The Hard Truth - The profile of an HIV / AIDS patient in Kenya [Nov. 18th 2005]

  As we walk down an alley into his one bedroomed house David Sira ignores the usual onlookers who marvel at the two boils on his cheeks. Walking is painful, slow & calculated as Sira has an extra boil on his left thigh.

  "I am sorry you found me in a bad shape", he tells me as he supports himself with a walking stick. Sira  doesn't like the sympathetic stares he gets & doesn't hide his disgust either." Such stares make me sick. I want to live my own life like an ordinary person", he tells me.

  But he doesn't. Although aged 30, Sira looks much older - thanks to the scattered patches of hair that remain on his head but usually covered with a sombrero hat that he removes & puts on a small cabinet. "I have been down this much before.... I will survive", he confidently says as we take seats on an old sofa set inside his house. It is that will to survive that keep him going - hoping to see his two children finish "at least" primary school, he says.

  "If I could reverse the clock I would be more careful, but it is too late",he says invoking a Swahili language proverb that loosely translates, 'you can not collect water that has poured to the ground'.

  "But I am now only careful on what I eat & drink, that is my survival strategy", he tells me. Sira had heard about HIV & Aids in his secondary school days & remembers marveling at the billboards with frail people suffering from the scourge. Ironically, he even took part in staging a play on HIV AIDS at the Kenya National Theatre in 1989 - some four years after the first HIV AIDS infection was detected in this east African nation.

  "It was just fun then. It never occurred to me that I would be one of the unlucky people to catch the vir us. Again none of us had seen anybody suffering from Aids. All those were good stories to stage a play on", he says.

  Sira came to Nairobi to live with an uncle & attend a computer college. He hoped to be a computer programmer & took a diploma, got a good company job & l&ed into good part time contracts. "My life started on a very positive note. I had the money & a good car at 23", he says.

  1995 will always be one dark year for Sira. He went down with what he thought to be malaria but a company doctor suggested that he give a blood sample for further tests.

  Nobody told Sira that his HIV status was also being tested & he never suspected anything amiss. "I took the test with confidence & continued with my work, although I was relatively weak. One month after the test I found a note on my desk asking me to see the general manager next morning at 9 am. I found the company doctor seated there with a blue file with my name. The two looked at me & asked me if I wanted to work there any more. I asked why & the manager took the file from the doctor & told me, look at that. I looked at page one & there were the results of my test. That information was released to me in a crude style. I couldn't believe what the doctor was telling me & I asked him whether I am going to die & I heard somebody say - yes! I think it was the manager, I don't know who. "

  To say Sira was shattered is an understatement. He walked out of his job... forgot to take a transport home - he actually forgot his vehicle at the parking bay! - & just walked the entire stretch of more than 8 kilometers. "I am not sure whether I met any people on the way, or how I was crossing the roads but somehow I got home & went straight to bed to die". The rest is history. "I never died. I thought of suicide but I never took any further step apart from buying a rope. I decided to take another test. It was positive also." Six years down the line Sira is still alive but his wife died last year leaving him with two children Nzuve, 4, & Mwikali, 8.

  None of them is infected. Still, they have been affected. "Living with the disease is not an easy thing because the society has not fully accepted the reality of the fast spreading pandemic", he says.

  "When I hear people who are uninfected arguing on whether to use condoms or not I wish I could be in a position to make such a simple choice".

  Although he recovered that initial shock & gained weight Sira did not reveal his HIV status to anyone & went into seclusion. "I knew from the word go that I had infected my wife. Or I infected her later on.

  I don't know because we never used any condoms", he says as he bends his head downwards & shakes it, left, right & then to the left again. "Its terrible watching your innocent partner living with a virus & not knowing about it". Immediately Sira knew his HIV status he stopped seeing the secret sexual partners - he had three - stopped drinking alcohol & started going to church.

  "I should have told my wife immediately", he now regrets. He changed his behavior, & in his own words "became a loving husband".

  From 1997 to 1999 Sira enjoyed "very good health...I even forgot I had a virus & would wonder whether those results were right". But the secret was soon out after the wife went down with a persistent cough that couldn't go a year after giving birth to their second-born, Nzuve.

  "At one point I thought if I was positive my wife would get her results from the ante-natal clinic. She never did as far as I know". Somehow Sira knew the truth was about to be discovered & even feared that their son could be infected too. "I decided to break the sad news to my wife before she took any test after she was advised by a doctor to do so. I told her the truth. I did not want her to hear it from a third party.

  That was a mistake I regret up to this day. She just collapsed in shock & had to be taken to hospital".

  Sira's darkest days had just began. At the hospital bed his wife talked to anyone who could listen about it..."All our friends just bolted away.

  The l&lord asked us to leave his house. She lost her job & my relatives severed all contacts with our family", says Sira.

  Nursing a wife he had infected was the worst nightmare that Sira went through. "I saw her suffering & there was nothing I could do to save her. My children always cried to see their mother in pain forcing me to take them to the village or to my sister to stay there for a while. I supported her to the end but when she died, I knew my time had come too, that I would soon follow, leaving our two children orphaned. Relatives openly told me to carry my own cross. I have done it with no regret", he says.

  Sira is reluctant to reveal how he got infected. "I was not faithful to my wife, that's all I can say. I developed relations with other young girls in the suburb & would go with them after some drinking spree. I guess that is how I contracted the disease, though I cannot tell which one infected me. But I do not want to blame anyone - this is God's will & it has happened".

  Like many other people living with HIV AIDS Sira went through a terrible denial stage. "I prayed to God to reverse the diagnosis, went to witchdoctors who told me my family has been bewitched by our in-laws...

