She never told me she was positive

[Lezblover]

I'm a lesbian and I've known my girlfriend for years now but just began dating a few months ago. Today her daughter made a big deal about her taking her meds and my girlfriend was just like "yea I took it". The thing is she told me the meds was for depression and other mental and emotional problems. She's been hospitalized over the years that we've been friends but I was always told that it was for her heart or some other noncontagious problem. Well, being that she hides her medicine and doesn't take it daily I figured she's like my father and doesn't want to take it because of the side effects. So as soon as I opened the medicine bag I see the cocktail of retroviral and freak out. We've had unprotected sex more than once and the sex have been extreme sometimes. I feel so betrayed because I thought we could talk about everything and she didn't really want to talk but she did answer all of the questions I had. She says it's not detectable but I'm still afraid. I love her, but I do want to make sure I don't contract it. I've heard of lesbian safe sex but never practiced it (only had 2  partners before her). Is there any practices we should incorporate into our daily lives and sex life? Is it OK to express my fears and "aha" moments with her(she told me once that her family has a red plate,spoon, and cup at their house for her to use)? Also, I tested negative 4 days ago, should I be tested again and if so when?

[Joe K]

Hello Lezblover,

I am so sorry that you are in this situation and I have some information to share with you, regarding safe sexual practices.  The first topic is cunnilingus and I will quote Ann on that subject:

Quoted from Ann:

"HIV transmission doesn't stand a chance of happening via female genitals to mouth - there are just too many obstacles on the oral route.

The first obstacle is the mouth itself. The mouth is a veritable fortress, standing against all sorts of pathogens we come into contact with every minute of our lives. It's a very hostile environment and saliva has been shown to contain over a dozen different proteins and enzymes that damage HIV.

HIV is a very fragile virus - literally. Its outer surface doesn't take kindly to changes in its preferred environment; slight changes in temperature, moisture content and pH levels all damage the outer surface. Importantly, it needs this outer surface to be intact before it can latch onto a few, very specific cell types and infect.

Which leads to the second obstacle. HIV can only latch onto certain types of cells, cells which are not found in abundance in the mouth.

The third obstacle to transmission this way is having HIV present in the first place. The female secretion where HIV has been shown to be present is the cervicovaginal fluid. This fluid is actually a thick mucus that covers and protects the cervix.

The fluid a woman produces when sexually excited comes from the Bartholin's glands, located on either side of the vaginal opening. I have yet to discover one shred of evidence (and believe me, I've looked) that shows this lubricating fluid to have any more HIV present than other bodily secretions such as saliva, sweat or tears. Saliva, sweat and tears are NOT infectious fluids.

So there you have it. Once the results of the serodiscordant studies started rolling in, what we know about HIV transmission on the cellular level was validated. The only people who were getting infected were those who had unprotected anal or vaginal intercourse. Period. One of the three studies went on for ten years and involved hundreds of couples. That's a lot of nookie.

There have been no fewer than three separate serodiscordant couples studies (where one person is HIV positive, the other negative.) These couples were tracked for three. five and ten years. The couples used condoms for penetrative vaginal and anal sex, but NO BARRIER at all for oral sex. Any kind of oral sex. These studies yielded NO infections.

Another area would be the use of any sexual devices.  You should avoid using the same device as your partner, unless you clean it between uses, or use a condom on it, for yourself, to avoid any possible infection.

Kissing and sucking on nipples are not a risk for infection.

If you wish to test for HIV, you can read about testing here: Testing Information

I hope this information was helpful and welcome to the forums.

Joe