The Heartbreak of Poison Ivy

Well, as I promised you all in my first post back (click here if you missed it), I am now going to tell all ten of you about the horrible, miserable case of poison ivy that I had to deal with this spring.

Edith Bunker once said (referring to another illness), "Oh, my, I hope it ain't as bad as the heartbreak of psoriasis." I don't know about that, but this case of poison ivy was pretty heartbreaking to me.

As the ten of you probably already know, I'm not one to complain much about things, but this experience caused me to complain every single day for a month a few times on Facebook, much to the dismay of my tens of friends on there, I'm sure.

It also led me to threaten have serious questions regarding my personal health care professionals. I felt like Joanna Stayton/Annie Proffitt in the movie Overboard saying, "Listen to me, medical people. ... I don't know who I am, but I'm sure I have a lawyer."



But I digress.

I'll just share the story and the pictures with you now, so you can feel extremely sorry for me see for yourself.

Shannon and I worked on cleaning up our land one weekend at the beginning of spring, and we both managed to get poison ivy all over us. NOT on purpose obviously, but nevertheless.....

However, as is par for the course in my life, I managed to get a much more serious case than Shannon did. We were both treated for the poison ivy on the same day, but my poison ivy had a mind of its very own.

A dirty, twisted mind.

I had poison ivy all over my body (please don't worry, I'm only going to show you the pictures of my arm), but it was REALLY HORRIBLE on my left arm. I noticed two days into this miserable case of poison ivy that something on my arm was different than the other parts of my body.

It looked like this....



Then the next day it looked like this....



As the days wore on, it continued to get worse.



I took pictures of it each day, so that I could text them to my family and friends. I wanted them to share in my misery know how I was doing.



By now, I'm sure you've all had enough.



I'll share this last one with you.....This was many, many, many days into the poison ivy misery that I experienced.



This is also after 2 Depo Medrol shots, 1 1/2 Medrol Dose Paks, 3 antibiotics (because the first one didn't work, & I had an allergic reaction to the 2nd one...but that is for another post), & 2 different strengths of steroids.

After so long on steroids, I am now in the process of trying to grow a beard, and my voice is deeper.

But I'm not bitter.

The poison ivy that was all over my body was your regular run of the mill misery. The poison ivy that was on my left arm, however, was cellulitis. Which as you have just seen...isn't pretty.

I'm better now. I just have what appears to be a shadow of it left behind on my arm. If you weren't looking for it, chances are, you'd never notice it. That, of course, will never happen, because if I see you, I will show it to you. ;)

Now, you may think I'm telling you all of this just to get your sympathy, but that's very not true. I'm telling you this for YOUR benefit. The next time you're at a party, and you find yourself talking to that person at the party that always has to OUTDO every single story they hear (you know the person I'm talking about), you can now tell them this story. You can tell them about the lady you know that had to suffer through "The Heartbreak of Poison Ivy." And not just any poison ivy, but the WORSE CASE OF POISON IVY EVER RECORDED.

There's no need to thank me. The enjoyment you will get from being able to tell my poison ivy saga to others and always outdo those "competitive" story tellers at parties is thanks enough.