HIV:The Storm: Anger

HIV

The Storm

Chapter 5: Anger

Sarah returned the following week in a towering rage. "I feel like I could kill Sam, Joe, Alan, Stan...it is no fair and it is horrible! I keep feeling like a volcano erupting. I can't sleep. I am burning up." She said that she had started to tell Sam, asking if he knew anyone with AIDS or HIV. "We were at home, Rebecca was at her Dad's house. I brought it up, kind of casually. Except I was shaking like a leaf. So I just asked him if he ever knew anyone that had it and he went ballistic! He started ranting and raving. He was totally homophobic, saying horrible things about gay men. I couldn't believe it. I have never seen this side of Sam, ever. He always seemed so tolerant and easy-going. So, I chickened out. I just couldn't tell him. And then I made a big excuse when he wanted to make love. I said I had another yeast infection. And I canceled our next date, saying I didn't feel well. I don't know what to do. I have to tell him. I know I do, but I just can't bear doing it. And I didn't get a blood test for Rebecca either!" Here Sarah crossed her arms over her chest and just glared at me.

What do I do now? Sarah was looking at me very antagonistically and I feared a repeat of the "shoot the messenger syndrome" that Sarah had done with Dr. Marten. I felt like I was walking on eggshells. If I told her what to do, she looked like she would leave therapy and never return. Yet, I also felt that lives were at stake: Sarah's if she didn't get treatment, perhaps Rebecca, if she was HIV positive, and Sam.
I quietly asked Sarah how I could help her.
She burst into tears.

"I was so afraid that you would yell at me or tell me how irresponsible I was being. I feel all these things and mostly really, really stupid for thinking this could never happen to me. The thing I want you to do I know you can't do, which is to make it all go away...Make it be the most horrible nightmare and then wake me up."

I too wished I had that power, but I don't. None of us has.

Sarah continued, "I guess really I am most afraid for Rebecca, that I have killed her life before she ever even had one. What happened is I was going to take her to the clinic, where I went for my anonymous test. We got into the car and she wanted to know where we were going. And I just couldn't do it, taking her to that place with those plastic chairs, and taking a number, and waiting. Then, a stranger would stick her with a needle. So, when she asked me where we were going, I started to cry. And I took her out for ice cream instead. So I guess I just failed everything all week."

We sat silently for a bit.
Then I asked Sarah how she was feeling. She started to cry, slumping into despair. She spoke of sleepless nights and of terrible nightmares when she did slip into sleep. "Can you believe it...instead of Rebecca getting into my bed, like she does sometimes, I wanted to get into her bed!" She was distracted at work and made so many errors that she said she had a bad headache and went home early one day. I raised the possibility of medication for her at this time, asking if she wanted a referral to a psychiatrist for some help with her depression and anxiety. She looked thoughtful and relieved at the possibility, but decided not to pursue it at this time. I think my offer felt like an acknowledgment to her that I sensed how much pain she felt.
"I feel so alone. No one that knows me knows that I have this awful thing, except for you."

We sat in the alone place. I was remembering an illustration from the Visconti Hours:

This image is of David supplicating God. It illustrates David's lament:
Save me, O God: for the waters are come in even unto my soul.
I stick fast in the mire of the deep: and there is no sure standing.
I am come into the depth of the sea: and a tempest hath overwhelmed me.
(Psalm LXVIII)
Jungians call this time the night-sea-journey or the dark night of the soul.

Chapter 6

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