Tag: life

Why I Don’t Say I Have Herpes On My Dating Profile

When I talk about my difficulties in dating one of the things I mention is having herpes. People have asked me why I don’t say I have herpes on my dating profile. This is an excellent question and whether to list a positive status is something that those with herpes often ponder. After all, if I eliminate the people who aren’t okay with this fact up front then my chances of finding a match should be better.

Everyone is going to have their own approach but here is why I do not state that I have herpes on my dating profile and why it works for me.

The first reason is that of all the things I want people to evaluate me by it’s not that I have herpes. Obviously, I’m not shy or I wouldn’t be talking about it now. Still, I want someone to know my qualities first and not the fact that I have a virus.

I believe there are good people who would rule me out if they read about herpes in my profile. I get it, herpes can be a complication that some may just simply choose to avoid entirely. So when they see it in a profile they think “well that person is a good fit but I don’t know what to do with that whole herpes thing so I’ll pass.” If I don’t list having herpes then I can disclose after a couple of dates. In essence, I’m banking on my personality and I feel much better with those odds. Now the same person may think “this is a really nice guy and we do seem to click so I’ll give him a chance.”

One of the things people ask is, “wouldn’t listing your herpes status connect you to other folks with herpes?” I think the answer to that is yes, and while I will gladly date folks with herpes, it brings me to my second reason which was a bit of an unexpected discovery for me.

I don’t want to attract extremely broken people. If that sounds harsh it probably is but here’s my reasoning. I recently joined four private Facebook groups for people with herpes. I was hoping that I might find some sort of kinship there. Instead, what I found were a bunch of sad sacks with a serious case of the poor me’s. I couldn’t handle all the negativity from these people who obviously felt like herpes made them irreparably damaged. Their anger and lack of self-worth spilled over into every conversation and what should have been simple posts became arguments and just another chance to put someone down.

Now I get it, herpes isn’t something most people choose but here we are so let’s just rock it. People generally spend so much time comparing themselves to others that they never take the time to figure out who they are. They think they have established a sense of self, but they’re far from it.

Humans have played this mental game with themselves for thousands of years and it goes something like this; these people are X and X is wrong/bad. Since I’m Y, I’m not an X, and therefore I’m right/good. If it’s not obvious the problem with this is that if someone only ever determines their worth as a product of how they deem someone else then it doesn’t take much to topple that house of cards. It’s not real self worth.

For example, if Jane thinks Ben is a dirty person because he has herpes then what will Jane think about herself when she ends up with herpes? The only thing that made her dislike Ben was a virus which she now has. Jane is going to feel like crap because her ideas of self worth were based on complete and utter bullshit.

Having contracted herpes these people have become the other (ie: the person they used to make fun of or think of as dirty) and it consumes them. They can’t get beyond how others may view them knowing what they used to think.

These folks are so beat down and fearful that many of them only want to date other folks with herpes. I really don’t want to attract someone who is scared of putting their self out there; someone who is just settling for another with the same virus.

If I date someone with herpes I want them to know they are still awesome. Keeping my status unlisted seems the best way to accomplish this. Someone will have to be bold enough to put themselves out there knowing their status and not knowing mine. I want that bravery for myself and from a partner.

Another reason I don’t give my status on my profile is that I don’t view the effort spent on someone else as a waste of time. Anyone who has ever uttered the phrase “you wasted my time” after dating someone when it didn’t work out is probably a piece of shit parading around as a human being and I put probably in there just to make me sound nicer.

Dating, hell life itself, is about taking chances and being vulnerable. If I date someone for a couple of dates (or months) and they drop some facts on me I can’t handle (like they watch the television show The Bachelor) I don’t view it as a waste of time. I took a chance and now I know we aren’t compatible. That’s good information to have. I consider information gained as a win. We didn’t work and I can look elsewhere.

The final reason I don’t list my status is that I’m perfectly comfortable talking about the fact that I have herpes so it’s not necessary for my profile to do that. I envision that dating me is a bit like blunt force trauma; someone is going to get all my truths in a very short period of time. As a result, I reveal my positive status fairly quickly so someone will know within three dates or less. By then, they have had the opportunity to briefly size me up (as I mentioned previously) and see if they view me as a potential partner.

Those are my reasons. Ultimately, I’m just a person looking for my person. In doing so, I hope to find someone who has done as much developmental work on them self as possible. Keeping my positive status off of my dating profile seems to be the best way to find a good match.

This One Goes Out To All The Queers

I fucking love you. I hope you’ve realized it already but if you haven’t let me tell you how special you are. In our society there is a lot made of the normal mode of being, which is to say heterosexual. As a queer person you firmly encompass a group that sociologists and philosophers like to term other. In a cookie cutter world (I’m not anti-hetero, I have straight friends) what a wonderful thing to be.

Chances are as queer folk you’ve felt at some point as if you are on the outside looking in. This can feel isolating at times, but it gives you a perspective that few hetero folks will ever have. This different way of seeing and interacting with society is why I love you. It’s for this reason that I wouldn’t want to be anything but queer. I love the insight and the way it sets me apart from most folks.

Let’s be honest. You will always encounter those who don’t get it. Worse yet you’ll always be able to find someone who actually says something shitty. Trust me, I’ve been called a faggot but there’s something very important to remember about these interactions. These people are afraid of what you are.

There’s probably a variety of reasons for this. People straight up (pun partially intended) fear what they don’t comprehend. There are also people who can’t handle their thoughts. Perhaps they are struggling with the fact that they really are queer or maybe its something way smaller like seeing some other person of the same  gender and finding something about them attractive. These are normal things for people to feel but some just can’t handle it. These people are failing to accept something about themselves and not only will they try and mask their thoughts with derision and hatred towards others, they will simultaneously dislike you because you have accepted what they won’t. You being the best version of you is a threat to them.

This isn’t your problem, though they sometimes do their damnedest to make it yours. Hold your head high and be fucking proud my beautiful gendered and agender family. You are part of a diverse and colorful tapestry of the world.

If you believe biology shapes us then we are a wonderful variant meant to define the nuances of life. If you believe nurture holds sway then we are simultaneously a part of and yet a defiant and proud offshoot of our parent culture. Either way if society thinks life is simplistic and deterministic then allow us to show them otherwise.

Even among our wonderful queer family we have many nuances. We are gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, agendered, transgendered, transsexual, asexual and even more. All I ask of you is to fucking love who you are because you are gods damn beautiful. Bloom, like only you can do and fuck the rest of the world. At the end of our lives we aren’t going to care that we played by the rules and fit in. And we certainly aren’t going to care what some muggle said to us as we crossed the street. Rather, we are going to care that we were out on that street in the first place, that we lived our lives by our rules, cared for those around us, and that we went after what’s important in making us whole.

So please, more than anything else, love who you are because who you are is amazing.

Postscript: Case in point: The finishing touches to this piece were done between sets at a She/Her/Hers concert in a garage filled with queer folk dancing their asses off. Such a beautiful thing to experience.