"Vermont ' C/IRES _W-inwt. / *.,«.'iiias aemmcsvhu‘ g‘ o ti» Dllvifffi “Our /-‘am//y Reunion.’ Embracing All Shades of Lavender” at Hut/and /-//y/7 School VCLGR wraps up another successful conference contninedjronifrontpnge crones; domestic partners got caught up on the latest with their radical faerie friends. The day's workshops ranged from marriage to witchcraft to financial planning. Fierce feminists gave the scoop on the Promise Keepers, registration volunteers collected phone numbers, a bunch of dykes and a lone man dreamed up their ideal community center, and Karen Williams made everyone laugh about sex. Williams’ keynote covered a wide range of topics, but especially addressed the need for new leadership in the movement that will bring fresh energy to grassroots organizing while recognizing and affirming work done by the previous generation. ”Some of us who actually burned our bras need them back now,” Williams pointed out. ”I bought a Wonderbra the other day and it cost me thirty—four dollars!” Williams also urged adults to be adults, saying, "Consider yourselves healed. Get a massage, do whatever you need to do. The youth need us." ’ At the end of the day, the VCLGR Leadership Award was awarded to Howdy Russel for his outstanding work as founder of Out in the Mountains and one of the founders of Outright Vermont. The VCLGR Courage award went to the plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the state of Vermont for the right of same-gender couples to marry. Holly Puterbaugh and Lois Farnham, Peter Harrigan and Stan Baker, and Nina Beck and Stacey Jolles ac- cepted their awards with moving testimony about their partnerships and their quest to be legally married in the state of Vermont. When asked about highlights of the day, Kim Switser of Barre answered, "I got to rub shoulders with Karen Williams. She gave me hot chills." Drew Campbell of Vergennes mischieviously answered, "I really liked the witchcraft workshop!” One concert partici- pant called the conference ”a great success” when she found several of her friends still together with the new friends they made at the conference as late as Sunday afternoon: Resurrecting the Body Politic continued from page nineteen around the country. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently published a study directly linking Vitamin B-12 deficiency to the accelerated onset of AIDS in HIV+ subjects. But the CCC sits on its hands and refuses to admit to the reality of B-12's benefi- cial effect in the absence of documented proof of its existence. As to testosterone therapy, suffice it to say that only after I had left the CCC and began getting my primary HIV treatment at the Burlington Community Health Center (CHC) did anyone take the problem seriously. Low levels of testosterone have been shown to contribute to physical and psychological depression in HIV+ men, according to studies conducted by Dr. Judith Rabkin of Columbia University. Like B-12, testosterone therapy is common practice almost everywhere else, and widely known to be effective. Like B- 12, it is affordable and safe. My new physician at CHC consulted with San Francisco General Hospital and an endocrinologist at Fletcher Allen in assessing and properly supple- menting my testosterone levels. I did not need to plead, and I did not need to argue for a treatment that shouldn't cause a ripple of protest at any well informed medical facility.- In addition to withholding commonly accepted therapies such as B-12 and test- osterone, the CCC, so far, has utterly failed to provide what any other AIDS service orga- nization will identify as an essential component of comprehensive treatment, and that is peer counseling. In the interest of "maintaining confidentiality," the CCC discourages and effectively prevents systematic communication between patients. This should be a Central element of their program. Confidentiality and communication are not mutually exclusive. Instead of arranging for patients to draw on one another’s experiences di- rectly, the clinic doctors and nurse practitioner have assumed that they can personally convey this massive amount of vital information from patient to patient. They don't and they can't. This exaggerated sense of their own abilities even extends to the psychiatric ser- vices which the clinic is attempting to provide. I like and respect the staff psychiatrist very much, but he is on site for only two hours a week. How can he be expected to effecti\'eIy'sei‘ve the psychiatric needs of the more than 300 HIV patients in such a small amount of time? The point is that in order to be truly comprehensive, the CCC must stop trying to contain and control all aspects of AIDS services. It must learn to listen to ‘its patients for real, to more readily consult other resources outside the Fletcher Allen system, and to become more diligent in its assimilation of recent scientific findings. Only then can it hope to provide the "collaborative working relationship" it promises in its mission state- ment. OUT IN THE MOUNTAINS — NOVEMBER 1997 — 23 IPIEIISFCIINLHLIAS Talking Personals! Hundreds of guys to choose from! Call Now! 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