Herpes for years, no-one to talk with about it :(

[Avuton]

Hey guys!

I want to share my H story as well.. Please bear with me through this long thing.

 

MY OUTBREAKS

My mother has oral H pretty often, but I never had one.

I got H when I was 15, 2 weeks after my first sexual experience - some kissing and fingering with 2 different guys. I have no idea if I had it before, got it from them or what happened. They never got tested to my knowledge.

After a lot of itchiness for days, I google a lot, realise I probably have herpes, go to my doctor, she looks at my genitals and confirms... then prescribes me oral acyclovir. It hurt, itched, I even got blisters on my lips and around them on my face, I cried myself to sleep and spent most of the 2 weeks in the shower. I think this was the worst how I felt in my entire life.

In the next two years I have OB at least once per month. I feel ashamed, disgusting, uncomfortable.

 

DOCTORS VISITS

At my first visit the doctor didn't give me any information except "yeah at this point I can't give you anything to make you feel better, though you can try the aciclovir" and sends me away. Please remember I am 15 at this time, so any information I had for two years after was just what I managed to google in my native language because I couldn't speak English at all.

In the following years she never wanted to give me acyclovir to have at home when I feel an OB coming or to take regularly. I always had to come to her office - you have to make an appointment which takes at least 2 days, by which time I was full of blisters and the antivirotics didn't help. Also I never got tested to which type of H I have.

At 18 I consulted a homeophathist about my frequent OB, he gave me some homeopathy, which surprisingly worked. So from age 18 to 22 I had maybe one small outbreak.

 

REACTIONS OF THE PEOPLE AROUND

Firstly I told my mum what I have, the first thing she said "what the hell, I thought you would have candidosis but you have an STD".

I also told around 2-3 my friends, but as you can imagine, in 15 y/o everyone was just like "eeeew" and "haha no wonder since you are such a slut" etc., so you can imagine that this discouraged me from telling anyone... a lot.

 

MY SEXUAL HISTORY

I had sexual 10 partners over the years. Most of them were one night stands with whose I used condoms. The only significant ones are those:

When I was 17, I told my boyfriend of one year relationship. He just said okay, I don't mind... He was the only one I ever told. We broke up when I was 22.

Since then I have been casually sleeping with a few guys. It might sound kind of impossible... but since I didn't have an outbreak in years and basically no information about H except what I googled when I was 15, I had NO IDEA that something like asymptomatic shedding exists, I kinda thought that if we are using condoms everyone is safe, even though I'm not on any medication.

I dated a guy for a few months, we did not use condoms most of the time. I have no idea about his STD history and he never asked about mine.

Now I met this amazing guy, went with him home in the evening and stay for two days. On Friday evening we had sex for the first time and without a condom. In the morning I could feel some tingling on my inner genital lips, but I thought I was just bruised from the rough sex.... so on Saturday evening and on Sunday morning we have sex again. Thankfully this time it was with protection. On Sunday evening I realised I was having an OB and completely freaked out. I have no idea when did the first blister appear, I just didn't notice, thought I was sore from too much sex since I did not have an OB for YEARS... When I arrived home, I just texted him that sometimes I get problems with herpes on my lips, and that I just got one so I hope he will not get it from me and he should look out for any symptoms.

Well... now it is Tuesday evening and I am freaking the fuck out. Aside from having a really big outbreak, when the blisters appeared also on my mouth.... I'm feeling guilty about not disclosing and THEN having unsafe sex, I'm angry that noone ever thinks to ask about STDs, I'm afraid that the guy will get infected from me, I am ashamed for my decisions... and I have no idea what to do.

 

WHAT NOW?

1) I vowed to myself to disclose to any future partners, at least the fact that I carry the herpes virus and that they should know about it. Do I really have to mention the genital part? it still embarasses me that I would have to blurt out something about my genitals. If the situation would be reverse - I would be angry about someone not disclosing, but since you can get genital herpes on lips and vice versa, I would not really care about which type of herpes the partner has.

2) Should I tell the guy I was sleeping with for 2 months without a condom? and how should I even mention this? he never had any outbreaks when we were together and me neither, but still... now we don't even talk to each other and i can't imagine texting him out of the blue, hey, how are you, I have herpes, bye. I can't talk to him in person since he is in another country.

3) What about my current partner? I told him I have herpes virus, but not which one... should I specify? or not? It started as an one night stand, we don't want to be in a relationship together but might continue sleeping together sometimes. Also how high are the chances of him getting infected by me? I am a statistics person but couldn't find any numbers of how high is the risk in this situation....

4) Do you think it's necessary for me to take meds? And where to get them? They are prescription only in my country, but it is not an usual practice to prescribe them long term, usually just for people who have frequent recurrent OB. I never heard about someone prescribing them to not infect the partner of the patient. (I work in medical field so I would know).

5) Should I take tests to find out which herpes type I have? My doctor never made a swab, just took a look, said "yup this is herpes" and sent me away.... So I have no idea if I have type 1 or 2, since it appears always in both locations....

