On Finding Out You Have Chlamydia

When you’re in an open relationship

“I’ve been seeing that girl I told you about,” he said, looking down, away from his beer.

Yeah, I know. You told me. Like 3 times.

Dylan* had been seeing this girl since I royally exploded any remaining relationship potential with him the first week of June. At that time, he told me he’d been “talking” to her again anyway, and that’s when I realized that he was using me the whole time in sort of the same way I was using him: I was just filler. Just filling the time and space until the girl he really wanted came back around.

And, I’d come to terms with it. It’s cool. He was happy with her, and I was happy fucking around with my main squeeze, Mike*. Things were actually going really well with Mike for the past two months or so. Sure he moved, but we stayed in touch, maybe even more than ever before. He’d visit one weekend, I’d visit the next. It was working. I was happy.

“She tested positive for an STD…” Dylan said quietly, trailing off, “Have you ever had one of those?”

He was sort of looking over his shoulder as he spoke, making sure nobody would hear. He looked ashamed. We probably shouldn’t have been having this conversation in a noisy bar, but that’s the way it happened.

“No, I never had anything,” I said, “What is it?”

I feared he might say “herpes” because I knew where he was going with this conversation and, let’s face it, aside from HIV, herpes is probably the worst thing he could’ve said.

“Chlamydia?” he said it like it was a question, “She thinks she got it from me. But you’re the only person I could have gotten it from. Are you sure you don’t have anything?”

“How is she so sure it’s from you?”

“I guess she gets tested all time, like once a month or something,” he said, “Her most recent test was positive and I’m the only person she’s been seeing.”

She gets tested once a month and that’s not a red flag?

“Why does she get tested so often?” I asked.

“I guess her last boyfriend screwed around a lot or something. I don’t know. She’s just really health conscious,” he said it like she should get bonus points for being so concerned about the health of her vagina while choosing to sleep with a douchebag.

“Hmm…” I said, trying not to scream HOW THE FUCK DO YOU HAVE THE NERVE TO TRY TO BLAME THIS ON ME? “I don’t have any symptoms.”

“Neither do I. And neither does she. I guess most people have no symptoms,” he said, “Anyway, I’m going to get tested tomorrow. I just wanted to let you know, ya know, in case you do have it.”

“Thanks for telling me,” I said. I wanted to punch him the face. Instead, I downed my drink and walked away.

My mind was racing, trying to fit together sexual timelines, amidst a mingling of emotions: confusion, anger, denial, disappointment. Disappointment most of all. I should’ve just used a condom with him. Duh. I know this. And I made a mistake because, at the time, I trusted him.

I went home that night and did what any normal person would do in this situation: I Googled “chlamydia symptoms”.

Turns out, what he said was true, about 75% of women have no symptoms at all. The good news, I learned, is that chlamydia is easy to cure. It’s caused by bacteria and can be treated with an antibiotic, often just a single dose.

I lay in bed, still trying to piece together the timeline.

He thinks I gave it to him?

I mean, we were only having sex during April and May. It’s August now. That would mean I had it before April? That didn’t make sense to me.

The tricky thing here is that, according to my Googling, chlamydia can be spread by oral, vaginal, and anal intercourse. There were only two guys I’d had unprotected vaginal sex with: Mike and Mr. Bearer of Bad STD News. So, if Dylan thinks he got it from me, I must have gotten it from Mike. But I know Mike hasn’t been seeing anyone else. And I trust Mike’s word wayyyy more than Dylan’s. But… could I have gotten it from oral? I guess so. And, in that case, there could be several possible sources. I was last tested in September. That’s basically a year’s worth of sex in question as the chlamydia culprit.

On the other hand, what if Little Miss New Girlfriend gave it to Dylan and he gave it to me? I have no doubt he was seeing us both at the same time, and she was also seeing the boyfriend who likes to unethically sleep around.

And — not to throw out stereotypes here, but it is kind of relevant — Dylan is a SAILOR. I was a total and utter fool for not protecting myself with him. He may say I’m the only other girl he had unprotected sex with, but considering the casualness with which he approached it, I don’t believe him for one second.

