Dreams and Nightmares 5: I Can’t Do This Any More


I Can’t Do This Any More


After Kenny had died in late 1986, it seemed like the deaths were coming ever more frequently. The local gay newspapers ran obituaries, and those columns were taking over more pages of the newspapers as time went on. On Sunday evenings at church we would pray for the sick and the dead and I began to get anxious at the thought of what new names we would hear. Several hundred gay men came to worship together. The chatter at the social afterwards would always include questions about whether we had heard about so-and-so who was newly sick, or so-and-so who had just died. It wasn’t just at our church, but this was the situation at every gay gathering. AIDS, and those who suffered from it, became the ever-present topics of discussion instead of fashion, music, and movie stars. It seemed like just after we had experienced gay liberation all the fun stuff about being gay had been taken away.
One Saturday afternoon Vince and I had gone to yet another funeral and at the reception afterwards people were talking about new theories of cures and treatments. “You really must avoid all the nightshade plants, like tomatoes and potatoes and egg plants, because they promote the virus.” Another said, “I just read that yew extract is being used by the Chinese as a successful treatment.” “Oh,” said yet another, “did you hear that they can do a complete blood transfusion now? They say that if you get all the blood out, and put new blood in, you will be rid of the virus.” Unfortunately, none of these theories proved beneficial. Even AZT, a partially beneficial aids medication, had limited benefits and severe side effects. People who tested positive for HIV had very few and very horrible choices.
At one point Vince and I had terrible chest colds, the kind with deep chest rattles and lots of coughing up of phlegm. They went on for weeks. We were terrified that we had been infected and could not bring ourselves to speak about our fear to each other. One afternoon we were sitting on my couch in my cold apartment, my roommate absent. There was a long silence. A dead space in our conversation. “I’m afraid, Vince,” I said.
“Me too,” he replied. 
“I think we have it.”
We held each other and cried, thinking that we would soon be leaving this life.
The constant deaths, the sick we knew, the sick people we saw on the streets, the barrage of news in magazines and in the newspaper and on television—it was all too much. In between the tears I said to Vince, “I can’t do this anymore.”
             Soon after, maybe some months, a reliable test for HIV became available. We were terrified 

 to be tested, but we had to know. Vince and I went to the clinic together. When we went back for our 

 results over two weeks later, the nurse asked us if we wanted to hear our results together or 

 separately. We chose to hear them together, which told me that whatever happened, Vince loved me. 

 The nurse did not make eye contact as she open the envelopes and read the information. Then she 

 looked up at us and said, “You’re both negative.”

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