I always knew I was different. Growing up, I was an alien compared to other boys my age. I remember when I was eight, my Mom had this beautiful dress and I would always encourage her to wear it because I thought she looked so pretty in it. She knew it was my favorite dress of hers, but what she didn’t know was when she left for work, I’d put that dress on and walk around the house like I was living my best life!

I felt like an outsider but as I got older the transgender community welcomed me with open arms. I loved being part of that world, especially the nightlife. Unfortunately, there’s an ugly side to that lifestyle and because I was the type to try anything once, my curiosity eventually led me down a dark path filled with parties, sex and drugs.

When it came to love, I didn’t know what it meant to be in a healthy relationship and I ended up in this vicious cycle dating men who were no good for me. There was one toxic ex that would unfortunately alter the course of my life forever.

My name is J.R. I don’t hang out and do crazy things, but I did almost die in the Emergency Room not long ago. I’m usually very healthy, but I suddenly and unexpectedly became really sick, and I began looking real bad too. I had become terribly skinny, and my skin had started turning into scales. After the ER doc ran a few blood tests, he came into my room and announced I had HIV! He explained that the virus had already begun attacking my lungs, which is why I had COPD and pneumonia too.

It was a trying time because I didn’t know too much about HIV. I also didn’t know where to get help and I wanted to start HIV meds because I found out I needed them in order to get healthy again. By this time, I had lost my apartment because I was too sick to work, but God blessed me with an angel.

Take a deep breath and pray. I found out I was HIV+ in jail and I was distraught. I knew what HIV was, but I was in shock. Then I got mad. Then I started crying. I felt like falling to the floor. Like time had frozen. I knew I had to talk to my parents after finding out my status. When I called, my father answered, and I said “Daddy I just found out I’m HIV+”. He asked if I was okay and my mom and dad, no matter what I did, never gave up on me.

I had to tell my daughter; “Mommy’s HIV+”, and she asked me “Mommy, what happened?” I said to her “Well, mommy was out getting high and one night I got into the wrong car, and a guy raped me. I found out that he raped a lot of girls in the area. He always told them, “You’re going to remember me.” He knew he had it and he gave it to me on purpose. I was using protection even when I was out doing what I was doing in my past. It just took that one time.”

There is a stigma about not asking if you're HIV+ or asking when you got tested. That's the twisted thinking that I had. Because my ex-partner didn't ask me about my HIV status, so I assumed that he was negative, and I guess he assumed that I was negative also. I was diagnosed with HIV after learning my then partner was HIV+. I went in and got tested and low and behold, I was HIV+. At the time, I felt that I fell into a black hole with nobody around; and then like the whole world just stopped around me and it was just totally black.

I started on drugs because I didn't love myself and I felt like my life was over after my diagnosis and I was pretty much vengeful. I didn't care about myself, so I didn't care what other people had to say. That was because I felt like the whole world was against me because of my sexuality. The stigma was strong because of my family upbringing.

There was a time in my life when I could barely get out of bed. I was always tired. When my mom was alive, we went to get medical advice to seek out what was wrong. That's when I got my diagnosis that I was HIV+. They linked me to a great doctor across the street and he got me to an undetectable level, where antiretroviral treatment has reduced the HIV virus to such small quantities that it can no longer be detected by standard blood tests, within nine months.

When my mom passed away, my insurance suddenly stopped. I had to figure out what Ryan White benefits were. I quickly ran out of my HIV meds and was trying to figure out, “What do I do here? How do I get myself linked back to care?” And you know, the phrase, not every helping hand is there to watch you succeed? That's what happened. I went back to a friend’s place and started a very deep drug addiction where I didn't leave his space again for another five weeks.

