At the tender age of 10, David Mutie Wanjiku watched helplessly as his parents battled a strange illness that seemed to drain their very lives.
Slowly, but viciously, their health deteriorated and his father was the first to lose the battle, followed by his mother and lastly his sister, the only sibling a few years later.
His parents' failing health, compounded by the stigma associated with being HIV positive, hit the boy hard, leaving him feeling helpless and abandoned. "Our family was isolated and discriminated against, even though at this point I still did not understand the kind of illness my parents were suffering from until years later," he reminisces.
With both his parents deceased, the young boy found himself in an orphanage in Murang'a, where he lived until the age of 18.