Dear herpes virus living in a nerve ending in the left half of my bottom lip,
This is a love letter.
It is a love letter to you as a metaphor for every trauma-enhanced part of my body. You, the metaphor for my fibromyalgia. You, the metaphor for my scoliosis. You, the metaphor for my migraines, for my depression-bent spine, for my anxiety-crushed shoulders, for my stress-shredded immune system.
But if I write only to you, the metaphor, then I am avoiding you, the reality.
You, herpesvirus.
Let’s call you HSV1, based on your location and despite not having a sero test.
Writing about you as a metaphor is relatively easy. My trauma body is easy for me to hate and the pathways to that hate have well-marked signs pointing to other paths. Graffitied onto the trees, ‘this path to shame and self-loathing, turn left ahead to reach compassion point.’
The pain inspires anger and shame and self-hate, and I know it well enough now to also (in the right moment, from the right angle) perceive the pain as an invitation to self-care. Information rather than attack.
The fibro, the migraines, the sore back. Less so the lungs – still work to do mapping new pathways there. And less so you, little virus. Much less so, you.
So writing a love letter to you required some reflection and some research.
I learned that you, herpesvirus, require fusion of your viral membrane with that of your host, me. I had thought of you as a guest, though an uninvited one, but in fact you have become part of me. Not just living in my nerve-ending but actually fused with it.
You are the prototypic species of the subfamily Alphaherpesvirinae, in the larger family of animal pathogens, Herpesviridae.
‘Viruses in this family are comprised of large enveloped DNA viruses of complex structure [26]. A lipid bilayer envelopes an icosahedral capsid that in turn encapsulates a linear, double-stranded DNA genome. The lipid envelope is separated from the capsid by a proteinaceous matrix called the tegument [27]. The HSV1 virion 3D structure was the first pleomorphic enveloped virus structure to be determined by cryoET [28]. The 3D structure revealed that the ∼220-nm-diameter virions are bipolar, with the capsid being positioned eccentrically, thus forming a proximal and a distal pole. The envelope membrane is highly studded with viral glycoproteins with a non-random distribution, viz., being more abundant around the capsid distal pole, with implications for viral entry and assembly.’
You’re kind of cool, actually. Complex and persistent, resilient. The complexity of your structure means that your infection cycle is also complex, and you are transported from your site of entry (where we fuse, my awful beloved) retrogradely down to a sensory neuron where you establish the latent infection that will stay with me permanently, part of me, part of my pain body, part of my trauma body, intersecting with my shame-pain and my physical-pain in moments when your infection becomes markedly less latent.
You have only been part of my body for six or seven years. I don’t know where you came from. I remember our first date, though. You, arriving unannounced. A week later, my mom commenting to Jon that she thought you were going to ‘take over [my] face.’
Awkward all around.
I’ve done all kinds of things to try and keep you at bay. To try and make you go away.
I’ve meditated, imagining a cleansing light burning you out of me.
I’ve avoided chocolate and citrus fruits, despite loving both.
I take Lysine like my life depends on it whenever you show up, and I take it preventatively in that one week of my cycle when you’re most likely to make yourself known.
I’ve mixed vanilla extract with Lysine powder and coated it on, because I read somewhere that it would help.
I’ve tried tea tree oil and various medicated gels and creams and ointments.
I’ve spent hours and hours and hours staring at you in mirrors, horrified and fascinated at how you change my face from something I’ve worked hard to accept into something I find viscerally repellant, in a day! Less than a day, sometimes!
And then you stay, for the whole upsetting 8-12 day cycle, and in that time I can’t kiss anyone or comfortably use a straw, or eat a sandwich, or lick my lips, or touch my lips, or smile comfortably, or laugh without wincing.
You are not the enemy, herpes virus living in a nerve ending in my lip.
You are not the enemy.
You are me. You are part of me.
And I am not the enemy.
I will stop visualizing the light burning you out of me.
I will start visualizing the light soothing you back to sleep.
Welcome to my body, small one.
Join all the other parts that hurt and ache and twinge and flare in response to stress and other factors.
We are an ugly mess, but we are learning, and we can keep learning together.
I’ll try to recognize your invitations to better self-care, to seek more sleep, better nutrition, more mindfulness. I’ll try to be gentle with you, with you-in-me, with myself.
When I look in the mirror, I’ll try to see my own face still present.
Love,
Me
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1879625714000091
