When I was first called I saw the Dr but this was just the beginning of a rather long process of being passed from pillar to post.
This initial one to one was just a consultation of sorts to see why I was there and what they could do for me today thank you.
I didn’t mention what I did for a living as I thought they might send me packing and suggest they had people with real needs to be attending to. I simply said I needed to have a full test for work. I’ve heard storeys of some catering jobs requiring HIV certificates before they will employ you. I’m sure this practice is fictitious but maybe I could use this as my cover. That or that I was emigrating to Russia. Id also read that when applying for a visa to move to Russia you needed a HIV certificate as part of the application process.
Any how they didn’t probe me – no pun intended.
To me getting the piece of paper saying I was HIV negative was the only thing I cared about. That was the killer and that was what I was concerned about. As long as no one had HIV I didn’t mind taking other risks too much. All the other diseases were treatable or at least wouldn’t kill you.
I would later learn about Hepatitis and get my A and B vaccinations.
It sounds crazy now to say I didn’t really care about catching things like Chlamydia and Gonorrhea. Of course I did but I was blinded by other more pressing concerns then like making sure I didn’t get HIV. At the time this attitude probably helped me rationalise things but in hindsight it may be stopped me thinking about the risks I really was taking entering this business. It was unsafe sex after all.
I was asked to sit back out in the waiting room where the nurse would call me and take me to do all my tests.
Another age later I was called again and a young and friendly nurse – not in a classic nurse uniform or any uniform of any kind come to think of it, whisked me off to a cubicle for my swabs and bloods.
She began by taking blood. Just before she was about to stab me up she asked if I knew what she was taking the blood for. I shrugged and guessed HIV as id had a screen before but they were all vaginal swabs. As I didn’t have a HIV test the last time nor did they collect a blood sample, I put two and two together and thought I had four.
She said that no, infact this was for syphilis and that as I hadn’t specifically asked for a HIV test they weren’t doing that. I must have had a look on my face as she asked if I did want one of these to which I said yes please panicking a little that I was wasting my time being here.
She said that was fine but that I would need to see a health advisor for counselling first before they did the test.
This meant me hanging around for even longer after they had poked my private parts with large cotton buds and plastic sticks.
Wasn’t counselling something that you went to over a course of time? I didn’t have 3 months to spend sitting on a couch talking about my childhood before I got this certificate. I had boy/girl shoots to do!
I needn’t have worried. The health advisor just asked me some questions to gage my knowledge of HIV and AIDS and what risks id been exposed to. Had I injected drugs, had I had sex with any gay men or people of African or Caribbean decent? He explained how the test worked and that it would take two weeks to come back to me.
But what about all my sex scenes? I’d have to hope I didn’t get any booked in for the next two weeks until I could come back for my results and certificate.
It was at this point that the health advisor questioned me about the certificate saying that the hospital didn’t give them out unless it was for insurance purposes and that I would need letters from my insurers if that was the case. SHIT!
Well I was here now, id had most of the tests done bar the HIV one and I wanted to know I was free of any nasties so I carried on regardless and tried to think of another blag to get this piece of paper out of them.
I waited some more in the waiting area before being called for my blood sample for the HIV test. Then I was free to go. I had been there for four hours at this point. I was going stir crazy from the boredom of waiting and the massive reality check I was getting about maybe being at deaths door with some hideous sexually transmitted disease or infection. I was quietly scared but knew the chances of me having anything were slim. Id hardly had any sex since my last screen. Still it didn’t stop me being paranoid.
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