Trying to put my mind at ease

[seekingadvice]

Hi Terri,

First of all, I just wanted to say that the work you do here is outstanding. It seems like there is a lot of false information on the internet which makes it easy to freak out just by googling.

I received unprotected oral sex from a male (I”m a female) 17 days ago. It did not last long and he did not have any visible cold sore signs. I’m not sure if he has a history of cold sores or not.

I know that I am probably being neurotic, but I am worried about my chances of catching something. I don’t believe that I’ve ever had cold sores on my mouth. I have not had any signs or symptoms of herpes legions, no itching or burning. I’m pretty much having anxiety over the “what-if” factor of catching something.

I’ve read through your forum and you’ve mentioned that if I were going to have a primary outbreak, it would be within 2-10 days, correct? Since that time has passed, is it just a waiting game from here on out? Do you recommend getting tested with no signs or symptoms?

Questions are as follows-

1.) What happens if you don’t see any signs within 2-10 days after an encounter? Should you consider yourself safe?

2.) Obviously, oral sex is something that more and more people are doing every day. How do we begin to protect ourselves if so many people can carry the virus without ever knowing?

3.) How easily transmittable is HSV-1 to the genitals without signs or symptoms of a cold sore on the mouth? Is it something that happens often? I’ve talked to a lot of my friends who are sexually active and I’ve just never heard of it happening from oral sex (not that I doubt that it DOES happen)- it’s just scary!!

[Terri Warren]

So 56% of the US population between 14 and 49 have HSV 1 infection and most don’t know it. Have you ever been tested to find out? Now that you are worrying quite a bit about this potential problem, you might want to find out if you already have this. Of course if your antibody test is positive, you can’t know where you have it but at least you wouldn’t need to worry about acquiring something that you already have

Yes, people can acquire HSV 1 genitally through receiving oral sex. However, I think one episode of receiving oral sex briefly with someone who has no symptoms at all would be very low risk indeed – I cannot quantify that for you, however

Yes, you would likely have symptoms within 2-10 days of acquiring HSV, but no symptoms doesn’t necessarily mean no infection though in this situation, again, extremely unlikely to have occurred.

There is no way to protect yourself completely but you could consider a barrier method for receiving oral sex, including something like saran wrap.

Terri

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