A tough week

The last week has been tough, actually that’s a wild understatement if ever I have made one. Last week was awful, due to all the stress and emotion it kicked off my PoTs symptoms into a new dimension and my EDS pain has been up through the roof. I have had awful palpitations on changing positions, even rolling over in bed has done it. I have been feeling faint a lot of the time too which has meant I have had to be really careful on standing. To top it all off though I managed to contract Shingles on Tuesday.

I had been feeling very run down, hot and achy for a few days. On Tuesday when I went to jump in the shower I suddenly got the urge to scratch my back. As I scratched I felt a series of bumps, I tried to get a look in the mirror to see what was going on but just couldn’t see, so went and had a look in my bedroom mirror. There was a line of 7 raised bumps some of which looked like blisters but again it’s difficult to see your back properly. So I asked hubby to come and take a photo with my phone so I can see. Unfortunately hubby is in denial about needing glasses so the photos he took were awful but I could make out there was a very red raised rash in a line. Hubby still denies he needs his eyes tested.

I did what most of us do these days and had a look on google. Within a few seconds I had found an image that corresponded with what the deeply out of focus photo was showing me. It was also corresponding with one of the locations shown as being a prime spot for shingles. I then decided to ignore it, only the itching was driving me mad. I took my temperature and unusually for me I was running a temperature. Again I ignored this as I just didn’t want to deal with it. I was having a bad day with my head, the first in over a month, so was struggling with sitting up and the pain it was causing. I didn’t want to ring the duty doctor and then find out I was going to have to take a trip to the surgery. I didn’t want to have to sit up in the waiting room not knowing how long it would be until I would be able to lie down again.

In the end after cajoling by my mum  (with hubby telling me it was just a line of spots and it wasn’t red - cheers love) I gave in and rang the surgery. Just ten minutes later I was rung back and ten minutes after that I was in the doctor’s consultation room. The doctor roared with laughter when I told her that my husband had told me it wasn’t red and it was just a line of pimples. She said it’s scarlet and they aren’t pimples they are blisters. Within a minute of looking at my rash, she confirmed it was indeed shingles. I was warned it will get worse before it gets better and also that I can’t be around pregnant women that have never had chickenpox, young children that haven’t had chickenpox and people that have a compromised immune system. Thankfully I don’t have contact with anyone who falls into those groups, with being pretty much housebound.

So now I am taking horse pill sized antiviral medication, feeling grotty and the rash has extended a little and is now looking like sunburn. Hence the very short post this week. The antiviral meds are hopefully going to knock it on the head as I have managed to start them very early. It’s just unfortunate that they are making me nauseous and have given me a slight headache. After seeing some pretty horrendous photos on Google yesterday I think I have got off incredibly lightly.