  I almost believed that for two years". At other times Sira would meet any one of his three former girl friends & would be astonished that doctors say he was HIV-positive. "How could I be positive!'

  I kept asking myself. But what surprised me most was that those I was relating with were very healthy. They looked okay. This made me doubt the medical results & I went for a third diagnosis. But believe me it was the same. I was positive!

  This was the turning point in my life. I have never experienced a rough time like that. I stopped contacting witchdoctors & traditional seers".

  Watching Sira tell his story uninterrupted is to get the deeper thoughts that still race in his mind today. "Every single day that passes marks a significant period in my life. I am now living a very terrible life supported by drugs. The drugs prescribed to me by my doctor are very expensive. I have been in & out of the hospital seeking medical attention. & here I am. Look at my face". "Recently, the doctor told me that I have developed a mild heart-related disease, which he said is one of the worst symptoms of persons with HIV/AIDS. He has insisted that I take a balanced diet & use the drugs, which I have to buy frequently.

  "This is really worrying me because my income is very little. I have very little resources to sustain me & my relatives have withdrawn their support from me. They believe that I am the beginning of all these problems. My in-laws have not spared me either. Every time they keep blaming me for taking away their daughter at a very tender age. They believe that my wayward behavior has cost them their daughter & that God should punish me more "I don't know how to deal with this situation. But I am very grateful to God because I am alive, though life is very expensive, but at least my two children have someone to lean on for the time being. It is very sad for young kids who are left by their parents. Life becomes unbearable, as they have to depend on their relatives or good Samaritans for their survival. "I wouldn't like to see this happen to my kids but it will. It is very painful to know that you will soon die & leave your siblings in problems. But we cannot avoid death: its inevitable.

  It is even worse for us who have AIDS. We are already dead, only waiting for the day to come". Sira is not angry with the person who infected him. He has not had any more sexual contact - apart from unprotected sex with his late wife since knowing his HIV status.

  "I want the virus to be mine & mine alone. Spreading it to other people is the last thing I would do in my life. I would not even dream of using condoms, it is still dangerous. I do not want to infect anyone else. I have decided to abstain as I wait for my day". The only solace Sira has is that his wife forgave him.

  "Before she died, she called me & held my hand & asked that we pray together. I did the praying. After that she told me nimekusamehe (I have forgiven you). That is what gives me courage. At least she died with no grudge against me".

  Sira had always hoped to own a computer firm. He had a good job, good contracts & had started investing in real estate. In August he sold the last plot he had bought to meet his medical bills. He has invested some little money in a small food kiosk in the industrial area - some 6 kilometers south of Nairobi. "Now I have the toughest time in life.

  I have to strive hard to prove to my relatives that I can still make it even though they have neglected me. My children were very much affected by the death of their mother. They used to ask me when she will come back to stay with them. They were still young to understand&. I have now broken the sad news to them. My struggle now is to prepare them for any eventuality..".

  As all these questions linger in Sira's head no answers come quickly. The picture of his wife still hangs on the wall perhaps filling in the emptiness at home. His major task is to fight discrimination.

  "I find myself confused when people discriminate my children. At times their playmates intimidate them & laugh at them because they have no mother. It is bitter...its painful", says Sira as he bites his lower lip.

  "Sometimes my son is so devastated that he stays indoors & refuses to go out & play because he is afraid of his playmates. These are some of the hurdles the society should tackle. We have to assure the children & give them courage because they are affected psychologically & making them come to terms with the loss of their parents is not a simple task".

  Sira says he has come to terms with HIV AIDS. He says that the "worst problem is the unaffected & uninfected". "I am very disappointed by the Kenyan society. Sometimes you think it is illiteracy but you then find out that everyone sees you differently.

  Nobody thinks he can get it & that is where we all go wrong" So far Sira has not joined any society of people living with AIDS. "I have gathered enough courage for those six years with minimal counseling. What most people need is internal courage to over come. But let me tell you, it is difficult because most people see death in their eyes when they learn that they have the virus. This should not be the case".

  As part of his healing process, Sira occasionally meets people who have been infected & they exchange notes on how to survive. Two years ago he started reading books on counseling. "I have been counseling most of my friends infected with the disease & they have gained courage to over come the problems that follow. We have somehow developed a way of appreciating each day in our lives. But the most devastating thing is that our colleagues are perishing day by day. I have buried two of my friends in the last two weeks. They died almost on the same day & this has affected me very much, though my health is still intact apart from these boils".

  But Sira is disappointed with the Kenyan youths. "They still think Aids is one big joke. But I think there is a problem with the way the information is delivered. Some people think information is packaged like a biscuit & all you need to do is open & eat".

  Sira got infected when he had heard the information & as a rule he says that the AIDS message should be changed to: "you cannot trust everyone in this world even yourself. That is the only way we are going to save the uninfected".

  Sira has a few kind words for his elder sister. "She is the only person who helps me when the going is rough. She has promised to look after my children just in case". The sister runs the food kiosk that Sira has built & stays in a nearby suburb with Sira's two children. "It is no longer a bad dream to me, it is the thin line we all walk that I walked..."

  Sira does not want to part with his picture fearing that people might discriminate his children the more. & that is why he is also reluctant to go public nationally...

  "Let me suffer alone, but not my children", he says as I shake his h& for giving me the interview. We spent the next two hours talking politics, economy & the bombings in America.

  As I stood to leave I could tell the loneliness that Sira lives in. "Don't even trust yourself", he reminds me as I bid him bye.