Here we go again ....

Changing medication is not something I, or anyone else with a chronic
illness for that matter, do just like that. The threat of
"bijwerkingen" is real i,e, more of the same diarhea, hypersomnia,
obstipation etc. But lets not forget the fear of an all new cast of
symptoms on top of the old ones; stomach cramps, dizziness, insomnia,
and on and on and likewise and so forth.

The medication is "necessary". A "necessary evil" is how it's sold to
us.

We have no real evidence of the effects of long term medication,
dosage, combinations, duration.

We have become a race of guinea pigs.
Lets hope we don't turn into lemmings.

Sent from my iPhone

vera springveer: fame

Gone but not forgotten

Bad Night

Dear me .... One of those horrible HIV nights.
Sweating like a pig for a couple of hours then feeliing cold for the
next couple.
Ibuprofen en paracetamol to lower the fever and relieve the pain in
the joints.
Taxi cabs outside my window, screeching horns, ditto English tourists.
Sleep will come eventually ....

Sent from my iPhone

Margaret Cho -- These Christian Groups Have Lost Their Minds

Morning

Up at the crack of dawn. The sun is shining, the sky is clear and
bright. White Party people are making their way back home in two's and
three's. Tiny girls in even tinier white dresses shivering as they
cross the square in front of my window.
It's 6:15 and the city has just hit the snooze button again. Another
hour before it realises it is Saturday and rolls over once again.
Even the junkies are late this morning ....

Sent from my iPhone

Proud (40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots)

Sleep

Sleep is something that we, as a child, take for granted. Its only later on in life when its 4 in the morning and we are still staring up at our middle-aged ceiling that we begin to understand how lucky we were.

Depression makes it worse, anti-depressives make it even more worse, and anti-virals make it sometimes a (please excuse the pun) nightmare.

I cannot just 'go to sleep' anymore. It takes a little medication and a lot of luck to get me asleep in the first place, but even more difficult to get me to stay asleep for no less and no longer than 8 hours a day. My body will sleep on for a minimum of 10 hours per night, wake up for the next 2 hours and then go to sleep again for anything up to 6 hours at a time. This will not exclude a nap of a couple of hours in the afternoon/early evening.

My Hiv specialist says, all people with Hiv are tired.

Pause, play, fast forward

Life has been a bit complicated the last few months.

No, I'm not going into it.

Well, maybe another time ....

I've just bumped into someone who lives around the corner from my Mum. Bizarre. That someone would actually choose to live there. Although my recollections of it are far from rose coloured, more a greyish taupe to be honest, it was on the grim side at best.

What can people expect? It was a heavy to medium industrial area with very little sunny bits. We always used to joke that I'd never actually seen a tree until I moved to University in London. (This wasn't actually true, it was a rabbit).

Moscow

Russian riot police arrest gay protesters

By Guy Faulconbridge, Reuters

Saturday, 16 May 

• • NORMAL

AP

Russian Gay Rights protestors are taken away by riot police officers in Moscow

Dozens of riot police broke up a gay rights demonstration today before the Eurovision Song Contest final in Moscow, grabbing protesters and throwing them into police cars and a waiting bus.

Those arrested for taking part in the small demonstration, which had been banned by city authorities, included British and Russian campaigners.

"There is no freedom for gays in Russia," British gay rights activist Peter Tatchell shouted as police bundled him away. "We call on President (Dmitry) Medvedev to meet with us."

Police pushed waiting reporters away as they arrested the gay and lesbian participants but there were no beatings.

Among those detained was Nikolai Alexeyev, a Russian gay rights leader. Alexeyev was walking with a person wearing women's clothes, whom he described as a friend. Police said they were arresting him for walking with a transvestite.

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov has taken a hard line against homosexual protesters, once describing a gay rights parade as "satanic".

Gay Parades are a Satanic Act

"Would destroy morals"

Moscow bans gay pride march on Eurovision day

Reuters news agency reports that the city of Moscow has banned a gay parade planned to coincide with its hosting of the Eurovision Song Contest next week, because it will "destroy morals" in the capital, a spokesman for the city's mayor said Thursday. Gay rights activists have staged small unsanctioned parades in Moscow without government approval over the past few years. But they have faced arrests and severe beatings by anti-gay and neo-fascist groups.

"Moscow has never had gay parades and it never will," said Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's spokesman, Sergei Tsoi. "Not only do they destroy morals within our society, but they consciously provoke disorder which threatens the lives of Muscovites and visitors."

Parade organizer and prominent gay rights activist Nikolai Alekseyev said on his website www.gayrussia.ru that the event would take place anyway.

