My name is Anghel Nicolae. I was born in Bucharest, Romania, but saying “I’m from Bucharest” doesn’t feel right. My home wasn’t a bustling neighbourhood or a warm family apartment. My childhood was spent in Colentina Hospital. That’s where my earliest memories live, in sterile rooms and narrow hallways that echoed with the cries of children like me—abandoned, sick, and forgotten by the world.

My mother left me when I was just a baby. I met her only once when I was 14 years old. By then, our bond had been replaced by a chasm of pain and questions I’d stopped trying to answer. My father denied me entirely. The only “family” I knew were the nurses and other children at the hospital. Even as a small boy, I understood something that most kids never have to consider—that I was different. I didn’t have a home to return to, no parents waiting to take me back, and no future that felt certain.

I was diagnosed with HIV when I was six years old. I didn’t even have a proper birth certificate, so it felt like my existence was already a question mark. I got very sick that year. I had constant diarrhoea; my body couldn’t absorb anything. The doctors gave me injections and hoped for the best, but hope was scarce in Colentina. The symptoms became my reality. I wasn’t a child who dreamed of playing outside or attending school. I was a child who dreamed of surviving.

The hospital wasn’t just where I was treated—it became my whole world. The other children were like me: sick, fragile, and desperate for affection. I remember how small we all seemed, how we clung to the moments of kindness from the nurses who were stretched far too thin. We didn’t talk about what we had. Even as kids, we understood the shame and the stigma. Outside those walls, people whispered about children like us. Inside, we lived it.

But hospitals aren’t homes. There’s no warmth in hospital beds, no joy in fluorescent lights flickering above your head. The loneliness was crushing. I had no parents to hold me when I cried and no siblings to share my fears with. My whole identity became tied to being a patient, someone who was broken and waiting to be fixed. Yet, the fixing never came.

I moved between different places as I got older—Snagov, Litza, Garofitza—but they were all the same: no one claimed temporary shelters for a boy. There were kind people along the way, but kindness wasn’t a replacement for love. I grew up knowing I was abandoned, that I was unwanted, and that the world saw me as a burden. That knowledge settles into your bones; it changes you.

When I was 18, I left Romania. By then, I’d had enough of hospitals and orphanages, of being a ghost in my own country. I came to England, hoping to build a life not defined by my past. But even here, the shadows of my childhood follow me. People hear “HIV”, and they step back. It doesn’t matter how healthy I am or how much I’ve achieved—they see my status before they see me. It hurts deeply.

I’ve tried to find love, but it isn’t very easy. I’ve been rejected by women who seemed to like me until they learned about my condition. I’ve been told, implicitly and explicitly, that I’m unworthy of a family, of a future. Sometimes, I believe them. Sometimes, I don’t.

Today, I’m studying business and tourism, hoping to improve my life. I dream of becoming a driving instructor, of finally having a role where I can guide others and feel proud of what I do. But the scars of my past are always there. They don’t fade—they only grow quieter.

When I think about Colentina, I feel sadness and gratitude. It wasn’t the home I wanted, but it was the only home I had. It kept me alive when everything else seemed determined to let me go. I still carry those memories with me—the smell of disinfectant, the cold touch of medical instruments, and how the nurses cared for me. I last saw Steven Doyle, who interviewed me for this piece. Those small moments of care were everything to a child like me.

I’ve learned to keep going, even when it feels impossible. My life has been a fight from the beginning, a battle to be seen, to be loved, to be more than a diagnosis. I’m still fighting. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll win.