This July, PN had a letter of thanks from reader Carole in praise of the National Long Term Survivors’ Group. The group had given Carole her life back. Tragically, Carole lost that life abruptly, just a month after her letter came in. Her partner Jeff remembers her ups and downs
Jeff tells Carole’s story:
“Carole’s dad, an army sergeant, ruled his household with an iron fist and the odd army boot. Mum sought refuge in valium and alcohol.
Carole as the eldest sibling naturally assumed the mother role to protect her
younger sisters. At 11 she was effectively the responsible adult, as her mother
was rarely sober enough to be even aware of them.
Her dad was a serial philanderer; his conquests included both his wife’s sister and his own 11-year-old daughter: Carole, who took mummy’s medicine to ease the pain. This path led her to flee the nest at age 14, a woman. A path that led her during her teens and early 20s into the hell of heroin addiction and, later HIV infection.
She was diagnosed in 1984, the same year she was convicted and sentenced to six years for cocaine trafficking from Holland to Germany. While she was inside, her husband also HIV positive, died of toxoplasmosis. Carole believed he was a victim of AZT. She served all but four months of her sentence in total isolation from the general prison population.
She came back to England and lost two more partners in quick succession. When I met her in 1998 she had spent most of the 90s in a cross-addicted hell of alcohol and prescription drugs : valium, temazepam, and others. I had to struggle single-handed to bring her out of those years drowning in that famous African river, denial. That’s right, me - 13 years older, a former screaming cross-addicted lunatic himself - me, trying to ease my own pain and denial.
She achieved it with three years of total abstinence from drink and drugs. But in the process she’d taken the anti-depressant Seroxat that imposed its own side effects - depression that became suicidal rather than merely crushing - and two years’ dependence on that.
A change of medication started the recovery from hell. The healing had begun. And when Positive Nation published Tom Lucas’s story (Opposites Attract, PN 68) in July 2001 that truly inspired Carole to change.
Last year, she discovered the ‘Living Proof’ weekends run by the National Long-Term Survivors’ Group (NLTSG) - and found that she was not alone any more. After 191/2 years alone she came across friends, lovers and soulmates. They became her So Solid Crew. So much so that she immediately adopted them as family and they hers. The empathy, love and care she came across there were icing on the cake of life.
At the weekend on 3 July this year she talked to Tom Matthews, the director of the NLTSG, and at his prompting, wrote her letter (below). It was like her life had come full circle.
But her life had come full circle in a different way. It closed suddenly and tragically on 24 August 2003, at the Conquest Hospital, Hastings. As yet no cause of death has been ascertained, but the doctors think she was killed by lactic acidosis, a rare, lethal side effect of HIV drugs. I was present when she died. She felt no pain due to heavy sedation.
So to all of you at the Long-Term Survivors’ Group - live long and God bless you all. With everlasting gratitude, Jeff
Carole’s letter to PN:
“Hi, I’m Carole. I was diagnosed HIV positive in May 1984. Last year I read Tom’s story in PN. After reading the article I became aware of the National Long Term Survivors’ Group (NLTSG).
After a two-year deep depression, I really needed something more in my life, if I was to keep it. NLTSG proved to be it!
After 11 years of non-stop travelling I finally, eventually got to a place I was looking for. Exhausted, tired and tearful.
I felt such warmth, compassion and empathy like I have never known in my whole lifetime. The days I spent there on 4-6 July 2003 were filled with fun, open and closed groups, aromatherapy massages, good sincere conversations, good, good food. It was all worth it. I paid for myself, as I couldn’t get sponsored, but that was worth the ££s two or three times over.
I hereby thank everyone from the bottom of my heart for all the love and understanding and a new lease of life, which I’m living to the full.
Thank you all, and may your dreams come true. I’ll be back around Christmas.
Love, Carole from Hastings
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The National Long-Term Survivors’ Group holds its Living Proof weekends several times a year in Staffordshire. The next is on 19-21 December - see www.nltsg.org for details. To book, phone 01449 780211 or email Tom Matthews at tommatthews@blueyonder.co.uk NLTSG is actively looking for partners so that weekends can be held elsewhere in the UK. |
