Ouchies!!

So around this time last week I had started to feel like there was a bruise on my upper left arm, but brushed it off because I probably DID have a bruise, considering how often I get injured at work. And when a rash appeared on my arm and bumps on my back on Monday, I ignored that as well, thinking the arm rash was from the heat and the bumps on my back merely being the result of a particularly dimwitted decision of mine involving a passionate encounter and the floor of my bedroom. However, as the week went on the rash on my arm developed rather painful bumps, and the bumps on my back began to itch as well as hurt.

Unfortunately I worked Monday - Wednesday, so I had to wait until Thursday to reach a doctor to see what was up. I still assumed it was a heat rash gone wrong, and was hoping that he'd prescribe a hydro cortisone cream to help with the itchiness or something. I was very wrong. Once the doctor heard all my symptoms (rash with painful bumps, headache, nausea, etc) he took one look and said with confidence "it's shingles". He checked them over again just to be sure, then prescribed me some anti virals, not to cure me, as shingles is a condition which must run its course, but to prevent postherpetic neuralgia, or lingering pain in the nerves where shingles took place.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, shingles is a condition caused by the same virus that causes chicken pox. After one has chicken pox, the virus can remain dormant in certain nerves of your body. When you're exposed to great amounts of stress, the virus can be reactivated, causing varying amounts of pain depending on which nerve it hits and how severely. I was relatively lucky in that it's not in a very obvious and painful place, like my face, and that it is easily covered for when I go to work. It's not contagious for people who have ever had chicken pox or the chicken pox shot, and if you never had the disease then don't touch my rash because then you WILL get chicken pox.

Of course it is after I get sick that I learn there's a shingles vaccine now on the market, so I recommend that everyone go get it, because this sucks. I only hope that it takes the average 2-3 weeks to recover and not any longer - sometimes it can take months or years to get better!! :(