Tears for Fears

The other night D was asleep and I was watching one of our favorite TV shows on DVD. In the show the main character has been widowed after her husband suddenly died after a heart attack. She is still relatively young and all of the sudden alone. In this particular episode the last scene shows her sitting on the floor of her bedroom watching a video tape of her and her late husband together and crying. 

I am usually unmoved by even the most heart wrenching movies, but that night, watching a fictional character cry I suddenly understood exactly what she was feeling. She had lost her partner, she was alone, she was scared, it's hard to explain, but I felt not only sad for her, but also fearful of one day doing exactly what she was doing. Sitting on the floor crying, not knowing what to do without my partner. I started crying and looked back at D, peacefully asleep. I though about it for a minute and decided my tears were tears of fear. I was afraid of losing him. I was afraid of his disease taking him away.

But then I realized that for one half of every partnership loss is just a fact of life. We will lose the ones we love. And it will always be too soon. We are never promised another second  in life, but we all seem to take for granted the blessing of every breath we take, every moment we enjoy. One day I will lose D, or he will lose me. You never know. He could get sick, or die in a car crash. He may outlive me by years and years. I could find out I have terminal cancer, or get hit by a bus. None of us, healthy or well, are promised more than this moment we are in. 

Once I realized that I stopped crying, not because I wasn't afraid anymore, but because I realized something. The saddest part of the show for me was that her husband died suddenly. She had no warning and no idea what to do afterwards. She wasn't ready. She had taken for granted that he would be there always.

D and I have not been afforded the luxury of allowing ourselves to think there will be an always. His diagnosis has reminded us of just how precious and fragile life is. With today's modern medical treatments it is very likely that D may well outlive me, but he may not. I may eventually  lose him one day to his disease, or maybe tomorrow he won't make it home from work. Who knows, I may even just lose him to a failed relationship. I may never lose him at all, He may be the one to lose me. There are just no promises, save the one I made myself at that moment. I will not take for granted what we have. I will enjoy every second we are given. I will not allow little things to ruin otherwise happy moments and I will hope for a very long time together, but live every moment like it might be the last we ever share.

I wiped away my tears, turned off the TV and crawled into bed. I didn't sleep for a long time, I just laid there enjoying his warmth, his smell, the peaceful expression he wears when he sleeps just barely visible in the light leaking through a crack in the bedroom door. I cuddled up next to him and was grateful for every moment we have been given and for the one I was enjoying. I eventually I fell asleep content in knowing that while most of us will lose our partners one day many will have taken for granted that time they spent together and realize how much of it was wasted, but I have been lucky in being reminded that I may only have today and I will make the best of it.

Damaged Goods? Not if you ask me.

Watching D struggle with his self image since finding out that he is HIV positive has been one of the hardest challenges for me. He is angry at himself for having engaged in behaviors that put him where he is. He views himself as tainted. Damaged goods. Unlovable and not worth the effort. He no longer sees himself as a valuable partner.

He is having a hard time accepting that to the people that love him his HIV status in no way diminishes his value. I know that in time he will overcome these feelings and regain his sense of self worth, but for now it tears me apart to watch him be so hard on himself. I understand that no matter what I tell him, until he realizes it on his own, nothing I say can convince him that having HIV does absolutely nothing to change how important he is to me. I feel helpless and frustrated at my inability to convince him of how amazing he still is. Whenever he says something negative about himself I feel sad and angry that HIV colors his opinion of himself so darkly that he can't see the himself like others do. It would be so much easier if it worked so that I could just say "You are in no way less of a person. You are still every bit as amazing as you always have been, and even with HIV you still have more to offer than most." and have it change how he feels about himself. But it doesn't work that way, and I have to accept that. 

All I can do is be patient and do my best to show him and remind him just how special I think he is. And I never let the opportunity to do so pass. He simply IS amazing, and every fiber of his being shows it to those around him, so I do my best to reflect that back to him. 

Every time I laugh until I nearly pee my pants because he is so funny I remind him that HIV has not damaged his sense of humor. Every time I sit back with a full belly from a delicious meal he has cooked I remind him that HIV has not damaged his ability to nurture. I every time his tenderness quiets my tears I remind him that HIV has not damaged his ability to comfort. Every time his smile makes me smile I remind him that HIV has not damaged his ability to bring happiness to someone else. I try in every way possible to remind him that HIV has not damaged any of the things that make him the precious and unique individual that he is. HIV may have the ability to damage the cells of his body, but the things that make him such a great person and partner are untouchable.

