At first blush, Bradford McIntyre and Deni Daviau appear to have an ordinary love story.
The Vancouver couple met online, dated for a year, were married in church and have been happily married for 11 years.
A run of the mill love story, except for one thing. McIntyre and Daviau are a mixed couple: McIntyre is HIV-positive; Daviau, HIV-negative.
“We are a serodiscordant couple, we are a lot of things, but the number one thing is we are in love,” said an exuberant McIntyre in their West End home. “We are more in love today than we have ever been in love.”
McIntyre was diagnosed with HIV in 1985, at age 33. He contracted the virus from the first person he was intimate with after getting out of a 10-year relationship.
His prognosis was bleak: his doctor told him to go home, inform his family, arrange his finances and his funeral because he had six months to live.
He had two relationships fall apart. Both partners told him they did not want to watch him die, recalled McIntyre.
“Due to the stigma associated with HIV, people usually ran as fast as they could when I told them I was HIV positive,” said McIntyre. “You could say it had a negative effect on having a relationship,” he added wryly.