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Page Contents
First, take a deep breath. Give yourself some time to process the news but keep in mind the sooner you take action, the more likely you are to have a long and healthy life. Everyone reacts differently when they find out they have HIV, but common feelings include shock, anger, fear or sadness. You may have questions about how you got the virus, and questions about what will happen to you. All of these emotions and questions are natural. Learning more about HIV will help to answer your questions.
If you got your diagnosis in a health care provider’s office or a setting like a health fair or testing event, you may have also gotten a lot of information about HIV, its treatment, and how to stay healthy. If you did not get much information, this website is a good place to start.
If you got a diagnosis by taking an HIV home test, the manufacturers can help you with the next steps. You may also want to get get a follow-up test. To find a testing site near you, visit: gettested.cdc.gov, or call 1-800-232-4636.
Sharing the news of your diagnosis (also called disclosure) with your partner, a close friend or family member and talking about your feelings can be really helpful, and your friends and family may be a good source of support. Unfortunately, there are a lot of misunderstandings about HIV, and some people who you tell might be afraid or judgmental.
It’s worth thinking about how you will tell someone you have HIV. It can help to have some information on hand to share with them. They may not know about how HIV is passed on, or about HIV treatment. They may assume that you don’t have long to live, or that you won’t be able to have relationships or have a family. If you can help them to understand the facts about HIV, they are less likely to react negatively.
It may help you to think about the reaction someone may have when you tell them. People will often surprise you and not react like you think, but it’s a good idea to be prepared. Talking to a healthcare professional, or a support group can help you prepare to tell others.
In most cases, it is a good idea to find a time when you are unlikely to be interrupted and you can take your time, and to talk in a setting where it’s quiet and you can sit comfortably together. If you’re afraid of a person’s reaction, it might be good to find a place where others are around, such as a park. In some situations, it might even be possible for someone else who is supportive to be with you when you disclose. Give the person you tell time to process what you’re saying, and check that they understand. Sometimes people respond differently after they’ve had some time to think about things.
Most importantly, know that sharing your HIV status with your sexual and injection partners is important to protect you and your partner. However, sharing your status with anyone else is your choice!
Because HIV can be passed on during sex, telling someone who is a current or previous sexual partner can be particularly difficult and emotional, but it is also very important. If you’re an IV drug user, it is also important to disclose your status to anyone you share needles with. Telling previous or current partners lets them know they should be tested for HIV. Certain states also have laws that require you to share your status with sex or injection partners.
There are a few ways to let your partners know:
Partner Services programs are available through health departments and some medical offices or clinics. Your health-care provider, social worker, case manager, patient navigator, or HIV testing center can help put you in touch with a Partner Services program.
Depending on where you live, there may be some legal issues you have to consider. In some places, if you know you have HIV, then you are required by law to disclose your HIV to your any partner before having sex. To learn more about legal issues related to disclosure, talk to your doctor or someone in an HIV organization. You can also refer to cdc.gov/hivstatelaws to get details on HIV laws relevant to your local residence.
It can be difficult to decide how much information to give children about HIV. Every child is different, and every parent is different, so there isn’t necessarily a ‘right’ way to tell your child that they, and/or you have HIV.
Often, telling a child that they have HIV is done over time, giving them information at the level they can understand, depending on their age. Children will often have questions about why they are taking treatment, or why they have to see their doctor, and this can present an opportunity to give information and offer reassurance.
Talking to other parents and a healthcare professional at your child’s clinic can help you think about what you might like to do and when.
If you have HIV and are pregnant, it does not mean that your baby will also get HIV. Today, if you take HIV treatment and have an undetectable viral load during pregnancy, labor and delivery, your risk of passing HIV to your baby is less than 1%.
This means that if you have HIV, the most important thing you can do is for you and your baby is to take HIV medication exactly as prescribed. If you haven’t used any HIV drugs before pregnancy and are in your first trimester, you should talk to your doctor right away. Your doctor will help you decide if you should start treatment. Here are some things to consider:
If you are taking HIV drugs and find out you’re pregnant in the first trimester, talk to your doctor about sticking with your current treatment plan. Some things you can talk about with your doctor include:
If you do not have HIV, but your partner does, you should also take prevention steps prior to having a baby. Talk to your doctor about HIV medicine you can take (called pre-exposure prophylaxis or PrEP) to help protect you and your baby from HIV. You may also want to consider donor sperm or assisted reproductive technology, such as semen washing or in vitro fertilization, to get pregnant. For more information about pregnancy and HIV, visit: womenshealth.gov.
