23 Years, No Outbreaks, My Story

[arabelle]

Friends, from my brief time researching HSV2 on this forum and elsewhere in the last couple of weeks, I've come to realize how unusual my experience is so I wanted to share it in case it benefits anyone. I don't think I'll stick around the forum, but I'll be happy to reply to comments if people have questions. 

I ended up here during a 72-hour period a little over a week ago when I thought (to my great surprise) that I was having an outbreak. It was quite dismaying as I'm in a new-ish relationship and have never had a second outbreak. I had a pretty horrific first outbreak in early 1995 (I had to run a bath to pee ...), but that's been it. I've been sexually active nearly the entire time, I've had more than a few partners, and I have never transmitted the disease. 

I was quite surprised to be experiencing (what I thought was) an outbreak, as I'm healthier now than I've been in decades, and taking much better care of myself (good diet, daily exercise, etc.). 

It turns out that what I thought was my second outbreak (after 23 years!) was a patch of folliculitis - it went away overnight with a bit of triple antibiotic cream. But during the few days I thought it might be herpes, I was researching like a mad woman. And while I learned a lot - about diet and lifestyle tips to avoid outbreaks, about others' experiences, etc. - I have to say I'm very glad these sorts of forums didn't exist in 1994. Not sure what my experience would have been like if I'd allowed a pretty harmless virus to become so constitutive of my identity. 

I actually wondered a little while ago if I even had HSV2, given that I've never had a second outbreak. I wondered if I might have contracted HSV1 in the genital area. But I did request the blood tests during a round of STD testing once (you have to request this test, it's not routine - I guess serum levels are much higher in the population than diagnosed cases ...) and I am serum positive for both HSV1 and HSV2.

The shamans advise "never let a diagnosis seal your destiny." When I had my first outbreak in 1994, I realized I had two choices: I could allow the disease to determine my future (i.e. I could live as a person with herpes), or I could put it behind me and get on with my life. I basically just went about my life as if the herpes had never happened. I never anguished over it, I did not change my diet or lifestyle (I have drunk coffee pretty much every morning over the last few decades, alcohol a few times a week, raw cacao in my smoothies on the reg ...), and further (this will be controversial, I get it) I have never told a soul. This is between me and my gynecologist, no one else on the planet knows. 

I am, I'll admit, a bit of a health nut, but I haven't worried about things like Lysine/Arginine ratios, I haven't been gluten free, I haven't followed an immune-boosting diet, and I'm underweight for my height. Moreover, I've had some unhealthy years including one back in 2002-2003 when I lived on Caramel Macchiatos and Amstel Light (with a few real meals a week). 

I'm not into magical thinking in general. I have a severe issue with my left eye that I know is incurable so I don't go about pretending I don't have the problem or trying to visualize it away because I don't need that kind of frustration in my life. Where my eye is concerned, I've had to follow the path of acceptance, not letting it seal my destiny necessarily, but making adjustments for it in terms of how I read, etc. But herpes is something very different because the outbreaks are not inevitable ... I really do believe this is a disease we can keep at bay through positive thinking and ignoring it, and I think obsessing over it is probably counterproductive (though if it motivates anyone to start exercising, eating right, and exercising more caution when it comes to sexual partners, that's all good).  

Edited June 3, 2018 by arabelle
clarification, spelling, grammar