SPFPP Episode 182: The Life Cycle of Herpes Education Advocacy

Herpes education advocacy is an entry point to healing whether it be healing others or self. It's important to understand our intention going into herpes education advocacy and remain true to it because there can be pressure coming in from all angles that causes us to burn out the inspiration candle. What I offer here is my own experience with the life cycle of advocacy and my entry point into it.

Episode 182 Transcript

The Stigma Symptom and the Purpose of the Podcast

00:00:00 Courtney Brame: Welcome to Something Positive for Positive People. I'm Courtney Brame. Something Positive for Positive People is a 501c3 nonprofit organization that supports people navigating SCI stigma and connecting them with mental health resources as well as community. So, if you're someone who perhaps may not know what it is that you need, please feel free to reach out to me and I can just kind of get a feel for where you are. I may be the first person that you're talking to since your diagnosis. Um, I'm happy to be here and offer some level of support. Uh, I've been there. I am eight years into my own genital HSV2 diagnosis and I found my own path of healing. what could be healed. While the physical symptoms of herpes and its presence in our nervous system cannot be alleviated completely and removed from our body, what we can remove is the stigma symptom and all of the different ways that that shows up in our behaviors and in our beliefs and in our uh thoughts about ourselves.

00:01:28 Courtney Brame: And my path to this point has been one that has been self-created. I have walked, I have stumbled, I have fallen, and I've made mistakes that I don't think people will ever find out about unless it's something that I'm aware of that I've willingly shared on the podcast. But typically, I like to keep this space as a place where people can receive safer support through hearing the experiences of people who are in fact living with HSV, the herpes simplex virus. And where I'm at right now in my own journey is figuring out how to use what's happened to date in order to advance the healing process for other people. So whenever people reach out to me and you share your stories, whether it be for the blog or just for private conversation, maybe even venting or just wanting a little bit of perspective, these things expand my own perspective in a way that I may be able to help support someone that otherwise wouldn't have been able to feel supported. And one thing that I've learned throughout this entire process is the importance of just being able to hold space and that is something that I've learned that I've done very well in just with the interviews with people of sitting there and allowing people to sometimes even process out loud their diagnosis and have these new epiphanies and understandings about themselves, about what herpes means to them, about what the stigma means, about how they received their diagnosis and even the behaviors that have been

00:03:21 Courtney Brame: associated around um what they feel may have been a cause of them being exposed to the herpes virus. So through having these intelligent, transparent conversations consistently, I think that this serves people in a way that right now, especially with COVID um being a thing and obviously restrictions are being lifted. Uh hopefully at the time of this podcast release date, more people will have been vaccinated and there's more businesses being able to be done and people can collectively socialize again. But um what we're able to do with a resource like this is provide people with the experience of being able to just sit in a room and hear two people talk about herpes and herpes stigma and see just how insignificant herpes in itself is to the conversation. That part right there is what I really want you as a listener here to take away from everything that I'm about to say. So there's no guest in today's podcast episode. It's just going to be me speaking about I guess really the last four years of herpes education advocacy I want to say and I want to give you some insight to the life cycle of herpes education advocacy.

The 90/10 Rule and Rejecting the "Herpes Activist" Label

00:04:55 Courtney Brame: I hate the phrase herpes activism, herpes activist, herpes advocate, because no one's advocating for herpes. Like I would really like for people to make their way through the process of okay, you receive your diagnosis. Yeah, this is how you identify for now. But as you begin to explore resources, as you begin to find community, you educate yourself and empower yourself, it's very important that we take ourselves away from identifying with herpes. So for me, I'm able to look at this now after having been in this space consistently for four years. And when I say this space, I mean being open about my own HSV status, having created this resource, Something Positive for Positive People. And for people to understand that this wasn't something that started as, oh my god, I have herpes. Let me tell the world I have herpes so that I cannot deal with the stigma. That wasn't the intention. And with the life cycle of herpes education act uh advocacy, there's always the starting point of receiving a positive diagnosis, receiving that HSV test result that comes back positive.

00:06:22 Courtney Brame: That I believe is the beginning for many of us whether we know it or not. Because at that point, we start a journey of our own healing or looking for ways to cope with now having to tell partners that we have an STI or have herpes. Let's let's say that because it's different. It's different saying I have chlamydia. I have gorrhea. I have cy syphilis. Even when you hear people talk about it, you never hear anyone say I have this now. It's always… I had that once before. I had that in the past. Oh, I used to I I had it and I cleared it. Like I got it taken care of. Herpes isn't something that you can get taken care of. And the reality of that sinks so heavily into our identities and our innermost being because this isn't something that we can walk away from, take a pill for, get a shot for, it's always there.