At the end of each day when he tells me about how work was I tell him how great he is at his job. When he practices dancing I notice and comment on how much improvement he has made. I make sure to tell him how attractive I think he is, and that since he has started taking better care of himself by eating better and exercising more he has only improved his appearance. I thank him for every little thing he does for me so that he hears how much I appreciate him. I tell him just how much I enjoy his company. At the store I buy his favorite treats so that he knows I am thinking about him. I make sure to give him as much affection as he can handle, never missing the opportunity to rub his back or hold his hand.

For now he still has a hard time accepting it all. He often asks why I am so good to him or why I bother with him and I always tell him that he deserves every bit of sweetness I can muster, and I would give him better if I could. He may not get it yet, but I know that if I keep showing him how special and important he is to me, reflecting what an amazing of a person he is, than one day he will start to believe again and regain his sense of value.He may think that HIV has spoiled him, made him into damaged goods and lessened his value, but not if you ask me. He may think that since contracting HIV he is no longer lovable, valuable, sexy, wanted, or worthy but I will do everything it takes to show him otherwise until he changes his mind.

If you're happy and you know it clap your hands!

If your angry and you know it-

stomp your feet

make some noise

fling some paint

jog a mile

write it down

Dealing with an HIV+ partner (or loved one, ore being HIV+ yourself) opens up a HUGE can of emotional worms and dumps them all over your house. They get into everything. You work hard hard to clean them up and but it seems like you just keep encountering more of them in random places squirming around. You go to brush your teeth before bed and there there in the bathroom sink wiggle wiggle.....you just start to cry and cry and cry about everything. Or you are getting ready for work and put on your shoes and squish between your toes and you just get so depressed you feel like crawling back into bed and calling in sick. Or there you are eating dinner and put a forkful of salad in your mouth and Ewww! you are so angry you just want to throw your plate at the wall and stab your fork into the table.

So many of the emotions that HIV dredges up seem to have no rhyme or reason. You feel angry, but you don't know who you are angry at or what you are angry about exactly or you are sad, but you can't say just why. Those kinds of emotions can be the hardest to deal with since we can't determine the cause in order to work them out. Other times we know exactly why we are angry or sad, but there is absolutely nothing we can do to change the situation. 

I am fairly certain that if I didn't have outlets for my emotions I would pop, or more likely implode. Neither D or I are big talkers when it comes to feelings. I avoid it because I have a hard time putting my feelings into coherent word groupings, or even identifying what exactly I feel. I couldn't tell you all the reasons why D doesn't talk about his feelings, he's never really fully explained it to me-that would entail talking about feelings- but I imagine it is mostly for the same reasons. Unless we absolutely have to talk about something we both try and express our feelings non-verbally. This allows us to vent our emotions, clue each other in on how we are feeling and take some kind of action. If you have a problem you fix it with some kind of action. I think emotions are kind of the same way, if you have a strong emotion you have to take some kind of action to "fix" it.

There is a fine line you have to walk sometimes when expressing very strong emotions. If you aren't careful you can choose ways of expressing and processing emotions that are even worse for you than not dealing with the emotion in the first place- drinking, drugs or otherwise hurting yourself or others, etc...

I like to practice what I call "constructive destruction". Basically you take something worthless, and worthless is key- your grandmother's china won't work the same, and destroy it. Shred all of your junk mail with your bare hands. Get a piece of styrofoam from a box and punch it to pieces. I have a friend who buys glass christmas bulbs in January when they are super cheap and saves them for when she is feeling emotionally overwhelmed then she takes them out to the dumpster and smashes them. I have called her more then once to smash bulbs. 

The point is to do something physical and destructive that doesn't harm yourself or anyone else and doesn't really destroy anything of value. It nearly always makes me feel better. 

So does exercise. I love to go in long bike rides, especially up hills, which I usually hate doing, when I am stressed or angry. D dances. Physically pushing your limits feels so freeing and empowering.

Sometimes I go into a room, shut the door and throw a tantrum complete with stomping my feet and yelling. It sounds silly, but so does being angry for an unidentifiable, or vague at best, reason. 

