World AIDS Day

[opali]

Started on 1st December 1988, World AIDS Day is about raising money, increasing awareness, fighting prejudice and improving education. World AIDS Day is important in reminding people that HIV has not gone away, and that there are many things still to be done.

Please keep those multitudes with this medical condition who do not have access to the necessary health care in your thoughts.

Of course keep all those who live with AIDS every day, and have loved ones who do, in mind as well.

Educate yourselves if necessary, and your kids, and show your support if possible, this week. Check around to see what is going on in your area. There are tons of opportunities. Wear a red ribbon, and be prepared to answer questions! The more people that are educated, the less discrimination and unfounded fears there will be!

Here's to hoping that one day AIDS will be eradicated from the face of the Earth.

opali

 

[Miss Chicken]

I have only ever known one AIDS sufferer as far as I know. Despite that I am quite knowledgable about the disease as are my sons.

I bought a red ribbon yesterday.

 

[Peacemaker]

Thank you for your support.

Speaking as an HIV positive person, may say, please:

Don't call us "AIDS Sufferers." I am, if I must identify by my HIV status, a person living with HIV. I'm not "suffering" with it. In fact, most of the people in the Western world that I know are not "suffering" with it, unless they are the sorts of persons that do nothing but wallow in their "suffering." It does them no good. Indeed, these are often, in my experience, the ones to expire early, because they let their disease control their lives. Frequently, they're also the ones that blame somebody else for their illness. I've told more than one of those persons to stop being so selfish. Most of us, however, have done our grieving for ourselves and have long ago moved on. Calling us "AIDS Sufferers" seems, in my opinion, to keep us in a form of perpetual negativity about ourselves, perpetual childhood - for lack of a better term, such that the official "grownups" in the world are those who are HIV-negative.

I know you don't mean that, but I'm just saying that that's the sort of thing that sort of terminology, as well intended as it may be, often does.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I don't think I would consider someone being HIV-positive as suffering but I think someone who has AIDS is suffering which is what this guy had. He had AIDS back in the early to mid 90s and was treated very negatively by society including by members of his own family.

 

[Danoz]

I work for the Global Health Policy Center.

Tomorrow we are hosting an event with Shannon Hader on domestic HIV/AIDS in the District of Columbia (the highest HIV rate in the U.S.)

If anybody is interested, I'll be posting the audio and video on this site tomorrow:

http://www.csis.org/component/option,com_csis_events/task,view/id,1852/

PM me for further info.

 

[RJDiogenes]

^^ Post a reminder when the video is up, please.

Here's to hoping that one day AIDS will be eradicated from the face of the Earth.

Yes, and the sooner the better.

 

[Peacemaker]

I don't think I would consider someone being HIV-positive as suffering but I think someone who has AIDS is suffering which is what this guy had. He had AIDS back in the early to mid 90s and was treated very negatively by society including by members of his own family.

Well, it's true that AIDS is a diagnosis you never lose. Clinically, I was diagnosed with AIDS 10 years ago this year. However, my blood work and health now is vastly improved. When I was diagnosed I had a CD4 count of about 10. Now I'm at 370, but it goes up and down all the time, like a wave. There's a certain amount of genetics involved in how your CD4's cells behave. They go "up and down" in everybody all the time. About every other year something really weird or unsual happens with my health. HIV has crossed the blood-brain barrier in me, so I'm starting to have mild nervous system issues, like numbness in my left foot.

I've seen all kinds of crap with families myself - even fighting over petty things like who gets the VCR while a family member is dying. I've learned over the years to be secure with who you are and the bad, ridiculous crap is "on them" not on you. That's probably why I can come across here so strongly sometimes. It doesn't bother me if people don't like me or what I have to say.