How am I going to care for myself?
How am I going to get treatment?
What am I going to do?
Those were my biggest fears when I found out that I was HIV+. Not about having HIV, but how to take care of myself. I have always heard about how expensive it is. That was the scary part for me. I'm the type of person, whatever is in front of me, I just stop and don't dwell on the problem. I'd rather find a solution. I'm a person of faith. So, I'm like, “Okay, God, you gotta show me right now.” I Googled HIV care in Florida and found a local organization to help me navigate through these challenges. Someone from the organization came to the hospital in an hour. That same day I was discharged and the very next day, I started free Anti-Retroviral Treatment.

I was only a freshman. It was my first year at UCF when I tested positive for HIV. Growing up, I was the healthiest kid ever, so getting sick in my first semester of college was really weird. I’m talking drop dog sick. I’ve been sick before, but nothing like this.

Deep down I knew something was up and getting tested only meant confirming it. So I didn’t. For 4 months I put off getting tested. I would see my doctor a few times over at the campus clinic and each time she became more concerned for my health, insisting I take an HIV test. It took me a while to overcome that fear of knowing but one day I couldn’t deny it. My health was getting worse so I finally agreed.

My name is Jennifer and I am a 37-year-old white woman living with HIV.

Since I was young, music has always been a passion of mine. In high school, I played percussion for our marching band and later received a Bachelor’s in Music Education from the University of Miami. I even played with the Broward Symphony Orchestra for six years. After playing with the orchestra, I became an Elementary school music teacher – and I loved it.  But just as music was a constant in my life, so was my battle with drug addiction. I was in high school when I started doing drugs and I tried pretty much everything. I was a little socially awkward so I felt like I fit in more, like I was accepted. My main go-to was always alcohol and as I got older, crack cocaine.

It all began with me getting trapped in the Dope Hole at Overtown, and it was difficult for me to leave because everything comes through there like male callers and drug dealers. It’s set up like a town, and my drug addiction had me believing I had everything I needed right there. I was a 32-year-old Black-Puerto Rican woman living on the streets because “stay high” was my motto, and there wasn't a day that I could blow a sober breath. Sometimes gentleman callers refused to use condoms with me. From my point of view as an alcohol/drug user, I thought, “If I don’t jump on this, then I’m going to miss out on an opportunity for getting some money to stay high.” So sometimes I would give in and not use protection. I also donated blood a lot because it was another way to get money for alcohol and drugs. I was already at rock bottom when the Blood Bank sent me a letter later that year, and I knew it couldn’t be good news, so I avoided reading it.

My mom found out about the letter. She has been HIV positive since the early nineties, and she was like, “Take that pipe out of your mouth, Tanisha, and go to the Health Department. You need to find out what the letter is all about, and you need to get tested because the earlier you deal with it, the better it will be.”

My name is Angel, and I’m a 48-year old Hispanic guy living in South Florida,

and I’m also living with HIV. I found out about my status after taking an HIV test when I was in prison. I knew I was risky because I’ve been with a lot of women, some guys too, and I didn’t always use condoms. So, I wasn’t completely surprised, but I still felt depressed when they told me I had HIV - I thought my life was over! I didn’t

want people to know I was HIV positive or think I had HIV, so I didn’t tell anyone, not even my family, and I refused to take HIV meds for a long time for fear that people would find out. Eventually, I got real sick though and was in so much pain with shingles straight down my spine that I had to start the meds to feel better. It wasn’t until I ended up in an Assisted Living Treatment program with others also living with HIV that I began openly talking about my HIV status. Feeling that support has been good and I no longer feel alone in this. It gave me the opportunity to practice sharing my status with my family - I’d wanted to tell them for a long time, but I anticipated they would treat me like an outcast when they found out.

The words, “You’re HIV positive,” changed me instantly because I had no idea what I was about to go through. My name is Katara, and I’m a beautiful, 33-year-old trans woman from Fort Lauderdale. When I was diagnosed with HIV, I broke down really bad. For me, not having HIV was something to be proud of because of the stigma of everybody saying, “You’re gay, you’re gonna get HIV and AIDS.” So when I found out I had HIV, I felt dirty and nasty inside like I was a cockroach that needed to be stepped on.

