I was right.

We talked to our friend Joe this morning and mentioned Katherine's shingles situation. He, being the caring friend that he is, consulted with his father, a doctor. Joe's dad then called us and said that Katherine needs to go to the ER right away to get antivirals. (Yay, I was right... and not overly enthusiastic!) So, we did, and Katherine got antivirals and pain patches in case her pain gets worse. She has to take 4 large blue pills every 4 hours for the next week.

I'm happy that we went. I feel better now, and I think she does too. She did tell me, on the way to the ER, that she was having more pain than yesterday. My reaction was, "And why didn't you tell me this earlier?" I just have to shake my head and be glad that she'll listen to others if not me. :)

Katherine has shingles.

It's so weird! Katherine told me that her back was sore, so I took a look, and talk about a perfect textbook physical finding!

She has a "beautiful" rash in a dermatomal distribution at her waistband that stops at the midline - erythematous with fluid-filled blisters - around the T10 or T11 dermatome. It's classic.

So, after getting over my excitement of making a diagnosis from a physical finding, I began to freak out.

"Do we need to go to the emergency room and get you started on antivirals asap? The sooner you get started on them, the less likely you'll have post-herpetic neuralgia!"

And then, I started thinking... hmmm... the majority of people who get shingles are older people (>60) or immunocompromised people. What does this mean?! Does this have any relation to Katherine's mysterious eye malady from a few weeks ago? Is she immunocompromised for a bad reason? Is that why the chicken pox virus is reactivated?

I can see why physicians tend not to provide healthcare to their own family members.

Unless her pain worsens or the rash increases, I've decided I'm ok with waiting until Monday so she can go to the Family Practice Clinic. I wanted to drive to the ER at 11 pm this evening. She wasn't so excited about that.

Weekend list

1. The Dark Knight was outstanding. Heath Ledger was amazing as the Joker. I now understand why the teenager in front of us saw it three times in a row on Saturday.

2. I had no morning commitments this weekend, so I was looking forward to at least one day of blissful late morning somnolence. However, I woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 7 am on both Saturday and Sunday. Why is it so much nicer to wake up early on the weekend?

3. The Iowa City Farmers' Market has grown since I was last there. Kath and I enjoyed a stroll through it this Saturday morning. Our purchases included an apple turnover, zucchini bread, zucchinis, new potatoes, and locally roasted coffee (outstanding). Whenever I go to the Farmers' Market or the Co-op, even when I buy unhealthy things, I just feel like I become healthier by osmosis due to all of the healthy smells.

4. Because I was studying sleep disturbances today while at the City pool, we learned that Katherine is so tired these days because she has been missing out on her key REM sleep time due to Dory waking her up at 3 am every morning. So, she has primary insomnia due to a hyperactive kitty. Me - I've been sleeping through Dory's squeaking these days. This morning I was congratulating Dory for not waking us up this morning and then wondered why Katherine was so tired and grumpy. My congratulations were premature.

5. Katherine knows all the lines in Dirty Dancing. It's slightly scary.

Age is irrelevant-it's wrinkles that count

Ever since Katherine and I have been together, she has reveled in the fact that she is one year younger than me. However, despite my being older (and wiser), it is Katherine who has the first wrinkle. She has a wrinkle on her forehead that becomes quite prominent during the summer when she tans. So, there are benefits to being pasty and pale after all. I take consolation in this fact. I am still wrinkle-free.

Random blips from a weekend that included "Lips"

1. This weekend marked the 6th anniversary of when Katherine and I started hanging out. A 2002 4th of July trip to see Melissa Etheridge that included lots of talking in the car. We thought it was appropriate that we were heading to Des Moines to see a rock festival in the same car.

2. Amazingly, we had not been to Des Moines to visit Joe since Christmas. Horrors!

3. Ingrid Michaelson is a fabulous singer. I first heard her singing a song featured in this past Christmas' Gap ad.

4. I learned the theory behind Rothko color field paintings. He wants the viewer to connect emotionally to his work. This makes me wonder if the Rothkos that make me cringe inside are supposed to invoke that response. I still love ours the best.

5. Joe learned that I like modern art because of the greater propensity to see "art" that you look at and think... "Huh?" It's never dull.

6. Yoshimi won't let those robots defeat me.

7. Joe thinks that I will be the lax parent and Kath will be the disciplinarian. I beg to differ. He bases this conclusion on my permissive behavior with the kitties. I say, "Kitties are not kiddies."

8. Gin and tonics are nice, relaxing summer drinks. Joe commented that all of his friends like G&Ts. Kath says that's because all of Joe's friends are laid-back, relaxed people.

9. Kath thinks Joe's song should be "It's hard out here for a pimp."

10. And the big news from today........... Puck lost 2 lbs over the past year!!!!!!!!!! Woo- hoo! She is no longer morbidly obese for a kitty!

All in all, a great 4th of July.

She's a medical mystery

Kath went to the opthalmologist yesterday. I made her go to the doctor's after about a week of what first began as an irritated, sore eye that became increasingly bloodshot. Then, the other day, I noticed that she had what looked like a blister over the same area. Naturally, this was slightly worrisome. I began looking up "scleral blisters" online and didn't find anything. I certainly was baffled.

So, she went to the UI yesterday. First she was seen by the 3rd year med student who took Katherine's history.

Then she was seen by the resident with the med student. The resident apparently kept asking Katherine if she had ever been hit in the eye.. "No... nothing scraped your eye recently... nothing... are you sure?" "Nope, nope, nope." He saw what looked like an old scar on Katherine's eye unrelated to the blister. The resident thought that the blister was a thickening of her conjunctiva due to irritation.

Lastly, she saw the doctor, who apparently had a funny last name to Katherine... let's just call her "Dr. Rodent-like animal with a flat tail that builds dams". The optho doc thought Kath's blister was, in fact, a blister. But what she was more interested in was a brown fleck on Kath's cornea near her iris. Apparently this brown fleck was not an intrinsic part of the eye, but a foreign body that had been present for some time because it was become vascularized. "Dr. Rodent" kept asking, "Doesn't that hurt? Don't you remember something hitting your eye? What kind of pain tolerance do you have? I can't believe it's growing a blood supply!" So, Dr. Rodent removed the fleck. She was curious if it was a seed or a part of a bug's wing and had actually seen other patients with similar "flecks"... Katherine was unimpressed with her lack of true curiosity as instead of examining the "fleck" under the microscope, she tossed it in the trash.

But, in the end, the resident and the optho doc didn't agree on the diagnosis for her original presenting symptom - the bloodshot blister. So, they gave her a prescription for some antibiotic drops and she returns in two weeks.

Katherine is happy because she is a "medical mystery". I'm happy because at least I didn't send her to the doctor for something benign. Once I made her go to the doctor's back when we were learning about derm stuff - she had what I thought was a new melanoma. Really, it was a scab. (At least I'm overprotective.)

And, the drops are working.