do you think i have herpes?
okay, so the first time i had sex i was 14. he used a condom, but a few days later i noticed bumps and sores that lasted a couple weeks. they went away and i've never had an outbreak since. i'm almost 20 now and have always wondered if it was herpes. i've been tested and the results have been negative but i'm not sure if herpes was what i had been tested for. the more i do research, the more i think that's what it is, but i'm wondering if its normal to have just had the one outbreak and then be dormant for almost 6 years? i'm probably going to be tested again soon and ask specifically for herpes just to make sure, but this whole situation is super stressful. i just want help. also, if i do have herpes and it has been dormant, can i transmit it to my partner?
This is tough to answer... the best one I can give is yes, you MIGHT have herpes. In my personal experience, I never had any (noticeable) outbreaks or symptoms. In fact, to this day, I have no idea exactly which one of my exes may have infected me. I got checked out for shingles, and my blood tests revealed that I was positive for the genital herpes virus (HSV-2). After lots of reading, I learned that you may never have an outbreak or (like you) may have one and then have it be years until you see anything else. This is why the disease is so prolific: most carriers don't realize they have it.
Whether or not you can or have spread it is even tougher to comment on. According to what I've read, you CAN spread the virus, even when there's no symptoms, through a process called Asymptomatic Shedding. However, your chances for transmission when it's dormant are highly minimized. Plus, it's hard to say whether the virus is "dormant", because sometimes outbreaks or symptoms are so minimal that they can be mistaken for something else.
Go get tested again. Get the blood test. Get tested for both HSV-1 and HSV-2, and get it specifically for your blood type, so that you minimize any chance for a misdiagnosis or false negative. Personally, it sounds to me like you do have it. So go get tested to be sure, so that you'll know how to move forward. Good luck.
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