Gah! I has the shingles

[Mrs Pingu]

And they sent me home from work to 'work from home'.
Dingalingaling! Unclean! Unclean!

I tried telling them that it's only the blistery bits that are contagious and that I'd cover them up with a dressing but they didn't want to know.

Meh. And as for 'working' from home - these people obviously haven't met Pippin, who expects 24 hour a day lap-athons. I'll not get a minute's peace.

Does this make me officially an old person now? 

[Wowbagger]

And they sent me home from work to 'work from home'.
Dingalingaling! Unclean! Unclean!

I tried telling them that it's only the blistery bits that are contagious and that I'd cover them up with a dressing but they didn't want to know.

Meh. And as for 'working' from home - these people obviously haven't met Pippin, who expects 24 hour a day lap-athons. I'll not get a minute's peace.

Does this make me officially an old person now? 

I'd like to be able to offer sympathy, but I don't know what shingles is like. I'm not even old enough to have had chicken pox.

[border-rider]

Nasty

Doesn't make you that old - I had it when I was 32.

Make sure they give you Acyclovir.  They can be reluctant because it is costly and less effective once symptoms show, but it can shorten the run of the nastiness and mitigate the symptoms. 

Just a warning: Acyclovir & a lot of beer & raft racing = vomit

get well soon though.  Take it easy and it will pass.  I haven't had it again since.

[Moloko]

Life's a Beach!

[Mrs Pingu]

thbtbhthb!

Some uncomfortable, red, foosty looking blistery bits on my neck and chest and sore swollen lymph nodes behind my ear lobe and behind my collar bone, all on the same side and that's it. Oh, and the doc reckoned my tonsils are a fair old size but I couldn't say I'd noticed.
Student doc, didn't seem to know what it was but when he brought the troops in, she took one look and said 'oh that's shingles!'

Note to self: don't rub sore bits dry with the towel or you will have to climb down from the ceiling.

Ant Disco?

Yeah, they did give me acyclovir. Bit confused cos I've been prescribed 200mg x5 daily but on the sheet inside it says 800mg x5 daily for shingles (!). I assume the 200mg is right.....

[TheLurker]

Ahh. Sympathy.

[Pingu]

Just a warning: Acyclovir & a lot of beer & raft racing = vomit

No nights on the tiles, then?



Is that my coat?  

[HTFB]

They bumped me (aged 27) up to the higher dosage of acyclovir when it looked like spreading to my eye.

Another tip: if you can contrive to have your shingles diagnosed in the trauma ward where you've been put with a broken skull, jaw, etc, the codeine takes all the shingles pain away quite successfully.

(I can't, however, recommend you to self-medicate shingles with Piriton. Even if it looks like a reaction to insect bites. It does stop the itching, but see broken skull, above.)

[Mrs Pingu]

I did actually self medicate with loratidine over the weekend - how did Piritin result in you ending up with a broken skull? 

[HTFB]

The actual sequence is a blank. But "may cause drowsiness" on the packet seems to mean "may cause abrupt loss of consciousness in an area inappropriately provided with solid china objects to fall onto really hard, like the gents' loos".

[Mrs Pingu]

Ooooya! I must admit to expecting something a bit more hardcore than 'I blacked out in the bogs', but then I suppose you can't get much more hardcore than headbutting a toilet

[nmcgann]

And they sent me home from work to 'work from home'.
Dingalingaling! Unclean! Unclean!

I tried telling them that it's only the blistery bits that are contagious and that I'd cover them up with a dressing but they didn't want to know.

Meh. And as for 'working' from home - these people obviously haven't met Pippin, who expects 24 hour a day lap-athons. I'll not get a minute's peace.

Does this make me officially an old person now? 

Shingles is horrible, I had it in my early teens. That was way back in the day pre- any kind of treatment.

I ended up with mild post-herpetic neuralgia too which I still get 30+ years on 

Neil

[toekneep]

I think I got off pretty lightly when I had it and I hope the same is true for you MP. Everybody said ooh, shingles, that's horribly painful and you might die. In practice it was more irritating most of the time with odd spasms of really nasty pain which only lasted a moment or two. This did have the unfortunate effect of making me look like I had been mysteriously electrocuted now and again which wasn't a good look in public places. I hope it clears up quickly and you don't suffer too much.

[HTFB]

Ooooya! I must admit to expecting something a bit more hardcore than 'I blacked out in the bogs', but then I suppose you can't get much more hardcore than headbutting a toilet

It was probably a rare example of the kind of impact that the better cycling helmet standards are calibrated against. Perhaps I should have been wearing a deskworking helmet---provided it was fitted with a full chin guard, since the point of the chin took the impact. (The jaw deforms but the teeth shatter. I don't know if this has any bearing on helmet design).

I hoped you'd find my story reassuring, compared with other possible causal sequences like "I took piriton for shingles and after a brief fizzing moment my head exploded".

[Mrs Pingu]

Well I had a bit on an inspection in the mirror this morning and though I could see a couple of scabs, I couldn't see any vesicles - I must be blind as well. So I was mistakenly hoping that they were mostly scabbed over but Pingu just told me that there's only a couple of scabs and heaps of vesicles, so I guess I won't be going back to work tomorrow.

I dunno how all you home workers do it, I think I must be terribly easily distracted. It reminds me of study leave, anything else in the house is more important than actually studying. It's just not right doing work at home.

Anyway, fortunately I've not had any pain so far and I'm hoping it's going to stay that way. Other than having a bit of a sore lump behind the ear it's just the skin which prickles, so fingers crossed......

[onb]

I had a mild dose of shingles last year so you have my sympathies ,I left it a while before going to the quack by which time it was to late for any effective medication.Hopefully you got in quick enough.

[hellymedic]

And they sent me home from work to 'work from home'.
Dingalingaling! Unclean! Unclean!

I tried telling them that it's only the blistery bits that are contagious and that I'd cover them up with a dressing but they didn't want to know.

Meh. And as for 'working' from home - these people obviously haven't met Pippin, who expects 24 hour a day lap-athons. I'll not get a minute's peace.

Does this make me officially an old person now? 

I've known people get shingles at age 10; that's not old though you are presumably older.

GWS!

[Mrs Pingu]

A mere 33

I feel absolutely fine. I want to go back to work! Too many distractions here.
I keep telling them if I cover it all with a dressing nobody will catch anything. Grr. I will be climbing the walls by Friday.
And apparently I missed free pizza today too.

[hellymedic]

Climbing walls or not, Friday and Monday are public holidays; would you normally work them?

[Pingu]

A mere 33

I feel absolutely fine. I want to go back to work! Too many distractions here.
I keep telling them if I cover it all with a dressing nobody will catch anything. Grr. I will be climbing the walls by Friday.
And apparently I missed free pizza today too.

Catch 22. If you want to go back to work, you're too ill to go back to work.

[Mrs Pingu]

Climbing walls or not, Friday and Monday are public holidays; would you normally work them?

Yes. All public holidays are added on to annual leave entitlement.