my brother is HIV positive...i have some questions

last year (april), my brother was diagnosed with HIV...it litterally tore our family apart. i will never forget the day i found out, it was one of the worst days of my life. when i found out, i went hysterical...the first thing i thought was "he is going to die". that is all i kept saying over and over in my head was "he is going to die"...it was all that i could think of for days. everytime i would see him, i would run away crying. i know he needed us (the family), but i just couldn't bring myself to to talk to him. i just couldn't...what would i say??.....do i talk about him having HIV??....do i not?? do i act like i don't know anything?? i didn't know how to react, so instead i just backed off and was kind of distant towards him. he stayed in bed for a few days, i guess to let reality sink in. i'm still not sure if it really did sink in for him yet. i can't imagine trying to cope with something like that. I am just so scared that with him having HIV that somehow I could catch it. I know that you can only catch it if you have sexual intercourse, share a needle, or come in contact with bodily fluids of someone who is infected with the HIV virus, but what if he uses my razor?? What if my toothbrush and his are in the same cup in the bathroom?? If i drink out of the same cup?? Or say we use the same bar of soap or something??...I know these questions are probably crazy, but i need to know. I took an HIV text in late December (2005) and it came back negative....but I am still scared that I might come in contact with it being that I live in the same house with my brother and he is infected. I don't want to be that person who pushes him away because of this terrible disease. I want to be able to hug my brother and not be thinking "what if I catch something??"...You have no idea the things that go through my head. If he has a little scratch or something on his arm....i won't touch anything that he touched because of it. I think that "ohh, maybe I can catch it from that". The other night, we ordered food....I wanted another chicken wing, and he took it out of the bag with his fork.....as much as I wanted it, I didn't eat it because he picked it up with his fork. I don't want him to think that I don't want anything to do with him...I just want some answers to my questions to help me a little. This is the first time my family has ever been through anything like this. Although it's made my family a little closer, I still do not feel like I can totally accept this. It's not easy....I'm so glad that there is a site where I can communicate with others who are going through the same thing. Please, if anyone can answer my questions, I would GREATLY appreciate a reply. Thank you for listening to my story....

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