January 22, 2015 at 7:38 pm #3166

Participant

By boil, I mean one large, round sore that had a very large, white head. I would say it was about half a centimeter or so wide. Almost like a gigantic pimple, but the discharge was runnier and the skin immediately surrounding the infection wasn’t swollen. A day or so after it formed, after it ruptured and all of the liquid was drained from it, the skin healed over and sealed off to be just a large red bump. It diminished in size very gradually over the course of a month. All this time, and even beforehand, the skin never tingled, burned, itched, hurt, or gave any indication that it was there. It was very unusual.

My PCP saw it and ran a culture on it (and I assure you he got enough of a sample), and two days later came back and told me it was negative for Herpes. “Hmm, should have checked for Staph,” was all he said as he scratched his head. We did test for every other kind of venereal disease possible, and all results came back negative (no Syphilis, Gonorrhea, etc.).

There is one thing though – About 4 months prior, I had had surgery in the area of where the boil had formed. I figured the site had healed thoroughly enough for sexual interaction, but it makes me wonder if it was a Staph infection. Still, I won’t rule out Herpes without evidence to the contrary.

Oh, and I wanted to mention also: during the course of this little brouhaha, I never experienced ANY flu-like symptoms (for either the “cold sore” near my mouth or the lesion on my genitals). No sore throat, no headache, no body aches, no fever, no swollen lymph nodes – nothing. And that, I should tell you, is very unusual for me. Every time I get the flu or the cold (or sometimes even a darned canker sore) I manage to get a sore throat or swollen lymph node(s).

Anyway, maybe you could make a better guess as to what the heck happened.

As Alice would say, “Curiouser and curiouser.” Thank you for your time.