HIV neg dating HIV pos

[cloud999]

so if i read all this right:
its not possible to know if your date is hiv+
-the incubation time of the virus plus the latency of the body building up a detectable level of anti bodies means you need to abstain from sex for a long time and be tested a few times during that time. no one is going to do this.

After initial infection, it takes two months for you to develop enough antibody to test positive.

Is it really impractical to expect men to avoid anal sex for two months?

[WesHollywood]

Wow, this thread has taken off and i'm impressed with so many of the posts.

I am, however, a bit concerned that some of the personal positions on this topic might be percieved as FACT. The bottom line when it comes to poz/neg relationships is: IT'S A PERSONAL DECISION.

For every horrible story of a poz/neg couple living with a black cloud of sickness, side-effects and pain, there is an equally uplifting story of a poz/neg couple living a full, happy and sexually fulfilling life together. HIV is a virus and how it effect each host is different. So we have to be mindful of keeping balance and compassion when we talk about this very important issue.

The only way to be 100% safe is to NOT have any penetrative sex with a partner (kissing, hugging, j/o are fine, but oral and anal - even protected is not 100%).

Regarding testing, that's such a difficult issue to wrap our heads around because test results are all about being HONEST! For example, if you meet a guy today and he says he just got tested on Oct 1 and did not have HIV. The next question is, have you had sex with anyone since Oct 1? If the answer is YES - even if it was "safer sex" - those test results mean absolutly NOTHING! So, say you BOTH go today and get tested and you both still test negative, the reality is the guy who had sex in Oct. after his Oct 1 test results mean you have to wait 2-3 more months and get tested AGAIN and THEN you have to both trust each other to NOT have sex with anyone else during that time period. Since hiv can take up to 90 days to show up in high enough quantities to be seen on a test, being 100% sure you or your partner is negative means a level of committment at the OUTSET of a relationship that far too few men want to deal with.

Heck, its tough enough getting a guy to go out on a 2nd or 3rd date let alone have an honest discussion about hiv, testing and sex - most guys just either don't want to talk about it or might think you're "rushing" a level of committment that they're not ready to make.

Finally, i want to say very clearly that i do not believe that "sero-sorting" poz should only date poz and neg should only date neg because of what i posted above. If you are sexually active you are at risk. If you meet a guy and you hit it off, you still reallydon't know if he's telling the truth about his test results, the number of partners he's had since his last test, etc - it's about TRUST and since this virus is so crafty, it's tough to ever know for sure UNLESS you both make that committment to be 100% monogamous during the 3 months between tests. Oh, and how many single gay men do you know that will make that committment in a brand new relationship.

I also don't belive in sero-sorting because: SEPERATE BUT EQUAL never, ever works! If you belive in serosorting, do you know how man guys who tested NEG 3 months ago are going to get tested again if they belive they'll be villified and separated from the rest of the gay dating pool? They will lie out of fear of being ostrasized - and that is the REALITY for so many sexually active gay men.

They test neg, and even tho they play around, even practice safer-sex, they belive they are "clean" and can still say they are neg - even tho they know that the minute they have sex with anyone - their last test is null and void.

Untiil there's a cure, we'll all have to deal with HIV in some way. For both poz and neg men, the reality that hiv is out there (along with HPV, HEP C, Syphillis, Gonhorrehia, herpes, etc) means all we can do is stay informed, practice safer sex and ALWAYS support and embrace those living with hiv. Pulling poz men aside from the community is NOT a solution - it only fans the flames of denial, intolerance and the spread of disease.

My 47 year old mentor has told me some of the wild sex stories about pre-HIV. I guess they had a ball, and VD visits for disease were a regular weekly trek - a shot killed everything! My mentor told me a story about walking in Griffith Park, and he walked passed a guy. They each walked about ten feet further, stopped, turned, and my mentor said, "My apartment is two blocks away." Evidently the guy said, "Let's go."

