[Viva] 3 cheers for positive women in the media!

Tue Jun 7 09:58:42 PDT 2011

Thanks for sharing your words of experience and wisdom Denise.  It's an
important topic - disclosure & media etc.  Disclosure itself is a life long
process.  As we all know, you don't just do it once and you're done.  Even
after 16 years I struggle with deciding who to tell and how to tell.  Eg do
I need to tell a new massage therapist since it's on the form they asked me
to fill out?  How soon do I have to tell someone I'm dating?  What about my
employer?  Kid's teacher? Neighbour? The list goes on and on.  If and when
these challenges come up VIVA is a perfect place to discuss and get support
from others.  

My latest challenge is with dating... and google.  I discovered by
'googling' my name if you dig down a few pages there were some online
articles I have written for CATIE (Canadian AIDS Treatment Information
Exchange).  It was from about 8 years ago when I was having some serious
health trouble that I wrote about in detail.  This is on the internet for
anyone (i.e prospective romantic partners)  to see and it's not the way I
would present myself today, now that I am healthy and 'strong like bull'!
So, you really need to think twice - or more than twice- about what
information you want out there about yourself circulating on the internet.
I don't regret writing the article and all the other public disclosing I've
done - it has made me stronger and helped me stand up and be proud of who I
am.  But there are definitely many factors that need to be considered!

~ Wishing you all a great day ~ 

Kath

From: viva-bounces at lists.resist.ca [mailto:viva-bounces at lists.resist.ca] On
Behalf Of Denise Becker
Sent: June-02-11 11:35 AM
To: viva at lists.resist.ca
Subject: Re: [Viva] 3 cheers for positive women in the media!

Thanks Kath, for this article and your words.  I think it is one of the
hardest things to do - come out to the media.  They do their story and walk
away leaving you with the results.  Having children and respecting their
privacy makes things even more difficult and then there are questions from
people.  I found that it was a great thing for me because it made people
understand why I was off work and I got a lot of people who said caring
things.  However, I did get a couple of letters from religious nuts telling
me "if only I took Jesus as my Saviour then all would be forgiven".  Of
course, they assumed I couldn't possibly be Christian already, hah!

If ever you consider talking to the public about your diagnosis or to the
media I would strongly caution you to think hard about it.  It will be
life-changing and there is no going back.  I found one family wanted to do
it and I talked to them for a long time about it.  Eventually, they did an
interview with the Globe & Mail.  On the day it was to come out then the
Globe found a story about a woman who had not taken meds and had infected
her baby and of course that was the big news and their story was dropped!
Once again, it showed that the media loves bad news.  I felt very, very sad
for the family because the media had no idea how extremely hard it was for
them to talk to anyone at all about it and they had really done a brave
thing and not even to be told it would not be run in the end was terrible!
Shame on the media!

Another friend of mine talked to the media and she is constantly asked at
any event to talk to them again.  It is very hard when there is one or two
of you and they try to get you to talk about it over and over, re-living it
every time.

Anyway, enough of my rambling on.  Kath, you are a very strong woman and I
applaud your courage.

Denise

On Thu, Jun 2, 2011 at 10:19 AM, Kath Webster <kathwebster at shaw.ca> wrote:

Hey gals,  

Please click on this link to read a story about climbing rates of HIV among
women in Ontario. It highlights a wonderful woman I know named Marvelous
Muchenje (Zimbabwean born). 

I think we need to celebrate our sisters who are courageously come out so
publically with their HIV status.  It helps break down stigma bit by bit and
paves the way for all of us.  

http://www.lfpress.com/news/canada/2011/06/02/18226551.html?sms_ss=facebook
<http://www.lfpress.com/news/canada/2011/06/02/18226551.html?sms_ss=facebook
&at_xt=4de76d13abb7306f%2C0> &at_xt=4de76d13abb7306f%2C0

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