A Viral Video for a Viral Disease

I’m sure a lot of people have already seen this but I’m gonna post it anyway. It may be old (I used it in a presentation last semester) but I still find it hilarious, and hopefully you will too. Because, after all, Batman makes everything better.

The only valentine for me

You know, herpes is really funny to those that don’t have it. I don’t know, maybe it’s funny for those that do too, it just takes a while to get there. I just imagine this would be much funnier if I didn’t have it. I also imagine that it would be much funnier if I didn’t have to worry about it being the last Valentine I may ever get.

Having herpes and being single makes it pretty easy for me to assume that I’ll be alone for the rest of my life. And you know, for the most part I’m ok with that. But on ocassion I think that maybe I’d like the option of being in a relationship again. Oh sure, statistically speaking I should find lots of other “herpsters” (as I once heard them called) that would be willing to mate for life. But first I’d have to put myself out there for rejection. Lots of it. I’m not sure how much I could take before it would seriously crack me. I don’t want to have to lower my standards because I’m looking for someone to accept me. I don’t want to have to put myself out there for people that I wouldn’t want under normal circumstances. Having herpes means having a life filled with either lies, loneliness, substandard partners, or enough rejection to make the average person bitter. But as someone with herpes you kinda realize that there aren’t any other options for you. That’s why this is the only Valentine’s day where I have hated being alone. And that’s why I know that this little e-card wasn’t made by someone that has herpes, just by someone who doesn’t understand it and all the implications it comes with. So, fuck you Valentine’s. I will no longer take part in your red and pink celebrations. I will  be spending tonight, and every night from here on out, alone.

All quiet on the Western front

So it’s been over a month since I’ve posted, that’s because there’s nothing really to update on. It’s been three months since my diagnosis and I still haven’t had a second outbreak. I’ve had many paranoid moments, but not an outbreak. Not to jinx myself or anything, but I really hope I’m one of those really lucky people that never has a second outbreak. In the mean time I’ll just keep crossing my fingers (and  my legs. Haha, I made a funny) and waiting it out, hoping that maybe my diagnosis was a mistake.

A plague on both your houses

I understand how scary it is to tell someone that you have herpes, and how easy it is to just ignore or avoid it. This is not my story, but one that made me feel a little bit better after reading it. A plague on both your houses as found on Nerve.com in the personal essays section.

Illigitimi non carborundu

When I’m thinking about herpes I’m not worrying about outbreaks, I’m worrying about telling people. In my anatomy class we’ve recently discussed herpes, and now it seems like it’s all people want to talk about. Almost everytime we have a class the teacher asks who has genital herpes, wants them to raise their hand in front of the whole class. It’s become a big joke, trying to embarass people by asking if they have genital herpes. He’s even offered extra credit for someone to admit to it. According to the statistics I’ve seen there are at least 6 people in that room that have it, me included, yet not one person has raised their hand. I think maybe next time I will. If someone else had then I definitely would have too. It’s that whole strength in numbers mentality. But you know what? I don’t think it’s ok for them to shame me for a medical condition, it’s not like they’d make fun of someone with frostbite. But both are conditions acquired by the choices that somebody made. They may have thought that they were adequately protected for their activity of choice, but instead they got a nasty surprise when they realized they hadn’t taken everything into account. Yet you can almost guarantee that the frostbite victim would receive way more sympathy than anyone with a nasty STD. Ewwwww! Stay away or you might catch it.

I wonder if it will at least stop them from talking about it like a joke if they know I have it.

It’s amazing how the little things make such a big difference

I read somewhere that when you’re having a herpes outbreak it sometimes presents the same symptoms that a common cold does, you know sore throat, stuffy nose, the whole shebang. So, now I’m sick and the first thought through my head was “oh shit, I hope I’m not having an outbreak”. I’m not, but apparently no matter how much I think I’m ok with my diagnosis apparently it’s always going to be right at the edge of my thoughts. It’s kinda disconcerting to think that the microscopic world is infecting my body and trying to destroy me one cell at a time. I don’t like it, and I don’t like herpes for making me hyper-aware that this is going on. Currently these are the little microbes that are invading my body and setting up shop to make me miserable.

Herpes- Almost makes you not mind the invasion, doesn’t it?

Common cold- this little sucker gets around too.

Sore throat-This is the one I hate the most

Limbo is hell.

