primitives catch mononucleosis

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x377744

Oh my.

Out of curiosity, since franksolich is weathering it himself at the moment, and not very well, I decided to see if the primitives have ever discussed mononucleosis.  This is from November 2003, nearly ten years ago:

LynneSin (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:08 PM
Original message

Anyone here ever have Mononucleosis????

Mononucleosis, otherwise known as the 'Kissing Disease'.

I got Mono at the end of my junior year in high school. I'm still not sure how I caught it although I was notorious for kissing plenty of men at my young age but ironically my boyfriend never got it

Anyone else here ever get mono?

One wonders what ever happened to the LynneSin primitive's boyfriend.

ALago1 (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:10 PM
Response to Original message

1. During a regular bloodwork analysis...

I tested positive for the mononucleosis virus. Funny thing was, I never experienced any symptoms of lethargy and the like. My doctor said that over 90% of Americans have contracted it but some just don't get full blown mono.

BigMcLargehuge (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:11 PM
Response to Original message

2. Mrs McLargehuge contracted it in college before I met her, but I understand it was awful

LynneSin (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:13 PM
Response to Reply #2

3. I did alot of sleeping and I missed all my final exams. I ended up taking them in July and I can assure you that this normally straight "A" student got B & C's when she took them in the middle of summer. They wouldn't let me go on to my senior year unless I took them, but I really didn't want to go to summer school and I was sick most of June. So I just finally went in July and figured as long as I passed them I didn't care about the grades.

progressivejazz (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:13 PM
Response to Original message

4. Yeah, I had it. Years ago.

One of my friends said I most likely got it from kissing a toilet seat. One of my favorite lines of all time.

hippiechick (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:18 PM
Response to Original message

5. I get it every year or so ....

....think it's more of an exhaustion/immuno-deficiency thing than related to uh ... extra curricular activities....

donsu (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:30 PM
Response to Original message

6. had it in my 20s - in bed for 6 wks. - thought I would die

felt so bad, wished I would die

ran a fever 24/7 for wks.

my dear dog stayed by my bed the whole time.

aquart (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:34 PM
Response to Original message

7. At 19. 2 and 1/2 weeks of high fever.

Then....I'd catch anything going. Became allergic to penicillin. Lethargy I called the whites followed by frenetic energy I called the reds.

The after effects lingered for years.

^^^the primitive whose 91-year-old mother pays the primitive's rent out of her meager social security check.

Waistdeep (469 posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:37 PM
Response to Original message

8. My son got it a few weeks before college applications were due. He had procrastinated, of course, and had most of the work left to do. He had a pretty bad case and could barely swallow.

I had to keep waking him up to finish his essays. A very unpleasant time for us both.

Exultant Democracy (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:41 PM
Response to Original message

9. Yep, frosh year of college

I woke up one morning and when I looked in the mirror my eyes were yellow, my doctor told me that I had probably had mono for a while and that it combined with my drinking had almost shut down my liver. It was not a pleasant semester after that.

bif (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:51 PM
Response to Original message

11. I got it in college

From sharing a beer with a friend who had it. And I thought you could only get it from kissing. Didn't find out till years later who gave it to me.

Tikki (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:51 PM
Response to Original message

12. In 9th grade....

...when I was 14. Six weeks recuperation sounds correct.

What I remember most: I was so weak...I could barely move...My brother would 'turn me over' about every three or four hours during the first couple of weeks... so that I wouldn't get bed sores.

Robb (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:57 PM
Response to Original message

13. "I thought I had mono for an entire year....

...But it turned out I was just bored "

Actually picked it up in college after a long hiking trip. Shared water bottles, don'tcha know. Miserable.

Nikia (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 03:55 PM
Response to Original message

14. No, my sister and I seem to be immune

We have both kissed boyfriends with the disease and have never gotten it ourselves. My husband thinks that I am a carrier since he got the disease early in our relationship. I don't know if we have just been lucky, are genetically immune, or contracted it at an early age (I read somewhere that mono is like chicken pox in that it is much milder if contracted as a young child).

Hell Hath No Fury (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:06 PM
Response to Original message

15. Yup...

Freshman year of high school -- before I had ever been kissing ANYBODY, so that blows the whole kissing thing.

