WARNING: This post will probably be long and exceedingly personal. If either makes you feel uncomfortable, read no further. Also, it will be divided probably into 3 parts.

A subject I often avoid or dodge around is my college education. The reason being that it is a very touchy subject with me. Not touchy in the sense that I will kill someone, but in the sense of I'm a bit ashamed of it. In speaking, I will touch upon it a little but I never really went into great detail about it before today.

( so it begins the unraveling of the past to reveal the hidden pains )


More later...

I asked you all this question, and really it all started from a conversation with a friend. Below are people's answers... if I listed your answer and don't have a mailing address for you, email me: apositivevoice at gmail dot com. I kept the names/usernames confidential - you can "out" yourself if you choose in the comments section :)


HIV is somewhat like a computer virus.... it replicates itself... and even if it doesn't deploy its payload, it can still be a drain on resources.... IT people constantly trying to keep it from spreading... taking up bandwidth, etc. Sometimes stopping it from replicating can cause disruptions in service....
but it's better than having it replicate more and eventually deploy its payload

HIV is a reminder that I'm no longer the person I once was. I no longer have an addiction to feed. I no longer disappoint people on a daily basis. I no longer disappoint myself. It reminds me, every day, that while there are certainly consequences for our actions..if I had to choose..I would choose this over what I once was.

I guess HIV means having to come to terms with oneself... for some its coming to terms with the lifestyle that might have led them to the disease... for others it wasn't exactly a choice, and they have had to accept their own particular situation with HIV. I find that I keep running from place to place hoping that HIV resources will be better, but realize that no matter how good the people or places might be, I ultimately have to accept that HIV is part of my life. I have to come to terms with the fact that I have it, my sister doesn't, and life without HIV is unlikely. I mean everyone has to go through the self-realization phase in one form or another, but with HIVers the process is a little more harsh because every aspect of your life is affected whether realized or not.

i think its faceless, well... you know when you go to an amusement park or something and there are those plywood characters or whatever with a hole cut out for the head and you can stick your face in and take a picture?? ....thats what hiv is like anyone can fill that face.

Growing up, I did not care about the AIDS virus. It never affected me personally, so I didn't really think about it. And then it happened. I dated a girl who turned out to be HIV+ and my way of thinking was altered forever. I was in love with this girl and unfortunately my reaction destroyed what could have occurred. See, I still love this girl, and because she's HIV+, I associate finding a cure for AIDS with her as weird as that may sound. I'm not talking about the Miracle Magic "I Have enough money to buy my way out of AIDS but fuck the rest of you" Johnson, but rather the real cure. The cure they neglect to find because it makes more revenue to treat this disease. So,I'm selfish when I think of AIDS. If it weren't for the love of my life who I can't have due to bad timing and locational issues, I would be in a relationship with her, but I fear every day of my life that it will be the day she gets to be sick and can't get better. But the kicker is, If she dies, I will never know because our relationship has been relegated to an internet one and that scares me.

Honestly, HIV was a disease I'd heard of but never thought much about until my best friend in high school disclosed she was HIV+. The disclosure didn't scare me in any way and, at the time, I didn't really understand why she was scared to tell me. Today, it's the faces of friends I met throughout my life, silently battling the disease daily and winning!


HIV means that I already know my friend is open and honest. I know things for sure about her than I don't know for sure about other people and if she's willing to be open and honest about having HIV, I know she'll be open and honest about other things as well, something I can't say with as much certainty about other people in my life.

umm...i dont know...honestly? scary, life-threatening, life-long, disease?

To those that responded... thanks for playing :)

You guys rock my world.

Oh and from Miss Nina:

Me:so does HIV look like me?
Her:no, but you make it look good haha

(DISCLAIMER: This is in no way meant to encourage people to go out and get HIV or "pretend" they have it.)

Next up - Does HIV Look Like Me? The national campaign is getting a face lift! More later :)

The term "down low" or "on the down low" has come to refer to a man that poses as a heterosexual (usually is involved in a heterosexual relationship) while on the side or "on the down low" is also dabbling in a homosexual relationship. On a side note, "down low" usually comes into play when talking about HIV in the black community, but also plays a significant role in the hispanic community. The "down low" has been associated with the drastic spread of HIV throughout these communities.

