It's an Epidemic

Today my dear friend Alyson lifted up the side of her shirt and revealed some very familiar-looking red bumps. Red bumps that appeared on my body just a week or so ago and burn like the devil. Shingles?! At least I'm not the only one having a phsiologic reaction to nursing school stress. It's funny - I haven't felt overwhelmed at all, but the body has a weird way of giving you insight to your subconscious. Stupid body. WHY WON'T YOU JUST LET ME LIE TO MYSELF?

Mine seem to be subsiding a bit since I have been careful not to irritate them, and I still haven't gone to the doctor because government-run health care is so painfully inefficient that it's just not worth my time or the headache. Also, they really screwed me over on my nursing school physical and I'm still mad about that, so I'm pretty sure I'm just going to wait this one out and switch doctors ASAP. It's been a fairly mild case and I'm WAY too self-conscious to fill a prescription for Valtrex anyway. Fun fact: When you get a prescription at a Navy medical institution, every time you show up for an appointment they hand you a list with everything they have ever issued to you and you mark what you are currently taking. I can't face seeing an obsolete Valtrex prescription EVERY DANG TIME for the rest of my life knowing that the corpsman that handed me the sheet has seen my shame. I'd die.

I know this is fairly common - I get it.... but I can't shake the feeling that there would be some 19 year old corpsman fresh out of Great Lakes who would see that on my sheet when I'm old and weathered, assume I have herpes, and wonder, "Who the heck would do THAT with HER?!"