"This is our right and it is guaranteed by the constitution. No official, including the Moscow mayor, has the right to violate it," Alekseyev said.

But Luzhkov's spokesman said any attempt to hold an unsanctioned gay parade would be "toughly stopped by law enforcement agencies in accordance with the law."

Luzhkov, who has been mayor of Moscow since 1992, once said gay parades were "a satanic act"
Russia did not decriminalize gay sex until 1993, two years after the Soviet Union's collapse, and intolerance is widespread.

Moscow has no gay-friendly district and the homosexual scene is still largely underground. Public displays of affection between same-sex couples are rare.

The gay parade, scheduled for May 16, was meant to coincide with Moscow's hosting of the Eurovision Song Contest. Activists had asked that competitors back homosexual rights on stage.

A Swiss-based Eurovision spokesman, currently in Moscow, declined to comment on the banning of the parade but said: "It's not a secret that we have a large gay audience and we respect everyone's backgrounds."

 

Gwen Stefani - What You Waiting For?

What are you waiting for?
Before your legs are paralyzed,
before you get pancreatic cancer,
before you waste away,
do it
now
.

LILY MORRIS: Why am I Always the Bridesmaid

".... never the blushing bride"

Susan Boyle - Singer - Britains Got Talent 2009

Unable to embed - please go to You Tube and make your day ....

News

Its official!

Hiv medication therapy should be started as early as possible - add this to the `Swiss standpoint' and what do we have? .......

A condomless strategy .......... hiv+'ers without fear

Gay Life, Gay Death in Iraq

Don't think you are safe .....

Kees

Professor Kees Brinkman is the man who finally got the chance to say it :

"Hiv medicatie can be used in a preventive way. If all Hiv+ people used medication then the rate of new infections would drop dramatically"

(and not a mention of a condom anywhere ....)

Schorer Monitor

Reactie van Poz & Proud op start Schorer Monitor 2009

Begin deze week is het jaarlijkse onderzoek van Schorer gestart naar de seksuele gezondheid van de Nederlandse homo: De Schorer Monitor. In de vragenlijst van de Monitor 2009 ontbreken opnieuw essentiële vragen die belangrijk zijn voor een goed inzicht in de seksuele gezondheid van homo’s met hiv. Ook heeft Schorer tot op heden geen concrete toezeggingen gedaan om zijn stigmatiserende communicatiestrategie aan te passen.

Schorer heeft in diverse gesprekken getoond open te staan voor kritiek en heeft ook toezeggingen gedaan om de Monitor in de komende jaren te verbeteren. Op belangrijke onderdelen heeft Schorer echter volgens Poz & Proud nog te weinig met deze kritiek gedaan. Poz & Proud mist vooral een helder signaal van Schorer dat de communicatie in de toekomst zorgvuldiger zal gaan verlopen. De uitkomsten van de Monitor dreigen hierdoor opnieuw door een onzorgvuldige communicatiestrategie een negatief beeld van homoseksualiteit in het algemeen en hiv in het bijzonder bij het algemene publiek op te roepen. Het instellen van een commissie op persoonlijke titel om de uitkomsten van het onderzoek te duiden is geen garantie voor een goede communicatiestrategie. Een onderzoek dat opnieuw op belangrijke punten de plank misslaat is geen goed onderzoek in de ogen van Poz & Proud en schaadt bovendien de belangen van hiv-positieve homo’s.

Poz & Proud ontraadt daarom aan het onderzoek deel te nemen.

i.e. DO NOT TAKE PART IN THE ON-LINE SCHORER MONITOR!!!!

The T-Mobile Dance

Wonderful!

Bio-hazard

The Bio-hazard symbol as used by Gay Poz Men is a self-designated symbol of discrimination. In much the same way that the Gay Liberation Front re-claimed the pink triangle in the 70's.

But the bio-hazard symbol is used in many different ways for many different reasons. On profiles, on T-shirts, on skin.

My ink is personal, and therefore I thought at the time that it was time to 'brand' myself with the bio-hazard (artistically of course) ....

What for?

A declaration for myself, a message to others, a warning, an invitation.

The Pope and Condoms

Nothing I could say could make the Pope more ridiculous than he's making himself.

Unfortunately he has more power than I do ....

Learning

I never realised that learning something new at my age would be so difficult. I used to be able (when I was young) to pick up new languages at the drop of a hat. It was common knowledge at university that if somebody dropped out of a play, opera, ballet I could be trusted to learn the part within a few hours and deliver a more than passable performance.

But learning to sing in Spanish is doing my head in ....

AMEN and out

Well, that was a disappointment to say the least, but not a surprise.

You can't compete with Rapido ....

