I get checked every year. Long story made short: got chlamydia and trich when I was 16 but didn’t notice it til it turned to PID. Went to the docs, they didn’t meantion any STDs so I figured I got it somewhere else (you can get it from vaginitis, as well, and my boyfriend wouldn’t cheat on me, right? :rolleyes: ).
6 months later I was in the hospital with excruciating pain, fever of 104. Abcess covering the entire posterior surface of my uterus. Finally diagnosed with the chlamydia and trichomoniasis. Almost freakin’ died (not an overstatement). BF at the time refused to get treated and insisted on no wrongdoing on his part. :mad:
I am married now (not to jackass mentioned above) and totally trust my husband anyways but it would not be an overstatement that I know what he is doing damn near every minute of the day. I still get tested once a year, along with my Pap and all that. I get tested for everything. And I wish more straight women (well, everyone, really) would.
Got checked up before deciding to stop using condoms with irishfella (hormonal birth control for baby proofing). It all checked out, so we stopped using condoms. Got checked again at my last smear. It all checked out again. Getting married in September, have a smear due before then, am not planning on getting an STD test.
I’m in a monogamous relationship, I trust my partner, so I’m not going to waste resources by getting unnecessary tests. However, I know that should that situation change, getting some tests done would be a good idea.
At this point in my life it doesn’t make sense to have regular testing, and while I understand that some people in relationships like to get tested regularly, I’m not one of them.
There is very little actual reason for a monogamous couple with known negative status to have routine tests. The key word being monogamous, if that is in doubt, then routine regular testing all round.
For me, if I felt that I couldn’t trust my partner to stay faithful, then, for me it would be time to get out of the relationship.
Blood transfusions, blood contact due to work [emt, medical personnel] accidental blood contact [someone has an accident somewhere, and you accidently get blood contact.]
To me, even if I were in a monogamous relationship, I would still get tested (and use condoms). Why? Because it’s a lot easier on everyone to do it from the beginning than to abruptly start.
As for resources, I understand the thought, but one test per year is hardly frittering away precious biomedical products when you compare it to the monetary and emotional cost of clearing up an STD.
Of course you trust him – but you still put on your seatbelt when he drives, right? STD tests are one of the basic precautions of life, not an exceptional control measure.
I’m not straight, but I know that most of my male straight friends (mainly single, professional, aged 25-30) get tested at least once a year. There’s a great service in central London which does free STD tests and then sends you a text message to give the all-clear.
I’ve heard a few horror stories though. My boyfriend asked his local GP – of all people – for a STD test and she reacted with some horror. She stuttered and asked why he thought he needed testing (“uhhh, are you living a high risk lifestyle?” :rolleyes: ). She wouldn’t administer the tests without umming and ahhing, so he told her to bugger off and went to a clinic instead. (He told me a week later – if I heard earlier, I would’ve reported the bitch.)
Also in the category of horror stories (funny, not serious like above) is a gay mate of mine who asked for an STD test and was promptly asked to roll over for an anal swabbing. The doctor then asked whether he’d mind if a (rather fit) intern sat in on the examination and watch him give it up for a cotton popsicle. :eek:
I trust my BF to drive, but I’m aware that road accidents happen. Someone might run into us, or he might make a mistake. OTOH, he’s quite unlikely to trip over and stick his penis in someone else.
How come everyone skipped over the socially responsible way of getting free blood tests. In Australia at least us regular blood donors get our blood tested everytime we give a bag. I recommend it to every sexually active single I know.
But men in monogamous relationships have had sex behind the backs of trusting wives (and husbands) since the dawn of time. It’s one of humanity’s oldest stories, and if the statistics I posted above are accurate, a major cause of HIV infection.
Most gay men I’ve spoken to about this know that they should either be having safe sex wth their monogamous partners. I’ve heard of gay men who have an arrangement with their partner whereby if they ever sleep around, they put on a condom – neither partner mentions it, and both partners are tested in six months.
I don’t know. I came out right at the right moment – after HIV transmission was well understood, and before it became taboo to mention it. My generation of gay men learned that a healthy amount of scepticism about fidelity is the only way to survive. As long as both partners take it as a given, it’s not a problem.
Heterosexuals, and especially heterosexual women, are far too complacent about this. That’s why heterosexual sex is the dominant mode of HIV transmission to women in the US (and probably other places), and why 2/3 of those who are getting it from heterosexual sex are getting it from their husbands.
(Not saying, of course, that queer people aren’t taking stupid risks, but complacency is only one factor – alcoholism, drugs, and especially low self-esteem are others. There are probably very few gay or bisexual men out there who don’t believe they’re a risk for HIV)
Would you advise a couple of your aquaintance (A and B) that they should be using condoms, in case one is cheating on the other? You have no reason to suspect that A and B are anything but monogomous, but would you still presume to caution A to take precautions, since B may or may not be fucking around behind his or her back.
Would you give this advice to your parents? What about perfect strangers?
Let’s keep in mind that HIV infections among committed couples in western countries remain rare. It is not useful advice to raise the spectre of spousal infidelity to push a safer sex barrow.
matt, to use an extension of your driving analogy, if I thought he couldn’t drive safely, forget seatbelts, I wouldn’t be in the car. My seatbelt is our commitment to each other to be faithful, and will be our marriage vows. If I thought there was any POSSIBILITY he had slept with anyone else, I’d be down to that clinic and out of this relationship before you could blink. I’m not being stupid about any of this, I just have faith in irishfella not to endanger my life.
As for blood exposure, that would covered by a mandatory occupational health blood test (I’m going to be a doctor in about 15 months), not an STD check, and I’d be wanting post exposure prophylaxis too.
As I stated in my first post, I have and the reaction was entirely negative. That’s why the concern.
