Asia-Pacific – The Graying of AIDS

Kim, age 59 | Melbourne, Australia

I first learned I was positive in 1994. I was unwell and went to a friend of mine who was […]

From 1983 to 1997, I am fully on heroin in between lots of rehab and lots of jail and lots

People were just dying in ’83 and ’84. All my friends were dying around me, and then a very good

I think that my story is personal, it’s unique, and it is not tragic. And, I think it’s something that

Sometimes, I allow myself to have a wallow day. But it doesn’t happen much now. It used to happen. I

I was diagnosed in September 2010. I’ve only had it 4 years. It couldn’t have been much earlier than that.

I first learned that I was HIV-positive in a letter from a doctor. I’d been working in a little hospital

I didn’t come out. I didn’t tell anyone. No one knew for 10 years. And I think that’s what helped

I told my family, and I do not have a full knowledge about HIV/AIDS, but I tell them I’m HIV-positive.

In year 2003 I already need to be on medications, but at that particle of time, that we need to

I always wanted a big family, you know – four to six children. My career was in childcare. I found

I’ve really had a lot of AIDS-defining illnesses in the ‘90s, some of which I’ve lived with since. I’ve developed

I don’t feel OLD old, ‘cause I’m still feeling young, because I’m still here, you know. I feel really grateful

It’s very difficult to meet positive people, because mostly, they’re still too afraid to come out and disclose their status

I think it’s harder now to live up to the expectation that you’re well. People think that HIV has been

By the end of ’99, I’d really been living with HIV for over a decade – my health was going

It’s strange to say: I was living in Sydney in the 1980s when the newspapers, every week when they came

My partner started to show symptoms of AIDS in 1983, and I talked to my doctor, who said, “Look, this

It was the 15th of January, 2002. I had a needlestick injury from one of my HIV patients. I’m a

For me, I had to make that distinction between “Me the Caregiver” and “Me the Person.” I couldn’t see myself