Herpes Doctor

Hi amy28,

It is a little confusing, I do agree. Genital Herpes is MAINLY contagious during the visible outbreak perios, but unfortunately also just before the sores are visible and in the so called viral shedding period, also called asymptomatic shedding. It means that the virus can be active without any noticeable symptoms. An active Herpes virus is contagious. Luckily, the risk is quite low outside the visible symptoms period. But it does partly explain why Genital Herpes is so common. The other reason is that condoms do not protect you 100% from catching it because you can get it not only directly on your genitals but also around them, anywhere between your knees and belly button.

And yes, your patner would get visible sores if he got it from you in a viral shedding period, just as if he got it from you in a visible outbreak period. But Genital Herpes can be latent for a while, anything between hours and years.

It's a tricky one. Some couples, where one has Genital Herpes, can live their entire life together without the other one getting it, while other people get it from a one-night-stand with protection. It's a question of being in the right (or wrong) place at the right (or wrong) time.

Luckily, Genital Herpes is by no means a life threatening disease and most people learn to live with it.

Read more in our Genital Herpes FAQ.

Thanks for the response, the whole viral shedding really confuses me bec. they say you can be shedding the virus even if you don't have an outbreak that's why I can't understand how my boyfriend would be able to get sores if I didn't have any at the time. This is the first time in 10 years I have had an outbreak! I got herpes from my first boyfriend when I was 19, he was cheating on me and infected me when we had unprotected sex one time.I had forgotten that I had herpes until I recently got an outbreak, it's been really hard and depressing to have to deal with the bad memories and now I'm scared to death to have sex with my boyfreind, we do use condoms most of the time but I'm constantly worried about it not covering his whole penis. I have not told him about the herpes bec. I think he would really freak out and it's been hard to try and hid from him. I've been having to make up excuses to not have sex. I hope I don't get another outbreak for 10 years again!

Great post !! !