My parents are a lost cause for any subject remotely touching on the modern world, and as for strangers, I find it is easier to discuss safe sex with people I don’t know than people I do.
Rare, but growing. But then HIV has gone from a handful of cases, to between 39 and 44 million people worldwide. That’s a mindboggling increase – it’s gradually creeping up to a noticeable percentage of the world’s population.
In And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts argued that if the world hadn’t been so complacent about AIDS in the early 1980s, it would not be the problem it is now. 20% of all new reported cases in the US are women, and men can get it from women, so it’s only going to become an increasing problem as time goes on.
Right now, in the queer community, we’re paying the price for silence. It has become so taboo to talk about AIDS that infection rates are increasing again. We have to start talking about this again, and straight people have to start talking about it, too.
Note that I specified western countries. 90 per cent of HIV cases are in Africa, Asia and the Pacific rim. HIV in the west remains rare. It’s perhaps not such a threat that we should be telling committed couples to cover up, in case either of them are cheating.
This says there’s 40,000 new HIV cases in the US each year, of which 12,000 are women. Based on this very small number, it’s perhaps unhelpful and possibly counter-productive to tell all women in committed relationships to use condoms (just in case he’s cheating).
I agree that people should be talking, but I disagree that what we should be telling committed couples to use protection. First, they’ll be (rightly) offended; and second, they’re going to ignore you.
(Really, can you imagine the bedtime conversation?: “Honey, can you put on a condom first? Why? Well just in case you’ve been barebacked by boys behind my back. Please?”
There’s probably nothing I can do to convince you of this, Jervoise.
But the queer community has suffered horribly for our bouts of silence on the subject. For me, it would be wrong to maintain silence on this issue even though the social taboo against speaking about it so great.
As your statistics show, things are even worse than I heard. Women who received the virus account for an even higher percentage than I’d heard, and your statistics have men as twice as likely to get the virus from heterosexual sex than the number told to me.
And there is nothing small about 12,000 people. Especially when that’s 100% increase in 24 years. I worry what the next 24 years will bring. Remember that with an incubation rate lasting for years, many people aren’t going to know they’re infected until after they’ve had unprotected sex – maybe with a number of people in our “serial monogamous” age.
The number of infections increases at a compound rate, and will only continue to grow until safe sex messages sink in. I certainly don’t see them spontaneously shrinking.
First, I’ve been checked, but not recently. Of course, I’ve also not had blood work, sex, or even swapped spit since my last test, either. (I suspect, based on reports from others, I’m about as close to asexual as a human can be. That or just so burned by people in general, I’ve suppressed that need.) Having said that, if I were sexually active I’d be into testing annually. While I’d been a regular blood donor, I counted that as a pretty good check, even though it’s not as thorough as a full STD check. BTW, for stats purposes - male, 95% straight. (i.e. I only get turned on by cute men and their butts after having been at sea for at least six to eight weeks.)
As for the debate about irishgirl’s decision - I take all the arguments about the statistics, but it’s also fair to point out that statistics are not individuals. There are committed, monogamous relationships out there. I’m enough of a pessimist that I think it’s wisest to continue with regular testing while in any relationship, but I’m also not going to push someone to get it, either. And, FWIW, I think that her situation is very different from the general case that the OP was referring to - she’s not saying that she objects to any STD screening, just that she doesn’t see a need for it, in her situation.
As an aside, I think that the view on the whole thing that the military has is actually one of the smarter ones going around - we can check this, so we will, every year. And I find it interesting that a number of posters have mentioned getting into the habit from their military service. I don’t know if it’s just military personnel are conditioned to not sweat the small stuff, or just get into the habit of CYA whereever they can. I just found it an interesting theme in this thread.
I have not been tested since before I got married - although I am a regular blood donor, which I suppose is testing of a sort. But I don’t donate to be tested - I donate to donate. As one-half of a monogamous relationship, my sex is utterly safe.
I’ve been thinking about the debate raging in this thread–how does a straight married woman know her husband is faithful? I realized that many times it’s because the wife knows her husband is too busy to be having an affair. If she can account for his time, she figures there’s no way he’s messing around.
“Let’s see…after he leaves home at 7:30, he drops the kids at the babysitter…she’s 82. Then he teaches snot-nosed little fifth graders from 8 to 3–hardly sexy. He has planning period until 4, which he must be using to do work, because he doesn’t bring any work home. He’s home at 4:15 playing with the kids. We spent last weekend doing yardwork and the weekend before that at my mother-in-law’s house. No way he’s cheating.”
And she’s probably right, even if it’s true that 60% of all husbands cheat on their wives.
My oppinion is I don’t much care whether somebody thinks it’s a big deal or not. People shouldn’t be sleeping with other people without testing, if such information is readily available. And it is. People who can’t afford to pay for it can go to free clinics. If one isn’t nearby, pay for a fucking bus ticket, at least.
Any woman who I was thinking of getting busy with better be willing to get tested in short order. If not, it’s to the curb, no ifs, ands, or buts. Nobody in their right mind should accept any less as a condition for intimacy. If you’re willing to take those kinds of risks with not only your own life, but that of your partner’s, you’re a stupid asshole, end of story. And I don’t have much time for stupid assholes. Too big of a deal? Give me a break. Grow the fuck up is what I’d say to that.
Using blood donations as one’s method of STD testing is frowned upon where I live and I would think in most other areas too. I wouldn’t do it for that purpose, either solely or as an addition to the socially responsible idea of blood donation.
My impression is that a lot of heterosexual men feel that STDs are not a worry for them. They think it’s unlikely they’ll get HIV from a straight woman; many STDs are asymptomatic in men; and many STDs can be cured by a quick trip to student health. Sexual health issues are women’s issues, in the minds of many straight men.