Herpes 101

I was diagnosed with herpes in 2011. That doesn’t sound like it was too long ago and that we haven't had to many changes but really, when you think about it we’ve had a ton of technological changes. Let me take you back to 2011. There was google, but it wasn’t what it is today. There was Facebook and Instagram, but neither had the impact that they have today. So what I’m trying to say is that there wasn’t the information out there that there is now. When I googled herpes, or who had herpes bac…

If you’ve just gotten herpes and you are in a ton of pain physically and emotionally, I know what you are going through. 

Sometimes when I look back I think it’s the physical pain that is the most. And then there are other times I think, no, it’s the emotional pain. Regardless they are both there and you are probably feeling something that you have never felt before. 

First of all, I want you to take a deep breath and know that everything is going to be okay. I know it doesn’t feel that way …

Why me? This is something I asked myself for years. I would sit crying wondering why this happened to me. What did I do to deserve this? I couldn’t think of anything worse than getting diagnosed with herpes. 

Things that ran through my head were: why me and why not her? How is this going to impact my life? I wasn’t a slut, I didn’t sleep around and I was careful so how did I get this?

The truth is the herpes virus doesn’t really care how many people you’ve slept with. The way you get herpes …

This is something that I felt was so important to put together and I really wish it was something that I could have walked away with when I was diagnosed. I wish that that Dr. would have said, "there is this great online community called Life with Herpes and there is an Outbreak Toolkit that has everything you need to know about herpes.”

So that is why I created this toolkit. When you get your first outbreak, your 100th outbreak or your first outbreak in a really, really long time, all you wa…

If your first outbreak was anything like mine you’re wondering like me: how people could not know they had herpes or at least something going on down there.

Probably similar to you, I was in so much pain. I couldn’t sit down, everything was swollen, my entire body ached. I mean there was zero way I could have missed that something was going on down there. 

But it is true that for many people living with herpes they have no clue they actually have it. Honestly, it’s not hard to find people wi…

So excited to talk about this because there are times when we have an emergency and need to talk to someone. 

This especially happens when you are first diagnosed with herpes. You hang up the phone from your doctor and then are like now what. Who do I talk to? What do I do? The worst thing is to start googling herpes and looking at the pictures. Eek! And then the second worse thing is to sit in your worry and let it consume you. 

I just opened up my schedule and added more days. I’m here for…

Here's the deal, the herpes test is not included in the STI panel. So even if you’re a responsible sexually active adult and you ask your doctor for every STI test, most likely herpes will not be included in the herpes test. 

Not including the herpes test on the STI panel is part of the problem on why there are so many people getting herpes, why so many people don’t know they have it and why we have a huge ugly stigma around people who have herpes. But…we’re not going to fix this today.

The …

So there are two types of herpes. Well actually there are way more but in this setting we really only care about two types. Herpes type 1 and herpes type 2. 

So what are the differences and why is it important that we talk about it? 

Let’s dig in. 

Herpes or Herpes Simplex Virus is a virus that is broken down into two types. Type 1 is the most common type with 2 out of 3 people globally having it and type 2 is also pretty common with 1 out of 6 people having it. 

So what is oral herpes?

O…

The amount of times that I get asked about having oral herpes down there is astonishing. I mean that not in an ignorant way but in a way that so many people are now getting oral herpes down there.  

Before we go into why that’s happening let’s back up and explain HSV 1 and HSV 2.

HSV or Herpes Simplex Virus was originally thought to just be one type. You either got blisters on your mouth or on your genitals. It wasn’t until we had better technology to be able to tell the difference in the DN…