My Own Country
Sometimes, when I have finished a book, there is a paragraph or sentence that my mind harks back to, something that will have made a deep impression on me. Afterwards I flick from cover to cover looking for those elusive words so I can savour them once more.
Abraham Verghese specialised in infectious diseases at the outset of the AIDS epidemic. There were many long years when he seemed to be tackling this vile disease in the dark with a lack of support from the medical community, and in the face of terrible ignorance among the general public. In the beginning there was no real help he could give his patients beyond listening to their stories, treating them as individuals, and learning to give them an easier death. At one stage he lit on the discovery that vitamin C seemed to help; to me that feels like using an aspirin to try and cure pneumonia.
AIDS was reviled because it was thought to be a strictly male disease, a plague that only attacked the gay community brought upon themselves by their reckless sex filled lifestyles as if this was divine retribution for aberrant behaviour. When Verghese took care of a husband and wife who were both infected (him through a blood transfusion, her through sexual contact with her husband) there was an element of being ‘innocents’ as though others were ‘guilty’ of causing their own illness. This couple couldn’t tell anyone for fear of being rejected by their church, their grown children and the possibility of never seeing their grandchildren again. There were also many haemophiliacs who were infected through blood products as if life wasn’t already such a hardship for them, their battle for survival made ten times worse, the stigma and fear damning them to hell and back.
One patient, James, had strong opinions that he had no hesitation in voicing as he was going through the final stages of this life threatening disease: “Mind you, I wouldn’t take anything back. As much suffering as I have gone through – my lover’s death, my illness – I would not take any of it back. Most gay men have travelled to several countries, have seen the best shows, movies, plays, have taken an interest in art, in their clothes, in the way their house is decorated, have experienced more of this world than any heterosexual. To me, a heterosexual male is a slob. If he gets divorced the walls of his house will stay as bare as when he first moved in, and it will be dirty, dirty, dirty. If he gets married – that’s it – he has no desire to improve himself past that. His idea of a good time is to get a six-pack and park his truck on the side of the road with his buddy and drink. He might beat his wife, be mean to his kids, and ultimately die where he was born having seen nothing, done nothing. But by God the one thing he knows is how he feels about queers! When he sees a queer he can look down on him, feel contempt, beat up a queer because it’s justified.”
Verghese relates each person’s story as if the men and women were personal friends that mattered to him. He held their hands, treated where and when he could, attended meetings, and rarely made any money at all, a failure when judged by his more lucratively successful peers.
Eventually, the drug AZT came along, coupled with a more enlightened approach to HIV and AIDS but those earlier victims who suffered horribly had few friends beyond the enlightened Verghese and those of his ilk. I look back on that time now and remember Princess Diana making a difference by merely shaking hands with an AIDS sufferer. This seemed to be a turning point though the fear still persisted; many thought that this virus could be transmitted by any contact, however limited, as was cancer in its earliest days.
I sit here sniffing with a minor cold that has me feeling terribly sorry for myself. I’m going to milk the sympathy my family feels for me for all it’s worth and take whatever help is on offer. I simply can’t imagine what it must have been like for those earlier victims of HIV and AIDS who suffered so horribly with an illness whose only outcome was an agonising death: shunned by family, neighbours, fellow churchgoers, and many health care professionals. And I listen, with great sadness, to the news of yet another country making it punishable by a lengthy jail sentence for anyone to partake in a same sex relationship. Two steps forwards, one step back with people like Verghese there to pave the way to a greater understanding of who and what we are. Vive la différence!
Abraham Verghese specialised in infectious diseases at the outset of the AIDS epidemic. There were many long years when he seemed to be tackling this vile disease in the dark with a lack of support from the medical community, and in the face of terrible ignorance among the general public. In the beginning there was no real help he could give his patients beyond listening to their stories, treating them as individuals, and learning to give them an easier death. At one stage he lit on the discovery that vitamin C seemed to help; to me that feels like using an aspirin to try and cure pneumonia.AIDS was reviled because it was thought to be a strictly male disease, a plague that only attacked the gay community brought upon themselves by their reckless sex filled lifestyles as if this was divine retribution for aberrant behaviour. When Verghese took care of a husband and wife who were both infected (him through a blood transfusion, her through sexual contact with her husband) there was an element of being ‘innocents’ as though others were ‘guilty’ of causing their own illness. This couple couldn’t tell anyone for fear of being rejected by their church, their grown children and the possibility of never seeing their grandchildren again. There were also many haemophiliacs who were infected through blood products as if life wasn’t already such a hardship for them, their battle for survival made ten times worse, the stigma and fear damning them to hell and back.
One patient, James, had strong opinions that he had no hesitation in voicing as he was going through the final stages of this life threatening disease: “Mind you, I wouldn’t take anything back. As much suffering as I have gone through – my lover’s death, my illness – I would not take any of it back. Most gay men have travelled to several countries, have seen the best shows, movies, plays, have taken an interest in art, in their clothes, in the way their house is decorated, have experienced more of this world than any heterosexual. To me, a heterosexual male is a slob. If he gets divorced the walls of his house will stay as bare as when he first moved in, and it will be dirty, dirty, dirty. If he gets married – that’s it – he has no desire to improve himself past that. His idea of a good time is to get a six-pack and park his truck on the side of the road with his buddy and drink. He might beat his wife, be mean to his kids, and ultimately die where he was born having seen nothing, done nothing. But by God the one thing he knows is how he feels about queers! When he sees a queer he can look down on him, feel contempt, beat up a queer because it’s justified.”
Verghese relates each person’s story as if the men and women were personal friends that mattered to him. He held their hands, treated where and when he could, attended meetings, and rarely made any money at all, a failure when judged by his more lucratively successful peers.
Eventually, the drug AZT came along, coupled with a more enlightened approach to HIV and AIDS but those earlier victims who suffered horribly had few friends beyond the enlightened Verghese and those of his ilk. I look back on that time now and remember Princess Diana making a difference by merely shaking hands with an AIDS sufferer. This seemed to be a turning point though the fear still persisted; many thought that this virus could be transmitted by any contact, however limited, as was cancer in its earliest days.
I sit here sniffing with a minor cold that has me feeling terribly sorry for myself. I’m going to milk the sympathy my family feels for me for all it’s worth and take whatever help is on offer. I simply can’t imagine what it must have been like for those earlier victims of HIV and AIDS who suffered so horribly with an illness whose only outcome was an agonising death: shunned by family, neighbours, fellow churchgoers, and many health care professionals. And I listen, with great sadness, to the news of yet another country making it punishable by a lengthy jail sentence for anyone to partake in a same sex relationship. Two steps forwards, one step back with people like Verghese there to pave the way to a greater understanding of who and what we are. Vive la différence!
Labels: Abraham Verghese, fear, health, humanity
