Being "out"

It feels good to have finally said out loud on the blog that Kendi is HIV+. Thank you all for the positive comments you left on that post. When we first decided to adopt Kendi we assumed we would be very open about her status with everybody. But after that first negative reaction (which came from our families) it slaps you in the face like a bowl full of cold water. It takes the wind out of your sails. And reality hits. Managing HIV will be very simple compared to managing people's reaction to Kendi having HIV.

It's hard for some people to recognize that her status is private and that nobody has a RIGHT to know whether she's negative or positive. We've had a family member tell us that if we didn't tell all of the siblings/cousins that THEY would tell the rest of the family. It's hard feeling like someone is taking information they were privileged to get in the first place, and not respecting that it is only ours and Kendi's information to share.

And there is Ryder--my cousin's baby that I watch during the day. When we first agreed to watch Ryder we weren't even thinking of adoption. We did feel like it was best to be open with Kendi's status to Ryder's parents. But the "price" for that openness is that now they may not continue to bring Ryder to us after Kendi gets home. It hurts. Bad. But I guess our skin will get thicker over time.

Our last hurdle was tell tell our pastor at church. [Not because we HAD to, but because we wanted to, as our church is so small no universal precautions are taken in the nursery.] Our pastor was very supportive, but through that a handful more people in the church were notified. I just figure...if a handful of people already know, we might as well become very open about it.

We're not in the least ashamed of Kendi's HIV status. Our struggle was whether or not it was our information to share, or whether it was hers to share when she gets old enough to understand the good and the bad that comes with disclosing status. But by waiting until she is older, we are creating an environment where there is a "secret" in our home, which we don't want to do either.

My blog is the one place where people from all areas of my life come together and read about what's going on (family, church, adoption, high school/college friends, etc.). If you read regularly and are in the adoption community, you already knew she was positive just by the wording I used. So to the majority of you it was no major surprise anyway.

The hardest thing about not being open from the beginning was that I was suppressing the desire I have to advocate for HIV+ people, and in particular, HIV+ orphaned children. There's so much more I want to say in the coming months. So many blog posts I've written in my head but never shared. I want people to know the good and the bad of it. I want people to find courage and put away our 1990 attitude about HIV/AIDS. I want people to see my daughter as a beautiful perfectly-made daughter of God FIRST. I want her HIV to be an after thought. I believe that some day, as we grow and learn together, it will.

Anita