Wherein I Contract an Ancient Disease

[BrenDAnn]

I've been told shingles are the absolute worst, and if they weren't bad enough as-is, you CAN get them on the inside of your mouth and throat.... ugh, there's something to look forward to in life.

I had chicken pox as a kid. A few years back, what appeared but a very mild (thankfully) case of shingles, on my lower left abdomen. Yes, it itches, yes it hurts. I genuinely hope you never have it. ETA: Gaki, get well soon!

[Catwoman2965]

Actually, it is chicken pox (varicella zoster) that later returns as shingles (herpes zoster).
http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-c...s/flh-20078300

There are vaccines to prevent both chicken pox in children and shingles in adults. The shingles vaccine (Zostavax) is recommended for adults over 60.

Measles can be terrible. As a 4th-year medical student, I worked on a medical project in West Africa. There was a measles epidemic while I was there, people brought dying children to the clinic by the dozen every day. It was beyond heartbreaking.

I really hope that your illness is not a vaccine-resistant measles but rather a failure to develop proper antibodies. Yikes. I also hope you are feeling much better!

Wow that stinks! I was thinking, until i read further, that maybe your antibodies from your initial vacc. had worn off, as mine did, but then you said you had been re-vaccinated. I had to get it again, about 13 years ago, in order to start grad school, as I had to show proof of immunization, but i had no records, and a blood test to check for antibodies didn't show any.

Funny thing was, i got a call from my town's health dept; from one of the nurses; i guess they had apparently been notified I had gotten the vaccine, and protocol was they had to check why. I guess to make sure there were no cases in my family, etc.? But once I said it was simply required for school, all was well.

[morgana]

Yep, shingles ABSOLUTELY sucks. It also can recur. *sigh*

I'm really sorry about your measles, Gaki, and I hope you get better soon, but thankfully you're at no risk for shingles from this.

[Cia]

Since people will never stop bringing their sick kids everywhere (no matter why the child got sick) have fun! Measles also screws up your immune system. You now have a higher potential to get anything, even if you already had it/were vaccinated.

My other personal opinions are definitely fratching, but people in general are fairly inconsiderate when it comes to this. At least it sounds like you work in a nice place when one is sick and people can call out without the normal workplace BS! So that's one less avenue of sickness.

Measles can do nasty things to your reproductive system too when you get them as an adult.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I got the chicken pox as a kid..... it was the least enjoyable weekend of my childhood.

Ba-wuh? When I got the chicken pox in 4th grade I was out of school an entire week.

Sure being home from school was nice, but having to do all my homework anyway and having to resist the urge to tear my skin off made it not really worth it.

[Sapphire Silk]

1. I am part of the extremely small percentage of people who did not develop antibodies from the vaccine, this would have had to happen not once, but twice.
2. This strain of the measles is vaccine resistant.

There is no such thing as vaccine resistance. What the vaccine does is stimulate your immune system to produce antibodies. By definition a disease cannot resist the vaccine.

However, sometimes changes in vaccines to reduce side effects result in a less effective vaccine that wanes over time. That's the problem with pertussis. It is thought that pertussis MAY have mutated into a variant strain that does not respond to the antibodies produced by vaccination (a nuance but important). However, there is no evidence that's actually happened. It's merely a report in a LTE published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

So it is much more likely you simply are part of the population, very rare, that did not sero convert (make antibodies). Normally you would be protected by herd immunity. Well, at least you now have lifelong immunity . . . I guess. I wouldn't wish measles on my worst enemy.

I've failed to sero convert after getting the Hep B vaccine twice.

OMG!!! Measles are terrible. You might not get them again, but you might get Shingles.

Minor factual correction; you're thinking of chicken pox (varicella) not measles.

[Sliceanddice]

Ba-wuh? When I got the chicken pox in 4th grade I was out of school an entire week.

Sure being home from school was nice, but having to do all my homework anyway and having to resist the urge to tear my skin off made it not really worth it.

Me and my brother had chicken pox at the sameish time. During my mother's last week of pregnancy with my sister and the first two weeks of her life. I was 3 and the boy was 1.

Family lore says we were crying every day for our mommy who we couldn't see cause of the baby and her healing c-section with tubal ligation (her doctor wanted her off her feet for a bit after that) until we were a week past active rashes. We stayed with our grandparents and my dad visited every day and had to strip in the backyard, put his clothes straight into the wash and take a hot shower before going home to his wife and new baby to make sure the baby wouldn't catch it.

Mom says the day I could come cause I got it first she was happy but when she could hold all her babies a week later when the boy was cleared was the best.

Meimei never got the chicken pox and got the vaccine when she was 17.

I hope I never have to deal with a child with measles...

[EricKei]

While I don't recall actually having chicken pox as a kid (it just got jumbled in with other illnesses), I do recall going to what, in retrospect, was a blatant "chicken pox party" in our neighborhood.

[Slave to the Phone]

Gaki, I'm glad that you are not too itchy. It still bites that you were exposed to a potentially deadly disease that is so preventable.

I'm also happy to be wrong about the shingles. I had all of the "typical" childhood diseases and got mixed up about which one was which because they all sucked. It is chickenpox that can lead to shingles.

[Aragarthiel]

I had chickenpox back in the fourth grade, and I was out of school for a week and a half because of it. It's strange because nobody else in my school had it at the time, and both of my sisters only got very minor cases (as in, they each had a tiny patch of 3-4 blisters on their backs). I'm not sure that they even missed school because if it. I'm still surprised I even got it, I was a healthy kid otherwise.

[dawnfire]

Measles can do nasty things to your reproductive system too when you get them as an adult.

yeh. I believe the doc had told hubby he'd have better luck winning the lotto but we managed get pregnant with a count that that low he was considered infertile.

[Ironclad Alibi]

Like the old women who still call those chocolate baby-shaped candies by their INCREDIBLY racist nickname.

I grew up in the deep south and had to Google those. I had never heard of them. I do recall what Brazil nuts used to be called.

As for the rash, after I visited Panama I developed a rash. I was in the hospital for several days while they pondered over what it might be. They finally decided it was a mono rash and I went home.

[WishfulSpirit]

Hope you feel better Gaki.

Since we're sharing disease stories, I got the stupid chicken pox in 7th grade (about age 13). The older you are the worse it is. I was out of school for two weeks and got them everywhere, including on the inside of my throat and couldn't eat because it hurt. It happened to be fall and eggnog was available in stores; that was the only way I got any calories. Definitely going to get the shingles vaccine when I'm old enough.

[EricKei]

The older you are the worse it is.

Absolutely, yes.

Kids -- Similar to an extended fever (up to 104F or so)/flu/etc with significant rash. Remote chance of death (equivalent to a flu/cold, iirc...?)

Adults -- More widespread, more intensive rash. Notable chance of birth defects for pregnant women. Not-insignificant chance of death.

Extremely communicable either way -- just walking into the room where a sufferer has recently been is enough to pass it along. Can be very bad news if you have a compromised immune system (which, as I recently learned, includes having diabetes o_O).

[Seanette]

if you have a compromised immune system (which, as I recently learned, includes having diabetes o_O).

That's odd. Lately, my diabetic husband has a better immune system than I do (I'm not diabetic).