It is estimated that 46 % of gay black men in the United States are HIV+. Yet, not many couples are talking about HIV these days - either in heterosexual or homosexual relationships. People I feel have become complacent about HIV in the United States. HIV is something you see on tv, it has become part of twisted plots on Law & Order episodes and other shows. HIV is something you hear about in the world news with Africa and the destruction it wreaks there. HIV is something you see in your inbox every time you get an email from "the one campaign". HIV is a part every day life in the big picture - but what about HIV in your personal lives? What about HIV in the person sitting next to you on the bus, the person standing behind you in line at Target, the person eating lunch next to you at your favorite little cafe. Did you say anything when you overheard that group of kids "labeling" people as being HIV+ "Oh look at her, she looks gross - I bet you she has AIDS".

Most of us don't even think about how HIV surrounds us. Yeah it's there, but are you really comfortable talking about it? We may not discriminate against people that are HIV + but yet no one wants to talk about HIV. It's a very sensitive topic for most people and for others - well, they don't know much about it and could care less about learning. Stigma. To this day - over 20 years after HIV was named, an enormous stigma still surrounds the virus. Why? Well because of how it's transmitted of course, or rather I should say how it "can" be transmitted. The religious fundamentalist's answer as punishment to all the sinful behaviors - pre-marital sex, sodomy, drug use. People get what they deserve right? Now what about the babies that are infected from their mother, those that get lifesaving blood transfusions with infected blood, the doctors and nurses that while doing their job suffer needle sticks? Surely they can't be suffering "God's punishment" can they? How someone is infected with HIV shouldn't make a difference. It's not as though the "sinners" have HIV and the "innocents" have HIV lite. The same kind of virus that runs in my blood - infected since birth, is the same kind of virus that runs through some of my bestest friends' blood infected within the past 5 years. Nothing separates us and if you are going to judge them, then you might as well judge me too.

Where I stand is here. HIV is HIV. Once you have it, how you got it doesn't matter. The important thing is how you deal with it. It took me 20 years. TWENTY YEARS to be okay enough with something I had absolutely NO control over to talk about it. Why is that? Part of it has to do with the fact that I've seen the face of stigma - I've seen people's attitude toward HIV change drastically in the past 20 years, and yet I still see very familiar characteristics. The whole reason I decided to throw caution to the wind is because I got tired of being afraid someone would "find out" and my reputation along with anyone I ever had contact with would be ruined. I will keep talking until I don't have to anymore. Maybe it won't happen in my lifetime, but the longer we wait to try to change society - the longer it's going to take.

Change is never easy. That brings us to the impetus of this post.

Tonight - I was talking with lunarshakti's boyfriend, Robert. I love them both dearly and would be lost without them. It surprised me though when he said he hadn't told his best friend "about David" yet. At first I was utterly shocked and thought he meant that he hadn't told his best friend that they were dating (which I thought was ridiculous since they've been boyfriends for almost four months now). What Robert really meant though was that he hadn't told his best friend that he is dating someone that is HIV+. It came up in conversation because the three of us are all going to Philly next month for The Ryan White National Youth Conference (cue three musketeer music) and when Robert was asked why we were going to Philly he found himself beating around the bush and avoiding mentioning that it was for an HIV/AIDS-related activity.

Ah how well I know the beating around the bush game. Even in my personal life - I still find myself not being up front about HIV. It's hard to undo 20 years of secrecy. When people ask what I do, I always give my "day job" (computer nerd) as an answer. When people ask where/why/what I am speaking about - I find myself hesitating to mention HIV. Yet I would not take back my decision to "go public" for anything. By public speaking I am challenging people's preconceived notions about what HIV is and what it's all about. I'm challenging their thoughts and forcing them to think outside the proverbial box.

Yes I'm HIV+ but you know what, I also have a sense of humor and an optimistic look on life. There are times where David and I will come up with some of the most non-pc sayings about HIV - we even have taken to calling it "the hiv" (pronounced w/ a short i). I get a lot of feedback from my presentations where people say that I've made them look at HIV in a new light - or that it wasn't what they were expecting (not as dour/depressing). Great! That's my goal! I have not had a speaking engagement where I didn't evoke laughter. That's my goal. HIV inherently is a very serious, heavy, and depressing subject. There are heavy moments in my presentation to reflect that, but ultimately my aim is to not only be an HIV "positive voice" but a positive and uplifting voice as well.

I pose the title of my post as a question to you all. By not talking about HIV in the here and now, by only talking about it in one area of our lives but not all - are we keeping HIV on the "down low"? What are we afraid of? Why should we be ashamed? I have a "kiss me I'm HIV+" pin that I will only wear in "safe crowds" (other poz friends or equally accepting groups of people). Why is it okay for me to be HIV+ there and not everywhere?

What can *you* do to help change things around a bit?