Emmyjean
Mom to 2 Wee Lads
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2011
- Messages
- 482
- Reaction score
- 0
So I figured I'd come to you ladies and talk since this isn't exactly something I want to share with everyone I know, and I want to vent a bit. Lucky you! 
I recently experienced something I thought was an infection of some kind and, when I went to the doc to have it checked out, she told me it was herpes. She said it was HSV-1, which I guess is the one that normally manifests itself as oral cold sores - she told me that I probably got it from my husband during oral sex.
I'm not ashamed of it or anything - it's annoying, but whatever. I am just a little mad at my sex education experience though, and also a little mad about the way society treats this type of herpes. Normally, HSV-1 is oral and HSV-2 is genital. Maybe it's different now, but I don't remember any of my health classes making a point of saying that cold sores shouldn't be brushed off as 'cold sores' when it could actually be an active herpes infection that you could pass on through sexual contact.
My husband had no idea that the pesky cold sores he gets are actually the herpes virus, or he never would have gone down on me while he had an active one (pardon my TMI). On top of it, I would have been more aware/careful as well.
I guess it just seems unfair to me that people with HSV-2 are made to feel so stigmatized and humiliated about having an "STD!!!", and people with HSV-1 are either never taught what they actually have and how it can be passed along, or else they know it and are allowed to just brush it off with, "Oh, just a cold sore, it's not like it's the BAD herpes". It seems unfair to everyone.
Maybe this is all stuff I should have known already since I have been sexually active for a long time now, but...I didn't.
Okay, rant over. Thanks for 'listening' (aka reading). 
I recently experienced something I thought was an infection of some kind and, when I went to the doc to have it checked out, she told me it was herpes. She said it was HSV-1, which I guess is the one that normally manifests itself as oral cold sores - she told me that I probably got it from my husband during oral sex.
I'm not ashamed of it or anything - it's annoying, but whatever. I am just a little mad at my sex education experience though, and also a little mad about the way society treats this type of herpes. Normally, HSV-1 is oral and HSV-2 is genital. Maybe it's different now, but I don't remember any of my health classes making a point of saying that cold sores shouldn't be brushed off as 'cold sores' when it could actually be an active herpes infection that you could pass on through sexual contact.
My husband had no idea that the pesky cold sores he gets are actually the herpes virus, or he never would have gone down on me while he had an active one (pardon my TMI). On top of it, I would have been more aware/careful as well.
I guess it just seems unfair to me that people with HSV-2 are made to feel so stigmatized and humiliated about having an "STD!!!", and people with HSV-1 are either never taught what they actually have and how it can be passed along, or else they know it and are allowed to just brush it off with, "Oh, just a cold sore, it's not like it's the BAD herpes". It seems unfair to everyone.
Maybe this is all stuff I should have known already since I have been sexually active for a long time now, but...I didn't.
Okay, rant over. Thanks for 'listening' (aka reading). 