Making noise really helps. D has a toy air pistol that makes a really loud BANG! that he "shoots" when he has to much anger or stress to keep inside. I make a lot of noise rearranging canned goods.

I don't think it matters so much what you do, just that you do it and it doesn't cause any real damage. I have learned that not dealing with emotions can be very harmful. They get all bottled up and explode with very dangerous consequences. Instead of allowing that to happen now I try and express them as best I can. Sometimes  midway through doing something like throwing a tantrum to vent your anger you start to feel downright silly and start to laugh at yourself. And laughing at yourself is about the best way I can think of to end a bout of anger.

Where do we go from here? Part 2

Once I found out I was negative for the time being I focused on how to help D get through this. I went to the bookstore, and for the first time in my life was let down by books, or at least bookstores. I have always been able to find help or comfort in books, but I couldn't even find a single book for newly diagnosed HIV patients. After four bookstores I finally found the Guide to Living with HIV written by the Johns Hopkins HIV Clinic. I read it cover to cover. I also bought D a nice pocket sized notebook and a portable filing folder. I knew that one of the keys to successfully managing HIV is to be very in charge of your own medical care. I know D really well and I know that he is very disorganized with paperwork and that whenever he talks to doctors it all comes out as mumbo jumbo, both what he says and hears. I bought the folder so that he could keep all his paperwork organized and accessible from doctor to doctor and I got the notebook, with color coded pages, so that he could take notes, write down questions so that he could remember to ask them, keep appointments,make notes about tests, etc. 

I gave him this first set of gifts and told him that no matter what, even though he had chosen to return to his ex I was still his friend and that that friendship meant a lot to me. I wanted him to know that I intended on being there for him and wasn't going to stop being his friend for any reason, that HIV didn't matter to me.  

Days came and went, some days we talked, others we didn't. I learned more about HIV until I felt I knew at least the basics forward and backwards. I visited thebody.com for hours at a time, reading everything I could. I got a whole bunch manuals from a friend of mine who works as an HIV patient counselor and educator for native youth. D started reading the book I gave him even though he rarely reads books and started opening up about his feelings. One day he called to say he had a card I had left at his house and was going to bring it by. Really he just needed to talk, but didn't know how to say "I am so angry I don't know what to do and I am afraid to be alone right now." He didn't know how to say it, but he knew that once he got here we could talk through it.

 Everyday we talked about HIV. It was everywhere. There were endless questions and not enough answers. It was impossible to get away from. We would decide to go get lunch and sushi sounded great and D would say, I'm not supposed to eat raw meat or fish. I love sushi. Do you think it matters? At first HIV found it's way into everything. But gradually as we answered our questions the periods between life/ life with HIV got longer and longer. Soon we could make it all the way through a movie without a question or comment about HIV.  I still remember the first whole day together that we didn't talk about HIV. It was still there in the back of my mind, and I know it was for D to, but we just never talked about it. We didn't avoid it, but at that time, it just didn't need to be a part of anything. The next day it was back in our discussions, and now it comes and goes, like any other part of life. 

HIV stirs up so many emotions it's hard to believe you could feel so many things all at once. There is anger, confusion, hurt, hopefulness, disgust, sadness, regret, nostalgia. It seems to come in waves or all at once, or sometimes in little bits like tiny daggers are being thrown at you in a ceaseless barrage. Most of the time it is hard to even define what you are feeling much less how to process and handle the emotion. It is just important to talk about it with some one who can listen and understand. D and i have both had conversations now where one of us says to the other "I am just feeling so...." followed by a loud noise or a bit of stomping and flailing. Even when I don't know how to express what I am feeling I just try and express that I am feeling something difficult instead of trying to bottle it up. Usually when this happens the other one of us says, yep, I know what you mean. I cried every day over silly thing and not so silly things for a long time. I felt ridiculous for so many tears, I never really cried and then all of the sudden I couldn't stop.  I remember how big of an event it seemed the first day I didn't feel so overwhelmed that I cried. 

I asked D if I could go to his first doctor's appointment with him and he said that would be fine. I had questions for the doctors, I wanted to meet them, and I wanted to make sure that D felt comfortable being assertive about his care. D had already had some blood work done and was going to get his results at that first appointment and I wanted to be there for those results. I needed to know how sick he was, and what they plan for treatment was. I guess I just wanted some convincing that my friend would be taken care of by nice people I trusted.

