NYC-Feature Story

My Best Friend
Has an STD

By Anonymous

(All names have been changed.)

There's not a day when I don't talk to my friend Shalane. We talk about school, our family problems, boyfriend issues. Even though she's had sex and I don't want to yet, we understand each other.

We used to talk about people who have STDs and how stupid they were for not protecting themselves. I'd heard in school how sexually transmitted diseases are spread. But when Shalane and I talked about STDs, we just joked around. I didn't think I knew anyone with an STD.

Cramps Hurt So Bad

Then, one night last summer, Shalane called me. She was in the hospital.

"Hey, what's wrong with you?" I said.

"I am not feeling well, obviously," she snapped.

"Don't try to play smart with me. What happened?"

"I have PID. It felt like I had cramps," she explained. "But they were hurting so bad, my mother took me to the emergency room."

"So what is PID?" I asked.

Shalane explained to me that PID is pelvic inflammatory disease. It affects a woman's reproductive organs, mainly the uterus. She told me she had chlamydia, a bacteria that's sexually transmitted. Because she didn't know she had it-often chlyamidia doesn't have symptoms-she didn't get treatment, and it spread, causing the PID. As a result, even though she was only 16, she might not be able to have kids anymore.

At first I thought she was just fooling around, because we sometimes play around with things like that. But she was serious. I felt shocked because to me STDs didn't exist.

I knew that sometimes Shalane didn't use condoms because she'd told me. But as far as I knew she only took that chance with one guy, Trey.

Still, I knew she'd had three or four boyfriends she'd had sex with. So I asked her who she thought she got it from. She said she didn't know.

'I Wish You Were More Like Me'

In my mind I was saying, "I wish you were more like me when it comes to sex. Then you wouldn't be going through this. I don't have sex because I think I can't handle the consequences."

But I didn't say that to Shalane because I didn't want to hurt her feelings. She was already feeling bad. Instead, I changed the topic. Truthfully, I didn't feel comfortable talking about it, either. I didn't want her feeling like I was judging her because of her disease.

Besides, I understood how she could have done it. Even though I tell myself I'd be sure to use a condom if I had sex, I can see myself doing the same thing as Shalane if I got caught up in the heat of the moment. That's why I think it's safer for me to tell my boyfriend that I won't have sexual intercourse with him-even though that's not easy either.

I felt sorry that Shalane had unprotected sex and ended up in the hospital, and most of all I felt sorry that she might not be able to have kids. But as long as it was treatable, and it wasn't going to be a permanent condition like HIV, I felt that I didn't have to worry about her too much.

But the next morning, Shalane called me, crying. Just hearing her cry made me sadder than I was before. I asked her what was wrong, and she asked me to call Trey.

Trey was the first boyfriend she had sex with, and even though they'd broken up, they were still friends-and sometimes still had sex. She wanted to find out who gave her chlamydia, and she thought it was Trey. She'd had sex with Trey a month before she found out she had PID.

Shalane asked me to three-way Trey, which I did even though it was about 8:30 a.m. and I worried I'd wake up his mother. But Trey wasn't home.

Shalane started crying more. I felt terrible because whatever affects her affects me. I got my stuff and rushed to the hospital to see her.

Angry at Herself

When I went in the room she was watching TV, ready to eat her breakfast. I was happy to see her with a smile on her face, because when she called me she sounded like she was dying. I sat on her hospital bed and we started talking.

She told me that she was angry at herself for maybe not being able to have kids. She wasn't planning on having one any time soon, but Shalane had often told me that she wanted to have a child because they look so cute.

I felt bad for her and I was kind of angry at myself, too, that I hadn't tried harder to convince her not to have sex.

A few weeks later, Shalane asked Trey if he had an STD, but he said he went to the doctor recently and everything was fine. Shalane believed him. They're friends and she didn't think there was any reason for him to lie. If he had said he had an STD, it could have been their little secret that no one had to know (with the exception of me).

Afraid to Ask Ex-Boyfriend

But if it wasn't Trey who gave it to her, who was it? She didn't know who gave it to her because all of her exes looked fine. As it turns out, chlamydia-the most common sexually transmitted bacterial infection in the U.S.-often has no symptoms in males, either.

Shalane decided not to ask the other guys she had had sex with. She thought that they'd say no, even though that would mean one of them was lying.

But what really stopped her from asking was that if she did, they would know that she had an STD, and then they might tell other people. She trusted Trey to keep a secret, but she couldn't trust the others.

She worried that people would start viewing her as a whore, because around where I live, that's how people talk about females with STDs. It's not fair, but there are names for girls who have an STD but no name for a guy who has an STD.

Protecting Her Reputation

I think she cares more about her reputation than about who gave it to her or who they might give it to. Finding the person who gave it to her won't cure the disease-antibiotics killed it-and it won't change her ability to have children.

If she talked to her other ex-boyfriends about her chlamydia, they might find that they have it too, and get it cured before it turns into something worse or before they spread it to someone else. But she's not going to. I know it's cold to say that you don't care about other people, but I think I'd do the same thing to protect myself from possible shame and social humiliation.

Of course, that's how STDs are spread. Someone who doesn't know he has an STD has sex without a condom and gives it to his partner. Or someone might even know or suspect he has an STD, but he just wants to have sex and doesn't care to tell his partner that he's infected.

It's Hard to Talk About STDs

Honest communication could go a long way to slowing the spread of STDs. But I can see how it's hard for sexual partners to talk about STDs because they might think that you don't trust them. In my relationships, I haven't started up a conversation about STDs because I just don't feel comfortable talking about them. I'm also afraid my boyfriend will think I don't trust him.

The problem is that no one really wants to talk about STDs or think about them. I didn't talk about it seriously with Shalane or my friends before she got PID. I didn't think we would ever be affected.

I don't think less of Shalane because she got an STD. Actually I am kind of happy she had it, so at least she could learn from it and not get something worse like HIV (not that I told her that). I don't know for a fact that she learned her lesson. I just know that if I were her, I'd now be too scared to have sex without a condom.

We used to talk about everything, but since she went to the hospital I feel like I have to be careful about what I can bring up in conversation because I don't want to hurt her in any way. I make sure that I don't say mean things about STDs, like we used to do. But that's OK-we have other things to talk about. She still talks about having kids, too.

I used to think that I'd never get any kind of disease through sex and neither would anyone around me. But now I think differently about STDs. They seem more real to me, and now I feel you can never be too careful about protecting yourself when it comes to sex. That's why I'm glad I've decided not to do it, till I am sure of how I'll handle it.