Many people who discover they have genital herpes feel as if their love lives are over – and this is just not so! Herpes is just something people *have* - it’s not who they *are* as people. As we’ve mentioned elsewhere, the stigma associated with Oral Herpes is nowhere near that of Genital Herpes, and yet the symptoms are the same – it’s basically a difference in location only! Herpes is not the end of love, sex, or the world!
Relationships are essential to people – we all enjoy the connection we feel with others, especially a romantic partner. It’s a need we all have. Relationships can bring us our greatest joys in life. And having a virus does not eliminate this need, nor should it eliminate this important element from our lives.
Once you’ve come to terms with the infection and learned to manage both the physical and the emotional aspects, you may be thinking about getting back into a relationship, if you’re not already in one. This can be a tricky and vulnerable time, as you open your heart to a new person and face the inevitable “conversation” about HSV. This is a time to be true to who you are, continue to maintain your self-esteem through personal development, and stay on track with your health and energy practices. Please read some of the HFiles Success stories to see how others have tackled this situation.
A great way to get back in the swing of things is to try Online Dating. Internet Dating has become a part of everyday life for many people – and thousands of couples have met and married online. Offered here are several of the top sites for Online Dating, with a few tips on how to navigate each site. HerpeSite has joined the Affiliate Programs of these sites – which means that if you click through out links here and join, we receive a small spiff. These programs help us to defray the operating costs of keeping up the Site which has been a labor of love for us all these years. (For your confidentiality, the links are anonymous, and are not reported to us other than by numbers.)
Just click on the link, check out the site, and have fun!
#1. Be sincere, but don’t take anything personally! While Online Dating has resulted in many matches that we personally know of – it has also become so popular that the less serious folks have joined en masse. People online can be rude, flakey, and obnoxious. You *will* be rejected on a daily basis for all kinds of reasons, none of which have anything to do with your worth as a person! But you will also meet other sincere, nice, fun people. You just learn to weed for them! Online Dating can take nerves of steel at times – just keep at it and, again, don’t take any rejection personally!
#2. Write a good interesting profile of moderate length that describes your unique individuality, use spell-check, and put up clear smiling photos that represent your looks as they are now. Profiles with photos get 3 to 10 times as much contact as those without.
#3. Decide what your “deal-breakers” are (age-range, location, height, kids, religion, lifestyle, etc). Reply to those people who meet your top 4 or 5 criteria – and who has written you a proper email with at least one full sentence! (Some people send out dozens of emails a day, often with little or nothing in them – these people will waste your time.) Beware of the long “novella” messages that describe their likes and dislikes, and often describe what they want to do with/to you, yet make no mention of anything that you said in your profile. These are nothing more than form-letters and also tend to be written by time-wasters. You will soon begin to recognize a sincere, real message from someone who actually took the time to read your profile. These are the ones to respond to!
All these caveats aside – Online Dating can be a fun adventure and a great way to at least practice your Dating skills. And, like so many others, you just might meet your soulmate!
General Sites:
MatchMaker.com: This is one of the more established sites, with a lot of flexibility. You join the MM site that’s in your area. You can put up a profile for free, and respond to mail send to you for free also. If you want to initiate contact with others, you need to pay to join. The fees are reasonable. MatchMaker is a big site in some areas, but has few members in others. You can check it out for free and see if it will work for you.
FriendFinder.com: Also a well established site. On FriendFinder you can also join and put up a profile for free, respond to mail and send “winks” free, but to initiate contact and read the full profiles of others, you’ll need to pay to join.
Passion.com (AKA AdultFriendFinder): This is a huge Adult site, “the Leading personals site for dating, romance, marriage, and fun.” With over 17 million members to date, it’s owned by the same company that owns FriendFinder. While the main concept of the site is “sexy personals for passionate people” and caters to the sexual side of relationships, there are also many people on the site who are there to find relationships also. You just have to be very specific in your ad that that is what you’re looking for – or not, and reply accordingly. We did a search in our area – and interestingly, many of the same people who are on the “regular” dating sites are also on Passion.com. So if nothing else, it’s good to join just to see if your “vanilla site” friends also have ads just for sex! Free members can do basic searches, but cannot view full profiles or initiate contact. Ads without photos get very little response, but one needn’t put up a sexy photo or even a face photo. The site also has chatrooms, discussion boards, and an internal IM system. You can pretty much find anything you want on this site… just remember to keep your standards high, be honest, weed like crazy, and play safe!!! Beware: The photos and ads can be extremely explicit, so this site is not for younger or more sensitive individuals!!!
Passion.com (AKA AdultFriendFinder):