One teen even wrote, “I feel as if I have so many questions, yet I don’t know what those questions are.” Their inquiries were moving beyond the initial curiosity about my HIV status to measuring the depths of their own life circumstances and the larger questions that shape our human experience. While each email was a window into an individual life, a collective truth emerged: the fundamental need to share their stories. “After listening to you speak so candidly about your life and experiences,” wrote one teen, “I couldn’t help but return the favor and write to you, not only as a human being, but as a person with a spirit who has struggled and is still attempting to make sense of this struggle in all of its diversity.”

These powerful exchanges inspired my second book, My Invisible Kingdom: Letters From the Secret Lives of Teens. I envisioned it as an entryway into their world, a collection of correspondence born from my first book. If that can be seen as the story of my life, then this body of work is the life of my story, a small representation of the thousands of letters and emails I’ve received. These letters transport us back to the once upon a time of unblemished expectation, serving as a vanguard of raw truth, guiding us to a rediscovery of self. Originally personal confessions and private pleas, they speak to something universal within us all.

As my lectures took me around the world, I began working with parents and teachers, which led to my next book, A Private Midnight: A Teenager’s Scrapbook of Secrets. This book addresses the ten questions I wish I’d been asked as a teenager, offering guidance to parents and educators striving to understand what lies beneath a teenager’s silence. Through anonymous teen responses and descriptive drawings, poetry, and reflections, it serves as a journal of dreams.

Expanding my focus further, I developed parenting workshops, eventually codifying my insights into my fourth book, How to Raise an Elegant Teen: The ABCs of Gen Z Parenting. This project grew out of two distinct lectures - one for parents/grandparents, the other for teachers at pedagogical conferences. After each presentation, which invariably ran over time, the attendees would gather at the merch table asking the same question: “Which of these books has everything you just taught?” After years of not having a definitive answer, I realized it was time to write that book.

Along the way, I added “Visiting Professor” to my resume, as Colby College offered me an opportunity to expand my 90-minute talks into a comprehensive, albeit short, semester-long course. It’s an intensive multidisciplinary examination of HIV/AIDS. Together, my students and I explore the epidemic through various lenses, including its historical, scientific, sexual, medical, political,  pediatric, and theatrical representations, even touching upon some factually incorrect portrayals. By considering perspectives from epidemiology, psychology, biology, sociology, and the influence of culturally constructed stigmas, we explore the realities and misconceptions that have shaped perceptions of this disease and those affected by it.

A unique aspect of the course is the final assignment, where students write a letter to a young child who died from AIDS in the early 90’s, at the epidemic’s peak. In this letter, they are challenged to explain the meaning of life to this child, which encourages each student to contemplate the marvels and difficulties of human existence, reflect on their own lives, and offer insights to their future selves.

Here’s an example: