A Little Concern

[brendn]

Greetings all.

After doing a good amount of searching on this forum (and elsewhere), I get the feeling I'm going to get the "no risk" assessment, but I still want to explain my situation.

First and foremost, I'm a 21-year-old male college student that is often sleep deprived and stressed, so I'm pretty susceptible to getting sick. For example, I ended up with the shingles last year as a series of exams came up, and I've made myself violently ill as finals have approach.

I haven't had sex in two-ish years, and since then have been tested and whatnot, all coming back negative. I try to keep as safe about my sex life as possible, which usually means avoiding casual sex and not stepping past third base; I guess I'm holding out for a committed relationship to hit a home run.

The last week of last month, I went on a date with a guy and ended up going to his place to watch a movie. We made out for a while before falling asleep.

The next morning, we made out and fooled around a little bit. Most if not all genital touching was done through underwear aka undies never come off but for a brief second towards the end. There were two times that I sat on top while kissing (both times undies were on), and he proceeded to stick his finger up my wahoo maybe an inch to an inch and a half in, which lasted for maybe 30 seconds at most both times. At one point, he was masturbating with his underwear on, but I don't remember the exact timeline of how things unfolded. I didn't ask him about his status (big mistake on my part, I know) because I knew ahead of time that I didn't want to have intercourse or even oral sex; any masturbation that occurred was done by himself, and I knew fingering was no issue.

Jump forward to last week, which would have been about two and a half weeks since that encounter. Monday and Tuesday I had pulled two consecutive all-nighters after a weekend of drinking with a big exam on Tuesday, and come Wednesday evening, I developed an extremely painful headache that I'm assuming would've been approaching migraine level (I've never had one before); it hurt to move, my skin hurt to the touch, and so on. The next day, my head still ached, but I decided to skip classes to recoup as I hadn't slept at all for three days at this point. During the day I felt fine, but once the evening rolled around, I was at the same state as the night before with sore joints and swollen lymph nodes galore. Also, I did notice that the top of my left arm was red (flat and even) like a mild sunburn, which it also felt like a sunburn to the touch. I live in Wisconsin, and if you haven't paid any attention to our weather as of recent, it's definitely not been shorts weather around here. Additionally, that morning I woke up with a sore throat and a slight amount of mucus in my throat. I checked my temperature before bed and saw that I was running a slight fever in the 101/102 range.

The next day, the fever had broken but my head still slightly ached, nowhere near as bad as the previous days. It took until Monday for the sore throat to go away completely. The rash, if it was a rash, was gone by Sunday.

Now, I do understand that symptoms alone cannot diagnose HIV because of how many other illnesses they can apply to. I guess the only one out of the bunch that is throwing me for a loop is the rash. And, of course, fingering is considered "no risk," but I guess I'm worrying about the possibility he had wet semen on his finger when the penetration occurred (Again, I don't remember the timeline of when fingering and masturbation occurred). Yes, I know that HIV does not survive well outside of the body, but if there are thousands if not millions enveloped in a sample of semen -- that is probably an exaggeration but I'm sure there's usually quite a lot -- couldn't plenty survive while the ones on the outer edges are slowly killed off? Not to overanalyze... I'm an engineering major, it comes with the territory haha.

If it weren't for the fact that I coincidentally got sick (and that darn rash), I wouldn't have started worrying. I have an HIV screening scheduled for next week at the 30 day mark, so that'll certainly help put my worries to rest if it comes back negative. I'd still have another one at the 3 month mark.

I guess I'd just like to hear some thoughts. Sorry for the book of a post.

[Jeff G]

You are correct that you fall squarely and snugly into the NO RISK assessment . It sounds like you have been having regular sexual health checkups but I'm going to offer this advice anyway . 

HIV is acquired sexually from engaging in unprotected penetrative intercourse so you were never at risk . ALTHOUGH YOU DO NOT NEED HIV TESTING AT THIS TIME, anyone who is sexually active should be having a full sexual health care checkup, including but not limited to HIV testing, at least once a year and more often if unprotected intercourse occurs.

