Apparently its ‘Blue Monday’ – the most depressing day of the year, but you would never have guessed that looking at my face today! Braving the cold this morning I made my way to the hospital to fetch my routine blood results from the tests I had a fortnight ago.

I’m over the moon! I remain undetectable (which means the number of copies of the virus per cubic ml of blood is <40) and my cd4 count (the number of cd4 t-cells found in the same measurement) is up to a whopping 598, a personal best! I’ve had a smile from ear to ear all day long, and I feel great.

Not only did I get a great set of results but I had a really good chat with the registrar as well. Finally took the plunge after suffering with side effects for a while and asked that I change my medication. I’m adjusting my combination, keeping two of the four current drugs and adding a new one, but moving to an ‘all in one’ once a day pill. Hopefully the issues I’ve been experiencing (and at greater frequency recently) will subside and I can start to feel better about my body, especially my abdomen, tummy etc.

The new pill, Eviplera needs to be taken with food so I took the plunge earlier this evening and knocked back the first one with a plate a protein pasta and veggie mince. Feeling ok at the moment, let’s hope it stays this way!

I’ve been really lucky that for the past five years, since I started medication in December 2009, that I’ve always left the clinic with a good set of results, even when my CD4 has decreased a bit I remain confident that I’m in good health and living a life as normal as I would have done before my diagnosis, if not better.

I’ll keep you updated with how I get on with the new pill, fingers crossed they’ll be just as effective as the current ones, I’ll find out when I go back in six and eight weeks’ time for a check-up but for now I am as happy as can be. In your face HIV!