Laura’s story was so sad, how she met the love of her life, and just as they were engaged and planning to make their relationship concrete by the bond of marriage in the not so distant future, her fiancé discovered he had AIDS, and died from it so suddenly after the horrible realization he was infected. It’s so unreal, not only to those of us listening who had never even thought something like that could happen, but I could only imagine what Laura must have been going through…the pain, guilt, shame, and God only knows what else she was experiencing, when she found out she was infected with HIV.

I have only had sex with two people, one protected, and the other, who is my current boyfriend and who I have known since high school, not protected, since I am on birth control now. That night, I talked to my boyfriend, and told him how scared and stupid I felt about not using protection every time, since he has had sex with three other people, although all protected sex, and me, one other person. Yet in high school, we were both somewhat promiscuous, with oral sex and various other types of sexual behavior going on in the entire high school. We both realize now we are past the point of no return if either of us have HIV, but we are going to get tested together over Christmas break, so if we do have something, there will be time to put things in perspective and deal with everything, without the worries of school. This panel even made me speak to my mom about HIV and AIDS, and I don’t talk about anything like that with her…sexuality has always been a “hush-hush” type of subject in our house. I told her that anyone can get HIV with any type of unprotected sex, and I let her know how scared I was, as well.

Laura and Kathy especially, made me see how close to home this disease really is, and that it can happen to anyone, anywhere. Rick helped to convey how crazy the drug cocktail is and how much goes into taking all of the drugs people with AIDS have to take, especially at his progressed “super virus” stage. I never knew how many drugs the “cocktail” really consisted of, or how often patients must take their medications. I was incredibly enlightened about HIV and AIDS from the panel that spoke to our class, and it seriously affected the way I will forever view and really fear this disease.