Jackson, Tennessee
Diagnosed with HIV in 1987

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” —Friedrich Nietzsche

At the dawn of the HIV/AIDS crisis, I was in the armed forces—and newly diagnosed with HIV. Thirty years later, I am thriving.

I was an out, gay young man when I decided to do what many in my family had done: serve my country in the armed services. I think my family thought this would be a path for me to ‘turn straight.’ How wrong those perceptions are. I served in the military for six years. I enjoyed it for the most part, even though I served before the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy was enacted. Every base always had its little handful of gay soldiers, and I knew well how to hide my true orientation from my fellow soldiers and leaders. At that time, there was punishment for being exposed as a gay person: from a General to a Dishonorable discharge and, depending on rank, up to five years imprisonment (even though I had never heard of anyone being prosecuted to the full extent of military law).

It was June 17, 1982 when NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw reported that a rare illness was beginning to develop in homosexual men due to their lifestyle. I was just 20 years old. Six months earlier, I had joined the military and was at Technical Training School for Meteorology at Chanute AFB, Illinois. I was listening to the broadcast that afternoon in my barracks, and it was the first time that I had heard the term HIV. My ears pricked up, and I carefully listened to the report. As any 20-year-old would, I rationalized that HIV was not relevant to me. Yes, I was a gay man. I was single and dating and sexually active, but I was healthy. I dismissed the report as nothing more than fear mongering about gay people. I was wrong.

By 1984, deaths from this rare illness, by then called Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, AIDS, began to increase accounting for nearly 6,000 deaths in the U.S. alone. Among the dead were a former boyfriend and two friends.

A lot of medical information was being developed about the disease and its transmission, and in 1985, the federal government licensed its first HIV antibody test. All branches of the Armed Forces began testing immediately. In 1987, the death toll from AIDS was at 41,000. I was stationed in Frankfurt, West Germany at the time, and my unit was about to be called up for testing of HIV antibodies. I was fearful. My career was on the line. Everything that I had worked so hard for could come crashing to an end. Rumors swelled among the ranks that the military was dishonorably discharging soldiers who tested HIV positive. This possibility was a nightmare since I knew that a dishonorable or even a general discharge would keep a veteran from utilizing the Veterans Administration medical services. I began to prepare myself for the worst. I asked my German boyfriend, Larry, to find a doctor who could privately test me.

The results were positive. Throughout our courtship, Larry had hidden from me his own positive HIV status. He felt that he was at fault for my HIV positive test, but I assured him that I had probably been exposed years before we had met. Months passed before I decided to make an appointment to meet with our unit First Sergeant and Commander. I planned to tell my commanders the facts, what my positive results did and didn’t mean. It would be simple, right?

Mark Benton

But as it turned out, there was nothing simple about my revelation. All hell, and humiliation, broke loose. One commander stood up and said in disgust, “You mean you’re a faggot?” I told him no. I knew that being HIV positive was bad, but revealing that I was homosexual carried with it the punishment of military law. Then, to my horror, I watched my commander leave the privacy of the office and announce to fellow soldiers in the next room, ‘thanks to Sgt. Benton, everyone has to be tested for AIDS.’ The terminology of the time was so misused. The average person in 1987 didn’t understand that a positive HIV antibody test was not the same as a diagnosis of AIDS (I later found out my leaders were severely reprimanded for their lack of professionalism).

I was whisked away immediately aboard a Medevac plane headed back to the U.S. In the States, I was sent to Wilford Hall Medical Center, an Air Force medical staging facility at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. I was placed in a room near the nurse’s station. It was basically a glass hospital room where the doctors and nurses could keep an eye on me. A guard was placed at my door. Later I found out that the guard was not so much for my protection but to keep me from leaving. I guess I was deemed a threat to society—all 135 lbs. of me.

The word about me spread quickly around the base and generated a steady parade of gawkers outside of my glass room. One guy mouthed at me the words ‘queer faggot.’ I felt like a zoo animal on display. It was the lowest I had ever felt in my life. Little did I know that Wilford Hall would be where I would gain strength, and gain knowledge about HIV.

