Originally Published to The Body by Brandi Velasquez

**Brandi Velasquez in 2021 (top) with her husband Jason and daughter Daniella. Courtesy of the subject**

I was born in 1980 in southern Oregon. We moved to Portland when I was 7. I became sexually active at the age of 12. When I was 13, my mother allowed my 17-year-old boyfriend to move in with me, her, and my brother, sister, and best friend.

To this day, I do not understand why my mom allowed this. She didn’t have parents or proper guidance in her life, so maybe she thought it was OK—or that it would make me happy. In fact, I had mixed emotions about it—but my Latino house was always full of teenagers, parties, men, and chaos, so it felt normal, even though he was violent toward me. There were some good moments, times when I would skip school and he would take my friends and me out for lunch at the mall. It was the rush of being a rebellious teenager. My mom also said over and over to me, “You have to find someone who can support you so you can finish school.”

Being sexually active so young, I had a medical exam every year. At ages 13, 14, and 15, my HIV test came back negative along with everything else. Coming up on 16 in November 1996, though, I had a gut-wrenching feeling. I knew about the risk of HIV/AIDS and the importance of using protection, but I didn’t like condoms and I’d chosen not to use them with my partner because I trusted him. We were always together unless he was working, so I didn’t think he was having sex with other people. Still, I had a bad feeling.

Shortly after that doctor’s visit, the phone rang. My mom passed it to me, saying it was the doctor’s office. I felt completely nauseous. The office said that I needed to come in for some test results.

I took public transportation across town. Once I arrived, they brought me back, sat me down, and said, “We’re sorry, but your HIV results have come back positive.”

I was in complete shock. I cried and cried for a bit in the room with my doctor at the time. My doctor had been doing my care for some time. She took the time with me until I was ready to talk about the next steps for my future health care. I was scared of what my life was going to be. I was 15, just about to have my Sweet 16. I feared going home to tell my family—especially my mother and my boyfriend. I knew he would blame me. I thought about all the stigma and shame that would now come into my life. How would I tell friends? I was already the outcast in the family, and now this.

The folks at the clinic asked me if there was anyone they could contact to pick me up, given I was only 15. I said no. Then they asked if I knew whom I may have contracted it from. I told them my boyfriend, but didn’t provide his name because he was an undocumented immigrant from Mexico. I was scared that he would hurt me if I gave his information out.

The clinic gave me a pamphlet of places where I could get services, including our local AIDS services organization. They also said that I would have to contact the Multnomah County HIV clinic for an intake and start receiving services there—and that I was no longer a client at their clinic. They told me nothing about treatments to help me, even though effective new treatments had just come out that year, 1996.

They sent me home in a taxi—“for safety purposes,” they told me, because most people who received positive results wanted to commit suicide. On the ride home, I was in complete shock, numb. Yet I was angry at myself, thinking, You said this would never happen to you, and look, it happened. I was scared of how my mom was going to react.

Upon returning home, I told my mom, brother, and sister. My mom stood up, started punching the front door, pacing, and yelling at me, telling me how much of a whore I was, that this was all my fault, and how could I do this to her? I sat there crying with my head down, watching the tears from the entire family. There was no hugging, no emotional support, just looks of sadness and disgust.

Things got worse after that. It was now time to tell my boyfriend, who was living between my family’s place and his own. My mom helped me tell him. I don’t think he comprehended completely at the time because he didn’t speak any English, so it was challenging to try to tell him he could possibly have HIV and that the clinic had said he’d have to be tested.

When they called to say he needed to come in for his results, we knew immediately they were positive—and they were. I went with him. He was in shock, then displayed anger toward me. We went home, barely talking, but he told me to never tell his family, that this was all my fault, that if the news got to anyone in his family, he would kill me. I think that, up to that point, he had intentionally evaded learning his HIV status. I don’t think he had been honest about his personal sexual history in Mexico.

