Gonorrhea (the clap)

It burns. When urinating, upon contact, in the mucous membranes — a fire that cannot be ignored. Gonorrhea is one of the oldest known sexually transmitted diseases: a bacterial infection that can affect the urethra, cervix, throat, or rectum, and that has serious consequences without treatment. Medicine is unambiguous here — antibiotics are the first and most important step.

And yet a second question arises, one that does not stand against the medical but beside it: why now? Why you? Why does an inflammation arise in your most intimate area — where closeness, vulnerability, and identity converge?

Gonorrhea is not a punishment. It is not a moral verdict. But it is a signal — from an area of your body that is closely connected to your self-worth, your relationship to yourself, and your way of asserting yourself in the world.