I have a more general question that (I hope) might be valuable to other readers here as well. I've seen in several places where you have indicated that there is essentially no risk of STD transmission from mutual masturbation, and I have two questions about this as I think about my own safe sex practices.
The first is how is it defined? Does mutual masturbation include activities like touching your partner's genitals and then touching your own? Or is it strictly touching your partners genitals and then not touching your own?
I'm curious because I think you have suggested that gential-to-hand-to-genital transmission is extremely rare if it happens at all, and yet it seems like a possible (and maybe even likely) route for something like HSV where you have said that the virus needs to be "massaged" into the skin in order to achieve transmission.
I suspect thats its very hard to isolate sexual experiences (people who engage in mutual masturbation probably engage in other activities too), but this strikes me as a possibility.
A few months ago, I had a "mutual masturbation" experience with a girl where I "fingered" her and shortly thereafter masturbated my penis with the same hand. Do you consider this a safe practice, or would it be better to use my other hand or wash my hand before touching myself?
I'm not particularly concerned with this particular incident (because my annual std screen last week was clean) but I'm trying to decide what my "safe sex" practices will be going forward.
Thanks for any light you can shed, and for all of the hard work you do.