Congenital Herpes
I recently about a year ago found out that I and my wife have genital herpes. I feel I gave it to her because I have always had cold sores all of my life. We have been married for 25+ years. The problem is my daughter has tested positive for herpes. Could she have got it by being born with it? She has no syptoms, she only got tested because I was concerned that it was passed down at birth. She is in a serious relationship and does not know what to do. Do you have any suggestions
- Herpes Doctor - Public Forums:
Herpes is not Hereditary
Hi,
No, Herpes is not hereditary. Another poster had a similar problem.
I am assuming your daughter has Genital Herpes. She probably got it from a sexual partner. Genital Herpes is actually very common and so are cold sores. Your daughter will have to tell her current partner about her Genital Herpes. She might want to consult her doctor on how best to approach the subject.
Kind regards,
iv
congenital herpes
My daughter does not have genital herpes, she only tested positive for exposer. She does not have any symptoms.
Daughter has herpes virus
I think that person misunderstood what you meant. It could be that techinically she has genetil herpes regardless of where it is at because of the strain, but I understand why the way that response was written would upset you. Herpes is herpes as far as I am concerned, blisters all look the same if they are on the gentils or the mouth or the nose, etc.
A friend of mine was born to a mother with an active gentil herpes breakout during labor. "L" has had the virus her whole life (she is mid-twenties) it comes out in and on her nose and mouth. Your daughter may wind up the same sort of signs.
The most common time a baby is exposed to genetil herpes is when the mother has no idea she is breaking out and gives birth vaginally. Unfortunately, due to the dificulty of women seeing thier internal leasions, many find out the way your wife did, by the baby having the disease.
You are safe to have more children, even vaginally. Now that your wife knows, with the next baby(ies), the two of you and her OBGYN can keep an eye out for outbreaks around delivery time. If there is no outbreak then vaginal is safe, if there is your wife will be given an emergency C-section. Some women take herpes meds in thier last trimester to make sure that the disease does not become active during labor.
The sores may show up later in life, "L" told me once that they used to be only inside her nose at first, then spread around to the outside of the notrils and her upper lip later (mostly from blowing nose during cold with active sore in nose). Make sure with the next child(ren) that you don't let them share nose asperators and such, and keep an eye on your daughters mouth. The eyes are the main danger, if the disease comes out in her optical mucus glands (tear ducts) it can cause cornia scaring (blindness), your pediatrician should be watching it though, plus the first place they put meds on the newborn is the eyes to protect against that or any other funkies (yeast infection for example) messing up the eyes. I would not encourage mouth to mouth kissing either, in case she does show up with it on her mouth later, she will not feel that a kiss on the cheek instead of the mouth is a shun, if that makes sense?
Hope this helps. And remember, you and your wife had no idea you had this, your baby girl looks just fine and loves you, this is not your fault. By the way, out of four couples I know of who have a total all together of 9 children (7 over 25 and 2 still little), where at least one of the partners of each couple had GH, "L" is the only one to contract it from her mother (parents). Just because your first child caught it doesn't mean the rest will, and "L" and her sister "A" do not have any animosity about "L" having it and "A" not having it.
Mommy to be
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