Educate Them

How has your HIV status affected your family members and friends?

Becoming HIV positive taught me and my family that no one is immune to HIV, nor AIDS simply because we do not date outside of our race. My family became more educated about HIV, and I notice that certain members in my family, that use to deal with more than one partner at a time, suddenly stopped and became more committed to one person, as oppose to the multiple partners they were once dealing with.

Although we are not as vocal about my HIV health issues as I would like us to be, I know my family is well educated about HIV. It feels good because just by talking to them I can tell that my family is more educated, more concern health wise, and much more supportive towards me and the health issues that I'm faced with. I feel proud because sometimes if one of my family members hears about something positive concerning HIV/AIDS (new treatment, vaccines, etc.), they make sure that they call me up and inform me about it.

My friends on the other hand dealt with me being HIV positive on a totally different way. I now have two sets of friends. One set of friends is HIV positive and we get to discuss HIV/AIDS openly and free of restrictions. The other set of friends are so fearful about the virus and it’s affects on an individual’s health that we don't even talk about it. So depending on who I'm keeping company with, we may talk about HIV/AIDS and the trails and tribulations of having it, or general same-sex relationships stuff. Either way I try to educate them whether they want to hear it or not.