00:07:21 Courtney Brame: And the more attention that we give to it, perhaps even because there hasn't been a need to give it any attention in the past, it's almost like the more we feed our identities into what it means to have herpes and that's how we identify ourselves. And it doesn't have to be. Um I was having a conversation with someone who uh is no longer in the space of just openly sharing herpes related resources and in our conversation we had this um this dialogue about 90% 10%. after a herpes diagnosis. I think that many people can relate to uh having placed 90% of their identity into their herpes status. And over time, what should happen is you take away a lot more of yourself from herpes and you put it into your humanness. And so that 10% that isn't herpes typically revolves around uh our value to other people. And I don't know how many people can relate to this, but this is just something that I've seen consistently.

00:08:31 Courtney Brame: There are not too many people who were diagnosed with herpes right away and were like, you know what, I know my self worth, blah blah blah. It's been a process. And if you are that person who was diagnosed and empowered and it didn't change anything for you, please reach out to me if you're listening to this podcast. Because honestly, I think that the majority of people uh perhaps have that uh they receive their diagnosis and then they just kind of go on about their business like, "Oh, dang. You know, I got herpes. All right. Well, I just got to tell people I'm having sex with blah blah blah la." Go on about your business. And this is something that I found to be true as well is that, you know, if so many of us have herpes, the numbers really reflect that more of us are okay with it than aren't okay with it. And for those of us who are not okay with it, there has always been consistently underlying things that have absolutely nothing to do with herpes.

Toxic Positivity and Challenging Beliefs with Action

00:09:27 Courtney Brame: It's just that those things that underlie amplify our response to the herpes virus. So, uh, before I got off into the rambling away from the subject matter, I didn't take notes. I just had this conversation about the whole 9010 thing. And here's what I have seen over the last four years of my own openness with my status and creating this resource for people to be able to come and listen to other people talk about their herpes experience. People get excited and a fire lit under them. I think people get tired of being controlled by the stigma and putting these limitations on themselves. And it just takes for you to see someone perhaps who looks like you or who reminds you of you or whose story is similar to yours to inspire you to want to jump up and just shout from the rooftops, I have herpes and I'm proud or I have herpes and I'm okay. What I learned is sometimes even with positive affirmations, there's this thing called toxic positivity where you say things uh that are supposed to be positive about yourself that in doing so, you're you're you're saying it and you're saying it and you're saying it and it's not having the effect that it's supposed to have according to whatever social media account you follow where they tell you this And all it really does is reinforce that you don't believe what

00:11:03 Courtney Brame: you're saying. So in turn, if you have beliefs about yourself that directly conflict with the positive affirmations and what you're saying and what you're uh with what words you're saying, all you're doing is saying the opposite because you're telling yourself what it is that you believe. Feel free to argue with me on this, but I've seen it too many times. I've even done it myself. I'm like, you know, I'm not like all these different things I try to say myself. I'm not wealthy. You know, I’m speaking things into existence is one thing, but lying to yourself is another. When my beliefs are like I look at my bank account, I look at the money coming in, money going out. I know I'm not wealthy. I know I'm not rich. I'm not about to sit here and say I'm rich and I'm wealthy. I'm not going to say that I have like an abundance of um uh of sexual partners even, you know, like with that.

00:12:00 Courtney Brame: Um I'm not going to sit here and lie to myself about that. I can say that I'm working towards something. I can say, "Oh, I'm trying my best. I can say that I'm putting work in uh as far as being able to uh make money because these actions, these affirmations that we say to ourselves, they have to be backed up by action. And I think that the action often doesn't follow. We think that we're just supposed to say things and it's going to change how we feel. That hasn't been true for me. Maybe that's been true for someone else. But in my experience, we have feelings that translate to thoughts that translate to actions. And there's no way for us really to uh control what we think, right? Or what we believe about ourselves. We can't do anything about that. But what we can do is directly defy the thought and the belief with an action.

00:13:00 Courtney Brame: So if I tell myself, uh, I'm out of shape. I'm unhealthy. I can't even turn down a Twinkie. Then why don't I put myself in a position where I have to turn down a Twinkie and then I do it. By doing that, I directly challenge that belief system with something different and I prove to myself, oh, I don't really have to listen to these thoughts. This isn't something that I learned right away. My original intention of getting into advocacy was there before I was even conscious of it. I looked up and it's been four years and now I'm backtracking and looking back on man all of these little things happened to have made such an impact on my life and guided me so to speak to having taken the actions that I have that led to the formation of Something Positive for Positive People as it is today as you know it. If you've been following from day one to now, thank you for being here, but you shouldn't still be here.

00:14:08 Courtney Brame: Like, flat out, uh, I want for you to be able to come here, get what you need, and then go. I'm interviewing people who are living with herpes about their experience. And in these conversations, I've transitioned. I don't know at what point it was, but 10% of the podcast is now about herpes. The other 90 is about the person. It's about highlighting humanness. It's not about uh giving the virus itself more power or fueling stigma or talking about what we can do about the stigma. Honestly, I don't care about that anymore. There are plenty of meme accounts, Tik Tok accounts, and video accounts. There's content that's out there that's been out there that kind of repeats itself in cycles. You can go, you can go there and get those things. But here, if you're here and you're continuing to uh you're committed to continuing the healing process of learning how to navigate the stigma, if you're still stuck on that, I'm not doing my job.