I found myself feeling lost within a very tangled sexual web, trying to piece it all together. But ultimately, the web doesn’t matter. Whatever the source, the bottom line is this: if I have it, Mike definitely has it too. And I’ll somehow need to tell him and hope he doesn’t hate me forever.

I texted Dylan a few days later, “Any results yet?”

“Yup,” he wrote back, “Positive for chlamydia. Ugh. Hope you’re okay.”

Yeah, gee, thanks. I’ll be okay.

I went to my doctor to get tested and was told results would take 2 days to come back from the lab. At this point, I was actually feeling pretty confident I didn’t have it. Dylan got it from his new girlfriend after we stopped sleeping together. I was convinced that’s how it had happened. I’d be in the clear.

I called precisely 48 hours after my appointment and spoke to a nurse, “The results didn’t come back yet,” she said, “Call again tomorrow afternoon.”

About an hour later, I got a phone call from a private number and didn’t pick up. I listened to the voicemail message a few minutes later, “Hi Stella. This is Dr. Mitchell. Your lab results came in and we’ll need to treat you for chlamydia. Give me a call back when you can.”

You know that sinking feeling you feel in your stomach when you get bad news?

That’s the feeling I felt.

The chlamydia itself was of little concern to me. Take an antibiotic. Wait. Boom. Problem solved.

It was telling Mike that I had it, that I got it most likely through unprotected sex with someone else — THAT’s the thing I was dreading.

Mike and I had one rule and one rule only when it came to our open relationship: if he and I were not using condoms together, which we weren’t, we’d use them with other people. It’s common sense. It’s simple. And I violated our only rule and now I would have to face the consequences.

I debated playing the oral card. “I must have gotten it from oral sex! No big deal!” But the truth is, I really don’t think that’s the case and there’s no point in spinning him a tale of lies. I’d need to be honest about why I went to get tested and how I think I was infected. At the very least, he deserved to know the truth: I screwed up.

“Hey, can you call me when you have a minute?” I texted him, after getting off the phone with my doctor.

It was an odd text message to send for sure. That’s the “I have something I need to tell you that I can’t tell you via text” signal. Obviously, bad news.

“Can I call in like an hour?”

“Sure,” I wrote back.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

“Sort of but not really,” I wrote.

Everything would be okay. Physically, he and I would both be okay. But whatever semblance of a relationship we had would be pretty much fucked.

I spoke to Mike around 6 PM on a Wednesday night. It was brief. He asked some questions. He didn’t yell. I tried not to cry. We texted for a couple hours after that, as I lay in bed staring at the ceiling. The next day, I left work early to go home and mope, completely and utterly depressed. Mike and I texted again for a couple of hours, again as I lay in bed staring at my ceiling. This wasn’t a gradual descend into the funk. I was forcibly thrown deep into the funk.

I didn’t even know how to apologize to him. Saying, “I’m sorry” just didn’t feel like enough. This isn’t something easy to forgive. It was a dumb mistake that I knowingly made without considering the outcome and with blatant disregard for Mike. It was selfish. It was unsafe. It was a violation of his trust.

I didn’t expect him to be forgiving. How would I feel if the situation was reversed? I’d be pissed off. I’d be hurt. I don’t know if I’d be able to quickly forgive. I fully expected him to tell me to go fuck off immediately, that he never wanted to see me again. But, fortunately, he was a tiny bit more kind.

I hate myself for being so irresponsible. I hate myself for breaking our only rule. I owed Mike better than that. I hate myself so much because I’m disappointed by my own choices.

The sad thing is the sex really wasn’t even worth it. Is the sex ever worth such a risk?

Mike told me not to be so hard on myself. He says he’ll get over it in time. And he probably will. But I don’t think we’ll ever be the same together again because he won’t be able to trust me, even if I did learn a valuable lesson.

I ruined a really good thing. I hurt someone who cared about me and placed his trust in me.

It’s 100% my fault.

And I wish I could take it all back.

* Names have been changed, of course, to protect the innocent.

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