You can't compete with a huge event which offers almost 3000 male bodies in various states of undress, with music so loud you can't hear yourself worry, with drugs so heavy that everyone else loves everyone else including their husbands, 

10 hours of mind numbing, 

worry alleviating, 

virus forgetting joy.

Concertgebouw

"Life is too short to waste it listening to Schubert".

Testing testing 123 ....

Sent from my iPhone

The Denver Principles Project

Way back in 1983 Hiv+ people in Denver got together and created a kind of Declaration of Independence for Hiv+'ers - The Denver Principles.

At that time all over the world Hiv+ people were getting their second wind and starting to challenge their medical and political status.

The Denver Principles Project is an attempt to blow life into that particular flame at a time in America where hope seems to be tempering the economic crisis in the shape of Barack Obama.

Here's the link to the original - 

http://www.napwa.org/denverprinciplesproject/denver-principles.shtml

- and because its (unfortunately) just as relevant today as 25 years ago here's the full version.

The Denver Principles Statement from the Advisory Committee of People with AIDS (1983) We condemn attempts to label us as 'victims,' a term which implies defeat, and we are only occasionally 'patients,' a term which implies passivity, helplessness, and dependence upon the care of others. We are 'People With AIDS.' RECOMMENDATIONS FOR HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONALS 1. Come out, especially to their patients who have AIDS. 2. Always clearly identify and discuss the theory they favor as to the cause of AIDS, since this bias affects the treatments and advice they give.  3. Get in touch with their feelings (e.g., fears, anxieties, hopes, etc.) About AIDS and not simply deal with AIDS intellectually.  4. Take a thorough personal inventory and identify and examine their own agendas around AIDS.  5. Treat people with AIDS as a whole people, and address psychological issues as well as biophysical ones.  6. Address the question of sexuality in people with AIDS specifically, sensitively and with information about gay male sexuality in general, and the sexuality of people with AIDS in particular. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR ALL PEOPLE  1. Support & Membership in our struggle against those who would fire us from our jobs, evict us from our homes, refuse to touch us or separate us from our loved ones, our community or our peers, since available evidence does not support the view that AIDS can be spread by casual, social contact.  2. Not scapegoat people with AIDS, blame us for the epidemic or generalize about our lifestyles. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PEOPLE WITH AIDS  1. Form caucuses to choose their own representatives, to deal with the media, to choose their own agenda and to plan their own strategies.  2. Be involved at every level of decision-making and specifically serve on the board of directors of provider organizations.  3. Be included in all AIDS forums with equal credibility as other participants, to share their own experiences and knowledge.  4. Substitute low-risk sexual behaviors for those which could endanger themselves or their partners; we feel that people with AIDS have an ethical responsibility to inform their potential partners of their health status. RIGHTS OF PEOPLE WITH AIDS  1. To live as full and satisfying sexual and emotional lives as anyone else.  2. To receive quality medical treatment and quality social service provision without discrimination of any form, including sexual orientation, gender, diagnosis, economic status or race.  3. To obtain full explanations of all medical procedures and risks, to choose or refuse their treatment modalities, to refuse to participate in research without jeopardizing their treatment and to make informed decisions about their lives.  4. To ensure privacy and confidentiality of medical records, to receive human respect and the right to choose who their significant others are.  5. To die--and to LIVE--in dignity.

Ill

Here I am again with a seriously dreadful head cold. I hate it. its so debilitating without being so serious that I actually need tot take antibiotics.

Spending a week in the flat is not my idea of a fun time of course, and at times like these I thank god that I have no poor partner to inflict my frustration upon - or maybe that's what they're for?

So forgive me please if I'm not keeping up to speed with writing.

Depeche Mode - Wrong HQ HD (Live at Echo Awards, Berlin)

Oscars

The Oscars have been given out and the media is full of the 8 wins for Slum Dog, and the best actress Oscar for Kate Winslet .... and then .... nothing.

Oh, sometimes in passing then the Oscar for best actor for Sean Penn in Milk is referred to but I have yet to hear his name in a headline.

and oh yes, Dustin Lance Black won best original screenplay for Milk too. His acceptance speech was short but oh so sweet.

"Oh my God. This was not an easy film to make. First off, I have to thank Cleve Jones and Anne Kronenberg and all the real-life people who shared their stories with me. And Gus Van Sant, Sean Penn, and our entire cast, my producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen, everyone at Groundswell and Focus for taking on the challenge of telling this life-saving story.

When I was 13 years old, my beautiful mother and my father moved me from a conservative Mormon home in San Antonio, Texas to California, and I heard the story of Harvey Milk. And it gave me hope. It gave me the hope to live my life. It gave me the hope one day I could live my life openly as who I am and then maybe even I could even fall in love and one day get married.

I wanna thank my mom, who has always loved me for who I am even when there was pressure not to. But most of all, if Harvey had not been taken from us 30 years ago, I think he'd want me to say to all of the gay and lesbian kids out there tonight who have been told that they are less than by their churches, by the government or by their families, that you are beautiful, wonderful creatures of value and that no matter what anyone tells you, God does love you and that very soon, I promise you, you will have equal rights federally, across this great nation of ours.

Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, God, for giving us Harvey Milk".

Roxy Music--Mother of Pearl

Ecstasy

www.wordle.net

Funerals, mine

I don't want anyone to panic, but I have been spending some time lately thinking about death, dying, and the practicalities of such.

It would be infinitely easier for all concerned if one gave a last gasp on one's death bed and then disappeared in a cloud of smoke. Or dust even. Glitter would be a nice option too.

No messy fluids, no deathly palor, well no body at all actually.

Because the point is, what on earth (forgive the pun) do I want to happen to my body after I've snuffed it?

Burial? Cremation? Recycling?

Starting with the last, I'm pretty sure that no-one will want bits of my body when I'm gone. Nothing will be of any use, except in a laboratory situation. I shudder at the thought that medical students would get to see even more of me after I'm dead than they do on a regular basis now.

Cremation? Scares the shite out of me to tell the truth. Just the thought of waking up in that shoddy coffin whilst the flames lick around my ankles is enough for me to break out in a cold sweat (no pun intended). Maybe I could just get skewered beforehand, like some huge shish kebab, so that everyone can see that I'm actually, really, well and truly dead before they fry me to a crisp.

Ashes in an Urn? It had better be bloody Faberge if I have to reside like some dehydrated genie in a bottle for the rest of eternity.

Burial? Brrrrrrr. Cold, damp, worm infested earth. Lying under the sod should really only appeal to the more innately morbid amongst us. Like the Scottish. Or the Fries.

So do I care? Not really. Just make sure I'm as dead as a door nail first before disposing of in an adult way and I'll be happy (or not if there's no afterlife).

P.S.

I would quite like a funeral please. Samuel Barber 'Adagio for strings' (and anyone who dares to play the Tiesto version I will personally come back and haunt). Delibes, 'Lakme' all that kind of stuff is good. Its moving and emotional and doesn't drown out the crying (forgive the pun).

There's Always a Woman - Carol Burnett / Ruthie Henshall

Its always the woman
The hand in the till
The five dollar diamond
The three dollar bill
A genius for trickery,
that's second to none
There's nothing as low as a woman
Isn't this fun?

Christina Aguilera - Beautiful

beautiful

Bugger the money

Yes I finally did it, I broke down, breached my own defenses, and, spent money on something I wanted but don't need ......

an iPhone

and I don't regret it one moment. (Almost).

Spending money is one of the things that still doesn't come easy to me after my relationship with Gerard. I was so used to him spending his (and more often my) money on ridiculous over the top 'stuff' that money became something tarnished, something to be frightened of, something to despise; filthy lucre.

Although I didn't know it at the time, I was the only one really paying any of the serious bills. There were several serious bills. A 2 week holiday in Crete that cost me 12.000 guilders, an afternoon in the P.C. Hooftstraat that cost me 6.000 guilders, etc, etc .... 

All the while being egged on by Gerard .... 

"I've paid enough this month, this one's for you"

"Just pay this for me will you, I'll put it back into the joint bank account later"

"I hate credit cards - use yours"

It should be easy for me to see which one of us couldn't handle money. After all, I am still here and relatively debt free, his was the personal bankruptcy.

But it was about power and control of course. The house was the ultimate weapon in his arsenal. The house was in my name with a mortgage so high I had nothing left of my salary after the monthly payments. Literally, nothing. I was financially in his power and in his eyes therefore totally under control. Then he stepped up the game when I started to fight back by mortgaging the house again and letting me sign for that too (he did this in total 4 times but without me finding out until after I'd left him). Financial debt that I would never be able to pay back on my own, therefore financially his prisoner.

What he'd failed to take into account however was my slowly blossoming self-awareness, my deep felt sadness, all leading to desperation.

Add to this his need to keep everything secret from me and it was a bomb that was bound to go off eventually. If he'd told em everything he'd done I might have been too scared to leave. I know that after I left and started to find out everything were some of the darkest in my life.

But I did leave, and I survived, and blossomed in my own way.

Time enough to let go the fears and sorrow of old pain.

