Paul Bakalite Emotional intelligence
I’m not all that interested in HIV. Perhaps this sounds like
an odd thing for a positive person to say, but those who are HIV positive
are not obliged to consider their disease of major interest or a major signifier
of who they are. It’s a part of me, an important part, but I’ve
known it long enough now to know it’s not everything.
There’s no doubt receiving an HIV diagnosis has a huge impact. Initially
the knowledge was overwhelming and, for me, it remained so for years. I look
back on finding out I was HIV positive in 1998 as a pivotal event in my life.
There was an inevitability about my contracting HIV that didn’t make
diagnosis a surprise. This inevitability arose from a dangerous and unconscious
desire to self-destruct and an underdeveloped ability to value myself.
I didn’t think “oh, that can’t happen to me,” but
nor did I care enough about myself to prevent it happening. I also think I
got HIV simply because I was a randy young man doing what comes naturally.
And perhaps, if I am honest, I actually wanted some means of opting further
out of ‘normal’ society that had never welcomed me, and that I
could never really make work for myself. HIV was a further step away for someone
already conditioned to feel like an outsider.
After diagnosis I entered a part of life that I could now call “the
numb years”. Being diagnosed with a life-threatening disease, even if
it doesn’t threaten your life immediately, is like bereavement. It is
bereavement from the self, and bereavement demands a period of mourning. How
long varies from person to person. There are no rules, no right or wrong,
only we know when we are through it.
News of HIV infection is big and something you can never undo. At first it
can seem both inescapable and terrifying. Some people deal with this psychological
trauma by not dealing with it. They close down and ignore HIV until forced
by illness to pay attention. Others can’t stop dealing with it. In an
attempt to take back control of their lives they become unpaid HIV treatment
experts, sometimes struggling to remain on top of what is a powerfully complex
and fluid subject. Crisis provokes extreme response, perhaps even more so
if you are someone who already polarises between extremes of behaviour.
I
thought life was over, that everything good had happened in the past. I didn’t
feel there could be a future and so I didn’t try and make one, not for
years. Whole months drifted by when all I did was smoke a lot of skunk weed,
not something I’d now advise anyone with fragile emotional health to
do. I watched every episode of Star Trek Voyager, twice. I was depressed and
numb at a deep level. At other times I crashed through every emotional state,
from denial to anger, resignation, even elation, and drank till black-out.
But I was still numb, even when I wasn’t quiet.
It was a sad time, yet I think HIV contributed to a breakdown that I needed
to have. Even in the most horrendous life experiences some lesson or some
good can be found. People fall apart so that they can put themselves back
together. Being HIV positive and desiring to make sense of why I became HIV
positive later caused me to reappraise both the past and potential future.
With a recognition of binge-drinking alcoholism and an examination of long-standing
personality traits, I began to reach a true acceptance of myself.
There will be new lessons and obstacles as and when my physical health deteriorates
further, but after eight years I am comfortable with my condition. I also
don’t care who knows about it. If others feel prejudice towards me then
they are responsible for that prejudice. It’s their business, not mine.
In saying, ‘I’m not interested in HIV,’ I’m not saying
I don’t want to stay reasonably informed about it. As a positive person
it is important to monitor your health, both physical and mental. It is important
to take up activities and be with people that allow healing, change and spiritual
growth to happen. But HIV isn’t me. It dominated my thoughts for a long
time and it doesn’t now. I’d rather think about beautiful men,
or architecture, or something funny and intelligent on TV, like Charlie Brooker’s
Screen Wipe. I’d prefer to do a few things in my local community that
might be helpful to others and help me feel like a useful person.
I’d like, in some small way if I can, to help other positive people
and other gay men have an easier time of it than I did. I’d like to
write about lots of things. I’ve started to do some of this. I am going
to do more.
