I almost opted for the shingles shot as well—had the world’s worst case of chicken pox as a child—lost a week out of my life, semi-conscious; and the druggist at Safeway said it was ok, no contraindications; but I always read the literature: and it says—life-threatening allergy to Neomycin is a contraindication. Well, I have a real bad and accelerating sensitivity to Neomycin. I can put it on a pinprick of an injury and within a day or two, the pinprick is the size of a half-dollar and welted up, gone soft and weeping. I’m not anxious to shoot the substance into my veins, thank you, which goes just everywhere… So I said nix that, but I’ll take the flu shot AND the pneumonia shot, yes? Well, at least they went into different arms, so I could tell which if I had a reaction.
Yesterday evening the pneumonia shot needed ice. An area about 6″ radius was red, swollen hard in places, and turning purple where the shot was. Painful as what you get from being kicked by a horse. I took 2 Benedryl in case I was allergic to some component. And 3 Advil. I did get some sleep (the new pillows!) but couldn’t sleep on that side.
This morning there’s a 4″ circle on the biceps that’s swollen hard and sore (wasn’t the biceps she shot it into.) and the area of the shot is bruised and also sore. It’s going to be Advil for breakfast, lunch, and supper, I fear. L looked up the shot and side effects and what I have is a ‘mild to severe’ reaction with a tilt toward the ‘severe’. There is a federal form for reporting it, but it requires the batch and info I don’t have. I may call the pharmacy and tell them to report it. The arm hurts not just in use, but just staying still. Plaque welt, the size of both fists, fever in the area. Nasty.
I begin to think pneumonia would have been the better choice, and I’m not sure I want another of these next year. No problem at all with the flu shot.
And Jane, poor thing, has a very unhappy tooth that is going to send her to the dentist Monday, we hope. Naturally it really flared up Friday after hours, but she has a call in.
Called the pharmacist: the reaction is now reported to the FDC. I have a lovely permanent marker design on my arm, which they asked me to draw so that if the plaque welt gets larger, I can report how much over what time. Since this welt is sort of the sum of what changed overnight, and it hasn’t grown since 10 am, I think I can safely hope it will now start diminishing. The biceps is quite sore. The welt is surface; but the whole affair itches. We weren’t able to find anything in the list of what’s-in-the-vaccine that I’d react to: ‘phenol’ is the only ingredient given. So it seems to be that my physiology has a massive resistence to pneumococcus, or whatever it is, which, I dunno, maybe why, though I’ve lived with people with pneumonia, I’ve never caught it. At any rate, this shot is good for 5 years, which is a good thing, because they’re not going to get me to take another one next year. 😉
Thank you, Nand’ CJ! The software recognizes me at work now!
I am very sorry that you had such a crap reaction to your shots. Please tell the pharmacy; if there is a batch out there that is causing this reaction in you, others may also have a bad (or worse) reaction. I have always elected to leave the various shots to those in greater need of them, and so far, I haven’t chosen poorly, despite being exposed to almost as many bugs as a kindergarten teacher. Maybe a shot of something palliative in your medicinal purposes coffee? I further hope that Jane survived in better shape. Having the whole household on its okole is not a happy.
I was talked into the pneumonia vaccine to. Biceps ached for a couple of days but nothing near what zapped you! How miserable! The Benadrly should help to. But so might some Scotch.
I like your prescription. 😉 But I’m trying to get this scene written… 😉 Maybe later today. Alas, we’d go out to eat, except Jane’s feeling sick and this abcessed tooth is getting worse, so I’m going to have to find something decent for supper that won’t make her mouth hurt.
Time to hit your local deli for a variety pack of soups? Owieeee all around!
I’ve noticed that if something is going to come up where I need a doctor or some remedy, the first will happen on a weekend, the second “after hours”.
Please tell Murphy he’s been working overtime around your house and should take his time off elsewhere.
Ack, I am so sorry you and Jane are feeling bad. Reactions to meds, or toothaches, are never welcome.
Best wishes.
What a lousy start to the weekend and the month! Hope your (nasty!) reaction to the shot subsides quickly. Anyway, you won’t be as vulnerable to pneumonia, which is its own kind of nasty. And a dental abscess — been there, done that, and I don’t know how anything not immediately fatal can hurt so much.
Get better, both of you!
hmm – not fun At All.
I had shingles about four years ago – BEFORE turning 60, which used to be the age when the vaccine was recommended – it has apparently now been dropped to age 50.
FWIW – shingles was indeed a pain, and lasted months, altogether, but it wasn’t unbearable, just more annoying than anything. Still – I don’t want it again. Besides, I lucked out, and it was covered by clothes. So I don’t want to have it again – and yes, it comes back again, and again, apparently.
So I got the vaccine last Friday (week ago). It is (thank goodness) a TINY needle, given on the back of your arm, like the flu vaccine.
