“I have always wanted to become a wife to the woman whom I truly and desperately love, and a mommy to our children.”
"Keisha and I knew that unfortunately because of Amendment One, we would not be able to get married in North Carolina," Dericka Hollifield said. "We knew we would have to travel in order to be legally wed, and that was incredibly important to us."
Dericka (left) and Keisha Hollifield.
Courtesy Dericka Hollifield
Just days after they requested a marriage license from McDowell County in Marion, N.C. as part of the WE DO Campaign by the Campaign for Southern Equality (CSE), the couple traveled Washington D.C. because it was the closest place where same-sex couples are "equally deserving of marriage licenses," she said in an email.
The entire trip to D.C., though, was almost canceled on the Wednesday before, when Keisha needed to undergo emergency surgery. "I was fully prepared for us to delay the entire trip and marriage; but Keisha was insistent that there was no better time."
Courtesy Dericka Hollifield
The experience of Keisha going into surgery, where hospitals and the other person's family could potentially get in the way of allowing access to unmarried partners, gave Dericka a new understanding of how "unjust and absolutely horrifying" many LGBT couples are treated due to bans on same-sex marriage.
"I am extremely fortunate to have supportive in-laws who would respect and honor my decisions as Keisha's wife — but we did not have health care power of attorneys', living wills, or a marriage license so technically I could have been denied that opportunity," she said. "I have never felt the way I did while she was in surgery. It was the absolute darkest moment of my life. I have never been so afraid, worried, and lost as I was in that moment. All surgeries carry risk, and there was a (extremely slim but still very real) chance that I would never be able to talk to her again."
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