HIV/AIDS Stigmatisation

Greetings and a happy weekend to everyone!

When I was still in my hometown, I was still in secondary school then, and that was many years ago. I had a very close friend, and we were in the same church unit. She was a female friend, and I must confess, I had a crush on her. But things didn’t work out. However, it was the crush and the bond that got us very close, and I got to know deep things about her family.
When her mom became severely sick and later died due to how critical the sickness was, news spread everywhere that it was HIV/AIDS that caused the sickness and eventually killed her.
I won’t lie, when the news became so loud and filled everywhere, my mind went far too, and I drifted away from the friend. We had been taught many times about stigmatisation, especially concerning victims of HIV, but I couldn’t just hearken to such teachings. I found myself distanced a little from the lady, with the mindset that if her mom had it, there was a possibility of her having it too, because they lived together in the same house before and during the sickness, and they might have also shared some items that could be contaminated

Hey, the distancing I mean here was not the type that I stopped talking to her or stopped seeing her—no. I just stopped going to their house, or each time I went, I would be so brief and minded the things I used or touched. Yes, my understanding of HIV back then was a bit shallow, and apart from that, we knew HIV/AIDS to be a very dreaded sickness.

Apart from this, the lady and her siblings were heavily stigmatised because of their mother’s lifestyle. Before the death of the mother, she wasn’t married, and based on what people said, she was into “runs,” and that led to her contracting HIV/AIDS.
This lady I was close to—I saw how she tried to mute her ears from what people were saying, but there was no way she could totally refrain from that. There were days she would just be crying, and one didn’t need to ask to know what was up. Her mom was dead, and she left a not-so-good legacy for them, hence making people talk badly about the family.

Well, nothing lasts forever. With time, the whole thing died off, and she went on to live her life. But even at that, just like how the internet doesn’t forget things, that’s how this subject is brought up once in a while, especially when any of the family members fall critically ill.

She survived the stigmatisation by being brave and allowing time to have its way. I know the thought still comes to her mind, but it can’t be as harmful as it was in the days when the news of her mom being infected with HIV/AIDS was still new.
I’m still friends with the lady. We talk on WhatsApp once in a while. She’s married now, and she has left the past to be the past.

Thanks for reading.