Pauline

Pauline and her husband were diagnosed with HIV in 2019, before she was pregnant, when they had attended routine sexual health screening. Pauline lives with her parents, who do not know her or her husband’s HIV diagnoses. Her husband lives abroad. Pauline and her husband decided to formula feed their child.

Pauline and her husband were diagnosed with HIV in 2019, before she was pregnant, when they had attended routine sexual health screening. Pauline lives with her parents, who do not know her or her husband’s HIV diagnoses. Her husband lives abroad.

Pauline and her husband decided to formula feed their child. They knew that they had the option to breastfeed, but they wanted to avoid all risk of transmission and have peace of mind. As Pauline lives with her parents and they do not know her HIV diagnosis, she had to think of ways to explain why she was not breastfeeding and why she was taking medication. She feels societal pressure to breastfeed, particularly an expectation from within her family and community.

Pauline has heard her mother say hurtful and stigmatizing things about people living with HIV, and therefore feels unable to share her diagnosis with her.

Pauline is received free formula milk from her HIV clinic, which was particularly helpful when she lost her job due to the COVID-19 pandemic. She has been comfortable with the practicalities of formula feeding.

Pauline decided to formula feed her baby as she would find the monthly hospital visits too stressful (played by an actor).

Age at interview 29

Age at diagnosis 27

Well before I got pregnant, I thought I could breastfeed but I think around 8 months in my third trimester I realised that breastfeeding was a lot, it was gonna be a lot of stress for me and the baby so the best option was to formula feed and that there wasn’t enough evidence out there to show that I cannot pass, I cannot pass it onto her. I looked online, I read a lot online that is advisable to formula feed but if I wanted to breastfeed they can support you through it and make sure I don’t pass it into the baby, but I wasn’t ready to go through that stress going to the hospital every, every month or two months. So, I just decided to formula feed.

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Pauline shared how HIV stigma has stopped her from telling her parents about her status.

Age at interview 29

Age at diagnosis 27

It’s because of the stigma, it’s because of the stigma around it yeah. I tried explaining to my mum that it’s not as bad as they think it is and her comments about it made me not tell her about my status, yeah, she made a really bad comment and like don’t say that, yeah.

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Pauline was upset by one nurse whose behaviour made her feel as though her blood was contaminated. The nurse acted this way in front of her mum, who didn’t know about Pauline’s HIV status (played by an actor).

Age at interview 29

Age at diagnosis 27

There was this particular nurse who was supposed to come and take my blood, and as soon as she got into the room it was right after birth, as soon as she got into the room she just went ‘Who is this’, that was to my mum who was sitting there and I’m like, ‘my mum’ and then she went “Oh okay”. But the way she was getting my blood [laughter] so my mum questioned it, my mum just went to me “What is wrong with your blood, because of the way she’s touching you”, because she made my mum suspicious because she went to me, “Why is she touching you as if your blood is not good” and I’m just like “I don’t know”.

And that was the only time I felt treated in some, some kind of way because of who I am or what I’m going through. But other than that like everybody treats me normal, like I’m not being treated special. The way she put on gloves and she was like touching me as though my blood was contaminated [laughter] and she was a midwife and not a white midwife, she was black so I’m like you don’t treat your people like that, but I wasn’t, yeah she wasn’t nice to me, she was the only one to do that.

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Pauline needed to hide the real reason why she was taking HIV medication (played by an actor).

Age at interview 29

Age at diagnosis 27

When she asked about my medication, I told her it was during pregnancy, they knew I wasn’t well throughout my pregnancy I had really bad nausea and all that and I even had to get iron transfusion so I told them it was because of that because before that they didn’t see me taking medication regularly, but yeah after the baby they realised I was always taking medication so when they asked me, that’s what I said.

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