For almost a decade, Jessica Gomes didn’t address that she was living with HIV.
Yes, she’d used intravenous drugs, but she’d been careful about what syringes she used. Yes, doctors had given her prescriptions to keep the disease in check, but “I was never good at taking medication because, to me, if I took the meds, it was like I was accepting it,” she says.
Her unstable lifestyle and housing insecurity issues exacerbated the problem. “It’s not like you have a medicine cabinet on the (street) corner,” she says. “If I had to carry a prescription bottle, I’d worry about (the pills) getting stolen or being tempted to sell them. That’s the reality.”
Thanks to Prevention Point Philadelphia and its primary care clinic for people living with HIV—Sana Clinic—that’s no longer Jessica’s reality.
Jessica, 38, now receives a Cabenuva injection once every two months. Her experiences at Sana have been so positive that she’s trying to end her opioid use disorder as well; she recently began a monthly Sublocade regimen.
After the first Sublocade injection, she recalls, she opened her eyes to see Sana Clinic Physician Dr. Jessica Meisner and PPP Case Manager Alex Kolstoe “standing there like proud parents.”
“They were like, ‘You did it! We’re so proud of you!’” Jessica says.
The support of PPP staffers like Dr. Meisner and Alex has been what’s missing from Jessica’s life and recovery, she says. She tried Suboxone before, but she never felt the doctor treating her cared about her.
“She never remembered my name, or at least she never indicated that she did. There was no doctor-patient relationship,” Jessica says. “Dr. Meisner’s completely different… She cares. She’s genuine.”
Jessica laughs when she says that Alex almost “over-advocates for me.”
“Anything that I need taken care of, he’s there,” she says. “I know that’s what he gets paid for, but he goes above and beyond. There have been times when he’s taken me to the ER and sat with me to make sure I’m ok. That matters.”
For the first time in years, Jessica is thinking about her future. She’d like to return to Temple University, where she’d once studied, to earn a nursing degree. She’s already getting some hands-on lessons from a PPP wound care nurse, Rachel Neuschatz, who Jessica calls “an inspiration and wound-care goddess.”
She would also like to get her own apartment that she can fill with books. An avid reader, Jessica has for years been building a collection of works she calls “timeless classics” including Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights and Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles.
“I hate how people look at addicts and how addicts get treated,” she says. “One thing I want people to know about me and others is that we’re human beings… You never know where life is going to take you, so be mindful (before you judge).”