My diagnosis with syphilis came as a surprise.  Because I have sexual health check-ups at least every 6 months, I know almost exactly when I got syphilis. It was during a visit to Madrid. A few months after the trip, during a routine STI check up I finally found out what was wrong with my finger. After weeks of having an infection on the tip of one of my fingers, and having it checked out by a number of doctors, I found out that the infection was a syphilis symptom.

None of the doctors I visited recognized it as a syphilis symptom – and I’d even had minor surgery to try to clean the infection from my finger. But it was the sexual health clinic visit that finally solved the puzzle. A few weeks after the Madrid sex party I remember having a minor rash on my body. But it wasn’t significant enough to cause me any concerns. But looking back, that might have been another syphilis symptom.

The thing is that none of the men I had had sex with had any symptoms themselves, or any that I could see. It’s probable that I got syphilis on my finger from touching a guy’s penis or playing with his ass. If it was from the ass-play then I wouldn’t have been able to see any of his symptoms, even if he had any.

What this taught me was that it’s possible to get syphilis from sex that we think of as being ‘safe’. I didn’t get syphilis by having sex without condoms – I got it from fingering.

When I found out I had syphilis I wanted to make sure everyone I’d been in sexual contact with knew that they could have it too.  Because I’m pretty sure I got it during a hook-up on that visit, I tried to contact as many people as I could who I’d had sex with. I asked those guys to also let the other guys they’d been in contact with know. I sent texts out – and asked them to spread the word.

But I was surprised by the response. There was a lot of resistance and some of my friends didn’t want to pass the information on. I think it comes from the stigma of having syphilis. When I’ve told sexual partners in the past about chlamydia or gonorrhea, the response has been different. But with syphilis, there is a different kind of stigma.

Maybe it’s something to do with perceptions of how easy it is to treat other STIs – take a short course of antibiotics and within a week, you’re treated and unable to pass those STIs on. But syphilis is seen as being more serious. Some of the guys I spoke to didn’t want to have sex with me soon after I was treated – maybe because they thought I was still infectious?

There’s still too much stigma about STIs – but we need to be able to talk about them, and to be honest about having had them.

I hadn’t visited an STI clinic for almost a year. Whilst I usually go every three months, I hadn’t been having much sex and was in between surgeries, so it didn’t feel necessary or important to stick to my usual routine.

Since starting the process of transitioning as trans, I started visiting places where I could be more sexually adventurous. And a few weeks after visiting a particular venue I started to get headaches and noticed a small rash on my stomach. I visited my GP who said it was a strep infection and, after a few weeks, the rash went away.

Looking back, I wonder if those were symptoms of syphilis? I’ve heard from other people that symptoms such as rashes are sometimes overlooked by GPs, especially when the symptoms aren’t severe.

After the surgery, I decided it was time to go and have a sexual health check-up and, at that appointment, I was diagnosed with syphilis. The clinic told me it was second stage or secondary syphilis, meaning that I had had syphilis for a few months, at least.

Because I mostly have sex with people I don’t know, or cannot be in touch with, I wasn’t able to let most of my sexual partners know that I’d had syphilis. The one person I could get in touch with had recently also been tested for syphilis, and had also tested positive.

I felt nervous having that conversation with them. What if they’d got syphilis from me? I mean I could’ve also got syphilis from them! But I didn’t know I had syphilis and I didn’t do anything wrong. And I’m glad I was able to be in touch with that person, and tell them that it was time for a check-up.

There’s not enough information around about syphilis and other STIs for trans people. It might be that, as with HIV, that trans people have greater susceptibility to syphilis. I know that starting to have sex in different networks of people means that my sexual practice, and possible exposure to syphilis has changed.

Getting diagnosed with syphilis didn’t surprise me. But it has reminded me of why it’s important for me to stick to regular STI testing. It’s also reminded me that I don’t need to be having lots of sex to be exposed to an STI.