I was infected with hepatitis C around 1981.  I say “around” as my life was in a pretty messy period, and there were many occasions during my adolescence and young adulthood where I could have been infected with hepatitis C. I had injected drugs for several years from the late 1970s, way before clean needle programs, and while my buddies and I tried to reduce any harm practiced, the reality was that we regularly shared injecting equipment. In 1981, three of my housemates all came down with jaundice, and were diagnosed with “non-A non-B hepatitis”.  

By 1993, my injecting was a thing of the past. Hepatitis C had been named, and as several of my friends had been diagnosed, and a couple of friends were living with significant liver damage. I thought it was time for me to get tested for hepatitis C.  I wasn’t surprised when the doctor told me I had hepatitis C, and while she was honest in saying she didn’t know much about hepatitis C, she said that together we could learn about how to respond to the infection. 

Living with hepatitis C was pretty simple for me. In fac,t I made a living out of it, by advocating for people with hepatitis C and people who inject drugs at a national level with Hepatitis Australia. I found that telling my story had power and could personalise hepatitis C for a range of people, including politicians and people working for government and other non-government organisations.  

While I didn’t think hepatitis C was having a major impact on my body, there were times when I would get completely exhausted and experience significant brain fog, which I put down to getting older and the stress of my job. But there was also the knowledge, sitting and watching from the back of my head, that hepatitis C could be a progressive illness and could be doing damage to my liver. Despite this background anxiety, I was a terrible patient and rarely went to get my liver function monitored.  

I had a couple of alarming liver function tests, and I investigated interferon-based treatments a couple of times. Several friends had been treated with interferon treatments, and I was put off by the significant side effects of the treatment. I didn’t want to jeopardise my emotional and mental health. I had a responsible job, my life was relatively stable, and while I would have liked not to have been infected, it just wasn’t worth the risk with those drugs.  

In 2015, everything changed. Information came out that hepatitis C could be cured. The cure, while expensive [at that time] for the government, had few side effects, was in a tablet form, and you only had to take the tablet for 3 months. I was cured in 2016 after 8 weeks of treatment.   

While hepatitis C hadn’t had a big impact on my life, being cured has been wonderful. In secret, quiet ways, my life has been transformed – I never have to disclose to anyone that I have a blood-borne infection. A couple of months after I was cured, I cut my hand at work and realised that even if I was bleeding heavily, I didn’t need to tell anyone that I had hepatitis C. I have a quiet, deep satisfaction about this. My energy levels are consistently good, and not having to live with the mental strain of a blood-borne cancer-causing infection such as hepatitis C, is liberating.