Truth and drugs (and snow)

I woke up this morning to find a blanket of white covering my world. I live in the east of England and snow happens here about 2 days of the year so this is a very cool (excuse the pun) event. Having had a few too many drinks last night I have so far not ventured out into the wintery wonderland that is outside. In fact given the heating in my house is not working particularly well so I think that I might just stay in bed.

I have started on a course of supressive therapy. My last outbreak was one of the worst I have had - not very painful or itchy but it took a while to clear up. It has for now retreated and I have been prescribed acyclovir twice a day for the forseeable future. I think that having an outbreak is one of the hardest things about herpes - it is a constant reminder . I hope the supressive drugs stop me from having such regular outbreaks and that I might be able to reclaim a normal sex life (actually I want a fun sex life - I am not sure this means a 'normal' one but I think you know what I mean).

Talking about sex life I am sure you are itching (oh dear, another pun!) to know what happened with the 'new girl' that I was spoke about in my last post. Well, I told her! This was about 2 weeks ago - I found myself walking to her house and I had already decided that I had to do it. I was nervous but not as nervous as I had expected to be. I walked into her room and sat down and we spoke first about everyday things. I realised that the time had come and I just had to be a man and so I spoke.

I told her that I had something to tell her and she sat down and looked at me with her beautiful green eyes. I looked staight back at her and for a minute I couldn't speak. I took a deep breath and then the words came. I started by asking her if she knew what cold sores are and then I explained that I get cold sores, just somewhere else. I talked about what a common sti herpes is and I explained that with supressive medication, condoms and abstinence during and immediately after an outbreak the chance of transmission is incredibly small (this is difficult to quantify and I will talk about it another time). After about 10 minutes I realised that I probably should have prepared slides (joking!) and so I stopped.

She looked at me and then she kissed me.

A great new girl and a not so great new outbreak

Mood: very happy, slightly scared, a bit itchy (okay itchy is not really a mood but you get the idea)

I went for a date with a girl last tuesday and so it turns out she is fantastic. Barely more than a day has passed since then without seeing her. Just her presence seems to twist time around so that it always seems to suddenly be very late and I never achieve much more than to get lost staring into her beautiful green eyes. What is even better is that she seems to feel the same way about me. It all sounds great no? The hard bit is that I know that I have to tell her about my itchy friend and frankly, as you might expect, I am just a little bit scared. I know all the 'if she is the right one then she will accept it' stuff but I guess I may be about to find out just what it means to be a man with herpes.

I have had a lot I wanted to say in the last couple of weeks but I have not known how to say it - and so I have not posted. I am having another outbreak at the moment - I was feeling it a bit at the start of the weekend but it has developed in the last day. I am feeling a bit down about this because I seem to have had outbreaks at least every 2 or 3 months in the last year. I am going to see the doctor tomorrow to see if it might be worth trying some supressive therapy. Fortunately my symptoms have never been really bad but I find it hard to deal with on such a regular basis. This seems even harder now that I would just like to relax and spend more time with this amazing girl.

Why haven't I told her?

I am sure that I mentioned it before but I when I found out about my new pal herpes I decided I should probably do the right thing and talk to my ex-girlfriend. As mentioned in the post I never showed symptoms when I was with her so most likely I didn't give it to her. It is also likely that he didn't give it to me given her apparent lack of symptoms during our relationship. Nonetheless I had planned to talk to her about it just in case. The problem I that I haven't. Perhaps I am being weak or perhaps I do not see the point in putting her through the grief.

This remains unresolved.

Online herpes dating

One of the first thoughts that went through my mind when I found out about the herpes was 'Will I ever have a relationship again?'. Substitute the word 'relationship' with the word 'sex' and you will have another of my thoughts at that time. However being the proactive kind of guy that I am I immediately had a look around for dating sites for people with herpes - I was suprised to find quite a few.

I have considered the concept of online dating in the past and I am always interested in new ways to meet people. 'Herpes dating' seems like a slightly different beast but I figure that going on a date with someone where you know nothing about each other except that you both have genital herpes could be if little else an interesting and bizarre experience. I am a man who loves new and bizarre experiences so I recently joined a two of these sites.

I want to be quite clear at this point that I 100% do not intend to only date people with herpes. I would absolutely encourage everyone with herpes to not limit themselves in this way. I have in fact recently been on dates with a couple of girls who I as far as I know are not members of 'community herpes' (although I guess that there is a 1 in 5 chance that anyone I date has it). Herpes dating for me is just another way to meet and if I meet someone I like on one then who am I to argue.

