Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2003. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
BBC News - Monday, 17 November, 2003
I was diagnosed with HIV in 1988 a little after my partner, then 30, was diagnosed.
He was the first for me in regards to penetrative sex. I had met the right person, who I wanted to be with.
It was a choice I made out of ignorance. HIV did not relate to people in love and in relationships.
We separated several months after diagnosis. I guess back then for me, the pain of watching him die would have been too much.
I decided I would never have sex again and I left to travel the world to have incredible adventures before I was to die.
During my travels I met an American reporter who was to give me self-esteem back by showing me it was OK to be intimate while having HIV.
Up until that time I had scrubbed myself frantically in the shower with soap every time I washed.
Learning to survive
On returning home I turned to a scene that I had previously turned my back on.
I managed a disastrous eight-year relationship with a guy who was incredibly unfaithful. I ignored this because I thought no-one else would want a relationship with an HIV-positive person.
My status gave him the reason and support from others to do what he did.
In 1997 I was diagnosed with Large-Celled Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. During my time in hospital I decided I had to survive and be independent.
I got my driving licence when suffering side effects from radiation therapy. I went through Sydney University to complete a graduate diploma and a masters degree before I was equipped enough to leave my relationship, my home and my comfort zone.
I began my new career in my new life by throwing up in the morning and aching from a badly bloated stomach because I started a drug trial a week before.
Luckily for me, the doctors and professors I see are intelligent humane people. Australia's health research is very progressive - for example the DNA test that identified my immunity to most HIV drugs on the market.
Access to HIV drugs in Australia is easy and I was able to sign up for plenty of drug trials.
Stigma
Having HIV, my sex life and personal life has suffered the most and I am sad it is all I have known during my adult sexual life.
In a society based on quick discreet and anonymous sexual meetings, the internet chat rooms are full of profiles stating HIV/Aids free, STD-free, or any other description that separates them from people like me.
Some specific websites are full of gay, bi-curious or straight, married guys wanting to be bare-backed - to have sex without a condom.
I have never forgotten my US journalist who reached out to me at a time when I wanted to curl up and not exist when far away from my country.
Stigma makes it impossible for people like me to live a life without lying.
I want to have the freedom to exist and to experience love in my life, shaped by my own adventures of love, travel and friendship, not by phobias and fear.
Travel restrictions
Having HIV has also meant that I have not been able to live in a free world.
Before my diagnosis I was building a promising career that would have allowed me to work pretty much globally.
Due to laws, policies and attitudes in various countries I cannot do this. I rely on short-term trips and have to disguise my pills as vitamins to pass through immigration.
Sometimes I take drug-free holidays with the risk of becoming immune to my pills. For me the experience of adventure is far better than any medical treatment.
At the moment I have made a few new friends since my recent return home to Melbourne from Sydney. I have not yet disclosed my HIV status to them.
I am allowing my mind a brief encounter to be a HIV-negative person. I see this is the true face of HIV in 2003.
My pain is not HIV, but that I may some day die without ever having experienced my full humanity.
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