A dream 16 years
in the making.

What that experience has become

The Florida ADAP changes in March 2026 gave the care directory a particular urgency.^[1] The site has grown around the connections between finding care, understanding HIV, and feeling less alone.

Counts reflect the September 2026 catalog. Care listings can change; confirm services directly with the organization.

Before my diagnosis

I started at American Express Business Travel in 2003. By 2010, I was living in New York City and working in Manhattan on the Barnes & Noble account, in a two-person on-site office that arranged corporate travel for the company’s employees and executives.

The diagnosis

For several days, I felt as though I had the flu and could not get out of bed. On the fourth day, when I was feeling a little better, I decided I needed an HIV test. I called my doctor and made an appointment for the next day.

Three days after the test, I got a phone call asking me to come into the office. It was March 3, 2010. I was 32 years old. I remember walking into the cold, basement-level doctor’s office. The people at the front desk were looking down, and I had a feeling I already knew. I went straight into a room with a round table.

The doctor came in and placed a sheet of paper on the table in front of me. It said “Reactive.” Before he said a word, I knew what it meant.

The doctor tried to offer encouragement, and after we talked, I went on my way. I walked up from that basement office to street level, into a warm, sunny New York day. I stood there with my life flashing before my eyes, trying to take in the news and figure out what I was supposed to do next. Getting my HIV diagnosis was my rock bottom.

I knew very little about what living with HIV meant. The person I knew of with HIV was Pedro Zamora, whom I had watched on MTV’s The Real World: San Francisco.^[2] Now I had my own diagnosis, and I did not know where to go or whom to turn to.

I went online and found TheBody.com. It was my first source of information about HIV, and through it I began finding resources and a sense of community. Later, I found POZ and other sources that helped me keep learning.

The day after my diagnosis, I went to Callen-Lorde Community Health Center for confirmatory testing and resistance testing. Callen-Lorde helped me find my footing. I received care, attended support groups, and began to understand how to move forward. I remain deeply grateful to the people there who put me on a path toward care and support when I felt lost.

I went back to work. And even then, I had the instinct that staying quiet about my status wasn’t something I was going to be able to do for long.

Finding my voice

The banking crisis reached American Express. There were layoffs, and I was among them. It felt like the floor dropping out — but it opened a door I didn't know was there.

The ADAP waitlist crisis drew me into HIV advocacy. On September 1, 2011, 9,298 people in eleven states were waiting for HIV medications through the AIDS Drug Assistance Program — the highest waitlist in the program's history.^[3] Florida had thousands of them. I relied on ADAP myself during that period. The crisis was never abstract to me. It was personal.

By 2011, I was writing about treatment access as a member of the ADAP Advocacy Association, then known as aaa+. In April 2012, I wrote about its ADAP Solutions Summit from my perspective as someone who depended on the program.^[12]

In early 2012, I became Deputy Director of Community Access National Network (CANN).^[13] My work in Washington, D.C., brought my own experience with HIV and treatment access into a wider community of advocates.

On July 3, 2012, the FDA approved OraSure Technologies’ OraQuick In-Home HIV Test, the first rapid HIV test approved in the United States for over-the-counter use.^[6] I was in the room for the approval announcement. Less than two weeks later, on July 16, the FDA approved Truvada for HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).^[7] I was two years into my diagnosis, witnessing changes that would give people new ways to learn their status and protect their health.

That July, I helped organize AIDS2012 Reunion events in Washington, D.C., where Timothy Ray Brown — the Berlin Patient and the first person cured of HIV — was also taking part. He had made his identity public in late 2010. On July 24, 2012, during AIDS 2012, he held what contemporary coverage described as his first U.S. press conference.^[5]

I was at that press conference and helped organize the media packets. I remember being in the room as he shared his story. Meeting him made a possibility I had barely allowed myself to imagine feel real.

In August 2012, I received my first award, ADAP Emerging Leader of the Year, from the ADAP Advocacy Association in Washington, D.C.^[4]

Quiet power is still a strength.

Working in Washington, D.C., just two years after my diagnosis, I began to understand the kind of advocate I wanted to be. I felt most useful listening, learning, and finding ways to help behind the scenes. I did not need to be the loudest person in the room to make a contribution.

That became my way of working. A quieter kind of keyboard warrior: paying attention, connecting people with information, sharing their work, and staying with it. Listening closely and knowing how to support others are skills. Quiet power is still a strength.

When that chapter closed, I went back to American Express.

No Shame & U=U

In 2013, I launched the No Shame About Being HIV+ campaign. I wasn't an established advocate with a polished platform. I was three years into my diagnosis, building something I needed myself. I thought maybe a few dozen people would respond.

Instead, the stories started arriving from around the world. A 17-year-old born with HIV who never gave up. A long-term survivor in Australia speaking publicly after decades of silence. A mother in South Africa whose own mother's words saved her life. They made me cry. They gave me hope.

Throughout 2013, while those stories were reaching people, my mother was living with COPD. It was a year of uncertainty and fear, and she died that year. The campaign grew during one of the darkest periods of my life. The people sharing their stories gave me something to hold onto.

In the years that followed, I was part of a small, tight-knit group — people who messaged daily on Facebook, strategizing about a message that felt almost too good to be true: that a person living with HIV who maintains an undetectable viral load cannot transmit HIV sexually. Before the endorsements, before the global rollout, we were figuring out how to make people believe it.

