1. The Meeting

The beat was still in my bones when I stepped outside to catch my breath. It was just a regular Tuesday night — or so it seemed — at the wedding of two colleagues of my partner. A last-minute “Why not?” had brought us there. But fate knows what it’s doing.

And the venue? Stunning. Perched on the edge of a lake near Amsterdam, with a glowing terrace for the reception and, inside, a bar and dance floor that pulsed with life. The couple looked divine in matching lemon-chic suits. Most of the guests had dressed to impress. So did we, naturally.

She spotted me dancing — couldn’t resist asking:
“Are you part Indian?”
“No,” I smiled, “I’m Creole.”
“I’m Marron,” she said proudly — descendant of enslaved people in Suriname. “The way you move, I just knew.”

We laughed. We both knew exactly what she meant. It’s that unmistakable sway, that rhythm born from bone and memory.

She was there with her girlfriend. I was with my partner. Two Black queers in a mostly white room — our connection was instant. Recognition has a way of cutting through the noise.

---

2. From Dancing to Depth

We started with the obvious — where we came from, what it means to be gay in our respective cultures. Then we slipped into deeper waters: what it’s like to live and work in white-dominated spaces, to love across racial lines, to navigate the ache of being “othered.”

Then came the reveal.

Both of us had lost our hormones.
She lost estrogen.
I lost testosterone — thanks to prostate cancer.

I always thought I knew testosterone. Read about it, talked about it. But there’s a galaxy of difference between knowing something and living through its absence.

To halt the cancer, I had two options:
Hormone therapy or surgery.

I chose the knife.
No injections. No slow drip. Just — cut the damn thing out.

What I wasn’t prepared for, was what it would do to my mind.

---

3. The Voices

I’ve had voices in my head for as long as I can remember.

Not one. Not two. A full cast.
Some whispered. Some screamed.
Some sounded like angry versions of myself.
Others were strangers — but they knew me.

They didn’t just interrupt my thoughts — they were my thoughts.
Telling me I wasn’t enough. That I’d made a fool of myself. That my energy was too much. That I was too loud, too sensitive, too weird.

They argued while I showered.
They mocked me during conversations.
They didn’t sleep when I did.

They’d show up just when I thought I had found peace — poking at wounds I thought had healed.
And the worst part? They sometimes made sense.

That’s the trick.
When the lie wears the mask of truth, how do you know who to believe?

It’s exhausting.

I learned to function with them — dress nice, smile wide, hold a job, charm a room — all while hosting a riot in my head.
Imagine giving a haircut, listening to someone talk about their divorce, while five voices inside you debate your own worth like judges on a cruel talent show.

Sometimes, one voice would take over the others.
A cruel one.
Sharp as glass.
It would tell me to stop pretending. To stop living.

That’s when I first wanted to die.
Thirteen years old.
And already exhausted.

But I couldn’t tell anyone.
Because when you say, “I hear voices,” people hear “I’m crazy.”
And I wasn’t crazy.
I was surviving.

I carried it with grace.
I danced, I laughed, I made people beautiful — all while managing a battlefield no one could see.

And through it all, the only voice that brought light was hers.
My mother’s.

“Take yourself seriously, my boy,” she’d say.
“Take all the darkness and drag it into the light. Let it speak. Let it stand trial. See which voice tells the truth — and which one just wants to hurt you. Love them all. They are yours, but they are not all right.”

It saved me.

When it got too much, I’d close my eyes and imagine angels.
Not floaty ones, but warriors — wrapping their wings around me, thick and warm.
“You’re safe,” they’d whisper.

Meditation helped.
Structure helped.
Solitude helped.

But noise was always waiting.
Lurking.
Ready to dance.

So I danced too.
Loud music drowned the chaos. If the voices were going to party, I’d give them a beat.

But I was tired, Number One.
So, so tired.

And I didn’t know peace — not truly — until the day of the operation, when the voices… vanished.

---

4. The Surgery — and the Power of Asking

Let me tell you something I’ve learned the hard way:
If you don’t ask for what you need — especially in the medical world — no one will.

The day of my surgery, I walked into the operating room with my heart pounding — not just from fear, but from resolve.

The team was there.
Masked. Silent. Sterile.
They looked like ghosts in gowns.

