Editor’s note: For World AIDS Day 2023, Reckon interviewed people from across the U.S. about living with and battling the persistent stigma that people living with HIV/AIDS still confront today. From those deeply personal, wide-ranging interviews, we published profiles of five people about their journey and fight to eradicate stigma.

On World AIDS Day 2021, jarrett hill, 38, shared his HIV status publicly for the first time, a stark contrast to his 2012 diagnosis when he was muzzled by stigma and shame shaped by his religious upbringing. Since then, the award-winning journalist, professor, author, and co-host of the FANTI podcast has made a splendid slice of life for himself in Inglewood, California. But this rich-fueled life of opportunity, love, and community wasn’t always something hill thought was possible. For the first time, hill shared with Reckon his experience living with HIV and his hopes for eradicating the stigma.

“I completely shut down, never talked about it with anyone, and ignored it for a very long time. When [I received] my diagnosis, I remember immediately thinking, ‘Who’s gonna love me now?’ Like that would not be a possibility for me as a person who’s always been a hopeful romantic,” hill tells Reckon.

At the time, the 26-year-old hill didn’t have health care insurance, was unaware of the resources available to him and stigma kept him from inquiring to seek treatment. For years, every time he had a headache, caught a cold, or nicked his finger, hill thought, ‘This is going to be the thing that kills me.’

“I lived with that for years and years and eventually did get sick enough that I got concerned because I had started to lose weight, and it was different than just having a cold,” he says.

Eventually, hill found community resource AHF, AIDS Healthcare Foundation, and got access to treatment and a therapist. “It was lifesaving and affirming because it was a community built for people like myself and a full circle moment as I went on to work at AIDS Atlanta, helping to organize their AIDS Walk,” he says.

Today, being positive isn’t something hill thinks about every second of his day. According to hill, even when taking a pill, HIV is not something that he worries about nor does he fear the things that concerned him before. Fully aware of the magnitude of the disease and better equipped with education about treatment, hill knows that the depictions in society and media of HIV as this “horrible, terrible alternative life” and othering is far from reality.

“I live such a full life that has so many other things to be concerned about than HIV. I’m really grateful for that, but I don’t know that I would have expected that when I got my diagnosis,” he tells Reckon.

The silence that stigma causes loomed, the weight exacerbated by working in a public-facing career. For a long time, he was concerned about not using his platform and influence to share this part of himself until very recently.

“I want to combat the stigma of people who are living with HIV feeling like they can’t talk about it and be safe to share. I know people get awful responses when coming out about it, but ultimately, the freedom of it is much better than the prison of the secret,” he says.

Not until hill watched FX’s Pose did he see an accurate depiction of his experience receiving his diagnosis. In one episode, Billy Porter’s character, Pray Tell, gets diagnosed with HIV; he chooses not to share and live with that secret.

“I didn’t do a good job of pretending and just shut down. But I wonder how my life would have been different if I had told someone or if I would have felt safe to; I wasn’t ready,” he says.

This World AIDS Day, hill says the best way others can show up for folks living with HIV is to educate themselves on what it’s like to live with the diagnosis today. “I think it would be incredibly valuable for us all. I’m still sometimes surprised by how many people don’t know much about HIV/AIDS and how far medication has come along to help you be able to live a full life,” he says.

As a person who grew up Christian and immersed in church, hill believes communities of faith should be thoughtful about the ways that they engage conversations and people aboutHIV/AIDS.

“We have pastors, preachers, ministers, etc., tasked with service within churches who are doing a lot of harm, sometimes without even knowing it. I’ve heard my own pastor refer to having HIV/AIDS amongst being a murderer, you know, all of these other terrible things. Communities of faith are tasked with being welcoming, inclusive, and sharing love, and I don’t believe many of them are doing that as well as they could,” he says.