Shannon Sims knows all about the circumstances that cause many trans women to contract HIV, because she’s lived through it
RENEE BAKER | Contributing Writer
editor@dallasvoice.com
Life as a prostitute, a drug dealer, a homeless woman, a transgender woman, an HIV-positive woman, a Texas prisoner and guard, a showgirl and a college student brings her a mix of experiences few could match.
But at 31 years of age, despite her difficult road so far, Sims has hope. She says she has never given up on God and that her bad karma is behind her now.
“I am going to have a childhood someday,” she says, “and have a birthday party.”
Sims grew up in the South Dallas area as one of four children who all had different fathers. Sims never had a chance to know her own father.
Making it harder was the fact that her mother, Dorothy Walker, was never able to accept the feminine side of her transgender daughter.
“I was on my own since 13, when my mom gave me the boot,” Sims says.
She says her mother reached a breaking point when Sims evolved past playing with Barbie dolls and began expressing herself in a more feminine and vocal manner. That was the beginning of Sims’ life as a transient.
“I used to sleep on the streets for weeks at a time,” she says, “mostly in the South Dallas and Fair Park area.”
Sims lived under bridges and was “in and out” of trash cans, finding food to eat wherever she could.
She says many have no idea what it was like living and sleeping with “roaches and insects crawling all over me.” She says her circumstances left her little choice but to turn to prostitution to survive, a choice that she wishes she had never been forced to make. She said she “came to Oak Lawn to prostitute [herself] for years and years.”
Even today, though it is largely past her, Sims says she has had to “turn a trick or two” to make ends meet, since other jobs can be very hard to come by. To those who might judge her for her decision, Sims says they need to understand that when you are an obviously transgender woman, “you can’t just walk into a place and hand them a resume.”
Indeed, the National Center for Transgender Equality reported in 2011 that 16 percent of a national transgender population feels “compelled to work in the underground economy for income (such as doing sex work or selling drugs).”
When Sims was 17 years old, she got a lucky break. By night, she had been living in a ticket booth at Fair Park in Dallas, sneaking through the air conditioning ducts to get in. To lull herself to sleep, she would read through the telephone book.
“By the grace of God, I came across the number for the Job Corps,” she says.
The next day, Sims called the Job Corp number, and she kept calling until she was given a chance to join the North Texas Job Corps program. That gave her a new start in life, allowing her to get her GED, a driver’s license, clean clothes, career planning and job placement as a security guard.
But at 18, Sims just hadn’t reached a level of maturity to handle the responsibility of her new life. Then she started selling drugs,and it all came crashing down around her.
“I got pulled over for about a kilo — 960 grams of crack cocaine,” she says. “That was my first time in trouble with the police.”
That first time cost her five years of prison time — three years from 2000 to 2003, and another two years from 2005 to 2007. The official charges were drug possession, drug manufacturing and drug distribution.
It was not quite four years ago, Sims says, that she came out of prison “with a new attitude.” She said she had to make a change and “either continue to do the stuff I was doing, or begin to experience the positive side of life.”
While her new positive attitude was a good thing, though, her newly HIV-positive status left her with another obstacle to overcome.
Sims explains that she engaged in some risky behaviors while she was in prison, and she believes that is how she contracted HIV.
“In prison, I was the queen of the block and the most feminine thing there,” she says.
Sims’ life on the streets gave her the smarts to keep her safe in prison, but she was unable to protect herself from the AIDS virus. While she was between stays in prison, Sims received support, as well as her diagnosis as HIV-positive, from the Renaissance III AIDS service organization in South Dallas, which closed its doors in 2005.
As an HIV-positive transgender woman, Sims is not alone. The HIV infection rate among transgender individuals is approximately four times the national average. According to the 2011 NCTE national survey, the HIV infection rate is 0.6 percent for the general population and 2.6 percent for the national transgender sample of 6,450 individuals.
The HIV infection rate increases to 15.3 percent for transgender individuals that engage in sex work. People of color in the transgender sample reported higher rates of infection: 24.9 percent for African-Americans, 10.9 percent for Latinos/Latinas, 7 percent for American Indians, and 3.7 percent for Asian-Americans.
Sims is not surprised that the infection rates are higher for the transgender population. She says it’s a result of the things many trans women have to do to survive.
She says she knows too many transgender women that are in the same situation she’s in, “just trying to survive and make it.”
Sims’ lack of choices landed her in the Dallas jail for prostitution. After getting out of prison, Sims didn’t know what to do and went “out on my own to Cedar Springs. … An officer propositioned me, and they [ended up putting] a leg monitor on me.”
At one point, when Sims was just out of jail, “this dude on a bus” gave her a phone number for Project Reconnect, a program operating through the city of Dallas that helps prisoners gain re-entry into society.
“Without them, I don’t know where I would be,” she says of the program, adding that this program was what finally helped her turn her life around and helped her transition to a normal daily life. She also credits health and food pantry programs at the Resource Center of Dallas as “making a way, when there was no other way.”
Sims says she has seen at least 10 of her friends die of HIV and she wants to make sure she takes care of herself.
Sims works with Oak Lawn restaurants now, and is pursuing an associate’s degree in business at El Centro College. She hopes to pursue a bachelor’s degree in accounting next.
After completing her education, Sims says she would like to channel her energies into creating a resource group that specifically advocates for and supports transgender health and vocational education.
At night, Sims is also known as Laylonni Duvall on the drag circuit. And for now, Sims is thrilled to be able to afford her own place with “a flat-screen TV, a few pretty things and a sleigh bed.” And, she says, she loves being a non-operative transgender woman and doesn’t want to have gender reassignment surgery.