At the Wilford Hall admissions office, I was told to go to the 9th floor – Ward C. I didn’t know what to expect. I had one piece of luggage as I entered the elevator and pushed the button. As the doors opened up, a frail, peroxided blond man, dragging an IV pole and dressed in a Kimono, beckoned. “Hey, sweetie, come down and have a cigarette with me after you’re admitted to your room,” he said. “They’re catching us all.”

This completely freaked me out. What was I about to be subjected to? As I walked down the corridor to the nurse’s station, I noticed that each hospital room housed two gay men (soldiers) with a total of about 60 HIV-positive soldiers on the ward. I didn’t know whether to feel safe by our numbers or to panic. What was going to happen to us all? I felt like I was in a bad episode of M.A.S.H.

But over the course of six months as an HIV-positive patient, the military medical personnel would show some of the kindest care towards us that I have ever received in my life. Each of us patients surrendered up to 30 vials of blood each week to medical staff for research. We learned to read our charts and labs. All the patients would compare notes.

We developed close friendships during our stay; some soldiers found love, some became ill…some died. Every week a new handful of HIV-positive patients arrived. We calmed them down. I remember the neo-conservatives within the Reagan Administration who questioned giving HIV-positive soldiers Honorable Discharges. Thankfully more level heads prevailed. In fact, the Department of Defense became one of the most compassionate U.S. agencies in dealing with HIV-positive people. Over the next couple of years, they would screen and treat over 15,000 HIV-positive service members—enlisted personnel and officers.

During my stay at Wilford Hall I suffered with chronically swollen lymph nodes and then had a Grand Mal seizure. The doctors thought that the seizure may have been brought on by spinal tap during which HIV virus may have leaked into my spinal fluid. I was Honorably Discharged but rated at 30 percent disabled.

Each year for five years, I returned to Wilford Hall for a yearly physical, and each year I would reconnect with others who had experienced this crisis with me.

For years my health remained excellent in spite of my continued fight against HIV. Ironically, I credit the strength and empowerment that I found during my military years with helping me win my many health battles. For the five years following my discharge from the military, many of us fellow HIV-positive soldiers became guinea pigs for experimental drug trials monitored by military and Veterans Administration medical professionals. I cannot count how many side effects we encountered in our desperate attempt to survive.

Upon arriving back home in Memphis, I moved in temporarily with my parents. Soon after I moved in, they were evicted from their Annesdale neighborhood home because of my HIV-positive status. Fear ruled within the gay community as well. Many of my gay male friends hid their positive status until the day they died. Others, in my own community, distanced themselves from me because I was out about my HIV-positive status. But in the end the disease transformed our LGBTQ community. We showed our compassion through creating and volunteering at Friends for Life. We raised money for HIV patient support by having fabulous drag shows, auctions, and other fundraisers. Through my participation in these projects, I was put on a new front line—LGBTQ rights activism.

Actually, I should say that my activism in LGBTQ rights began when I entered the military. I was a very patriotic young man, and no one was going to tell me I couldn’t be gay AND serve my country. My activism has been transformed over the years. In 2014, I married Mike Millson in Washington, D.C. Mike had been my spouse for 25 years, long before marriage equality became the law of the land. Through marriage equality laws, we were able to receive better medical coverage for Mike through my military benefits. This was a life-saving benefit, literally.

Today, I have several Memphis friends who are long-term survivors. They are my heroes. We are a network of close friends. Together our shared journeys, whether public or private, have empowered each of us in many ways. For me, each crisis in my life has given me the necessary strength to carry on through the next challenge. Even though great progress has been achieved concerning HIV and treatment, there is much left to be done.

HIV and AIDS issues are not just LGBTQ issues. They are the world’s issues. One should never feel shame for being HIV positive or having AIDS. Although I have probably been HIV positive for 36 years, officially, I’m a 29-year survivor. I wear my status proudly, and share my journey publicly in hopes of empowering others.

Pride for me is confronting the issues head on. When people tell me that I ‘can’t,’ my response is always, “Just watch me…I will.”

 

This article was reprinted courtesy of Focus Mid-South Magazine.