SPFPP 252: OHA Series - Introduction and Overview

Beginning this project, I had a hypothesis that people who tested positive for an STI would not find the resources they obtained from health care providers useful if they’ve been given any resources at all. Only one response was yes to the information being useful, but with the caveat that it was very basic. Another consistency with the SPFPP 2021 herpes survey results was that people who test positive for an STI are more likely to not test positive for a second one. My reasoning behind that is because of the communication skills they develop through their own self-education about STIs leads them to vetting partners differently than they have in the past about sexual health. What you’ll find over these podcast episodes is that the most useful resources in navigating sex after their diagnosis is that they didn’t come from their health care provider at all. Whether trich, herpes, chlamydia, or HPV, the resources they received from their health care provider wasn’t useful for them. In these podcasts you’ll hear many of the guests share that their journeys led them to online resources and social media accounts talking about this very thing. This begs the question “What is it that these people who’ve tested positive for an STI are learning that makes 70% of them go on NOT to test positive for a second STI?”. How do we integrate their lessons into the existing CDC recommended STD Prevention efforts? I further hypothesize that while use of condoms is presented as the “best” protection against STDs, it is worth noting that my guests speak about using condoms with partners, yet still tested positive. A major difference is that they learned to communicate in their relationships about their needs and set expectations with partners intentionally rather than under assumptions. This means that they were initiating conversations about sexual health, PROPER barrier use, and STI testing routines.The CDC says to get tested and know your status, but it also says to remain abstinent and practice mutual monogamy. Many of the prevention efforts as they exist are assumed norms in sex around intercourse. Part of the communication people have expressed learning is that there needs to be an uncoupling of intercourse and sex, and then separate sex from pleasure. That last part I predict can be done in sex education. Our podcast guests from this series speak to how kink and BDSM negotiations for play between partners has nothing to do with sex most of the time. What happens in these negotiations is that language is being co-created for consent, people are identifying and asking for their needs to be met while determining if their play partner is capable of meeting their needs for the play being negotiated. Boundaries are set during these negotiations, and an established STOP or safe word is determined. During this vetting process, we identify potential red flags for abuse or green flags for a healthy interaction. Through the practice of these negotiations, people are able to move forward and have set expectations for an interaction and know that if anything goes wrong or is off, that’s been pre-negotiated and they know where to go for support. Equipping people with this communication foundation could not only minimize STIs, but also rape, violence/harm, negative mental health impacts, abuse, and self-suffering in silence due to not knowing where to go for support. This podcast series has brought to the surface these needs here in Oregon which reflect much of the podcast’s experiences that have been shared on SPFPP since 2017. Thank you to the team at the Oregon Health Authority for allowing me to explore these findings with the funding to put time into it and get these findings to back up the work being done through SPFPP. This sets us up to explore the need for integrating these experiences into prevention efforts.