SHARED BY Richard

Tamika + William

Tamika & William: A Road I Never Expected to Travel

In 1984 when the AIDS Pandemic started to garner a lot of attention among adults, children started showing up in hospitals. I got in touch with a woman whose name was mentioned in an article about the children. That is when we decide to create The Children with AIDS Project. We approached Gay Men’s Health Project (I was already involved with them doing fundraising) about our project be a part of their organization. Primarily because they were a 501c3 they could apply for grants to help. There was an article written about us in one of the newspapers in NYC. Right after the article hit, we got flooded with calls about kids as young as 4-5 years old showing up in hospitals with either HIV+ or showing AIDS symptomatic illnesses. I reached out to a lot of people and in short time between this woman and myself we put together a group of about 100 volunteers to start going to the hospitals to see the kids and see what was needed. Most of these kids came from horrific circumstances and were left at the hospital to die. 90% were from IV drug environments.

I received a call about a little girl named Tamika who was at Lennox Hill hospital. She had been in there for a few months because her health was up and down. Also, Social Services was trying to navigate how to handle the kids. I went to the Pediatric ward and introduced myself to the staff. They were wonderful as they gave me some background about Tamika. They said that she was sweet but had no visitors. I bought a little stuffed penguin with me. I knocked on her door and went in. I spent about 3 hours with her. She was showing me her drawings and her stuffed animals etc. I asked her if I can come visit with her more often? Her eyes lit up and a big smile emerged, she gave me a hug and said, “I would love that!”. So began a 15-year journey with Tamika. A lot of ups and downs. Hundreds of hospitalizations and spending countless hours in ICU. Over time, Catholic Charities of NYC decided to take up the Foster Care aspect of her life. They were very new to the pandemic, but they understood that Tamika as well as other kids needed help and they did not care how she got it and it was not just a Gay Man’s disease. As a side note, I was able to ascertain that because her mother was a junky, one of her many IV drug users man friends molested Tamika at around age 5-6 and that is how she got infected. Catholic Charities recognized my role with Tamika and granted me Foster Guardianship. When Tamika was 17, she met a boy named Jason. She was in love and he knew what her condition was. Around 18 she found out she was pregnant. Jason was tested repeatedly and was negative. Through the miracle of God and AZT the transmission of the virus was prevented in utero. She was a great Mom and gave the baby JJ the love she never got for her first 5-6 years. I would like to think that the love I and my extended family gave her was the love she was able to find within to nurture him. As age 22 Tamika lost her 15-year battle with HIV. She was at the time the longest surviving child living with the disease. JJ, her son, is now 22 and has a son of his own.

Around the same time Tamika was in the hospital, a little boy William was admitted. He and Tamika became friends and I fell in love with him. He was a tough kid, age 9 and very angry. His Mom was a heavy IV drug user and apparently there were so many needles around the home he was in that he was stuck with the needles and the infection was transmitted. His brother and his Mom died before he was 7. He and I bonded immediately and, like Tamika, a little love can open one’s heart. He turned out to be the most affectionate, loving child. His condition overall was worse than Tamika and he never really left the hospital. A woman named Maria reached out to me saying she knew William when they lived in Spanish Harlem. She met me at the hospital, and she saw William and he immediately recognized her. She asked if it were possible for William to stay with her. Feed him the food that he knew - he was Puerto Rican - and with a lot of red tape, he was able to go stay with her. Unfortunately, it did not last long. Within a few weeks he was rushed back to the hospital with very labored breathing and was moments away from passing. They tried to reach me and by the time they did he had passed. When I got to the hospital, the nurses were crying and when they saw me, I broke down and cried with them. They told me that all he was saying before he passed, “Get Richie, I want him here”. The head nurse came over to me and said, “You were in his heart because he was wanting you, so he knew you loved him, and he loved you”.

I knew when I started this path there would be an end. It was way before cocktail drugs came to be and treatments were still being experimented on. I did this because I had a blessed childhood and I wanted to share what I experienced from my parents to these children. It was also a way of thanking my parents for the childhood and upbringing they gave us. Also, a reminder that you always have to give back in the world and make a difference no matter how large or small. I would like to think that I did make a difference in Tamika and William’s life as they did mine.

SHARED BY Richard

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