bearbandit

I'm going to go back pre-internet on this one - Studsnet, a BBS system. At the time John and I ran the UK's only gay BDSM BBS "The Vault" and we had a fidonet feed into Studsnet's system. I'm still in touch with a guy I met online there though we've never met. We went to SF (Studsnet 's home base) three years in a row mid nineties and met up with them all. Great fun... It's where I got my first screen name - Beartrap: for my ability to trip a bear up and be on the floor for him to land on

That's partly what I was talking about in my post poz orphans . I still want to know what happened to my pozdaddy whoever he is, but after all this time I fear the worst. I've used facebook to catch up with a lot of others from the past - I have a privacy advantage there as I officially changed my name in 1988. But then you catch up with someone after a long time and you've either grown apart to the extent that you barely recognise each other, or, as happened to me recently when changing trains in Cardiff, you end up talking like you only met for coffee last week...

If it's published, it'll be at www.beyondpositive.org - I just sent it in for review by the editor. I've toned it down considerably since it's the first time I've addressed sex in the magazine and the UK is awash with "condoms or else" propaganda. In case it's rejected, this is the original as I sent it in: A change from history this time... I’m talking about today, but need to backtrack for a couple of paragraphs. When I first started on protease inhibitors, the side effect that many doctors denied existed was that 800mg of ritonavir was the equivalent of chemical castration. Jake Deckhard (sigh) could have walked into the room and I’d just enquire if he wanted sugar in his tea. I was just recovering from this when my partner got sick. I nursed him for four years until he died and then decided no life changing decisions and no men for two years or until I’d got my head round surviving him when we always thought I’d go first. When I decided to put myself out there again I wasn’t in the best of locations: north Powys midway between Welshpool and Machynlleth, but every now and then I’d have a bit of a fumble with someone from Gaydar and never see them again, with one exception. Then dammit, one of my drugs bit me on the ass and by the time I moved to Neath where I now live, I was sick and getting sicker –at one point I thought a litre of fruit juice and a small yogurt per day was an adequate diet. Naturally I lost all the weight I’d built up exercising and went from twelve stone to under nine. Obviously I recovered from that and have regained the weight, and although you can see the ghost of the shape I was in beforehand, I’m pretty out of shape. And I’m feeling horny as hell. I’ve always had an experimental approach to sex (a polite way of saying I’m a slut). I feel like I’ve missed approaching fifteen years of sex life: John and I had a playroom in our council flat and had monthly play parties before the laws on public sex changed. Most of the “rules” of sex seem to have changed in my absence from the sling. And worse: most of the leather gear has either gone missing or has got mildewed in storage. I feel almost like I’m coming out all over again... Suddenly I’m pretty much the age of the guys I used to chase after in the nineties and I’ve got guys half my age asking if I’ll be their Daddy. I had one of them visit the other day for a drink and chat about whether it could work sexually. He’d stalked me across two online sites and finally caught me unawares on another site, so ten out of ten for persistence. His photos showed a certain level of kink