My name is Mary and I've been living with HIV for 18 years. When I found out I was HIV+, I was 22 years old. I contracted the virus through intravenous drug use. I was a heroin addict and a crack addict and I lived on the streets for about 13 years.
I was coming in and out of jails. I felt like I was living life on the installment plan and I was just tired of living the way I was living. I started to make some changes in my life and one of the changes I made was I started to educate myself to educate myself about my disease, because I find that people fear that which they don't understand. And I feel that a lot of the stigma and a lot of the ignorance that surrounds HIV come from lack of understanding and lack of knowledge.
With people that are living with the virus, I think a lot of it, a very large portion of it, is how we deal with it mentally. I think that if you can keep a positive spirit, a positive, outlook, a positive mentality, you're well on your way. I think that that motivates me to get out of bed in the morning. The fact that I'm getting up not because I have to get up but I'm getting up because I'm going to help somebody else.
The medicines do work and you can live a really long time if you take your medicine and you take it the way you're supposed to. I began to realize that I'm not gonna die. I went back to schoolÑI was a 10th grade drop outÑwhen I went back to school I went to community college and I just transferred over to Drexel University. I'm studying to become an addictions counselor. So, anything is possible. Anything is possible. Just because you find out you're HIV positive, doesn't mean it's the end of the road.