If you have never experienced a Gay Pride celebration it is something you have to do before you die. The Gay/Lesbian community celebrate like no other group out there. While we were at the festival we decided to take advantage of the free HIV testing they were doing. Even though I was 95% sure it was negative, you never know.
To get started you fill out a form that asks the usual questions: Name, address, age, sexual orientation. I am pretty sure I was one of a few who checked the hetro box. They then ask you on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest what do you consider your risk level to be. I had no idea. So I left that line blank. We had to wait about 30 minutes to get in but when I did I was so nervous. Even though I knew it was negative I was still nervous.
The nurse I had was so nice and sweet and was in the air conditioned van. She looked over my form and asked why I did not rate my risk level. I looked at her and told her "I have no idea what it would be." She was so nice, she told me that we were going to look over my lifestyle and past sexual history and make a decision based on that information. I told her I have been married 3 times. I knew that as of 1994 I was negative because it was tested when I got pregnant. Since then I have had 2 encounters with men that I was not married to. She asked if I was 100% positive that #3 was faithful to me. All I could tell her was that he said he was, but then again he said he loved me too. So based on that I now consider anything said by him to be a lie. So no I was not a 100% sure that he was faithful and even if he was he has had more relationships in his life than a I can count. So he probably has a higher risk than I do.
Being the kind person she was she did not even flinch when I said this. Even when she saw that it upset me just a bit to admit it out loud. She simply said "We never trust them after they break our hearts. So you are okay not trusting him. And you are doing the right thing by getting tested."
The next step is they take some blood from your finger, like they do when you donate blood. The prick the end and fill this little vial with a certain amount of blood. It sounded so easy and probably was for the other 1000 people who got tested. But for some reason, my body refused to bleed. She pricked my finger and a drop of blood came out and that was it. She got a bigger pricker thingy and did another finger and a drop of blood came out. She showed me where we needed to fill the vial to and suggested maybe standing up would help the blood flow faster. So I stood up...nothing. Finally after much squeezing she got just enough to put on the test strip. Now you wait 10 minutes. This was the longest 10 minutes of my life. But, while the test was going I asked a few questions about how the disease is transmitted and how it was treated.
This was the fun part, I explained that I have not dated much in the past 20 years. So I am a bit of a novice on the intimate level of dating. I asked how is it appropriate to ask a potential partner if they are disease free. Apparently this is a common thing in the homo world. Her answer was so funny, she said once I was comfortable in a relationship and we have decided we want to forgo protection you take them to a clinic and get tested and you wait for the results. She told me "never take their word for it that they are clean. If you can't trust a man you were married to an felt you knew pretty well than why would you trust someone you had only known for a short time. See the test results for yourself in black and white and from the clinic not the person." Apparently you are not suppose to trust anyone. Which works well for me since I don't trust anyone.
When all was said and done and I had my clean bill of health and was updated on my Hepatitis shot (cause you do that at a gay festival too) I talked to Harold about it and he said that many gays advertise disease free. So I will keep my clean bill of health and before I have any kind of encounter with a man I will ask to see his, since this is the new dating format I want to make sure I do it right.
For now however, I think I am going to stay single for a while longer. The whole testing for disease before you get intimate is just a bit much for me.
To get started you fill out a form that asks the usual questions: Name, address, age, sexual orientation. I am pretty sure I was one of a few who checked the hetro box. They then ask you on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest what do you consider your risk level to be. I had no idea. So I left that line blank. We had to wait about 30 minutes to get in but when I did I was so nervous. Even though I knew it was negative I was still nervous.
The nurse I had was so nice and sweet and was in the air conditioned van. She looked over my form and asked why I did not rate my risk level. I looked at her and told her "I have no idea what it would be." She was so nice, she told me that we were going to look over my lifestyle and past sexual history and make a decision based on that information. I told her I have been married 3 times. I knew that as of 1994 I was negative because it was tested when I got pregnant. Since then I have had 2 encounters with men that I was not married to. She asked if I was 100% positive that #3 was faithful to me. All I could tell her was that he said he was, but then again he said he loved me too. So based on that I now consider anything said by him to be a lie. So no I was not a 100% sure that he was faithful and even if he was he has had more relationships in his life than a I can count. So he probably has a higher risk than I do.
Being the kind person she was she did not even flinch when I said this. Even when she saw that it upset me just a bit to admit it out loud. She simply said "We never trust them after they break our hearts. So you are okay not trusting him. And you are doing the right thing by getting tested."
The next step is they take some blood from your finger, like they do when you donate blood. The prick the end and fill this little vial with a certain amount of blood. It sounded so easy and probably was for the other 1000 people who got tested. But for some reason, my body refused to bleed. She pricked my finger and a drop of blood came out and that was it. She got a bigger pricker thingy and did another finger and a drop of blood came out. She showed me where we needed to fill the vial to and suggested maybe standing up would help the blood flow faster. So I stood up...nothing. Finally after much squeezing she got just enough to put on the test strip. Now you wait 10 minutes. This was the longest 10 minutes of my life. But, while the test was going I asked a few questions about how the disease is transmitted and how it was treated.
This was the fun part, I explained that I have not dated much in the past 20 years. So I am a bit of a novice on the intimate level of dating. I asked how is it appropriate to ask a potential partner if they are disease free. Apparently this is a common thing in the homo world. Her answer was so funny, she said once I was comfortable in a relationship and we have decided we want to forgo protection you take them to a clinic and get tested and you wait for the results. She told me "never take their word for it that they are clean. If you can't trust a man you were married to an felt you knew pretty well than why would you trust someone you had only known for a short time. See the test results for yourself in black and white and from the clinic not the person." Apparently you are not suppose to trust anyone. Which works well for me since I don't trust anyone.
When all was said and done and I had my clean bill of health and was updated on my Hepatitis shot (cause you do that at a gay festival too) I talked to Harold about it and he said that many gays advertise disease free. So I will keep my clean bill of health and before I have any kind of encounter with a man I will ask to see his, since this is the new dating format I want to make sure I do it right.
For now however, I think I am going to stay single for a while longer. The whole testing for disease before you get intimate is just a bit much for me.