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Alcohol Blackout - HIV fear

Last night I got very drunk, and while I remember most of the night, I only vaguely remember driving in my car to go to McDonalds. I know it wasn't the most intelligent choice I made, I could have definitely put myself, or others, in danger. But when I woke up this morning, I had a persistent thought, or image, of me having gone downtown to pick up a prostitute, or any 'willing' person, and perform sexual acts with him or her. Now I'm not homosexual, and I don't fear homosexuals or homosexuality, and furthermore, even in the case of the opposite sex, I am quite shy, and don't get to have a lot of sex very often. It is true I have a persistent fear of acquiring HIV and, possibly, infecting my friends or family, and I don't know if I did what I did, commit a sexual act with someone I met on the street. I've never done anything like that before, and I rarely do have sex, but because alcohol was involved, I question whether something like this happened to me. Would I know deep-down if something like this happened, despite the alcohol? Am I under the grips of a delusion? I have to admit I have anxiety problems involving HIV, and I am seeing a counsellor, but she has been unavailable for the past couple weeks, and I've been making inroads, but now I've been hit with this, and I don't know what to do. My apologies for bombarding you with this. I just wonder what your take on it is. Is this a false memory? Can OCD make us feel like we have committed something so outside ourselves? And in truth, would our very selves stop us from doing something like this, even while drunk, because it is against our individual nature?
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Avatar universal
Hi , I´m from Chile Southamerica and I have your same problem OCD with  the same fear (HIV) and also I have feel several times the exactly same situation like you after drinking  . The best you can do is try not to drink or drink less and of course forget that episode I´m straight like you but if you have homosexual sex overall for the first time you would know it next morning by your *** pain and other things, doctors say this  . Don´t worry I understand you 100%.and I´m sure you didn´t have sex . Even my wife told me the same when I have these torturing thinking . It´s a horrible feeling but please forget all and try not to repeat a black out .
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Avatar universal
I think that if you actually found some random person who was willing to have sex with you, you would remember at least bits and pieces of it, not just having a vague feeling that you had done something.  Since you are afraid of HIV, it sounds like your OCD is really making a stretch to somehow connect you to the possibility of being infected.  And like caregiver222 said, HIV is difficult to get (medical personnel who get needlesticks with syringes while working on HIV positive patients get infected only 0.3% of the time).  Plus, if you were drunk enough where you blacked out, you probably would not be able to function sexually.

Yes, OCD can make us doubt ourselves and our nature.   Alcohol lowers inhibitions, but does not make us do things that we have no interest in doing.  If you are not gay, being drunk is not suddenly going to make you so.  I'm glad you are in therapy for OCD, but it sounds like you may want to look into your drinking.  You are much, much more likely to harm yourself or others by driving drunk than you are to be infected with HIV.
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144586 tn?1284666164
First of all, these can be false memories. Second of all HIV is not easy to get. Over ten years ago I was stuck by a syringe from an HIV infected patient and never seroconverted. In any event, it takes six-to eight weeks for seroconversion to take place and a test before that period of time is not helpful.
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