The reason I haven't been blogging...shingles.
Yep, I had shingles...they are almost gone now.
The crazy thing is...Shane had them too!
The doctor that we saw said that he has been a dr for 31 years and has NEVER seen two people in the same house get them at the same time.
Yep, I had shingles...they are almost gone now.
The crazy thing is...Shane had them too!
The doctor that we saw said that he has been a dr for 31 years and has NEVER seen two people in the same house get them at the same time.
That's right, NEVER!
So then I felt like a super-freak.
Supposedly, they are not contagious...unless you have never had the chicken pox, in which case you would have to be directly exposed to the shingles (rubbing them or someone rubbing the shingles and then touching you, eeeew!) to get chicken pox from a person with shingles. Also, supposedly, once you get shingles you won't get them again. Unless you are someone in Shane's or my family...my mom has had them 5 times and his dad has had them twice.
ALSO - when my youngest brothers were little my dad got shingles and my youngest brother got chicken pox and the next youngest brother got chicken pox on half of his body and shingles on the other half...they lasted for months. He still has scars from them.
So I asked the dr if there is any genetic predisposition to get shingles and he said no. I have to say that I really am having a hard time believing that, given our family history.
Shane had his for a week before he went to the dr. I got mine on a Sunday morning. I thought I had a spider bite on my left hip and it was really itchy. By the end of the day the sores had spread up the front of my waist and down the back of my leg in a sporadic non-pattern. They didn't hurt at all. They itched like crazy though. They didn't follow a pattern and I had a few on the right side of my waist too. We both went to the same dr on Monday morning and he saw Shane first. He looked at his sores and told him they were shingles. I went in about half an hour later and he was shocked that I had them too. They didn't look anything alike, but our symptoms were similar and he said they were the only thing they could be. We both started medicine that day and Shane's didn't spread any more. Mine spread for a few more days and just stayed itchy until they got blisters and scabbed over. (I know, graphic and gross, but that's what they did.)
Really, I didn't believe him that I even HAD shingles so I went a few days later to see a different dr in a different practice and he took one look at them and said "those are shingles". I didn't tell him beforehand that I had already had that diagnosis.
The reason I didn't believe the first dr? Well, shingles are supposed to follow a band/ribbon-like pattern around your body and stay on one side.
They usually hurt in those areas first and then you get the sores.
They are not supposed to be contagious.
Weird!
They are fading just as rapidly as they came. Shane's still hurt every once in awhile but I haven't felt mine for days. But yesterday I was driving and thinking how strange the whole episode was and that I couldn't even feel them now and just then I had a shot of pain go up my hip and around to my back...right where the shingles were.
I guess I haven't felt the last from them yet after all.
So then I felt like a super-freak.
Supposedly, they are not contagious...unless you have never had the chicken pox, in which case you would have to be directly exposed to the shingles (rubbing them or someone rubbing the shingles and then touching you, eeeew!) to get chicken pox from a person with shingles. Also, supposedly, once you get shingles you won't get them again. Unless you are someone in Shane's or my family...my mom has had them 5 times and his dad has had them twice.
ALSO - when my youngest brothers were little my dad got shingles and my youngest brother got chicken pox and the next youngest brother got chicken pox on half of his body and shingles on the other half...they lasted for months. He still has scars from them.
So I asked the dr if there is any genetic predisposition to get shingles and he said no. I have to say that I really am having a hard time believing that, given our family history.
Shane had his for a week before he went to the dr. I got mine on a Sunday morning. I thought I had a spider bite on my left hip and it was really itchy. By the end of the day the sores had spread up the front of my waist and down the back of my leg in a sporadic non-pattern. They didn't hurt at all. They itched like crazy though. They didn't follow a pattern and I had a few on the right side of my waist too. We both went to the same dr on Monday morning and he saw Shane first. He looked at his sores and told him they were shingles. I went in about half an hour later and he was shocked that I had them too. They didn't look anything alike, but our symptoms were similar and he said they were the only thing they could be. We both started medicine that day and Shane's didn't spread any more. Mine spread for a few more days and just stayed itchy until they got blisters and scabbed over. (I know, graphic and gross, but that's what they did.)
Really, I didn't believe him that I even HAD shingles so I went a few days later to see a different dr in a different practice and he took one look at them and said "those are shingles". I didn't tell him beforehand that I had already had that diagnosis.
The reason I didn't believe the first dr? Well, shingles are supposed to follow a band/ribbon-like pattern around your body and stay on one side.
They usually hurt in those areas first and then you get the sores.
They are not supposed to be contagious.
Weird!
They are fading just as rapidly as they came. Shane's still hurt every once in awhile but I haven't felt mine for days. But yesterday I was driving and thinking how strange the whole episode was and that I couldn't even feel them now and just then I had a shot of pain go up my hip and around to my back...right where the shingles were.
I guess I haven't felt the last from them yet after all.
5 comments:
I'm so sorry. We have just had a couple of cases in our ward. I hope I don't ever get it. But I had the real chicken pox as a kid. So that's my knock on wood! Hope everyone is cleared up really fast!
Ick! I hope you and your husband are recovering! One of my little sisters was born with shingles on her legs. Weird, huh?
Freaky stuff!
Jennie - that's the way you get shingles, it is a recurrence of chicken pox as an adult, but it happens in a different form
Jen - that is crazy about your sister! Was she okay? Did she have scars from it?
Thanks for the well wishes! We are doing a lot better now.
Not fun:( Glad you're better.
that makes me feel so much better! the other day my VT partner and I went VTing and found out that one of our girls had had shingles 3 weeks prior and it was just clearing up. She is a nurse in NICU so they wouldn't let her go back until she was completely clear of it. When we went to leave I gave her a hug and my partner followed suit, I figured she wouldn't have done it if, being a nurse, she thought it were a bad idea. When we left my partner was really freaked out and I felt like it was my fault. So I'm glad to find out more info. thanks.
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