married for 12 years, no other partners for 17 years, no previous outbreaks on penis. I went to the doc when I had skin irritation on penis head and a pcr test showed hsv1. my spouse and I hadn't had any activity for 7 months for procreative reasons and normal decrease in activity due to raising young kids. I was uneducated on hsv and was sure there was no way I could have it but I was obviously thinking it was hsv2. Only after asking the nurse to read the results did I find it was hsv1. they ordered igm blood test to see if it was a "new" infection and it came back negative. I know from reading here that there is some controversy surrounding the usefulness of igm tests but in any case, they are telling me it's not a new infection but I never had an outbreak. The only other time I ever had a mark at all on my penis was 23 years ago and it wasn't in same spot. it was smaller than this outbreak. it was one red dot as opposed to 5 dots. i'm trying to learn as much as I can before I tell my spouse. I don't want her to think I went outside our marriage and I want to understand if this lone mark on my penis 23 years ago was in fact a hsv1 initial outbreak, then can I expect to not see this again for another few decades if at all? any help is appreciated greatly. I just can't wrap my brain around how this happened and feel like I let down my spouse.