𝐈𝐦𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐔𝐩𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐅𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐁𝐞𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐧: 𝐖𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐁𝐞𝐧?🤔🤠 For the past five days I’ve been in the hospital. I was suffering from severe shingles—the worst case the doctors had ever seen. I could not open my left eye and my right eye was swelling half shut. An artist needs his eyes, and I was worried. I was repeatedly jammed with needles. I forgot how many times, but I had three IVs set up. Then, each night around 4 a.m., a nurse would wake me for a blood draw. She ran out of places to jab, I guess…because the last two draws came from my hands. Very painful to get poked in the hands, but it’s nothing compared to the big enchilada—the spinal tap. Yes, I had to curl up on my side while a physician thrust what felt like a long needle into my spinal cord to extract blood for analysis. Turns out, his suspicions were confirmed—the shingles virus had invaded my brain. I’m not sure what the virus intended to do with the conquered territory, but I was soon getting anti-viral meds in IV and pill form to fight back. I lost the desire to drink water and eat food. I wasn’t thirsty and food repulsed me. I was given an IV for fluids because my kidneys were breaking down. I can drink water now, but I still don’t want to eat. I’ve lost 10 pounds since the ordeal began. My shingles started with the usual pattern. I began feeling painful ‘pulses’ or electric shock-like pains that would occur every 5 to 15 minutes somewhere near my inner ear, but it never went away. I noticed an area on the top of my head that felt like it had been burned, which is odd…because I always wear a hat out in the sun. The sensation shifted around and the one morning I noticed I had small red welts on my forehead. I was worried it was skin cancer, but my symptoms matched what I saw on the Internet—shingles. It can take nearly a month to heal from the outbreak and I’m halfway there. With more pills, I should be OK. One can get shingles anywhere, but I got it in the face and my eyesight was threatened. An ophthalmologist looked a my left eye and said I was OK so far. No corneal damage. Both eyes are now sensitive to the light. Today Tina brought me back home. She was holding down the Grrrgraphics fort. Now the story can be told. If you’ve had the chicken pox as a child, then you are at risk of shingles as an adult. You can avoid it with a shingles shot. As for me, well…I don’t trust vaccines so I refused to take it. I’d probably take it now, but it’s too late. —BG 👍🤠