Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (MTV)

Last night on “Savage U,” Dan hit up Rhodes College, a small university in Memphis. The campus consists of less than 2,000 students so guys and girls find it really tough to avoid dating their friends’ exes. One of the students Dan met is scared to date altogether, but not because of  jealous BFF’s. Allison has been through a lot since she was diagnosed with HPV in high school. Watch her story below at 13:30.

+ Deets

When she was 16, Allison found out she had HPV through a routine pap smear and visit to her gynecologist. She had several related medical procedures to deal with some abnormal cells caused by the HPV. It’s been a tough road and Allison has had a lot of feelings of fear and depression along the way. “I just felt kind of alone through it all,” she said.

+The (SEX)perts Weigh In:

After listening to Allison share her story, we kinda want her as our new BFF. This chick seems so level-headed and cool, not to mention more responsible than some people twice her age!

“I wanted [the HPV] to be out of sight, out of mind. I wasn’t having any symptoms so it would have been easier to just pretend like it wasn’t there,” she said. But she DIDN’T: she followed her doctor’s recommendations, got treatment for the abnormal cells, and is now happy and healthy.

She is also talking about her diagnosis openly, and why shouldn’t she? HPV is nothing to be embarrassed about, it is incredibly common. More than 50% of sexually active people will get it at some point during their lives and most people who have HPV will never know they have it. As Dan says, “It’s the common cold of sexually transmitted infections.”

Of course we know HPV is no fun: it can cause genital warts, and a small percentage of cases do have more serious health consequences, like cervical cancer. That’s why women need to get regular screenings at their gynecologists, just to be safe. The good news is that cervical cancer is the easiest cancer to prevent with regular screenings, so it can be caught early before it develops, just like in Allison’s case.

It’s important to do what you can to protect yourself against HPV, but also to understand that most cases are mild. About 90% of cases are cleared from the body naturally within a few years.

As for the dating game, Dan said Allison needs to get back out there and let herself like someone again. “It’s scary, but you’re going to have to get back on the bike,” he said.

+What You Can Do

Get vaccinated: Getting vaccinated is the best way to protect yourself from HPV infection. There are vaccines that can help protect both guys and girls from some of the more common types of HPV that can lead to disease or cancer. The vaccine is given in three shots and it’s important to get ALL THREE. The HPV vaccine is recommended for teens and women up to age 26, men up to 21. Get more info on the vaccine here.

Use Condoms: If you’re having sex, use a condom each and every time. Condoms can lower your risk of getting STDs including HPV. But know that HPV can also infect areas that aren’t covered by a condom so the surest way to avoid getting an STD is to not have sex at all.

Get regular screening: Women who are sexually active or 21 or older should get regular pap smears, which help detect cell changes caused by HPV that might develop into cancer if they aren’t treated. There is an HPV test for women, but it is not common and the best way to get screened is a regular pap smear. Currently there is no HPV test recommended for men.

For more information on sexual health visit It’s Your Sex Life and enjoy some of our favorite Dan-isms of the night below:

Dan’s fascination with Shake Weights: “I’ve never seen one of those in the wild!”

Dan’s take on jealous ex-girlfriends: “You didn’t steal her car, she doesn’t own that boy.”

Dan on getting over embarrassment about periods: “It’s a vagina — blood falls out of it once a month.”

Best uplifting advice of the night: “You should do what you want to do and you shouldn’t worry about other people’s judgment”

Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (MTV)

During the first hour of yesterday’s back-to-back “16 and Pregnant” episodes, we met Sarah — a Georgia native whose family clashed with Blake, her baby’s daddy, after he moved-in. Well, in case you missed it, he moved right back out, leaving Sarah and newborn Tinleigh behind to work toward becoming a shrimp boat captain. What has Sarah taken from the whole experience? And where does she hope her career is headed? Watch after the jump!

“I would tell myself to respect me, to do what I’m comfortable with and respect my morals,” Sarah told us about what she’d do differently. “When you’re 16, you don’t think about that. It’s not the first thing on your mind. You want to please other people sometimes.” Sarah says she was blinded by the love she felt between her and Blake, and hadn’t she, things would be a bit different. (Okay, a lot.) “When you think you’re in love, it’s a lot easier to be like, ‘I’ll do what he wants to do and not what I want to do because I think that he loves me,’” she added. So…how do you know if you’re ready for sex? There’s no real sign, but you should never feel pressured to, Lauren Mann of The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy tells Remote Control.

As for where she wants to go moving forward with her life, career-wise? Hint: for two years, she read almost every issue of Cosmopolitan from cover to cover! Get it, gurl. Watch her talk about those plans, sex myths and more below. Plus, take control of your sex life by taking action after the video.

+ WATCH: Sarah reflects on being “16 and Pregnant.”

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Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (Getty Images/DoSomething.org)

We’ve all heard about pregnancy tests, but how about pregnancy . . . text?! Yup, you heard right. From May 14 through June 4, DoSomething.org is launching a unique campaign called Pregnancy Text to prevent teen pregnancy through the use of your cell phone.

The idea is to show that raising a baby isn’t easy, and that if you have a baby, it’s going to deserve a lot of attention and hard work. DoSomething won’t be giving you a baby doll to take care of (or — even worse — an egg), but it will be giving you your own digital baby. If you go to their website, you can “give” one of your friends a “baby” for twelve hours. If you give a baby to 5 friends you qualify for a $2,000 scholarship. What happens when you give a baby?

