On December 17, 1984, I had surgery to remove two inches of my left lung due to pneumonia. After two hours of surgery the doctors told my mother I had AIDS.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
In 1984, my mom gave birth to my older sister, Teresa. Due to a complicated delivery, she needed a blood transfusion, and at that moment, my mom had HIV+ blood put into her body.
In December 1988, my mother died of lung cancer. I died too. I couldn't function.
The newspapers were saying, 'You have AIDS.' They actually said I was dead. I just threw myself into my work when the whispering campaign turned really ugly.
I nearly died of double bronchial pneumonia at the age of five.
When I first found out I had HIV, I had to find somebody who was living with it, who could help me understand my journey and what I was going to have to deal with day-to-day. I found out that a person named Elizabeth Frazier was living with AIDS at the time, and so I called her up, and she took a meeting with me.
I was a sickly child, contracting tuberculosis at the age of five.
Both my parents were doctors, and my mother had her surgery in the house. There were six children.
When I was 11, I spent eight months in the hospital with rheumatic fever and almost died.
I quit school in the sixth grade because of pneumonia. Not because I had it, but because I couldn't spell it.
I had a serious childhood illness - sort of like spinal meningitis - that led to a three-month hospitalization. Afterward, I couldn't be insured because of a pre-existing condition.
No opposing quotes found.