Staying Positive: People living with HIV/AIDS Speak Out

Although HIV/AIDS has remained a significant public health challenge since it first emerged back in the early 1980s, the spotlight on the virus has waned as treatments have rendered it a largely treatable chronic condition. However, HIV/AIDS continues to affect thousands of people in the U.S., and vulnerable communities– particularly women and people of color– still face unique challenges in accessing prevention, care, and treatment resources.

With funding from a private family foundation and the Rocky Mountain Public Health Training Center, and in partnership with The Center, the Empowerment Program, and Mile High Behavioral Healthcare, StoryCenter worked between 2016-18 with people in Colorado who are living with HIV, to support them in sharing and creating their own digital stories. The emphasis of Staying Positive was on personal healing, as well as on galvanizing communities to challenge stigma and educate the public about often-overlooked dimensions of the larger HIV/AIDS narrative. We focused first on women living with HIV, many who were formerly incarcerated, and then ran workshops with both young, recently-diagnosed individuals and older adults who had lived with HIV for years.

The resulting stories cover a range of important topics, including dating post-diagnosis, how to handle stigma from family members, what it means to be born with HIV, and how loving and standing up for oneself can bring strength and personal acceptance. They have been shown publicly at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and on local news programs in Colorado, and they have been aired on Colorado Public Radio. With the goal of fostering dialogue and discussion about the issues raised, the stories have been shared widely online and via social media. View the Staying Positive stories and watch a documentary film about the project.