The thing is I had been using condoms, but it only takes one time. I was in between escorting and having a boyfriend. As an escort, I always used condoms, but with this boy, I didn’t. I didn’t know him well, but he told me he would never hurt me. When he looked into my eyes and said we didn’t need to get tested because he didn’t have HIV, I was like, “Okay, baby, I trust you.” But the relationship became rocky, and I found out I was HIV+ after he left me. I was not thankful for what I was left with - I felt like I laid down with a dog, and I got up with fleas. Fleas go away, though. HIV doesn’t.

I’m Kendrick, and I’m a 60-year-old straight man from Jamaica. I am also HIV+ and have been living with HIV for many years. Because I take my HIV meds every day, my HIV has been undetectable, and I’ve felt really good, but suddenly I began feeling pretty sick again. It reminded me of how my body felt before I found out I had AIDS. Anyway, I kept on taking my meds, but my health was getting worse! When I finally made an appointment to see a doctor, the doc told me my viral load was high. It didn’t make any sense because I wasn’t doing anything different and the doc had a hard time trusting me when I told him I never missed taking a dose of my meds. 

It was April 14, 2006, I was sitting in the UCF campus clinic only a freshman in college when the doctor told me I tested positive for HIV. The doctor from the clinic sent my information to my health care provider so I had been expecting a call. What I didn’t expect was to be judged by the person who was supposed to help me.

I guess he was having a bad day or something because the first time he called, he immediately started chewing me out, “What were you thinking sleeping with all these men” and just dogging me out. Thirty-two seconds. That’s how long it took for him to call back. I was in tears but I remember because I had to count to calm myself down. It was the health care provider calling to apologize for what he said minutes earlier. He was like, “Oh my God, I just did the math on the year you were born. You have to be 18 or 19. I’m so sorry for what I said.”

I got HIV from the love of my life. I'm Denise, a Hispanic woman originally from Venezuela. He was a sweet and funny Latin Musician, a Nuyorican I met here in South Florida. We fell madly in love, but the year after he proposed to me, he started getting tired all the time and became very sick. When he finally went to the doctor with white lesions on his lips, he discovered he had HIV/AIDS. The news was a shock for both of us, and my husband believed he had been infected by a former girlfriend who never informed him of her status.

I wasn't in a hurry to find out if I had HIV because I was physically very healthy and working full-time while also caring for my husband when he became too sick to work. Because I was so healthy, the doctors thought I might be negative and said they'd seen cases where one partner is positive, and the other is negative. When my husband's health started rapidly declining four months after his diagnosis, that's when I decided to get an HIV test. My test came back positive for HIV.

I was dating somebody back in 1994 when I found out I was HIV positive. We both went to get tested, and I was the one with the bad news. At that time, I was disgusted and felt dirty - I wanted to shower in bleach! It took me a long time after finding out before I would even be intimate with anybody because I didn't want to put anybody through that. And so, disclosing my status hasn't always been easy for me because when I've shared my status in the past, sometimes I've been told things like I'm "not clean." And when you really, really like somebody, and there's chemistry, having to drop that bomb can be a very uncomfortable conversation whether or not the other person is HIV positive.

Once I was dating this doctor, and we were getting along great - the chemistry was incredible! Knowing that he was a medical professional, it seemed safe and that he understood once I did have that conversation with him. But soon afterward, he broke up with me saying he didn't want to get involved with somebody who could die. I had a hard time processing his ignorant statement because I didn't plan on dying, and he could've been hit by a bus tomorrow. But you learn to pick up and go on, and eventually, you come to terms with, okay, this is your life now, and you just got to deal with it. You realize that if you really like a person, then you should also be caring about their health and well-being and do anything to ensure that. That's why I always recommend disclosing your status. It's not about a quick experience. It's about caring for this person and having that conversation because you obviously want them in your life.