which I think we could build on. If he doesn’t bottle it I think we could have some fun. Well, I could: it depends on how strict a Daddy he’s looking for and I admit that I can be a bastard. Guys my age, or even within fifteen years of my age, seem to be harder to find – though if Band of Bears are reading this, guys, I’m yours – do what you want! All my online profiles mention, in one form or another, my HIV status: I think of it as a twit filter: those who can’t cope with HIV don’t make contact. I’m there looking to have some fun, not give lessons in HIV awareness. That said I’ve made some good friends online. Trouble is the guys with my sort of kink profile are always a fair distance away. Of course, I’ll compromise: after all, isn’t life a series of negotiated compromises (unless you’re stinking rich, of course)? Then when I find someone right we run into the condom problem. (Heresy alert!) I don’t like them. There’s plenty of other things besides dick in arse but... So I prefer to serosort and have sex with guys who’re also HIV+ and save the rubber trees. Hell, even before I finally decided I’d had it with condoms I preferred other poz guys simply because a condom failure didn’t mean such a panic. I’m fine about being Daddy but I don’t want to be anyone’s pozdaddy. That’s why I’m so keen on test and treat and TasP (treatment as protection). For thirty years safer sex has depended on a booklet published in 1983. That booklet has been used to say “thou shalt not” far too often. And the truth is that there’s a subculture of gay men, and you’ll have figured I’m one of them, who enjoy really pigging out. Gay sex has always been transgressive and HIV has made it more so. To be fair “How to Have Sex in an Epidemic” was groundbreaking and the right advice for the time. But our ancestors thought it a pretty good idea to hang witches. More recently THT’s advice was that if you were diagnosed positive you should stop work before you needed to, cash in your pension, and enjoy life before the inevitable decline and sickness. Again it was the right advice for the time. We need to look at how we minimise the spread of HIV in 2013 not 1983. There are about 25,000 people out there with undiagnosed HIV. We need to get them at least tested so they know and into treatment if it’s indicated and they want it (very few don’t). The longer they go undiagnosed the worse their prognosis. My last husband was diagnosed late: the memories of nursing him at home are still very raw and vivid even six years later. Yet I have the sense of him agreeing with me on this. Recon are stocking what looks to be a brilliant toy which they’re calling Hump Gear. Essentially it’s a hollow silicone buttplug. Because it’s silicone any lube’ll do, though they’re careful to say it isn’t a substitute for a condom you can bet your bottom dollar it’ll be used in place of one. I haven’t had the opportunity of testing it out (hey Recon – how about review copies?) but from what I’ve heard say about it, it fits nicely in the ass and is flexible enough to conform to the individual shape of your ass and when the top works his magic, it flexes and changes shape to give an extra feeling of fullness while giving the top the feeling that he’s right inside as the silicone is a good heat conductor. Basically, as far as I can see they’ve worked to imitate the bareback experience. It’s easily cleanable too. I want one (or more!), but credit card said only one. Not perfect as a condom, then, but a substantial reduction of risk. If I were running a safer sex campaign I’d jump on this product. I’ve enjoyed Recon’s other silicon toys and they have a good (if pricy) reputation.

