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Living With AIDS
AIDS 101 - Billy's Story - A Surfer Living With AIDS / HIV
By Mark Sperling
How am I gonna live my life if I'm positive? Is it gonna be a negative?
Like many others his age, Billy grew up with little knowledge about AIDS. For years the media kept pointing to particular groups - mainly homosexuals and drug addicts- as the only people affected by the disease. But as more and more is learned, AIDS cases in heterosexual teens and young adults have jumped to great proportions.
"Had I known what I know now about the disease, say, five or ten years ago, all my choices about relationships and sex would have changed. Back then, and even today, it's a male thing to sleep with as many girls as possible - kind of like bragging rights. To look back on it now - trying to be cool will actually kill me."
Billy, a blond, 23-year-old native Californian, fits the typical surfer/boarder stereotype, except one thing distinguishes Billy from others - he's HIV positive. He is one of the growing numbers of teens and young adults who have been caught off-guard by this once-unknown disease. It is estimated that between the ages of thirteen to 24 years old, one in every 300 is infected with HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), the virus that leads to AIDS.
I think about life and immorality what's the first thing I do if I'm HIV
At a local coffee house, Billy and I talk about what he's gone through. Sipping on a mocha, he remembers the fateful day he found out about his circumstances.
"I remember all the details - going in to get a normal physical at the hospital and having blood taken from me. Everything seemed okay, and even the doctor mentioned I appeared in good health. About two weeks later, ten days away from my birthday, a nurse calls from the hospital to ask that I come back in - no explanation, nothing."
They took my blood with an anonymous number two weeks waitin wonderin
Billy thought he was stricken with cancer, like several members of his family before him. "I was so scared to go see the doctor," he says. "I told no one - not even my parents or girlfriend. The thought of them having to worry about me frightened the shit out of me." Billy pauses to reflect, then continues, "Something about the office and the doctor looming over me felt like I was at the gates of heaven waiting to meet my fate." Then, BAM - like hitting a brick wall - the doctor told Billy his blood test came back HIV positive.
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