The Life Cycle of Advocacy and Unconscious Intentions

00:15:06 Courtney Brame: I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do. I'm not serving you. And it is every intention of mine to serve this community in a way that supports how I'm evolving because I can't ask for you to come here, get what you need, and then transition off into the world as you choose to and then not do that myself. So me transitioning here looks like that shift from the 10% uh um between 90% of it being about herpes and 10% being about the person to the opposite way. If you listen to the first maybe 20 to 50 podcast episodes, you'll hear such an emphasis on herpes. Oh, well, where do you live? Oh, okay. Well, when were you diagnosed? How long ago were you diagnosed? How's herpes changed you? How's herpes? And I've been someone who has unknowingly, unconsciously given so much power to herpes itself. When I realized this, I didn't even know that I realized it.

00:16:07 Courtney Brame: I just became more interested in the person that was behind the diagnosis. And that's how these conversations have shifted. This parallels disclosure. When we make an effort to really just get to know someone and let someone get to know us, let that be 90% of the day. Let that be 90% of the disclosure process. And then the other 10% be, oh yeah, uh, I should probably tell you I have genital herpes. Um, not a big deal. I've dealt with it. It is a big deal to some people. Um, and if you're one of those people, I completely get it. But, uh, I think you're awesome and you know, I want to take it to the next step with you. Let me know what you think. Simple as that. And the way that I've learned to have this conversation has exclusively evolved solely because of the guest experience and the people who have DM'd me and shared their stories and um and their uh successes and failures.

00:17:06 Courtney Brame: And I also want to highlight here having the conversation in itself about SCI about sexual health about mental health it is a success in itself. It's not about disclosing and just telling the person you have herpes and then being able to move forward. No, there's so much more to it than that. All right, what was the followup? Like, what's next? Did you get what you wanted? Did you go into it with the intention of consciously being able to just relate to and connect with another human being? Or are you taking whatever it is that you can get because you feel like you aren't worthy of having much because you have herpes? We got to step away from that. Uh I keep drifting off, but I want to get into the life cycle of herpes education advocacy. I have seen very many accounts come onto the scene and we're talking social media from uh Tumblr to Twitter to uh Instagram to Facebook support groups.

00:18:10 Courtney Brame: I've seen many people come and they open up about their status and they go so hard and put out content. They share resources. They kind of dabble into uh they dabble into something that perhaps extends a little bit beyond herpes and into sex almost as if there's like a template being followed. And I haven't seen very many people stay true to themselves in this space. I've seen far more people come and go and leave due to either being overwhelmed or they not- them not being intentional about it and are unable to get what it is that they actually want. And I would like to take this opportunity to speak to that. Uh, if you follow some pages that talk about herpes and are creating community, um, and you feel like this is a shot at them, I hope that you don't think that. Uh, all of these accounts that are out there, everyone who's doing whatever it is that they're doing to offer support to people has a purpose.

00:19:23 Courtney Brame: I believe each and every one of these social media accounts, each of these disclosures, each of these deliveries of a diagnosis, in each of these communities, serve as an entry point to healing. So there's no right or wrong way to go into advocacy. I think there's a conscious and unconscious way of going into it. Mine was unconscious and this is where it got me. So, I mentioned and I'll give a short overview of the origin story here. I started interviewing people about their experiences living with herpes simply because when I got onto the dating sites and into the support groups, I saw way too many people wanting to kill themselves. And regardless of what their reasoning was, uh it it was it seemed to always be no one's going to want me. I'm never going to find love. I'm never going to be able to have sex again, which is really what the root of it is.

00:20:22 Courtney Brame: It's not about finding love or finding companionship or partnership because we can get these things in ways from people that don't have to be um exclusive to sexual contact. So, but nobody wants to hear that right now. Right? When I saw this, I just asked people, "Hey, you know, I've worked at an advertising agency that worked with podcasters and we bought podcast advertising." So, I listen to a lot of podcasts. So, it was by default my go-to format for collecting stories and experiences. me as a Black man, an adult Black man, telling a collegeaged white woman, a 50 plus year old white man, a 40 something year old Hispanic man, or just people who don't look like me, who aren't from where I'm from, who have different political beliefs, different religion values, me telling them that it's going to be okay or not to worry or um it's not that that that doesn't carry much weight coming from me. So, out of impulse, this was an intuitive impulse, I decided to just start interviewing people that don't look like me or just interviewing whoever I could because how can I prove to them that it's going to be all right?

Identity, Sexuality, and Destigmatizing Mental Health

00:21:47 Courtney Brame: So I started interviewing people and recording these recordings at the time that evolved into being a podcast and I very quickly realized that this isn't necessarily about herpes. It's about the power that we give herpes because we don't have it. We aren't taught to explore our own power or look at our own identities or have our own self exploration and figure out who it is that we are at the core of our identities. Our identities are so interconnected with our sexuality that a person who gets a diagnosis of an STI now believes that they can't mesh genitals with someone and that was the entirety of their worth. So now they're ready to end their lives simply because of that. I can think of a hundred things off the top of my head that probably have more significant value on my identity than my ability to put my penis in around or at someone's orifice. Uh, and it's taken me a while to realize that. Why does it take so long for us to realize that?