24 hours later – swollen to tennis ball diameter, hot and painful – plus a sore throat, plus a really good fever (like, 101 or so) followed by ‘I think I shall lie upon the couch and – lie upon the couch’ for a day, while the fever dissipated slowly. The area of the shot remained swollen and painful, plus bruised and red/rash looking, for another few days.
So – one teeny shot, followed by about four days of ‘reaction’ at the level between ‘minor’ and ‘call your doctor at once’.
What really bugs me, is the darned vaccine is only about 60% effective anyway! I am really wondering if it was actually worth it in the first place.
Why do I have to have ‘inappropriate drug reactions’ so much? I think they are getting worse with age,too.
The flu vaccine is only partially effective too. But that’s good enough for it to be useful as “herd effect”. Considering it’s just a goad to our immune system, and we have such varied genomes (e.g. some HIV positives immune to AIDS), it shouldn’t be expected to be “guaranteed” for any particular individual.
Go to the dentist, though. Teeth problems are serious.
It turns out that Murphy and Rielly were best of friends. They took sciences together so that Murphy could get a running start at the write up while Rielly did the practicum.
Sometimes the old adage of “the cure is worse than the disease” does seem to hold true, doesn’t it? I hope you are soon well. It sounds absolutely miserable.
Please convey “get well” wishes to Jane, too, if you feel up to it. I just went through the abscessed-tooth experience and it’s no picnic. Mine abscessed while I was staying around-the-clock with my Mom, during her hospital stay. Before she passed away, she spent some time in the hospital, so the infection in my jaw really got a strong hold. I didn’t get treatment until after she died – I didn’t feel that I could leave her. Besides the pain, I actually had dizzy spells – the room would actually spin – and my heart would pound with just the smallest exertion. I could hardly put one foot in front of the other. I just thought it was caregiver-exhaustion, but after 10 days of antibiotics, the dizzyness, etc., was gone. I had no idea an abscessed tooth could have such an effect. It makes sense, though, I suppose. I hope Jane can get hers treated quickly. I’m sending good thoughts to both of you and hope the Puddy Tats are taking good care of their Staff.
That sounds EXACTLY like the reaction I had way back when to allergy testing… They did the normal scratch tests all up and down my forearms, then in my upper arm they did some injections. OH boy. I don’t know which of the 15 or 16 things it was in my arm that caused the worst reaction, I reacted to quite a few with a typical welt, a few with nothing, then there were one or two that sort of just welted up and by the end of the day had overwhelmed EVERYTHING. The next day the swelling had moved down my arm to just above my elbow making a very hot, very uncomfortable lump. The swelling went down within a few days though, thank goodness, but I was a sore grumpy camper for a while.
Maybe keep taking the Benadryl at bedtime? And not for nothing, talk to your doctor, the reaction might just take you off the list for good! I know I haven’t dared get flu or pneumonia shots even though as an asthmatic they’d love to get their needles on me! One of the allergens I know was in that miserable lump of pain was eggs, which is what they use to culture them.
I’m of the era that by law had to have a smallpox vaccination before I could attend first grade. Mine didn’t even scar. Tetanus shot? They hurt like the devil and I have “tetanus” (tetany — involuntary jumping of muscles at every noise) for about 6-8 hours afterward. (I’ve reacted that way to every one I’ve had.) I’ll never forget lying in the emergency room all night with a broken kneecap and “tetanus” and my leg (and the rest of me) jolting at every sound. — not to mention that I’m allergic to most pain meds (the opiates, Darvon, Demerol, codeine, oxycodone, fentanyl — all the good stuff), to the point of trying to scratch my itching skin off while I’m talking to people who aren’t there, so I can’t take any of it without a whalloping dose of Benadryl on the side. After I came out of shoulder surgery (rotator cuff), they had me on Benadryl and fentanyl, and a nurse sitting beside me to shake me awake every time my blood oxygen level dipped below 85%, and then shut the alarm off. I’ve had the flu shot but not the pneumonia vacination. With my asthma, I probably should get it, though.
BTW, something cool for the selkie crowd: http://www.sandayranger.org/
It’s at Sanday, one of the Orkney Islands.
Aww. Seal pup. 😉
I’ll tell you a guilty secret: I had a TB vaccination a long, long time ago. When I was about 8, Dad used to work a TB hospital for Social Security, so we were all well aware of the disease, and vaccinated, I swear.
But when I started in as a teacher, in public schools, we had to give the date and place of our vaccination or take it again. And who knew what doc, or where? We’d moved about 8 times, docs had died, we couldn’t remember…
So I took the darned TB vaccination, but it would not raise a reaction. Nada. If I couldn’t get a reaction, they weren’t going to let me work. So being a young rebel, heck, I just took the little bandaid off and bathed the arm in my freshwater fish tank…nice red spot. I passed. I taught for about 11 years and traveled overseas and never had a problem. Most people have that little scar on their upper arm. Not me. But I’ve also been exposed to everything from whooping cough (it was so bad in our town that if you heard someone cough that characteristic way at the bus stop, you waited for another bus) to rubella, what we called the German measles, chickenpox, mumps—had the first three, skipped mumps, despite repeated exposures. The one time I’d spent days in a house where someone came down with mumps, right near college finals, I went ahead and took the gamma globulin shots that gave for prevention…talk about hurt! That’s a nasty shot. Two doses at the same time.
