Project Kengikat

Going Through Changes…..LAUGHING At Myself

// September 14th, 2010 // No Comments » // Animals, HIV and AIDS, Health and Fitness, Me Time

There are times when I just want to be in another place, a place where no one knows my name and I don’t help people. A place where people don’t wear masks and play all sorts of games. A place where love is all that really matters. But then reality sets in and I simply smile and say “ok”

Last week I had the opportunity to take a three day AIDS Treatment Training through AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA) It was pretty intense and I am so glad that I am in the place I am in now, because I was able to be “present” with no distractions. I guess for those who are new to reading my blog or even new to knowing me, I should qualify what I just said.

I was homeless when I diagnosed HIV positive and that alone was distraction enough, but on top of this I was also battling cancer and my never ending battle with Sickle Cell. Add to this all the hardships of simply being homeless and all the crap you must put up with if you intend to make it through homelessness with most of your marbles.

I am happy to say that after 29 months of homelessness I made it through pretty damn good and with more then most of my marbles. More importantly I made it through with two awesome outreach projects I created while homeless, some pretty amazing friends who truly care for me and some awesome mentors who saw the best in me, even when I didn’t always see it in myself. I can be very hard to see all the colors when you’re out in the pouring rain. Everything seems dark and grey.

At this point in my life there are few distractions and the ones that are there I am able to face them head on without fear or hesitation. If I learned anything through 29 months of homelessness is the fact that I am strong beyond measure and my will to survive may become shattered, but it will not ever be broken and that my EGO can be a damn good thing sometimes. When I was homeless it was my huge EGO that refused to allow me to believe all the crap that was being fed to me.

The tree day training was filled with new information and resources that if put into practice will greatly benefit and serve people who are battling HIV and AIDS as well as those who are affected by HIV and AIDS. To make it as plain as I can, it will serve humanity equally.

The presenters were awesome, experts in their fields from all over, there to give us the tools we all needed to fully understand HIV and AIDS. For me it was the single most valuable three days I have ever spent learning about HIV and AIDS. It also gave me new tools to help me fight HIV as well as be of service to the people I try so hard to serve.

I had the chance to speak with people from the Bay Area as well as other parts of the State and learn more about the services they provide and how they go about doing it. I even had the opportunity to connect with someone who works in the Skid Row area of Downtown Los Angeles. From all of this I am hoping that she and I will be able to find ways to better serve the men and women of Skid Row, who in my opinion are at the lowest end of the totem pole, the part that is berried in dart, the part where any cut in any program can mean life or death, the part that never sees the light of day, the part we all tend to forget and in some cases look down upon and even ignore. I often think many of us, including myself at times, tend to forget that there are lives in that dirt that deserve, require and need help. When I say help I mean just that, not judgement, guilt, shame,  religion and stigma, but real honest and true help.

In all of this the single most powerful part for me was the very last person who spoke. For me she was able to wrap all three days up in a sexy box and give it to me. She made it real, she put it in my face, laid it all out of the table and dished it up. She was funny and on point, patient yet mindful of the time and just when I thought she couldn’t get any better she then talked about burning out.

After we came back from the short break and she began to speak again right away there was something very familiar with what she was saying. Something was ringing true to my soul and what is now my purpose in life. As she continued to speak something inside of me began to move around and before I knew it I was smiling and laughing, not like before when she was being funny, but in complete agreement with what she was saying. It was in that moment when I said to myself  ”Oh my God, this is 90/365 Loving Me.” She was speaking about knowing the signs of when you are becoming burnt out, about getting some friends in your life, leaving work at work, taking time out for you.

However there was something she said toward the end that I didn’t get until yesterday (September 13) and that is when she said we have to learn to laugh at ourselves. Even after we have been played.

For the past two months I’ve been doing peer support like I never have before. At the request of some people I was sitting in on case mangers meetings, taking on issues that should be taken on by the person who created them, listening and being present for people who were only “playing me” in the end. I was making phone calls, running around like a chicken with their damn head cut off and in the end it was all in vain. “I am going to do this my way and I don’t need you helping me.”