00:23:14 Courtney Brame: This was something I didn't think to ask. But what I will say is uh after having started these interviews, I just had this natural stumbling into creating a nonprofit. It's almost like I was just going with the flow of life and not resisting it. I looked up and was like, damn, do I want to make this into a business where I can collect advertising dollars and pay myself um money for talking to people with herpes or can I make a nonprofit that actually solves a problem. And over time, I just became this investigative journalist as a volunteer passion project that was exploring herpes stigma. And what I came to realize was just how much our mental health plays a role in our sexual health. So like how we talk about sex or how we don't talk about sex is the way that we have to be able to talk about mental health because not only do they parallel, not only are they integrated, I will argue to the date I die that they're the same thing.

00:24:27 Courtney Brame: We can talk about sex without talking about sex if we have a foundation set for mental health. And what I mean by that is being able to communicate about relationships by navigating relationships, being able to identify, talk about and not abuse people. the word abuse in itself, being able to have and respect boundaries, saying no, being able to ask for what you want, and being able to seek support in the event that you find yourself in a situation where boundaries have been violated or you find yourself in an abusive relationship or even if you find yourself being an abuser and you know you need help, but you don't know how to ask for it. You don't know how to communicate it. You don't know how to feel what it is that you feel. And these are all things that I had to become self-taught through the conversations that I had with people that were supposed to have been about herpes, which 90% of the podcast was starting out.

00:25:26 Courtney Brame: And as it began to transition to where it was like, all right, 80% of it is about the herpes. The other 20 is about the person, 70% and 30, and then 5050. And I think where I am now, you know, I've interviewed, most of the people that I've interviewed have herpes. And there's a few episodes where we don't even talk about herpes anymore. I've just somehow been having the conversation, sometimes we get away from it. And that's what I want people to do. I want people to be able to get away from it. Like, let's put more emphasis on the 90% of our humanity and s***. to be honest, like herpes should be even more insignificant. Like, when will we get to a point where we're at 100%. Well, I guess we have to communicate that. It's not like we can withhold this from someone that we want to be physically intimate with.

00:26:21 Courtney Brame: Like with friendships, we want to offer all of our humanity. Friends don't need to know that we have herpes if we're not sleeping with them, if we're not kissing them. And we have oral herpes. Right? So when we get into sex, it becomes an issue. Now again, just going back to what my intention was in sharing these conversations and it evolving into something that allowed for me to continue to serve people. I think other people knew or had an idea of how important and valuable my quote work has been. And I've never really called it work because there's just such a curiosity here and an interest of learning and unlearning through the sex positivity uh the sex positive community that's been on my Instagram feed. Like as I talked about sexual health, I have learned that there is so much more to this than just talking about your status. And as people have come along with me on this journey, I'm assuming that you have stuck around uh you'll see that there have been people who face stigma in a way that their mental health is impacted.

00:27:35 Courtney Brame: So that's why I want to be able to pay for people's therapy. And I say that now, you know, with a period. I can't change the mission statement right now, but there will come a time where Something Positive for Positive People is going to have a lot of money and be able to just straight flat out pay for people's therapy, period. I don't want this to be exclusive to people who have herpes. I mean, I did a post with some of the uh admins in different support groups and shared that I was paying for people to receive group therapy or even individual therapy and no one in those groups reached out and I know people saw it because these are massive groups and I wasn't the only one that posted. So, it's like the more people who follow you in the groups, I guess, the more people see it. But I've cashed out on some people's social capital in sharing this resource.

The Real Intentions Behind Herpes Advocacy

00:28:28 Courtney Brame: And yay, that not that many people signed up uh or no one signed up in these groups because I was able to put together a cohort of 11 people. They all came from the podcast or they all came from the HOMY chest Instagram page. And when I saw that, it made me think. I was like, "Huh, this does in fact support the idea that most people with herpes don't really like it's not really a big deal." But it also beg the question of do people in these groups have they've um found the group dynamic to be a coping mechanism a way of not having to deal with their herpes diagnosis or the underlying mental health aspects of their herpes diagnosis or maybe there that's all they needed right so I can't make that call um but throughout that interaction, that process, like it's been confirmed to me that the resources are there for people when they're ready for them. I'm not going to shove my therapy down people's throats who have herpes, but I have learned that there is a bigger picture goal here to be able to continue to serve people and that does not look like or include herpes exclusively.

00:29:52 Courtney Brame: So the next step could look like Something Positive for Positive People is a 501c3 nonprofit organization that provides mental health resources to people who have experienced a sexual trauma. Or it can be Something Positive for Positive People is an agency that removes the barriers of people in impoverished communities to be able to receive therapy and counseling services like that. That feels good to be able to do. So again, herpes being a launchpad into blank, healing, healing. Fill in the blank with healing. If you have a better word for it, then you can feel free to use that for yourself and apply that to your experience. But this is what it's been. My herpes was a gateway to healing. Not just for other people or the people who listen to this podcast or people who are guests on this podcast or people who find out about it, but also for myself. And I didn't recognize that consciously.

