Hi, i was just diagnosed with hpv and i am a mess. i feel like i have to put my life on hold for another year to get tested to see if it goes away. i have done all the research that says my body is supposed to fight it off, but its been in my system for over 14 months, and that is if it was my last boyfriend that gave it to me. My insurance wont pay for another hpv test for another year, so i wait for another year to see if i can rid myself of this horrible virus. i was wondering if there was anything that i can do to help my body fight this along. i am taking regular vitamins and exercising regularly. is there any specific vitamins, other than multivitamins, that i can take to help me? i do not have GW (knock on wood). i just want this to go away so i can go on with my life. i will do anything, please help me!!!!!

Basically, you want to do anything and everything that keeps your immune system in tip-top shape.

If you smoke, you NEED to quit in order to get rid of this.

Other than that: get lots of sleep, try to minimize stress as much as possible (although that alone seems impossible when dealing with this stupid virus!). I use lots of Purell to try to not get a common cold so hopefully my immune system can divert all of its resources to this particular virus.

You can look into taking an indol-3-carbinol supplement as there have been some promising studies (google it along with HPV). I tried it and it didn't work for me though.

Still dealing with HPV after having been diagnosed two years ago. Sigh.

Sorry to hear you're having to deal with that. I guess you must have been told it's a low risk strain since you mentioned warts. Are you or have you been checked for warts/cervical cell changes? If so and you don't have any, I would encourage you to try not to worry as much as you can. It's hard - believe me, I know - but if you aren't having any outward symptoms, you wouldn't even know you were carrying had you not been tested! I too felt like I had to put my life on hold when I first was told I had abnormal cells, but after a while I got angry at letting an impersonal virus ruin so much of my time. So far everything has turned out ok with my first follow up (waiting for the PAP but no biopsy this time), and I'm wishing I hadn't spent so much time worrying initially. I hope you're able to at least push it to the back of your mind.

Here are the things I did to try to help myself clear the virus... basically just generally trying to be healthy and follow common recommendations that most people ignore:

Took a multivitamin in the morning
Took a folic acid supplement at dinner (found some research suggesting folic acid levels may be related to virus clearance, but keep in mind not much research related to HPV is wholly conclusive)
Exercise 3-5 times a week
Get plenty of sleep
Cut out red meat from my diet
Greatly reduced sugar intake (except chocolate...)
Stuck to the '5 a day' recommendation for fruits and veggies, especially broccoli (some studies suggest DIM in broccoli may be helpful)
Used condoms with my partner, even though we're monogamous (again, studies related to viral load)
Used pads instead of tampons (again, studies)
I don't smoke, but I also almost completely eliminated my exposure to secondhand smoke (no smoky bars, clubs, etc)

Side note - I didn't get sick once after I started doing this. Don't know if any of this actually helped virus clearance, but it helped me feel like I had more control, which reduced my worrying. I hope this gets easier for you.

Ok...so this is what I take...multivitamin twice a day, Green tea pills (morning only), DIM 2 pills (twice a day)...be very careful with DIM because it does impact your BCPs effectiveness, definately use condoms when taking DIM, 400 mg Folic Acid (twice a day), 200 mg Selenium (twice a day).

thanks for all the advice, i cannot tell you how much i appreciate the support. I do take a multi-vitamin twice a day. i am glad someone sad that - for a minute, i thought i was overdosing my body with too many vitamins, i also take an extra C vitamin. I do not smoke and try to avoid it as much as possible. i getting plenty of sleep - one of my favorite pastimes. I also exercise regularly. I do not have sex, dont have a boyfriend and will not seek one out until this virus is out of my system. I am recently divorced and didnt even know i had this virus until i was diagnosed, i do not have outward symptoms (GW) - but know i am paranoid about getting them. which seems to be a common theme.

I am planning on getting a folic acid supplement to add to my vitamins. any more advice would be greatly appreciated, i will do about anything to get rid of this virus. thanks to all of you.

So were you diagnosed with high risk HPV or low risk HPV? High risk HPV does not cause warts...it causes cervical changes. Avoiding sex is something that is a personal choice, as is using condoms (although condom use is recommended as it has been shown to help regression of the virus). The good news is that most of the time, HPV regresses on it's own within 2 yrs.