BBC News - Tuesday, 2 December, 2003

I contracted Aids because I had sex with prostitutes. I used to pay them to have sex in hotels and that's how I got infected.

Nine years ago I had tuberculosis and my weight dropped to 90 lbs. I was taken to hospital and after tests I was told I had Aids. From that moment I have been living with the illness.

About two months after I came out of hospital, I just wanted to die. However, with psychiatric help, I improved a lot mentally and I have accepted that I have to live with this illness. There is no other choice and at the moment, there is no cure.

I had psychotherapy for a year because - just imagine - when you fall in love with a woman and then she finds out, she leaves because she's scared.

I had met a girl in a restaurant and we went out a few times and had sex using a condom. But I told her about my illness and when I rang her again she said she didn't want anything more to do with me, she didn't want to risk her life with me.

Not many friends

I have learnt to adapt and just carry on as best I can.

Sometimes I work in a florist's. I make wreaths and garlands.

They call me when there is a lot of work. I worked with them for 12 years before contracting Aids, so they try and help me by giving me some work because the disability allowance we get here is just not enough to live on.

But I don't have that many friends. Since I contracted the disease I have become rather isolated.

People think that when you shake hands with them and then they touch their face or something, they might get something.

In one restaurant, when they found out I had Aids, the owner started serving my food on disposable plates. No more normal plates and cutlery.

So I don't have that many friends any more.

Sunday is a very gloomy day for me. When it comes around, I want it to pass quickly because it's such a sad day.

I do enjoy fishing. My friend has a boat and sometimes I go out with him, I find it relaxing. I like going to a show and seeing singers like Julio Iglesias, Emmanuel, Jose Jose, Chayanne, that's relaxing too.

I also enjoy going to a nice restaurant.

You just have to live with this illness.

You've got it, there's no going back. Nothing can be done - you're in God's hands.

My biggest failure

My family doesn't know about my situation. My mother died in 1982 and my father in 1986. At that time my brother was a captain in the army. I wrote to him but he told me he wasn't interested in my life here, that I should respect his ideals.

So I stopped writing to him. For more than 18 years, he doesn't know if I am alive or dead.

Sometimes I don't feel like carrying on, it's so hard to live with this illness.

I would like to be with my wife and family but now I can't.

I have two 18-year-old children who live in New York.

When my wife and I separated, she was pregnant and she left me a letter in our apartment saying she was going to her aunt's in New York because she had had enough of me.

She was almost eight months pregnant when she left for New York and I haven't heard from her since.

It was the biggest failure of my life, not to be able to keep my family.

I just went crazy after that, going to discos and so on and eventually I contracted this illness.

I'm not very sociable any more, I don't go to parties, I don't know if it's because I'm 45 now, but I've lost the zest for life since I got ill.

I do get depressed a lot, thinking about my illness, and that you can die any day and I don't want to die at 45, I'm still young.

I'm definitely not the man I was.

I don't do the things I used to because I'm ill, I recognise that.

This is a terminal illness after all. Your heart isn't in it any more, to do all the lovely things in life that you used to.

Your world just collapses around you.

Thank God, I've still got some fight left in me to carry on.

This interview with Juan was provided by the BBC's Spanish service, www.bbcmundo.com.
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