00:30:57 Courtney Brame: And this is what goes back to um being able to do this consciously and unconsciously. There's not a right or wrong way of going about it. I've never dealt with my uh diagnosis until 2020 when the pandemic hit. Uh, I had a podcast sponsor, BetterHelp, and I ended up getting a therapist, and he and I work together. Even though he's no longer with that company, we're still working together. And I hadn't realized that all of this that I've been doing was an avoidance strategy from dealing with my own herpes diagnosis. I have had opportunities to walk away from this. I've had opportunities to uh get what I needed or what I thought I needed or wanted and then disappear. Fortunately, somehow the universe conspired for me because I'll tell you now, I still kind of have this fear of messing this up somehow, some way, by like not being able to keep it in my pants because I peaked late.

00:32:00 Courtney Brame: So for me, being an attractive man who is displaying vulnerability, I'm learning just how attractive that is to people that I may find myself attracted to. And I recognize how easy it is now to be seen, to be accessed. Um, and that kind of scared me. And I had this like I'm not sleeping with any of my podcast guest rules. And I think that what that led me to was being vulnerable in other arenas and like justifying it in that way like oh yeah I'm never going to sleep with any of my podcast guests and then like oh well she's not a guest and also had this thing of not wanting to sleep with anyone who was low when they reached out to me. Uh, I've met people and I actually did hook up with a few podcast guys, but uh that's that's neither here or there. But these kinds of um I I've seen other people like have their platform so to speak, create spaces for community and healing and then get what they need or didn't know that they need it and then walk away.

00:33:13 Courtney Brame: I won't say the names of these or uh these what do I want to call them communities but like there specifically uh there are one two there are two guys that I can think of off the top of my head went heavy hard in these activism spaces encouraging people to disclose publicly he and I uh one of the guys we were supposed to have done a podcast together and for the I talked to him right before we were going to record and he just flaked on me and then I go and and I look up the group and it's no longer there. And all of these people who were encouraged to disclose who had this community no longer had this community. Eventually, he and I talked and guess what he had? He had himself a girlfriend and just walked away from everything. If that's your intention and your advocacy, then please do me a favor and not jump into this. Don't say that you're here to help people.

00:34:09 Courtney Brame: Don't say that you're here to serve people. Uh if that's not genuinely what your intention is, if you are looking for a girlfriend, cool. But if you or a partner, let me say that. Um if you're looking for a partner, put yourself out there. This is one way to put yourself out there, but be intentional about it. I think that uh me having had partners or been dating outside of this has probably been one of the things that kept me from muffing this up. or for me like even when uh the herpes activist networking to dismantle stigma was a thing. I was one of one two dudes in that group and all of the women who were in that group are attractive. Like it, I wanted to shoot my shot with everybody. But I had to ask myself, okay, what's more important here? Is it more important that I build and foster these relationships and in the name of service?

00:35:05 Courtney Brame: Or do I just want to get my dick wet or like shoot my shot in an effort to do that? Or do I want to have a relationship? like what is my intention? I didn't think about the word intention at that time. Uh, even over the last year and a half, I've grown significantly. I think Hans would have been like four years old now, maybe three years old, I don't know. But um having walked away from that experience with this like I matured as a result um because now being on a public platform and knowing just how many people have herpes and like I flirt with people. I flirt all the f****** time. Like there's no harm in that. Um but I recognize that there can be uh miscommunication of intention. So when people come and they aren't intentional about what it is that they do, like this is why I don't actively support a lot of people, I need to see consistency from you because I look stupid when I bring you on my podcast and I interview you about what it is that you're doing and your story and then you are uncomfortable because that like I do this thing and this might be a superpower of mine and I'm so happy that I have it where people feel

00:36:26 Courtney Brame: like they can be themselves around me. And one of two things happens. I I serve as a mirror and people see what they like about themselves the most and that comes to fruition or they see things that they don't like and you can just kind of see it in their behavior. They're shady or they seem creepy or weirded out or something. And that's what I got from uh one of these guys uh for sure. And sure enough, you know, when he disappeared and shut everything down, it was just he was in a relationship. Um, other people who have done this, uh, and it's only been like two guys or three guys, I'm sorry, I just thought of a third one, who've come into the space, uh, got what they wanted, I guess, and then just disappeared and like left people hanging. And I feel like I can't do that. I don't want to do that. So, in order for that to happen, it really means that I have to examine my own intentions and I have to be intentional with this space and who I bring into it.

