Holy crap, I have shingles.  Yes.  I HAVE SHINGLES.

ON MY FUCKING FACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You maybe me wondering to yourself “would I look better with longer hair?” but you may also be asking your self “holy crap Toni, how did you get shingles, and more importantly what the hell are they?”

It all started last week, with my ear.  I had something in my ear that hurt.  It felt like a bug bite, but I couldn’t tell what it was because I can’t see inside my own ear.  Every time I would turn my eyes to look in the mirror, my ear was not facing the mirror anymore.  It is like trying to lick your own tongue.  Or tickle yourself.  Impossible.

So I figured that I had a spider bite in my ear.  What do I know? I am not a scientist.  It hurt, and annoyed me, then went away.  Then a got this weird painful mark on my face, on the side of my nose next to my eye.  I figured that I officially had spiders living in my bed and eating my face while I slept.  I again assumed it would just go away.

It didn’t.

A few days went by, and my mark started spreading.  My friend suggested that a spider had laid eggs in my face, and now my nose was a womb for 10,000 baby spiders.  Now I am all for being a mother, but I decided that my nose was going to have an abortion, and called a dermatologist.

So this is where my personal contradiction begins.  I don’t really do doctors.  I am almost arrogantly against the western medicine industrial complex.  I believe that when healing becomes big business, there is much less attention paid to actually curing people and figuring out the cause of their ailments than there is to drugs and invasive surgery.

I committed to healing my brain tumor with positive thinking, visiting a variety of hippy healer types, a raw diet, and a lot of existential examining.  I am a believer in holistic therapies.  I think all sickness and injury is the “true self” desperately trying to communicate to the ego through the language of the body.  That sickness and suffering is a metaphysical lesson for us to address.  As such, I have been very experimental and dogmatic when it comes to my natural approach to health….

UNTIL I HAD RASH ON MY FUCKING FACE!!!

Needless to say, I am more vain that I thought.

The morning of my dermatologist appointment my eye swelled up like I had been donkey-kicked in the face.  That mixed with my gross festering rash was making me feel pretty sexy let me tell you.

When the dermatologist came in to see me, the first thing I noticed was his undershirt made of pleather (fake leather), his long flowing locks, and his meggings (man leggings).  I knew I was in good hands.

Doctor: “So what is the problem here Antonia?”

Toni: “Well, have you looked at my face yet?”

Doctor: “Hmmmmm yes.  Your lips could be a little fuller, your eyebrows need plucking, and you have lines on your forehead from making too many facial expressions that is appropriate for a lady.”

Toni: “True…. but I was talking about my swollen eye and repulsive rash.”

Doctor: “Ahhhhh, I see.  What is that? Ewww.”

Toni: “I was hoping you would know.”

Doctor: “Well Antonia, looks to me like shingles.”

Toni: “Yuck.  What does that mean?”

Doctor: “Do you know what herpes is?”

Toni: “What? Are you saying I have herpes of the face? How the hell could that happen? Is some ghost raping my nose at night and then ejaculating into my eyeball?”

Doctor: “What you do in the bedroom is your business.”

Toni: “Ahhhhhhh how could this have happened?  I have an STD on my nose!”

Doctor: “Its not that kind of herpes silly.  It is the chicken pox herpes.”

Toni: “I thought only kids got chicken pox.  I had no idea children were so slutty.”

Doctor: “Listen, the chicken pox lives in your spinal column.  Forever.  Just exists in there.  Obviously as a child you had them.  So sometimes, the virus gets released.  And it will travel along your nerve pathways and produce shingles in adults.”

Toni: “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! How could this happen in this day and age? This feels so medieval! Or at least from the Victorian era. ”

Doctor: “Now I am going to give you an antiviral prescription which you should have started taking days ago.  And you should see the eye doctor right away because this can affect your cornea and you can go blind if not careful.  It is weird that you have this because it is very rare in people so young. But anyway, have a lovely holiday!”

The next morning my eye was swollen shut, so I was pretty glad to be seeing the eye doctor.  When I got there, I could tell The Munch was going to be in a mood, but I decided to ignore it.  And you know what I learned that day?  Your eye doctor really doesn’t appreciate a two year old in their office.  Especially when said two-year old crawls all over the patient while a very expensive machine is pressed against their eye, and then jumps off only to activate the lever for the chair to recline, crushing the patient’s legs and almost impaling their eyeball.

Doctor: “Well Antonia, although you eye is obviously revolting and yucky, so far your cornea is safe.”

Toni: “Oh, well that is good news.”

Doctor: “Well, what isn’t good news is that your shingles can easily spread from your nose, up past your eye, onto your forehead, and across your scalp.  And has anyone told you that you are very young to have shingles? Anyway have a nice holiday?”

Feeling pretty dejected, I called my hippy doctor.  Maybe he would have some thoughts or advice that would make me feel better.

Doctor: “Well, it’s a good thing you went to the Conventional doctor because there really isn’t a lot of research on holistic therapies for shingles.  Only people with weak immune systems get shingles, and most of the people I work with have pure diets of raw vegetables and fruits. I mean the last time I indulged in anything was I let myself have some wool with a touch of raw honey about 3 months ago.  But there are some things I can tell you to get that might help the anti-viral medicine work.”

Toni:  “Yes please.  I am really in a lot of pain and it is quite irritated, and itchy, and effecting my will to live.”

Doctor: “Hmmmmm I understand.  So, can you get your hands on some hawk beak residue?”

Toni: “I don’t think so?”

Doctor: “Okay, well you must have some powdered yack tears at your house.  You can just mix that with the urine of a manatee and sprinkle a little dust from Aztec ruins.  Make a paste and put that on the infected area.”

Toni: “Yeah, well I just ran out of all that stuff.  Do you have any other suggestions?”

Doctor: “Mmmmmm, that happens.  Well, you could try an ancient ayurvedic remedy that has been past down through thousands of generations.  Just get some aspirin, crush it up, add a little rubbing alcohol, and slap on your face.”

Toni: “Sounds mystical.”

Doctor: “Has anyone told you that the shingles can spread, and infect the rest of your face and scalp.  Not to mention you are really young to be having this?  Anyway, I hope your pagan rituals are festive and you have prepared appropriately for the Mayan apocalypse.”

Just to really drill the point home of how much this sucks, let me tell you that not only is my face itchy, tingly, and in immense discomfort.  But also because all my nerve endings are involved I have all these eclipses of shooting pain.  They happen below my eye, on my nose, across my head, behind my ear… just random bombardments of suffering.  Piercing pain.

Have I mentioned the itching….. ohhhhh the itching….. or the agony? Does anyone out there feel as sorry for me as I do for myself?

So in conclusion:

Dear The White Man’s Western Medicine,

Sorry. Please fix me.

Love Toni

(P.S Check out my dermatologist’s flowing locks… you would trust that guy right?)

(P.P.S In case you didn’t see the lovely picture of said shingles on my home page, make sure you check them out!)