There are situations we encounter in life which compel us to do what we always thought was for certain people and not for us.
Prayer had never been part of my daily routine before 1999 when I was down and in admission at St Luke’s hospital suffering from a debilitating bout of TB. I had also just tested HIV positive and was not sure whether I would be able to see my 2 children Simba then 8 and Rutendo then around 5 grow into adults let alone see my grandchildren.
The day I received my HIV positive result I asked Mai Simba my wife to take me out to a secluded place near the male TB ward and asked her to leave me alone there for a while. It was there on that night where I really prayed to God in a way I had never prayed before. I poured out all my sins to God asking for forgiveness and ended by asking God to heal me and allow me to see my 2 children grow into adults. I made a solemn promise to God that if I was healed I would spend the rest of my life telling everyone about His goodness in saving my life. I would also go on and help all those struggling with HIV regain confidence and live their lives to the full a promise I have kept up to this day. I have never spent a day without praying first when I wake up and when I go to sleep since 2010 I also pray for those HIV positive like me and others when I see the need wherever they happen to be. Never a day passes without me talking about HIV and how I was saved from imminent death by God’s Grace.
Recovery from TB is a long process and in most cases a lot of people never fully achieve full recovery as they die during the first few months after they have been declared healed. Full recovery in my case took 7 years after I had returned to my teaching job at Mkoka secondary school where I had taught for only 1 year before I was attacked by TB and HIV. I had been living one a day until I began to feel fully recovered and had slackened on my prayer habits like a lot of people do when a looming threat has subsided. I began to revert back to my old wayward ways and Mai Simba was beginning to get worried with my behaviour especially drinking and smoking.
One day in 2010 during a weekend Mai Simba called me into our sitting room for a short talk which ended up being a very long talk and dramatically changed my life. She started by reminding me how close to death I had gotten to and how through God’s kindness I had been made well again. She went on to take me back to our hospital days, how for 3 months she had endured sleeping under my hospital bed in a ward full of frail, coughing TB men. How our 2 young children had remained at our rural home with my mother and sometimes my sister while we were in hospital at St Luke’s for 3 months and how they had cried on our return. I listened without making any contribution to her monologue and finally she brought up a bombshell by asking me whether I did not think that while a lot of people had died of AIDS, God was keeping me healthy for a purpose. I woke up as if in trance and began to digest all that Mai Simba had said and began to see a lot of sense in all of it. I declared there and then to her that from that day on I shall never again touch beer and cigarettes I would also pray to God and would also get baptized in church.
Since birth I had never been baptised in church though I had been brought up in the Roman Catholic with plans to get baptized as soon as conveniently possible. After our discussion with Mai Simba we decided to look for a church that would fit in with our needs and we had to move from one church to another until we settled for the Seventh Day Adventist Church for reasons that suited us.
We took our time to go through the processes leading to baptism until August 2013 when I was baptized at the Kana Central SDA Church. A lot of people with a lot them from outside the SDA church came to watch me be baptized. I had been a very bad person doing all sorts of bad things that people in our area never believed that I would be baptized in a church and remain a Christian going to church every church day and in my case attend every Sabbath. It was like the Devil himself was being baptized and I am happy to say that I have never looked back during the 13 years I have never missed a Sabbath.
I am so grateful to God for taking me this far and for making me and my family enjoy such good health while living with HIV. It feels like we have been able to conquer HIV/AIDS. Mai Simba is yet to be baptized as she wants to have her childhood wish to have a real white wedding fulfilled. She had insisted on wedding when we got married back then in 1990 and because of circumstances beyond my control we ended up married without one .All these years I have been trying to put together resources to make that wedding a success and am still working on it .I think soon we will be able to have that wedding and have Mai Simba baptized .
Mai Simba has been and continue to be a very good companion to for all the 37 plus years we have been married. I can’t thanks her enough. We have been through the ups and downs that define most marriages. We have been invited to churches to help others manage life with HIV as we have done. We have had radio and TV programs organized for us by NAC where we have shared our experiences with other people. We have attended workshops hosted by NAC and other stakeholders in the HIV/AIDs sector with one we where we addressed newspaper editors, TV and radio station managers held in Chinhoyi. Being positive has made us understand life from a different perspective. We are no longer afraid of AIDS and we have come to terms with it to a point where we Since 2013 when I was baptized I have never taken any alcoholic drink or cigarette, are enjoying life with it. Next week I shall share with you some of the good and bad moments in our lives with HIV.
Piason Maringwa
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