It's hard to stay focussed

[MarkB]

Since infection and subsequent diagnosis (June 2006 - February 2007) I have lost both parents, my home and my job (the redundancy was not HIV-related). While I have temped for short periods during that time nothing has come my way professionally. I have a couple of qualifications and have been applying for jobs for which I should be a shoe-in, but without success. At the local work centre the 'adviser' said "you are too old and too well qualified. You must face the fact that you will never work again". Increasingly, he is being proved right.

Atripla appears to be working for me at one level, at least: I am undetectable, and quite disciplined in my adherence. It does, however, appear to be having unpleasant effects on my liver and kidneys. Also, I am mentally sluggish and forgetful. More importantly, I am living my days in a most peculiar frame of mind and my dreams, always vivid with Atripla, are becoming nightmarish.

As someone who is pretty isolated geographically and emotionally (and since diagnosis I have only met one other person whom I know to be HIV+), middle aged, monogamously single, unattractive and unemployable, with an increasingly bizarre mental life, it is actually becoming harder and harder to stay focussed and positive.

[Assurbanipal]

Mark

Don't understand why you are still on Atripla, with concerns about deperession.  There must be other options available to you in the UK-- what about Reyataz / Truvada.

At our age it is common to start feeling a little slow, as the nature of how our brains react changes.  That happens to people whether or not they have HIV.  But recent studies have shown that aging brains tend to make up for it in other ways.  And certainly, from your postings on the Forums you are literate and articulate in more languages than most people have heard of (didn't you point out once that English is not your first tongue?)

Generally it does take longer for people our age to find a new job -- and the current recession is making things much more difficult -- but I wouldn't let some barely literate, prejudiced adviser at the local work center who knows little of what you do discourage you.  You have far too much to offer.

A