00:37:30 Courtney Brame: I can think of a number of other accounts that perhaps feel some sort of pressure to be consistent and be active and show up for people who need herpes support. But we don't need herpes support. That's not what we need. And let me be the first person to say this. I'm not going to be the first person to say this. I don't want to. I really don't want to talk to you about herpes, right? I want to talk to you about you. I want to talk to you about what it is that you do or don't believe about yourself that makes herpes have such a significant value over a significant um amount of control over your life, over your identity, over your being. And this is me speaking from a place of having done that myself, of having let having herpes lead my direction of my behavior and drive my beliefs. I've done that.

00:38:32 Courtney Brame: I've been there. I don't want to go back. And I don't want people when they get here like I'm… I'm meeting you where you at and then I'm showing you to the promised land. That's what I want to do. And the promised land for me like I thought I had healed when I first started therapy at the beginning of 20 in the Yeah. early 2020 when I started therapy. One of the first things my therapist said to me was, "I don't think you dealt with your own diagnosis." And I started to say, "F you." But we stuck together. And he was absolutely right. It took me until about the end of the year to actually realize that I created an environment that allows for me to feel so supported that I never have to experience rejection. I never need to know what that feels like. But in a way, creating this wall, this defense mechanism for myself, it has made me reject myself in a way.

00:39:27 Courtney Brame: And I'm jumping way too far ahead, way too fast. I want to make sure that I'm staying with people here. But when we look at our intention of jumping into activism, there's nothing wrong with it. I encourage you to, if you're new here, listen to some podcast episodes and decide if that's for you. You can be involved with herpes education advocacy by just supporting, educating, and healing yourself from the symptoms of the stigma. Healing is an ongoing process. It's never just over. So, all right, I have herpes and I'm upset. Well, why am I upset? You can't ask yourself, why do I have herpes? Like, that's going to take you down this external road. If you start with, why am I upset? We get to the core of it, right? And now, it's completely okay to use your healing and put it on display, but don't do that.

00:40:26 Courtney Brame: and offer support to others if you aren't receiving support yourself. And I think that this is where a lot of the unconscious way of going about it really highlights itself because we want to support people. We want to do good. People generally want to do good. Some people may just want attention. Some people think this may be a career for them and so on. like and whatever it is that you can think of, go down the list and I'm sure you can fill in the blank with something with a person that you follow or followed who's disappeared off the face of the earth for whatever reason apparently. Uh, whether it be because they got into a relationship or whether it be because they needed to erase everything herpes associated from the internet with them. But like what are we doing in allowing ourselves to stick here and make everything be about herpes? Like my identity as the herpes coach, like that's me, the herpes coach.

00:41:28 Courtney Brame: You know, herpes is a trigger word for many people, whether it be used in the context of herpes support, yay, empowerment, or if it's herpes in a stigmatizing way. And it will trigger a person to shut down or trigger a person in a way to challenge their beliefs about it and become empowered. And there's no way for us to really control that. Uh I think that we have to be conscious of our efforts in our advocacy because people are looking to us. People are looking to us for the next move, what to do next. And when they get here and it's like herpes this, herpes that. All right. Well, when are we going to move on? How are we diffusing the stigma? What are we doing here? And I see pages that have the purest of intention. And there's even some stigmatizing language. Um, I've seen at the time of this release, um, there will be probably many other posts, but by, uh, Emily Depaz from sex education on Instagram posted something about the stigmatizing language that's used even in the medical community that's fear-mongering and like calling this disease uh, that I forget the word that it was used in her tweet, but it was a tweet on today, March 31st, 2021. That was a tweet.

00:42:50 Courtney Brame: It… it said something like that. So, if you want to go back and find it, you're more than welcome to. Um, but that, you know, that's where the transitions have to occur. Are we just being here and milking it? Because people are always going to get diagnosed with herpes. Like, that's never ending. And I think that people burn out in being support resources to so many different people. Uh because I may not resonate with everybody. I'm a man. How many men do you know with herpes? Right. Or how many men do you know who are reaching out to men with herpes? Like the representation is um it's mostly white women. So mostly white women being on social media will find someone who looks like them. So, while I may offer a unique perspective on this, you know, I get talked to and interviewed about and questioned about herpes, but ask me about what I'm discovering as I try to solve the problem that I'm seeing through these interviews.

The True Origin of SPFPP: Suicide Prevention

00:44:02 Courtney Brame: Talk to me about the sex education system. Talk to me about our boundaries. Talk to me about suicide prevention. Talk to me about that story. This is where we have to be mindful of this life cycle of uh herpes education advocacy because it can be with something as simple as accepting your own diagnosis, disclosing to someone close to you and informing them, disclosing to your sexual partners and encouraging them to educate themselves and also advocate for you. Our support systems serve as our advocacy um our advocacy resources. So, social media inherently isn't a toxic environment, but it can be depending on your consumption. Uh candy isn't necessarily toxic. It's a matter of your consumption in moderation, right? So, media and candy go hand in hand. Too much of it, too much of the wrong kind, it will send you into a belly ache. You can have a psychological belly ache from your media consumption, right?