I'm with you buddy - by coincidence I've been writing an article for an onliine magazine on the same lines. Just wondering if they'll publish it or not... It depeds on the publisher's nerve.

It shouldn't... body temperature is body temperature. Best to avoid early morning piss as it's more concentrated but beer piss - wow!

I'll spend a hell of a lot longer rimming a hairy ass than a smooth one. And as MascMountainMan implies, the mixture of spit, cum and anal juices making the hair stick to my dick as I fuck is a mindblower. The only question when an ass is in that state is do I carry on fucking or go back to eating?

Similar problem here: diabetes has worked its magic on the nerve that controls erections so I'm pretty unreliable as to whether I can even get it up which accounts for my bottoming more and getting more into discipline when topping. Viagra works BUT I rarely cum with a Viagra hardon (I've got some Cialis to try next time). When I do finally manage to cum it's about eight hours after I took the damn drug so if he stays over he's liable to wake up with a dick in his arse (I can think of worse ways of waking in the middle of the night). Whether I'm using V or not the thing I've learned is that it's the journey that counts, not the destination. Top or bottom I want the guy(s) I'm with to have a good time and want more...

I'm long term poz having picked it up in 1980 (diagnosed retrospectively). Wasting syndrome (or malabsorption syndrome) happens more often in inadequately treated people with HIV. It seems to be caused by HIV taking up residence in the gut which is one of its favourite hangouts. You eat as normal, but it literally goes straight through because the cells of the gut are too busy dealing with HIV. In the first few years of my actual diagnosis (1987) I was overweight at about 190 pounds. I developed wasting syndrome and dropped eventually to 126 pounds or thereabouts. Older drugs may have had some impact in that vomiting and other GI distress was a common side effect. In 1992 I was down to 155 pounds and I have a photo from 2002 that shows me as clearly thinner than I am today. (Most of the photos I have from 1999 onwards are of our dogs - at one point we had three rottweilers). As use of the first protease inhibitors some nasty side effects were revealed, including diabetes and lipodystrophy. Lipo is when the body fat migrates to central areas leaving you with stick-like arms and legs but with what looks like a beer gut, except that the fat is visceral, wrapped around your organs rather than lying just under the skin as a conventional beer gut would. There also occurs "buffalo hump" a collection of fat across the shoulders and lower back of the neck. I got fucked hard by an expert recently and I could feel the fat in my shoulders responding to the pounding my ass was taking. Since it covers the spine I'm taking advantage of it by putting my biohazard tattoo there. As a side note women with lipodystrophy tend to find that the fat collects in the boobs - I have a friend who is skinny except for her overlarge bosom. Getting your dream body... well I did it a couple of years ago with a load of weight lifting, the exercises designed to put muscle on my upper body. I had to replace my bike jackets because I could no longer wear a sweater under them (the mountains of Snowdonia are cold, even in summer). I looked, in the words of the guy who designed my programme "like a rugby player who likes a pint". For the first time in years I could look at my body in the mirror and think "yes!". The area that most poz men I know have trouble is the ass: it's remarkably difficult to restore your ass after it's lost weight. I can't walk far because of neuropathy in my feet, so I've got an exercise bike sitting upstairs waiting for an engineer as it's not charging properly. The weight loss from my thighs wasn't so evident because of the amount of walking I used to do (remember the dogs!). Even with a good start with a gym body, you're going to take some physical hits with HIV which may well change your body shape. HIV doesn't magically give you the body you want: it takes work, and it's probably easier to do that work without HIV working against you. One of my drugs bit me on the ass last year and I dropped back to 125 pounds. I've only just got my weight and appetite normalised and I've got a long road ahead getting the muscle back. My arms aren't as skinny as they used to be - my body has remembered part of how I looked before dropping all that weight last year: my biceps for example are still their, just nowhere near the size they were. Wiry rather than skinny, so I haven't lost all the work I put in before I got sick. HIV is a disease not a body-sculpting program. Get yourself down the gym and revise your diet. If I can do it, you sure as hell can! Strangely I'm not worried by the wasting in my face. It's like my grey hair: shows I've been there... Best of luck...

I'm posting this here instead of the porn blogs section because this isn't a porn blog. It's a very new online magazine set up by the editor after several magazines stopped taking his HIV column in favour of more advertising. Basically it's an series of "our experience" columns, with something of a focus on safer sex - before you all yawn and go away, it's not staying that way as I'm one of the columnists. I'm representing the face of long term survival and at present my articles are following my person experience of the eighties and nineties. After that I can see things getting more fiery as I intend looking into the dark corners the HIV charities and medics don't want to see. The editor himself has been diagnosed two years, and an incredibly brave eighteen year old who was only just diagnosed a few days ago and who joined the staff just before me. We've got a pharmacist to write for the magazine and at least one woman will be joining us. Our aim is to cover the spectrum of HIV+ people. Please have a look - we can be found at www.beyondpositive.org . Don't expect a stream of porn, but those of us who are poz, or are thinking of converting might find something useful, as indeed might the neg guys. I hope this plug for a pretty innocuous magazine isn't out place - my apologies if it is...

"Like", my friend, is far too weak a word!

That depends on the location of the PA hole. For pissing I get the ball right up close to the hole, (but usually end up with a hardon). Cumming is more problematic dividing attention between cumming and keeping the hole covered. Mind you, diabetic neuropathy might be adding to the problem Taught myself a long time ago that it's the journey not the destination...

Obviously I meant to write "it was just my bad luck, in the same way as your staying negative has been your good luck." Sorry 'bout such an idiotic error...

After years of refusing STI work-ups, either because you can't catch anything from a porn DVD or because you can't catch anything from a bit of bondage and torture, I'm going to have ask for a full screening on Monday week when I have HIV clinic after pigging out at a biohazard party last month. I'd just decided it was time for a change... I can imagine the start of the lecture (my consultant can be quite directive at times) but if he starts I plan to ask he'd rather I bb'ed with other poz guys or followed up on the "pls fuk me bare Daddy" messages I get on Grindr from young guys who've barely heard of HIV.