When I heard the silence on the other end of the line and after looking at my phone to see that call had ended I sat on my sofa and started laughing. Dodger (my dog) got really happy because I think he knew that this meant we were going for a walk. He ran to the other end of the room and grabbed a few of his toys and began to shake them like crazy and even bark at them. I continued laughing.

In that moment I knew that I need to take a break and get some perspective on things. I knew that if i was going to keep doing the work I’ve created, if I was going to hang onto the sheer joy of helping people wanting nothing in return, if i wasn’t going to be like so many others who simply go through the motions, I was going to have to make some changes and those changes could not wait until next week.

I started this blog with my thoughts of wanting to escape and be in a place where no one knew who I was, well I have done just that. This week I am taking a STAYcation. While people know who I am and my phone does ring, the emails come in and all of that, this week is all about me and no one else. Today I slept late, went for a long walk with Dodger, went to the store to get a few things to start eating healthy and I made myself a gym schedule. I put air in the tires on my bike and I went for a bike ride.

Tomorrow the only plans I have are to take care of some things I must take care of for me and then I am going to take some pictures. I might even have a picnic all by myself.  This week and maybe even the next is going to be all about me. I guess you can say that I am no longer waiting for anyone to replenish all that I give away, I am not waiting for anyone to notice or love me. I am doing it myself and no one can do this better then me.

Stay the Course

// September 1st, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Animals, Cooking, HIV and AIDS, Health and Fitness, Homeless Outreach, Me Time

I’ve been doing “peer support” and “case management” for quite a while now through my outreaches and for the most part it has been very rewarding work to see the people I am helping move forward, but there are times when it can be very frustrating because the person I may be working with is their own problem and not HIV or homelessness.

For example I’ve been working with this guy who says he is having a difficult time understanding all the many things he is dealing with, but after spending three days with him and sitting in on one of his sessions, I must say that more the 80% of the problems he is experiencing is a direct result of him not following through or not asking questions.

If I have learned anything from being homeless, HIV positive and having to rely on government funded programs is that I must stay on top of everything. I must be my own advocate. Sitting back and waiting for someone else to care or someone else to do something is just plain silly. Furthermore I have learned to remind social workers, case managers and even doctors of what they said they would take care of. More then 90% of the time they had not done what they needed to do in order to move me forward. I can only point to one case manager where I did not have to check behind her to see if she had done what she said she would. This was my case manager at APLA.

It seems that so many people who are HIV positive use their diagnoses as an excuse for everything in their life. It is my opinion that  to some degree support groups and ASO’s play key roles in allowing people to make excuses instead of encouraging them to deal with the real issues that were there long before their HIV or AIDS diagnoses. It is my opinion that a person with HIV or AIDS is better served when they are encouraged to live a normal life without hiding in the HIV or AIDS closet as well as fully deal with the problems and issues they have unrelated to their diagnoses. I have this opinion because I have been on the inside looking out and the outside looking in.

Working with this person was still very rewarding, please dont get me wrong and even though it is  huge challenge to work with him, I will continue to do so because it is the right thing to do and to be very honest, I know from my own experience how very frustrating, depressing, degrading, humiliating and down right nasty many places can be when it comes to helping homeless people and people with HIV or AIDS.

I think it is very important for me to say that not all people who work with homeless people or people battling HIV and AIDS do piss poor jobs, there are some people who do amazing jobs and serve their clients well. I know several of them, but from experience they are the exception to the rule and they are also far and few in between.

After the tree days of working with this person, I was very drained, some might say I was exhausted and in the end the person has still decided to go down the “whoa is me” road. Which is fine and is his choice, but this person can not say that he did not have options or that someone did not only tell him of the options, but made arrangements for him to sit face to face and explore the other options. This person now has no one to blame for the “whoa is me” road but self.

