Life With Herpes
How to Fill out Online Dating Apps with Herpes
I get a ton of questions from people in our Secret Society asking if they should date in a regular dating site like bumble, tinder or match or if they should go to a specific dating site for herpes. That's a great question! In my opinion, if having to reveal that you have herpes is going to hold you back from going on dates then absolutely go to a herpes dating site. The elephant is already out of the room and you both know that you each have herpes. What could be better than that?
Regardless of it being a “herpes only” dating site or a “religious dating” site or just a “hookup dating” site whatever it is you still have to fill out your profile and you still have to have the conversation about having herpes.
On any dating site they're going to start off the same types of questions; What's your gender, name, age, where do you live, what's your profession, ethnicity, do you want children, do you smoke, do you drink, and other pretty generic questions. A non herpes specific dating sites they’re now asking people about STD’s!!! One of the questions asked if you’d feel comfortable dating anyone with herpes! I think this is awesome!
With the herpes specific dating sites there are a lot of herpes specific questions. So before we get into necessarily how to answer that let's just talk a little bit about Herpes 101. Okay so there's two types of herpes that were concerned with here. One is HSV-1 and one is HSV-2. Both HSV-1 and HSV-2 can cause oral or genital herpes. One of the biggest misconceptions is that HSV-1 only stays in the oral region and will never go in the genital region or vice versa. Just an FYI there's a lot of people being diagnosed with HSV-1 genitally. If you want to learn more about herpes you can click here and here
Now back the dating sites and why it's important for you to know if you have HSV-1 or HSV-2. Here’s the deal it’s possible for you to contact the other herpes strain. A perfect example is my personal situation, I have HSV-1 and HSV-2. Have HSV-1 orally and HSV-2 genitally. It’s rare for people to get both strains of herpes however like my personal situation it is possible. So if that's something you're concerned with then it's really important that you're aware of what strain you have and potentially what strain your partner has.
Ok back to you filling out the dating site information on a herpes specific dating site it’s important to be as specific on your herpes location and type. This way you and your potential partners can have a heads up. Remember, as I was explaining earlier, you could have really any combination you can have HSV-1 orally or HSV-1 genitally you can have HSV 1 and 2 genitally you can have HSV-2 orally.
I took this from a dating site word-for-word and this is how it reads:
HSV-1 usually cold sores HSV-1 usually genital HSV-2 usually cold sores HSV -2 usually genital I don’t know where I have herpes I don’t know what type I haveOkay, so if you know where you have herpes then click the appropriate box. But if you don't know let's help you figure that out.
There's a lot of situations where people know they have herpes and know where their outbreaks are but they don't know what type it is. If that's you the best thing for you to do is to go to your doctor or whoever diagnosed you and ask them to look into your paperwork and find what strain you have. The blood test or the swab test will tell you what strain it is. If it’s too much of a hassle for you to locate your original herpes diagnosis paperwork then ask your physician to run a blood test. Again, this is not crucial or required but it’s probably best to know what you have so that you can communicate that with your partner.
If you’re reading this and thinking how’s it possible for someone to not know where they have herpes well let me tell you. This happens all the time. These people are asymptomatic which means they don’t get outbreaks but because they have the viruses they’re still able to transmit the virus to potential partners. In this situation just fill out the questions to your best ability and let your potential partner know that you have herpes, you know what type it is but don’t know where you have it.
Ok, so I hope this helps you with the herpes dating sites and filling out what type you have and why it's important. Of course as always, if you have questions feel free to reach out to me.
Oh and here’s a list of the dating sites I recommend:
MPWHDating Positives Life With Herpes Details:
HerpAlert (use promo code: lifewithherpes and get 10% off)
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Xoxo,
Alexandra
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