Shingles

Well, my amateur diagnosis of Hacking Bird Flu turned out to be completely bogus. It also turns out that I made up Hacking Bird Flu. I would have sworn it was an actual medical condition. It also turns out that the professional diagnosis, by an actual medical professional was equally wrong. You may recall from yesterday's post that I was told on Monday that I had a sinus infection. Last evening I developed a a red rash on the left side of my face, extending from inside my upper lip to just below my left eye. My headache returned in full furry and I spent another lovely night crying like a baby. The rash extended into my mustache and beard and made it feel as though I had a million ingrown hairs or something. So, I did what anyone in my condition would do, I shaved off a big chunk of my beard at three in the morning. This morning I shaved off the rest. This is the first day in about twenty-five years that I am clean-shaven. My face looks like a baby's butt, unfortunately one with a bad case of diaper rash. I called my doctor this morning and they got me right in at nine. He took one look at me and said, "You have shingles." That sounds bad. It turns out that shingles is the reactivation of the chicken pox virus that lurks in most, maybe all of us. It is called Herpes Zoster. I'm not crazy about anything with herpes in the name. The doctor put me on an anti-viral drug and gave me some lovely pain pills for the headache. Pills that work pretty well. He also referred me to an ophthalmologist to make sure it isn't affecting my vision. I hadn't eaten since Sunday afternoon, so I was delighted to find that between my Monday visit and today's visit, I lost about nine pounds. It's not really a good long-term weight loss plan though. I promise to quite writing about my disgusting health problems real soon. I owe a huge debt of thanks to Daughter Sneed's soon-to-be-husband, Mr. Peterson, who stepped up and took Son Sneed to his two medical appointment's today. What a guy! Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky