Something Positive for Positive People

Jordan joins us following her 1 year anniversary of podcasting to reverse the script . She's interviewed me on her podcast to discuss my experience and work living with genital HSV2. What she didn't tell me, was everything she shares on this podcast! As a health care professional, she was able to validate the gap of experiences between patient and provider when it comes to HSV. Connect with Jordan by checking out her podcast, "Vaginas Vulvas, and Vibratiors" Or follow her on Instagram @Jordandnelle

This was supposed to be a quick update on the survey and overlooking herpes in relationships but it turned into an hour long celebration of our success with this 2021 HSV survey! If you've seen the movie 300, you'll know what I mean when I say I'm feeling like King Leonidas of Sparta in the mofo right now! We got MORE than 1,000 people to rise against the Trojan Empire... Stigma! We have declared war on stigma and this survey creation was the initial kicking in the chest of the Trojan messenger that came up in our house, Sparta for peace! You ain't gettin that up in here SON! Okay I am getting carried away lol but you get the point by now. Anyways, the podcast stresses the importance of identifying what's important in your relationships. For me, I learned from my last relationship the importance of communicating with emotion vs communicating. Emotions can be the undercurrent of language/words being communicated and aren't something to be avoided through repression or ignored altogether. Ask yourself are you supported, challenged AND celebrated in all your expression/identities by your partners/communities/relationships. Are you communicating what you need when you need it? As much as I try to downplay my experience with herpes, it's a major part of my life and identity, but by choice. I understand this to be valid now, and the validation of this in my expression is important as it is part of my self expression. Survey results are being cleaned up and I'll post them to the website as soon as I can! Thanks for your support and patience!

I interview 35 year old Lauren. A bisexual polyamorous woman who shares how she began to reconnect with her body after some unethical decisions that revealed to her who she was NOT. We discuss dating out of convenience, and then transitioning out of the space you no longer wish to reside in. We speak to a few ways she was able to obtain her own self-validation through masturbation and self-exploration. An interesting exchange of dialogue around people disclosing one partners' HSV status to another, and what would it be like if people had to disclose that they had been intimate with someone with HSV in the past to potential partners. Link to the 2021 data collection survey is in the show notes or can be found here: https://www.spfpp.org/take-the-2021-spfpp-survey

The journey from resistance to receiving is tough. Think about how we look at what a herpes diagnosis has taken away from us without ever looking to see what it has given us. There's a natural rejection to what is undesired, followed by an inevitable need for acceptance to it. I interview a fellow Yogi who shares how he began to heal by accepting that his herpes diagnosis was a good thing for him.

Bek Antonucci joins SPFPP sharing everything we stand for here. The interconnectedness of mental health and sexual health that becomes inflated by herpes stigma is something we explore without herpes even taking up more than 10% of the conversation. This episode is about avoidance and what it looks like in action. We also dive deeply into what it looks like to break patterns of avoidance and Bek does it so smooth. We talk about blaming people as a form of avoidance, staying in a relationship with someone we resent as a form of avoidance, use of substances as a form of avoidance, sex, and being around people who aren't in alignment as a form of avoidance as well. I consider this to reflect the direction of where SPFPP is now, where a lot of what we're talking here is about recognizing patterns in behavior and changing what we don't like, accepting what we do like. This is an episode of self-discovery, exploration, and healing through the lessons of avoidance. Follow Bek on Instagram @bekantonucci

With consent from our clients who've gone through SPFPP therapy services, we share our first exit interview featuring Ali. Ali is a 32 year old black presenting, able bodied, bisexual, fun-sized cis-gendered woman. While she received a diagnosis for HSV-2, making her a candidate for SPFPP therapy, she wanted to explore and understand her anger toward her father, and do something about it. This episode simply sums up her experiences throughout therapy and how it helped her relationship with herself and the relationships around her.

Herpes education advocacy is an entry point to healing whether it be healing others or self. It's important to understand our intention going into herpes education advocacy and remain true to it because there can be pressure coming in from all angles that causes us to burn out the inspiration candle. What I offer here is my own experience with the life cycle of advocacy and my entry point into it.

I'm joined by two friends who attended a recent social gathering for one of the herpes groups we're part of. We talk about the headspace one should probably be in prior to joining in order to get what you need out of it. Katie, Laurie and I share an overview of our initial experiences within the social groups as well. There were some new concepts of disclosure that came up in this episode about redirection to get to your destination, and that's where disconnecting the dots came from.

A solo episode brought about from reoccurring conversations I'm having with people around herpes disclosure and how it impacts one's confidence. A major question to ask yourself throughout listening to this episode is just how much value are you placing on your sexuality and ability to mesh genitals with a potential partner at the expense of your own humanness. Think about all the other things to disclose and have disclosed to you. So often, in our minds, herpes disclosure takes over our ability to recognize things non-sexually that are far more important to us than STI status is. We talk through several considerations for disclosure on this episode. Enjoy!

I get real vulnerable here which seems to be what people think I do on a regular, but it is very challenging for me to do this. I ask for help. I don't need it RIGHT now, but it's also not really for me, it's for us! I'm creating a survey for only people who have herpes created by us for us so that we get representation of our lived experiences out there to the world in a way that presents data. My goal is 1,000 participants which would really increase our credibility. The survey link will be shared once it's ready. I hope that everyone listening and who sees this will do their part in getting data that is relevant to us and updated with 2021 information that we care about. And I talk about my thought process about ending the SPFPP podcast and stop bullshitting myself about the excuse I was making for it. Listen to find out.