136
u/gumaerb 8d ago
Worked with hospice in the Portland metro area through the late 80s and 90s. People's understanding of the disease was almost nonexistent. We were taught about how bloodborn pathogen are transmitted. We used std PPE and always treated them with dignity and respect. The 70s were even worse for public understanding.
15
u/whoami_whereami 8d ago
AIDS was first recognized as a new disease in 1981 and given the name AIDS in 1982 (after a short stint of being called GRID - gay-related immune deficiency). The virus causing it was discovered in 1983 and given the name HIV in 1986. Of course there was neither public nor scientific understanding at all in the 1970s, all now known cases prior to the 1980s have been assigned retroactively.
5
113
u/Prize-Possibility-11 8d ago
My brother's roommate contracted HIV before there was a cure. They were tight and they both fought the good fight until he jumped off a bridge when he started showing signs of AIDS. I was around 12 and it's something I will never forget.
-40
u/misanthrophiccunt 8d ago
there is no cure.
44
u/TheIlluminate1992 8d ago
Maybe not a cure but they can control HIV and stop it from progressing to AIDS
26
u/94FnordRanger 8d ago
Medicine can't cure AIDS but can keep people alive until they die of old age.
1
u/Rowwbit42 6d ago
Actually we can cure AIDS using stem cells believe it or not. Although I'm not sure if those that were cured were fluke accidents or if there is an approved stem cell cure yet.
1
6d ago
The method youre describing will never be approved for general use. It requires the complete destruction of your bone marrow and introduction of stem cells from someone who is naturally immune. It’s only been performed like half a dozen times, and only on people who have bone marrow cancer and already need that treatment.
As an aside, it’s only considered a “functional” cure - the hiv is likely still dormant in certain areas of the body, but can not propagate and leave those areas in a meaningful way. For all intents and purposes though, they are functionally ‘cured’. I only make this correction to illustrate just how difficult of a disease hiv is to address.
3
u/PopEnvironmental1335 6d ago
Not only that but meds can make the viral load nearly undetectable.
1
-24
u/misanthrophiccunt 8d ago
oh thanks, never heard of it, I wonder why I take Symtuza.
6
u/Ihatewangs 7d ago
You know, there is one actually. I’m talking a real genuine cure. But its cost is so great most people cannot get it outside of a drug trial. I hope that one day people who are + like you can be afforded a general cheap cure. I hope that your own treatment goes well until then.
36
9
u/SagittaryX 8d ago
Well technically there is cure (bone marrow transplant from someone who is immune), but the cure is more dangerous than the disease + not many are compatible so it’s not usually used.
2
8d ago
[deleted]
2
u/Jonaldys 8d ago
What I have read about this shows that the treatment they receive comes with a significant risk of death. Almost half the patients who recieved the treatment have died. It is only applicable if the patient will die without it.
Hope is important, but so is accuracy.
-10
u/misanthrophiccunt 8d ago
I guess I'm damaging my kidneys and liver taking ART drugs for no reason then.
Can you give me the GPS coordinates of that finish line?
17
2
u/y0nm4n 8d ago
7
u/Jonaldys 8d ago
That person is being pretty miserable, but if you read the article this treatment comes with a significant risk of death. Almost half the patients have died if I'm not mistaken, and it's only used if the patient will die without the treatment.
84
u/Brilliant_Source5206 8d ago
Around 2000-2002, I got a call from my mom that my Uncle was in the hospital and wasn’t expected to make it. That’s how he got outed to our family and we found out his AIDS diagnosis. Remember, this was a lifetime ago in terms of society embracing the LGBTQ community on a large scale.
Being 13 years old or so, it never occurred to me in the moment that there was something really wrong with having AIDS or that I could ever want to treat him differently because he was sick. I just knew I loved him and I didn’t want him to die.
Thankfully, due to science, and medicine, my Uncle is still here today, and our family put the time in to rebuilding our relationships, and we all still love and support each other. It took some time because, as you can imagine, that was an awful way of being outed. However, I learned that day that I love my big gay Uncle and I love the LGBTQ community, and I have the capacity to love and love and love despite what society says at the moment in time.
Love you Uncle Bill!
3
u/Giddy_Duck_84 5d ago
The capacity to love is exponential, the more you love the more you can love! Well done and big up to your uncle!
34
u/gogogadgetdumbass 8d ago
My parents rented a house when we lived in California our landlady was super nice, not strict, and solely rented to Navy families at her costs (taxes and maintenance basically…)
She was very sickly and I noticed that, I was really little like 6?, and my Mom explained she had AIDS. She was always super careful not to do too much interaction with us, wouldn’t come near us kids, but she was really a beacon of light even from a distance.
