Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2002. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Miami Herald - Sunday, August 25, 2002
Daniela Lamas, dlamas@herald.com
It was like a day at the spa for the women, whose bodies need more attention than most. They were all HIV-positive.
"It's all about these women, for once. We create a sacred place," said Sheri Kaplan, executive director of the Center for Positive Connections, the Miami-based organization that put together the event. "We have women from all walks of life -- some come from treatment centers, others are Ph.Ds."
NEWEST ADVANCES
The fourth annual Women's HIV/AIDS Conference, held Saturday, brought 70 women to the Renaissance Hotel at 1601 Biscayne Blvd., where they learned about the newest advances in drugs to battle AIDS and experimented with complimentary alternative therapy.
They left with goodie bags filled with mascara, lip liner, material on HIV testing and condoms.
At the health fair after the lectures, Stephanie Symonette and Pamela Lewis waited for the makeover artist after their massages.
Lewis is a peer counselor who runs a class at Jackson Memorial Hospital, where she met Symonette, who refers to Lewis as her "mentor.".
"This is my other life," Lewis said. "I'm a mother, and I'm a wife, but here I can take care of the other part of me, being a woman living with the virus."
Symonette said the luxuries offered at the health fair, like acupuncture or Reiki, a healing technique involving hand movements, keep her better informed about ways for her to stay healthy.
"We're not dying with the disease, we're living with it now," said Symonette, who has been HIV-positive for 10 years. "We've got to take care of ourselves."
TO LOCAL CLINIC
Winnie, a Liberty City resident who declined to give her last name, said she takes the information she learns at the lectures and the health fair and takes it back to her local clinic.
On Saturday, one lecture by a University of Miami researcher urged the women to maintain their spirituality and establish a comfortable relationship with their doctors. Another detailed the gynecological issues faced by women with living with HIV, the AIDS virus that causes AIDS.
"A lot of our clinics don't offer all of this or talk about the new medicines," said Winnie, who tried acupuncture for the first time at last year's event. While she was a little frightened at first, she said, she felt relaxed afterward.
"When we come out here, we know we're not alone. I love it," she said.
SUPPORTIVE PLACE
That's the purpose of the Center for Positive Connections, Kaplan said. She opened the center seven years ago after she was diagnosed with HIV and felt there wasn't a supportive place for heterosexual people who are HIV-positive to turn.
About 20,000 women and 45,000 men in Florida are living with HIV or AIDS, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Miami has the highest rate of new AIDS cases of any metropolitan area in the nation, with Fort Lauderdale third and West Palm Beach fourth, according to the CDC.
Positive Connections, which offers free services that include chiropractic adjustment and workshops on mental health, has expanded to include a support group for gay men and will soon offer a bisexual group, said Lin Novick, the center's director of operations.
A center has opened in New York, and Kaplan said she is planning to start one in California.
Her goal, she said, is to have a Center for Positive Connections in every major city.
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