Disclosed my herpes, he accepted... now how do I accept him taking the risk of herpes transmission?

Hi guys,

So this is my first post ever in any forum whatsoever.

I have had herpes for about 8 years now. My partner of 9 years gave it to me, he didn't know he had it. Now our relationship has come to an end and well it is the first time I am realizing about the implications of this condition in my life.

In general, I am not worried of being rejected, I know that if someone doesn't want to take the risk they are not rejecting me, they are rejecting the virus and that is OK, I don’t take it personally and I know it must be a difficult decision so no problems there.

My main concern is in accepting that someone would like to take the risk. To be more precise I am sort of starting a relationship with an old boyfriend, we dated for one and a half years. Because of our previous history it is a very special connection we have and I don’t need more time to say I really really care for him and all I want is for him to be happy and healthy. I know he has strong feelings for me too. Even after 10 years of separation and the fact that I broke up with him and he still wants to try again.

Now, he knows that I have the condition and that hasn't stop him from reaching out to me but I don’t think he understands what is all about and although I will do everything possible to make sure he understands before making the decision I am kind of worried that he may want to take the risk but I won’t. Although I feel a bit more at ease after reading the information on this website and knowing that there are many ways to avoid him contracting the virus I still think that I would not be able to live with myself if he gets it. And let’s face it there is still that 1% chance of him getting it that won’t let me live in peace.

To add to the drama I have HPV too, I mean... how bad does this guy has it? I don’t know how to handle this. I really love and respect him and I would love to see him a happy man either with me or whoever he chooses. But if I love him how could I ever take the risk of giving him this virus? What if down the track he wants to part ways and he is way to depress to start a new relationship because of this. I can’t do that to him. He is the most amazing person I know and I have this immense love for him not just romantically, I love his whole being and he deserves Heaven on Earth if you ask me. I have already broken his heart before, doing this will be just unbearable for me.

Has anyone gone through something like this? Or are any of you with a non-herpes partner? How do you deal with you allowing your loved one to take the risk?

Thank you so much for reading this.

Hi mdellam44!

Welcome to the site! And congrats on losing your forum virginity! :)

I so appreciate your care for this man. I can feel your heart when I read what you wrote. And it's so ironic, too, that that same heart will hold you back from sharing it with him ... because of herpes? Because of something that he's okay with risking the 1% chance? He's an adult and can make decisions on his own sexual health. You disclosed to him, he accepted, which means that both of you now do your parts on keeping him as safe as you can (without being paranoid about it) and leave the rest to allowing the love to flow. :)

The 1% chance of herpes transmission (with suppressive therapy and condom use) isn't letting you live in peace? Let's put this in perspective for you so you can see that you are creating a much bigger monster out of this than need be. What other things in life are a 1% chance? Crossing a residential road and getting hit by a garbage truck, for example. Are you shaking with fear every time you cross a road because there's always a possibility of being hit by a car? There are millions of examples out there of things you do in your day to day life that are a 1% chance of epic and horrible death, but it doesn't phase you. Why is herpes any different?

Look, ultimately what you're saying in this is that avoiding the 1% chance of him getting a skin rash is more important than sharing LOVE with him. I gotta give you some tough love, sista. ;) How does that sound when you put it side by side like that? What is your love worth to this guy? It sounds like he sees the VALUE of your love. Why don't you see it to that depth yet? Own the depth and beauty of this love that you have to share with him. Remember: You're not offering him herpes; you're offering him your heart. Herpes is just a small hurdle he's willing to jump through. It sounds like he's focusing on your heart while you're focusing on your herpes. Don't pre-reject yourself for someone who's ready to take the plunge with you. You. Are. Worth. It. You're heart is worth loving him and you're worthy of being loved by him.

Thanks for taking the time to answer me and for putting things into perspective. I thought I let some time pass before I wrote again just to have a bit more to reflect.

Things are going really great with this amazing guy. Unfortunately we live 15.000 miles away or something like that, but we are working on moving closer to each other very soon.

But as you imagine no actual sex has happened which gave me time to research and reflect and I sent him a pretty long email not long ago with all the information i could find so that he can make an informed decision and as predicted he is pretty much 100% on board.

He being, the great guy he is, said things like if we love each other we shouldn't let anything keep us apart, especially not this which is not a big deal anyways.

So now all I am focusing my energy on is in making sure I take care of him while also sharing an amazing time. So I am researching a bit more and I will add another discussion with this question but just in case, is there any type of test I can do to know if I am shedding?

Thanks again, and I hope I can soon be able to write more on our success story.

mdellam:

Sister... sounds like you have a winner there.... many of us on here would kill to find that man. :)

To answer your question... I don't know of any test to see if you are shedding...but if you look at the stats on the Handout you can see how often you are likely shedding depending on which one you have (I don't think you disclosed that anywhere on here). As far as I know we are almost always shedding ... it's just that most of the time it's a minuscule amount. Just like you are in contact pretty much every day with *someone* who is at one end or the other of a cold (which affects how many people get the cold from them... which is also factored by the strength of *their* immune system). So all it comes down to is doing the H+ equivilent of washing your hands and coughing into your elbow.... take the anti-virals and don't have sex if you have *any* tingling, burning, itching, whatever down there (which opens you guys up to exploring OTHER ways to pleasure each other.... BONUS!!! :D ) If you are really concerned, use a condom (somehow I don't think *he* will be THAT concerned ... LOL ) .

In fact, it would be a great thing if some drug company came up with a cheap test that could give you an idea about your risk on any one day.... hmmm - AAAAAAAdriaaaallll! Guess what's going on our list???? LOL

Regarding HPV.... read this for the facts: http://www.cdc.gov/std/HPV/STDFact-HPV.htm - nearly everyone gets HPV at some time in their life. Depending on what you read, there are 40-100 varieties of HPV - a small handful causes genital warts, another small handful *may* turn to cancer (takes at least 5 years). MOST will disappear within about 2 years. Despite what the drug companies have done to put the fear of God into people around HPV, most of the time its a temporary nuisance. And BTW, they can't test men for HPV... so he could be an unwitting carrier anyway ... the attitude seems to be don't worry about it until you get it, and then monitor it to make sure it isn't one of the 4 +/- strains that cause cancer ...

So glad things seem to be working out for you. Keep us posted..... We need to keep getting these success stories for the newly diagnosed to give them hope! Never mind that *I* love a good love story :)

Peace!