Something Positive for Positive People

I’ve been struggling g with “fitting in” and I think it’s because I’ve allowed so much of my social media consumption to dictate how I behave even if I don’t agree with it.  I took a break from social media and really reconnected with these repressed aspects of myself that I started to believe were “wrong” back when I went to visit Germany in October, and then realized there’s nothing wrong with me, or anyone who thinks there is.  In my travels and moments where I’m disconnected from social media, what I’ve started to ponder is where I belong, where my people are, what’s my community, and how do I find people like-minded who I can absorb from and pour into? Reality is I’ve not been able to connect with people on a genuine level because I’ve not been myself, I’ve been a product of the algorithm telling me how to interact with these strangers online through likes, comments, and shares.  Many of my thoughts aren’t “like” worthy and a lot of things I desire or believe in leave me isolated because the people who most put themselves out there operate in extremes, whereas most people who think realistically just aren’t involved in putting themselves out there to be connected with.  That all said, my place I belong is wherever the fuck I create the space to be, and that’s wherever there’s the work to be done that only I can do. I’m here for it.  The HSV Kink group can be found here: https://fetlife.com/groups/251020

Anthony and I have an open dialogue. We are 2 Black Men close in age with a willingness to challenge the status quo. I mostly let him talk and instead of pc-ing the language for the listeners' comfort, I let it ride. We discussed how sex positivity is not helping create strong Black families, We discuss how having preferences is offensive to some populations. We speak to a lack of accountability from some communities of people as well. Follow Anthony on Instagram @iamcontroversy

After losing the audio where our guest Lauren shared surviving abuse in a marriage, we FINALLY got to revisit the convo. Apologies in advanced just because my mics didn't have the setup I thought I bought, so there's significant moments of background noise between the pug and Lauren's partner. Basically this sounds like every other podcast episode haha. I think this episode will connect with people who've aimed to fix people, and who live by loyalty due to their religious ties. Some people sty in relationships too long after their expiration date, and Lauren shares a story that demonstrates that well.

Sarah, @Bloodswanmusic on Instagram shows up for a live podcast recording on Instagram if you want to watch. We initially began with her herpes story as we usually do. But then we went into discussing co-dependency vs interdependence in relationships, love addiction, disclosing celibacy, the difference in dating men vs women for her as a bisexual woman, and how all these other things in our lives with much more weight than herpes tend to not carry as much weight to us as an HSV diagnosis does. Here's the Love Addiction Podcast I referenced: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4Nu9tF2AtwAGYMVNPtanwk?_authfailed=1

Zach 38 year old man who tested positive for HSV2 in 2017. Our episode here really emphasizes the quality of communication that comes from an STI diagnosis increasing. This is something that can be integrated into an intervention that serves people who have yet to test positive for an STI and for those who date or will date someone who has at some point tested positive for an STI. We speak about kink/BDSM negotiations coming after an STI diagnosis and how a little more care goes into it when someone has an STI to disclose already. Zach shares how different his chlamydia experience was compared to his herpes diagnosis as well, given the symptoms were so bad with his first outbreak. He was in a committed relationship with a partner who was told by a provider she was “good” after having come in for what in hindsight was likely her initial herpes outbreak.

Elle (She/They) 35 year old Mother, Sex Worker and Educator who’s had experience with chlamydia, HPV and oral HSV shares a powerful perspective with us on how bias shows up from health care providers when sitting across from someone who IS comfortable talking about sex. The greatest analogy here was from how prepared we are for sports, but not really and how we are prepared for sex . . . but not really. The similarities are described in this podcast episode. If we all knew the risks of playing football for example, would we sign up for it just because it’s fun? We aren’t nearly as well prepared for sex, but we do it anyway and deal with the outcomes of it. What does preparation look like? For football, we don’t explore every potential injury and then consent to participation, it’s just wear a helmet. For sex, we don’t explore every potential injury/infection, it’s just wear a condom. Elle speaks very well through points of our ongoing SPFPP messaging of “Sexual health is mental health” given we want health care providers to see patients as whole humans rather than a consequence of an action that may not align with that provider’s on values. As we wrap up this series for the Oregon Health Authority, we again see that patients need better resources to navigate STIs in and out of the doctor’s office, and that it often takes a diagnosis for someone to begin to learn the things they wish they learned from their doctor.

We talk details about her sex education and how it completely missed the mark for teaching youth to communicate boundaries, consent, and vetting practices for playing in this project that ultimately just said don’t have sex and if you do you’ll be contaminated. Uncoupling pleasure from sex and intercourse from sex allows us to see all that sexuality encompasses. Adults dumb down common sense youth has essentially putting them on an escalator for failure in their sexual relationships to further detour people from sexual pleasure in a safe way. These tools early on can make us better patients to providers and therefore make providers better for patients, but for some reason there’s such a resistance to the comprehensive lessons of sexuality education because intercourse and pleasure are so linked together. Jade speaks to the antistigmatizing health care she received and how that coupled with coaching and kink/sex positivity set her up for success moving forward in her dating life after her chlamydia experience.

Tori, freshly 29 years old (she/her) shares her experience with revisiting planned parenthood 4 times to receive a herpes diagnosis. She brings up a good point about grief, and we tie the lessons she learned through grieving her old self can be integrated into this sex avoidant society we live in. The barrier to the sexual health convo coming from people who DO NOT have an STI is simply them receiving our experiences and lessons post-diagnosis. This communication is a critical part of prevention efforts and is far under-utilized as a sex positive approach falling to the prioritization of a sex avoidant approach such as “use a condom” exclusively to reduce risk of STIs.

Ashley (She/Her) shares her experience testing positive for chlamydia, HPV, and HSV1 and 2. What developed from this conversation is that sex positivity is pleasure positivity. She shares how being sex positive is essentially an acceptance for the lifestyles and decisions of others in relation to their on sexualities, but what was missing from my perspective was how in sex positive spaces, the emphasis is on one’s own needs and how accepting they are of themselves. This was my third recording today and interestingly enough, the conversation about institutions needing to be involved with the folks who are out here educating large audiences and who engage on social media need to be considered for partnership to improve efficiency of messaging. Ashley was on top of her providers, but she shouldn’t have to have been. After researching online about her own diagnosis and becoming more educated, you hear her share how she essentially became the educator of her providers about HSV.

Elle (she/her) is a 27 year old sex positive Oregonian. She’s heterosexual and monogamous and ironically our talk led to this statement of mutual non monogamy which you’ll hear more about here. Diagnosed with HSV-1 genitally just a few months ago, I was really shocked at how cool she was with talking about it so soon. We talk about how her self education led her to discovering the most useful information she received was learning how others navigate discussions about HSV, disclose and just overall talk about it. It’s odd that health organizations don’t want to work with those of us who are being sought out for sexual health information at all. My resistance was that I’m not credible because I’m a dude with a podcast. Now, as a non profit, I’m still just unable to get connected to anyone at the CDC for what’s a no brainer collaboration to minimize new STI transmissions. We’ll get there soon though, with or without the support of major institutions.