The Whore Of Babylon

The Protestant Church is ripping itself apart over the subject of 'homosexuality'. A schism not seen for many centuries between fundamentalist conservatism and liberals.

The Pope, in a spirit of divine opportunism, has set a course with the Roman Catholic Church of hard-core conservatism hoping to glean the crop of disillusioned right wingers from the Protestant Church.

He's willing to go as far as necessary to get the RC Church back on the 'straight and narrow'. Far enough indeed to re-ordain a bishop who believes that the Holocaust didn't really happen.

Revelations - the end of the world is close at hand, for the Whore Of Babylon truly does sit on the throne in the House Of God.

MSM

The New Year's reception of the Aids Machine was this week. I sent my Auntie.

Of course she embarrassed all and sundry by not being able to hold her tongue on certain issues. She wasn't embarrassed herself, far from it.

A woman from Los Angeles cornered her towards the end of the evening and introduced herself as one of the members of the 'MSM' Congress. She'd just been told wittily by a (probably very drunk gay) man that it stood for 'Men Sucking Men'.

This was Auntie's response ....

"Men who have Sex with Men? Is that what we are supposed to call them these days? Isn't that just a tiny bit irreverent towards all those Gay men who have suffered, and sometimes died, for the right to express their sexuality?"

"Does a Bi-Sexual Man have Bi-sexual Sex when he has sex with a Man? No, He has sex, and because its two (or more) men, then its gay."

"Being Black isn't about the colour of someone's skin. Being Black is about the discrimination because of the colour of someone's skin. The moment one is not discriminated against because of their skin colour then they have no need to call themselves Black."

"Being Gay isn't about having sex with other Gay men. Being Gay is about being discriminated against because of that sexual identity. The moment a Gay man stops being discriminated against because of that then he loses the need to identify himself as being Gay."

"Re-claiming words such as 'Black' and 'Gay' are responses to oppression, discrimination and apartheid. When these things no longer exist then there will be no need for the oppressed minorities to distance themselves from the rest of the world. There will be no need for a 'Black Mentality. No need for a 'Queer Consciousness'. No desire for a 'Woman's Culture'. Why? Because there will be no more fear."

"But until that day I think its wiser to call a spade a spade. Don't you?"

Of course the LA woman explained that the government had demanded its use in order for them to qualify for subsidy. There's an answer to that of course, but thankfully Auntie kept it to herself for once.

MSM is infinitely oppressive and discriminatory as a term. It is repulsive and degrading and it is doubly disgraceful if 'so-called' Gay organizations use it.

DUFFY RAIN ON YOUR PARADE (FULL VIDEO) HQ

Duffy does Judy ....

All aboard the Atheist Bus Campaign

"They have to take offense, its the only weapon they've got!"

Hibernation

I feel like a bear in winter sleep the last few months. Like today I can sleep anything up to and including 15 hours at a stretch. No, that's not a good thing I know, but its just one of those 'small' side effects of my medication.

How I'm ever supposed to do a full time job again I do not know.

That saddens me.

Not because of the job, I've learnt over the last years that I really can exist as a person without the emotional crutch of a career, but because it means my energy level is so low its almost non-existent.

Ah well, I'll just call it beauty sleep and say I need it more than most.

(before somebody else does) ....

Demons

"Nothing's gonna harm you

not while I'm around.

Nothing's gonna harm you, no sir,

not while I'm around.

Demons are prowling everywhere, nowadays.

I'll send them howling,

I've got ways."

"No-one's gonna hurt you,

no-one's gonna dare.

Others may desert you,

not to worry,

whistle, I'll be there."

"Being close and being clever,

ain't like being true.

I don't need to,

I would never hide a thing from you.

Like some ...."

From 'Sweeney Todd'

This is the song I used to sing to myself in my head when things got really bad during the 'Herman' days. When he was being raped every day by his German ex and I was helpless to intervene. Herman had decided that resistance was futile and had forbidden me to intervene. He had, in fact, emasculated me. In this way he forced me to watch, or at least listen to his degradation in a state of utter despair.

Every night I would lie on my stretcher bed in the attic and listen to the shouting and screaming below. Formless words in a language I did not understand. 

Then the silence. 

Then the grunting. 

Then sleep.

In Memoriam

Edwin van der Knaap

30 November 1968 - 20 November 2008

I should read the Poz + proud Blog more often I know, but I seemed to have missed this sadness too.

Poor Edwin. Life was not easy for him in very many ways.

In Memoriam

Gerard Boels

7 March 1957 - 1 November 2008

I only found out today when I emptied the mail box and found the new Hivnieuws.

Gerard is finally dead. Why finally? Because he fought it all the way. From the moment I first met him almost 30 years ago up until the last moment I saw him just before his birthday, his unique mix of stubborn refusal to accept defeat and hysterical enthousiasm have always typified him for me.

We met when we met, we didn't when we didn't. We weren't friends but we definitely weren't strangers. I think we both knew more secrets about each other's lives than most people close to us.

I remember his refusal to even entertain the idea that he might have aids, so long ago, I'd already lost Herman to aids and he knew that but still he wouldn't talk about his own vague symptoms, aches and pains.

He'd disappear for months on end when he felt ill (ugly), and then re-appear as if nothing was wrong.

I found him again years ago at the Aids Fund, a different person.

Poz + Proud.

I won't miss him every day, because I never saw him every day, But the world will.

Old Year

As many of you know I really hate New Year's Eve.

And for those of you who don't -

I really, really, really hate New Year's Eve.

Its the start of a long Winter which no-one except the penguins are looking forward to. Mentally disturbed people everywhere cower behind the curtains clutching their bottles of anti-depressants until the sun rises again sometime in April (if we're lucky). Previously boring stay-at-home people go out to clubs and bars where they meet all the other previously stay-at-home people who they only see once a year on New Year's Eve and promise to keep more in touch with next year which of course they don't.

The alcohol flows, nay, gushes through the emotional gutters of the soul resulting in a thick phlegm of pseudo soul searching, looking back on a year of missed chances, mistakes made, resolutions broken.

I'm staying home - Auntie Dottie is on the Angel Cruise and good luck to all who sail in her.

The Queen's Christmas Speech 2008

Watch and shiver ....

In Memoriam

Ms Eartha Kitt

1927 - 2008

Alternative Medicine

For the last few months I have been seeing a Chinese Herbal Doctor. There's a large surgery, dispensary, and training college just on the other side of my canal. Hey, I live in Chinatown, what did you expect?

Its been an eye opener to say the least.

My problem with the general (Western) Practitioners is their inability to treat me as a whole person, holistically. For example I know that certain of my ailments are caused or at least aggravated by my mental state of health, and/or vice versa.

My Chinese Doctor(s) don't seem to bat an eyelid when I reel off my list of symptoms ranging from joint ache to an infected fingernail that won't heal. Blurred vision and backache. Constipation and dry eyes. They seem to regard all these seemingly unconnected symptoms to be a part of the way the body communicates and displays illness.

It was a relief the first time to have a Doctor actually take interest in all of my symptoms, and offer a plausible reasoning afterwards for their connection. And also say when they had no connection. To them, the patient is absolutely responsible for their own well-being and as such must take responsibility thereof if any positive state of health is to be achieved.

Its very empowering to me to be told that I can make a difference to my health in a positive way. Negative influence is also (up to a certain point) my own responsibility, that is made very clear at the beginning of the treatment - well-being can be achieved, but will take longer to achieve if advice is not taken.

All this is a far cry from the hospital hit and miss diagnosis technique.

Nurse:

Doctor, the patient has lost his arm!

Doctor:

But I'm a heart surgeon, tell him we can't do anything about that until I've got his heart started again!

Angel Cruise

Dottie counting the Old Year Out and the New Year In on the Angel Cruise.

http://www.engelamsterdam.nl/angelcruise.html

Angel Cruise

Onno got Sir David (Attenborough) and my Auntie Dottie together to make this infotainment clip for the Angel Cruise this New Year’s Eve.
It’s one of many more to come I'm afraid .... Its Sunset Boulevard all over again ....

anyway, if you haven't got tickets yet I'd hurry if I was you - they seem to be going fast ....

De Engel Van Amsterdam 'Angel Cruise'

It's the Little Things

I'd just like to say that for us Hiv+'ers it's not the big things that do our heads in.

Being in hospital is not pleasant, but somehow we rise to the occasion and find the motivation to keep smiling and laughing our way through the pain and humiliation.

Being winched out of a window on the second floor in broad daylight was extremely embarrassing, but it had to happen and as such I know that there is really very little point in moaning about it.

No.

It's the little things that do our heads in.

It's an irritatingly painful infected nail that won't heal.

Day to day stuff.

Lily Allen - Smile

Thanks to Leo for reminding me that Lily Allen is not just a pretty face.

The Untouchables

Its not something any of us like talking about, especially the english, but intimacy is an important part of our lives.

Or the lack of it.

I do feel untouchable a lot of the time. This is very difficult for me as I am by nature a very tactile person. I like to keep physical contact with loved ones around me.

Something about touching other people calms and reassures me, and I hope them. Its my way of saying non-verbally that they are a part of my life.