As I have stated before I will continue to support this person as best I can and offer any advice I may have. I will even refer and make phones to try to help, but the bottom choice must come from them. No matter how much cheer leading I do, no matter how many hours I or anyone else spends with this person, ultimately the work must be done by this person and the desire to change and live a long and healthy life starts with them.

After those three days I was really looking forward to going to ceramics on Saturday. As I have stated before ceramics became my safe harbor back in 2008 when I was first diagnosed. However I have not been in a while because there has been some drama taking place there, but I was really wanting to go take some time out for me and just create something. I am not sure what it was, but there was some tension there and I was not able to dig into my creative side to create anything. It’s funny how other people and the energy they bring can change the entire atmosphere of a place you really love.

KENGI’s BOOK CLUB

I asked three of the guys from my Unpluggin’ HIV outreach if they would like to be part of my book club and they all said yes. We decided to read Invisible Life by E. Lynn Harris which happens to be my favorite writers. He passed away not long ago and he will be missed a great deal. Myself and two of the guys had already read the book, but were willing to read it again. The third guy had never read the but and we knew if would be an awesome book for him to start with. Plus we all wanted to read the book again.

The guys came over to my apartment on Sunday, I cooked dinner and we laughed and enjoyed a nice long evening of great food and great conversation. I am so happy that I picked these three guys to do the book club with because they are all intelligent,  respectful, trust worthy and my friends. Another cool thing is that we all in very different points in our lives and even in our diagnoses, but we all are very much fully engaged in our overall health and well being.

Suddenly the stress of my week had passed, the tension from ceramics no longer dogged me and I found myself in the company of three beautiful Black men sharing an amazing experience of reading, friendship, food and laughter. In that moment my heart began to smile because the stress was replaced with laughter and friendship and in that very moment understood why it is so important to keep doing what I am doing. I that moment I thought how cool it would be to one day be able to see the person I had just spent three days with in this book club with us. In that very moment I saw what is possible when you put people first, when I do not allow myself to place people into molds, I saw what is possible when we simply show up for people without excuse.

Dodger and I walked the guys to the train and along the way of the the guys said “I’ve always wanted a group of guys I could hang out with and have fun with. I hope this doesn’t end.”

I smiled because after the evening with them I was thinking the very same thing.

(The pictures in this blog are from my book club)

Thursday

// August 12th, 2010 // No Comments » // Cooking, HIV and AIDS, Health and Fitness, Homeless Outreach

This week has been both productive and difficult at times, but for the most part it has been a very rewarding and blessed week for me.

My week started with a trip to see my doctor to get lab results for my HIV as I stated in my blog, I wasn’t the least bit concerned about the outcome of the labs. The first reason was because I knew I was still fine and the second reason is because even if I was told I needed to start HIV meds, I know I now have a great doctor and awesome support staff there at the clinic that will get me through it. I know that with my faith and will combined with them, things will be just fine.

The only thing that was on my radar is the fact that there is a history of heart disease as well as other things in my families history and I need to make sure I am doing all I can to make certain I don’t go down the same road. While it was good to talk with my doctor about this and she was able to offer some expert advice and direction, the ultimate outcome is all in my hands. I have to eat right, make sure I am getting plenty of rest and I need to exercise. Bottom line is this, my doctor can give me all the information, advice and support there is, but if I dont start changing how I view food as well as spend more time exercising then the road that I want to avoid I will surely go down and I will have no one to blame for this but myself.

I also had the cool chance to spend some time with one of the guys from my Skid Row outreach and get to know him better as well as give him some information on how to go about correcting and dealing with some of the things he now has in front of him as it pertains to ADAP and Medi-Cal. Thanks to the support of my Keep-n-Touch program I was able to purchase a phone for him that will allow him to stay better connected to the things he needs to stay on top of. Not having a way to contact people, be in control of things you need to take care of and always having to depend on others to get messages or make phone calls can be very discouraging and even depressing for someone who is doing all they can to make things better for themselves. My Keep-n-Touch program allows me to supply a free prepaid cell phone to those in need. It may not seem like much to many people, but I know from experience that having a cell phone is a real connection and allows you to stay in control of some things in your life, while others are in charge of so much more.

