Nervous about infant's exposure to family member with herpes
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Anonymous
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My mom has herpes, and I'm nervous about visiting her with my infant at the holidays. Here's info from the March of Dimes website:
Fluid in genital herpes sores carry the herpes virus. Your skin also can release the virus, even if you don’t have a sore you can see. If you have direct contact with an infected person’s sores or skin, the herpes virus can pass into your body through a break in your own skin. If you touch a herpes sore or the fluid from a sore, you can spread herpes from one part of your body to another. For example, if you touch a herpes sore on your lips and then rub your eye, you can spread the herpes infection to your eyes. If you do touch a herpes sore, wash your hands right away to help avoid spreading the infection. It is probably very unlikely that my child will get herpes from casual contact with my mom, but my mom does not have the best hygiene and it makes me nervous. What if she's wearing shorts and the baby just accidentally flops and touches her upper leg? What if mom doesn't wash her hands after going to the bathroom? Of course, I don't want to do anything to make my mom feel uncomfortable or like a leper, but I also want to protect my child. Should I tell my mom that this is something I'm worried about? Can I ask her to be really careful about washing her hands? Should I ask if she's having an outbreak or if she is taking any medicine to manage the herpes? Any suggestions are appreciated. |
Anonymous
| You should talk to your doctor. I do know someone who got it from an uncle (non-sexually) as a child...because he had to tell his GF in college who was my roommate. |
Anonymous
| I have herpes and never once have I ever worried about anything. I won't kiss my son on the lips if I have a breakout but that's about it. |
Anonymous
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Hmmm, I have herpes. I have always been extremely careful with hygiene though. I have never ever heard of someone spreading genital herpes to another unless throguh sexual contact. The virus is present in active sores, saliva, semen, and vaginal mucus. And has to enter in a skin abrasion or mucous membranes like vagina, mouth/lips, anus.
If your mom washes hands before handing the baby, it will be fine. You could pull the paranoid new mom thing and insist on that if you don't want to talk about herpes directly. And I'd actually be more worried about cold sores transmitting the virus to a baby than genital herpes.... |
Anonymous
| Don't have advice but this is something I would worry about as well - mainly because I worry about everything. I think I'd say something. But then again, isn't the stat something insane like 1 in 4 sexually active people have herpes? I might be making that up, but if it's true, you have to worry about everyone, not just the person with herpes that you know... |
Anonymous
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I can totally understand. While it's very unlikely that genital herpes would spread from a person with very good hygiene in this manner, if your mom can't reliably wash her hands after touching her genitals, there is a tiny risk of spreading. I'd ask your doctor if it's something to be very concerned about. In general, what I'd do is just have the hard and fast rule that everyone who holds the baby has to wash their hands with soap immediately before picking him up. We had that rule for our preemie and nobody was offended, as long as you make everyone do it.
Personally, my bigger worry was people with oral herpes. One of my cousins had a cold sore and I had to ask her not to kiss him. (I told her that we asked everyone not to kiss him.) And then of course she kissed him -- numerous times -- and said she just forgot. Luckily (so far) he doesn't seem to have gotten the herpes virus from her, but I finally had to say, "You have an open cold sore on your face. That's the herpes virus. I really cannot have you touching his face with an open herpes sore." I'm sorry that I had to embarrass her that way but I was furious that she kept kissing him even when we asked her not to! |
Anonymous
Good for you. How did she take it? |
Anonymous
| OP, just gently remind your mom to be vigilant about hand-washing, then say no more and don't treat her any differently than you would if she didn't have herpes. It's rare but does happen that a caretaker with poor hand-washing hygeine can transfer herpes to a baby during diaper changes. But I really would not worry about this. |
Anonymous
| I have had oral herpes for many years. I never kiss my son if I have a cold sore and don't touch my mouth when I have an outbreak. He is now 6 and does not have oral herpes. |
Anonymous
| I get your worry OP. I will say my mom has oral herpes and was always very careful during an outbreak. I'm 28 and happy to report I'm herpes free |
Anonymous
Maybe. So you think. Many people with herpes don't even know it. Unless you've been tested, you can't know for certain. |
Anonymous
PP here. She was defensive -- basically said that everyone has cold sores and it's not a big deal. I didn't point out that I'd never had a cold sore; I just said that the neonatologists said that it actually would be a very, very big deal for our preemie to get herpes and that I knew the last thing she would want to do is send him to the NICU again. She didn't say anything again about it after that, and she also didn't kiss him again as far as I could see, but I know she was hurt and she didn't come back to visit for months. The ironic thing is that she is the only member of my family who visited to help and was incredibly helpful and loving. I had a c-section and a preemie in the NICU and she came when he was 6 weeks old and she saved my sanity for a week and let me sleep for an hour or two at a time, so I was incredibly grateful. The last thing I wanted to do was drive her away, and I really couldn't fathom why she kept kissing him when I asked her not to, since she was so thoughtful and giving in every other way. I think she really did poo-pooh the seriousness of oral herpes, since she's had cold sores for so long and just considers them normal. |
Anonymous
Was tested last year when I had a mysterious illness and they ran every type of test they could think of. So yes, I know I'm herpe free |
Anonymous
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I was worried that I would spread it to my newborn niece, through casual contact - just holding her. This was a month after I was infected for the first time so I was paranoid and ignorant about the virus. So I called the herpes hotline number and asked them. The person was very nice, very non-judgmental and didn't laugh at me but I also think she was very worried about my ignorance. She assured me that I could not transmit it through casual contact. If you could EVERYONE would have it just from shaking hands! Call them yourself or talk to your doctor though if you want to hear from an actual doctor.
http://www.herpes.org/telephone-hotline/ The other people are correct though - oral herpes (which can be type one or type 2) can be spread if you have an active cold sore around your mouth. And yes, I believe the statistic is indeed 1 in 4. |
Anonymous
| Cold sores to a healthy person are no big deal. They can be annoying and embarrassing when you get older though. |