#220 - how gross is this?

okay, i'm going to try and make this first paragraph really long so that if you don't want to see the gross-ness it won't smack you in the face as soon as you open up this page. i was considering not posting the disgusting-ness at all, but then i thought, what the crap, if i'm going through all of this (and i think this is a pretty unusual occurance, at least for me) then i should just go for it right? anyway, i am currently writing this post at home. at home, you ask, but shouldn't you be at work right now? yes, i answer, i should be at work, but instead i am at home... quarantined. because i just found out that i have shingles! gross! it's so disgusting, i don't know how it got it either. my doctor was stumped too, because once you get the chicken pox (which i got when i was in 3rd grade) then the virus lies dormant in your nerves, then if you've got a period of high stress or something taxes your immune system then you it can turn into shingles. but i haven't done anything different the last month or so and i'm no more stressed than i usually am, and i actually think i was in a pretty healthy period. i mean, i got sick two weeks ago, but that was just a head cold and i gave myself time to recover from it (remember my sick day post?). but you can also get it from someone who has the chicken pox, but most kids nowdays get the chicken pox vaccine so i didn't think i got it from work, but then we have a lot of kids from like marshall islands and stuff and they probably never got the vaccine, so my doctor suspects it might be from one of them. still, i feel a little defeated that i got it. i mean, i think i'm a pretty healthy person, so i feel like a failure that i let it get me. haha, well, anyway, let me give you a timetable of what happened:

wednesday - after volleyball i went to longs and safeway, but had to rush outta there (and i mean RUSH outta there) and book it home 'cause my tummy was way upset at me... but i didn't think anything of it, i figured i had some bad poke

thursday - regular day, kinda itchy on my back, i figured i got a bug bite

friday - regular day, still itchy on my back, checked it out best i could in the mirror, figured it was a spider bite, but maybe a pretty nasty spider, worked out in the afternoon

saturday - went surfing, kinda embarrassed to have this weird ugly spider bite on my back, but whatever, it was sun and salt water so it was cool, kinda sore, i figured it was from working out at the gym the day before

sunday - went to tennis, more sore, but i figured it was from surfing since i hadn't surfed in awhile, at night went to a family b-day party, tummy kinda mad at me again, then felt kinda queasy, but figured i just needed to eat something, and i felt better after i did, so i didn't think much of it

monday - went to work, started worrying about the weird rash (it had kinda become a rash now, spread out a little more) on my back... hoped it would go away, mostly though just because it was ugly and itchy

tuesday - woke up, went to work, PAIN PAIN PAIN PAIN!! the grossness of the rash intensified and i was getting stabbed all over my back every second. couldn't even sit still, i'd wince and grimace at each needle poked into my skin. so, i went to the doctor, and bingo = shingles. gross.


see how disgusting that is? i can't stand that it's on my skin. eww. and i think skin is pretty gross anyway, i mean, the bump-ular-ness of it. i don't like bumpy things. or, i don't like when there's a multitude of bumpiness. or a multitude of anything really. i think swarms are absolutely disgusting and i hate when they magnify pictures of like pollen and stufff and it's just all little irregular (or even regular) bumps. eww. so when my rash started getting all bumpified and irregular, ugh, i was about to barf. just the thought of all that pustular-ness on my skin is so much worse than the pain, although the pain is very crappy. it's kinda like a jellyfish sting, a whole lot of them, every second, when i'm not even doing anything! i can understand when you roll an ankle and it hurts when you put weight on your ankle, but this is retarded. i'm not doing anything, just sitting still and i get stabbed... repeatedly. just like a damn jellyfish. at least sharks and stuff bite you to try and eat you, but evil jellyfish hurt you just because they dumb-assedly go floating by you, retards.

so shingles sucks. the weird thing is that it's always only on one side of your body, mine's all on the right side, and it's usually always in a distinct pattern. luckily mine is not so bad yet, kinda confined, and now they've got anti-viral medication to stop the spread of the rash and hasten the healing, so i'm on that now. still... PAIN PAIN PAIN PAIN PAIN! argh!

so now i'm stuck at home for the next week.. good because it's like a mini-vacation from work, but bad because it also means i'll have to skip working out and volleyball and yoga and tennis and surfing and church too. pretty much any contact with the outside world.

so it looks like i'll be giving up social interaction for lent. and also i'll have to give up lying on my right side... ouch.

ps - this sucks!