“But I didn’t have the courage to tell”: disclosure of serostatus in the love/sex life of people living with HIV

Abstract

This article presents a socio-anthropological study, of qualitative approach, that addresses love relationships of people living with HIV/aids (PLWHA) in the current context of infection’s chronicity and discursive restraint on the epidemic. From brief narratives, comments on posts about loving experiences of PLWHA in a personal blog, this study aims to understand the meanings attributed to strategies for serostatus disclosure and the ways of coping with love partners’ reactions facing this attitude. From the thematic analysis of the empirical material, two categories emerged: “but I didn’t have the courage to tell”: the unveiling of the serostatus; and “and all of a sudden disappeared”: the other’s (re)actions in the relationship. The narratives showed the experiences of living with the secret about the own serostatus, and the feelings involved in revealing it when dealing with the possibility of a love relationship. In this sense, the secret is expressed by the lack of “courage to tell” the partner. Moreover, we highlight the meaning attributed to the other’s reaction on knowing about the serostatus, which is mainly distinguished as a “door” that opens up and allows (or not) the love experience.