Interview with Lisa, 18-19, British, middle class, Protestant. Women, Risk and AIDS Project, London, 1990. Original version including field notes. (Ref: LJH37)

This interview is part of the Women, Risk and Aids Project (1989-90) archive which was created as part of the Reanimating Data Project (2018-20).
Original transcript of an interview with Lisa, who works in social care with vulnerable adults. She talks about how important her relationship with her mother is since Lisa had been abused by an ex-partner, which she goes into quite graphic detail about. This had come as a huge shock to her and she is still veering between conflicting feelings of guilt and anger towards the relationship. She had had another difficult relationship before this, where her partner's mental health breakdown had been a catalyst in her move to London. Lisa had lost her virginity to this partner - a sexual relationship that she had really enjoyed. She had been using the pill, but decided that condoms and a diaphragm would be safer - this became complicated once she had multiple sexual partners at the same time, not always using barrier protection. Her sex education at a small, co-ed primary and secondary school was comprehensive and Lisa offers some amusing anecdotes about it, though she acknowledges that it was very heteronormative and thinks there should be much more emphasis on female confidence building. She talks about the effectiveness of different AIDS public health campaigns, and also had some AIDS education while at school. Lisa is unsure of what the future might hold for her - she has lots of options, but staying London isn't financially viable at the moment.