Most people barely notice their first outbreak. Could be a pimple or an ingrown hair, and it’s gone in a couple of days.
I had a patch of blisters that hurt so bad, my doc put me on hydrocodone. I ran a fever, had joint and muscle aches, exhaustion, and nerve pain down my left leg, like fire ants were constantly biting my toes.
That, my doctor said, indicated that when I was infected, I was hit with a whole LOT of viral particles, so they were very well established by the time my immune system tried to fight them off. Valcyclovir helped clear it up and could keep it at bay, but it costs $800 a month without insurance.
Since then, I have more frequent outbreaks than most people with herpes. Slowly but surely, though, my immune system gets a little better at taking it down. Symptoms aren’t as bad, don’t last as long, and I heal faster.
YogSoSoth, I have a couple of questions about the doctor’s diagnosis. Did he just take a sample of your blood and run the blood test and have it come back positive for HSV-1? Did he take a culture of the actual sore?
Also, didn’t you say upthread that the bactracian seem to help it?
I guess overall I’m a little surprised that you would have a first outbreak without any recent sexual activity. That might be not uncommon, but it’s not something I’m aware of.
Thanks for that info. Sounds rough, particularly the first outbreak. Glad to hear that things are slowly improving though.
Makes sense I guess when you think about it. Of course in many cases, what makes sense and what really occurs are two different things. In this instance I guess they happen to coincide.
Again, thanks for fighting a bit of ignorance and best of luck.
Usually the first outbreak occurs within 10 days of infection. Sometimes, it’s so mild, the person doesn’t even notice it. Later, if the person is under unusual stress, their immune system is weakened by something, or maybe they’ve got a nutritional deficiency, a later outbreak can be significantly worse. OR the first outbreak might not take place until long after the original 10 day latency.
Usually, if a patient presents with sores, the doctor takes a culture to identify the cause. In my case, I asked for a blood test afterward, because the culture can’t differentiate between HSV-1 and -2. The blood test can. For those sane and good individuals who get STD panels run regularly, that’s when they find out they have an HSV infection, even though they don’t have symptoms.
My guess is, the bacitracin helped because there was a concommitant bacterial infection due to the break in the skin caused by the herpes outbreak. No one ever said you could catch only one bug.
Yes. Opportunistic infection LOVES breaks in the skin. I have eczema on my hands, and if the skin breaks, I put on triple antibiotic twice a day. This doesn’t do anything to help the eczema go away (since no one knows what causes it or how to cure it), but it will prevent an eczema outbreak – which is only an annoyance – from becoming a weeping, oozing, flaking, steph-infected mess of a wound. Not 100% prevent, but probably 9 times out of 10 if I’m diligent the skin heals itself without incident. I still have the eczema of course, but it isn’t disgusting.
Since we’re sharing, this is my dispatch from the Embarassing Ooze wars.
So im hoping for some info before i make a doctors appointement. My problem is what is described as hemorrhoids but prep h does not do the trick. I’ve went through 3 tubes already over a months time. I experience anal leakage that produces an odor that i know is detectable by those around me. I feel the need to wipe alot and find a brownish-reddish liquid on the paper. Also lumps around the anus. There is no pain, only itching, like there are coarse hairs or a tear or something. This has been going on for some time now. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks
