Dr. Handsfield and Hook, I respect your work from MedHelp and appreciate the way in which you both provided sensible, fact based info.

In May 2017 I met a man on grindr for the first (and last) time. We met, and begin giving each other hand jobs. His penis was in my mouth for around 40-50 seconds. Not long enough for him to even have a real erection. I was in his mouth for under a minute. From there, we both continued with the hand jobs for another couple of minutes. He suddenly told me he had to leave bc a roommate or someone was about to arrive home. The encounter ended in under 7 minutes. As previously mentioned, gave oral for 40-50 seconds and received for around a minute. Neither of us ejaculated or even came close. I inspected his penis pretty well and there was no signs of sores or lesions, or discharge. He blocked my account after, probably didn’t enjoy himself much. I messaged him a few weeks later on a different account where he said he had been tested 11 days before the encounter and was clean.

I went to see my doctor around 2.5 weeks later a bit scared. She sat me down, explained to me my risk was low, and that she didn’t recommend testing. She tried to comfort me as well as she could see I had an emotional reaction to this.

I let go of this until recently, when in a spur of the moment I decided to buy an oraquick test. My results were expectedly, negative.

My main concern at this point is regarding Syphilis. Is it worth worrying about 2.5 years later from the very brief oral I described, in the absence of symptoms? I’m the type who regularly checks my mouth and penis so I find it highly unlikely I didn’t notice. I never developed symptoms of anything. I have been very conservative sexually since then and only was in 1 monogamous relationship with a girl which only involved oral. That was the only sexual experience I had with a man.

Welcome to our Forum and thanks for your detailed description of the events of concerns.  I'll try to help.  Sexually transmission of syphilis required direct contact with an infectious lesion.  Typically, once a person has been infected, it takes an average of 21 days for a chance (the syphilis sore) to appear at the site of contact.  Chancres not subtle- they are typically visible but may be painless and for that reason, rectal chancres of chancres in the female vagina may go unnoticed.  OTOH, in your case, you had the opportunity to directly inspect your partner's penis and (I presume) his mouth and saw no lesion.  Similarly, if you had developed a chancre on your penis or in your mouth, I suspect you would have noticed this is well.  Finally, syphilis is a relatively rare disease.  Putting all of this information together, your chance of having gotten syphilis from the exposure you describe is very, very low and is not something I would worry about.  If I were you, I would not feel the need for testing.

I hope this perspective is helpful to you.  EWH

Thanks for your thanks.  I agree with your assessment regarding syphilis.  After all, you inspected his penis and there was no lesion, thus there was nothing there to inoculate you with syphilis. 

For other STIs the risk was tiny and now, two years later is virtually zero. The most common penile STIs resulting from receipt of oral sex, gonorrhea and chlamydia would be symptomatic and you would have noted them.  Infections due to the same organisms occurring at the pharynx can be asymptomatic but given that his penis was not erect, the brevity of the exposure, and the lack of ejaculation, it is unlikely that you acquired any of them either.   Further, even in the very, very unlikely circumstance that you acquired one of these infections, they clear without therapy over time and would have resolved by now.  Putting all of this information together, my sincere advice is to not worry further, to move forward without concern, and to be confident that you do have an STI.  I see no reason for testing and no reason to be concerned that you might be putting future partners at risk. 

As this is my 3rd response, this thread will be closed shortly without further replies.  Take care.  EWH