Having small wounds on your private parts does not necessarily mean you have HIV/AIDS. The only way you can know whether you have HIV/AIDS is through taking an HIV blood test. You should not just believe in what your friends say about yoour situations.

The small wounds on your private parts may be a result of wearing tight, damp knickers in which case you need to wear comfortable dry cotton knickers. The small wounds could even be a result of a sexually transmitted infection (STI) that can be diagnosed by a medical personnel and treatment given.
You should immediately see a medical personnel for help.

STIs stands for Sexually Transmitted Infections. Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) are passed from one person to another primarily through sexual contact by body fluids (semen, vaginal fluid and blood). However some STIs may spread from person to person or from one area of the body to another by causal contact or by contaminated items and clothing such as towels.

Some of the common STIs include:

• Gonorrhea
• Chlamydia
• Syphilis
• Genital Warts
• Candidiasis
• Genital Herpes
• Unitary Tract Infection
• HIV

Some examples of common symptoms of STIs include:

• Wounds, sores, ulcer, rash or blisters on, in or around the vagina or penis.
• A pus-like or bloody discharge from the vagina or penis.
• Vaginal yeast infections.
• A smelly discharge from the vagina.
• Pain in the lower abdomen.
• Itching or redness in the genital area.
• Pain or a burning sensation when urinating.
• Abnormal or irregular bleeding from the vagina.
• Pain or bleeding during sexual intercourse.
• Swelling around or in the vagina or penis.
• A combination of any of the above symptoms.

If you notice some of the above symptoms, it is advisable to see a medical officer for treatment. Some people with STIs however may not experience noticeable symptoms but this does not mean that the STIs would cause problems down the road. STIs increase the risk of both acquisition and transmission of HIV. Thus prompt treatment for STIs is important to reduce the risk of HIV infection.

Infection with STIs can lead to acute symptoms, chronic infection and serious delayed consequences such as infertility and cervical cancer.  HIV and syphilis can also be transmitted from mother to child during pregnancy and childbirth.

STIs that are caused by bacteria e.g. Gonorrhea, Chlamydia and Syphilis can be treated and cured by antibiotics.
STIs which are caused by viruses e.g. HIV, Genital Herpes, Genital Warts cannot be cured but the symptoms caused by the viruses can be treated  thereby limiting how they spread.

Yes it is possible for a couple who are both HIV positive to produce a child who is HIV negative using Preventing Mother-to-Child Transmission (PMTCT) of HIV.

The child is not infected at the moment of conception as sperm and ova do not carry the HIV virus and they are what create the foetus. The baby is usually infected during pregnancy as the mother exchanges blood with her child through the placenta. It is during the delivery that the risk of infection of the child is highest due to exposure to maternal blood and vaginal secretions. The baby can also be infected by the mother’s milk, which contains HIV during breastfeeding.

Mother-to-child transmission of HIV can greatly be prevented through regular testing of pregnant mothers. Free ARVs are given at the hospital to the HIV positive mothers during pregnancy, labor and delivery, after delivery and to the newborn babies for the first few weeks of their life. There are should also be no breastfeeding of the baby.

Your challenge is a diverse one in the sense that you not only have to live with yourself but also with the different world in your life like your friends, classmates, the school community and family. This entire world of yours has to be in good balance for you to live comfortably in school. In them all however, you should not look at yourself as someone “gone” with no hope at all because the truth is that you still have a future to achieve your dreams in life. A number of HIV positive people are still living successful lives.

With yourself, you may need to try and accept your status and better look after yourself by taking your medication consistently (that is if you started on ARVs), keeping out of stressful situations so as not to burden your mind, feed in a healthy way, go for routine counseling for support and guarding your life from re-infection or infecting others.

With friends and classmates, hard as it might seem, you may need to let your friends know about your status so that all can better protect themselves from getting infected, to earn yourself social support which you will so much need and to be a role model for other students that might have the same challenge as you but with less courage.

While in school, you might have to empower yourself with skills to build your confidence because in as much as stigma against HIV positive students is going down, not everyone will have a positive attitude towards you. If you don’t have confidence, you may feel less of yourself and even perform poorly in class.

Besides friends, you have to let medical personnel know about your condition, so that you can easily be helped in case you have need for medical assistance.

At home, one of the main things you need is social support- to remind you about your medication, provide for your good feeding, offer you a stepping stone of confidence, just as it needs to be for any other family member.

All in all, you are going to need to love and appreciate yourself, try to build a firm social network and to live positively. You are still very youthful and still have a lot to offer to your world.

Yes. It is possible for a girl to get pregnant even when the boy withdraws his penis before ejaculation. The “pre-come” (the lubricating fluid that leaks out of a boy’s penis before and during sex) contains sperm. If this fluid gets in or around a girl’s vagina, it can find its way inside and she can become pregnant. Girls should never be fooled that withdraw during unprotected sex is a protection against unwanted pregnancy or STIs.

Naturally, girls have a clear discharge that comes out of the vagina. This discharge should not be of any color, be it green, yellow, pinkish, etc. It should also not be itchy or smelly. If you notice any of the above signs, go see a medical personnel preferably a gynecologist and they carry out tests to diagnose the cause of it. Many of the infections can be treated if one goes to the hospital early.