Hey y'all.
tl,dr; in what way should someone change their sexual behavior when they (probably) have herpes?
...
I was recently diagnosed with genital herpes aka HSV-2. The doctor said that his visual diagnosis is only about 80% accurate, but they didn't ask if I wanted the swab test when I first came in, so supposedly I can't do that now until I have another outbreak.
I live in Bangkok, Thailand and am moderately sexually active. Obviously this was a huge bummer emotionally. I'm going into counselling (I think I need to make some other life changes anyway, but I digress) to deal with it, but what I'm trying to work out now is a game plan going forward. The biggest dilemma I'm facing is that from what I can tell there is next to zero awareness about GH in Thailand, so potential partners are not likely to understand what I'm telling them.
From what I can tell, all three of conventional wisdom, personal anecdotes, and scientific research more or less say that transmission while there is no outbreak is very rare, especially when condoms are used.
More colloquial info can be found at: STD Risk and Oral Sex | STD | CDC
and Can HSV2 Be Transmitted Orally?
whereas scientific studies can be found here: Condoms Reduce Women's Risk of Herpes Infection, But Do Not Protect Men.
and here: Herpes and Oral Sex: Women’s Risks.
So, the first draft of my plan of action is as follows: (and for what it's worth, I only sleep with women)
1) Avoid all skin contact during any future outbreak
2) Always, always, always use condoms for penetrative sex (I already do this)
3) With any "short-term" partner, do not bring up the topic, but avoid oral sex in both directions
3a) Reduce the frequency of short-term partners and casual hook-ups
4) With any long-term partner, discuss the disease, the facts, etc. and try to come to mutual understanding and comfort.
Obviously the thing in question is the morality of not bringing it up with a casual encounter/ONS/etc. From what I can tell in my research, I would estimate the likelihood of me transmitting it while following these guidelines to be microscopic, somewhere in the 1 in 10,000 range. (It was estimated to be transmitted male to female in 8.9 in 10,000 sex acts which INCLUDED unprotected. 45% of infections were with couples that never used condoms and only 5% were those who did, so I'm extrapolating that to say condoms reduce the risk by 9x.)
I'm a very mathematically-minded person though and see 1 in 10,000 or 0.01% as basically zero or "statistically insignificant," but I recognize that isn't how everyone sees things.
Please let me know your thoughts or any other experiences you'd like to share regarding herpes. I just ask for a little compassion as I'm trying to figure out something very confusing.
tl,dr; in what way should someone change their sexual behavior when they (probably) have herpes?
...
I was recently diagnosed with genital herpes aka HSV-2. The doctor said that his visual diagnosis is only about 80% accurate, but they didn't ask if I wanted the swab test when I first came in, so supposedly I can't do that now until I have another outbreak.
I live in Bangkok, Thailand and am moderately sexually active. Obviously this was a huge bummer emotionally. I'm going into counselling (I think I need to make some other life changes anyway, but I digress) to deal with it, but what I'm trying to work out now is a game plan going forward. The biggest dilemma I'm facing is that from what I can tell there is next to zero awareness about GH in Thailand, so potential partners are not likely to understand what I'm telling them.
From what I can tell, all three of conventional wisdom, personal anecdotes, and scientific research more or less say that transmission while there is no outbreak is very rare, especially when condoms are used.
More colloquial info can be found at: STD Risk and Oral Sex | STD | CDC
and Can HSV2 Be Transmitted Orally?
whereas scientific studies can be found here: Condoms Reduce Women's Risk of Herpes Infection, But Do Not Protect Men.
and here: Herpes and Oral Sex: Women’s Risks.
So, the first draft of my plan of action is as follows: (and for what it's worth, I only sleep with women)
1) Avoid all skin contact during any future outbreak
2) Always, always, always use condoms for penetrative sex (I already do this)
3) With any "short-term" partner, do not bring up the topic, but avoid oral sex in both directions
3a) Reduce the frequency of short-term partners and casual hook-ups
4) With any long-term partner, discuss the disease, the facts, etc. and try to come to mutual understanding and comfort.
Obviously the thing in question is the morality of not bringing it up with a casual encounter/ONS/etc. From what I can tell in my research, I would estimate the likelihood of me transmitting it while following these guidelines to be microscopic, somewhere in the 1 in 10,000 range. (It was estimated to be transmitted male to female in 8.9 in 10,000 sex acts which INCLUDED unprotected. 45% of infections were with couples that never used condoms and only 5% were those who did, so I'm extrapolating that to say condoms reduce the risk by 9x.)
I'm a very mathematically-minded person though and see 1 in 10,000 or 0.01% as basically zero or "statistically insignificant," but I recognize that isn't how everyone sees things.
Please let me know your thoughts or any other experiences you'd like to share regarding herpes. I just ask for a little compassion as I'm trying to figure out something very confusing.