I was out for over a month -- my first symptoms were fatigue and pain from an enlarged spleen. Once that passed and I was almost ready to go back to school I came down with the worst case of tonscillitus I have ever had in my life.

cally (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:12 PM
Response to Original message

16. I got it when I was 7

Well I had gone to the bushes and kissed a boy. All the jokes about the kissing disease terrified me. It took me years to realize that I didn't get sick from kissing a 7 year old.

My oldest got very sick at 4. She was put in the hospital before they realized it was mono. They then tested my 10 month old. She had mono too. I still do not know how they got it.

Lydia Leftcoast (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:13 PM
Response to Original message

17. Sophomore year of college

I was in a play, and backstage there was a little kitchen where we'd prepare snacks while we weren't on stage. (Rehearsals with this director were LOOONG.) However, there was no dish soap, and no one ever thought of buying any, so we just rinsed the dishes.

Three people from the cast got mono. I was one of them.

My first symptom was a severe sore throat and weakness. Since I knew someone who had died of heart disease caused by strep, I went in for a throat culture. Because of the other cases on campus, they were routinely checking all sore throat patients for mono, and bingo!

My principal symptom was extreme physical exhaustion. It was an unusual kind of tiredness unlike the kind of tiredness that makes your brain foggy. Instead, I felt like melting into the bedding.

For about two weeks, I'd sleep till 3PM, have someone bring me a "sick tray" from the dining hall at 5PM, and stay up till 11PM. Fortunately, all my courses that quarter were reading courses, so I'd sit up and do my reading assignments for German Literature, French Civilization, and Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century English Literature.

After those two weeks, I was back to normal. I think I may have missed one test.

jeter (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:14 PM
Response to Original message

18. Twice

I...was...very...sleepy.

chefgirl (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:26 PM
Response to Original message

19. About two years ago, in the fall..

I got strep throat from my son, which can trigger mono if you've already got the virus. It's one of those that never goes away, just lies dormant.

Imagine my surprise when I tested positive for it after about three weeks of high fevers and extreme fatigue. The doctor said there was no telling how long ago I may have contracted it, and oddly enough, I dont ever remember having symptoms before then.

The worst part was having to work 12-14 hour days 5-6 days a week. I honestly dont know how I did it.

The restaurant I work at closes every year from New Years Eve till Valentines Day, so when we finally did close up for the winter I just slept and slept and slept. By the time I went back to work I felt much better, but in reality it took almost a year for me to really feel normal again.

grannylib (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 04:31 PM
Response to Original message

20. Yup, got it when I was 41....took weeks to get over it.

PurityOfEssence (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 05:13 PM
Response to Original message

21. Talk about a kick in the head

I was in tenth grade. It came on just out of nowhere, and my throat swelled closed as I was unable to walk due to sudden exhaustion. Both my parents had to help me into the Doctor's office. They gave me 800k units of hydrocortisone and 800k units of penicillan and I slept something like 23 hours that day, 22 the next and 23 the next, and then came out of it fairly quickly.

It was amazing.

geniph (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 06:44 PM
Response to Original message

22. I had it just following graduation from high school

it was during a hot spell, and I had a temperature of 103 during a week when the temperature barely dipped below 90. I was beyond miserable. I ended up in the emergency room to have my throat opened - it sort of rotted closed. It was disgusting - you could smell the putrid throat from across the room. I couldn't swallow for about three weeks - drinking water was acutely painful. I remember having to crawl to the bathroom on my hands and knees - I literally could not stand.

I didn't have the long recovery period some people have, although I did catch any and every disease that wandered down the pike for about ten years afterward. EVERY cold, EVERY flu, EVERY case of pinkeye or strep, chickenpox, rosacea...gah.

I got it at a Led Zeppelin concert. Tip for those who haven't already figured this out: never share a joint with someone who says he's been really sick for the last couple of weeks.

Nailzberg (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 06:55 PM
Response to Original message

23. Horrible case while college junior

I was sick as a dog for two days, so I went to the University Health Services. They are famous for two things.

1. Telling all girls they are pregnant no matter what they came in for.

2. Telling all guys they had strep no matter what they came in for.

So the doctor gives me Z-pac, with is a pretty powerful anti-biotic. Never mind that throat culture to TEST for strep.

Well, the anti-biotic introduced bacteria into my system, and took the immune system by surprise, allowing the mono virus to completely destroy me.
 
Took myself off the Z pac on the second day of being three times sicker than I was before going to Health Services.

Went into town to the hospital, and told them the Health Services is incompentent, and seeing as I had coverage other than the school's insurance, they can run whatever test the want. They did. I had mono. Dumb ass Health Services.

