Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this piece are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the position of Positive Women’s Network – USA.
2012, The International Conference on HIV and AIDS in D.C
by Susan Mull
Twenty-seven years of thriving with HIV has been a powerful, spiritual, incredible experience. What makes it beautiful even through extreme difficulty is the people living with HIV, their compassion, courage, intelligence, and their ability to be intrepid when fighting injustice, and a complete understanding throughout this family of PLHIV that our authenticity, the way we all handle and tell our own stories always helps others. One of the most important things about being a long term survivor is to show up. Keep showing up. Encourage others to show up. Tell yourself every day that you are an amazing, talented person living with HIV, in other words, always use people-first language. HIV will never define me. We are not dirty, tainted, infected, or ever “less than.”
One of the other things that are so significant is learning from people leading the movement. As a white woman, it was important for me to take part in the “Move To End Violence” curriculum last year. It is important every day to address racism, and it’s important as a white woman to make space, not do all the talking, to listen, and keep learning what will continue to make us better supporters of our black and brown sisters, and keep educating ourselves. HINAC has been another way in which I have been able to use my voice, my poetry, and my sense of justice to help end HIV criminalization.
I think I want to say, as a long term survivor, I have been so inspired by the activists who were already writing, marching, organizing sit-ins and die-ins, that I never doubted that I could take my story of living with HIV and speak at universities, at churches, at seminaries, and challenge all the misinformation that still abounds in many settings. I was already a high school teacher when I was diagnosed, but I credit the women of WISDOM in Philadelphia, and folks in ACT-UP, the NJWomen and AIDS Network, WORLD, and many more for infusing in me with the belief that I could accomplish all the goals I had set for myself.
I want to say to anyone newly diagnosed, “You can conquer the world with your art, your music, your words, your energy, and you can use your moxie to break down all kinds of barriers. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you are not enough.” I tell young people that, after I was diagnosed, some of the most amazing things in my life took place. Here are some of those things: through the Philadelphia Writing Project I got graduate credits from the University of Pennsylvania; I was honored twice as a Gilder/Lehrman scholar, an organization which honors teachers, their academic work, and helps create a focus for those teachers on specific research; my social justice poetry has been performed on stage; I got a scholarship to go to seminary and delve into what I could do to be a dynamic worker in the arena of church and social change. Then . . . in the midst of all of this PWN burst on the scene, and my life hasn’t been the same since!
I have sisters; brilliant, innovative, think-tank savvy sisters! As an “old head,” I want to say, keep showing up, tell your own authentic story, be bold, and use your compassionate intelligence to get scholarships to go to all kinds of conferences, and study the leaders of our organizations, and the leaders of our movement, and how they achieve and accomplish what they do, and get ready to be steeped in intersectionality because in the work of PLHIV we are seeking to infuse the world with justice. We love our young leaders. We stand on the shoulders of those who went before us. We are an amazing family!