I am sure there will be more to say about this topic in the future!

'Crazy horrible things' - don't listen to them!

I am feeling incensed with the volume of bad advice abundantly available and given to people with herpes by people with herpes. In many cases the advice lacks any coherence and serves to scare all readers who may have herpes and may be planning to carry on with their lives without the constant fear of it spreading to their brain or the thought of not having sex for the next decade.

I quote from a message board that I was recently reading:
'today I took care of a patient that had encephalo hsv meaning herpes inside his body spread up to his brain... you mentioned herpes in the lungs.. yes, there are all these crazy horrible things that can happen with HSV.'

Okay yes it is possible for herpes to spread around the body but I think we may be missing a few key facts here. For example did this person actually had some immunodeficincy such as AIDs or recent chemotherapy. Perhaps some real statistics about the likelyhood of this happening would also be of use with reference to a scientific paper. Also do I need to remind everyone that 80% of the population have one or the other form of herpes - should we spread the word and make sure that people start living in constant fear of the 'crazy horrible things that can happen with HSV'.

Better still is my favourite advice about how diet can help control herpes outbreaks;
'Get your Ph level up and get alot of oxygen to your cells then you should be good.'

I mean what does this even mean. 'Get alot of oxygen to my cells' - so I should breathe then (because I hadn't planned on stopping that anytime soon) and cut back on the vinegar to help solve my Ph problems. Are you really serious?

Please I implore you all - Seek the advice of a medical professional and learn the facts!!!!

Friends and herpes

I have been very busy this week and have not found any time to write. Right now my brain is tired out and I should probably be asleep. I am not sure I have anything to say about herpes today and I hope that by writing this blog I don't start defining my persona as a man with herpes. I will try to make some of the posts just about my life without just talking about herpes - if anything I hope they will continue to remind myself (and anyone who choses to read) that people with herpes are no different to people without herpes.

I have so far told 5 of my close friends about the herpes. I did in fact tell them soon after the symptomatic diagnosis last year. Since these 5 people are very close friends they have all been very supportive and I often find myself joking about it with them. It has been great to talk to people about this and it has really helped me put things into perspective.

It turns out I am also a complete wimp since I have not spoken to my exgirlfiend about my diagnosis. I am still not convinced that it will do anything but cause her unecessary grief. I do however feel more strongly that I should tell people about H before I start having sex with them. It will be interesting to see if this plays out in practice.

How did I get herpes?

The simple answer to this question is I do not know. I am not a particularly promiscuous person - in fact I have slept with just two people in the last 3 years. The first was a relationship that lasted for 2 years whilst the most recent was a one night stand. It was after the one night stand that my symptoms started so it is no suprise that I thought that was the source - BUT I did of course use a condom so I assumed that I caught it from unprotected oral sex. I was wrong - I emailed this girl after being diagnosed and she got tested and yes she is negative for HSV2.

I did however learn recently that it is possible for HSV2 to lay dormant for many years and be triggered by some 'penile trauma' (see last blog entry) - which may explain the appearance of symptoms after the one night stand (I am not insinuating that it was traumatic). This however leaves me none the wiser - I could have caught this at any time in my sexual history and since I have not been symptomatic until recently then it is incredibly unlikely that I would have passed it to someone else.

The other possibility is my exgirlfriend - but this leaves me with a dilemma. If I tell her she might have a test and the outcome of the test will be one of two things:

• positive - I am still none the wiser since she may also be a carrier and just have the antibodies with no symptoms. I might have given it to her OR she to me and there is no way to know.
  

• negative - I at least know it was from someone before her but am left back where I started with the same unanswered question.

I therefore do not know what to do. I do not think there is any value in trying to find someone to hold accountable - we already know this is a common and contagious virus which many people have without ever knowing about it. It is possble that I caught it off my exgirlfriend just before we split so perhaps it is worth her getting tested to be on the safe side.

I have resolved to talk to her about it (at least by email) so that she can at least hold all the facts. I do not however plan to work my way backwards though my exgirlfriends and sexual partners because as discussed that does not benefit them or me.

On a much lighter note - the date today went very well. It is early days so I am not considering the herpes issue quite yet. I will cross that bridge when I need to. One day at a time!