I have a worry which I think is completely irrational but can’t quite shake it.
About a month and a half ago I hooked up with a friend of a friend on a night out. I’m 30 years old, just like the girl I was making out, who I’ll call Julie, with while my friend recently turned 50 and, I think, feels somewhat protective towards me (I’ll call her Ana). We were clearing out the bars of their tequila stocks and the three of us ended up at Julie’s place.
Julie and I ended up spending the night on her sofa bed in the living room after Ana retired to Julie’s bedroom. We must have had sex 7 or 8 times over the night and morning after, which took me back to my first 16 year old fumblings. I am not used to one night stands, nor that kind of sex frequency but, naturally, found it delightful.
This took place on holiday in another country and I had to leave two evenings afterwards.
The worry has arisen because I noticed a small bump in my mouth on the lower frenulum (tissue connecting the tongue to the floor of the mouth). When we got back to Julie’s flat, Ana had helped prepare the living room while Julie was in the bathroom and laid out a load of condoms saying, “make sure you always use one of these, Julie is a bit crazy”. I obviously don’t want to slut-shame the woman I had a good time with. Her private life is up to her, and I have nothing to say against her lifestyle, but from a few comments it sounds like she has had an impressive number of partners. This is relevant only in that it fed into my later worries. The sex was all protected but not me giving her oral sex.
The bump on the frenulum I later discovered was likely due to over-exertion (or just the right amount, you could say) and, indeed, disappeared within a week or so. However, I also came down with a fever from hell about four days later. Sore throat, bad cough, in bed for a day - the works. I got over the worst of it after about a week but still had a sore throat, cough and stomach pains afterwards. About three weeks afterwards I was hit by another bout of illness, which sapped all my energy, kept me in bed and was also accompanied by bad throat pain and coughing. Again, the worse of it cleared up but the sore throat, cough and stomach pains lingered. This has persisted until about a week ago. I feel physically fine now - just a slight cough.
I know the risks of STD transmission from this would be low.
Quite early into feeling sick I came across the risk of oral HPV (from, of course, too much Googling). It’s the mouth/throat cancer risk that is playing on my mind, even if this is marginal. I had been been partying hard, as well as having just done a marathon a few days before, and running on little sleep, so I worried that my immune system was weak and would be more liable to infection. This of course would explain equally well a likelihood of coming down with any number of more common bugs, perhaps a common cold at the race finale. Or something else. Who knows?
The fact that there is no way to detect HPV makes it hard to get over this thought. I have had STD scares several times in the past and have been half-convinced that I must have caught something. Testing has never picked anything up - though it’s been a couple of years and I should probably go again.
There are two layers of worry. First, the level of immediate health concern and second, worrying about my own capacity for paranoia and autosuggestion and whether I can move on from this without having any testing to give reassurance. After going through STD panics, getting through the so-called ‘window periods’ several times in the past I should have gone for counselling to address this as a mental health issue. Inevitably as soon as any such episode had passed I just assumed it was a one-off.
I also went through a traumatic experience a few months ago and had already identified a pattern of things going wrong after drinking too much. Something bad has happened every time I have got drunk since that incident - so I was doubly primed to see things in a negative light. In fact I hadn’t been drinking for two weeks prior to the marathon but I was feeling good after the race and, well, not at all in the mood for moderation.
I am still chatting to Julie every so often so I feel guilty that these worries are playing on me.
I have been able to get over worry #1 but it is still there lingering the background. Then I pass on to worry #2 of whether I can move on entirely and forget about this. But worry #1 is still there and leads me to think, for example, “it’s not normal to have had a cough for this long and I would have been especially susceptible after the run and wouldn’t this just fit the pattern of bad things happening after drinking…” - and so on. Usually these thoughts happen in the background and normally I can find a way out of them and then I’m left with #2 again.
How can I find out more about this from reputable sources so that I can get a handle on what the objective risks are (presumably very low) and whether I can completely discount this having anything to do with my bout of illness?
As hinted at above, I think I probably need counselling and probably needed it before it came to this but it’s not something I’m familiar with so I’m hesitant.
Thanks in advance for any advice.
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Originally Posted by AMomentofClarity