Quality Products

One major set back this week came in the form of my video camera breaking on me. I’ve had some problems with the camera for a while now. Slowly but surely the camera has been in what I have called “shut down” mode and Wednesday afternoon the camera finally shut all the way down. JVC has been no help with this other then offering tech support that I must pay by the hour for or by shipping the camera to them and allowing them to repair it for far more then the camera is even worth. However they did say that if I ship them the camera and they find that the problem is something that is defective, they would cover most of it, but since the camera is past the one year warranty I would have to pay for some of the cost to fix it. So how this does not seem right, the camera could be defective, but I would still have to pay.

Whatever happened to the day when the customer was KING? Where companies made quality products that lasted forever? What happened to the days when you could by something and it would be around for many, many years? I recall things in my grand parents and even my great grand parents home that had been in their lives forever. How is that companies are allowed to make lousy products, that cost so much, but you get far less then what you paid for them?

BE OF YOUR WORD

Another thing I have noticed is that I am pulling away from certain people from YOUTUBE because they have volunteered or offered things and time and time again they never come through. Furthermore they act as if they have never volunteered or offered. For me this speaks to their character and the person they truly are. I am not saying they are bad people, just that they are people whose word no longer means a thing to me. Once I get to the place where your word no longer means anything, it isn’t long before I start to pull away. As I type this I am thinking about a call I received this week from someone who I had to step away from last year, she wanted to call to offer her apology and wanted to see if things could be different. She also tried to engage me in conversation, but I was not about to go back down a dead end road. I thanked her for calling and told her it was water under the bridge and not to worry about it. I then told her I hoped she was well and said goodbye. It is impossible for me to maintain any sort of relationship with someone who does not keep their word.

Hygiene Supplies

Wednesday shortly after coming home I had a knock on my door, when I opened it the UPS guy was there with a box. The box came from someone on YOUTUBE, who wanted to help me with hygiene supplies for my outreach. Inside the box were items such as toothpaste, deodorant and razors along with a very nice card. Let me tell you a little bit about this person, first she is a teenager and all we ever seem to hear, see or read in the news about teenagers is all bad. But here is one who reached out to me a while back after viewing one of my cooking videos where my family and I were doing an outreach to Chess Park at Santa Monica Beach. She wanted to help me with my outreach, she wanted to help me help those who are in need. A teenager stepping to the front of line and saying “I want to help” and not just that, but making sure she was allowed to help by staying on top of me and reaching out several times to remind me that she was willing to help.

This young lady saved her allowance and purchased items that will be used to help people who are homeless or battling HIV and AIDS. This young woman suited up and showed up, without excuse for people who are in need. She didn’t place empty comments on my blog or vlog, but she gave me her word and she followed through and this speaks volumes to the mother she has and the values instilled in her. It speaks volumes of the type of teenager she is and the amazing woman she will become.

Peer Support

So last month I was able to go with Donald as he made his purchase of his laptop. He saved his money and asked me to o with him to make assist him in selecting a new laptop. Since then I’ve had the huge honor of helping him learn his computer and once again today I have the huge honor of helping him once again.

Donald is someone I met through my HIV outreach on Skid Row and right away there was just something about him that stood out. He has become someone I consider as a friend, someone I care a great deal for, but more then this he has become someone I truly admire, respect and look up to. He is a massive inspiration to me and is someone who is beating the odds against HIV. He is someone you will never read about on some CDC report and is someone you may never see in some magazine, but for me he is the cream of the crop. He is kind, caring and damn funny. I look forward to visiting with him because it is always so much fun, but most of all I look forward to the pearls of wisdom he drops in my life each and every time I see or speak with him. Wisdom that you can’t get from a book, on a job or from any school, but the kind of wisdom that you must stop dead in your tracks to soak in, wisdom that can’t come from rushing things or by pretending, but the kind of wisdom that you must sit and allow to settle into your soul. Wisdom that comes from someone who has lived a rich life filled with great joy and even some sorrow that the soul is so ready to give to all who welcome it.

