Necrotic Skin-Eating Disease

A couple years ago I started getting small, itchy red spots on my skin. Hmmm, I pondered, what new fresh Hell is this? Well, it did indeed turn hellish because my skin was soon blanketed with more and more dots that itched like insanity. I became Baloo the bear, rubbing my back against anything tall enough and standing (including people because I have no inner censor). Now it looks like my back and chest have been shotgunned.

So, I went to my regular doctor. Somewhat amused, she says, "try oatmeal baths."  The only good that did was it allowed me to multi-task by bathing and eating breakfast at the same time.

"Doc," I said, "It's not working!"

"Okay, let's do blood work," she says as I roll my eyes. "Blood work" is code for agony as the nurse drains me worse than Dracula, the fallback of all MD's.

The blood work came back. Nothing looked askew except for the obvious culprits: high cholesterol and blood pressure. But these wouldn't explain my necrotic skin-eating disease (okay, it's not truly a "necrotic skin-eating disease," but that's how I like to describe it because A) it appeals to my inner Drama Queen; and B) it drives my long-suffering, highly scientific-minded wife nuts).

"Well," says Doc MD, "how about you go see a dermatologist?"

Several days later, I found myself sitting in a lobby surrounded by acne-ridden teenagers. As the biggest "kid" in there, it reminded me of when my mom kept taking me to the "baby doctor" as I grew older. The extremely young (hardly older than the lobby teens), kinda cute (hard to tell with masks these days) nurse practitioner took me back and grilled me. Bored to the point of catatonia, sparks of life suddenly flickered in her eyes.

"Okay, show me the rash!" she shouted. "I like to see rashes! I want to see rashes!"

Hesitant at this sudden weird personality transplant (and because I was ashamed of my newly acquired "Covid curves"), I whipped off my shirt.

"Hmmm," she said, "isn't that interesting?"

"What? What, what, what? What's so interesting? Am I dying?"

She ignored that last question, because, well you know, liability. But she just shook her head and kept muttering "Isn't THAT interesting?" like she'd just discovered our next Pandemic (and maybe she had; looks like I'm Patient Zero).

"Well, I don't mind being interesting," I said, "but how do we get rid of this?"

I saw her every other week for a while as she kept trying out miracle cures. When they continued to fail, she'd totally switch gears every time. 

"Okay," she said, "I think you have Scabies."

"What??? Scabies? How in the hell could I get Scabies? I'm too young to have Scabies! And clean! And..." I continued ranting for a while, mainly because I didn't want to get branded with the big (dotted) Scarlet "S" of Scabies. And, frankly, I didn't buy it for a minute.

So, that treatment was fun. I had to smear this toxic junk all over my body, neck on down to my toes, and live with it for 24 hours.

Hey, whaddaya know, it didn't work! Next week, dejectedly, the NP said, "Hmmm, looks like you don't have Scabies." (Well, no kidding.)

Next, she pumped me full of steroids. For a few blissful days, I was itch-free! But it came with a major caveat: it wasn't permanent. And, alas, it wasn't.

She then proceeded to take pictures of my body to show her mentor/guru (and undoubtedly giggle about it over lunch). Later she called me and said, "we think it's a reaction to the sun."

I knew that was absolute hokum. I pretty much haven't left the house since Covid reared its ugly head. I told her as such and she said that that's how my condition represents. "Just to be on the safe side," she said, "I want to do more blood work."

Back to Nurse Wretched's Torture Lab! (This time someone forgot to run one test, so I had to go back a third time).

The results netted nothing. This farce continued on for a couple of months until I finally asked if I should go see an allergist.

"Hmmm, that's an interesting idea," she said.

Picture Mr. Rogers in a Covid mask and you have my allergist. Patiently, in a soothingly calm, Rogers-like voice, he drew pictures for me, explained things as if talking to a toddler, then later quizzed me. "Annnnnddddd...what causes this?" He cupped a hand to his ear, tilted his head, and urged me on by churning his hand.

"Ahhh, sorry, Doc, I didn't know there was gonna be an oral exam," I said, head hung in shame. No lollipop.

Anyway, after he determined I didn't have allergies, he tried several protocols as well, all of them dismal failures as I saw my life scratching away. Then he introduced a real Hallelujah moment in monthly shots.

I said, "Doc, if that'll give me relief, I'm down with traveling across the metro area once a month to get shots."

Two shots, each in the back of my arm above the elbow. A week went by. And then...slow relief! Day by day, the rash got better! At the end of the first month, it started coming back, so I hustled down there and got my next month shots. But then tragedy struck in the return of red splotches. The rash was back, angrier than ever.

I'm scheduled to go back to the doctor next week, but I'm honestly losing faith that they'll find long-lasting relief (I've pretty much given up on a bonafide "cure" as I've stumped every doc, NP, and specialist in town). It's really getting tiresome having to explain to everyone I meet that I'm not contagious, nor am I a Meth-head with my constant scratching.

While on the topic of unexplained things, they don't call Peculiar County "peculiar" for no reason! Come on down, stay for a while. Just look out for ghosts, murderers, witches, and things that shouldn't fly in the night sky. That's Peculiar County. Book your visit now.