The worst thing someone gets is isolated. Isolation is the darkest part of any condition. You can live with almost any condition if you're living within a community of people who can share a common understanding. We create these communities from women who share common conditions, and those mothers carry each other through.

You have a bigger view, of something bigger than you, and you have to view that and take that in mind. At times you feel like despair rises up over hope, then other times you feel hopeful again.

Medicine comes with hope: the hope of having a healthy child, the hope of being able to raise your family.

My first understanding of HIV and AIDS was like everybody else from my generation. In the mid-'80s, we heard about this, and it was terrifying, because we knew nothing about how to respond to it appropriately, and we didn't really understand about how the virus is passed. There was a lot of misconception about that.

I wasn't trying to be a role model for anybody. I don't think that you can.

I mean, I'm 48 years old and I've been through a lot in my life - you know, loss, whether it be death, illness, separation. I mean, the failed expectations... We all have dreams.

This is the book I never read ~ These are the words I never said ~ This is the path I'll never tread ~ These are the dreams I'll dream instead