Bottom line is those days are gone. I was in a small bathroom in a gay bar. This absolutely gorgeous guy was in the bathroom and propositioned me then and there. He said he just came out and wanted to suck me off. Apparently, he had spent the last two days working his way to West Hollywood having sex at every stop. It was too good to be true, so I left.

Like I have said, in California "it is just sex," but 'just sex' can have life changing consequences. It is just not worth it. You do not want to limit your future relationships with the gay plague for a quick load.

[pellaz]

After initial infection, it takes two months for you to develop enough antibody to test positive. ...

question????
when the state of Colorado had money they offered a more sensitive test at the Denver General free clinic. now they only do the lesser sensitive test. you can also buy a drug store take home a test kit.

does it still take 2mo for all these tests?

[Uke]

HIV is a thing that freaks me out...or, well, HIV can be sustained but if it gets to the point it becomes AIDS, then it's not so cool.

I want to live in a normal relationship with my future boyfriend, without a fear of HIV risk. We all want. But for me, there'll always exist this shadow of angst regarding the issue

[cloud999]

question????
when the state of Colorado had money they offered a more sensitive test at the Denver General free clinic. now they only do the lesser sensitive test. you can also buy a drug store take home a test kit.

does it still take 2mo for all these tests?

There is new RNA PCR HIV testing that we do at our laboratory...but it simply isn't practical for the vast majority of testing, yet. We only use it if someone knows they were exposed to the body fluids of an HIV+ individual...or if they specially request it. This PCR method can detect HIV just seven days after infection...meaning you can be certified clean seven days after you last sexual encounter.

If you are desperate for an early yes/no, you could demand that your doctor order the HIV PCR test...but it will cost you several hundred dollars, at least, because someone like me needs to do it. And I don't work cheap! Your insurance won't cover the test without cause.

The good news is that our PCR methodology is rapidly improving, so it will become cheaper and more accessible as years go on. What took a trained individual 3-4 hours of RNA extraction and manipulation when I started five years ago, can now be performed by a machine in 45 minutes! In a few years, this PCR method will probably become the new standard.

In fact, my lab just bought a new PCR machine to perform flu testing this winter...perhaps we'll offer cheaper sensitive HIV testing next year, too.

[cloud999]

HIV is a thing that freaks me out...or, well, HIV can be sustained but if it gets to the point it becomes AIDS, then it's not so cool.

I want to live in a normal relationship with my future boyfriend, without a fear of HIV risk. We all want. But for me, there'll always exist this shadow of angst regarding the issue

Pandemics generally are terrifying, given how they threaten the survival of our species. People are rightly terrified of the plague, smallpox, the flu, and now HIV.

The good news is that HIV, unlike many other disease, can be prevented. Using a combination of serial monogamy, testing, and safe sex practices, HIV can be prevented. The people who were first infected in the 80s and 90s didn't have that ability.

It's far easier to prevent HIV then, say, smallpox.

---

I could tell you things about the evolution of infectious disease in our hospitals that would keep you up at night. In a few decades, HIV will be one of many incurable diseases we will be terrified of catching.

[dfiant]

The good news is that HIV, unlike many other disease, can be prevented. Using a combination of serial monogamy, testing, and safe sex practices, HIV can be prevented. The people who were first infected in the 80s and 90s didn't have that ability.

Ok, I'm officially confused.

HIV/AIDS came to the fore around 1983 as a sexually transmitted disease or 'The Gay Plague'. By late 1984 early 1985 we were bombarded with the 'Grim Reaper' series of ads (Here in Asutralian and I always thought that there was a similar adevertising campaign world wide), so why exactly wasn't there the ability to abstain from sex to prevent HIV infection in the 1980 and 90's. Is abstinence new technology discovered around the turn of the century?

The message from day dot about HIV has always been the same...Abstain, monogamy, testing and protection.

The only thing that has changed in the last 27 years is the way the disease is treated in people that are infected, extending peoples lives from a certain death within 5 years from initial infection (Which was at times impossible to determine as the disease manifests and progresses differently), to now whne we are hearing stories of people having and raisning families and are likely to so their children who were born after they were infected to see their kids 21st.