I test positive for TB with the usual skin test. We were vaccinated in the mid 1950’s in Australia. It gives the interns a nasty scare. It left a scar, smallish bump high up on my left shoulder although this was minor compared to what some people got from it.
The interns that my neurologist had at one time hadn’t even heard of the BCG vaccination. He, being from Cuba originally, knew of it and had to tell them all about it. I was quite a curiosity in the office.
During the mid ’50’s it was compulsory for everyone in Australia to have an annual chest X-ray. My best friend’s mother was caught this way and sent up into the mountains to a sanitarium.
We have a friend who managed to contract chicken pox as an adult, in his early 30s. What will lay you up as a child with 3 days of fever and a week off of school knocked him on his butt for 3 weeks.
I’m sufficiently old school that I have the hip scar from a smallpox vaccination, and got immunity from the childhood 3 by actually contracting measles, mumps and chicken pox. Rubella they ran everyone through vaccinations in elementary school; I remember thinking the newfangled injector they were using looked a lot like Dr. McCoy’s hypospray on steroids, and asking the nurse abo bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbut it! (Zorro is feeling her oats right now, with a full tummy, and wants to play. “Pay attention to meeeee!)
I got CP as an adult, from a relative’s shingles. (Everyone assumes you either got CP as a child or were immunized; neither here.) I had a very light case. In under ten years–which is just wacky–I got shingles, which lingered for a couple months despite antivirals and antibiotics (for secondary infection). So, you might want to think about seeing if the shingles vacination can be resolved somehow.
What bugs me is that docs aren’t very good about mentioning side effects. I had a pet mouse for a couple days, a sleek black one. I wouldn’t have paid it any mind if the doc had mentioned sulfa antibiotics can cause hallucinations. I was a little too sick to remember to ask.
As a child, I got three consecutive weeks off school: measles, then mumps on each side in sequence. Sheesh.
You’re fortunate, as I’m sure you know. It’s serious in an adult! I once worked with a guy who got mumps as a late adolescent and they “went down on him”. No kids.
I gave them to my father. Nobody was amused.
Oh, my! I hope both of you feel better soon, although I think Jane’s situation will not improve until after she sees the dentist. Has Anbesol (or its equivalent) helped? I get the flu shot each year, after having had the “real” flu once (came down with it ~6 hours after getting the flu shot, so I was already infected, obviously). The flu became bronchitis, which became pneumonia (I even had crepitus), and I was miserably ill for many, many weeks. The flu shot makes me feel under the weather and tired for several days, but I think it’s worth it.
As for the childhood diseases, the only one I clearly had was chicken pox–right before Halloween when I was 7. My great-aunt had given me a wonderful hand-made Raggedy Anne costume, so I was (very noisily – I was only 7) disappointed.
I probably had mild versions of the others; my older sister had “vigorous” cases of them all. Our mother did what she could to make sure that I would get sick, too, but I never exhibited symptoms. Was checked for rubella antibodies as an adult, and I had a high titer, so I clearly had the German measles at some point, but never knew it. I am allergic to something in the Tb test (a very fast and strong reaction that subsides before it’s “read after 3 days), so I no longer have to undergo that bit of torture.
Good wishes for a rapid recovery!
We got the first version of the (Saulk) polio vaccine that they gave you on a sugar cube. Both my brother and I had measles and chicken pox, and I had mumps. He never “took” them. I was around 5 years old when I had the measles. The general wisdom was that you had to lie in a darkened room to prevent complications. My mom worked and we had an older lady who came in to watch us on Saturdays (Mom worked half a day on Saturdays), and do ironing. One of my earliest memories is of having measles, lying in bed in a darkened room with the door “cracked” about an inch, and listening to that lady singing hymns while she ironed. All the good old fashioned “revival” hymns. My brother and I had chicken pox over Christmas, and it was a Christmas when we went down to Houston to spend it with my Mom’s sister. Oh, what fun. Not. We all talk about having measles like it was no big deal. Europeans had evolved an immunity to it. Unfortunately, American Indian were “naive” to the disease (had never been exposed to it) and whole villages/tribes were wiped out by it. Same situation with smallpox.
I always reacted positive to TB tests and ended up having to have a chest x-ray. I think it was from being around my dad’s mother as a child.
When I worked in a hospital, we all had to have rubella vaccines. Terrible things happen to the babies of women who contract rubella during pregnancy. In fact, if a woman is thinking about getting pregnant, a rubella vaccine is essential.