As a kid growing up I had the huge privilege of having what I called “elders” in my life. I use to want to go visit them and just sit and listen to their amazing stories from their rich lives and each time I would walk away with wisdom and a great feeling of encouragement. I had great respect and a greater reverence for the “elders” in my life and in many ways  Donald has become an “elder” in my life. I can count on one had, three fingers in fact, the “elders” I now have in my life and they are my great Aunt Loraine, my Aunt Emma and Donald. I am so richly blessed and honored to have them in my life.

I will spend my Thursday afternoon doing what some call “peer support” with my friend Donald, but in reality I will spend my Thursday afternoon in the company of my “elder” soaking in all the wisdom he allows to flow from his soul.

Clean Up Friday

// June 18th, 2010 // 2 Comments » // Animals, Health and Fitness, Me Time

Today was a pretty quiet day for Dodger and I, just a few walks and a lazy day on the sofa. I took the day off from the gym because I am really sore from the past two days. No pain, no gain is just a bunch of BS. I am not trying to hurt myself to prove some silly point.

The one thing that I really wanted to get done today was doing a major clean to my apartment. My place isn’t that large, but there are 5 windows, 4 of which are large, plus my place sits over a fairly busy street, so there’s lots of dirt that gets in. I do my best to keep it pretty clean, but there are times when I need to do what I did today. What I like to call  ”deep cleaning”. During this cleaning I move all the furniture, sweep the baseboards and then I place some carpet fresh on the carpet. It takes about an hour to get it all done.

Before moving the furniture I make sure I have already done the dishes, cleaned thebathroom and the counter tops. Today I had to also clean off the table. The table tends to be a place where I place things that never seem to move. So there a great deal of time was spent getting things where they belong, most of which was the trash and a small amount needed to be filed away or put in areas where I could see them so I wont forget they are due.

Most times Dodger gets really nervous when I start to clean because he knows sooner or later I will be running the vacuum cleaner and he doesn’t care too much for that. However today meant that his favorite spot perched on the back of the sofa looking out the window would be a no go. He also doesn’t like when I move the sofa with him on it.

I also wanted to focus on recreating my “sacred space” as well as making space for my ceramics that I’ve been bringing home. This meant that I was going to have to move some things around in order to make space for all the new pieces. I have this really cool leather chest that I received from my friends Krystal and Patrick that use to sit near the sofa and arm chair, but today I moved it near the bog window so it could hold my plants and ceramics while creating a really cool space. There was a smaller table that I had in the entry hallway now located in living room that holds my FAITH cross, rocks and some really cool pieces I created.

I also needed to sort my laundry, change the sheets on my bed and sort my recycling. Dodger’s bowl needed to be cleaned, water bottle on his water station also needed to be changed as well. This meant I needed to clean the area where the bottle screws in to make sure no dust or dirt there that could get into his water. My little baby also needed a bath and then a good brushing after.

Once I finished all of this it was time for our afternoon walk. We usually go for a longer walk in the afternoon, but today Dodger seemed to be a bit tired. He wasn’t walking at his normal pace and when I turned at a corner where we never go to head back, he gave me nu fuss. In fact he seemed very happy. When we got back home, jumped up on the sofa for me to remove his collar and harness and went right over to his bed and curled up. However once I got settled and relaxed on the sofa, he ran over and jumped on me and we took our nap.

This evenings walk Dodger had his swagger back and was all over the place. Since he had somuch energy we went for a long walk and he seemed to like this just fine. On our way home we ran into Maggie and Sally. They live near us and Dodger is always on his best behavior whenever he sees Sally. This time he saw he before I noticed they were up ahead and he started pulling.

