This is what having to get tested for STIs taught me.

[Anonymous]

While I was waiting for the doc to call me to his office I looked at the posters on the walls. One said 'STIs are not preventable, they're inevitable' and the cynic in me couldn't help but think 'Yeah, they only tell us that to make us feel better about ourselves'.

How did I get myself there?

Bluntly: I like myself some casual sex. I'm not the kind of person to hook up with someone different every other weekend - and normally I prefer to have a friends with benefits - but every few months or so I just feel like it and hook up. I don't see any fault with it either. Normally I am very strict about always, always using a condom but I must admit: this time I fucked up. Majorly.

To cut a long story short: About a month after the hookup I got a text from the guy, telling me that he got tested positive for chlamydia and that I should get tested as well. The time we had penetrative sex without a condom amounted to maybe a minute or two (until I told him to put one on or I'll leave) but even a minute can be enough and there are some STIs that can be transferred orally, chlamydia being one of them (to my knowledge, don't quote me on that). So I had no choice but to get my ass tested.

The process of getting tested

I looked up the STI treatment center in my city and went there the next morning. It was a weird, little, hidden away entrance at the far back of the second biggest hospital complex we have. So much for not evoking shame in the people that have to go there. I had annoying flashbacks to that one time when I was 16 and the condom my boyfriend was using ripped. I was so fearful that I might be pregnant that I decided not to wait for my next period and get the morning-after pill. The doc I went to barely spoke my language and berated me for a good half an hour on the fact that I needed to use a condom and that the morning-after pill wasn't a permanent contraception option. No shit sherlock, I told you that the condom I used ripped. Needless to say that my experience until then with such matters hadn't been too positive.

But at the treatment center everything went down smoothly. The receptionist had a warm and welcoming smile and spoke in a way that took away my tension immediately. I had the option to take the test completely anonymously - I decided not to. I felt like I had to stand to my fuck ups and coating myself in anonymity would have been a lazy cop-out (ha-ha the irony). I then had to fill out a detailed questionnaire about my sexual activities. It took me about 10 minutes. Then I had to wait. I expected to see sleazy looking people in the waiting room: women that looked like hookers and men that looked like they might visit them but everyone was just as normal as me. Most people were my age, a couple of guys were a little older, one especially young girl seemed to have brought along her aunt or another close family member. They were all so uninteresting that I fixated myself on the aforementioned poster.

The patients were called up not by their names, but by cards with different colors and numbers, the men were sent to a male doctor, the women to a female one. I was called up after about 30mins of waiting. The doc was nice and calm, in the same way the receptionist was. I told her why exactly I wanted to get tested and not once did she look at me with disdain. Not one word on me not being 100% thorough with the use of the condom. Thankfully. It was nice to not be patronized.

A nurse then took a blood sample from my arm and I had to give them a urine sample. That was all. It took 30 minutes at most. I was told that I could pick up my results in a week and was sent home.

So today I got my results back. They were negative. The guy I slept with probably got infected after me, but he still contacted me, just to be sure. I am thankful for that. A chlamydia infection isn't a big deal, really. One pill and it's done. But if left untreated it can have disastrous consequences. It's better to be a little scared for a while and then find out it was for nothing, than infecting people with an STI that doesn't even show symptoms in 50% of affected women and 30% of affected men (again, don't quote me on those numbers).

So, what did I learn?

1. Get your ass tested!

Not only once you're scared that you might have something, but on a regular basis! Especially if you have casual sex with different people. And that counts for oral sex as well. I'll try to hit the 6 months/ once a year mark, depending on how many sexual encounters I have. Not only is it best for my health, but also for the health of my sexual partners.

2. Vaccinate yourself against Hep B!

There's a vaccine for an STI, use it! I've already got my appointment: next week I'll get the shot. A sickness can and will always harm you more than a little needle at the doctors office. It's worth it.

3. Be thorough with your use of condoms!

'But it feels better without', yeah so what? Are you going to put your or your partners health on the line for a slightly better sensation? There are no excuses. And if you're in a monogamous relationship where you already had sexual partners before meeting each other and are thinking about switching from the condom to the pill, get tested first. Be sure you are safe. Think about the not showing symptoms part I talked about earlier.

4. There is no shame in having or just suspecting an STI!

This is probably the biggest revelation I had. I wrongfully thought that STIs are something that would never affect me. Because I'm a smart women normally. But my one and first moment of stupidity showed me otherwise. Besides this being an extremely humbling experience, it showed me that it is an extremely normal experience. People have sex. People have diseases. And people having sex will most probably at one point in their life contract a disease. Yes, we can all protect ourselves but no one is 100% thorough, everyone will fuck up at one point. Diseases as such are neither moral nor immoral, it is the people around us that thrust those labels onto them. And in my eyes it doesn't make me a worse person for almost having contracted an STI. I don't feel any shame, I'm just slightly afraid of the stigma.

And that is why I'm writing this anonymously (see, we're coming full circle here). There are some nasty people on this website and in real life as well and I prefer not to have this experience linked to my screenname or my profile photo. Y'all can leave all the hate comments you want. Call me a slut, say I deserve it, pull out all your religious and misogynistic propaganda. I don't have to care. You don't know who I am and your screams of hate and disdain will fizzle out like the little bit of fear I had from potentially, maybe having contracted chlamydia.