The doctor's were really nice, open and easy to talk to. They helped to put to rest all of my fears about proper treatment. D's caseworker even showed up and told us they try to always make it to the appointments to help ensure that everything new is understood and nothing is forgotten. They went over how HIV works, what it means and how it affects people. Then the gave us the first set of test results. D's CD4 count was about 560, still within the normal healthy range and his viral load was around 40,000 which sounds high, but really isn't bad for being untreated and compared to what a high viral load can be. There was no need to start any medications yet, and hopefully for a while. D sis have to get a bunch of vaccinations though. We left the first appointment feeling hopeful, a bit relieved and better informed than we had been up until that point. It is always so much easy to make a move when you know what is going on.

After D told his mom he was HIV+ I started emailing her to let her know that I was here for her son, that I would make sure she was informed about how things were going and that I just wanted her to know that even though she lived far away her son still had people that cared for him and were taking good care of him.  We started emailing regularly, and have gotten pretty close. In fact, she is the one who first encouraged me to begin a blog about dealing with HIV. She is a pretty neat lady and I am grateful to have her in my support network. She is doing a great at being a supportive parent. 

After D's first doctor's appointment he had a falling out with his girlfriend. She wasn't as understanding about somethings as he needed her to be and he finally decided that he understood why they hadn't worked out in the first place, and that it wouldn't work any better now than it had before. She had also tested negative, and they decided to continue with their lives separately again. I felt really sad for D. I had wanted it to work out for him if it was what he wanted, and I didn't want him to feel alone or rejected because of things that were said or areas where understanding wasn't offered. I just let him know that I would stand by him no matter what, that I was still his friend, and he would never have to face this alone. 

Once again we found ourselves back in a transitional phase. Things seemed to be constantly changing and evolving faster than we were able to process them. We had gone from friends to lovers, back to friends, to an uncertain place, not knowing where to go from here. We had gone from both being happy and healthy to having to face and new and scary disease and having any kind of emotional stability seem like a blessing. 

Our ability to adapt and change, accept and understand, seems to be under constant trial now, but all in all I think we are doing pretty well. Whenever I think right now "where do we go from here?" I can't come up with any clear answers. The best I can come up with is that we keep trying to move forward and keep learning. Keep being there for each other and working through our feelings. I think if we do that we will end up exactly where we need to be. I think for now we've got it right, or at least right enough.

Where do we go from here? Part 1

When D first called to talk to me and let me know that he had just found out he was HIV+, we were already in the middle of a very rough patch in our relationship. He had just broken up with me to get back together with a former girlfriend. This wasn't any new news, in actuality, it was something that had been a catch in our relationship from the start (we are anything but conventional). I knew about the old girlfriend and that it wasn't exactly finished between them at least emotionally so I encouraged him to explore his feelings and decide what he needed to do. After taking a trip back home to visit family he returned and we talked about him having seen his old girlfriend. They had slept together and spent some time talking things over. Since he had slept with someone else he insisted in getting an STD checkup before sleeping with me again. Before we ever got the results I confronted him about what he was planning on doing with me and his old girlfriend. He decided he missed her and still thought he loved her and wanted to give things another shot. So we parted ways for a while.

Even when you know the score on something it can still be hard to deal with emotionally. I had always known about this other girl and the possibility of him going back to her, but that didn't make it any less painful when it actually happened. I had encouraged it, knowing that until he know for certain one way or the other, things would never have worked out between us anyway, and I prefer things to occur in an open and honest environment. 

We hadn't really spoken in about a week when he called me kind of late one Friday night and said we really needed to talk, was I home? I was kind of startled, wondering what he could possibly want. I was at one of my oldest friends houses watching movies and eating pizza, our break up ritual since high school, so I told him I was busy and asked if it could wait.

"No, it can't. I got my test results back. I have HIV. You need to go get tested too."

My first reaction was oh god, are you ok?How are you doing? When did you find out? And a ton of other questions like do you know how long you have had this? After talking on the phone for a while, after I was convinced he wasn't suicidal or otherwise unstable from the news we agreed to talk later and hung up. My girlfriend who knows every secret I have and has known me in my darkest days and still been my friend was like what is wrong with you? I explained that a previous partner had just tested positive for HIV and I needed to get tested too. She just hugged me and said it would be alright. 

