Having rather chunky outer labia and dainty inner bits, my only girly piercing options were the outers. I began with standard horizontal rings, which were basically rejecting the entire two months that I had them. Eventually, I had to face reality and take them out. A few months later, I replaced them with vertical outer labia piercings. I had 5/8" curved barbells, one on each side. Getting them hurt more than any other piercing I've ever had but I loved them so much! Healing was going beautifully. I lived with Advil and ice packs for the first week but things were almost back to normal after that. I had to avoid the really hard slamming action during sex but I didn't have to avoid sex so it was still okay. I kept feeling a need to show off my shiny bits so there was a looooot of sex happening around here. It was all unprotected. Having been in a mutually monogamous relationship since I was a teenager with neither one of us having any sort of sexual history (unless you count masturbation as sexual history), neither one of us thought we were meant in the CYA warnings to always use a barrier method of protection when you have unhealed piercings. We've swapped so much bodily fluid over the years that we figured anything we'd have gotten from each other, we'd already have. We were wrong.
At A Glance Author anonymous When It just happened Artist It wasn't his fault. He's still the best! Three and a half months into the healing process, things went from fabulous to, "fuck!" It began with swelling. I would probably not have noticed the swelling except for the fact that my barbells were sinking into flesh. I was wearing 1/2" barbells by this time so I switched them for the longer jewelry used for initial piercing. It relieved the pressure but things did not get better. I was getting a visit from my monthly friend so I assumed it was hormonal and would settle down. It didn't settle down. The fistula on the left side was growing. I could see into it. My piercings were done at 14 but I could probably have stuck a 10 gauge barbell in there without encountering resistance. I knew that wasn't a good sign. That was around the same time the insane crust action began. I had so much crust, I would stick to my pants within two minutes of putting them on. It hurt. It hurt a lot. Within a few days, I was in so much pain that I didn't even feel it when my barbell popped through about 1/8" of skin at the bottom. I knew it was rejecting and there was nothing I could do about it so I took it out. I took the other one out too because I didn't want to be lopsided but then I had a last-minute reconsideration. I wasn't giving up that easily. The barbell went back in. When the pain only increased, I assumed my remaining piercing was irritated from being changed too much. I was wrong but I didn't know that yet. A couple days later, it too popped through the skin by 1/8" and again, I was in so much pain that I didn't feel it happen.
When my first outer labia piercings rejected, the holes closed up within minutes of jewelry removal. They closed up fast and the pain went down dramatically, very quickly. That didn't happen after the removal of my verticals. The pain only got worse. I could feel hard, painful bumps under the skin. I wanted to think they were some sort of cystic acne. I didn't know quite what to make of the stripe of fluid-filled blisters that appeared on my outers. The slightest pressure made them pop and when they popped, they became painful. I did a web search to see if I could find any information on girly blisters. Of course everything turned up information on herpes. Herpes? What the hell? How would I have gotten herpes? Remember mutually monogamous relationship with the same person for practically forever, neither of us having previous sexual histories. And YES, I know it's been mutually monogamous. He has a fetish-like obsession with me in a very, very, very good way. So of course I dismissed the idea and forgot about it.
A week later, healing wasn't happening like it should have been. I was still oozing goo from the piercings. The morning I woke up with the pain still happening in my pants, the hard, painful bumps still under the skin but also inflamed lymph glands, I knew I had to see a doctor. I did not want to have to explain the piercings to a judgmental "why would you do that to yourself?" doctor but I didn't want to die from some horrible infection either so went. I saw a woman who's not my normal doctor because she had an earlier opening. I started to explain that I had some piercings and I thought they might have gotten infected. I never really got to explain the rest because she interrupted to tell me her usual nurse was married to a body piercer. She told me what she seemed to think was an amusing story about a pregnant woman who had a piercing embedded in her girl bits and how the nurse's husband was paid however much money to come in and save the day. Okay, let's focus on me? I'm in stirrups with my pants off this whole time, by the way. She finally stopped making herself laugh, lifted up the sheet that was covering up my girl bits and laughed. She literally laughed and said, "Infection? That's herpes!" While I sat there shocked by what she'd just said, she proceeded to go downtown without gloves on, looking for a pierced hood I guess. I was too stunned to tell her to put gloves on. Herpes?! What the hell? That's what I kept saying. I was running a low grade fever and that, the swelling, the inflamed glands, pain in general and the mystery blisters were all explained by herpes. That was all nice and tidy but how the hell would I have gotten herpes? I've heard you can get it from a cold sore during oral sex but my man's never had a cold sore. I was sure the doctor was wrong. She was sure she was right. I had to insist that she take a culture to be tested.
