Life With Baby Doll post. Since them, similar episodes have been occurring, with the most recent lingering.  He goes through periods of spikes and lulls, as expected with the nature of the conditions. His next appointment with the rheumatologist is April 28th.  At that time, we will return to discuss more options.

Yesterday, I had returned home from errands to find John sitting on our bed.  His expression broke my heart.  As a man who is used to fixing what is broken, I have never come to terms with the fact that I cannot fix Baby Doll’s body, not that I haven’t and continue to try.  I don’t give up easily and not without a fight.  So I pulled him close, as I knew his guard would dissolve in my arms.

“I’m sorry, Andrew.”

“You’re got nothing to be sorry for, Baby Doll. I promise we’ll get through this together.  I’m reading new articles everyday about what’s going on in your body.  There is something out there to help you, and I will find it.”

“I’m tired of the flares…of never knowing when.  I couldn’t even go with you today.”

“Your spirit was with me.  I always feel you beside me when we are not together.”

“I don’t want to drag you down, Casanova.”

“There has never been a moment with you that I have regretted.  Remember what you told me our first Christmas together?  That I was your heart and home.  John, you’re mine.  I would also walk through any circumstance with you, just so I could prove that I could pull us out on the other side.”  

“Are you going to kiss me, because it looks like you are?” John asked in a flamboyant tone.

“And you shouldn’t ask your top rhetorical questions,” I replied. 

As we continued to sit together on our bed, I gently pulled him onto my lap. I placed one hand around his body, as the other cradled the back of his head.  I made sure that my kiss was tender, passionate, and laced with the knowledge that I am a man who keeps his word.

Later that night, after the house was quiet, I pulled Baby Doll into my arms again.  This time we were lying in our bed.  Tangling our legs, I held my partner close.

Often before falling asleep, we like to talk or read together. I am a romantic man who has a love of literature and poetic verse.  There are a few special poems dedicated to memory, just in case opportunities like the one on Saturday night arise.  I have found that handsome twinks, like the one that was lying in my arms, can be vulnerable to romantic words. Shakespeare’s Sonnet XXIX  more than fit the intended meaning of the emotions behind my kiss earlier.  The last two lines are reminders that love's desire always sees the best in everything. Particularly, when John has always been my little taste of Heaven.

“For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
   That then I scorn to change my state with kings.”

~ William Shakespeare

To learn more about John and I visit: Life With Baby Doll.  Due to the increasing popularity of the Life With Baby Doll series, I have created the permanent tab on my Website that contains information concerning the intense and passionate love affair that I share with my partner, John Jericho.

I enjoy hearing from all of my readers, and look forward to your e-mails. Remember Love is Love…Period.

Andrew Jericho is a ManLove erotic romance author for Siren-Bookstrand Publishing  and LGBTQ rights activist based in Hot Springs, AR.  All of his work can be found at:  Andrew Jericho.  For questions or comments please e-mail him at:  authorandrewjericho@gmail.com.