The Sky Hasn’t Fallen Just Yet

This isn’t much of an update, but here goes anyway.

On Saturday evening, I noticed an outbreak of spots I didn’t remember having on Friday. For most people in my situation this would be clear evidence of chicken pox, but for someone like me who has lived my whole life with eczema (except for those four blessed alabaster years in England; now I think about it, I really should have given in to Alec’s miniskirt requests while they were still a viable option), it could just be a exceptionally bad skin day.

The efforts of myself and my family to determine whether I had chicken pox or not were quite amusing. The problem was that although I certainly had some red bumps, they didn’t look like those classic pictures of chicken pox pustules, they just looked like little pimples or mosquito bites. Or eczema. Hence statements like this from my mum: “It was easy to tell with Alec because he’s normally so unblemished, but with you…”

I went to the doctor this morning, and he didn’t know either. The antivirals I started taking on Thursday may have contributed to this, since they may have considerably lessened the severity of the disesase. I have to go see him again tomorrow, so he can see if the spots have developed at all.

So essentially, here’s the situation: it now looks like I may have caught chicken pox from the same source as Alec, except maybe my immune system just held out longer against it. (If you are a doctor and about to correct me on this, please refrain. One of my only sources of pleasure these past few days has been teasing him about being a WEAKLING.) (He is, by the way, doing great and on the mend. If he wasn’t, I wouldn’t be teasing him. I’m a mean girlfriend to have, but I’m not that mean.)

If I do have chicken pox now, the good news is that my birthday plans won’t get screwed up, but the much worse news is that my mum has now been exposed to two different cases of chicken pox in the past few days. This worries me dreadfully, although she seems fairly chilled about it.

If I go back to the doctor tomorrow and he isn’t convinced it’s chicken pox, then I will have wasted 2 days’ absence from work which I will have to make up for at the end of my pupillage, thereby cutting short my trip to England. I will also still not be in the clear as regards possible infection from Alec last week, and neither will my mum. I will also end up never really knowing whether I had chicken pox or not, which kind of sucks given the amount of stress it’s caused me so far.

For now, I guess all I can do is try to enjoy the unexpected free time. I’ve already cleaned my entire room and read two books. I’ll also try and catch up on all the blogging and surfing I haven’t had time to do lately. And drive my mum crazy by incessantly asking if she’s okay.