hiv risks

[littleun5]

I had unprotected sex 9 months ago.  3 months after I developed herpes and it reocurred a few weeks later.  I have beeb feeling fine up until a few weeks ago when I had chronic pain in my chest & I was told I had pulled a muscle.  Last week I started having a cough shivering and bringing up phlem.  I had a lump just below my ear lobe which has gone down after 3 days.  I have occuring spots that seem to take some time to disapper within the genital area.  Please help as I am going mad wondering the possibility of having hiv

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

Welcome back to the HIV forum. Presumably this represents a new exposure since your question on this forum almost a year ago.

There is nothing in your symptoms that suggests HIV.  The possibility of catching HIV from your eposure 9 months ago is impossible to judge without knowing more about its nature (sex of your partner, his/her HIV risks, the kind of sex you had, condom use, etc).  However, the risk usually is low from any particular sexual encounter, and your symptoms do not suggest you have HIV.  So the odds are strongly in your favor.  But the only way to know for sure is to be tested.  As you already know from Dr. Hook's reply to your last question, 9 months is more than enough time for a definitive test result.

If you are not under professional care for your newly diagnosed genital herpes, please see a health care provider about it.  You might benefit from anti-herpetic therapy to help prevent recurrent outbreaks and also help prevent transmission of the virus to your current or future sex partners.

Feel free to return and tell me the result of your HIV test, which most likely will be negative.  There is no point in any follow-up questions until then.

Good luck--  HHH, MD

[littleun5]

I know you said there was no need to respond but I was looking at sites on the internet and it said that women with hiv are more likely to have abnormal pap smears which I did 2 months after this encounter.  
I haven't felt unwell until recently when I had flu like symptoms and have suffered with headaches for the past two weeks.  I am experiencing pain in my knees and getting tingling feeling in the top of my legs.  I am having a hiv to be sure because I can't cope with the anxiety anymore.  

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

It is true that women with HIV are more likely to have abnormal paps.  But the reverse is not true:  women with abnormal pap smears are no likely than other women to have HIV.  

You still describe no symptoms suspicious of HIV.  Instead, they sound most like the physical manifestations of stress, anxiety, or depression.

Apparently you still have not been tested.  See a health care provider about your symptoms and, because you are nervous about HIV, get tested for it.  But do not return to this forum until you have done that and plan to post the test result.  Any other comments will be deleted without reply.

[littleun5]

Hi
I would just like to say a big thank you for your help I had my results back today and it was negative.
Thanks again

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

Of course you are the only persons surprised by the result!  But I hope your experience will help others who are hesitant about HIV testing to just do it.  If negative, it will resolve one's worst fears.  And if positive, for most people the relief from knowing will blunt the bad news.  (But 99% of people who ask questions on this fourm should have no serious worries about having HIV.)

Anyway, congratulations on the negative result.  Stay safe.