bearbandit

Sorry, I just thought it was part of normal sex

Depends on mood: it can be part of sub/Dom play, but out of role it's just another form of piggery. I remember one guy who'd just given me the fucking of a lifetime, but pulled out to cum over my face, and then went to piss in the toilet. I actually felt insulted being denied his piss. If I'm topping and I feel the urge to piss I go ahead: love the look in their eyes when they realise you're pissing in them...

Truvada is the ONLY drug licensed for PrEP, anywhere in the world. Other drugs are still at the research stage. I took therapeutic truvada for about eight or nine years, maybe ten years (quite a while before it was investigated for PrEP) before I hit the wall (actually I came off my motorbike), but then I'd already had a lot of damage done by earlier anti-retrovirals - diagnosed as early as I was I wanted to continue going to funerals (or, rather, for preference, none at all), not be the the star attraction at one. The side effects of truvada are well known and I have my little place in history from being one of the first in the UK to hit Fanconi's syndrome where your kidneys are so fucked that they excrete the vitamins and minerals they should be recycling. Note: it does help to have a competent doctor if you get this far. Mine wasn't: he was a CD4 and VL merchant and looked at you askance if you even asked about CD4 percentage. I hear he's now retired. According to the Daily Telegraph's "search for you consultant" feature some years back he's actually a GU consultant with a special interest in diseases of the vulva, which explains why I used to feel such a twat trying to getting information out of him. So having hit pretty much the worst that truvada can offer, would I recommend it. Fuck, yes! Just keep up your regular appointments and blood tests and DON'T treat it as a party drug: take it as prescribed every day. It wasn't designed to be used for disco dosing, rather it needs to become just part of your daily routine. Some people complain of GI problems with it: take it with you breakfast: enough calories there to buffer the inrush of strange chemicals. At present it's the only PrEP drug, though as others have remarked other gentler drugs are being investigated. And frankly looking over the pile of anti-retrovirals I've taken to stay alive, truvada was, for the most part one of the easier ones.

A number of guys on PrEP are have a tattoo of a truvada pill (the side that says "701").

Not so long ago I sat with my GP and we went through the entire British National Formulary antidepressants section. There wasn't a single antidepressant that didn't have loss of libido tagged as a side effects...

AlwaysOpen, Stribild contains tenofovir, cobicistat (which is the booster, allowing the other drugs to be given at lower doses, elvitegravir and emtricitabine (FTC). Atripla contains tenofovir, emtricitabine (FTC) and efavirenz. It's the efavirenz in atripla that gets the credit for the dreams and sleep disturbances (as demonstrated by taking efavirenz with a different "supporting cast"), though in rare cases FTC can do the same thing. I'm taking raltegravir, darunavir, ritonavir and FTC: only the latter has any affect on sleep on dreams. I've found FTC dreams to be disturbing and capable of overflowing into wakefulness - things like thinking "I must tell John about that" when I know damn fine that he died seven years ago. From what I've found in discussions with people taking efavirenz*, the sustiva combination and FTC* is that while the efavirenz dreams can be trippier, but the FTC dreams can be more disturbing. *obviously in combination with other drugs...

One little correction I'd make to what you say is that the sentence should read "That WAS always my downfall." Because this time you're not going to have that "just one cigarette", are you? You've done bloody well: keep going!

HIV- guys tend to have a much easier time of it with truvada than poz guys. Remember that the patient information insert was almost certainly written for PwHIV rather than HIV- guys. Both drugs in truvada have exceptionally long halflives within the body, so don't worry if you do miss a dose, but at the same time, don't make a habit of it. On a side note the technical term for women who forget to take contraceptive pills is "mother"... As wood says, taking your truvada with a meal would help with the GI effects, as slowing its absorption down a little isn't going to make much of a difference once it's got to all the places it's meant to be. The tiredness could simply be the relief of tension - maybe you've been subconsciously worrying about remembering to take it. Why not buy a week's pillbox? That way you'd be able to see at a glance whether or not you'd taken it. Odd dreams is a fairly newly recognised side effect of the emtricitabine component (in the UK a user group of PwHIV, myself included) took it on ourselves to research the issue. Score one for patient power! The dreams are pretty rare amongst PwHIV and given truvada's much lower side effect profile in HIV- guys it's not something worth considering. If you have the occasional nightmare remember Sigmund Freud: "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar" Things are obviously going well - hope they continue in that direction!

