Chicken Pox Vaccine, Part 1

No, the title does not imply I'm about to write an epic saga about the pox, the vaccine, or my limited interaction with it.

It's that there will be a part 2 to the vaccine in about a month...and what with my swiss-cheese memory these days, I thought that if I wrote about it, and the fact that I was jabbed on the 6th, it might prompt me to make the '30 days later' second appointment.

If I don't turn into a brain-sucking zombie first.

I don't know the mechanics of the vaccine except to say that they injected me with a live virus, I heard the word "attenuated" at one point and the fact is, aside from the double-sided pdf I printed out from the department of health which tells me I could die? I'm not looking too deeply into what is floating around in my system because I am already SUPER OOKED OUT about the fact that I had a lovely pharmacist-in-training inject LIVE VIRUS into me. And hello? I could die? Super awesome news there.

Anyhow, I think I last posted about my non-chicken-poxed status like at the beginning of the year? That would be when I was supposed to get this over and done with. But because it was left up to me? And my adoration of voluntarily going to a doctor's office? I put it off as long as I could. And then some.

Thanks to bureaucracy that again, I do not care to understand, only be mad at, my own doctor could not inoculate me. I'd have to go straight to the department of health! And thanks to messed up economies we keep hearing about, actually no, Dept. of Health could not help me, because I am not currently a patient of theirs (which is a big catch-22 in the making, but I'm leaving it there).

That's when I thought about yellow fever, and malaria, and hepatitis B. No, I'm not a hypochondriac. At least I don't think I am... But I do reimburse quite a number of folks for getting those vaccines before they go off on their Global Non-Profit trips (you learn a lot working in the accounting department, let me tell ya, you want all the good information? Make friends with the A.P. department...just sayin'). A travel clinic who can get access to the Yellow Fever Vaccine has GOT to be able to get a hold of a couple doses of Chicken Pox Vaccine. And then I kinda let the information simmer until about June, cuz, um, yeah, possibility of GETTING the chicken pox from the vaccine is not zero...and I am a chicken. (HA!)

But I finally manned up (womened up?) and called up my local pharmacy, which is also a travel clinic, and ordered dose #1 (to my knowledge not covered by my health insurance, but I'm told I need to revisit that...I hope I didn't lose the receipt...), and got stabbed by, as I mentioned before, the pharmacist in training (PIT) last Friday.

I currently feel like poo.

I was fine the rest of Friday, though I fell asleep really early... and Saturday morning I was able to get my act together and go help shop for "business casuals" for a friend, and then totally fell into a puddle of tired once back home....and the same went for Sunday, but I was having to muster the energy ALL DAY...but was able to be okay during the 3 hour birthday party for a friend's daughter....then yesterday....

My energy is coming and going in such sharp shocky spurts that I feel like a diesel engine trying to burn up the dregs of it's 36 year old tank. I hope this is normal and not the start of the pneumonia that there is a chance of developing...one in however many hundreds...fingers crossed. And double crossed if it means that in 6 days I don't wake up with the spots. (The PIT called them lesions. Yes, I know that's what they really are, but um, PIT? Really and truly, call them pox or spots, NOT LESIONS! Am I not scared enough already?!? Sigh.)

On the bright side? If I catch the pox, I won't have to go in for the second (costly) dose! (If you're wondering, I think it was $130...but again, not sure where the receipt is...)