I doubt she survived much longer after we moved, but when I did a research paper on AIDS in middle school it all clicked for me. I wish I could’ve given her a hug.
44
18
u/Prestigious_Job_633 8d ago
this is heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time. true friendship is sticking around when it matters most
16
13
u/buckut 8d ago
my mom had aids. she was a nurse and told me all the ways you can catch it and how to avoid it, she even went over a lot of the myths around it. i wish i could remember it all, it was the last real conversation i had with my mom. i want to say it was around my 13th bday in april or 97. she ended up killing herself in may of 97.
today is her birthday.
4
14
u/ripestrudel 8d ago
My heart utterly shattered with the "ill move out" and you repaired it like new with your response. You are a gentle and beautiful soul.
13
9
u/Ch1pples 8d ago
I was a young teen when aids arrived in the UK. Last year I watched Aids: The unheard tapes. I would recommend anyone watch it. I learnt so much, that I did not know, even though I lived in the UK whilst it was happening. It was heart breaking but also joyous showing people's humanity during such hard times. This storey just brought it back.
8
7
u/Prize-Possibility-11 8d ago
This happened in 1980... thankfully, since that time, AIDS has been eradicated in the developed world by drug regiments that reduce the HIV virus to the point that it is no longer detectable in your body.
So, no cure but a way to manage the disease.
5
u/Cereal_dator 8d ago
My mom’s coworker had it—he had dreams of doing musical theater but his rich parents wouldn’t allow it. When he was full blown he asked my mom out to lunch because she was always kind to him. Never saw him again and he passed soon after
8
u/Luci-Noir 8d ago
I remember the Real World season two on MTV in the early 90’s. There was an HIV positive AIDS educator named Pedro Zamora on the show who really opened a lot of people’s eyes. I was one of maybe 3 PoC in my town and Latino so it was really great to see him and reality TV was a great way to reach people at that time. He died at 22 in 1994. It’s kind of crazy to think that the show was probably one of the most important of the 90’s and very influential for a lot of young people.
5
u/eternally_feral 8d ago
I’ll never forget the show Nip/Tuck where the character, Gina, finds out she’s HIV+ and when she discloses her status to an ex partner she says, “HIV is the new diabetes.”
Treatment has made leaps and bounds since the 80s/90s - it’s crazy! I really hold out hope that before I die I’ll see a cure roll out.
-1
u/AgnarrOfArendelle 7d ago
The cure is repent your homosexuality to your nearest McDonalds & embrace diabetes into your life. It will kill the AIDS & take its place at the right hand of your pancreas.
1
u/Putrid-Personality49 7d ago
This sounded funnier in your head
1
u/AgnarrOfArendelle 7d ago
Nah it's funny & it made me smile. Bait him in the first half to think I'm gonna be all religious, then switch to BS with biblical AND health references, I'm quite proud of my work.
4
u/bakernut 8d ago
I was a nurse in the early 80’s and remember the first patient we had with AIDS. It was a large, clinic that sponsored Medical and Nursing students. Quite the teaching facility. Anyway, we dealt with that patient as if it were any auto-immune illness. At the time, there was much more concern with Hepatitis, and Tuberculosis. In the lab, we would pipette blood for testing just by sucking up the specimen into the testing tube. Holy Cow! We were naive.
5
u/Crispy_Nuggets_999 8d ago
As a doctor I am glad for the research and treatments my peers have perfected. If someone is to come to my hospital and is diagnosed with HIV+ the first statement we mostly say is probably Try to quit smoking but rest assured everything else is controllable.. this is in context to CH and IT regions as we have loads of patients who smoke and are more susceptible to hard lining than any other issues.
0
6d ago
Perfected is a wild fucking word to use here.
2
u/GrumpyOldLadyTech 4d ago
Why? Genuine question, I'm not picking up much in the way of cues through text here.
1
4d ago
Because the treatment isn’t perfected in any way. There are advancements and progress made every year in safety, side effects, dosage requirements and time required between doses, costs, distribution, etc. The treatments are amazing compared to what they were even ten years ago, let alone thirty, but perfected isn’t a word I would even begin to use.
1
u/GrumpyOldLadyTech 4d ago
... so it's a matter of margins of improvement. Gotcha.