A friend has just told me of another site about legal truvada in the UK: https://start.truvada.com/

Yes, Tenvir-Em is available for purchase online BUT: 1. you still need regular HIV antibody tests. Should you seroconvert using a stop/start regimen like this, you're liable to end up with virus resistant to emtricitabine and tenofovir (probably the two commonest ARVs in use today, and coincidentally, the components of truvada), which would limit your choice of drug regimes thereafter. 2. Emtricitibine is process through the liver so it's essential to have your liver function checked every three months, and if necessary, leave the Tenvir-Em alone. 3. Possibly more seriously, you need to have your kidney function tested, again every three months. Having nearly died through tenofovir attacking my kidneys, admittedly a worst-case scenario, it is still possible. I think you need to do a lot more research on this plan of action. In the meantime there is a petition to the UK government that truvada be released for prescription immediately at https://submissions.epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/72422/signature/new . I'd urge all readers to sign it...

Tiger, it's seven days since anyone's added to this thread - how are you doing? Just worryin'

The current rule of thumb is that it take someone with a viral load of >1,000 to establish a "successful" infection, though someone here has pointed out that they know someone who was infected by someone with a viral load in the 380's. The PARTNER study, following the transmission risks of magnetic couples, both straight and gay, uses an "undetectable" figure of 200. They have yet to see a single seroconversion amongst trial participants. If the undetectable guy is using an integrase inhibitor, such as raltegravir, dolutegravir or the one in stribild, chances of transmission are even lower as the integrase inhibitors get further into where the virus hangs out. I echo wood's words that guys who are neg would do well to get on PrEP: I've met too many guys who claim to be neg on the basis of a test a year or more ago. Plenty of time to pick up HIV and develop a six or seven figure viral load...

Bugger me (please)! I just looked at the members list and I'm fifth on number of postings... I might be a whore, but I still do freebies

HIV has two major strains, predictably HIV1 and HIV2, the latter found in sub-Saharan African, the former in Europe and the Americas. HIV1 has several subtypes, which are basically only of interest to microbiologists: they have the same susceptibility to ARVs and are susceptible to the same drugs. HIV2 is believed to be slower acting, but in an environment where ARVs are beyond the reach of the majority of PwHIV, who knows any more? For guys looking for a recharge, the easiest way is just to stop medication: your viral load will ascend and you'll lose CD4 cells. Let your own virus run rampant. My belief is that the search for a recharge is an emotional decision, along the lines of bug chasing. The fact is that if you're well medicated, a recharge isn't possible: what can the proverbial 10cc of semen, even with a high viral load, do against a system that's flooded with anti-retrovirals? Remember that truvada, just two thirds of an adequate combination, is enough to stop HIV in its tracks. Even for someone with HIV who isn't on meds, the amount of HIV from the average fuck isn't enough to add to the existing infection. I agree with sinfuljock: it's the "forbidden" nature of the fuck that's important. Psychology... I've taken loads from guys who aren't on meds, who've claimed high viral loads, and it's the "safe danger" I've gotten off on, as well as a damn good fuck (for which I thank you guys!).

Keep going (or rather not going), Tiger! If I could make it through the fog of smoke I lived in, so can you!

The European trials of PrEP have been sufficiently successful for a variety of UK HIV organisations to release a joint statement regarding its immediate approval... http://www.gmfa.org.uk/prep

It's recommended that atripla (and therefore efavirenz too) is taken shortly before going to sleep, after not eating for a couple of hours. A snack alongside the drug, especially something high fat like cheese, slows the absorption of the drug and makes the weird dreams more likely, and possibly likely to affect you after waking. As a friend said "free acid" - but do you want to go to work tripped out of your head?

People are still dying of aids, admittedly not in the numbers we saw in the eighties and nineties, but the ARVs are not a cure. Never forget that. If I came off my ARVs I doubt I'd last a year. Two conversations: one with a nurse when visiting a friend who clearly wasn't going to last the day: "should he be smoking in his condition?" "Well, it's not as thought it's going to do long term damage..." And a neighbour: "Should you be smoking with what you've got?" "I've got aids: you expect me to be worried about lung cancer?"... Fact is that stopping smoking is among the best decisions you can make for your health, and yes, some HIV-related conditions are exacerbated by smoking, whether you're on treatment or not.

Guys, thank you for all your comments on this: my next step is to edit it into something possibly novel-shaped, more likely "dirty book shaped" . If anyone has issues over continuity, flow or content, please let me know: next month I plan to start editing with a view to sending selected "beta readers" the edited version in a few months (I've got a house move coming up so I can't do the job as quickly as I'd like: it's more important to find adequate living space). Thank you for reading and (I hope) enjoying: your having a quick one off the wrist while reading gives me a hardon!

