HIV testimonial: ‘Why me?’

Published 10:47 pm Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Cynthia Allen shared her reaction from the day she tested positive for HIV in 1994.

“I went into my bedroom, locked the door, closed the blinds, went into the bathroom and pulled every pill I could find out of the medicine cabinet.

“I brought them back to the bed, picked up the first handful and put it toward my mouth. Then God spoke to me as I’m speaking to you today. He said, ‘That’s the easy way out.’

“My question to him was ‘God, why? Why me? I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me, all I do is go to work, church and home. I’ve been a loving mother, wife and caring daughter, why me?’

“And God’s answer was ‘Why not you?’”

Allen, 49, was one of the speakers at the World AIDS Day program on Tuesday at Dalton State College sponsored by the North Georgia Health District’s Living Bridge Center and the college’s Department of Social Work, School of Health Professions.

“It has been 21 years and it feels just like it was yesterday,” Allen said. She said she promised herself she wouldn’t cry but “that’s been all a part of my healing.”

Allen said she contracted the virus from her then-husband.

“I thought I knew everything about him, we dated two years, got married and the next year I tested positive for HIV,” Allen said.   

At the time Allen had two small children from a previous relationship. She thought of different ways to commit suicide.

“I didn’t want to put my mom or kids through that,” she said. “I didn’t want them to see me go through what I’d seen others go through.”

Allen said it was her mother who brought her out of the suicidal state of mind, but not as others would imagine.

Allen was living in Fort Benning when she got the call that her mother was in a Florida hospital.

“I remember walking in the hospital and they had all kinds of tubes on her, she couldn’t talk, all she could do was nod her head,” Allen recalls.

Allen said doctors had no idea what was wrong with her mother.

Doctors told her, “We have run every test possible, but there’s one test we haven’t run because of her age, we don’t think it’s necessary.”

Allen was told HIV was the only thing her mother wasn’t tested for.

“I said run the test,” Allen recalls. Her mother nodded in agreement.

The test came back positive.

“My mom had some things going on in her mind that she never shared,” Allen said.

Years prior her mother and an old high school sweetheart had rekindled their relationship.

“I felt like now my mom is HIV positive so I have to stop thinking about myself because I have to be here to help take care of her,” Allen said.

Allen started going to support groups and educating herself about HIV and AIDS.

She recalls thinking, “I’ve got a husband that don’t want me, my mama is diagnosed with HIV and I have two small kids.”

 “I said, ‘Lord, I see what you are trying to get me to see, but I’m still not ready for this,’ but I had to get ready,” Allen said.

Today Allen, who lives in Atlanta, goes around the state sharing her story. Her face is on billboards and she’s in television commercials about HIV.  

Allen said she remembers saying to a friend that there are faces to represent breast cancer, why can’t she be the face for HIV and AIDS? Her friend responded, “Well now you are.”

Cory Lowe, a senior social work student at DSC who attended the program, said it was very educational.

“Listening to Cynthia’s story was very inspirational. I looked around and saw everyone crying,” Lowe said.

“That’s what we’re going into,” he said of his fellow classmates and their social work focus. “We work to help bring change. One of my favorite things to say is social work is where action meets compassion and that’s what we’re here for, to make a difference.

“She made a difference in us and now we can share that knowledge with people.”

Allen said making a difference is her goal and why she shares her story.

“Some of my friends say they wouldn’t tell their story, ‘I’d just be better off with nobody not knowing,’” she said.

Allen said there are a lot of people walking around knowing they are HIV positive and not saying anything for that reason.

“Every time I get an opportunity to share a part of my story I feel like if only one person takes something I said away from this room today I’ll be all right,” Allen said.

“I don’t want anyone to have pity on me, I just ask everyone in this room to remember me in their prayers, and if you ever see me in public it’s OK to speak, it’s OK to hug me, it’s OK to touch me, it’s OK to love me because love saves lives.”