I stood in the center and said:

“Before anyone touches me, I need to see you.”

They hesitated. Protocol, they said.
Masks had to stay on.

I looked them in the eye — or rather, in the slivers above the blue — and said:

“With all due respect — I am not a body on a table. I’m a person. I need real contact. Otherwise, I walk.”

Silence.

Then the lead surgeon stepped forward.
Tall. Confident. Ridiculously handsome.
I nicknamed him McDreamy on the spot.

He said, “Take off the masks. One by one. Introduce yourselves.”

And they did.

That moment grounded me. Humanized the room. Made me feel safe.

Then McDreamy knelt — yes, knelt — and said:

“You’ll heal quickly. And yes — your dick will still work.”

(Yes, I asked. And yes, I needed to know.)

And in that moment, I understood something vital:
Advocating for yourself isn’t a luxury. It’s survival.

I walked in a patient.
But I stood there a person.
And I walked out with more than surgery.
I walked out with proof:

Your voice is your first medicine.

---

5. The Silence

After the surgery, once the pain began to ebb, I noticed something strange.

Silence.

Total, bone-deep, soul-quiet silence.
No voices.
No mental chatter.
No whispers.
No critiques.
No committee arguing about whether I was enough.

Just… quiet.

I remember lying there, blinking into the hospital light, whispering:

“Hello? Anyone? Somebody?”
Nothing.

I kept it to myself at first. Thought maybe the anesthesia hadn’t fully worn off. Surely the noise would return.
But days turned to weeks.

And the noise… didn’t come back.

I felt peace.
Yes. But also —
emptiness.

You see, I’d lived my whole life with internal company.
No matter how chaotic — they were mine.
They filled the space.
They’d been with me longer than lovers, longer than friends.

Now?
It was like waking up in a familiar house where all the furniture had vanished.

Peaceful?
Sure.
But also hollow.

Eventually I told my partner.
He said he’d noticed a calm, a softness — but didn’t know what it meant.
Neither did I.

The world looked the same. But it no longer sounded the same.
And I didn’t know who I was without the chorus inside.

I tried to enjoy the quiet.
I really did.
But I felt… distant. Like a man floating above his own life.

I didn’t miss the pain — God no.
But I missed the tension.
The fire.
Even the struggle.

Because at least it meant I was alive.

I had prayed for quiet.
But I hadn’t prepared for loneliness.

---

6. Numbness – The Madness of Nothing

Then came the moment that shook me to my core —
Not with pain, but with absence.

I went to visit André, my first true love, in Dijkzigt Medical Center.

We hadn’t seen each other in a while.
He was recovering. It felt right to be there.

I entered the room.
There he was — pale, fragile… but still André.
My André.

He saw me. His eyes welled up.
He reached for me like a man clinging to a life raft.
We hugged.

And I…
felt nothing.

No spark.
No lump in my throat.
No rush of memory.
No ache in my chest.

Just… stillness.

I held him — the man I once loved deeply —
and it felt like hugging a stranger.

And I knew: something inside me was missing.

Because I know myself.
I’m the one who cries after deep talks.
Who hides in bathrooms to breathe.
Who needs a bench after goodbyes.

But this time?
Nothing.

I left the hospital in a daze.
No tears.
No shaking.
Just the click of a door closing behind me.

And it hit me:

If I could feel nothing for André… then what else had gone numb inside me?

It scared me more than any voice ever had.

---

7. The Return – I Had to Find the Way Myself

It didn’t happen all at once.

There was no magical doctor, no roadmap, no brochure.
Just a void. And me in it.

My oncologist? Skilled. Kind. Brilliant.
But limited.

He watched my PSA levels like a hawk. That was his job.

But my soul? My spirit? My silence?
Not his chart.

I told him about the numbness. The lost lust. The flatness.
He said:

“Most patients don’t care about those things. They just want the cancer gone.”

And I believed him.
Not because I doubted myself —
But because I’d been here before.

I had lived through the early days of HIV.
When fear ruled. When doctors had no answers.
When I had to make my own path.

So I did what I always do.
I learned.

I read about testosterone and cancer.
External vs internal hormones.
How male menopause works.
How quiet can become suffocating.

