It is funny to see the two constant reactions here. The, "man in college I once slept with the hottest yet sluttiest piece of gutter trash and had me a STD scare," reaction. The other which I think is more telling of our reaction to how we treat people in the first, "......and when the test came back, I was as clean as a preachers sheet." I mean of course we are only have each others word but it really does make you think about how socially ostracized these people can be. I'd say though out my adult life there have been maybe a dozen instances where some sort of acquaintance of mine supposedly had some sort of STD. I say supposedly because not one of them actually ever confirmed it and in a good portion of the cases could have been a third party spreading baseless gossip. One of my buddies from the dorms had the latter of the two happen to him with a lot of help from my jack ass roommate. My buddy had dated this girl for a while the first few years of college, but he was what you'd call a ladies man and like Tiger couldn't resist numerous girls throwing themselves at him. He broke it off with the girl, who had always been jealous of the attention he got, and she claimed he had given her herpes out of spite. She was friends with my roommate and when he heard this he fucking ran with the story. My roommate didn't want a story like this to pass him by so he let everyone know that our buddy supposedly was "burnt." It all came to a head when he snickered to our buddies new fuck buddy that she was now probably burnt for fucking this guy. She had serious OCD issues and I imagine she took the news pretty hard and immediately confronted my buddy about it. He of coarse didn't have any sort of STD and didn't realize everyone he knew figured he did. The shit hit the fan and he vowed to beat the fuck out of my roommate for it. I don't think theyve spoken since.
The closest I've come to a legit scare happened just before St. Patty's day. I had this red spot, see. It most definitely started as an ingrown hair, but even after I pulled it out, the spot stayed red. Not a bump, certainly not a sore, just a red spot that was noticeable when I looked close and was freshly shaved. So I go get checked, and for the second time out of the four tests I've had, the nurse borderline laughs at me (the other being the time I got checked for a white head), saying "I wish more people were as conscious about this as you, but it's nothing. Stop looking at it, you'll just stress yourself out," pause, looks somewhere else, "although this could be something." I momentarily freak, but she tells me that, if anything, it's some hard-to-pronounce skin condition that anyone who ever uses a public washroom could get. She tested it, and I was fine. What really freaked me out was in the waiting room, when I saw this smoking hot nurse. Somehow the prospect of getting diagnosed by a hot girl made things ten times worse. Luckily (along with being clean), I got the fat 'n jolly lady. The fist time I got tested was because a girl I was no longer sleeping with told me she started showing symptoms of the big herp, a few months after we stopped hooking up, which means I was exposed to the dormant(?) strain, or whatever. Still clean four tests/five years later, but what really stuck with me was what the nurse told me that first time. She basically blew herpes off like it was something anyone who does any kind of sleeping around, with or without a condom, should basically expect to get at some point. Said the 1/3 or 1/5 stat is only of people who show symptoms, but the actual number of carriers is closer to 50%. And again, that condoms by no means protect against it like they protect against baby scares (which I've thankfully never had). So....yeah. Happy humping everybody!
One of my all time favorite posts on the old Advice board was from a guy that had AIDS, and couldn't figure out why girls won't sleep with him after he told them. Focus: I've never been tested. I can tell you that it does not hurt when I pee, there are no bumps down there, and the common cold has not killed me yet. So I assume I'm good to go. However I'm about to turn 26. With my birthday coming around I have an actual desire to get in better health, so I don't die when I am 50. Stopping smoking, cutting my binge drinking down to a few nights a month, eating right, exercise and I figure I should probably visit the doctor for a checkup (since I haven't had one since I entered college 8 years ago). Until that day comes, I feel I can live comfortably not knowing. Maybe I would be more concerned if I got laid more. Who knows.
Ive had 2 pretty bad ones. One was a gross overreaction, the other was just odd. First, early into my freshman year of college, more or less sexually inexperienced (only one partner up till that point, add only 2 more in terms of oral), I showered one day to find a purple-ish circle in the middle of my, ahem, shaft. I start freaking out. Now at the time, I was semi-dating a girl who, in more clearer reflection, was probably more than classified as a slut. But I was head over heels into her, so I never paid it any mind. Now all of a sudden, I was damn worried. I have some sort of disfiguring STD. Go to the health center, see the doc, and he starts chuckling upon examination and probably from seeing the panic on my face (not because I have a small penis you assholes). "Son, you get tapped in the groin recently? Cause thats just a nice little bruise.' I thought about it and realized that said girl took a perverse joy in a little game of ball tapping when we were wrestling, flirting, etc... I breathed a deep, embarrassed sigh of relief, and proceeded onward by giving her titty twisters if she dared trying to smack me down there again. That ended that pretty quick. The next time was later that year, as I came home for the summer. At the end of school, I developed some sort of skin infection. All sorts of reddish bumps and such all over my groin and onto my manhood. Well, my panic is slightly less cause I had still been monogamous with aforementioned girl and she had had an STD test back in April when she went to the vagina doctor. Either way, I knew this shit wasn't normal. So I go to see my doctor at home, who was extremely cool, and explained the sort of skin condition I had and assured me it wasn't an STD. It often is spread in locker rooms and dorm bathrooms. If someone who had it used my towel (retrospect: my roommate hooked up with SKEEZY girls and had a habit of lazily grabbing my towel without telling me), or something of that nature, it could have been passed to me. However, it was a nuisance, contagious, and wouldn't go away on its own. Great, I figured I would get an antibiotic and be on my way...NOPE! Had to burn that shit of...with liquid nitrogen. Just like a wart on your foot. Let me tell you folks, I would welcome 5 Q tips up my urethra before I want skin lesions BURNED OFF MY FUCKING COCK with that shit. The actual procedure wasn't horrible because after 30 seconds or so, my whole groin went into pseudo shock and numbed up, but I was inflamed/scabbed over for a few weeks in which masturbation or sex was out of the question. Lord that sucked.
As a female, of course they test me just about every checkup. Although I went through my promiscuous phase after getting out of the service, I've calmed down in that area since then. Queue about three years ago, when the guy I was living with/had been monogamous with for over two years & I were having "issues" with him going out "with the guys" all the time, including overnight trips (I never complained, thought it was just because it was an hour drive to where the band was playing, and rather he stayed than get a DUI). I had female... problems, we shall say, to keep it simple. Googling basically told me, "Guess what! You have chlamydia!" Oh, great... and here I trusted him... Luckily, before I went the whole accusation route, I went to my gyno. Turns out I had a rather bad yeast infection. A few days of antifungals, all fixed. The only other scare I've had was the honest to <insert diety> I think I'm pregnant scare. When I went into the Army, the drill sergeant was taking all prescription drugs, including birth control. Well, after a couple days, he found out he couldn't do that with birth control, and gave them back. I threw them in my locker & didn't bother starting to take them again because what was the point? I knew I wasn't getting any for the next eight weeks... So I get through eight weeks of basic, then go through the next month of AIT. At this point, I haven't had my period since before I joined, so I'm not just late. I'm over three months late. Try explaining why you want to go on sick call to a drill sergeant who looked like a black Boss Hogg.... about three words out of my mouth, he tells me just go! Apparently the timing when I stopped the BCP combined with the mental & physical stress of the Army put my body into shock. Trust me, it's not fun to kick start it again. I think I know what the pain of contractions is now.... (probably TMI for the guys!).