Shingles

We have probably all heard the phrase, “What I got for Christmas.” In this instance, I’m referring to, “What I got for Thanksgiving.” In a word, Shingles. Why am I writing about this? Because I want you to know, if you don’t, what I didn’t learn, until too late. There IS a vaccine for Shingles. I usually pick up on things like that, which are beneficial to life and health, but somehow I missed out here. Now, I know it has been available for several years. I’ve been told that they can’t guarantee that you won’t get shingles, if you have the vaccine; but if you do, it shouldn’t be as severe.

I had a doctor’s appointment around the first of October; the next scheduled visit was in late December. Between these two appointments, I learned about the shingles vaccine. I intended to ask the doctor about it when I next saw her. Meanwhile, ‘up jumped the devil,’ that was shingles. If you haven’t heard that expression, neither have I for quite some time. I heard it fairly often in earlier years, which was meant to describe an unpleasant, or unwanted happening.

If you have had chicken pox, you could get shingles, and our vulnerability to them is said to increase as we get older. A bad thing about this, is that having shingles doesn’t give you immunity from them. You can have them again and again, I’m told. It seems they can range from mild to pretty awful. I had, an apparently quite severe bout of shingles, and am not free of them yet. I am now into the ninth month of this. Believe me, you don’t want that. From the way my back looked, at its worst, the pain could have been even worse; but it was bad enough as it was. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that it wasn’t worse!

Unfortunately, my shingles began on my back; at my right shoulder [a part of the body not frequently in your visual field, as a rule]. As I found out later, if they can treat you within 72 hours, they have a better chance of limiting the effects. By the time I knew about the rash, I was well into the 72 hours, and Thanksgiving Friday, the doctor’s office was closed, as is usual. The first indication of anything wrong, was a sore spot below my shoulder blade, the day before Thanksgiving. I thought I had pulled a muscle, or bumped into something that I paid no attention to at the time, and had perhaps left a bruise. Thanksgiving evening, while talking to my second daughter on the phone, I said, “Ouch,” as I moved in the chair, and felt a stab of pain. She asked what was wrong. I said, “Nothing, I suppose I’ve done something that has made a sore place on my back. I’ll check to see if I can see anything there, when I get ready for bed."

Later, I checked out my back, with the aid a hand mirror. I saw a rash marching down, and across the right side of my back, from my shoulder to within an inch or so from the bottom of the shoulder blade. And across from my spine to my arm. A couple of days later, rash appeared on my right chest. In another two days, a rash appeared on the back, and under side of my right arm, from my body down to the wrist. The rash may lead to blisters, then scabs as the blisters dry up. About a two to three inch wide area, angling from my spine over to my right side, had the worst part of the blister-scab part of it. The chest blistered, but the scabbing wasn’t as bad. The arm only had rash.

The intense, searing, stabbing, pulling/twisting pain in my chest was the worst, even though it didn’t look as bad as my back. At times, it felt as if something had hold of my chest and was trying to rip the skin off my body. The back pain was intense and constant, with some of the stabbing, but not the searing, pulling/twisting of the skin on my chest. The arm, even though it only had rash, rivaled the other two places for the intensity of pain. The skin on each of those places was extremely sensitive [still is], and my back had a special don’t-touch-me attitude. It still does, but the pain is not quite so intense. My clothes touching my body, at times, has been torture. It is still a problem, but not quite as bad.

The first three months were pretty bad. I felt awful in general, and thoroughly miserable in the areas affected. At the end of the three months, someone drove their car into my living room, and I can tell you, that didn’t help at all. The pain isn’t as bad now, but it is still here. There hasn’t been a day yet free from pain and/or discomfort The severity has lessened, but it has never stopped. Sometimes when I sit in a chair reading, and don’t move at all for a few minutes, I don’t feel it. But, it is there, just waiting for me to move, so it can let me know that it is still around.

Sleeping was difficult, with maybe 20 to 30 minutes at a time. An hour’s uninterrupted sleep was a good stretch. Being so uncomfortable, you didn’t always go back to sleep right away, so you might get 2 to 4 hours sleep in all. There were several nights when the sleep total was zero hours. After a couple of months, the time gradually increased; moving more toward the four hour level, and began working upwards, but was still in broken snatches. Or perhaps long periods of wakefulness, until your body finally surrendered to exhaustion, before sleeping.

I am describing what happened to me in detail, so you will know what shingles can be like. Some people have it worse than I have. How I feel for them!

I’ve heard people say that Medicare doesn’t pay for the vaccine, and that it is expensive. Some have mentioned $200. And others have said about $300. If it would have prevented the pain and discomfort, of these last months, which was extreme at times; I would gladly have paid that, whatever it took.

I’m not suggesting that you get the vaccine. It’s not my place to do that. That’s for you and your doctor to decide. I’m just letting you know the vaccine is available. How I wish I had known about it a couple of months earlier!