If you aren't already having regular, routine checkups, now is the time to start. As long as you make sure condoms are being used for intercourse, you can fully expect your routine HIV tests to return with negative results.

Don't forget to always get checked for all the other sexually transmitted infections as well, because they are MUCH easier to transmit than HIV. Some of the other STIs can be present with no obvious symptoms, so the only way to know for sure is to test.

Use condoms for anal or vaginal intercourse, correctly and consistently, and you will avoid HIV infection. It really is that simple! .

I wanted to go over the testing window period with you . If you ever feel that you have had an exposure the appropriate time to test is 6 weeks post exposure and then again at three months . I read you intended to test at 30 days so I wanted to give you the correct CDC guideline on testing . I stand by my statement that there is no need to test over the incident in question though .

[brendn]

Hi there.

Background: Last Monday I was closing the window in my kitchen, and while doing so the glass broke and cut my left hand in several places (older house from the 1800s + cold weather + very thing glass pane = brittle). The worst cut was on my middle finger about an inch from the tip, not quite on the top but not quite on the side either, which bled profusely for a good 20 minutes. I had it bandaged for two days but decided to remove it on Wednesday so that it could air out and begin to scab.

Last Friday I was going out to grab drinks with a friend at a local bar, but ultimately the plan fell through after I had gotten to the bar. I decided to stay and grab a drink before heading home, but had another guy approach me and we began talking.

Eventually this lead into kissing and him wanting me to come back with him to his hotel room to "cuddle," which I said I did not want to do as hook-ups and such are not my thing. To temporarily tickle his fancy, I said I'd walk him to his room.

When we got there, he stood in the doorway and persistently tried getting me to come in with him, before he began to drop his pants. He was wearing underwear, and they were extremely saturated with pre-ejaculate.

I remember him taking one of my hands from my side at one point and rubbing my fingers over his penis, through the underwear, in the wet spot, so my fingers got a decent amount of precum on the tips. However, I can't remember which hand it was. I'm certain he didn't rub my hand in such a way that the wound directly touched the wet spot had it been the left one, namely because the wound was still tender and would've hurt from the friction. It hadn't scabbed at this point and there was a little bit of clear liquid on the surface last I had checked. I removed my hand after 5 seconds after I realized what was going on, nothing else happened, I said I needed to go, and I left and rushed home to wash my hands, but at that point it would've been probably 45 minutes since it happened.

While I know that HIV doesn't survive outside of the body very well, and that intact skin isn't a route for infection, I am curious about a few things.

First, since the wound was not bleeding, and therefore the blood had clotted, is this considered direct access to the bloodstream? At this point it had been 4 days since I had gotten cut, and it was clearly still open without a scab over top; you could see the underlying skin layer. The cut was circular and approximately 3-4 mm across.

Second, precum through underwear. The underwear looked to be made out of polyester and the wet spot had presumably been there for a while, although still receiving a fresh supply as he was still turned on at that point. Would the combination of the exposure to air and the chemicals from dryer sheets/fabric softener/detergent hinder the virus in as little as 5 minutes?

I don't know his status, and I didn't bother to ask since I knew I wasn't going to do anything with him. Knowing my luck, it was the left hand he had grabbed, but I can't remember exactly. It wasn't that I was intoxicated and can't remember as I only had one drink; more of a heat of the moment thing I guess. I guess I just find it ironic that I try to abstain from casual sex and have something like this happen instead.

Thanks for any replies.

[Jeff G]

Please only post in this one thread and do not start another . You can visit your profile and select show own post and it will take you here .

HIV is acquired sexually from engaging in unprotected penetrative intercourse so you were never at risk . Please reread this thread and the previous advice I offered .

The risk factors for HIV are ...

Sharing IV drug needles immediately after use.
Unprotected anal and vaginal sex.
Mother to child during or shortly after birth
Very specific healthcare situations.

HIV isn't transmitted in the manner you are concerned with so there is no need to test over this specific no risk incident .

[Jeff G]

Please read the posting guidelines before posting . I will remove one post so that you don't use your final question for nothing .