It is not the actual hsv that is the problem with anyome who has it, it is the social repercussions when people discover you have it. It is how I watched people behave toward me, not the actual illness but the betrayal, disgust, and accusations of people around me I had known my whole life. No amount of commonality statistic can undo or sooth such an experience. If I was treated the same way because I decided to wear a yellow shirt on a wednesday, I would still be horrified and sad and equally troubled because of what I saw, felt, and experienced. The reason I know he gave it to me I get tested at the beginning and end of every relationship and insist my partner does the same. Both of us were negative. Time goes by, we live together. I am coming to the final stretch of a very well known and challenging university so I buckle down on course work, he starts complaing I dont spend time with him or I don't love him anymore and I do not understand why when I work hard because I'm thinking of a future together. He starts coming home at 3am, I ask if there is a problem, he says no and I am not the jealous type, I just wanted him to be happy and I have more time for course work so I'm thinking coo, win-win. Suddenly he gets a rash and says it is some sort of hereditary stress related condition from when he was a child and his father had it, and uses cortizone cream for about two weeks. A month later in to year six, I go to doctor for what I think is a bladder infection and instead discover he was having a little too much fun. I stay calm because I'm stunned, and I get out to the parkinglot and call. He says his ruined, hangs up, and I get home to all of my shit out on the lawn, locks changer (yes it was quickly executed without a moment of hesitation) and then I am getting a constant stream of texts from people who see on his facebook that we have evidently broken up because I am a filthy cheating back stabbing hoe. So yeah, I am pretty sure the question of what happened is not actually a mystery. I do not think back and feel pain for a diagnosis, because frankly, I don't know if out in the real world in person I am attractive or charismatic but disclosing on day one of a new relationship has never produced bad results and been relatively easy. No, I tend to think back and feel the horror of how the people I was related by blood to, my fiance I thought I was going to spend my life with, and people I grew up with since small child had all become strangers. It is the sudden realization of how people you love can turn without thought or consideration and take it upon themselves to punish you for something you did not do, and praise him, pity him, give him money to make up for the difference of income after I got kicked out, praised him for supposedly dodging a life changing bullet from a backstabber, meanwhile I'm the one getting texts that I should rot in hell and die. I'm the one waking up to a phone call from work suggesting I might be a liability, Then on the same freaking day getting confronted about cheating on a test with news spreading like wildfire of what I had supposedly done so people went along with it 'insisting'--because they thought it was 'justice'...and then the phone call where he pretends to apologize and wants to fix it...followed up with asking for money and my naive ass lends it just to watch him start screaming awful things--which led to me blocking hom on everything possible. (much more went on but I am only trying to provoke situational empathy to give an idea of how it was and not a laundry list of pity). I mentioned some fragments the situation in previous responses but there was wave after wave of torment and some new disaster or massive literal life changing loss every day for about a week that I really doubted I was going to suvive it. But then it finally relented and I stopped waking up to hateful text messages from people I cared about and pretty much understood that nothing else happened because I had nothing. So... I saw a text message years later and totally lost my shit for a moment and got so involved for a minute with the idea that there was some kind of twist of fate, karma, or whatever, that would give me something out of it. Except the minute passed and I understood I should have said nothing at all. Not gonna lie, it sucks because fundamentally there was no right way to step and there never actually ever was, and how easily everything can change or be destroyed so it must be protected, and that is basically the level of closure I got from it all. But if I am frustrated intensely by it, there is something wrong with me, and if I accept it and shrug it off regardless of what surprises come out of the woodwork that is actually the correct thing--it is painful, and it sucks, and believe me, I understand the feeligs will pass eventually, but eventually is further away than I like and it is not so easy to just say okay cool I have moved on, and not feel rhe tinge of anger when this is concerned. Wouldn't anyone lose their shit? But since it was me and not...you, I am merely fretting over something pretty much everyone has these days and understands it. I totally get that, but that knowledge changes nothing.