One of the big things about herpes for me is knowing where it came from. Which I still don’t know. And quite frankly it’s pissing me off. The boy I thought gave it to me said he came back negative, but he couldn’t remember everything that they tested him for. So until he gets total confirmation I still don’t know. It’s either him or my boyfriend from when I was 18 (because he’s the only one I couldn’t get ahold of), and I think if it was him it would have shown up before now. So, now I sit around and wait until he gets around to figuring everything out. Waiting sucks.

Well there’s nothing to lose And there’s nothing to prove I’ll be dancing with myself

So… Billy Idol has herpes. Oh yes, he does. There’s actually a lot of websites out there with lists of celebrities that have herpes. I’m not totally comfortable outing them here, this is not a sleeze column and it’s not really my place. The reason I brought up Billy Idol by name is because I’m pretty sure he’d be cool with it. Hell, he told Rolling Stone about it, I’m fairly sure he doesn’t care who knows. But that’s cool. I don’t care what you say, I’ve always thought Billy was a total badass. It makes me feel a little better knowing that Billy Idol’s cool with herpes, like I just joined the cool kids club. I mean, this is one instance where I’d totally be ok being the nerdy outcast kid, but at least it’s a slight softening of the blow.

Here’s a snippet of what he said:

AIDS fucked up everything. What did you have to worry about till then? Gonorrhea you could get rid of. Herpes was the worst.

You probably had that already.

Yeah! Let’s give it to each other and get on with it! Back then, it used to be like a Fellini film: nonstop drugs and sex, and then we’d happen to do a gig at some point.

Unfortunately some people will think that all of us in the cool kids club live our lives like this, which is so not true. However Mr. idol was there for the transition from free love and sex for all to the era where STD’s started their rampant run so I understand where he’s coming from. Plus he was a rockstar, and part of being a rockstar is getting laid. It just is. But my point was that I like his attitude. A very “fuck it, It doesn’t matter to me what I have” attitude.

I think I may just steal his line and use it as a pick-up. “Yeah! Lets give it to each other and get on with it!” Think it’ll work?

“I believe in making the world safe for our children, but not our children’s children, because I don’t think children should be having sex.”- Jack Handey

So, it’s really been bugging me that I don’t have a definite answer yet on who gave me herpes. The boy that I think did it hasn’t gotten his results back yet, and I could have just waited before taking any further action, but it’s me, and I’m impatient and have trouble waiting for anything. That’s why I decided to ask every boy that I’ve ever had sex with (at least the ones I could get ahold of) if they’d been tested lately and if they were clean. It wasn’t a big deal, as it wasn’t too long of a list. The best part was that I decided the easiest way to do it was to go through text. Yes, I do think it was a slightly inappropriate way to go about it, and I know you probably think so too. However, I’m the one with herpes, not you, therefore I will go about this in the way that is easiest for me. So anyway, I texted three of them. They’re all clean, which I figured they would be. They’re the type of guys to get tested regularly and take smart steps and precautions with their sexual health. For the most part I was pretty good at picking guys like that. But it just took the one misstep on my part and now I’m going through everybodys sexual past.

They were pretty cool with me prying into their behavior with my questions, none of them called me a dirty whore and two of them said that I didn’t deserve herpes (doesn’t make a lot of sense, I know, but it made me feel better anyway) and that they figured they should’ve had it before I did. One of them told me that he did get the clap, but that it was from the girl after me, so it wouldn’t have affected me.

Telling them and getting some not so bad reactions has made me feel a little bit better about my “ordeal” (as one friend puts it).  Plus I figured if I get some practice telling people then I will be a little bit better when I tell the boy that I’m dating that I have it. Everyone else in my life will love me anyway, but that’s because they’re not in danger of getting it. Neither is this boy, but if we keep going he will be soon, and it’s only fair that he knows before then. So, I will just have to practice on some more trustworthy people, or maybe I’ll just find some strangers to tell, I don’t care what they think anyway.

You just can’t get away from this shit.

There are eight types of the herpes virus. EIGHT! Between all eight of them you’d be hard pressed to find someone without herpes. So, if someone ever says anything negative about my herpes all I have to say to them is “fuck you! You have herpes too.” The only difference between me and those “without” herpes is that I know about mine. So excuse me for being more self-aware and in tune with my body than you are. But you don’t get to pass judgment just because you choose to be ignorant about the little hitch hikers in your nervous system. Oh yes, if someone ever tells you that they don’t have herpes look them straight in the face and call them a big fat liar. Because they are. Herpes affects us all, in one form or another.