If you are in a relationship or want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t share your status, it is important to know that you aren’t alone. For years, couples have maintained happy and healthy relationships across HIV status. Mixed-status and serodifferent relationships are terms used to describe when people navigate relationships where one partner is living with HIV while the other is not.
As with all relationships, communication is key. First, it is important for each partner to know their status. Knowing and communicating your status allows each of you to make decisions about how to stay healthy and protect each other.
There are several ways you and your partner can protect each other when having sex in a mixed status relationship. Experts recommend the following:
For more information on protecting yourself and your partners, visit CDC’s website and get customized information based on your own needs at https://hivrisk.cdc.gov/.
In the United States, the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) provides federal and civil rights protections to all individuals with disabilities, regardless of their HIV status. In fact, having HIV or AIDS is also considered a disability by the ADA.
The ADA offers legal protection for individuals with a disability to ensure that they have the same opportunities as do individuals without disabilities. This means that employers are legally obligated to provide reasonable accommodations that allow individuals who have a disability (HIV related or otherwise) to work for that employer. Moreover, any place of public accommodation must make their goods, services, and facilities accessible where it is reasonable to do so. A public accommodation is a private entity that makes services available to the public, like a hotel, doctor’s office, or HIV clinic. This includes providing auxiliary aids and services where necessary to ensure effective communication as well as removing any physical barriers that make services inaccessible.
Examples of accessible services include:
Discrimination under the ADA is the failure to provide an individual an equal opportunity to use or enjoy a public accommodation’s goods, services, or facilities. For example:
If you believe you are being discriminated against, you might first try to educate the manager or owner of the public accommodation about what the ADA requires. You should suggest reasonable policy changes that will provide equal access, request a communication aid, or ask that a barrier be removed. You may also wish to seek out mediation services provided by community or private agencies. If the situation is not resolved satisfactorily, a complaint may be filed with the Department of Justice. You are also entitled to bring lawsuits as an individual. If you do file a private lawsuit, you may not seek monetary damages. However, you may seek injunctive relief (that is, forcing the manager or owner to halt a discriminatory practice) and attorney’s fees and costs.
For more information on this, visit Americans with Disabilities Act and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
It’s common for people living with HIV to have other health issues. Some of these issues may be directly related to HIV or its treatment. Others may be completely unrelated. These health conditions can mean more doctors’ visits, lab tests, and medications to keep up with. Taking HIV medication (called antiretroviral therapy or ART) daily as prescribed, and staying in regular medical care is the best way for people living with HIV to stay healthy.
Sometimes people living with HIV have mental health issues. Others use alcohol, drugs, or tobacco. If not addressed, these sorts of issues may complicate HIV treatment. If you have any of these conditions, you should talk with your medical provider or seek counseling services.
People living with HIV are also more susceptible to a variety of common co-infections. These include:
Some people also experience side effects from HIV medicines that can continue for a long time. HIV medicines can also have negative interactions with other drugs. See your health care provider regularly to discuss any other medications you may be taking, and discuss any side effects you experience. Never cut down, skip, or stop taking your HIV medications unless your health care provider tells you to. Your provider will work with you to develop a plan to manage the side effects and potential drug interactions, or may recommend that you change medication. Be sure to take care of your emotional wellness, eat a healthy diet, exercise, and quit smoking. These all play an important role in living healthy with HIV.
Mental health refers to a person’s overall emotional, psychological, and social well-being. Mental health affects how people think, feel, and act. Good mental health helps people make healthy choices, reach personal goals, develop healthy relationships, and cope with stress. Anyone can experience mental health conditions, but people with HIV face greater risks for some kinds of issues like depression. Often this is because a positive HIV diagnosis is disruptive and can be quite stressful. People with HIV often also face different types of stigma, because the disease is not well understood by others. This can be especially challenging.
Having a mental health condition can make it very hard for a person to manage HIV successfully. The good news is that mental health conditions, like HIV itself, are treatable and many people with mental health conditions recover completely. To treat a mental health condition it is important to know when to get help, and who to ask.
Signs that you might have a mental health condition include:
If you experience any of these signs, it’s important to get help!
Who to ask: Talk to your health care provider about how you are feeling, and they can suggest others who can help. You can also ask for recommendations from an HIV clinic, or find help using online resources from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Also check the resource library for resources in your area.
The content for this page was compiled from several public information sources. We would like to thank and give credit to the following sources:
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