One of the most popular questions we’re asked is: Is it really possible to find love on POZ Personals? And we’re happy to report that yes it is! And to prove it, here are three of our favorite stories from the past several years.

When Aaron Met Claire

In 2015, Claire discovered a six-foot-one truck driver from Cleveland named Aaron who had been diagnosed with HIV only three years prior, at age 40. He’d asked to be tested for the virus as a just-to-be-sure precaution during a doctor’s visit for another matter—and had a meltdown when he was diagnosed HIV positive.

“I just lost it,” he recalls. “I was in and out of consciousness, like someone had hit me with a bat. They had to shut down the whole clinic to deal with me.” He says he assumes he contracted HIV from a sexual encounter.

He was devastated. “The doctor told me, ‘You’re going to live a long life.’ And I said, ‘No, you don’t understand.’ Dating was very important to me, and I thought I’d never date again. I felt very alone and wanted to lash out at people.”

But eventually, he considered that perhaps there were online dating sites for folks with HIV, and that’s how he found POZ Personals. It was a lifeline for him—and not just because of romantic possibilities.

“If it weren’t for the site, I don’t know how many years it’d have been before I met another soul with HIV. I met a lot of wonderful women,” he says. But until he and Claire connected, none of those interactions blossomed into courtship.

Click here to read more about Aaron and Claire.

Long-Distance Didn’t Stop Richard and Dean

(left to right) Richard and Dean

Richard was living in Los Angeles and had been a POZ Personals member for close to a year. Although he had met some interesting people online, he just couldn’t find what he was looking for in a serious, committed partner.

“I had about 100 people reach out to me on POZ Personals, and it let me practice dating, get my feet wet and find my confidence again,” says Richard, 43, who was diagnosed in 2005. He had just gotten out of a serious relationship when he signed up for POZ Personals and wasn’t looking for anything casual or fleeting.

But he kept looking. His work as an art gallery director in Los Angeles allowed him ample travel opportunities, and since his parents live in England, he decided to reach out to POZ Personals members in the United Kingdom. That’s when he found Dean. The two spent July and August of 2008 chatting regularly via e-mail and telephone and arranged their first in-person rendezvous that September in Dean’s hometown of Bristol—about 100 miles west of London.

Click here to read more about Richard and Dean.

Chance Encounter on POZ Personals United Kevin and Ram

A chance encounter on POZ Personals united this British-Indian HIV-positive couple in 2006. Kevin and Ram, ages 50 and 24, respectively, hardly expected to meet someone from halfway around the world. Kevin was diagnosed with HIV in 1996, while Ram was diagnosed 10 years later, just months before the two began dating. The couple celebrated their civil union in the United Kingdom last year—on Kevin’s birthday—and have since settled down on a farm in the English countryside.

Click here to read a Q&A with Kevin and Ram.

Ready to give it a try? Click here to join POZ Personals and get started today!

Have your own story to tell about finding love on POZ Personals? Email us with details at personals@poz.com and you might see yourself in a future issue of POZ magazine.