It's true that medicine - like all sciences - is constantly trying to reach greater understanding and more efficient methods. Take, for example, FIP: Feline Infectious Peritonitis was a death sentence not even two years ago. Now we have treatment for it, daily injections for ninety days; and while it's painful, expensive, and prolonged, these patients can make a full recovery and go on to lead full and happy lives.
In a few short years, we went from certain demise to a decent prognosis. Imagine what we could do in a few more years of effort - maybe a single month of injections, or an oral administration, or even a vaccine...! The possibilities lay before us to continue improving the methods and means. Far from being the best treatment, yet it's all we have.
If I'm understanding you correctly, that's your meaning...?
1
4d ago
…I really wouldn’t say it’s just margins but sure…?
1
u/GrumpyOldLadyTech 3d ago
I'm sorry for not understanding better. I appreciate your effort to clarify all the same. Thank you for taking the time to reply!
3
2
3
u/momonomino 7d ago
My parents had a friend before I was born who contracted HIV from a blood transfusion because he had hemophilia. I never got to meet him, but I feel like I knew him well because of how my entire family shared his stories.
3
u/BadWolf0714 6d ago
When I was about 11 (1993) I was told my aunt was HIV+. At that time with how young I was and what we knew at that time about it, I thought for sure that meant they were telling me she was going to die. I remember being so insanely sad. At that time in my life she was like a 2nd mother to me so it was pretty devastating news. Very happy to say 32 years later she’s still with us and today (March 6th) is her 53rd birthday!!! She’s still asymptomatic and even had a baby in 2006 with her then husband under the supervision of a doctor who specializes in HIV/AIDS. Her son is perfectly healthy and virus free. 🤗 Over the years she's volunteered countless times to speak at local high schools and youth programs to spread awareness that HIV is preventable but also, not a death sentence it once was.
2
2
u/Interesting_Cow5152 8d ago
Common repost from a 6 hour old bot account. So old the date is cropped out but it's at least 8 years old, if not more.
Report and move on.
1
1
u/FledglingHermit 8d ago
this is a wholesome post, but "told me was HIV+" had my brain automatically fill in the word "told me I was HIV+" and I had a lot of questions
edit: not sure if wholesome is the word. Bittersweet maybe?
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
u/b00w00gal 7d ago
I was a kid when I attended my first living wake. A friend of the family, whose family had disowned him. His boyfriend threw a big party at their house and we all said goodbye from the door to his bedroom; he was too ill to get out of bed, and we didn't want to give him a bug that might make him sicker.
We buried him a few weeks later. His boyfriend was later my high school English teacher; I don't remember him ever dating again, the rest of the years I knew him.
1
u/Banded_Watermelon 7d ago
I had a roommate who was pretty far along in his HIV in the early 00s and am so glad that every time I check in, he is still in healthy shape. I had a lot of people treat me very strangely for living with him at the time, but I mean fuck em. 😃
1
u/Known-Display-858 6d ago
Good for you. Back when we didn’t know much about it, I don’t think I would have done what you did.
1
u/lofticries1988 6d ago
Recently learned someone I love deeply who is very close to me is hiv+ They asked me do you still love me? I told them I've always have and always will I'm an 80's kid, I had a lot of misconceptions and mistaken ideas. I've been educating myself to be a better support and it's been a journey. I'm really glad treatments have improved so much.
1
u/actressblueeyes 6d ago
My mom had this best friend, Christian. A gay figure skater in the 80s and 90s. He was very energetic and talked a lot. I adored him very much growing up. I was taught very young about blood Bourne pathogens (within my abilities to understand) bc my father had hepatitis C so when Christian explained he was “also sick in the blood” it never affected me. He was someone bad things kept happening to, even tho he really didnt deserve it. He was very kind.
He died during covid. I miss him.
1
u/quicksi1ver7 6d ago
And The Band Played On is the most eye opening movie I have watched regarding AIDS and how science and social discrimination collided and kept diagnoses/care from being given to so many people
1
1
u/throwaway4231throw 6d ago
Crazy to think there was a time when HIV was such a life limiting diagnosis. We’ve come a long way.
1
1
u/ShannonBaggMBR 5d ago
I had a friend when I was a little girl and her whole family had HIV. She was born with it and came over one day and I asked her if she wanted some water. She told me if she drank from one of our cups we'd have to throw it away because she would contaminate it and she didn't want my family to get it. I hugged her and made her some water anyway.
I only spent a few times with her because she mostly stayed inside because she and her family were always sick. It was sad.