Keep in mind my man is sitting there in the room with me this entire time. As I'm trying to think of how the holy hell I could have contracted herpes, my doctor is laughing nervously at perceived tension in the room between me and my man. There was none. There was only disbelief. My man said his mother has always had a problem with cold sores. I asked if he could have gotten them from her and passed them to me. She gave me a look that said, "Honey, wake up!" and then she said, "It's sexually transmitted." She laughed and said he didn't get it from his mom. Then she said, "Who knows? Maybe she's cheating on you." She just kept laughing, like this was all very amusing to her. I started thinking about sex (I'm sorry I have a one-track mind) so I asked, "If I have it, he has it too, right?" She said we wouldn't know unless he got his blood tested for antibodies. Of course I wanted him to take the test. At this point, I just want things to make sense! She acted like it would be a bad idea but ended up agreeing to it. The extent of her sex advice went like this, "Well you don't feel like having sex right now anyway, do you?" She told me to go home and Google. What kind of lousy advice is that?
My relationship with my man is rock solid. At no point did either one of us question loyalty despite the seemingly ridiculous STD verdict. I was convinced I was going to go home and end up with a severe systemic infection because I could not wrap my mind around the herpes thing. How could we have been swapping fluids for more than 16 years with nothing and then *wham*, sexually transmitted disease? What the hell? I took my antiviral meds faithfully but I didn't believe I had it. There was just no way.
To make a long story longer, my test results came back positive for herpes simplex. They didn't tell me what type and I didn't ask because they called me at work and I had a coworker nearby. My man's results were positive for herpes simplex type 1. That's the oral kind. When he got this result, the bitch doctor (same doctor) advised him to not pursue it any further, meaning that she still thinks I'm cheating on him and he may not want to see that in black and white. I'm not cheating on my man. He's not cheating on me. We now know you can have the herpes virus and pass it on to other people without ever exhibiting a single symptom. And he didn't. He's never had a cold sore. The best explanation we've been able to come up with is the virus entered my body during oral sex through the cuts made by piercings. It explains why I would get this now, after all this time, and why the symptoms began at the piercing sites. It didn't happen with my first genital piercings because I was in too much pain to have that kind of action. My piercings could have rejected as my body's way of trying to remove the irritation. If only it was that easy. I now have this virus for life but because it's the oral kind, there is a good chance I'll never have another outbreak. After enough time has gone by, I might think about trying the verticals again. I'm in a little too much pain to think about it right now.
This is a long story so let me list the important points for those of you skipping straight to the end.
1. A whole hell of a lot of people are carrying the HSV 1 virus with or without knowing it.
2. You can have the virus without ever having a symptom.
3. You can also share the virus without exhibiting symptoms.
4. No saliva anywhere near open wounds!
5. Use a barrier method of protection when you have unhealed piercings even if you have been in a mutually monogamous relationship forever and have no reason to think either of you has anything.Also, I just have to note my piercer is by far cleaner than my doctor. The few people I discussed this with immediately pointed to my piercer. "Do you know you didn't get it from him?" Well, yes. He could have all kinds of diseases for all I know but the man is CLEAN. All his tools, needles and jewelry have been sterilized. Unlike my doctor, he's never gone downtown without gloves - sterile gloves, I might add. At my doctor's office, I was sitting on a piece of paper. In the piercing chair, I'm on a plastic-backed dental bib placed over a chair that's been wiped down. Nothing was wiped down at the doctor's. Herpes needs a warm, moist environment to survive. The only warm, moist environment in the piercing chair is the one I always seem to leave behind me when I get up. Oopsie.