I had gone in the day before with my friend Lori to get tested. After we left, I told her it would take 5 days before the results would be in, all the while knowing I had asked for the 24 hour test.

Walking in, this eerie sense of calm came over me. I wasn’t nervous, I wasn’t anxious; I also was no longer 100% sure that this time I would get off easy. I walked into this little office, my hopes flaring up high all of a sudden. I sent a quick prayer upstairs. And as I sat down in the chair I noticed his eyes. Looking down onto the paper he just handed me, I heard him say “I’m sorry.”

He is still talking, but all of a sudden I cannot make out one word of what he is saying. I am surrounded by clouds. It feels like I am in a cocoon, numbing my senses, my mind, my heart and my thoughts.

This isn’t real. This can’t be happening to me. I can see the words. They are right there on paper.

But they can’t mean that. How can it say: TEST RESULTS: POSITIVE?

I am negative, NEGATIVE. This can’t say Positive.

Its okay, I can handle this.

My god, I am going to die.

I just need to go home. I’ll be fine.

Shit, how did this happen? What am I going to do? I got to get home.

If I get home, I’ll wake up. This isn’t real.

I can do this, just take deep breaths.

HOW THE FUCK DID THIS HAPPEN?

Stay calm, focus. Where did I park? Why can’t I find my car???

GET A GRIP ON YOURSELF.

Oh my god, this isn’t a dream. Why isn’t this a dream?

I am going to get tested again. And when that one comes back negative, I am going to sue the clinic. Jesus, this isn’t something to make a mistake with! They should know that. I am going to kick somebody’s ass over there. You don’t mess up an HIV test. That’s all there is to it. It is a mistake. It has to be.

How can you be such an idiot! You know better.

It’s your own fault. Idiot. Go home, get high.

I’ll be the first person to beat the virus. Yeah!

Don’t let me die, please.

How am I going to tell my friends? I am so stupid.

I can’t believe I fucked up like this. Now what?

I don’t know what to do!!!! Somebody tell me this is a joke, please?

I can’t be Positive. I wasn’t meant to be Positive. God wanted me to be Negative.

I wonder if I can convert back.

Shit, did you really think you were THAT special Sven? God you’re an idiot. You deserve this just for being so stupid.

I’ll show them how to live proudly with HIV.

I am so scared.

Dad was right, I am a loser. And I just had to prove his point.

I can’t afford to lose any weight!

I couldn’t just get the clap or something…nope. I had to go out and get freaking HIV +.

I should just keep driving, right off the canyon.

I am never going to leave my apartment again.

Dirty, I feel so dirty. All I want to do is take a shower. Wash all of this off.

I can’t breathe.

Scared.

I don’t want to think anymore. Stop thinking. Stop feeling. Get out of my head.

This isn’t happening to me. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.

I can’t do this. I just can’t.

What am I going to say? What are they going to think?

Shit, who fucking gave this to me?

Who??

Oh my god.

Who else?

I swear I am going to lose it. I am going to go out of my mind.

What have I done?

God give me strength.

I don’t really remember how I got home after I left the clinic that morning. Somewhere between being told I was HIV + and finding myself sitting on the kitchen floor sobbing, my mind has managed to black out a good 3 hours of my life.

My cocoon is wearing off. The pain is starting to seep in, choking me. My head is pounding with a million thoughts all at once. I throw up in the middle of the kitchen; it is so hard to breathe. The only words coming out of my mouth manage to send shivers down my spine and engulf me in total fear.

I start to cry; “Please, I don’t want to die. Don’t let me die.”

I am a college educated male, I read the paper, watch the news. I am not stupid by any means, yet when it came down to having unprotected sex and drugs, all that went right out the window. Somehow I never really worried about turning HIV+. Partly because I still had that feeling of being invincible (after all, this always happens to “those people” not me,) partly because of the media.

Let me explain that one. I somewhat remember the panic that set in after the world learned about HIV and AIDS. The horror stories, people selling their life insurance and living it up before they would die; Rock Hudson; the “new plaque”. Over the last 10 somewhat years we have made such progress in treating HIV, along with the media’s part in tempering the panic, that we have become a lot more complacent about this. HIV+ is no longer a death sentence; it is now a life long illness. No longer cause for immediate funeral planning, it is now manageable. All it really means is a regimen of pills. Right? Why really be concerned about it? We have done such a great job in down playing the effects of HIV that in the process we have made ourselves more ignorant.

There are “bug chasers”, “gift givers” “conversion parties”. Maybe it is because I am blond, but when is the last time you heard anybody volunteer to get syphilis? Or Hepatitis? I must have missed the invitation to my “Brothers of the Clap” community. Instead of making us more conscious and aware, we have created a group of people who think that HIV is actually kind of “cool.” One night, one guy online actually told me he was looking forward to being bred and take “charged-up” loads. What exactly is a “charged up” load? A load that has had a Red Bull or one that has been in the charger overnight? I really hate to be the one to break it to them, but it’s not like signing up for an AAA membership! It doesn’t come with any frequent flyer miles, nor do you get a free coffee mug and I would gladly cancel my membership at a moments notice. If only I could.

Any of you ever seen “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”? Great movie, isn’t it? I feel like that. The weekend I converted, being sick like I had never been sick before with a fever of 104, that’s when it took over my body and turned it against me. That wasn’t a fever; it was the virus burning down the fortress of my defense, infiltrating my system. And my body only lasted maybe 7 hours before handing over the keys. 7 hours is all it took to erase my hopes, my dreams, my beliefs, and my life. It is a weird feeling knowing exactly when you got sick with this. It isn’t like waking up with a cold one morning, I can actually tell you on what day I converted. That is a very abstract and almost absurd reality. I remember the first time I cut myself after I found out I was HIV+; I just stood there looking at my finger bleeding. And all I could think was that my blood had actually become poison. To this day, I still shower twice a day, hoping that with each shower another layer of shame and guilt will disappear. Maybe by some miracle, it will all just wash away.

Once considered a golden boy, I was perceived as a lucky son-of-a-bitch, tenacious, persistent, an achiever. Now, I can’t hold on to a dream long enough to let it even begin blossoming. I am disoriented inside my own body, still trying to somehow regain control. I am on a mission to recapture that spark. To find that something that made me dream all these years.

Instead, I have spent most of the last two years trying to sabotage all that was good in my life. I, naturally, am in therapy. And while it looks to the world and even to me that I am doing just peachy keen with all of it, I am not.

I went from being the Golden Boy to being unemployed, destitute, unable to make this months rent. I now can count 1 failed suicide attempt to my list of failures. A lot of my friends have parted ways with me, for whatever their reasons may have been. I have become more and more of a recluse inside my own world. There is this overwhelming sense of being too late to catch up.

Somewhere deep inside of me, there is still another battle going on. A battle between my self esteem, social stigma, self projection, self loathing, shame and fear. I am trying to reestablish my identity as an HIV positive male. Not just for society, family and friends, but more for myself. Two years ago, I would wake up in the morning and remember what I dreamed about that night. These days, I rarely dream at all. As a matter of fact, I dread going to sleep all together these days because of the recurring nightmares I keep having. I used to have no time for the past, too busy planning my future but now it seems all I do is putting out fires from yesterday. Trying to cover up my tracks, fighting to stay afloat, it is a struggle to hang on to even just today.

There is a feeling of guilt and shame. Every morning I wake up realizing that I made a decision that completely altered the course of my life. A decision that so far has caused little good. You see, unlike the long term survivors of HIV/Aids, who contracted the disease without knowing anything or very little about it, I was fully aware of the risks I was taking. Unlike a cancer that just shows up in your body, I became HIV+ because of something I did that I knew was wrong. And it is hard to forgive myself for that, very hard.

In all likelihood, until the day comes when I am no longer the one that has to say “I am Positive, is that a problem,” but instead can go “some of my best friends are negative”; I will not be okay with being HIV+.

My name is Sven