QuestionHi doctor, and thank you in advance for read my question, I am recurring to you as my last resource, first of all I want to apologize for my English, it is not my first language. I am a 28 years old female, I have been with the same partner for the last 2 years and before him I only had another sexual partner for 5 years. 6 months ago, I had a episode of what my gynecologist said was genital herpes. I have to say that I had all the symptoms of herpes, it starts at the beginning with being very itchy all the vaginal area, then it came the lumps the it came the ulcers, my doctor prescribe valtrex, and everything clear up in a week and half, it was the worst time of my life, it was so painful that I couldn't even go to the bathroom, I thought I was never going to be able to get out of that situation, my doctor made a blood test the same day I went to her office and I tested negative for genital herpes, she repeated it one month later and still was negative for genital herpes, she keeps telling me that what I had was genital herpes. The other part of the puzzle is that my boyfriend, which is not a promiscuous person, is clean of stds including genital herpes. I haven't have another outbreak since then, so could it be a posibility that I could have had something else rather than genital herpes, are there any other conditions that mimic the genital herpes? in case it could help, i am Hispanic, living since 2 years ago in the USA, I am originally from the Caribbean region, and my partner is from Eastern Europe.
AnswerHello Elaine,
Your English is very good. Painful ulcers in the genital area are almost always genital herpes. If a herpes culture was done from the ulcers, that would confirm it. A blood test tests for antibodies that the body develops against the virus. They may take 3-4 months to develop. Perhaps half of the adults in the US have positive antibodies to herpes, although most of them (like your boyfriend) have never had symptoms. We can carry the herpes virus and never have symptoms. Whether any symptoms develop and also whether you ever get a recurrence seems to depend a lot on our immune systems. I suspect that what you had was genital herpes, and that if the blood test is repeated 4 months after the episode it will probably be positive.