Real intimacy, down dirty intimacy, full insertion intimacy is something I miss very much. Sex was always my way of being close to other men when there was no emotional bond. Having sex with them meant I could feel their skin, smell them, taste them.

Since my sex life has become so dramatically reduced, I can't help but feel a sort of deadening happening in my body. I'm not used to people touching me unawares. My body goes into shock almost if someone tries to get too close, especially 'down there'.

Alcohol and drugs helped to loosen my inhibitions, but since I have to be careful about that now I'm afraid the sex has gone completely out the window.

So I bought a Teddy bear for the first time in my life, and I sleep with him, and that's okay as long as I don't feel the need to fuck him.

04:00 am

04:00 am and I feel wide awake.

I feel like I'm jet-lagged.

I feel like a cigarette - and that isn't funny after 8 years of abstention.

It's lack of stimulation of course. Watching television for hours on end will tend to dull any nerves had. Anyway I can't do that, its boring.

Dressmaking involves standing and sitting for hours on end so that's out of the question for the time being. Although I have been doing some of course.

Computer? Trying to make a 'mix' on the new software I downloaded but its very complicated and mysterious. It gets me frustrated that I don't understand how it works, or even how the manual works. I know it can do all the things I want it to, but how?

Anyone got any experience with this sort of thing?

I'm trying to speed up 'Too Funky' to match 'Flawless' - but its beyond my skills at the moment.

Ah well, I'll just keep trying ....

Next?

A person goes to the GGD, or the local doctor for the Hiv test.

Or they end up in the emergency ward of the local hospital and end up giving permission for a Hiv test.

Or any number of scenarios.

And the result comes back within 45 minutes, a week, 3 weeks, as positive.

What's next?

I think most people will be surprised to hear that the answer to that question is:

Nothing.

Or at least very little.

Ideal scenario:-

Person gets referred to a hospital in Amsterdam by their friendly local doctor. Person ends up in the capable hands of one of our wonderful nursing specialists. CD4 levels, viral loads etc are all discussed, treatment methods suggested, next appointment made.

What's next?

Well, nothing really.

Or, once again, very little.

Anything that happens next will have to be on own initiative.

Hopefully said person will find other Hiv+'ers, especially if he/she is Gay but they will take sometime to find.

In the meantime, all the feelings of remorse, pain, grief, fear, loss etc. will have to be worked through on their own or with partner(s), friends etc.

I don't think it should be like this.

Do you?

Exhaust pipe needles

Dear reader, you of all people know that the last thing I wanted was to be rushed into hospital again, for whatever reason. But there I was again last week in the emergency ward of the OLVG, and don't tell anyone, but in my usual bed too. At least I was in a new ward afterwards, although Neurology is one of those departments that always sounded very vague, and nothing has happened to change my mind on that one.

I'm a fan of the OLVG as everyone knows but not a fan of some of the specialists and/or doctors. God help me, the female ones.

I don't know why it works like that but it does. 

The man in the bed next door to me was recovering from a craniotomy, that's skull surgery to you and me, and had a wound over half his head held together with stitches that would not have been out of place on Frankensteins monster. The doctor decided that he needed a lumbar puncture there and then, in bed, in a full ward. Now the man was obviously not completely 100% in our world and the insertion of what is laughingly referred to as the 'needle' didn't go as planned. Three times. 'Needle' my arse, its a fucking piece of steel as big as an exhaust pipe that they try to insert into your back without painkillers.

He of course screamed the place down, I had to leave the ward, there's just so much pain and suffering I can listen to. But not before I had heard the doctor reprimanding the patient that he wasn't being very helpful by responding in that way, and that if he didn't co-operate it would only take longer because she was determined that it would happen today.

This is the best hospital in the Netherlands. Still, doctors, specialists, surgeons treat patients like small petulant children.

Not all. Dear lord, no. There are wonderful people in the OLVG.

I'm just saying, once again, that although the powers that be try to represent our Health Care System as having no problems whatsoever, its not true.

In particular an Aids Machine that denies that patient care for Hiv+'ers falls short.

So long a hiv+'er stays within his or her own department (usually Internal Medicine) then they are usually treated with the utmost care by doctors, specialists and nurses who are worth their weight in gold. But if they stray to another department for whatever reason there are no guarantees.

On the Neurology ward I kept my Hiv Meds on the bedside trolley so that I could get at them easily. Visible to all. I don't see that as a problem, the only people who would know what they were, were other hiv+'ers and doctors. No big deal.

Yet nurses still referred to them in whispered tones as 'your other medication', and remembering to take them was my own responsibility, not theirs, that was made clear very early on.

Health.

Its a subjective opinion.

To me its one thing, to you another.

