Newly Diagnosed
For a long while now, we have been focussing on HIV diagnosis and helping people overcome the various misunderstandings and misinformation about excluding a HIV infection.
However, more and more we find that people who are diagnosed with HIV often find themselves at a lost and searching for information. Often it is the unknown that scares and worries us the most. So the more you know, the less scared or anxious you will be.
For this section, I would like to give some practical tips to a person who has just found out he/she has HIV.
First of all, yes it is a lot to deal with. If you are feeling scared and overwhelmed, that is completely natural. If it helps, just allow yourself to be overwhelmed for a while. Stay in your room, cry, stare at the ceiling or just lie there and let it overcome you.
Try to put aside all your concerns about telling family and friends and your job etc. Focus on yourself. What is going to happen to you physically from now on?
The fact is you have an incurable disease. But then so do people with cancer and the one big difference is you are going to live a lot longer than the person with cancer. You are more like someone who has been diagnosed with Diabetes or High Blood Pressure. These are incurable disease too. But they can be controlled.
That’s right. Just like someone with Diabetes, if you, with HIV, listen to your doctor and stay with treatment, you will lead a normal life span. In other words, you will live as long as someone without HIV. The other good news is during these years, you will feel healthy and well.
So you will live long and healthy except you need to swallow some pills everyday. Not sounding so bad now is it?
So now what do you actually need to do? First of all pull yourself together. The time to be overwhelmed is over. Now is the time to take charge and face this problem head on.
First thing you need to do is to arrange to see a HIV specialist. That will be your first step in a lifetime of treatment. A long and healthy lifetime.