For half a day, your pal’s phone will be announcing when the baby needs attention — when it’s feeding time or time to change diapers. DoSomething.org says this campaign focuses on guys as well as girls, because it doesn’t think it’s fair when pregnancy prevention campaigns only target girls. So how about some girls out there give their BFs a digital baby?

When it’s over, DoSomething.org gives you info on teen pregnancy. ‘Cause if you have a real baby, it won’t go away in twelve hours . . . and unlike your phone, you can’t turn it off when you need a break.

Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (Getty Images)

Today is the National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Yep. Up until last week, I didn’t know we had one of those either. According to The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, 3 in 10 teen girls in the U.S. will get pregnant at least once before turning 20. Here are some other facts about pregnancy, pregnancy prevention, and…Ryan Gosling.

+ 8 out of 10 teen fathers don’t marry the mother of their child.

“If you impregnate it, then you shoulda/coulda/but didn’t put a ring on it!” ‘Scuse me while I remix a Beyonce classic. According to The National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, only 20% of teen moms get a ring put on it. Seriously, ladies. Hold out for Ryan Gosling. He breaks up street fights, saves women from oncoming traffic, and — when you’re ready, many years from now– will make an awesome babydaddy.

Continue reading →

Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (Agenda Magazine)

May 2 isn’t just the day after May Day. It’s also the National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. The teen birth rate has gone down recently and some attribute it to the “16 & Pregnant/”Teen Mom” effect, but there are still hundreds of thousands of teens having babies each year. But hey, we’re not here to point a finger! We just want to give you more deets on the power of protection in bed, the sofa, wherever you are getting down — IF you’re getting down. We spoke with Farrah Abraham of “Teen Mom” to get the lowdown on what she thinks of the day and the impact she sees from the show.

Continue reading →

Reported by MTV Act.

Photo: (Getty Images)

TLC has been popping up in the news lately, though it’s for a sad reason: this week marks the tenth anniversary of member Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes’ death in a car accident. While we send our thoughts to Left Eye’s friends and family, we at MTV Act want to show the amazing and helpful things Left Eye did, along with her fellow bandmates T-Boz and Chilli.

+The Lisa Lopes Foundation

Left Eye visited Honduras and wanted to help out the poverty-stricken country. She was in the midst of starting up her org — which would supply educational facilities and medical treatments — when she died in 2002. But that wasn’t the end of the Lisa Lopes Foundation, no siree. It’s now up and running and this July the foundation’s gonna have a Left Eye Music Fest in Decatur, Georgia.

+Safe Sex

Forget a pirate patch! Left Eye liked to wear a condom over her, well, left eye. This was an eye-catching fashion move (arrrgh, bad pun!), but it also held a purpose. Left Eye and her bandmates wanted to talk about safe sex and how important it is to use protection every time a person has sex. Just check out TLC’s “Ain’t 2 Proud 2 Beg” video to see this style in action.

+Self-Esteem Issues

In 1999, TLC tackled the issue of low self-esteem with their song and video “Unpretty.” In the video, Chilli is pressured by her BF to get implants and a teen girl makes herself sick trying to get as thin as models in magazines. By the end of the video, Chilli has let all hell break loose on her boyfriend because of how he treated her, and the girl puts on a bathing suit and is happy with herself the way she is.

+HIV Treatment

In 2003, Chilli and T-Boz hooked up with Agouron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. for “Dialogues: Education and Treatment for a Well Planned Future.” They wanted to teach people about getting tested for HIV, and the importance of seeing a doc right away for treatment. Talking to a medical professional sooner rather than later can make a world of difference, because there are ways to live a long, healthy life with HIV.

+Be the Match

Since she was a little girl, T-Boz has struggled with health issues because of her sickle cell anemia. Having to deal with so many hospital trips and doctor visits has given her a deep personal understanding of what it’s like to be sick, and she wants to help others. That’s why she got involved with Be the Match, an org that helps people with diseases like leukemia and lymphoma find marrow transplants.

Reported by MTV Act.

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You can catch Dan Savage hand out sex advice on “Savage U” every Tuesday night at 11/10c. Each episode, he visits a different college campus and meets with different students in different situations with different sex questions. But there had to be something that overlapped in all his visits — some piece of advice that he found giving over and over. Well there wasn’t one… there were three!

“Be really who you are!” he warns. “Because if you scare people away by being open about who you are sexually, what you’re interested in, what turns you on — those weren’t the right people for you. They weren’t going to be good partners for you. Those weren’t going to be successful relationships anyway.” In short, don’t be shy and do you, boo. See what else he had to say:

+ WATCH: Dan Savage shares his three most important pieces of advice.

So to recap: communicate; be yourself; and, know what consent looks like! Got it? Good.

On tonight’s episode, Dan dishes out some more advice — this time to a self-described vivacious young woman looking to making things a bit wilder(er?) in her life. He’s given out advice on topics from safely hooking up online to getting out of the friend zone, so things are about to get even more interesting. Check out a sneak peek of tonight’s episode below:

+ WATCH: ‘Savage U’ Episode 4, Sneak Peek.

And since Dan Savage got us on this “be yourself” topic, remember to know yourself, too! Know yourself and know your status by taking action with GYT below.