Asphalt, Metal, Composite? What’s Your Favorite Shingle?

I am not talking about the roofing for our new home.

Heck,
we don’t even have a bid on construction yet.
(We get the first bid tomorrow 2/01)
It’s a little soon to be deciding asphalt over composite.

I’m talking about the kind that is more commonly known as
”Herpes zoster”

What the….?

Herpes zoster is the other name for a medical condition known as
SHINGLES!

Which is the newest diagnosis I received today.

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This morning when I woke up, I still wasn’t feeling great, and that surprised me.
I thought I’d have a little relief since I took my antibiotics as prescribed.
Surely, some of the swelling should have gone down.
Some of the pain should have decreased.
Maybe the redness of my face mountains wouldn’t be so vibrant….

It didn’t happen.
As a matter of fact, as I slept, a new face mountain erupted.
This time on my chin.
I was still in the same amount of pain.
Swelling was as big as ever.

Also, I was awoken at about 5 am by a weird sensation.
I felt things moving inside my face!!
The sensation – kind of a tingly feeling – would start in the middle of one of my sores,
and trickle down my face.
Or it would start in the swollen area and inch its way across my cheek bone.
Sometimes it just felt like a hair was brushing across my face… or a tiny spider walking across my skin.

YUCK!

After I ate breakfast, I discovered another sore.
This time on my tongue. In the back of my throat.
And more on my lips.
And the tip of my tongue.

And I began to worry.
Really worry.

Thankfully, there was time in the doctor’s schedule for me to come back.
He was just as concerned as yesterday.
Probably a little more.
And he was still as confused.
He grabbed a colleague and had this man come look at my face, in my ear.
Then I had TWO confused faces staring at me.
Talking about me like I wasn’t in the room.

Finally, a decision was made.
It was time to get aggressive.
Send Betty to the hospital for a CAT Scan, CBC.
Worst case scenario would be possible hospital admittance for IV hook-up of antibiotics.
Best case scenario, have an ENT doctor review my scan and get a diagnosis from that.
We were all voting for the Best Case.

I have never had a CAT Scan before.
Yuck.
I hear it’s better than an MRI, and I guess it is.
But I sometimes get motion sick and sure enough,
as the table was moving back and forth in that little circle of imaging technology,
I had to just close my eyes and hold on.
And I was certain I wet my pants when the contrast dye started working itself through me.
Thankfully, I didn’t.

To make a long day and a long story short:
There were no large masses or growths in my jaw.
That’s GOOD NEWS!

Off to the ENT I went.
He walked into the room, took one look at my face, looked in my ear and rambled off
slkjdasglajeialfdkjadf.

Yep. That’s exactly what I heard him say.
But then he spoke in people speak and said,
”Betty, my dear Betty, you have shingles of the inner ear.”

Maybe not that familiar, but you get the gist.

I HAVE SHINGLES!

While that may be a devastating diagnosis
and I’m certainly not happy about it,
I’m happy to have a diagnosis.

I will start a nice cocktail of medicines to aid in my recovery.
I feel like an 80 year old woman:
I have shingles (not the usual disease of a 25 year old…. )
And I have to get a days-of-the-week pill case to help me remember what
medicines I have to take each day.
Next week I buy the support hose and the blue hair tint.

But the best news is that I will get better.
The sores and “blistering rash” will go away.
My 3rd and 4th chins will disappear.
I’ll be able to hear again.
And my mouth won’t hurt so much when I try to smile.
That’s the best news of all!