I got the phone book and proceeded to attempt to find a place to get tested. We live in a fairly small city as far as cities go and it was after 11pm on a Friday night. All of the major hospitals said they had tests, but results would be at least two weeks. I was not accepting of that. I had just been told I might have HIV and I was supposed to wait two weeks before they would tell me for certain? I finally talked to one hospital receptionist who referred me to the local AIDS/HIV assistance group. It turns out that there were two places in town that offered the oraquik test that gives results in 2o minutes, but they wouldn't be open until Monday.

The rest of my weekend went by in kind of a blur. I went to work, and nearly every moment I spent not working I spent on the internet looking at HIV websites. I needed statistics, I needed to understand what the disease meant right now for patients, I needed to know exactly what my chances of having contracted it were, I needed to know what we needed to do for D to ensure he was taken care of. I just needed answers, Mainly the answer I needed was am I HIV+, but since I couldn't have that answer and the not knowing was killing me, I just wanted any answers. I cried a lot, something I very rarely do, and didn't really sleep at all. I even got some sleep aids one night, but I still couldn't fall asleep. I didn't really eat either, and usually when I am stressed out that is what I want to do.

 Another kind of strange thing happened over the weekend, also something I didn't expect. D's old/new girlfriend sent me an email, letting me know that if I needed to talk, I could call her since we were both going through the same thing. We talked a few times, I helped her find a testing locations in her area, we discussed how to help D. We kind of made a truce for the time being so that we could all make it through the tough time. I was grateful for that, I had never been her enemy in any way and I can't say how she felt about me, but it was nice to know that she reached out to me, for whatever reason.

D agreed to come with me to my test on Monday morning, so I asked him to come visit with me that Sunday night after I got off work, I had questions and wanted to talk before I got my results. When he came over we just hugged for the longest time, I said I was afraid for so many reasons. I was afraid that if I tested positive I would have to alter my career plans (they involve a lot if international travel and many countries ban HIV positive visitors, in most cases HIV doesn't prohibit you from any job), I was afraid that since he had decided to return to his old girlfriend I would be facing it alone, I was afraid because I hadn't had enough time to think things over and process what it all meant. He assured me that no matter what his relationship status I wouldn't be alone, that he would always be there for me like I had been for him, that I had always found a way to get what I wanted and would find a way to do what I wanted to in life, that everything would be ok. It's kind of strange, but that was probably the most open conversation we had ever had. We always tried to be honest with each other and open about our plans and ideas, but we had always kept our feelings a bit guarded. I asked him to stay the night, and he agreed, I think I was afraid that if he left he might forget or not wake up in time and I would have to go to the test alone. He fell asleep and I stayed up all night thinking things over (again). 

In the morning we drove to the testing site, D had already been there as it was primarily a resource center for HIV positive patients and he registered to have his intake appointment that day after my test. The guy that administered my test asked a few questions about how I felt,what exposure risks I had taken and talked about what a positive diagnosis meant as far as HIV no longer being a death sentence and how there were so many avenues for support and treatment that there was a very bright outlook for positive individuals, etc. After the twenty minutes was up he told me my results were negative, but I still wasn't in the clear. I needed to retest in six weeks then three months.  

I was so relieved, I knew that if my results had been positive I would have been fine, I would have handled it and continued with my life, but it was a relief anyway. I was worried about testing, but not really about being HIV+, it was the uncertainty that had me so wound up over the weekend. I had done a lot of research into transmission and I had taken only very small risks. We had always used condoms for intercourse, and though we didn't use condoms for oral sex the risk of transmission was very small. It didn't seem likely that I would have contracted the virus, but I had needed to know for certain. 

After testing negative, my focus shifted to helping D get through this. We sat down for his intake appointment at the resource center and started the process of getting help. They offer managed care for HIV patients here, so he was assigned a case worker to help him negotiate the medical, legal and financial hurdles that HIV patients face. His first doctor's appointment was scheduled, they gave him a big packet of information and we started moving forward. 

What do you know about safe sex?

In June of 2008 my partner discovered he was HIV+. 

Since his diagnosis I have spent a lot of time asking myself some really tough questions. One that has really made me think is- what do you know about safe sex?

