At this Episcopal school, the formal introduction of AIDS in the classroom was received in 7th grade, after two tumultuous years of learning the basics of sexual education, our lesbian instructor including the fact that yes, homogenous couples do exist, as foreign an idea as it was. Then when AIDS was studied scientifically in the biology class as well as socially in the “Wellness” class it was when I truly began to understand the effects of this virus. Watching videos of deceased AIDS victims reinforced the fatality of this virus instilling a certain trepidation toward both the disease as well as the gay community which it seemed to attack.

    My family definitely had a major influence in determining AIDS cases around Montgomery County. Growing up my mother and father, both in the medical field, always taught me to be aware of certain diseases that could be transmitted through blood-borne pathogens. At a very early age I understood strangers could be “sick” and victims of a variety of diseases which, intentionally or not, went hand-in-hand with the age-old idiom: “Don’t talk to strangers.” As a nurse my mother was once pricked by an infected needle and consequently forced her to undergo serious treatment and as a result cannot donate blood. Not only did that infected needle compromise my mother’s health, but it also reinforced the idea instilled by my father, an anesthesiologist, that needles are for medical purposes, and anyone who uses such instruments otherwise are considered dangerous. AIDS, specifically, was presented to me as yet another disease to be cognizant of, yet I never quite grasped the importance and significance of the virus until I attended school-sanctioned sexual education.