If you want to live — not just survive —
You better become a student of your own biology.

Doctors care, sure.
But they’ve got 100 patients.
You’re just one.

And it’s not cruelty.
It’s the system.

So after a year of silence — beautiful, healing, lonely silence —
I made the call.

Not because I was desperate.
But because I was ready.

---

8. Rising Again – When the Fire Came Back

The prescription was simple:
Testosterone gel.
Rub into skin once daily. Wait.

But this wasn’t just medicine.
This was alchemy.

I didn’t expect much.
I had disconnected so deeply — I barely remembered desire. Or motivation. Or fire.

But two weeks in…
something shifted.

Not a boom.
Not thunder.

Just a tingle.

A flicker.
A thought I hadn’t had in months.
A glance in the mirror that didn’t feel empty.

And then… the voices returned.

Not loud.
Not aggressive.
Just… present.

I laughed. Out loud.

“Well, hello again, you little shits. I missed you.”

But this time?
They didn’t run the show.
They answered to me.

Hair returned.
Lust returned.
Hot flashes calmed.
Sleep deepened.
The hum returned to my bones.

For the first time in over a year —
I felt like me.

Not who I used to be.
But someone new.
Someone who had walked through silence and come out glowing.

This wasn’t about sex.
Though yes, I welcomed the return of my body like an old friend.

It was about connection.
To myself.
To the world.
To rhythm.
To life.

---

9. The New Me – A Room of My Own

I didn’t know what it meant to lose my ADHD, my HSP, and my voices…
Until they were gone.

I always thought that was just me.
The sensitivity.
The urgency.
The way I felt everything. Too much.

But when my nervous system fell still — I realized something:

Everything I experience happens in my brain.
And no one else will ever truly know it.

Not my doctor.
Not my partner.
Not even André.

And that’s not tragic.
It’s liberating.

Because once I understood that, I also realized:
I don’t have to perform anymore.
I don’t have to try to be normal.

I can just be… me.
Little old me.

Not the “too intense” version they tried to trim down.
Not the “overthinking” Scott.
Just… Jules.

And for the first time, I have room.

Room to think without spiraling.
Room to feel without drowning.
Room to live — calmly.

This calm?
It’s new.
Sometimes I miss the noise.
But the peace — oh, the peace — is sacred.

It’s not silence anymore.
It’s space.

A space where I meet myself each day — and no longer flinch.

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To Anyone Reading This

🧠 Take yourself seriously.
Not just the visible parts.
The inner world too — the one only you know.

📚 Do your own research.
Doctors can’t feel what you feel.
Become your own advocate, your own healer.

🌀 You’re not flawed. You’re different.
Mental challenges aren’t defects.
They are a different wiring — beautiful, complex, powerful.

You are not broken.
You are brilliantly built — just differently.

---

And Me? I’m Still Becoming.

I still dance.
Still laugh too loud.
Still love deeply.

But now…
I do it with a calm I never knew was possible.

I’m not trying to be someone else.
I’m not begging the voices to go or come.

And then I remembered her —
The woman on the terrace that night.

Later that evening, just before we parted ways, we circled back —
One last moment on the terrace.

I had shared my story with her — about the voices in my head, the cancer, the loss of testosterone, the silence that followed. I had laid it bare, without shame, without filter.

She looked at me — her eyes still, searching — and for a moment said nothing.

Then softly:

“I’ve never told anyone… but I have things in my head too. I don’t know what they are, or how to name them. I didn’t grow up with the language for that. I was raised to survive, not to speak. Not even my partner knows.”

We stood in that silence together — but it wasn’t empty.
It was full of recognition.

“Hearing your story,” she said, “gave me… options.
Gave me permission. I didn’t know I needed that.”

And I…
I felt something shift.

I had spent so long thinking I was alone in the noise.
But that moment — that quiet honesty — gave both of us something rare:

She felt seen.
And I felt purpose.

A moment of healing.
A moment of meaning.
Between two strangers who weren’t so strange after all.

I’m just here.
Present.
Whole.

And for the first time in my life, I don’t belong to the noise, the fear, or the expectations.
I belong to myself.

“Let me know if it moves you. I wrote it with every fiber of my being.”