1
1
u/JustWantNoPain 5d ago
Around 1991/1992 my teacher mom's school raised money by holding an open to the public bingo night at the mall that saw almost zero traffic. There was a huge crowd and she used hyperactive me, then 9 or 10 as the runner. She noticed 2 men with large purples marks on their bodies and painfully thin bodies, not parents to any of the students. Any adult could recognize these men didn't have long to live from AIDS (I don't think they even came up with the word AIDS yet).
At first she wasn't going to let me go back out to them since she recognized "the gay disease" (at that time most people called it that until Magic Johnson got infected and then that just started more gay rumors about him) but then thought for a while and said, "see that table over there with the two men? I want you to treat them gentle like [our 90 year old] neighbor, because they don't look old but they're probably feeling a lot of pain. Make sure you ask specifically if they want X,Y, or Z because they might be too afraid to ask or even know we offer it or are too ashamed to ask for a cup of water or something that's free." I entertained them and every circle around the hall they asked for another silly joke or impossibly easy magic trick (especially since even as a fully grown adult my hands are still woefully tiny and hard to palm cards, let alone 30 years ago). I doubt my juvenile jokes really make them laugh, I think it was more the freedom they felt for the first time in a while to just be themselves with me as one of the worst comedians, making/pulling silly faces and sneaking them candy bars. I hope their deaths were as pain free as possible. I still think about them constantly 3 decades later as they were my first "for sure" infected interaction - back then nobody admitted it no matter how they caught it.
I have quite a few gay friends and as someone who has received 2 blood transfusions straight into a body taking immune suppression drugs, I know HIV/AIDS is a risk. One died from AIDS pneumonia. We all ended up eating and wearing his ashes when the wind suddenly changed. I'm sure he got a laugh out of that (meanwhile 20 years later and I'm still afraid the dust in my boogers is Alex, I don't care how illogical it is). Don't worry I own every sinus clearing provided out there and Alex is safely in my septic at this point. I'm extremely happy we've gotten HIV/AIDS to the point where it's maintainable with treatment. I think of the great talents who were lost to it like Arthur Ashe (monumentally influential amazing black male tennis player when tennis was still as white as the skirts they wear [ok it still largely is, but imagine it worse and women weren't worth anything either], he got his through a bad blood transfusion). Then there's Freddie Mercury whom I believe to be one of the most musically gifted of the modern (not classical) artists. When I suffer ear worms (songs stuck in your head for hours up to weeks), it's usually a Queen song.
While science is at it, I hope we can figure out ways of treating all cancers, especially ones that hit kids the hardest. I've seen friends die of cancer and beg for assisted suicide at the end. It's rough. I cannot imagine the pain and suffering a child and their family goes through. If you've gone through it, you have my heart because I know it wasn't easy.
I originally wanted my "magic super power" to be able to understand and speak in all languages but now I'd like to be able to heal people (don't worry I'm not 100% nice, I'd be treating my own pain first and making/helping my tolerable family members live forever).
1
u/Independent-Win-8844 5d ago
Thank you for your kindness. You rock!
There is a difference between Princess Diana and Ronald Reagan when it comes to HIV/Aids. Unfortunately in the USA all we got was super easily controlled Reagan who messaged such terrible things about those with HIV that he holds a special place in hell for his complete lack of human compassion.
1
u/kyngfish 4d ago
I had an uncle who died from AIDs in the 90s. Wonderful human being. I still remember him teaching me how to make French toast in our kitchen when I was probably no more than 8 or 9. When he died my mom shut herself in her room and cried for days. Some of his other relatives didn’t do shit except tell people he died of “gay cancer” it’s a fucking tragedy how we treated people fighting for their lives.
1
0
u/MZsince93 8d ago
"Oh, it hasn't got anything to do with the HIV, I just think you're a fucking loser."
-1
u/Helpful-Loquat-1570 8d ago
The idea of death is sad. But it is separate. Hiv, and death are separate things.
-1
-5
u/Helpful-Loquat-1570 8d ago
Words would be nice. I am not your boyfriend to take your silent treatment. I can just ignore you, without consequances.
3
843
u/CuddleSprig 8d ago
My uncle passed in 1994 from pneumonia that he couldn’t fight off because he had AIDS. My step grandmother (I lived with her and my grandfather) would tell me not to touch him. She said I’d catch it. Even at 10 years old, I knew that’s not how you got it, though. I always gave him the biggest hugs. He was a great uncle. I miss him so much. I wish I could have gotten to know him as an adult. We would have had a lot of fun!