Shingle Bells

One morning in December 1977, I was dreaming of sugar plum fairies and crispy latkes when I awoke with itchy bumps on my face and chest.

My father, on his way to see patients at the hospital, surveyed the situation.

“Chickenpox,” he proclaimed to my mother. “Very contagious. Make sure she licks her brother.”

Other than the raised red splotches, spreading chickenpox was no big deal, just another questionable 1970s childhood rite of passage, like Indian burns and drinking from the hose. Once you’d had it, you were rendered immune and could go back to burning ants with a magnifying glass with the neighbor kids or whatever else we were into back then.

A little medical humor, you’re welcome.

Until the virus ran its course, however, I was to be kept home from school, which was upsetting because I was looking forward to showing off my new Christmas carol repertoire to my non-Jewish classmates (that would be all of them) and acing the snowman word searches my first grade teacher had been passing out since before Thanksgiving.

Tied to a job of her own, my mother dispatched me two houses down to Mrs. Pico, whose six children had had chickenpox ages ago (and had also taught me about burning ants.)

Mrs. Pico owned a selection of floral-patterned housecoats and drank TaB cola with a slice of lemon, though I think she may have splashed a little something else into it from time to time. We sat on the couch as she expertly dabbed Calamine lotion on my itchy spots, watching soap operas and sucking on candy canes from their tinsel-festooned tree.

By the time my polka-dotted brother showed up a few days later in his pajamas, I’d learned how to manage cotton balls by myself and that Erica from All My Children was a real slut.

Of course, kids today don’t get chickenpox anymore, just another quick jab at the pediatrician, depriving them of natural immunity and quality daytime television.

I hadn’t given a thought to this odd Christmas memory until last week, when it surfaced with unexpected vengeance.

Why does this medical textbook illustration looks exactly like me and my little brother in 1977

After cooking and serving the Thanksgiving meal, instead of enjoying the sounds of other people doing dishes while I ate more pie, I went to bed at 7pm. I assumed the severe pain in my right ear came from some sinus infection I’d picked up from my adorable runny-nosed nephews in Arizona, though I didn’t understand the strange rash that spread quickly from my right cheekbone down the side of my face and up into my scalp.

The next day I felt poorly enough to drag myself to Urgent Care, even though as a doctor’s daughter I know what an amateur move it is to get sick on a holiday weekend.

An exhausted nurse practitioner peered into ear and prescribed antibiotics, shrugging off the rash as an allergic reaction or bites from a particularly intrepid mosquito. But over the weekend the pain got worse and the crud started creeping towards my eye, sending me into a panic of Google diagnoses that included brain worms and leprosy.

On Monday morning I sped right to my doctor, who took one look at my face and asked, “Did you have chickenpox as a kid?”

It seems that same nasty little virus, also known as herpes zoster—not that herpes, he assured—had not been vanquished by my old school hose-drinking immune system been but had been living in my body for the past 47 years, awaiting an opportunity to flare up and destroy the season once again like a microscopic amalgam of the Terminator and the Grinch. (Now there’s a holiday blockbuster idea.)

You probably already know that the grown-up version of chickenpox is called shingles, which actually sounds kind of festive. Sadly this has been nothing like those cozy, Calamine-drenched candy cane days on Mrs. Pico’s couch.

The doctor had no idea why the Christmas rash of my childhood decided to appear again. I’d never gotten around to getting the new shingles vaccine recommended for anyone over 50, what with trying to keep up with COVID shots and all the menopausal probiotics.

I did recently submit to one of those intense facial peels that is supposed to erase years of sun damage and leave me glowing like a fresh-faced teenager, which can apparently aggravate the virus. When I was promised this cosmetic miracle would take me back to the skin of my youth, I’m pretty sure no one meant the spotty, scabby visage of a poxxed six year old.

The first thing anyone will tell you about shingles is that it is very, very painful. This is because the immortal demon virus hides itself then spreads along the nerves, causing stabbing, exhausting agony that can last weeks, or God forbid, even years, which seems very unfair considering it’s already made me look like the flesh-ripping scene out of Poltergeist.

On the pain scale, I place it between both of my natural childbirths put together and falling asleep on a cactus. I’ve been managing with antiviral meds and enough ibuprofen to anesthetize a horse, but I’d sure like a few doses of whatever Mrs. Pico was putting in her TaB.

Accurate depiction

Fortunately, the physical part of my revived childhood affliction has mostly cleared up, and the doctor promises I’m not contagious to anyone who’s had chicken pox or had the shingles vaccine. If you haven’t, you might want to consider this your cautionary tale.

The upside is I’ll definitely get out of any more holiday cooking, and I’ve finally got a chance to catch up on my soap operas.

Visions of shingle bells dancing in my head ~ JLL