6) I wanted to talk about this to my friends... But I freaked out. Half of them think I am a slut already and judge me for my active sexual lifestyle. And telling someone that I have STD is not going to make it anymore easy.... hell, I have such a mind block about this, I can't even say these words out loud in front of my teddy bear. But I want my friends to know and I don't want to just text them this thing that is pretty significant for me.

7) How the hell do you guys manage one night stands?

8) Any idea why I got an OB now? I got IUD implanted recently, otherwise this weekend I did not sleep much and the sex was pretty rough, but nothing that did not happen in the past, when I did not get OB from it. Might it be IUD? Or is it possible to get an outbreak with a new partner my body is not used to?

 

Please don't judge me for any of this, I want to change, I want to be a better person, but I have no idea where to start. I really need someone who will be supportive and not one more person who will say to me that I am a slut... (That is a word people mostly use for me when they learn I work as a stripper or how many partners I had through my life - which isn't even that many... And I don't want to add one other "slut" characteristics to this by telling to anyone I'm H+).

I hope it made sense at least a bit. I just feel like shit the last few days and really wanted to get it out....

[RegularGuy]

That is a lot of information all at once. Forgive me if I didn't read thoroughly enough and some of my answers are a little off base:

First, tell the guy you're with. If you care at all about his well-being or his right to consent, tell him.

It is about consent and your own view of yourself. Taking away someone's right to consent is always wrong, even by omission. It is no better than the cliche, "I thought she was cool with it".

Next, tell the guy you were with. Text him out of the blue and say, "I have herpes. You should get yourself tested."

He has a right to know. Don't condemn more people to find out the hard way, by surprise, like so many of us did. Give him a chance to deal with it in a better way than all the rage, confusion and depression so many of us struggled with.

 

Don't make excuses for yourself. There is nothing wrong with sex, having sex with multiple people, seeking one night stands, and having fun with it. But there is absolutely something fundamentally wrong with manipulating and hurting people who choose to trust you.

There is a right way, and disclosing before getting physical, fully and honestly without ommission is that right way.

Not just for others, but for your own view of yourself, your peace of mind, your self-respect.

 

Realize that ommitting how your diagnosis could effect someone who chooses to trust you is inherently malicous and resovle to not use sex as a weapon to unwitting hurt people. Instead, get consent, have fun, be happy, and leave those other people feeling good about having shared intimacy with you, rather than guilt and shame. Or worse, with an infection that causes them hurt, shock, depression and fear without warning.

 

Much of what you talked about today was rationalization away from responsibility and good intentions. It's easy to come up with excuses why one should not do the right thing. There are millions, and you have simply thought and pondered until you discovered a few that make you temporarily feel comfortable with ommitting the truth and robbing others of consent. It will catch up to you internally. Each lie erodes your own self-respect. Each omission cuts down the good person you rightly should be, despite all of your amazing qualities, you are sabotaging your own happieness and condemning yourself to a path that leads to self-loathing and anger.

 

I really do see the process of thought that you put into many of your points in what you addressed today. I see someone who is ashamed, embarrassed, fearful and hurting.

But you have nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing to be afraid of.

If you resolve to demonstrate your positive qualities, commit to giving others thir right to consent, and start seeing yourself as you very well could:

As a desirable, strong, intelligent and good person.

Because you are most definitely all of those things. You've only let fear control your decisions. Many of us are guilty of that, many times over. The important thing is to decide who you will be from this day forward and do the things that person would do.

 

If you are so uncomfortable that you can't talk about genitalia, maybe you should throttle back on seeking sex and focus more on becoming comfortable with your own sexuality.

If you can't understand the importance of consent, you should study the effects of what happens to a person when they are sexually abused and consider whether you want to be the kind of person that takes away others' rights to sexual freedom and security.

If you think the only reason to be honest with others is for their own sake, take a look at how harshly you judge yourself for failing to provide the simple, honest truth to people who choose to trust you. The fall out is already happening, and it gets much worse.

 

None of what you are experiencing is unheard of. There are many people, including members of this site who have experienced what you are.

Seek out those threads such as ones where the poster did not disclose, ones where the poster did disclose. You'll see a very profound difference in the days following. Seek out threads where people who have overcome the hardships of living with herpes and have advice to give. You'll see that your struggles aren't so different, and that you can live exacly whatever life you choose.

Choose to be brave, confident, honest, trustworthy and good. Choose to do it for yourself and for the people you care about. Build up your pride and your self-respect. You deserve to do those things and to be that person.

[Avuton]

Thank you for this comment, I am glad that someone read through all I wrote and replied to that such a long message.

I have read a lot of other threads here, but I also needed to get my own story out. I am going to do what you told me, no matter how uncomfortable will it be for me... Thank you.

[RegularGuy]

I'm glad you read my lengthy response.

I'm also glad that you're taking responsibility for your own happiness, present and future. You're going to bumble through things a little (everyone has to figure things out as they go), but as long as you are trying your best to do right for yourself by your own standards, things will work out.