Dear Judy,
I really felt vindicated yesterday when I saw how you replied to an email from a reader who was against burying a terminally ill gay friend in the family vault.
I’m openly gay, and so is my best friend. Like the guy you wrote about yesterday, he too has HIV/AIDS, only his partner left him, and he’s now living — dying really — at his parents’ house.
They treat him like crap, Judy. They serve his food only on paper plates, like he’s contagious. They keep their distance and never hug him. He is very weak and also lonely. The drugs he takes have side effects, he is not responding as well as his doctors have hoped, and there are opportunistic infections.
How can I get his parents to understand they are only making things worse, the way they treat him? It’s tearing him apart and me too!
James C
Dear James,
I am very sorry about your friend, and sorrier still that his parents are so ill-equipped to deal with his illness.
I don’t think at this late date you’re going to be able to change their attitude, however — and also, any suggestions coming from you might be disregarded, given the way you describe the couple. They are at least providing their son with shelter and food, and you certainly don’t want to provoke them in a way that might make them re-think those obligations!
But since you are this man’s best friend, you can play an important role. You can be there with him when he feels ill. You can pick up his medications. You can drive him to the doctor’s office. You can talk to him.
And you can provide him with decent china for his meals!
In other words you can become a kind of synthetic parent. He’ll appreciate the attention.
Thank you for writing
Judy
In addition to what you said, there are lots of HIV support groups, with most in big cities. Maybe contact them on behalf of your friend, or ask them to contact him.
Is there no one from his gay community who will take him in? Or a hospice/ Why should anyone suffer such indignities?
The parents are obviously opposed to the man’s lifestyle. Nevertheless they have taken him in as he faces the conseuqences of his choices. For that I think they should be applauded. Instead, a stranger, who might or might not be carrying the same diseases, is advised to bring his china into their home. They may not be open minded, but surely they too deserve some respect? Insulting them in their own home is odd advice, at best.
Hospice would most certainly take this patient and provide the emotional, physical and spiritual support he needs. The parents would qualify for bereavement and grief support after he dies. It sounds as if they may need it. As we say in Tennessee, “tough row to hoe” I wish people could understand there is not ‘do over”. Very sad.