The other things that has changed is complacency, people are seeing HIV as less of a death sentence because a 20 year old infected can live to the ripe old age of 50 with treatment...The 'Grim Reaper' advertising campign needs to be bought back.

[Bowyn Aerrow]

After initial infection, it takes two months for you to develop enough antibody to test positive.

Is it really impractical to expect men to avoid anal sex for two months?

It can also take much longer. It was 2 1/2 years between the encounter that lead to my partner being positive and the positive test result. He got it from his ex (a real piece of work on so many levels).

While we tested positive the first and second time (set roughly 6 months apart) it wasn't until he developed shingles that he found out.

With our two negative test results we started bare-backing, and bare backed for nearly a year before he was diagnosed.

Talking with the doctor, there are cases where six years have passed between initial contract in of the virus and the test picking up on the antibodies produced.

That 6 month window they pass of is an AVERAGE, not a hard line drawn in stone. Most (not all) cases will develop detectible levels of antibodies in 6 months, some won't.

[Bowyn Aerrow]

Ok, I'm officially confused.

HIV/AIDS came to the fore around 1983 as a sexually transmitted disease or 'The Gay Plague'. By late 1984 early 1985 we were bombarded with the 'Grim Reaper' series of ads (Here in Asutralian and I always thought that there was a similar adevertising campaign world wide), so why exactly wasn't there the ability to abstain from sex to prevent HIV infection in the 1980 and 90's. Is abstinence new technology discovered around the turn of the century?

The message from day dot about HIV has always been the same...Abstain, monogamy, testing and protection.

The only thing that has changed in the last 27 years is the way the disease is treated in people that are infected, extending peoples lives from a certain death within 5 years from initial infection (Which was at times impossible to determine as the disease manifests and progresses differently), to now whne we are hearing stories of people having and raisning families and are likely to so their children who were born after they were infected to see their kids 21st.

The other things that has changed is complacency, people are seeing HIV as less of a death sentence because a 20 year old infected can live to the ripe old age of 50 with treatment...The 'Grim Reaper' advertising campign needs to be bought back.

It is the old 'It can't happen to me' Mindset.

This is the same one that leads to people living in trailers in Tornado Alley, living the known paths of hurricanes, living on the sides or in the shadow of active volcanoes, leads to massive building in flood plains, leads to people building houses on sides of hills that have a history of sliding, and many other things we humans do, even knowing that the risk exists.

"It won't happen to me." Is more prone to exist in 'kids' teens through 20's. But then they also believe they will be young and immortal forever too.

"It won't happen to me." is a survival thing. If we all worried about all of the real potential threats in life noting much would get done. This human 'blind spot' has allowed us to do many things as individuals and as a species. It is the opposite to fear, and is as illogical as fear itself.

Older guys/people in their 30's on ward are playing safe more often than the 20-something crowd, but then by the time you hit the big 3-0 you are much more aware of the dangers that are in the world, so start taking things a bit more seriously.

Back in the 80's when the epidemic started we were all pretty foolish. Least ways here in the USA were the government refused to acknowledge the issue and there were a lot of myths on how to not get it (Just douching after sex was considered good enough).

Today the older guys, those who lived through the 'bad days' who had friends and relatives contract HIV and go to full blown AIDS, wither and die are still affected by that time. The younger kids can't 'relate' to it all, they have no personal experience with the death part.

Seriously, a guy in a Death Suit on the TV has as much impact as the guy telling us 'this is your brain on drugs' then smashing an egg with an iron skillet. It is not 'real' enough. Only those who have 'been there' and 'done that' can understand these things.

[pellaz]

it's about TRUST and since this virus is so crafty, it's tough to ever know for sure UNLESS you both make that commitment to be 100% monogamous during the 3 months between tests. Oh, and how many single gay men do you know that will make that commitment in a brand new relationship.

honey; just the way its going to be for the next few years.