Last smoked 6 July 2003. Was on three and a half packs a day. Cut it down to two packs a day for a year and got so bored at watching the clock for when it was time I was allowed to have another that I set a date a couple of weeks away when our houseguest would be moving on (both he and my partner were heavy smokers). I told everyone I was stopping (nothing like the threat of egg on your face to help the resolve) and spent a months cigarette money on software I'd been wanting for a long time. At 23.40 on 6 June 2003 I stood in the back garden and had my last cigarette, throwing the butt into the mutant rhubarb patch over the path (we never did figure out what those plants were). Cleaned out my bedroom ashtray and went to bed. It takes the receptors in your brain about 72 hours to get used to the idea that they ain't getting any more nicotine. After that, it's physical habit. Be active: don't slump in front of the TV. Go out and get fucked instead. Drink more than usual quantities of fruit juice (though if you're in HIV medication avoid grapefruit juice because of possible interactions). When the cravings get too much, promise yourself you can have one in twenty minutes, and go and do something. I worked on a "jam yesterday, jam tomorrow" system: all those unfulfilled promises. I found that a lot of my triggers for smoking were around having something to do with my hands: I actually tried writing things by hand instead of on the PC. Make notes of when you get a craving and what you can do to sidestep it. If you need something to put in your mouth and there isn't a dick around, go for low calorie soft drinks or plain water. Chewing gum helps too in this respect. Our houseguest stayed on an extra week and it was only on the day he left that he realised I hadn't had a fag all week. My partner started a two month stint in hospital "for tests" about six weeks later. Even though the friend who drove me daily to the hospital was a heavy smoker and John came close to death a couple of times, I managed not to smoke. Forget about patches: you really don't need them. All you're doing is giving the money you would have given to the tobacco industry to the pharmaceutical industry instead. If I have one regret about stopping smoking (it was medically necessary: my lung capacity is about 70% of what it should be), it's that I daren't get into cigarsex again (did I mention that along with my seventy a day there'd be a few cigars every week?). Much as I'd love to I'm afraid I have to leave that to fantasy and DVDs... Wish all quitters the best of luck... If I can do it, you can!

The new version of Firefox 3.1 (currently updating to 3.1.1) still struggles with this site, most recently truncating posts. The formatting tools that I see in IE 11 I don't see in Firefox, and the Post button doesn't work in Firefox. Going to have to maintain two browsers now...

No, it's a minority taste, for sure. I've only done blood play a couple of times, and decided it's not something that particularly interests me, except as a threat. On the other hand I spent a year with my partner's initials cigar-branded on my chest, lightly enough to need "topping up" every couple of months. Both cigar-branding and cutting require a certain amount of knowledge and skill. My only concern with this video is that the correct technique is used. I've seen the results of more than enough badly done cutting... I remember years ago in the days of the BBS, my partner and I ran the UK's only gay BDSM BBS. At the time porn videos were illegal in the UK. As an American (we took a feed from a BBS in San Francisco) asked us, almost in shock, "how do you guys learn the right techniques for certain scenes?"

The Medicines Act 1968 is applied with enough force that recreational poppers are effectively illegal in the UK. Drugs covered by the Medicines Act are only supposed to be supplied on presentation of a prescription, so even giving poppers (or tramadol, or amoxicillin or whatever) as a favour is illegal. Sales of amyl nitrite have triggered enough raids on sex shops that butyl nitrate or isobutyl nitrite are now considered the norm in the UK (I've even seen them advertised as "English" poppers, which used to refer only to amyl nitrite.

Undetectable varies from lab to lab, hospital to hospital. I've seen u/d be under 20 and under 70, and remember when u/d was considered to be under 400. As has been pointed out the viral load in cum tends to be higher than in blood (hence the 6 month rule that you can't be really sure till after that time). On the PARTNER study no-one has seroconverted and they consider <200 to be undetectable. Someone here said that the lowest VL they know of someone having and infecting someone was 385: most doctors tend to agree that a VL of 1,000 is the absolute minimum required to establish a "successful" infection. To be as sure as anyone can be, take the belt and braces approach and go on PrEP: it's intended for guys in exactly your situation...

A health caution: if you have high blood pressure (and especially if you're on treatment for it), if you've taken viagra or any of the other *afil drugs, or if you're poz and taking a protease inhibitor (which will be boosted by ritonavir), proceed with caution as you could put yourself in hospital or worse. All three apply to me and I find that I need a fraction of the amount of poppers to get the same high I did years ago. Throughout the eighties and nineties, when you were pretty much assured it was real amyl nitrate you were buying, poppers were pretty much a weekly purchase, I got through so much... Nothing like getting shit-faced and then pigging out!