POZ Community Forums
Main Forums => Living With HIV => Topic started by: 2bafriend on August 03, 2008, 11:12:39 pm
-
PLEASE! IF YOU ARE HIV+ NON DETECTABLE....OBSTAIN FROM EXCESSIVE ALCOHOL/DRUG USE! LET YOUR MEDICATIONS DO THEIR JOB! PCP'S AND SPECIALIST...PLEASE QUESTION YOUR PATIENTS ABOUT LIFE STYLES!!!
This is the 2nd partnership with a partner who is HIV+ and Non Detectable. In the first relationship, when my partner found out he was non detectable, all restraints were unleashed! He began to drink more, drug more and just simply went wild. Of course it just tore down what the specialist had accomplished. My partner passed away Jan. 30th from liver failure due to excessive alcohol and popper use, not HIV disease. He had 20 years HIV+ under his belt and doing great until his diagnosis of Non Detectable was announced.
Now, in my second relationship with a HIV+ partner and also Hep. C, the same thing is happening. He is non detectable and drinks 12 beers every few days along with heavy marijuana use. His eating habits are pitiful because he is so full of beer he can not eat. He goes to the same Specialist as the first partner and the same PCP.
It would seem to me that when you reach the "GOAL" of "NON DETECTABLE", that would be the time to put all your efforts into fighting the disease and making your body stronger instead of weakening your system. You would think that this would be what the patient is told when the non detectable stage is accomplished. Not so in Tallahassee, FL. The specialist that my partner goes to just says you are non detectable and see you after your next blood test. On the first partner, the same specialist, had him on the wrong meds for a patient that had hep B or has Hep. B (which the patient had in the past). Damage was being done to the liver my his HIV meds and the excessive alcohol/drug (popper) use. The only thing the specialist was interested in was the fact that he had the patient at Non Detectable status. Ask your specialist what he/she thinks is excessive alcohol use and let them know what drugs you do as "recreational", it is your health and your life!
Another interesting fact is that neither the PCP nor the specialist (in our case) inquire as to how the patient is conducting his life while at the non detectable stage. On several occasions I have been in the doctors office with my partner and sat in the patient room while the PCP/Specialist go over my partners stats and not one time asked him, are you abstaining from alcohol use? Are you doing ANY recreational drugs? How is your eating habits (his lack of eating and 9 pound loss caused me to hound him until he finally questioned his PCP and received a medication to help in eating), ect. They just give the results of the tests, ask if there are any questions, set the appointment for the next blood test and say good by.
So again, Please, if you are HIV+ with or without Hep. C...use some common sense! So many medications affect the liver anyway, why put extra work on your liver by using drugs and alcohol? Ask you PCP/Specialist exactly what amount of alcohol is OK to consume a day, week or month. Be open on what drugs you do that they are not aware of and see what response you are given. Make your doctor talk to you and you talk to your doctor!
By the way, I am a 27 year recovering drug/alcoholic! You can stop if you want to!
Concerned,
Jack
-
OK Dad!
-
My partner passed away Jan. 30th from liver failure due to excessive alcohol and popper use, not HIV disease.
Wut?
-
By the way, I am a 27 year recovering drug/alcoholic! You can stop if you want to!
And that's the bingo-if someone wants to. You should know from your own past experience with booze and dope that all the lecturing in the world does no good if someone doesn't want to stop.
-
And that's the bingo-if someone wants to. You should know from your own past experience with booze and dope that all the lecturing in the world does no good if someone doesn't want to stop.
Maybe I said it all wrong...the point was that the Specialist and PCP never questioned my first partner on his living habints. (The same two doc's are not questioning my present partner either. Sometimes it helps when it comes from a professional.) He showed NO symptoms of liver disease until one month before he passed. Yes I do understand that you have to want to stop and that it has to be for yourself and not someone else. I had hoped that maybe what I said might help someone...from the responses, I must have missed my goal. Sorry!