Supporting the health and wellbeing of children and young adults living with HIV

Chiva Families’ Weekend Offers Healing, Connection, and Empowerment for Families Affected by HIV

Angelina Namiba, 4M Network and Chiva Associate reflects on the Families’ Weekend in May 2025

The Chiva Families’ Weekend continues to be a very popular and much-needed intervention. The interest in this year’s residential far exceeded the number of spaces available. This necessitated organising two residentials in 2025, to accommodate as many families who need the space, as possible.

The first Families’ Weekend for the year was held from the 2 – 5 May 2025. An extra day compared with in previous years. This was in direct response to feedback from parents/carers. The extra day enabled ample time for families to arrive, settle in and to engage in various activities.  

16 family groups attended, made up of 20 parents/carers and 26 children and young people (10 aged under 7; 5 aged 8-10 and 11 young people aged over 11). This was 46 participants in total. 

Some families who had attended in previous years returned. Those were families who were very isolated and still in need of further support, as well as those who could also informally mentor/support new families who might, understandably be anxious about attending the event for the first time.

The Families Weekend’ aims to give families the space to share stories of living with HIV together, to explore how to improve family communication about HIV, and also, most importantly, to allow for some much-needed self-care and wellbeing activities.

Due to the large number of families attending, there was a strong team to help run the weekend comprising of Chiva staff / Steering Group member a Creche Manager and young adult volunteers for the creche, as well as myself and two other Chiva Associates/representatives from 4M network, Rebecca and Fungai.  

As in previous years, the programme was a mix of parent/carer-only activities, children’s outward bound activities as well as joint family sessions. The sessions started with a family art workshop, where families created colourfully painted flags depicting the story of their family.

This was followed by a plenary, where a mother and son pair, and a young mum shared their experiences of talking about HIV within their families. This session was powerful, moving and very engaging, and attending families very much appreciated it.

Workshop options for parents/carers included: Creating resources to help name HIV to children; Supporting children with additional needs and Welfare rights and getting the most out of your healthcare team.

Wellbeing workshop options included: yoga; mindfulness and pebble painting; mindful colouring and quiet chats; creative reflections and hopes for the future and a creative writing session using the Our Stories Told By Us – guided journal for exploring your story.  Participants got a copy of the guided journal to take home and continue writing.

Another unique addition to the programme was the karaoke on Saturday evening with DJs Bex on the deck and Ange on the mic. This was quite a hit as families really engaged and many joined in with the singing, including some of the very young children and two of the dads. A number of impromptu girl and mum bands were formed with one of the favourites being the Chivettes, made up of the young people aged over 11.

It was heart-warming to see returning parent/carers supporting their peers to settle in and it was also such a joy to see how some of the parent/carers who arrived looking and feeling anxious, blossomed and integrated as the weekend progressed.

A family reflections wall further demonstrated this shift. Families populated the wall with notes throughout the weekend. Feelings like ‘anxious’ posted at the beginning of the weekend changed to ‘happy’, ‘confident’ and ‘inspired’ by the end.

Because of the nature of the warm, safe space that the residential created, encouraging conversations happened. Some naming work – helping to talk about HIV to children – was able to be provided by the team.

Feedback from one of the dads:

‘I would like to take this time to thank the Chiva team for a job well done and what they are doing in people’s lives. Especially us with HIV. This was such an amazing experience where we got to share our daily living experiences with you, it was a relief to meet and talk with other people living with HIV. Please go out there, there are lots of us out there that need to hear about you. Thank you a million times, we feel a lot more happy, comfortable and no words can describe how me and my family are feeling. Well done Chiva, love you lots. E & family.’

And last but not least, I would personally like to say another huge thank you to Chiva for once again providing this much-needed, much-appreciated, much-valued space for families. And for walking alongside families and giving hope and support, where often times there isn’t much, and for positively impacting the lives of many families. Extra special thanks to funders for enabling this incredible space to exist.