Is there anyone who are still around after getting pozzed during the crisis in the 80s

[Guest]

Curious to knw if there is anyone still about that got infected back in the 80's or 90's at the peak of the AIDS/HIV epidemic. I was not alive back then but I have done a lot of research into that time and the fights that so many people went through. Would love to know

[SpectreAgent]

Yes. A mate of mine in London was one of the very first diagnosed in the UK. He’s in his 60s now and I speak to him regularly and see him occasionally. He has been gym fit all his life and looks amazing. 

Edited December 11, 2022 by RawPlug

[ellentonboy]

I was informed in 95 I was positive and it progressed to full blow AIDS by 2000.  I was fortunate to have my disability approved almost immediately,  I have great doctors and I take the medicine as prescribed.  Sometimes I feel like I am on a doctor "merry go round" it seems like I have either labs or a specialist for this ailment or that.  However,  I am in no way complaining.  For guys who have no insurance they are on ADAP (Aids Drug Assistance Program) and the county I live in has a high percentage of infected individuals.   Those guys (not yet on disability, but still sick, have to see the doctor four times a year. I see my infectious disease specialist twice yearly  and he writes 6 refills on all my meds.

I have heard sadly that in the US they have made the criteria tougher to get on Medicare/Medicaid/SSD and SSI.  One guy I know had to hire an independent attorney to fight with the Social Security Administration, and he had to stop working for almost two years to prove he really needed the help to qualify for assistance.

Requirements have changed dramatically for guys, it's not like 25 years ago where it was considered a death sentence. I know I have been fortunate that despite not being from a "hot spot" for HIV I still managed to get excellent care and found an Infectious Disease Specialist who was young and interested in helping his patients.  I was in my early 30s when I found out, but I do remember many guys my age or even younger who didn't get the proper care right away and ended up passing away.  I always encourage people to know their status because as soon as you jump on the situation the better chance you have of surviving.

[FelchingPisser]

My brother's partner was infected in the late 90's.  He had the first round of horrible medications that did further damage to him, but they saved his life. 

[hntnhole]

To refine the time-period a bit, from the onset to when the first treatments became available, I can't recall any that made it through to the present.  at that time, hiv was quite literally a death sentence.  However, once effective treatments became available, I can think of a couple guys (who sero-converted subsequently) that did, and are alive and fucking to this day. 

Sadly, we (as a group) suffered terrible losses at first. Those losses still haunt every one of us of a certain age. 

[NYBBGUY58]

I was diagnosed in 1993, but hadn't ever tested before then. I likely sero-converted in the late 80s when I annually would get a horrible case of what felt like flu, so it could have been any of those. I also started getting a lot of skin rashes in the late 80s; one doctor (though I didn't think she was a particularly good or skilled physician) proclaimed that must have been it. She was insisting that I begin immediate treatment with the early ineffective antivirals and was generally an idiot.

[garsento]

Just a few minutes ago, I saw a dear friend who tested positive in 1985. He has definitely had health issues, to the point where side effects of the medications have created significant health problems. He is, however, obviously alive.

I also have a friend, one I have not seen for a while, who thought he became positive much closer to 1980. He is still alive, happily retired.

[Guest]

I've discussed my HIV history in several threads over the years on this site, so I'll recount just the basics here: I tested HIV positive at age 24 in 1985, the first year a test was available. (My doctor theorized I seroconverted in 1983, when I became ill with hep B and shingles.) I began taking the first HIV antiretroviral drug, AZT,  when it became available in 1987. I've taken a variety of HIV meds continuously since then except for a "holiday" that lasted less than a year, until my T-cell count fell to almost 200.

I've been fortunate to be employed with good medical insurance, stay physically active, and otherwise enjoy mostly excellent health since my HIV journey began nearly four decades ago. I look forward to turning 62 (and retiring!) next year.

Edited December 12, 2022 by DeviantLust

[Pozguyinchi]

My ex bf that gave me HIV was diagnosed in 1985. He would tell me stories of how everyone he knew was dying and his survivor guilt. When I was diagnosed in 2000 treatment was not great but at least we had something. I can’t imagine how terrifying it must have been to have hiv and there was no medication that you could take. Men were just waiting around to die.

[Guest]

8 hours ago, Pozguyinchi said:

My ex bf that gave me HIV was diagnosed in 1985. He would tell me stories of how everyone he knew was dying and his survivor guilt. When I was diagnosed in 2000 treatment was not great but at least we had something. I can’t imagine how terrifying it must have been to have hiv and there was no medication that you could take. Men were just waiting around to die.

I have many older poz friends who were diagnosed in 80s and 90s and they often tell me it was a traumatic experience as friends and fuck buds died left and right & no one was doing anything about it & they themselves often left worried when their day will come. 
 

I remember when I decided to go raw in the early 2000s and how some of them gave me a stern warning not to do it. I took their advice in consideration but I felt if I became poz I would be ok as meds were good 

[hntnhole]

4 hours ago, NudistBBBLK said:

they often tell me it was a traumatic experience as friends and fuck buds died left and right

It was trauma on steroids. 

Before hiv, fucking every guy you met was the norm.  No one used condoms.  Then, guys started dying a slow, terrible death, and no one knew more than it was because we were fucking each other.  It got to the point guys wouldn't shake hands anymore - just say hi, with that 'deer-in-the-headlights' look, and move on.  In shortest of orders, the world went from being our playground to being our cemetery.  There was a gay weekly that began publishing "celebrations of life" notices, page after page of them, and went out of business because no one wanted to pick it up anymore, let alone page through it to see who'd passed the previous week.  We were going to those "celebration" services constantly; week after week, month after month, for several years.  

No guy that lived through those years went unscarred.  Now, decades later, with the medical arts advancing as they have, those scars have healed over, but they're still there - just under the outer layer of skin.  Men that didn't live through it can empathize, but it's difficult to imagine how they could understand how truly desperate, fearful, awful, horrifying, soul-injuring, nightmarish and destructive those years actually were.  

Now, of course, there are medical advances that have allowed those years to fade into the blackness of a plague survived.  Thus, many of us who lived through it have a very, very difficult time accepting the mindset of younger guys that refuse to take every possible precaution against illness, particularly this hellish hiv.  Still, it's not for anyone to judge anyone else, but no one could fault us for remembering either.  

Thanks for your post.

[tighthole64]

19 minutes ago, hntnhole said:

 

Now, of course, there are medical advances that have allowed those years to fade into the blackness of a plague survived.  Thus, many of us who lived through it have a very, very difficult time accepting the mindset of younger guys that refuse to take every possible precaution against illness, particularly this hellish hiv.  Still, it's not for anyone to judge anyone else, but no one could fault us for remembering either.  

Thanks for your post.

Well stated!  I was not sexually active during those times, nor was I gay, but I still knew about them.  I never had a thing for girls, but I think the fear of aids kept me from being gay. 

As you are ALWAYS open in your thoughts, what would you tell the young guys you mentioned?  Go on Prep and explore, or become poz and then do meds?  I KNOW it's a totally personal decision.   

[hntnhole]

Given my reply of a little while ago, I would always always advise any guy to take advantage of all the medical preventative steps.  To me, it only makes basic, common sense.  These preventative steps can enable us to live longer, healthier lives, and therefore fuck far more men than if we were sick or dead. 

I would never, never advise a guy to ignore the miracles that medicine has achieved.  To me, it's completely nuts to court hiv and refuse the preventative steps.  Maybe younger guys don't understand, and that's ok. 

Life is good.  Illness or worse, not so much.

Edited December 12, 2022 by hntnhole
phrasing

[bareholefl]

I was pozzed in 1989. Started taking raw cock when I was closeted and visiting bookstores. Lucky no health effects so far

[AlwaysOpen]

I had an allergic reaction to a banana Jan 1987- landed in the ER via ambulance( my BP at the minor emergency clinic that I drove to was 70 over 40 and unsteady) The clinic hit me with 6 shots of epinephrine and 6 shots of diphenhydramine, so I was pretty much floating for a few hours,luckily. One thing that was very common in the 80's, when a single 30 and older man had any medical crisis was to assume it was AIDS.I recall some nurse pushing a hollow needle into that spot on the wrist/thumb juncture to draw bone marrow for testing. He was apologizing about how uncomfortable it was, but I was so deep in shock and drugged from the clinic that I felt nothing. A week later, the cardiologist who had been my ER doctor called me and told me to come in to his office, the results were in ( in those words, I was already planning how many weeks I had left)  And then the next day I got pissed at getting that type of a phone call, and pissed at how biased the medical industry was to gay men at the time. I went to  the docs office, got the news, he followed up with a Western Blot test, and I learned my viral load was 84,000 and my T count was 45. AZT was the killer drug they pushed back then. I had been keeping a ledger sheet with the names of friends and the date of their death already, and already had 15 to 20 names init. I refused going on any meds. The only complication I had for 12 years med free was a case of walking pneumonia, and probably came down with it as a result of working a full time job and then at night working another 5 to 6 hours at a part time job out in the weather. 

When I eventually did go on meds it was late 1999 and the first generation  of anti retro viral med combo's was just coming of age- drugs like epivir, viramune, etc. Once I began meds, I was laser focused on following the dosing schedule and not missing a dose. I have gotten on Dovato recently, 1 pill a day with just 2 drugs combined init, and have to say, I feel healthier than ever before. I cannot stress it enough tho- I believe the most important thing is and was  making it a priority to never forget to take the meds exactly as prescribed. 

I lost a 85 year old poz friend 11 months ago. He had  been in NYC in the 70's and 80's , even working the door at Rawhide for a while. He lived in Greenwich Village, went to a lot of the bars ( ahh, the MineShaft !! lol) and parties, and mid 80's he tested poz.  I knew him the last 20 years of his life, and he was healthy and on meds. He even got covid twice, and neitherr time was it more than a cold that dragged on for a week  or so. Being poz/AIDS didn't kill him, he made a left at a light and got slammed by an oncoming car. I mention his case, because for a lot of you  neg guys, hearing  a poz result from a blood test is not probably the thing that will kill you one day. ESPECIALLY if you monitor your health and stick to the  dosing schedule of the HIV drug you will eventually go on.