Send me the air fare and I'll come and kiss it better for you

Guys, what you're talking about here is your own personal experience. You can't generalise from that: I know guys who got HIV after just a few fucks. I don't doubt your individual experiences, but they're all anecdotal. Just because tenofovir turned poisonous for me doesn't mean that everyone should come off PrEP: it was just my good luck, in the same way as your staying negative has been your good luck. As an incidental, I personally believe that the rates for transmission via oral sex are inflated by guys who'll go as far as saying they sucked someone off, but won't tell the truth about getting fucked. Just a thought...

Ease up mate... it'll heal fast but quite possibly not that fast. In your situation I'd be going easy on my dick for three or four weeks to be sure. Getting hard while taking loads isn't going to be a problem, but I'd be gently on the dick for a while yet. When I get mine PA hole stretched so I can up to a 4mm ring or horseshoe (think I'll alternate) I intend doing it at the start of what I expect to be a quiet period. And that's just a small cut when you have a hole stretched...

You have my sympathy. Although I've taken mine out for the time being, I do intend having the hole stretched again. When I look at photos with my PA in it's a remarkably thin piece of tissue that holds it in place, so it's quite surprising that we don't hear of more of this sort of accident (though I did know a couple of guys who got a PA tangled with a tongue piercing). Fortunately, as you know, wounds to the dick heal pretty quickly - when I had my first PA I was wanking in the bath the next day, though it was several weeks before pissing stopped being painful. But even then it was a good pain

It's been said of me that I'm not happy unless his knuckles are dragging on the ground - definitely one for hairy backs, arses, chests. Prefer cropped or shaved heads though...

There seems to be a fair number of guys here who know, or are fairly sure, who pozzed them. I got pozzed in 1980, before we even knew there was a virus out there. There are times when I'd really like to know who my pozdaddy is even just for the fact that I carry a bit of him with me always. In some ways I feel like an orphan not knowing who he is. I hope whoever he is that he's had the same luck as I've had and is still around, though it's statistically unlikely. Anybody else feel like this? Or am I just being really weird? Whoever he is, he's had a bigger influence on my life than my genetic father who was a piece of shit. I changed my surname over twenty years ago as a means of "divorcing" him.

I had a similar problem with Nasty Pig jocks: had to mend them myself (wish I'd had a sewing machine). The problem is that they tend to use a straight stitch rather than the stronger zigzag, which uses more thread and takes longer to do.

Thank you - you made my night with that

You learn something every day. I've got a mate who likes few things more than watching a fisting movie while I rip the hell out of his tits. I've always had the bad habit of going in too hard and fast with nipple play but I've never known anyone take as much from my fingers as he does. I don't see him often since I moved south (he's about a hundred miles north of me), but he's coming over tomorrow. Explains a lot about his behaviour...

Dunno what's happened - maybe they put something in the water, but suddenly all I'm getting is "will you be my daddy?" messages. One uses the same HIV clinic as me and so has seen me at my worst, a second stalked me across three sites. Seeing him on Friday. There's a third sulking because I don't do scat... Not bad going for a little town like Neath!

So far in the UK it's only case law, using the 1881(?) Offences against the person act. It's only been used in cases of non-disclosure so it seems that it's still legal to poz someone as long as he consents - but as we all know people sometimes change their mind after the event. For me, I either have HIV+ on my online profiles or at least a biohazard symbol and tend to make mention of HIV in the chatting up process: Him - "how you doing" Me "Great: just heard my CD4 went up again" I've got diabetes so I'm more than usually prone to thrush which is transmissable by simple touch. When I've got an outbreak I make friends with my right hand and a porn movie.

I found that after I got my PA, whether it's in or not, my cum dribbles out rather than shoots - it's got an extra hole to get out of. That said, a guy who fucked me last month finished with a facial: it was like he'd thrown a bucketful of cum over me. Pig heaven!