Prevention Access Campaign launched U=U publicly in 2016. New York City's Health Department signed the consensus statement in August of that year.^[8] I used my platform early and consistently to amplify the message. I became a founding steering committee member of Prevention Access Campaign in 2016 and am now recognized as a U=U Ambassador Emeritus.^[11]

It wasn't just science. It was liberation.

No Shame grew. U=U went global — endorsed, adopted, expanded. After returning to American Express, I balanced my travel career with independent advocacy. Income from that work helped fund the campaigns and community projects I took on after my diagnosis. No grants. No salary for those independent projects. I paid their costs out of my own pocket.

Stories and campaign T-shirts continued reaching people around the world through 2017. As U=U gained momentum, No Shame gradually wound down. Grief and struggles with addiction also pulled me away. It was painful to feel something I was so proud of becoming part of the past. The page went quiet; at one point, I deleted it and brought it back on day 29, just before it would have been gone for good. Some part of me still wanted to carry it forward.

Along the way, I was featured in POZ as a POZ 100 honoree and received an award at the Transforming Care Conference in Columbus, Ohio. I also participated in HealtheVoices as an attendee and adviser, learning alongside people who use their own health experiences to support others.

Those moments matter to me because they connect the quieter work with a wider community. Each one carries the influence of people who trusted me, taught me, or made room for my voice. I carry that responsibility into this site.

Work, loss, and recovery

About six months after COVID disrupted daily life, I was laid off from American Express. From February to December 2021, I worked through IQVIA on a project contracted by Gilead Sciences, supervising a patient education line focused on Biktarvy and a structured four-week HIV education program. The work brought together patient education, community support resources, and the importance of helping people understand their care. I later returned to American Express.

I lived in Albany, New York, from February 2022 through August 2025. My father developed idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and being close to him became an important part of those years. I wanted to be there for him.

In October 2023, I needed major open-heart surgery to repair an aortic root aneurysm. I had a valve-sparing aortic root replacement. Recovery was difficult, and I have not returned to the health I had hoped for. After I went back to work, the demands of the job became harder to sustain alongside my health conditions.

My father died in April 2025. I was still navigating my own recovery, now with the grief of losing my dad.

In May 2025, I had a mild stroke. I left American Express in June 2025, while I was still recovering from open-heart surgery and grieving my dad. My career with American Express Business Travel, later American Express Global Business Travel, spanned 2003 to June 2025, with interruptions for layoffs during the financial crisis and COVID. It was time to focus on my health and begin thinking about the next chapter of my life.

The years I went quiet

There were years when I went almost completely silent publicly. Grief, struggles with addiction, and ongoing health issues, including pulmonary disease, were part of that story. Even then, I kept reading, listening, and following the HIV news and research this community was sharing. Those quieter years shape the compassion I bring to this work.

Building RiseUpToHIV

In September 2025, I bought a home in the Tampa Bay–St. Petersburg area and returned to Florida. I began turning a long-held idea into a place where care resources, education, and community could live together.

Then Florida cut ADAP.

On March 1, 2026, Florida reduced ADAP income eligibility from 400% to 130% of the federal poverty level, ended insurance premium assistance, and restricted access to some medications. The Florida Senate described the changes as potentially affecting more than 12,000 Floridians.^[9] People were facing uncertainty about the care they depended on.

I had relied on ADAP personally. I knew how much stability access to treatment could provide.

On March 24, 2026, emergency legislation restored 400% FPL eligibility and provided $30.9 million in bridge funding through June 30, 2026.^[10] The return to direct medication assistance did not resolve every coverage problem. During this period, I was paying $500 a month out of pocket for health insurance that ADAP had previously helped cover. These dates describe the events behind this project; the Florida ADAP guide links to program information and assistance resources.

An unexpected insurance bill becomes a very personal policy issue when you are trying to pay it. I wanted the site to help people facing that uncertainty find information and somewhere to turn.

The Florida Care Locator became an early focus in March 2026. It brings together listings for HIV care, ADAP enrollment resources, housing, legal aid, harm reduction, and other support. It puts that experience toward a practical goal: helping people find a useful next step.

From my home office, I built outward from the locator into education hubs, the Learning Hub, practical answers, and community stories. The links between them help readers follow a question from understanding it to finding support.

Keeping this work going. I have personally funded this project and years of independent advocacy. Ongoing health limitations shape what I can take on, and I would welcome opportunities to contribute in the HIV field in a role that accommodates them. Reader support helps with the costs of keeping this resource available.

A few milestones

Built to last, with room to keep learning

History, lived experience, and the explanations people return to can remain useful for years. Clinical guidance, policy, research, and care listings need continuing attention. I will update what I can, make corrections, and listen to what the community tells me is missing.

Read about the Denver Principles → · Help shape what comes next →

Disclosures

Pharma consulting: full disclosure

My past work has included two relationships connected to pharmaceutical companies:

IQVIA / Gilead Sciences (Feb–Dec 2021): The patient education role described above was through IQVIA on a project contracted by Gilead.

Janssen Pharmaceuticals: In earlier years of my advocacy I did occasional small consulting engagements with Janssen and participated in HealtheVoices as an attendee and adviser. That relationship ended years ago and there is nothing current to disclose.

There is no current consulting relationship with any pharmaceutical company. Pharmaceutical companies do not fund this site or direct its content.