VAGINA
MONOLOGUE
SEX AND THE SUBURBS
stop press - Natasha's baby Ben was born on 13 Dec 2004 at 10.55 pm, weighing in at 6lb 7 ozs
I haven’t seen my vagina in over a month. Quite frankly I could have grown a penis and I’d be none the wiser. Trying to trim pubic hair I suspect is growing into a yeti-like foliage, down my thighs - while sporting a gargantuan pregnancy bulge - becomes an act of genital mutilation. I’m sure I’ve lost at least one of my labia in the process. This humiliation, coupled with pregnancy piles and extraordinarily erratic hormonal imbalance, has led to my metamorphosis into a hyper-sensitive shrieking virago, who happens to be living with HIV.
It dawned on me my tolerance was at an all-time low the other day when I hurled my ham sandwich at my partner after he commented that I was “not particularly busy”. I watched in awe as a piece of buttery ham slowly slithered down his brand new £800 Kenzo suit.
Similarly, I was transported into paroxysms of rage upon discovering that someone had put a posting on the UKC website’s discussion board stating that the PN columnists were all ‘crap’ and ‘didn’t live in the real world’. Luckily no projectiles were close at hand, nor the perpetrator, so I was able to contemplate his criticisms with a level of detachment and deep breaths into a paper bag. I was intrigued by his notion of a ‘real’ world. Did he assume his experience of living with HIV was shared uniformly by everyone? And that any other viewpoint was fraudulent or invalid?
One of the few charms of the virus is how deliciously diverse we all are. I can’t see a common universal experience of living with HIV, beyond sharing a virus that happens to attack our immunity to various degrees of severity. How we choose to cope differs significantly. To me HIV can sometimes be a drag, but quite frankly, I believe there are worse things in life - like being ugly or wearing bad shoes. But I wouldn’t begin to assume my current viewpoint or experience was necessarily shared by others or was of any enhanced validity. Nor will I embark on guilt-induced self-flagellation or snivelling apologies for my attitudes and lifestyle.
I realise that for many people, receiving a positive diagnosis can be extraordinarily traumatic. Despite my apparent ennui at living with HIV, at the time of my diagnosis I was paralysed with terror, hurtled into despair and had convinced myself that I only had about six years to live. (As that was about six years ago, forgive me if I end abruptly due to collapsing dead onto my key board!) A friend of mine recently diagnosed HIV positive is extraordinarily upbeat about it, describing his diagnosis as ‘a bit of a bore’. He’s been accused of being in denial or pretending to cope so admirably. What gives any of us the right to judge him on the appropriateness of his response, simply because our reaction differed to his?
Obviously the reality of living with HIV in resource-limited settings without access to medication will differ obscenely to the experience of us, fortunate enough to have access to life saving treatments. However, even in the UK, the lifestyles of people living with HIV can differ dramatically. Some of us struggle financially with very real crises around housing or money while others fritter away cash on designer clothes and recreational drugs, and many fall somewhere in between. Surely ‘the real world’ to each group is the world in which they live. There can never be one experience more valid than another.
I won’t try to defend myself against the accusation of being a “crap” columnist. I’m a shameless exhibitionist after all. But PN’s other columnists, past and present, all seem genuinely nice and brave enough to share their intimate experiences of life with HIV. PN has always had diverse columnists, with different experiences, cultures and lifestyles. To label them all ‘crap’ and not living in the real world, seems crass and lacking in imagination and grace. Okay, diatribe over. Blame it on the hormones. Excuse me, I have to go try re-attach my labia...