Our relationship had already been rocky, but now it got worse. His drinking and substance use increased, resulting in nights when he would come home so drunk after work that he would rape me. Yet I stayed with him, scared that nobody else would want me now that I was HIV positive.

**Velasquez at age 16 in 1996, the year she was diagnosed with HIV. Courtesy of the subject.**

A Painful High School Experience

After my diagnosis, everything changed. I developed an “I don’t give a fuck” attitude, hating on the world, my mom, men—anything. And I began to dislike myself. My schoolwork suffered. Before, I’d been a straight-A student, eager to achieve. But now, I failed freshman year, having to start all over again the following year.

I would leave home anytime I could to hang out with a few people whom I did not disclose my status to. I started drinking and partying more than I had ever, experimenting with different substances, losing myself in a circle of lies and secrets. My mom had me as her runner, selling drugs for her on the streets of downtown Portland and bringing men back to her. Life was crazy. I had to protect myself, so I built a shell around myself, not letting anything faze or hurt me. I became cold, angry, and bitter.

At the start of 1997, I moved out of my mother’s place to live with my boyfriend and his family. “I am no longer responsible for you,” my mother told me. “Now he can buy your clothes and feed and support you.”

When I didn’t want to be with my boyfriend, I would hide at a friend’s. But my boyfriend would stalk me, going through the halls of my high school yelling my name and hiding behind trees with a branch in his hand to whip me if he found me. It came to a point where I decided I had to completely remove myself from my family and boyfriend.

Amid all this, I had a few one-night stands, seeking something I would never get—unconditional love. If my mom knew I had an interest in a guy, she’d ask me, “Did you tell him?” “No,” I would respond. “I don’t need to.” I knew this was wrong but just didn’t care. My mother actually scared off a few guys by disclosing my status to them. I remember the look of anger and disgust from them, although they got checked and tested HIV negative.

Meanwhile, my best friend had disclosed my status to her husband even though I’d asked her to keep it to herself. Once, when I was helping her prepare potatoes, she said, “My husband doesn’t want you touching any food.” I knew right away that she’d disclosed. I was hurt—my closest friend since childhood had just betrayed me.

Our friendship fell off after that. I had no one to talk to about this—and especially no place for women. I remember walking into our local AIDS services agency. It was full of ill-looking men who looked like Tom Hanks in the movie Philadelphia. I didn’t see any positive women around, so I felt like I just needed to stay silent about my diagnosis and try to live my life as normally as I could.

But my life was far from normal. I was now skipping, and of course failing, all my classes, as well as staying with an abusive partner who would not go anywhere to get help, as I was.

I started HIV meds the beginning of my second freshman year, September 1997, with AZT/3TC and nevirapine. I got so ill. I ended up staying with my mom because my boyfriend didn’t want his family to see me sick. I had migraines, nausea, vomiting. I could not go to school or even function. I stopped those meds a few months after starting them.

I didn’t make it through high school. My mom was so angry that she framed my final report card to show the world how badly her daughter did. I saw myself as a disappointment.

Taking Steps Toward Freedom

I had to find an alternative to high school, so I got into Job Corps, a national job-training program for young adults, which was just a few counties over. On weekends, I’d come back to my family or the boyfriend. Job Corps was a plus, a place where no one knew me or my history. Still, I had to show the administrators my medical history, and I was required to get my HIV medications daily from the nurse. Others in the Corps often asked why I had to see the nurse twice a day. I simply told people I had health conditions.

I had to drop big pills into water every night like Alka-Seltzer. It was horrible. Eventually, I shared my diagnosis with one of my roommates. I was scared she would look at me with disgust, but she was a friend who supported and stuck up for me. We didn’t talk about it much, but at least I was able to not feel like my life was a complete secret.

Sometimes I would lie to my boyfriend and family and say that I wasn’t able to leave for the weekend. Then I would hang with other students in the area, which felt safer. I made it through Job Corps taking my medication almost all the time, not because I wanted to but because the Corps required it of me.

