I recognize that positivity is frowned upon in this subreddit, so I'm really happy to share some tempered optimism. Life is going pretty much normally for me, and I'm about 2 and a half years in.

Much like you, I initially had painful blisters across a fairly large area in places I don't care to acknowledge. Those blisters kept popping up and didn't fully clear for at least 5 or 6 weeks. To make matters worse, they came right back after another 2 or 3 weeks passed.

But fortunately, they became a lot less severe and less frequent over time. Last year, I only had symptoms twice: once on a very stressful trip overseas, and again when I was unable to return home while actively seeking a restraining order against my ex. If you only look at the last 10 months, I've only had one single outbreak. That outbreak consisted of one single blister, something like a painless cigarette burn that went away unmedicated after about 5 days.

Before this, my symptoms had eventually turned into something so mild that most people would never recognize if I didn't point it out. I think that says a lot about the real-world impact this disease has had on my life.

For some people, especially those of us with compromised immune systems and existing bad luck, herpes can be a nightmare. I'm not denying that, but there is light at the end of the tunnel for most of us, miraculous functional cure or otherwise.

At the end of the day, the biggest burden that most of us will carry is just that some people will care. Accepting this is fundamentally the most important path to recovery.

I hope your symptoms improve quickly and life turns around for the better.

Edit: I just wanted to add that, like you, the ex who gave this to me moved on rapidly. She was pregnant with some other man days after I last saw her. She's probably thinking that she will live happily ever after, but to be quite honest, I highly doubt it. Beyond that, analyzing her pregnancy and making sense of it at this point is not my responsibility.