David Akinsanya was tired of the “gay lifestyle” (so stop living it I say, you don’t need “the lifestyle” to be gay – however you choose to live your life is your gay lifestyle), tired of being single (gays aren’t the only ones who are lonely – there are tons of people, of every orientation, who are tired of being single) and wanted “[a] wife, kids, the lot.” But he didn’t “fancy women at all.” He just wanted to be “normal,” he says.

David looked to heterosexuality to fix the way he felt:

In my present way of being, no one relies on me, no one depends on me and I, myself, have no one to rely on. When you have a wife and child, they’re yours and you are theirs.

He continues:

“One of the reasons I want my own family is because I never had one as a child,” he says. “I was born in 1965 when mixed-raced relationships were frowned upon, and my mother, who is white, split from my Nigerian father before my birth.”

David traveled all the way from the UK to Memphis, the location of Love in Action‘s headquarters, for reparative therapy but walked out four days into into the program recalling:

“Even the course organisers, who claim to have been converted, admitted they still struggle with homosexual feelings,” he says. “They seemed to be in some strange no man’s land.”

Back in the UK, David started to investigate if his sexuality could have been determined before he was born:

Akinsanya pursued another line of investigation: that his sexuality was determined before he was born, and that the unusual events of his childhood were incidental. He attended the laboratory of Dr Qazi Rahman at the University of East London, whose work on foetal development and testosterone levels is renowned. Akinsanya underwent a number of tests, including measurement of his response to sudden loud noises and assessment of such spatial skills as his ability to rotate cubes conceptually. Both types of tests differentiate strongly between heterosexual and homosexual subjects. Akinsanya says he came out as “gay, gay, gay!” in every test.

He’s now giving himself a break and waiting for the right person, whether they be male or female, to come along. I think once he realizes that the most important person is him, he’ll run into Mr. Right.

For anyone feeling like David did when he started the journey he hoped would straighten him up, I hope you can all realize that there is no guarantee that becoming straight will lead to a wife/husband and children. That there is no guarantee that you will feel “normal” if you do end up with a nuclear family. That there are many miserable “normal” families out there. That there just aren’t any organizations out there wanting to help the members of those families become gay for a chance at true happiness. No, there are no organizations out there telling straight teens that their lives will be better if they become gay. Straight teens are just told that being a teen is hard. The truth is, life is hard. And trying to change who you are only makes it harder.

More: Queer Action Coalition blogged about the BBC2 Documentary “Sad To Be Gay,” which documents David’s experience with Love in Action, here.