Awkward

I've never been one to get normal illnesses. I get the normal ones and then I also get the really odd, weird, and not so common ones from time to time. Now that I work in a hospital my awareness for illnesses has only increased with "I cannot bring this home to my family" in the front of my mind at all times.

When I was 9 I had tonsillitis and was out of school for almost 2 weeks. When I was twelve I had strep throat and spent another week out of school. During a family vacation to Florida over the Christmas holiday I, and eventually my entire family, came down with the 24 hour stomach flu. When I was in college just a month away from finals I got pancreatitis and spent another good week getting my strength back. Logan and I passed Thrush back and forth to each other when I was nursing him and I ended up with an abscess (different from mastitis). And now, dear friends, I have something you really only hear about children getting. It's even dubbed a children's disease and is rather rare among adults either because they had it as a child or they have a natural immunity to it. I, clearly, did not have it as a child nor do I have an immunity.

Now, what is IT, you ask? Well I'm a little embarrassed to admit it and only because disease is at the end of its name. How unfair! It's not really a disease. It's an illness! So remember on Sunday when I mentioned that I thought I had the flu? Wrong. Those body aches were in fact the first signs of Hand, Foot & Mouth Disease--minus the hands and feet part. Sunday I felt terrible. Monday I worked, only feeling very weak, tired and carried around a terrible headache. As the night went on my throat really started to bother me. I'd noticed Sunday that my glands were sore and swollen but again, attributed that to the flu.

When I got home I peeked in the mirror at my throat and saw spots that I was sure indicated the onset of strep. First thing yesterday morning I headed to the doc and walked out with a totally different diagnosis. Those aren't the puss spots that come with strep. They're blisters and within a few hours my entire mouth was covered in so many blisters it hurt to talk, swallow, and eat. Today I'm doing a little better. More energy and hanging out with Logan but found out I cannot go back to work for 5 days because of how contagious this is. There's a huge change Logan will get this since he has been exposed to me the entire time. However, I've heard it is not nearly as bad in children as it is in adults. There's a 4-6 day incubation period so if B or Logan end up with it we should know pretty soon.

Please pray my blisters heal quickly and that B and Logan don't get this nasty thing. We have a wedding to go to on Saturday which I should no longer be contagious for. I can still feel new blisters under my tongue and it's so painful! Awkward post, I know. But I just had to get it out.