Terrie Hawkins is keeping
a positive outlook

By Ruth Rovner
For the Times

It happened more than 10 years ago, but Terrie Hawkins remembers clearly the day she was given two pieces of dramatic news.
It happened in a medical office. A nurse first told her the good news: She was pregnant — with twins. Next, the bad news: She was HIV-positive.
"I was so excited about the twins — that’s the only thing that clicked," Hawkins recalled. "And I really didn’t know what HIV was — to me, it was just initials. I didn’t comprehend at all."
She was soon to learn the reality, that HIV-positive means she was carrying the virus that can lead to full-fledged AIDS. But since that fateful diagnosis at age 29, Hawkins has fully educated herself about HIV and AIDS. She has not only accepted the reality of her condition, but she maintains a positive attitude.
"I’m doing great!" said the Frankford mother, who is on two medications and regularly sees a doctor who specializes in HIV and AIDS. "If you take your medications and live a healthy life, you can continue to have a normal life."
She is certainly a good example of that. She’s a mother of three (besides the twins, now 10, there’s her 21-year-old son Jamel ) and she’s a full-time student at Community College of Philadelphia, taking four courses per semester.
Moreover, Hawkins is completely open about her situation. "I’m not ashamed of it . . . this can happen to anyone," she said. "If people would stop being judgmental about it, then it wouldn’t be so taboo. There shouldn’t be any stigma. People living with HIV and AIDS need support and understanding. Then we can lead normal lives."

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Although she started out knowing almost nothing about her own diagnosis, she’s now a dedicated activist who has immersed herself in activities to promote awareness and help raise money. Her commitment is so noteworthy that on Friday night, during a gala black-tie event, she’ll receive the Volunteer of the Year Award from the AIDS Fund, an organization that raises money for varied AIDS organizations in the Philadelphia area.
Hawkins had worked for the AIDS Fund for four years. When she left her staff job last year so she could attend Community College full time, she continued to work with the organization as a volunteer.
"I really wanted to stay in the AIDS community to continue educating myself and to be around people who really understood my situation," she said.
However, as a heterosexual African-American woman, Terrie Hawkins also found that she was in the minority in the AIDS community.
"Many people were bisexual or gay or were recovering drug addicts," Hawkins said. "I couldn’t really relate to their experiences.
"And the sad part," she noted, "is that people only associate AIDS with gay people or drug addicts — not with straight people who got the virus from unprotected sex."
She has tried to change that by participating in educational projects, and also by talking informally to people whenever she sees the opportunity.
Meanwhile, even though she’s in a small minority as a straight woman — and an African-American — she enthusiastically works on behalf of the AIDS Fund.
Every month, she spends hours helping with Gay Bingo, one of its fund-raising activities. It’s held weekly at the Gershman Jewish Y in Center City. On the day of the event, Hawkins is there from 1 in the afternoon — long before it gets started — until 10:30 that night.
"This is very important because the money it raises goes to different AIDS organizations," Hawkins explained. The event consists of a two-and-a-half-hour live show, starting at 6 p.m., and then the bingo games begin one hour later.
More than 400 participants — both gay and straight — show up at each Saturday evening event. "It’s a hoot!" said Hawkins, who helps out wherever she’s needed.
This tireless volunteer also is on hand for every major event that the AIDS Fund sponsors, including an annual AIDS walk in October.

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At home in Frankford, Hawkins is kept busy by her twins, who are fourth-graders at a charter school in South Philly. They were tested for HIV at 18 months.
"I was on pins and needles until they could be tested," Hawkins said.
To her enormous relief, the tests were negative.
Hawkins lives with her longtime boyfriend, Kevin Diggs, the father of her twins. He, too, attends Community College of Philadelphia. And there is another common bond in their lives — Diggs also is HIV-positive.
They’d been together four years when Hawkins was diagnosed. She’d had other partners before they met, she explained, but she’s been monogamous ever since.
Hawkins came to accept the HIV diagnosis as a fact of life that she had to cope with. "I don’t blame anyone . . . why dwell on it?" said Hawkins, who knows only that she contracted the virus from unprotected sex.
Like many people, Diggs initially was afraid to be tested. It was five years after Terrie’s diagnosis that he finally found out his own HIV status.
"I felt relieved that he finally got tested and could be treated," Hawkins said. "And it brings us much closer. He understands what I’m going through, and I know how he feels."
Both of them are open about HIV with their children. "It’s just part of our everyday lives," said Hawkins. "It’s just as if we had high blood pressure or diabetes or any other chronic condition. We talk about it in an everyday way."
And she refuses to give in to pessimism. "I don’t know what’s promised for tomorrow," she mused. "I can only live for today. This is a condition like any other . . . it just means I have to be careful about my health."
Perhaps surprisingly, she not only accepts her status but even sees how it has been a positive in her life.
"This gave me a focus and a purpose," she said. "It makes me more humble and reminds me not to take life for granted. My life is actually better because of this experience." ••