00:45:15 Courtney Brame: So now you perhaps go into a place where, sorry, I just looked down at the clock. This little pop-up timer came up telling me how much time I had left to record. Um the the media belly ache metaphorically psychological media the psychological belly ache would look like consuming so much of this herpes content or producing so much of this herpes content uh that you are going through this burnout process of just exhaustion and um you know think about it when you have too much candy you have too much candy your stomach hurts and you don't want to do anything. You don't want to move. You can't, you can't do things, right? We don't want to be stuck there. We don't want to be stuck in that place. I was totally going to say something else and ran with this analogy that completely deterred from my point. So, if you still listen at this point after I just did that and you felt like I was going somewhere and then I just shifted directions, that is exactly what happened.

00:46:20 Courtney Brame: You caught it. But uh I offer here in this space Something Positive for Positive People the podcast an opportunity for self-reflection, an opportunity to set your intention, an opportunity to take in the experiences of other people who have gone through whatever their own healing process is so that you can choose for yourself how to navigate this. So maybe uh you disclose to a partner, maybe you disclose to even a health care provider and share this resource with them or share the other resources with them. If your doctor did a poor job of delivering your diagnosis, maybe you have the courage now to approach them about how they delivered your diagnosis. And that's not about herpes. That's not about herpes activism or herpes education advocacy. That's about medical. That's about engaging the medical community about a lot of the things that we cover in this podcast because that is in fact STD prevention. The way that a person is delivered their diagnosis directly impacts if and how they choose to disclose.

00:47:28 Courtney Brame: So someone could not disclose simply based on the poor experience that they had with a health care provider. And our coping mechanism strategy um could just be to dismiss our own healing and offer support to other people. Hey, it's okay to have herpes. And going back full circle to that toxic positivity stuff, why are we telling other people things that we don't believe in ourselves? I've done it. And through my behaviors, I have challenged the beliefs. I have challenged the thoughts that I've had about my identity as someone who has herpes. Those first four years of my diagnosis, I was embarrassed. I didn't want to tell anybody. There were some people that I had sex with that I didn't tell. And I as after starting the podcast, you know, I I had to make sure that I told them because I would hate for them to find out through me doing this podcast that I have herpes and didn't tell them.

00:48:32 Courtney Brame: So, to this day, knock on wood, I haven't given anyone uh herpes. I haven't passed it on to anyone. Um, some people that I've dated in the past have reached out to me later and been like, "Yeah, I actually ended up getting it from someone who didn't tell me right away. They didn't tell me until after the fact after I had symptoms and mentioned it to them. Um, and in some cases they were, they entered a relationship with someone who had herpes who had disclosed to them this particular resource because of my openness. So my advocacy does not have to look like your advocacy. So, if you want to make herpes memes, if you want to share herpes information, if you want to teach people how to disclose, if you want to make a video, a TED talk, a YouTube channel, a podcast, a resource, feel free to do these things. But I'll tell you what we need right now are more like footwork uh advocates.

00:49:35 Courtney Brame: We need more people advocating for mental health and sexual health together. Um, we need people to talk to their health care providers, their doctors, their um, uh, what else would I call them? Yeah. To health care workers about the delivery of a diagnosis, about comfort, talking about mental health, of the comfort about talking about um, sexual health. We need people to uh not necessarily uplift and support us as people who are creating these pages, but the behind the scenes stuff is equally just important. I think about all of the uh media consumption. I think I have like 6,000 Instagram followers on the H on my chest Instagram page and that's amazing first off and uh to speak to this podcast full transparency um what was the most I think the most downloaded episode is in the thousands. So I feel like people are doing what I asked them to do. Come here, get what you need and leave.

00:50:43 Courtney Brame: But when you leave, please go out into the world with the intention of being intentional about your advocacy should you choose to step into it. Now, what conscious herpes education advocacy looks like is a matter of looking at am I doing this to be of service? Am I doing this for some selfish reason? Because I mean at the point that I was doing it, it was like the driving force was suicide prevention. I have a very ugly relationship with suicide and anger is what fuels that um that relationship. I talked about this once before, but I had an ex-girlfriend attempt to kill herself. And it was through me calling that actually it's been about 12 years now since that happened. through me calling the suicide lifeline or 911. Um they were able to save her. She was in a bathtub. She had um taken some pills and her brother called me a couple hours later and just let me know thank you and that that was what happened.

00:51:50 Courtney Brame: And I actually recently reconnected with her because I wanted to just let her know that I believe that situation. And it's weird that 12 years later is when I finally put this together. Um, I think that that has something to do with my advocacy here for mental health resources. It has something to do with my advocacy for suicide prevention as it relates to a herpes diagnosis or mental illness. Um, I don't even like that phrase mental illness, mental wellness, because I think that it's more like a spectrum of your mental overall well-being. You know, you're either managing with whatever it is that your mental state is or you're not managing. So, people who have what we would consider probably the worst mental health conditions, and I use air quotes when I say worst, if you're able to navigate that consciously, then it's good. like it's fine. You're coping. You're doing well for yourself.

