Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for Lepheana Mosooane
Never judge a man until you've walked miles in his shoes. One day I was
sitting alone in my room drinking my cold beer as usual. Then I got a call for
my closest friend. I quickly grabbed the phone from the table but before I could
answer it I remembered something. He had come to a local hospital to do a
voluntary medical male circumcision. The first thing that came into my mind was
pain. I was scared that he was going to tell me how painful it was. Then I said
to myself "Maybe he's going to tell me something different" so I decided to pick
up the phone. He greeted me and before I knew it he said "Dude I'm HIV
positive." I was shocked, I couldn't believe what I had. I stand quietly as if
I was watching a horror movie, my mind took me back to the days when I was
putting with him day and night, to the days one would sleep on the same bed and
share alcohol and share sex partners and I said to myself there's no doubt I'm
also HIV positive but I didn't want to believe it. But I didn't want to believe it.
Then suddenly I remember that
I was on a call. I said to him "It's okay, we will talk tomorrow" and I dropped the
call. As I sat alone quietly in my room, I remember the time when I was six years
old the first time I saw an HIV positive person and it was on TV.
I saw a dark tall skinned man in a dirty hospital and he was grinding his teeth. I
said to myself HIV-positive people are not people and they need to be kept away
from the society. I never had an HIV positive neighbor, I never had an HIV
positive friend, I never had a HIV positive family member but here is my
closest friend and he's HIV positive. The following morning we met and I told
myself that I didn't want to quickly show him that I was going to stigmatize
him like I was doing with all innocent send HIV positive people.
So I greeted him with a fake smile as if he was not reading my mind. He grabbed my
hand and greeted me. I was shocked but I could feel the same touch. He was still
my friend. I couldn't feel the HIV virus. I could feel that he's still a human being
just like me. We joked, we smiled, we drank together again. He was still my
friend. The desire of going to the hospital to do a voluntary medical male
circumcision kept on raining in my heart but I was scared to do the HIV test. Then
one day I said to myself "It's now or never."
Off I went to the hospital I remember sitting alone in the counseling room
with a counselor I felt like I was in prison and the only the only keys for
my freedom were my HIV test results. The counselor kept on the most trade in
the HIV test but my mind was absent. I could remember there was a woman in my
village and she was selling traditional beer. She was HIV positive and I was
worth saying to myself "Why would people buy beer from an HIV-positive woman?" My
mind took me back to the days when I was HIV peer educator and I was telling
people about stigma but deep down I was secretly stigmatizing HIV positive.
people. I told myself that I could not share food with an HIV positive person,
I cannot kiss an HIV-positive person but here I was scared to know my HIV test. As
if I was waking from a dream the counselor said "Shall we?" I gave her my
finger and she drew some blood and poured it cautiously on the HIV test cut
and we waited for some moments. Every single moment passing it was as if needles
were flow in my bloodstream. In my life I've never experienced such
long two minutes.
I didn't know what I was thinking but I couldn't imagine facing my father.
I couldn't imagine facing my mother and telling them that I'm HIV positive.
Because I could see them breaking because of all the trust they had but then
again I still fell that I had a chance then the counselor said "Now it's time to
look at the results." At that time my heart was beating like a throbbing engine
of the helicopter. I was sweating, I was weak,
I wanted to kill myself, but I was powerless. As they say, "Curiosity never
killed your eye." I looked at the result
I couldn't believe what I saw. I was HIV negative. I was excited, I wanted to
scream, I wanted to tell the whole world that I'm HIV negative, but then
again I thought of all those thousands and thousands of men who are scared to know
their HIV status because of stigma. At that moment I made a pledge that every
HIV program that I work on I'll establish a revolution against stigma
because I realized that more than half of people who are killed by HIV AIDS are
not killed by the virus, but they killed by stress and stigma.
That's not HIV/AIDS that kills, it's stress and stigma. Stigma is in our heart and
it's for us to make it live or to kill it. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, Lepheana Mosooane