It's Not a Bug Bite...

Sunday afternoon Mark noticed a painful bump on his forehead. We thought it was an early spring bug bite. Yesterday and today it's been more and more painful for him. This morning it was painful for him to just chew our rice breakfast. By the end of the school day, he wasn't looking so good.

You know he's not feeling good when you say, "Honey, we need to get you to the doctor," and he agrees without any hemming and hawing.

So the title of the post gave it away. It's not a bug bite.

It's funny...this morning as I was getting dressed, I thought to myself, "I wonder what will happen today? I wonder if the end of the day will be a lot different from what I expect?"

I suggest you not think things like that. Or maybe God was giving me a little warning nudge.

Turns out Mark has shingles. The childhood virus from chicken pox has been waiting around inside him all this time, and it chose this week to get active again. Bummer.

But there is some good news...
1. We live in the 21st century, with good antiviral meds and pain meds available.
2. We got to the doctor while it was still very early and treatable.
3. We have medical insurance.
4. Mark has plenty of sick time.
5. He wasn't contagious when we were visiting little grandchildren over spring break.
6. He should be well enough for us to travel to Utah for our son-in-law's college graduation later this month.

It's all well and good to keep counting those blessings, but poor Mark... how come such a nice guy gets stuck with such a painful illness? I hope he has a mild case with quick healing. When we got home from the doctor, he signed up to have a substitute teach in his classroom for a week. The doctor said he'll be doing well if he can go back to teaching then.

So please do keep Mark in your good thoughts and prayers!

And by the way...I looked online for some kind of "shingles" image to share, but they are all gross photographs of people with a horrible rash. I am glad to assure you that Mark doesn't look anything like that. So far he has a rashy place on one part of his forehead. The rashy area will get blistered and oozy and hurt a lot before it gets better, but since we caught it early and he is on antiviral meds, the doctor is hopeful that it will be confined to that one area.