Herpes Virus 1:

Human herpes virus 1 (HHV1) is also known as herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV1). It is typically the cause of cold sores around the mouth. HHV1 can also lead to infection in the genital area causing genital herpes usually through oral-genital contact, such as during oral sex. HHV1 infections are contagious and are usually spread from skin-to-skin contact with an infected person through small breaks in the skin or mucous membrane. The HHV1 virus is more likely to be spread through things like sharing eating utensils, razors, and towels from a person who has an active lesion.

Herpes Virus 2:

Human herpes virus 2 (HHV2) is also called herpes simplex virus 2 (HSV2). It typically causes genital herpes, a sexually transmitted infection. However, it can also cause cold sores in the facial area. Like HHV1, the HHV2 infection is contagious and is spread by skin-to-skin contact. The main route of transmission is through sexual contact, as the virus does not survive very long outside the body.

Herpes Virus 3:

Human herpes virus 3 (HHV3) is also called varicella-zoster virus. HHV3 causes chickenpox. It can also cause a recurrent virus infection of the skin, which is called herpes zoster or shingles. Shingles occurs when dormant varicella-zoster virus from an initial bout of chickenpox becomes reactivated. Like its close relative, HHV1, herpes zoster likes to infect skin cells and nerve cells. This virus may also recur along nerve fibre pathways, causing multiple sores where nerve fibres end on skin cells. Because an entire group of nerve cells is often affected, shingles is generally much more severe than a recurrence of herpes simplex. The lesions generally appear in a band-like or belt-like pattern occurring on one side of the body and are often accompanied by itching, tingling, or even severe pain. Healing usually occurs in 2 to 4 weeks, and scars may remain. Postherpetic neuralgia is a complication of shingles where the pain associated with the infection can persist for months and even years. Most people who experience shingles once do not experience it again.

Herpes Virus 4:

Human herpes virus 4 (HHV4) is also known as the Epstein-Barr virus. It is the major cause of infectious mononucleosis, or “mono” – the “kissing disease.” It is a contagious infection and is transmitted through saliva. Coughing, sneezing, or sharing eating utensils with an infected person can pass the virus from one person to another.

Herpes Virus 5:

Human herpes virus 5 (HHV5) is the official name of cytomegalovirus (CMV). CMV is also a cause of mononucleosis. In people with healthy immune systems, the virus may not even cause any symptoms. It can be sexually transmitted, can cause problems to newborns, and can cause hepatitis. CMV can be transmitted through sexual contact, breast-feeding, blood transfusions, and organ transplants. CMV infection is one of the most difficult complications of AIDS. It may lead to diarrhea, severe vision problems including blindness, infections of the stomach and intestines, and even death. For a virus that barely causes a problem in most people with healthy immune systems, it can be amazingly nasty in people with damaged immune systems, such as people with AIDS.

Herpes Virus 6:

Human herpes virus 6 (HHV6) is a recently observed agent found in the blood cells of a few patients with a variety of diseases. It causes roseola (a viral disease causing high fever and a skin rash in small children) and a variety of other illnesses associated with fever in that age group. This infection accounts for many of the cases of convulsions associated with fever in infancy (febrile seizures).

Herpes Virus 7:

Human herpes virus 7 (HHV7) is even more recently observed and is closely related to HHV6. Like other human herpes viruses, HHV6 and HHV7 are so common that most of humankind has been infected at some point, usually early in life. HHV7 can also cause roseola, but it is not clear what other clinical effects that this virus causes

Herpes Virus 8:

Human herpes virus 8 (HHV8) was recently discovered in the tumours called Kaposi’s Sarcoma (KS). These tumours are found in people with AIDS and are otherwise very rare. KS forms purplish tumours in the skin and other tissues of some people with AIDS. It is very difficult to treat with medication. HHV8 may also cause other cancers, including certain lymphomas (lymph node cancers) associated with AIDS. The fact that these cancers are caused by a virus may explain why they tend to occur in people with AIDS when their immune systems begin to fail. The discovery also provides new hope that specific treatments for these tumours will be developed that target the virus.

Anybody never have chicken pox? Anyone? Not very many. What about mono? That’s a common occurrence in Jr. High when everybody starts making out with each other. Cold sores? Yeah lots of you people too. Why do people admit to these without a second thought, yet when you ask a roomful of people which of them has genital herpes you’d be hard pressed to find one person willingly raising their hand? You have herpes, I have herpes. No judgment! Lets just be friends.