00:52:53 Courtney Brame: But if you're not okay and your mental health is perfectly normal and you're not understanding how to navigate that, like look at someone who's attractive, has everything and they have people around them, they have money, uh but they don't have purpose, right? So on the surface it looks like everything's fine for them, but they're struggling on the inside because they feel stuck. There's not a mental illness for that. There's not an illness for that. You can't diagnose someone whose mental well-being on the surface is in check, but they're just suffering on the inside from a lack of purpose, right? So, I want people to understand that. But, um, just in my own self-exloration and self-discovery, I realized that that is at the core of what I do. I got the opportunity to first ask her if that's if she gave me herpes because I was like, damn, did you try to kill yourself? because after we had sex, like I gave you herpes or maybe you had it all this time and that was what it was, but she had never tested positive or had any symptoms of uh herpes as we just talked about.

00:53:58 Courtney Brame: So, I still to this day don't know where I got it from. Yay. I think that's great because I don't have anyone to point the finger at and this is what is continuing to be what I fuel uh with my own intention, right? Um, so I got an opportunity to just say thank you to her for how many people that she's helped through me having that experience and maybe I just pushed it down out of my memory. Uh, but it came out on the other side and it came out in a positive way. So I want people who consider to go who consider going into herpes education advocacy uh creating a page anonymously like please consider how you may be perpetuating herpes stigma by not having gone into this intentionally like the the herpes advocate you know like think about what that says that says I'm advocating for herpes naming yourself based on herpes exclusively. Think about how you're possibly triggering someone.

00:55:12 Courtney Brame: Take into consideration longevity and sustainability. Do you want to really be in this space of herpes education, advocacy, or do you just want community? Do you want a significant other? Are you hiding from the real world? Are you escaping from it? Think about these things and it's okay for you to ask these questions and not have an answer and still take some kind of an action that you feel is best for you, but make sure that that action is for you and that it's the best thing for you and that it's not being driven unconsciously by um loneliness, embarrassment or or fear even. You know, for me, I wasn't scared when I started this. I was mad. I was angry when I started Something Positive for Positive People. Angry because someone got a bump on their penis or a bump on their vulva that they wanted to end their life.

00:56:09 Courtney Brame: Life is precious to me. Life is precious to everybody who's here. And I know people who have lost someone to suicide. I'm a survivor of suicide. I've never considered it for myself. I've never contemplated it. Um, I've tried empathizing and just picturing how someone could do this to themselves and fortunately just… I can't... I can't envision that. I can't envision taking my own life. But I also can't imagine what a person might be going through who gets to that point of even thinking about it, let alone actually having done it or made an attempt. So that anger has been my intention in my herpes education advocacy, which is actually a secondary effect of it actually being suicide prevention. Ask yourself what yours is. Ask yourself if you're going to repeat this cycle of activism that begins with an intense enthusiasm sparked by Ella Dawson's TED talk, Sex Education's Instagram, Positive Results, uh Women's Support Group, Courtney's podcast, or Positively Positives podcast or Shana Singleton's uh TikTok videos.

00:57:31 Courtney Brame: If these things are inspiring you and empowering you to get to a point where you want to scream that you have herpes from the top of the world and you want to be a support resource, you know, ask yourself what the intention is. There's nothing wrong with being inspired. I love that all of these people, all of these accounts are inspiring people to serve and support and help. But make sure that you're taking care of yourself, however that looks for you. Make sure that you're intentional about this. Look at sustainability. What do you really want? If you want to make a career out of this, if you want to go viral, if you want to have community, there are several ways to go about this. It doesn't have to be exclusive to herpes. And once the life cycle begins to approach its end, all that ends up happening is we get perhaps stuck and it becomes repetitive.

00:58:32 Courtney Brame: We get the same messages over and over and over again. But consistency to me is important. I support you if you're consistent. So like if you just created a page, please don't reach out to me and say, "Hey, can you share this?" Because I'm not, I'm just not. Let me see some consistency. Let me let you know your intention. Let me feel the energy behind what it is that you're putting out. Let me see how you handle yourself when perhaps you feel called out by someone else's post. That's what I want to see. I want to see your character. I don't care about this herp stuff. I care about character. That's what this is all about. How are you serving our community? Are you involved in our community? Are you showing up? How are you supporting people?

00:59:22 Courtney Brame: How are you supporting yourself? I have no problem with having this conversation with anyone. If you feel like you want to get involved, I've had this conversation with numerous people. I've lost count and they've talked themselves. They were inspired by something they saw on Instagram. We reached out or they reached out to me and said, "Yeah, you know, I want to create my own page and do this, too." And then I get on the phone with them and we have a real conversation about the reality of it. And many of them have been like, "Oh, okay. Well, let me think about this." Or maybe it wasn't for them. And I thank them for that. I thank them for asking that question and then answering it and then knowing what their intention was. So again, suicide prevention for me, the anger of that, that's what inspires me. That's what keeps me going. So what keeps you going? That concludes this episode. Till next time, stay sex positive.

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