A GREAT BIG THANK YOU AND WHAT HIVINE IS ALL ABOUT
I would like to say a great big thank you to everyone who has visited the old hivine site and most of all to the people who took the time to post a message. I can’t tell you how much your kind and supportive comments have meant to me over the last few years – and moved me to tears at times. Not sad tears I hasten to add, although sadness always plays a huge part in this HIV equation. But the fact that you have supported me, also means hope for other women and men out there affected by this disease in that by supporting me, you have also supported them.
For that reason I ask you to keep visiting the site and posting your comments and in that way we can keep the vine, the hivine, flourishing and continuing to grow from strength to strength. I like to think of every visit as a leaf on the vine and I will continue to update the site and add useful leaf-links for people with HIV, their friends and families and also for people who just want to become more aware of the facts, figure and myths relating to HIV/AIDS.
There will be a help-vine, a fact-vine and who knows, maybe even a love-vine – and don’t forget, you will have ‘heard it on the hivine’.
Talking of vines, this blog all came about through Catherine and I being asked to speak live on the Jeremy Vine show on BBC Radio 2, so I would also like to thank him for giving us the opportunity to speak out to the nation and thereby do our bit to help raise awareness about what it is like to live with HIV. Let’s hope he continues to give people the chance to take part in his brilliant programme on current issues.
My son Ben and I are going to put some flowers on my mum’s grave later on today because I am sure she is watching over me and probably gave me a spiritual push to speak out. As I said in the interview, she was with me when I first found out about my status and urged me to be strong and call upon my ‘true British grit’, which like I said on the radio, I have been forced to call upon on a daily basis ever since. But thanks to her and the collective inherited genes of my wonderful family, I have the strength and will to carry on and I will continue do everything in my power to reduce stigma and prejudice for all of us who have had our lives blighted by HIV – and I sincerely hope you will help me.
I would also very much appreciate any feedback on my autobiography, ”The Spider and the Fly’, which tells the story about the how, why and when I became infected by HIV and the trials and tribulations of my journey navigating within its deadly perimeters. I will post regular chapters and hope you enjoy reading it,
Once again a great big thank you to everyone,