Elena Di Cioccio, I'm HIV positive but I'm no longer ashamed

"Hi, I'm

, I'm 48 years old and I've been HIV positive for 21. I have HIV, I'm one of those with the purple halo".

This was revealed by Elena Di Cioccio, former Hyena and presenter, in her monologue to the 'Iene', on March 28 in prime time on Italia 1.

    "I was very young when this diagnosis completely turned my life upside down. At first I was afraid of dying, then of being able to harm others," she said.

And again: "I experienced the disease as if it were a fault ... I felt dirty, defective. I was afraid of being mocked, insulted, disqualified by the prejudice that still exists against us HIV positive people. So to defend myself, I hid the disease starting to live a double life. One in the limelight and another destructive and depressed. But a life halfway through is no life, and I realized I was going to die of it if I didn't make peace with that part of me. I am many things and they are also my disease. Today I am proud of myself, I am no longer ashamed".

Now she is negative;

"You can touch me, hug me, kiss me and everything in between.

If you want to continue to be afraid, I accept it, but turn your gaze towards your real enemy.

Ignorance".

    In an interview with Vanity Fair, Di Cioccio returns to the theme, also at the center of his book Bad Blood (Vallardi, from April 4): "I resisted a lot to tell the truth. But the truth makes you free. Jesus Christ says so in Gospel, even though I'm a Buddhist. I accepted that the Universe told me: 'Now I'll put the deck in a row, these are the cards. You don't need to shuffle, these will always come out, the health card isn't there.

    Accept yourself, the disease, your mother, your family, the shame, the abandonment, the betrayal.

Make peace'.

I went all the way and passed it.

Now I'm also that person there, but not only". She talks about how she reacted when she found out she was HIV positive, of having "thrown herself into work in radio and TV, and in the evening I would come home and get stoned on marijuana so as not to thinking", of the endometriosis that "made my motherhood journey difficult", she explains. But also of the traumatic childhood, of cocaine at 17, of the thought of suicide and of her mother's which occurred in 2016 which she defines as "the spring of my change".