I gave my friend Audrey a call to see how she was doing and I am so glad I did that, because once again we had such a great conversation and I was able to learn more about her as well as discover that she is a pretty strong, brave amazing woman was has been through so much in her life. What is so inspiring to me is that she has this beautiful spirit and this energy that is so powerful. We spent over an hour talking and laughing.

I was feeling ok after talking to Audrey, so I thought I would head to the gym, but right as I started to walk to the door Dodger went crazy, as if he knew I was about to leave him and this was going against my plans. I walked out anyway, but he kept it up and did not stop. I was outside the building and walking towards the gym and I could still hear him. Dodger never does this, so I gave in and came back. When I sat down on the sofa, he ran to lick my face and then back to his favorite spot. I simply shook my head and said “Ok Dodger, you win” He turned and barked twice and went back to looking out the window.

Clean up Friday was awesome. I took it easy and spent the entire day with Dodger, talked with with two friends and returned some emails. I am ending my day by burning some sage, ringing my bell and lighting some candles….oh yeah a really hot bubble bath.

Gym Time

// June 16th, 2010 // 4 Comments » // Health and Fitness, Me Time

I left for Washington DC on April 25th, the last time I was in the gym was April 23rd. Even though my eating habits have not changed, my fitness level has almost come to a complete stand still. Other then walking Dodger I have not been doing any other exercise at all.

The result of this is me now weighing 325 lbs. I knew I was gaining weight, but I really did see it until I saw some pictures of me taken by a friend of mine and what I saw was disappointing to me.  Now I could find plenty of things to blame not going to the gym on, but the bottom line is that I have been lazy. Plain and simple and I know people will say oh don’t be hard on yourself or beat yourself up and everyone falls off the wagon and all that sort of crap. The truth is this, I am not being myself up, being too hard on myself or any of this. I am just being honest about my situation of simply being too lazy to walk four blocks to the gym. There is just no other way to look at it.

I had plans to get tot he gym all last week and the week before and I also had plans to get there Monday and Tuesday of this week, but I made excuses and it never happened, but after seeing those pictures last night and then watching this documentary on high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke, I knew the only way for me to see changes in my overall health is to make solid life changes to my daily life.

I am no longer a member of the YMCA, for reasons I already talked about in other blogs, but I did join Bally’s Total Fitness before I left for Washington DC, so there is no excuse other then my own laziness as to why I have not been. Like I said I can find excuses and all sorts of awesome reasons why I didn’t go, but the bottom like is that they are excuses and in the long run these types of excuses will only cause health problems for me. I already have enough health problems to deal with already, so I should not allow my laziness to cause even more.

Today was my first day back in the gym and to be very honest it felt great. I worked out for 45 minutes on the cross trainer and it really wasn’t that hard at all. Since my new gym has TV stations at many of the machines, I was able to watch CNN and before I knew it I had reached the end of my workout. I feel great right now and I know I will sleep very good tonight.

This time around I am not going to allow things to get in my way of working out. I am also not going to depend on motivation from anyone other then me. The last time I was getting some motivation from friends who later quit, but they don’t have they same health issues that I have, so I can’t allow this to be any part of why I am working out. I have to do it for ME and MY HEALTH.

The hardest thing about the gym is simply going and not making excuses as to why you can’t go. Now if you can’t afford the gym, then find something that will allow you to workout and be healthy. I know there are some things we simply can not control when it comes to life and how our health will unfold, but there are lots of things we can do to make sure that the road to good health is as smooth as possible. For me that road started today, not tomorrow or next week.

I will never have the body I use to have when I was a jock and dammit I will never look like Deon and he two sexy ass friends, but I can be healthy, look good and feel good. Hell I am pretty damn sexy right now, and I am 41 years old now, my twenties are far behind me. However 42 is just up ahead I am going to be in better health and fitness when I turn 42, then I am right now. In turn this will improve my quality of life and overall health and well being.

Today I have started what I am calling “BALANCE: Mind, Body & Soul” and I am off to an awesome start.