But then she looks up for a minute and says, “Well, maybe one day.”
HIV positive and still doing tricks? Should be thrown in jail for good.
At least I’m not a coward. With that said, continue to hide behind your words.
what about the people you slept with without telling them your status.. thats wrong!!!!
how is your karma behind you know after you have had sex with negative men unprotectedly?
I didnt read anywhere in the article where it say’s I have un-protected sex with anyone after my diagnosis. Read carefully before trying to judge. Misery loves company! God bless!
im not judging just trying to figure out how your karma is behind you when you still “turn a trick or two” to make ends meat when you know there are still risks of passing the virus to someone else. i just dont see the POSITIVES in it.. God bless
The article dont imply that I have unprotected sex with anyone after my diagnosis. You are stupid to think someone would openly say that! Please learn to read & write correctly on your free time vs criticizing others. Too many mis/spelled words.
excuse me i’m not the one who put my business out there in public. furthermore i already have my degree and i’m currently working on another. as far as reading and writing show me a misspelled word. “imply” and you telling me i can’t spell. thats the problem with people. they put their business out there and not willing to accept the reponses they get. you said you turned to the streets (prostitution, dealing drugs) which you didn’t have to do. you said you still turn a trick or two (prostitution) tell me the positives besides your attitude change on life.. s/n.. i have not disrespected you in any kind of way or form.. and turning tricks is still wrong
Who cares what you consider wrong!! Who are YOU! We all can have a degree online! Make ends MEAT is your misspelled word, its meet. Thank you! And dont try to change the subject, you said you read I have unprotected sex with hiv negative men & you were wrong. BOOP Good day
Carmen, I just want to say to you that I just met this girl, and I’m going to jump to her defense, not that she needs it, but because YOU need to know your place. She doesn’t have to explain ANYTHING to you. Have your opinions if you’d like, but understand that they are just that: YOUR opinions. They don’t actually matter when it comes to who SHE is. Also, know that until you’ve walked a day in HER shoes, you can never comment on her choices or try to figure out why she does what she does. That is not your place. And if you ever DO end up in such circumstances, holler at me then and see if your tune doesn’t change….
Shannon, you’re a brave girl. It was a pleasure meeting you.
Thanks Taureen. People are so quick to offer criticism or talk down on someone, when they have no clue!!
This is to Carmen Ruix, Justin Hawkins & friend whoever you are. Thanks for all of your care & concern, but your comments mean NOTHING. I personally aired all of my laundry to help someone who might be going through something similar. You 3 are the perfect example of why so many are so hesitant to open up about health, lifestyle or other issues & continue to live risky lifestyles because their afraid of being bashed from miserable people like YOU! Get a freaking life! Luckily, I’m comfortable in MY own skin & I know that people like YOU yern for the life that I live. Good day!!
I wanted to take a moment to applaud you Shannon for your courage and your dreams to support others. The one thing we forget as humans is that closed minded and bigoted opinions are what kept and continue to keep people in bondage and afraid to truly accept and love each other. We are a melting pot, a global community who absolutely should be committed to guiding each other in the most positive and truthful way we can. God bless you Shannon and continue to educate others and learn from your past. Never lower your standards based on the low opinions of others, continue to rise and shine. And those of you without sin, cast the first stone…
Hi Shannon that was great that you opened up like that and allowed yourself to be transparent. You have a great testimony and I am glad that you know God has a plan for you to help somebody else. s/n all online degrees are not bad sometimes as you know you do what you can. be bless and keep smiling which I know you are.
Thanks Lou Lou. No, all degrees are good, whether online or not. I was saying that anybody can hide behind a profile online & say things that are untrue. Thanks again for kind words.
I have known Shannon for many years and consider her a close friend. Since the day I meet her she has always been upfront about who she is and where she has came from. One thing that I can say is that Shannon has always been a religious person. I first meet her shortly after coming out and she encouraged me to be who I am. We all have secrets and things in our past we wish we could change. This is what makes each of us unique and who we are. I recently had a young transgender person weho began asing me questions I could not answer. The first person who came ot my mind to help this very young person was Shannon. The point in sharing her story is help others. Thank you for doing so. May God continnue to bless you Shannon.
ALEXIS, thanks a ton sis. That means a bunch. I am not worried about these people. I have moved on. Actually since this article I have had such luck with meeting wonderful people like you & have moved on to Arkansas to further my career in marketing. I have met a wonderful man whom I plan to wed & we just bought a great home together. So good riddens to the past & you will continue to be in my heart. OK babe, Shannon Sims
Its great that you have God and you are enjoying life to the fullest, but people have got to realize that when you put “personal information” out on the web or magazine or whatever and get a response to a remark or thought or personal story of any kind of matter you should be willing to accept them. When someone gives there opinion, thats just what it is an opinion. And for you to refer to to people as “these people” and get upset by there opionion on your story that YOU posted or signed off on it show ignorance. Honestly, keep your head strong and keep that positive mind frame. hope better days to come for you…
When someone is trying to convict or be judgmental Then I have issues with that. Obviously I put the story out, this is not my first story or interview. (These people) and I mean just that, are the reason we don’t stand up for what’s right and true because people are always trying to find negativity to comment on or find something that was never there, as these people did! Some of the stuff they wrote in the responses are in this article nowhere. Take time to read & understand before always being so quick to type bullshit. I am and was never mad. Hunni, what is there to be mad about? The facts are there, I wrote them. The ignorance comes from people that you defend that have no clue as to what they even wrote. Just wanting to write & be critical. Better days have come. I’m happily married in my country home and I shouldn’t be commenting on this but I won’t again. God Bless!
I think u really brave, most of us look up to u,god bless ú