I got my GED and then finished my studies for a certified nursing assistant (CNA) license, graduating from the Corps at the end of 1998. I wanted to get my own place so I could be on my own. I felt a great sense of accomplishment leaving the Corps with my GED, CNA license, and funds for an apartment and a job.

But my personal life was yet more chaos. My brother’s girlfriend and their baby, my niece, moved in with me so I could help take care of her because my brother wasn’t even 16 when she was born. My boyfriend moved in shortly after that.

Thankfully, I was passionate about my nursing assistant job. It helped me prove to myself that I was strong enough to keep moving forward, even though there was so much more that I needed—someone to talk to, to hug me and just say I was going to be all right.

Instead, I lived with my abusive boyfriend, sister-in-law, and niece, while working all the time. I even worked holidays to avoid being around my family. Otherwise, I just partied. I also stopped medications after leaving school. I couldn’t handle them and just wanted life to feel normal.

Yet after being in my abusive relationship for so long, I started to fight back, calling the police on him, showing that I was not willing to take his abuse anymore. He eventually moved out but remained the only person I continued to have sex with, because I was afraid of passing HIV to someone else. We only saw each other to have sex.

I’d had birth control implanted in my arm at an early age so I would not get pregnant, but at 17, I took it out. Rebelliously, I actually wanted to get pregnant—but couldn’t at first.

Then, every night after my coworkers and myself had our dinner break, I started to get sick. I was not at the time taking any HIV meds. I called my mom, who immediately replied, “You’re pregnant.”

A New Life in the Picture

She turned out to be right. An ultrasound showed I was already almost five months pregnant. Once again, life changed in a split moment. I immediately started back on HIV meds, since now I had to be sure I was healthy for the little one inside of me.

When I told the ex-boyfriend I was pregnant, he said it wasn’t his. I knew he was wrong—he was the only one I’d been with. I continued to see him off and on, but only for convenience. He bought clothes and shoes for the baby and took me out. I quit work, left my apartment, and moved back with my family to receive help. My mom was happy I was going to have a child. I was totally focused on having this baby and attempting to change my life.

People who knew I was positive asked if I was going to have an abortion. Crazy! Why would I do that? In my last month of pregnancy, I was at the hospital twice a week so they could monitor the baby due to the HIV meds I was taking. I am going to be an HIV-positive mother, I would think. How will this look and feel?

Before I was put to sleep for a C-section, I asked the medical students there if they would take pictures of the birth. The pictures show the doctors pulling out my baby and immediately cleaning her with a special solution. When I woke up, my mom put her in my arms and snapped a picture. I named her Daniella. Her birth had given me hope for the future, now that I had someone to love me—and someone I could love. She tested negative for HIV, which I thought was an absolute miracle. Life has its ways of showing you the light when there is darkness.

When Daniella was about six months old, I started dating someone and moved to Vancouver, Washington, to be with him. I’d disclosed my status to him even before we started dating. But he turned out to be a cheater. After seven months of lies, I moved back in with my mom, who, along with my brother, also by then lived in Vancouver.

But before long, I was focused not on my child but, again, on partying. I was escaping from the pain of silence about being positive. My mom had her ways of getting me to go out and dance and drink with her while my brother and sister-in-law would watch Daniella.

A New Man Steps Into My Life

One night, my brother had his friend Jason babysit Daniella. Later that night, Jason and I started talking. Wait, I thought. This person is interesting and actually listens to me. We talked until my mom picked us back up. Then we started talking daily. For the first time, I was interested in someone compassionate and kind, someone who was really seeing me. It gives me butterflies just writing it now—that’s how intense the feeling was.

We started dating. I didn’t disclose my HIV status—I didn’t want to scare him off. Even when we slept together, I didn’t disclose. I knew this was wrong, but I was scared.

Well, my family took it upon themselves to tell him. First my sister-in-law, then my mom. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked. I just started crying, ashamed and embarrassed. “If you’d told me, I would have had the option to choose,” he said. He wasn’t angry–he just wanted to know why. Then he said, “I can see why you didn’t say anything, but it was harder to hear it from other people.”

