A response I recieved to my HIV thread...
I recently received an email in response to my thread about being HIV positive (This thread is currently locked, prehaps this was why?)
I am not in the habit of posting correspondence, but as it directly sought to speak for the lack of sincerity of everyone whom posted on my thread, I felt it only right that all of you should be allowed a chance to respond to it. If it's comments were purely directed at me, I would not have mentioned it at all. My response to the person, whose email address I will not repost is also listed below, people views on this would be most welcome, especially from all those who orginally posted or replied to me on the orginal thread.
Message read:
hey, I read your thread about being HIV positive and am surprised how you said nothing new about the disease. Am curious why this hasn't affected you enough to give you a personal reaction to the disease. You honestly sounded like you just copy and pasted what you wrote from some book. I hope to see a more genuine post about your status.
Also you choose to disclose this information on HA which, as unfortunate as it is, full of the most moronic human beings in the world. Sorry to tell you this, but every single "appologetic" reply you recieved was incredibly shallow and fake. I don't think you need sympathy- i think you need strength. What you did, as you admitted, was your own fault, so now what you need is retrospect so as to help educate others about the reality of the disease.
Yours Truely,
Henry Fonda's Ghost
My response:
I am sorry you feel that way,
As for it not effecting me personally or having a personal reaction to it, it has changed my whole life upside and seven ways of Sundays, many in ways that I cannot go into.
If you think my comments are copied and pasted from 'Some book' I would be interested to know from which book you refer. If this a generic statement, well there is nothing generic about the illness as if effects every one from different perspectives and issues. I cannot offer any further anaylsis on it other than those of my own experiences, and it would be wrong of me to do so. I was also diagnosed sometime ago, so if I seem less personal about it now, well that is a good thing, several years ago I was a wreck and would not have posted about it anywhere.
As for posting about it on hungangels, I was prompted to do so by the death of a friend of mine, who was on the forum. If you think people's responses to my posting were shallow and fake, well your entitled to believe so, personally I do not think that is the case.
I have spoken to several of them on the phone and have had long correspondence with many others and this has led to some very useful discussions to the benifit of both parties.
Hungangels is primarily a fun site, but many of the people whom post there are very intelligent and have much to say on life. I posted there because I know HIV is a strong issue in the TS community, it was a spur of the moment decision to do it and I nearly did not, but I have no regrets about it and I am glad I did so. I certainly did not do it to seek sympathy and I actually took a great deal of strenght from much of the correspondence I received in private. I learnt to be strong about this awful thing, sometime ago.
On the net you can never see a person as totally white or black, we are, while in this medium all shades of grey.
If none of this makes you think any differently, well there is nothing I can do about that.
Thanks for your message. I think you should post it on the forum.
Az x
PS - I did not say I had AIDS, I said I was HIV positive, there is a big difference.