Impacting Lives
Reality, Hope and
Commitment
“Your HIV test came back positive!”
I stood paralyzed in disbelief as I heard the counselor say these words. How could this be? I was in love.
I wanted to marry Rick.
Rick and I, both 27 years old, had been exchanging thoughts of marriage. Rick was a virgin. I had a different story. My parents divorced and I had given up hope a good marriage was possible. As I began to date, I did not have clear sexual boundaries. Eventually, I became sexually active. I really wasn’t looking for sex – I was looking for love – the kind of love I had found with Rick. He loved me unconditionally. Rick didn’t love me for sex – we weren’t having sex.
As the news of being HIV-positive raced through my mind, devastating thoughts quickly followed. Would Rick end the relationship? Who would stay in a relationship with someone who was HIV-positive?
However, when I told Rick I was HIV-positive, he said, “I have been looking at engagement rings because I am committed to asking you to marry me and I am sticking by that commitment.” And although I was given a prognosis of only two weeks to a year to live, in October 1993, we were married.
Today, as Rick and I tell our story, the strength of our relationship while facing HIV/AIDS offers real hope and spurs a desire for real commitment. As we walk people through the reality of living with HIV/AIDS (telling my family and Rick’s family, facing my sexual past, taking piles of pills, managing side-effects from drugs, deciding not to have children, riding emotional roller-coasters, fearing rejection, etc.), we also offer a picture of a relationship able to endure.