He was very sweet about it, and we had a brief conversation about HIV. After that, we tried using protection, but most of the time we chose not to. He said, “I choose to stay with you—I know the risks.” We did not know at the time that being undetectable meant you could not transmit HIV sexually to someone, what we now call U=U. But he continued to test negative going forward. [Ed: Even without being undetectable, the chance of a cisgender woman giving a cisgender man HIV through sex is very low.]

We continued on our journey as a couple, Jason taking on the role of Daniella’s father. He was married, but his wife had left him and taken their daughter with her, which made him angry. About six months into our relationship, I was again not taking HIV medication and leaving Jason to take care of Daniella while I went out and partied with my mom. One night, I came home and Jason said to me: “At the end of the day, when all is said and done and the party’s over, who will be there for you? Not those men in the bars—but me. If you allow me to.”

An Awakening Leads to Change

Those words hit me hard. They changed my perspective on life and the direction I was choosing to go. I told him I would take my HIV meds again for him and Daniella. “If you’re going to take your meds for us and not for yourself, don’t take them at all,” he said. “You have to love yourself as much as you love the two of us.”

This was a huge eye-opener, and it also hurt, because no one had ever taken the time to say the words I needed to hear. I started moving in a different direction. Jason met my doctor, went with me to my appointments, and supported me in a way that had not existed in my life. Jason was my guiding light at that time, someone who was placed in my path for a reason. He was trying to teach me to look outside the box and change my ways. This was hard. It felt like he and my family were pulling me in different directions.

Jason, Daniella, and I moved out from my family, but they were always still around. Meds remained a constant battle for me, on and off and on and off. They’re still a daily challenge for me, even though I’ve been adherent now for 14 years.

In May 2006, someone broke into our home, approaching me with a knife, which kicked up a lot of PTSD for me. After graduating college in 2003, I’d been working as a front-office telephone operator and medical assistant. But after the break-in, I stopped work because I was no longer able to take public transportation, too afraid of people. To this day, people standing or walking behind me makes me anxious.

A few months after the break-in, my doctor told me I needed help with all my previous traumas. I ended up at a center that also happened to have a psychosocial support program for HIV-positive women and their children. My therapist said, “There is a women’s group you can go to here. It’s called WOW (Women of Wisdom). Come on, I’ll walk you over.”

**Velasquez and her daughter Daniella on an AIDS Walk Portland billboard. Courtesy of the subject.**

Finally Finding Community

After a few months, I decided to go check out this group. I walked into a room filled with ladies sitting around a table. I felt odd at first—very closed-in. But the women embraced me with open arms.

It turned out to be a place like no other. Finally, I was not alone. I was overwhelmed with mixed emotions. Why didn’t I know about this place before? Why was this not being publicized in our community?

Knowing I was not the only woman who was living with HIV changed my life. I went to WOW every Wednesday evening with Daniella. I started to heal, learning about other women and their journey, knowing that there were other mothers living with HIV out there like me. I was gaining education and growing with all the women in the group. When I wanted to isolate and not attend WOW, Jason would encourage me to go. He was there for me, he’d say, but it was healthy for me to go and be with other women who understood what I was going through.

So I kept going, slowly integrating myself into the group, finding my place and my voice within it. There, I learned to love myself—all of me, including my HIV. I learned to open up and talk about my status freely and educate others. This group helped me grow as a woman, mother, and wife. The unity and love that was created by all the ladies gave me a sisterhood I’d never had. I gained confidence in myself, learned how to care for myself.

I began volunteering as the group’s outreach coordinator, trying to find other women living with HIV in the area. Women in Oregon today make up only about 12% of the HIV-positive population here—a very low number that means we get few support services and have to fight for anything. Just getting our voice heard can be challenging. We fight to be seen, and if you think there is nowhere for you to go or be with women like you, then you stay isolated and silent. That’s why our voices matter. Nothing about us without us!

Finally, after 11 years of Jason and I being together, his ex agreed to a divorce, and he and I married in 2014. We just celebrated 20 years together and our seventh wedding anniversary. Daniella is now 21 and back home with us. She has a bleeding disorder called Type 2M von Willebrand disease that we discovered when she was 13. We had to pivot from learning about HIV to learning about bleeding disorders, and we are now part of the Pacific Northwest bleeding-disorders community. Life doesn’t stop! It will continue to give you obstacles that, at times, you don’t think you will get through—trials and tribulations we continue to learn and grow from. But we are a strong family. Jason and I are dedicated to making sure Daniella receives the support she needs.

My family hasn’t changed and still gives me no support around being HIV positive, but I no longer allow them to hurt me. I now stand up and voice my needs. Thankfully, I have moral support from Jason, who is my best friend and could not be a better partner to share my life with, and Daniella. I have created my own support system—in person, online, and all across the country.

Becoming an Activist

I got involved with Positive Women’s Network (PWN)-USA in 2016. At the time, the woman who was facilitating WOW saw the passion that I and another woman in the group had for the issues around women and HIV, and advocated for us to go to PWN’s national summit. At the time, I was doing peer support for all the WOW ladies who needed it—and working as WOW’s part-time facilitator myself.

With funds from WOW’s fundraising events, we went to Fort Walton Beach, Florida, for the PWN summit—my first time both off the West Coast and on a plane. At the time, I didn’t know anything about PWN-USA other than that it was a conference to attend and learn and meet other women from all over. Attending the summit, meeting around 300 different positive women in one place, changed how I looked at the population of women living with HIV in the world and the direction of the work I was doing. I cannot describe the feeling of power in that room. “All these women are positive just like me,” I thought, “and look at what everyone does for their communities.”

The summit sparked my passion for learning more about advocacy and policy. In 2017, PWN put out applications for policy fellowships, a new program. I applied and received a spot, plunging me into something I knew nothing about, such as learning the importance of voting and advocating on the federal level. I approached it like it was school, with dedication.

By this point, Daniella was also a high school senior, so life was busy for me. That same year, 2017, I was named one of POZ magazine’s 100, celebrating women doing great work in the community. I took it as a sign to keep doing what I am passionate about.

I graduated from the PWN Policy Fellowship at the 2018 PWN-USA Inaugural Class Policy Fellowship summit, during which I was also asked if I wanted to become a state lead for Oregon. I said I’d be honored and did that training as well, learning more about how to do effective policy advocacy. Since then, I’ve attended AIDSWatch in D.C., advocating for HIV funding in D.C. I’ve attended USCHA (the United States Conference on HIV/AIDS), the biggest conference I had ever attended. I worked with Multnomah County as a consultant after attending the training for the trainers with HRSA’s Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program (RWHAP) Center for Quality Improvement and Innovation (CQII), which provides technical assistance on quality improvement to Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program recipients.

In 2019, I quit working as the facilitator for the WOW program, as limits on my physical mobility constrained my ability to do that work. Yet I am still active with PWN, advocating on policy and getting out the vote, teaching others how important their vote is. Prior to joining PWN, I didn’t vote. My outlook on voting has changed, now that I see how personal health and reproductive issues apply to laws and policy. In August 2021, I was named PWN’s Shero of the Month.

What I’ve learned through this difficult journey, and what I would like readers to know, is that our HIV diagnosis does not define us. Yet living with HIV has also changed my life. Despite all the pain, life is worth it. It may not be easy, but you are strong and will get through it. We are worthy of unconditional love. In moments that you feel lost, know you are not alone. There are many of us out there who still struggle on a daily basis.

I am one of those people, and I am here. The past is not as important as how you choose to move forward. Everything happens for a reason. There’s nothing better than being your own advocate. Find your voice and your passion. Begin your journey to happiness, wherever you might find it.