I have always considered myself to be well educated and responsible when it comes to sex. Ten years ago, when I first started becoming sexually active I knew enough from Sex Ed class at school to know that there were plenty of dangerous and unpleasant diseases out there that I would need to protect myself from- Herpes, Syphillis, Chlamydia, HIV, Ghonorrhea, HPV (causes genital warts), Hepatitis, the list goes on. I knew abstinence was 100% effective, and that condoms were an effective method for preventing pregnancy and STD infection, but I still had questions. 

In an ideal world I could have had a nice after school special kind of talk with my parents about how to engage in sexual activity and still protect myself and be responsible, but in reality I had the kind of parents who were entirely against premarital sex and would have offered no support or education regarding how to become safely sexually active, and in fact would have punished me for even considering becoming sexually active. Luckily there were other options out there and I made an appointment at a teen clinic offered by the health department that provided services to teens without parental consent. I started birth control and was encouraged to use condoms. At the time I was in a monogamous relationship with a healthy partner so our main concern was pregnancy and I was already on birth control, so we didn't feel condoms were  really needed. I learned how to use them and filed the information somewhere in the back of my mind, where it wasn't accessed until years later when I was single and negotiating new relationships. 

I would love to say that after that first relationship I was continued on a strong path and always had the foresight to think, I want to have sex with this person, what is my plan for being safe? How do I approach that topic? But I didn't. I had already spent several years having sex, but it had all been with the same partner. I was comfortable taking my pants off, but hadn't had enough practice to be comfortable saying you know, I am pretty certain we are going to sleep together, here are my rules, condoms every time, etc. etc. 

There were parties and boys and far to many episodes of unprotected sex. It took several trips to the clinic for STD tests after having had unprotected sex before I started carrying condoms with me everywhere.  Over the years I tried to be responsible,and often succeeded, but nearly as often I didn't. There were times I forgot, or was to wasted to care, or boys who didn't want to use condoms and I would say, ok. I know you pretty well, I'll make and exception. I always did a better job at being safe than my friends, and that made me feel like I was doing really well. I thought, see, so many times and no STD's, good job! A+! It was almost like I thought that because I knew the statistics and how to protect myself I was safe even if I wasn't doing it 100% of the time. I thought if I knew people and they tested negative and we had agreed to monogamy we were safe, because people you know don't keep secrets.  It was like I thought that somehow I was safe because I wasn't in a high risk group or because I was smarter or something else equally as dumb.

Now when I look back I should have been saying try harder! C-! It certainly didn't hurt that I tried most of the time to be safe, but really it was just luck.

When my current partner and I first got together we both talked about safe sex, why we thought it was important and what we planned on doing about it. We agreed that even though we had both recently been tested for STD's with negative results, we weren't serious enough to rely on monogamy and birth control, so we would use condoms for intercourse. I had never made a practice of condoms for oral sex, the risk never seemed high enough, and so that rule applied as well. Condoms for intercourse, every time. And we followed the rules we had set, although I have to thank my partner for that one, if he hadn't insisted on them every time I am sure I would  have failed to live up to my own rules once again.

After he found out he was HIV+, I had to get tested again, and thanks to a little bit of luck (oral sex still carries a risk, even if it is a small one) and diligent condom use I am HIV-.  After testing negative and realizing that I probably wouldn't be if my partner hadn't insisted on using condoms I changed how I viewed condom use and safe sex. I had thought for so many years that I was doing such a good job, that I was educated and thus safe. I failed to accept that education without practice isn't any kind of protection at all. I failed to accept that even with a partner you know, who has tested negative before doesn't mean you are safe. There is always the potential for secrets, and test taken before something like HIV shows up. It took this much to convince me that trying most of the time isn't good enough and that it isn't about trust or intimacy. It's about realizing that there will always be uncertainties and risks and that protecting yourself isn't a part time job or something you can make exceptions to. It is about realizing that using a condom is such a small thing compared to living the rest of your life with HIV. 

I am thankful everyday now for having a partner who cared about us both enough to use condoms every time, and I am thankful for having been so lucky all the years before I met him.

Now, safe sex means something entirely different, to both of us, than it did before. For him it means he HAS to use a condom every time for the rest of his life, or risk infecting someone else. For me it means I WILL use a condom every time (with any partner, even if they aren't known to be HIV+) for the rest of my life because I have already taken too many chances and I realize now just how foolish I was.