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Facilitating POP
Side feature article to Positively Prevention, Michigan HIV & STD News,
Winter 2006 Issue
Chris Posler is the facilitator for the HIV/AIDS Resource
Center’s (HARC) POP intervention, and he’s about as perfect for this as any CBO
could find.
A long term survivor as a person living with AIDS (PWA)
himself, Posler is also a minister and positive prevention specialist. He has
been a PWA advocate for years, recently as co-chair for the North American Tour
of the Campaign to End AIDS in Michigan. And he has been involved in gay and PWA
communities in several US metro areas. Posler was part of the Chicago group that
started the Test Positive Awareness Network, publishers of Positively Aware.
Posler thinks the social norm building in POP is only possible with a group that
is peer led – “by an openly positive person who has thought about healthier
behavior for many years, talking to their community, being part of their
community. This makes it difficult for the facilitator because you are both of
the community and something different.” Posler said the job “requires a specific
skill set and temperment.”
“For years before coming back to Michigan I had always
advocated for prevention for positives,” said Posler. When Amy Peterson started
talking about the program Posler said he was a bit skeptical of a “boxed
intervention,” what is now called an evidence-based intervention or EBI.
Additionally, when he saw the training manual he was concerned that the program
would be too inflexible. Having since presented the program to several groups he
now realizes there is considerable latitude for the facilitator.
Another concern that Posler had initially with POP was
whether the need for community building would be fulfilled. Communication with
other PWAs had been number one on the needs list in feedback from the PWA
survey. “Now that I have done three POPs the number one thing that has happened
is community building.” Some participants, he said, have developed a very tight
community from their POP group work.
“And as a by-product my other support groups are full of
these POP guys. They have also become a part of the POL - Popular Opinion Leader
project for men over 25 at HARC. So these were the first guys to come up and say
‘I talk to other PWAs; I talk to other queer men. And I talk about prevention, I
talk about counseling. I talk about treatment options and all these other
things,” said Posler.
POP has helped get HIV back up on the list of conversation
topics among the local gay population he said. “And slowly we are getting more
leaders of HIV advocacy and prevention.”
Another by-product of the POP groups,” said Posler was the number of
participants who started having sex again. In the PWA survey 36% of respondents
reported shutting down from sex or avoiding sex altogether. “They didn’t know
they could practice behaviors that wouldn’t expose others to HIV,” said Posler
who has been positive since 1983 and has never had a doctor talk to him about
his sexuality until recently. “So these guys were frightened and had turned off
to life, which is very damaging to your immune system,” he said. Participants
have called him to say ‘I just disclosed,’ who before POP have been afraid to do
this, but learned the skills they need and gained the empowerment to do this in
the POP group.
“So now wherever I go I speak up POP because under the right facilitator and
counselor I think it can be a wonderful thing.” He likes to call it Prevention
with Positives. You can reach Chris Posler at HARC, (734) 572-9355.
A Veteran's Viewpoint
Leon Golson attended the POP facilitator training in
November to see how it would be applicable to Black MSM. A veteran to prevention
programming, Golson began his HIV/AIDS work in 1990 for the Southeastern
Michigan American Red Cross and was one of the first trainers in the Red Cross
African American HIV/AID Education program.
In his 12 years with the Midwest AIDS Prevention Project (MAPP)
as Program Director, Golson has created several innovative targeted prevention
programs.
Recently Golson has been using the CDC evidence-based intervention Many Men Many
Voices (3MV), which is in its second year at MAPP.
“POP and 3MV both have important and unique focuses. 3MV
looks at issues specific to the African American gay/bisexual male and POP is
broad in its scope for the gay/bisexual male who is HIV positive.” Golson said.
For example 3MV addresses multiple identities, one as a black
man, one as a gay man, and as a black gay man. “All three of those identities
play a vital role in the decisions we make,” said Golson.
3MV does not provide the intense individual level counseling
sessions that POP does. “Overall I felt that having the individual level in
addition to the group sessions provides POP with a complete, well rounded
feeling,” said Golson. “It helps the person stay focused on what they want to
do. The individual component, I think, is really key.”
If he could choose any program for African American men, he
said, “I probably would choose certain pieces from POP, adapt them and add them
to 3MV.” Although as it currently stands, POP and 3MV must remain separate
interventions, Golson is bringing the two closer together. An activity he
developed, called Herman’s Head, was added to the POP curriculum in the fall.
Leon Golson can be reached at (248) 545-1435, ext. 121.
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