But to a health care professional it means a completely different thing.

Finding the median between the two (three) is something we all need to work on.

But do we all want to?

Men of Inseam

Joe Oppedisano for Inseam

Beautiful

Dark

Its 8 am and its cold, wet and dark outside.

Inside its warm and cozy and I'm already bored.

So I'm afraid dear reader that you are going to be the object of my distraction for the next few weeks. That should please at least 1 person I know (I'll get round to writing you a mail today).

My routine is back to what it was a few years ago - sleep wake take pills eat sleep wake take pills eat .... you get the jist of it ....

Sometimes it really does feel like 3 steps forward and 4 steps back - but that's not quite true of course. Essentially I'm healthier than ever, just chronically ill etc.

The whole 'health health health darling' thing is difficult to comprehend when you are Hiv+. I'll try later to get a handle on it.

Sneezing Can Seriously Damage Your Health

Well that was a bummer to say the least .... bloody hell .... I sneeze and then suddenly I'm on the floor screaming in agony unable to move in any direction at all for 2 1/2 hours.

Winched out of my flat through the hole where the window used to be by the ambulance men and the fire brigade (after receiving so much painkiller that i can't remember any of it or them) and then coming round in that 'oh so familiar' lime green OLVG emergency room ....

So Love Dance went ahead without Auntie Dottie and she won't be up and about for another few weeks.

Now I'm at home, drugs, drugs and back up drugs to kill the pain.

The Doctor said "Its just bad luck".

Grrrrrrrrr

But many thanks to everyone who is helping me to get back on my feet, all the sms's, mails, telephone calls etc. Wonderful and very, very much appreciated, thank you :-)

P+P again

Oooooh that was comfy last night ...... like slipping on an old shoe ..... like finding your favourite sweater behind the sofa after you thought you'd lost it ..... and I'm not quite sure whether that was a good thing .....

Going to the Poz & Proud meeting last night for the first time in a very long time was no different than going to the last meeting. It felt wonderful to be with the boys again, arguing, discussing, sussing, encouraging, debating, moaning at the Schorer as usual, and I love them dearly.

But it didn't feel like a lot had been achieved in the in-between time.

There we were again, just like last year, just like the year before, complaining about the Schorer Stichting and their horrific Press handling of the Schorer Monitor 2006/07/08 etc.

I suppose its because the Schorer has never actually cared whether the people it is supposed to serve are happy or not. I suppose its because they've never had to. Or have never been made to.

It was good to be together again but it was depressing to be reminded of the lack of change.

Grace Jones - Corporate Cannibal

tip from GJ ....

RAPIDO laser show amsterdam november 2008

I'm somewhere in there .....

Rapido!

Just to prove I was there ....... me and Taco.

AMEN

Next Sunday in Church ....

democracy

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that there's a Democrat in the White House.

I just don't want you all to forget that it is a man who, because of his religious convictions, opposes same sex relationships.

That's all.

Health Care for the Rich

Its getting so that only the rich can afford to be ill these days, and I'm afraid it doesn't seem to be getting any better in the near future.

As chronically ill person it was distressing to hear that next year all the small tax deductibles will no longer be available. So no writing off extra medication, therapy, hospitalization etc that is not covered by the insurance companies. Its more than unfortunate of course that insurance companies these days have decided that even with very expensive policies usually not more than 75% of this kind of thing is claimable anyway.

Psychiatric help has also been dramatically reduced to a maximum of 12 sessions a year with any kind of psychiatric practitioner, psychiatrist or psycho-therapist. As if the government/insurance companies can determine that's enough. "Sorry sir but although you are chronically ill and have mental health issues that may or may not be related to this, you are officially healed after 12 sessions with a shrink".

Imagine my distress a couple of days ago when I found out that as per january 2009 all medication used to treat anxiety disorders, stress disorders, sleep disorders and the like will no longer be paid for by the insurance companies.

No, not even the most expensive policies will honour a prescription. People with mental health problems will have to pay for their own medication.

The logic?

According to the leaflet ....

"This sort of medication is only meant to be used for a short while. Having to pay for it yourself will help you to keep its use to a minimum."

On a day that one of the largest countries in the world decide who will be their leader, where one of the crucial questions is a National Health Care Plan, on the other side of the water what was the most liberal of all countries is rapidly demolishing its Health Care.

.... and no-one says a word ....

I'd start saving up for your HAART medication if I was you - after all - it was your own fault now wasn't it ....

Silence = Death

Bjork (Play Dead)

I play dead
it stops the sting
I play dead
and the hurt stops
its sometimes just like sleeping
curling up inside my private tortures
I nestle into pain
act suffering caressing me now