8-Year Old Son with HIV Best Friend

Do the reading - that should help. There are thousands of families out there that live with, take care of, etc. people in all stages of HIV who do not contract the virus because of the specific method of transmission that this disease takes. Knowledge is power. Thank you for taking the steps to know more!

i have a close friend who's been HIV for 20+ years. He's just like any other person and i don't make any special arrangements when he is in my home. Educate yourself and your family about HIV. This is a great opportunity to talk to your son about people who are living with this virus and how they are not to be feared. The HIV virus is not easily transmitted. There needs to be direct contact with bodily fluid such as sexual contact or blood transfusion. Please educate yourself and your family. Ignorance breeds fear and fear breeds prejudice.

While I have NOT been through this personally, I think your family is in the lucky position of being able to disprove all of the myths out there about HIV! Educate, educate, educate! knowledge is power so learn all you can and the more you learn, the less afraid you'll be. God bless!

I can understand your husbands' nervousness about the situation. I think you need to allow him to read these websites and ask your son's Mother if she would be willing to talk with your husband. I have not dealt with this as far as a child is concerned but one of our former church members has been living with HIV and AIds from a blood transfusion for the past 20+ years!! I have never been worried about hugging, her or kissing her on the cheek. The only thing that you should be worried about would be transfer of bodily fluids, but since he has not been "viral" for such a long time, maybe that would not even be a concern, I am not sure.
I would hope that your son can continue his friendship with this young man, it will be an invaluable lesson for him to carry through life, about caring and kindness.

Hi B.,

While some viruses are more aggressive than others, viruses generally rare their heads in low immune situations. The best line of defense is to make sure your son has an immune system working at it's optimum level. This goes for you and your husband as well.

My three recommendations are:
detoxing your home
taking an absorbable multivitamin/mineral complex
regular maintenance chiropractic care

If you want any information on any of the above, let me know and I can get you some. I walked into an H1N1 epidemic a few months back and contracted the swine flu. I was down for a week but no one else in my home got it. They all tended to me as any loving family member would. Mine was a mild case. I believe if we hadn't taken lifestyle precautions that it would have been much worse and everyone in my home would have been sick as well.

Read the literature on HIV and also do some research on viruses. Viruses are so much more dangerous than bacteria related problems. The best way to take care of a virus is to not contract it in the first place. I believe that can be done.

God bless,

M.

I agree with everyone, use this as a teachable moment. There are many things out there that can hurt your family more easily than HIV. Ask the mother to talk to your husband, and you and your husband look at the websites together.
I also agree with Mimi, getting the stuff that can hurt your immune system out of your house is very important. Did you know that in mosat places you can't just throw out un used cleaning products, they are considered Hazardous Materials?! That will go a long way to helping your immune system help itself.
If you would like some ideas on how to do this, e-mail me. I got rid of the toxic cleaners in my house, now my oldest's asthma is very well controlled and my middle child's eczema flares rarely. They still get exposed to the chemicals at their Dad's house, friends houses and school, but their immune systems, with the help of highly absorbable vitamins too, can fight off stuff much better.
I hope that your husband sees that he is just another friend and relaxes, I wish your family contiued good health.

E.

I don't know what you mean by "has not been viral". HIV is a virus and once you have it you always have it. It is possible to have a "low viral load" which would mean that the virus has a very low presence in the body.

I would have your husband do some reading about HIV. If he understands it he shouldn't be nervous about it.

I agree with all the other posters, and I think that this is a good opportunity to talk with your son about dos and don'ts of blood safety. I would not say anything specifically about his best friend, but next time you get a paper cut, point out that he never touches someone else's blood, how blood can carry diseases, etc. That's a really good thing to know in general. Kids get bloody knees and noses all the time; you want him to know that he should hand over tissues and make sure that everyone washes up well with soap.

I think that you are being very compassionate.

Yes this child is just like every other child, and should be treated as such. But it is not completely unfathomed for your husband to still be weary. My personal worry is that kids are always picking at scabs, they lose teeth, and get hurt on the playground (hurt enough to bleed). Your child needs to understand that he does not touch blood, or scabs whether they're oozing or not. As much as the "new statistics" state that you can't get HIV from saliva I'm not completely convinced. If I have the possibility of contracting it because of a stick with a tiny needle. I'll probably be chastised for this post because it's not necessarily PC but here's how I look at it. It's definitely not something I would want to contract, or bring home to my husband and kids, so I take every precaution I can to prevent it. It doesn't mean that I treat my patients differently, I just know that I'm going to follow all the guidelines on body substance isolation.

Can your husband speak to the mom as well? She sounds like she set your mind at ease, I really think she or any other health care professional would be best to talk to your husband too. It's different to speak to a person than just reading info on the internet.

I would never suggest putting your child in harms way and I can completely understand the fear, but if this were my child I would not keep him from his friend. My uncle died of AIDS about 15 years ago (I wish so much that medicine had been as advanced back then as it is now) and I will never forget him or the impact he had on me growing up, and I after being around him I would never want to ostracize someone with HIV. The biggest reason for fear is ignorance (ignorance is not a put-down, it just means not having enough knowledge) and if your husband takes the time to educate himself on this he will probably feel a lot better.

Since the boy's mother is a nurse, I am sure that they take it very seriously and behave very responsibly. Your son can be taught to do the same, and it should not be a danger to him. At 8, they can learn to be careful. Good luck to your family and your son's friend.

Thank you for posting this question. I have become very close friends with a family who adopted a child with HIV and our children spend a lot of time together. Reading the websites helped put my mind at ease.

It was encouraging to read the responses here. I'm using this friendship to teach my kids about the blood safety.