Gay: You Got the Hiv...

So far, so clean! By practicing safe sex and thinking before I do things, I've been spared this unfortunate virus.

Unfortunately the same can't be said by hundreds of thousands of other Americans who were not as lucky. And it breaks my heart to say that one of them is a close friend from undergrad who was something of my hero back then. He was brave enough to come out during undergrad; I was so afraid for him...but also me. I didn't want to be labeled, to be "that gay guy." I couldn't figure out why he purposefully be that guy.

After years of thought, blood, sweat, and tears, I know why. Because he was proud of who he was; something it took me a really long time to realize about myself and more importantly, to appreciate in him.

But as many young gays can attest to, "coming out" is a lonely process. Doing so after being enrolled at the biggest Baptist university in the world can be life changing. So he, like many of the men on "Queer as Folk" dabbled in drugs, one of which was crystal meth.

I don't know how it was done (i.e. IV or snorting, etc) but it helped result in likely promiscuous sex and contracting a lifelong fatal disease.

And it breaks my heart.

Even as a physician, I had never seen HARRT meds up close and personal. Sure, I could write for them and I may have seen them dispensed before, but as I stood in the motel room, holding a 7 day pharm plastic dispensing unit full of horse pills, it hit me...the Hiv is real. And it's killing my friend.

So now, my world has changed and I'm promising to better to myself and to enjoy my life as best I can. And continue wearing condoms :)