At 71, Nathan Townsend embodies resilience. As the founder and Executive Director of THE BLACK QUEER COLLECTIVE Inc., a nonprofit that just celebrated its first anniversary on July 4th, Townsend has spent over 25 years working in HIV and sexual health. Diagnosed with HIV in 1984 at age 30, he is among the first individuals diagnosed in his community and has been living with the virus for 40 years.
His journey from Philadelphia to Atlanta in 2017 at age 64 was sparked by a startling CDC statistic predicting that one out of two Black gay men living in Atlanta would experience HIV in their lifetime. Unable to accept this forecast, Townsend quit his job managing an HIV group home and moved to Atlanta without knowing anyone in the city. He credits Steve Harvey's book Jump for inspiring his leap of faith.
In 2017, I read a statistic released by the CDC here in Atlanta that predicted one out of two Black gay men living in Atlanta would experience HIV in their lifetime. To me, that was very unsettling and a statistic that I as a Black queer individual living with HIV could not accept. I could not accept being comfortable with just having a job in the field where it was not as impactful because at that time I was managing an HIV group home. My responsibilities were more managerial, more like a landlord. I missed that front row seat. I missed being in the trenches where you really meet the needs and see the emergency of how this is impacting our community.
I quit my job. People were asking what are you doing at 64 years old? Who do you know in Atlanta? Where are you going to live? I read Steve Harvey's book, Jump. It says, if God has something for you, you have to believe in that calling and know that if you jump, there will be a parachute there to catch you. So many of us are afraid of the unknown, afraid of being stretched, afraid of growth, afraid of our own ideas and initiatives. I jumped, came here December 1st, 2017 and have not looked back since.
"You should know better." "You look like you're smarter than that." "You are too cute to be living that kind of lifestyle." "It's your choice." "You chose this." There's all of those negative truisms that are not truisms that you're held accountable by. Stigma, shame, fear, being ashamed to even go get tested because you know what it looks like if people know.
We as Black individuals and culture have a way of dumbing down and giving nicknames to things that really matter so much so that we don't know what the truth is. Someone says he got sugar. What is sugar? Diabetes. We need to speak in real terms and not be ashamed because of our religious beliefs or cultural upbringing. We need to be decolonized because none of these thoughts are our own. Black queer individuals do not have an authentic narrative. The narrative has been driven by the systems that have oppressed us, suppressed us, depressed us, and repressed us.
Back in 1984, there was only one medication available and that medication had never been tested on Black individuals, which brings the issue why so many Blacks died so early because they were taking medication that was not meant for them. AZT, I refuse to take it. That's why I'm still here. They told me to take four pills four times a day. You had to wake up to take a pill. I said if I'm sleeping well, I'm going to wake up to take medicine to feel better? I won't know if I'm feeling better. I'll be asleep.
The problem is that all of the attention for the last 25 years have only been on people who are HIV positive. Why are we not talking to the people that are at risk? We have to assume that everybody's either HIV positive or HIV possible. Had these preemptive services been available prior to HIV, it wouldn't have been as explosive as it was. It's about behaviors.
The beauty of telehealth is I don't have to worry about how I look because I don't have clothes to go to an appointment. I don't have to worry about how I'm going to get there or how I'm going to get back home because I don't have car fare. I don't have to navigate through mounds of people. So it eliminates significant barriers.
The only issue is that the intimacy level cannot be captured that way. Anytime you're on a platform there is the tendency to perform. You're not going to be yourself. Telehealth can have you face to face with a doctor but that doctor can't touch you or treat you. Mobile health units would be ideal, especially in rural communities. When I grew up, the doctor made house calls. We need that especially where there's lack of access to transportation.
You have to build trust with yourself. You have to have a relationship with yourself before you can have any kind of relationship with someone else. When we talk about building trust many times it's not about access, it's about exposing our vulnerability. If I'm secure in myself, my vulnerability is not going to be a barrier for me. Some of that work has to be done here first. Communication is a two way street.
Make it more accessible, more affordable, and more impactful. The problem is we are reactionary emotional people. That's not war strategy. What you need is a life vest. That life vest is community. That life vest is village. That life vest is each of us lifting each other up and caring for each other. We have to rebuild community. We have to care about each other.
The highest growing community now is Black women. Black women have borne the burden of everything in this country. We have to protect our women.