I have been arrested 3 times in South Florida and have been living on the streets here since being released from prison about 4- months ago. I’m a 33-year-old African American male who has worked hard to get my bachelor’s in Fine Arts, I trained as a ballet dancer, and I’m HIV+. Just before I graduated college, I fell in love with a man and we moved in together not that long after. We had a great time, in the beginning, going out and partying as much as we could. That was how I got started on meth and eventually became addicted. After my 3rd time in jail, I realized that I wasn’t in control of my life anymore and that I couldn’t remember the last time I heard from a friend.

I also found out later that my boyfriend had a drinking problem. When he was diagnosed with cancer, I knew it was time to do something to take care of myself! We broke up because the drug use was getting in the way, and he didn’t seem to want to take care of himself anymore. After the breakup, I found myself on the streets and in homeless shelters, surviving on the handouts people gave me. 

I wish I could go back in time and educate myself about HIV transmission. I wasn’t taking care of myself and I didn’t know how much of a risk I was putting myself in regarding HIV. I used to only have sex with people who said they were negative because I trusted that they knew their status. I never had sex with anyone who said they were undetectable because I thought that I could still get the virus from them. I didn’t realize that the people who said they were HIV negative but didn’t actually know their status, were more of a threat. So, since I thought they were HIV negative, I never used or asked a lover to use a condom during sex.

I was stunned to find out I had contracted the virus after a routine HIV test. Everything I knew about HIV and its transmission was wrong. It was then that I realized that if I wanted to change my life for the better, I had to start immediately. I needed to work on myself.

No one could have ever prepared me for the death of my dad. I couldn’t handle losing someone so close and just when I was starting to cope, my grandma died soon after. I wanted to withdraw from the world, from everyone and everything. I was consumed by my depression but that wasn’t the only thing that plagued my mind. Around that time, I remember having a sexual encounter that had me seriously concerned for my health.

I didn’t use a condom, so I knew there was a possibility I could have contracted HIV. I kept putting off getting tested because the idea of being HIV positive and having to deal with my dad’s death felt so overwhelming at the time. I had been confiding in a close friend of mine and he insisted I get tested. After talking about it for weeks, I finally decided to follow through and we drove to a testing facility together. I was hoping my suspicions were just suspicions but the test results came back and my intuition was right – I was HIV positive. I started medication almost immediately and it has been a part of my daily regimen ever since.

It came out of nowhere. I could barely breathe and there was an intense pain in my chest. I tried laying down but that hurt. I tried getting out of bed but that hurt too. The pain became so unbearable that I finally went to the hospital. After drawing my blood and running some tests, the doctor told me that the pain I was experiencing was heart inflammation. I was sure it was from installing drywall, painting houses and inhaling all these dangerous fumes without wearing a mask.

The heart inflammation was surprising in itself, but what the doctor said next left me in shock. He informed me that my blood work came back and that I tested positive for HIV. Not only was I on bed rest for weeks from the heart inflammation, I was stuck in a hospital room with nothing but my negative thoughts trying to process the fact that I had HIV.

Looking back, I guess it shouldn’t have been such a surprise. I’d been running the streets, smoking and selling dope since I was a teenager. My addiction to crack cocaine led me to a point where I couldn’t even recognize myself in the mirror and I eventually found myself making reckless choices when it came to my health. I would see these females getting high and sometimes they would have sex with me in exchange for drugs or money. Most days I was so high I didn’t even bother or care to wear a condom.

My biggest fear in life is that I wouldn't be loved. So, I put all my energy into acting to assume the role my perfect Jewish family wanted me to live. My name is Richard, but I honestly didn't know who Richard was. When I was 6 years old, I wondered if I was the only boy in Boston who preferred looking at boys and their muscles - this made me feel like the loneliest person in the world. As I grew older, I eventually gave up on developing my role as the perfect son and left for New York in my early twenties. There I discovered that people accepted me for who I was, and when I got promoted to Director at my company, it was proof a gay boy could become successful. I realized that being gay was not an illness as my mother had called it. However, at age 53, I was surprised to find out I had contracted an actual illness - I was HIV positive!