Notsurprised

Thank you , thank you, thank you! I feel better already.

Thank you for sharing your story. I just hope when I have future outbreaks they are as mild as this last one was, but I guess there is no way to know. I'm not really clear on the medication either. Should I just take it every day (valtrex) to avoid it, or do you only do that if you can tell it is coming on? At this point, as I didn't realize either episodes may have been outbreaks, I'm not sure how to tell that yet, except to just go by other people's descriptions. I am such a loner I can deal with avoiding sex. I'm afraid of the pain and severity of an bad outbreak. I bought lysine today to begin taking. I eat fruit and veggies daily and supplement with herbs and vitamins already.

Hi everyone. I am glad I found this site. But I haven't come across any posts that remind me of my situation. Though I'm not surprised I was diagnosed with genital herpes, I just want answers I think I will never be able to get. Firstly, I think I have had herpes a long time but am one of the lucky ones that doesn't have noticeable symptoms. But at the same time that has me questioning when and from whom I got it and whom I should warn. What is confusing for me is this ... I had a serious relationship about 5 years ago with a man who told me from the beginning he had herpes. We practiced safe sex, until after about a year. He had been outbreak-free for years and we both thought that meant shedding would not be a problem. I tested negative during that relationship. It ended and since then I have had a handful of sexual partners, some only very briefly. For the past year, I have had no sexual partners. About 10 days ago while showering I felt a very small bump in the folds of my vagina. No pain, no itch, no nothing. It really just looked like a pimple, but I went immediatly to my GYN. She assured me this was just a skin eruption, too, but did a scrape. I left the doctor's office feeling silly for being so paranoid. But she called me yesterday and sounded as shocked as I was. I was positive for HSV2. I don't know if I contracted it from the relationship with the man that I knew had it, or from someone I slept with over a year ago. A year ago I was seeing someone and after one of our encounters — a few weeks later — I had flu-like symptoms and weird pain in my upper thighs, "heaviness" in my pelvic region, and a huge swollen lymph node in my neck that lasted for several weeks. They were about ready to do surgery on me, but luckily it came down. Could that have been an "outbreak?" There were no bumps, blisters, or anything on my genitals. I am thankful that, if these recent bumps were my first herpes outbreak, it was not harrowing. I did get a script for Valtrex in case though, just in case, but am not taking it unless something pops up. The two little bumps I had 10 days ago were completely healed and gone within 3 days of the doctor visit. I'm calm about it. Obviously I've had it for at the least a year (at the most 5) and it hasn't impacted my life. I hear it is harder to pass from woman to man, and none of the men I've slept with have called and said anything about contracting herpes after sleeping with me. Perhaps because I don't have noticeable outbreaks the chances were slimmer of me sharing. But of course now I will tell anyone prior to sex. I am 47 so I have a lower sex drive, and casual sex has no appeal to me at this point in my life.