First-hand experience of HIV-positive diagnosis retold at U.

Before diagnosed as HIV positive, Vicky Aryenyo, a woman living in Uganda who now helps others who are sick, had already been through many struggles that most could not cope with.
History Professor Martina Saltamacchia met Aryenyo in Italy and invited her to discuss her trials with HIV/AIDS in Uganda Thursday night in Trayes Hall in the Douglass Campus Center.
“AIDS is a stigma for women in Uganda. Even if they get a vaccine they are still looked down upon,” Saltamacchia said.
Aryenyo said her troubles started after her mother died of breast cancer. She dropped out of school, started working and got married.
She then fought with her husband, who told her she must terminate her third pregnancy, Aryenyo said.
But in 1997, she began experiencing HIV symptoms.
Doctors kept justifying the painful symptoms as temporary and unimportant, but after a two-week stay in the hospital in 1998 the hospital finally told her she was HIV positive, Aryenyo said.
She said soon after, her son became sick and tested positive for HIV.
“Even outside the womb, this disaster still followed my son. What wrong had he done? I forgot my own pain. I felt something strike me deep inside my heart,” she said.
Aryenyo then met Rose Busingye, director of Meeting Point International, a Ugandan non-governmental organization, and she and her son were soon given serious treatments.
While Aryenyo was convinced her only purpose in life was to suffer, Busingye taught her that the value of her life is greater than the disease she carries, Aryenyo said.
“Rose lives to show you that you have a value. No matter my failures, the way she treats me today confirms my value,” Aryenyo said.
Aryenyo, now a member of MPI, remembers her reaction from her first visit to the MPI center.
“Is this a project for people who are sick? There are people who are singing and dancing and happy. When you have AIDS, what can make you dance?” she said.
MPI operates in four slums situated in the areas of Nagru, Kireka, Ntinda and Nsambya in Kampala City, and it is a branch of the larger Association of Volunteers in International Service, Aryenyo said.
Their main activity is caring for people affected by HIV/AIDS and their orphans. MPI assists HIV/AIDS patients through counseling, medical care, home visits, provision of food and essential items, adult literacy, health education, hygiene and child care, according to the AVSI website.
About 2,000 orphans have been adopted through AVSI, according to “Greater: Defeating AIDS,” a film the audience viewed an excerpt of before Aryenyo spoke about her experiences.
The film was voted Best Documentary 2008 by a jury chaired by Spike Lee for the Babelgum Online Film Festival at Cannes, according to the AVSI Web site.
In the film, Ugandan MPI members collected money for New Orleans Katrina victims, and the Ugandan women working to raise money justified their labors by considering themselves similar to Americans.
“Life is an adventure toward the discovery of its meaning,” said Busingye, the film’s protagonist.

Comments

2 comments

michael s.

Sun Mar 1 2009 20:55

sad but honest and uplifting at the same time.

Elon Weintraub

Tue Feb 24 2009 18:39

'“AIDS is a stigma for women in Uganda. Even if they get a vaccine they are still looked down upon,” Saltamacchia said.'

Vaccines are only preventative measures. They don't generally cure disease. And even if they did, there is no proven HIV vaccine.

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