Dated someone who was HIV+

[azure.sky31]

Hi all, i am new on here and wanted to talk about what has been stressing me out. I had sex with a girl who revealed to me after that she was HIV positive. Thankfully i used protection, we only had sex vaginally. But unfortunately i have read that if a person has an existing STI, that it can increase the chances of contracting HIV, and sadly i have HPV. while we were having sex, the condom ripped but i am certain i caught it early, but i still might have been exposed even if just for a short while.

We had sex on Jan. 14 and i got tested Jan. 16. A few weeks later i got an RNA test which came back negative, i'm supposed to go back to get tested in March for a conclusive result. I have been scared nonstop of my increased chances of getting HIV. I feel so overwhelmed and mentally and emotionally drained, i really don't know what to do right now.

[azure.sky31]

anyone?

[herbie73]

Hi there, I honestly don't think you have anything to worry about, HIV is a very fragile virus and is quite difficult to contract especially the fact you protected yourself and it was only one time, its harder for a man to contract it from a woman, so please try and stop worrying, go back for your test in march to put your mind at rest, but I'm sure it will be negative, take care xx

[lior]

I have a friend that is going through similar worries at the moment. I had another friend who had a more similar situation to you, except that she was a girl, the man knew he had it and didn't use protection. (Not sure how anyone could be that morally corrupt.)

If you do have it, you would have caught it super early so it would be totally manageable, it's not a death sentence.

With regards to worrying about it: I learnt in therapy that there are two types of worry - productive worrying and unhelpful worrying. If a worry can be solved by problem solving, it's a productive worry. If it can't be solved, if it's a worry that is unlikely to happen, then there is no point thinking about it because there is nothing you can do about it. On the very rare occasion that the worry does come true, you will deal with it when you get there.

There is nothing you can do about this worry so there is no point thinking about it.

You know what I find? Usually, the things I imagine might go wrong don't go wrong. Other things that I didn't consider go wrong. I try to consider everything so that nothing goes wrong, but something unexpected always, always happens. It's not possible to imagine everything that might go wrong.

Does that help?

[azure.sky31]

thanks so much guys, i pray that i don't have it, thankfully we only had sex once and for a grand majority of the time we used a condom until i noticed it ripped, but because i kept checking it during that time with her, i am certain i caught it early but i don't know if there was any exposure to it, but i am feeling more calm, thank you, i just hope that since i have HPV, that the odds of contracting HIV is still fairly low.