VOX (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 07:02 PM
Response to Original message

24. Had it when I was 13. Missed a semester of school - yipee!

But I kept up my classes from home. Had an enlarged spleen, so no phys. ed. for a year -- worked in the library instead. Looked like a scarecrow from weight loss, so I got to have malts, shakes and fries whenever.

All these years later, I still test positive for mono once in awhile. I understand that the mono virus is related to chicken pox/herpes/shingles, so that it lives on in the nervous system for life.

Who knows what the hell it's doing in there?

brook (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 07:02 PM
Response to Original message

25. Had mono along with...

hepatitis. Lost about 30 lbs. before my roomate forced me to go to emergency. Spent a week in the hospital then went home to Mexico. Dr. prescribed "Bed rest and hard candy". I still have a snapshot somewhere of me in a bar in Taxco with a drink in one hand - and a lollipop in the other. (Yes, it was painful...but when you're my age, you just remember the *good* parts).

Ilsa (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 07:27 PM
Response to Original message

26. Yep. Just before sr. year in high school.

I was exhausted for a month. Slept alot. Lost weight.

Don't need anything like that again.

[jtyangel]

I had it at about 20. I was miserable. Unlike the primitives I continued working and ha to accept sleeping between work. It sucked but I didn't have a familial or government teet like the primitives do to suck on while I babied myself for a couple of months. Maybe not the best move since I now have autoimmune issues I think are related to that but survival financially dictated behavior at that time. It is what it is.

[Vagabond]

I think I knew one girl that ever came down with it.  She got it from drinking out of a cup at a family get together in 7th grade and had a pretty rough go of it.  Beyond that, I don't know anybody that got it, which means they either weren't that knocked down or recovered before they knew what it was and antibiotic treatment worked.

[Dori]

I used to get strep throat all the time, but was never told I had mono.  Strep can really make you sick.   

[BlueStateSaint]

One wonders what ever happened to the LynneSin primitive's boyfriend.

Prison, for drug-running, probably.

[franksolich]

Prison, for drug-running, probably.

I wonder if the LynneSin primitive was, uh, petite back then, in high school.

By the way, the LynneSin primitive's been absent from Skins's island for some time, and the primitives in the Lounge are inquiring as to why.  Anybody know?

Also, has anybody seen Pamela lately?  I may have to start reading the obituaries in the Wichita newspaper.

[BEG]

I got it when I was 20, along with strep throat. My soon to be husband didn't get either mono or strep. It lasted for months and I think the combo was what triggered my autoimmune disease. I was sick on my wedding day, my dress felt like it weighed 500 pounds. It was miserable.  About a month after my wedding I got Erythema Nodosum on my shins, it wasn't pretty.

Oddly enough about a month before I got mono/strep my husband got cat scratch fever. Scared the crap out of everyone because we feared he had Hodgkins at first. 

[chitownchica]

I came down with mono 10 years ago.  Thankfully I was able to take short term disability. It was a horrible experience.

Later that year I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia.

 

[BEG]

I came down with mono 10 years ago.  Thankfully I was able to take short term disability. It was a horrible experience.

Later that year I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia.

 

Do you feel the mono triggered your fibromyalgia?

[BEG]

hippiechick (1000+ posts) Fri Nov-07-03 02:18 PM
Response to Original message

5. I get it every year or so ....

....think it's more of an exhaustion/immuno-deficiency thing than related to uh ... extra curricular activities....

I thought you only get mono once?!?

[GOBUCKS]

Also, has anybody seen Pamela lately?  I may have to start reading the obituaries in the Wichita newspaper.

Pam seems to still be with us, though absent from the DUmp for a long time.

She's still listed on the staff at her junior prison in Wichita.

Incidentally, I ran across an old post from last July or August that may have been the end of poor stupid Beth.

She was in an argument over affirmative action and became enraged when other DUmmies said it led to dumbing down of any program where it existed.

Poor stupid Beth said that without affirmative action, she would never have been an honor student at Berkeley.

Come to think of it, poor stupid Beth could be a perfect example of affirmative action.

She said she was finished with the DUmmies, and disappeared. I haven't seen a post from her since.

I clicked on through and didn't save a link, dammit. She'll probably reappear.

[chitownchica]

Do you feel the mono triggered your fibromyalgia?

Yes. I can't remember if it was my regular doctor or rheumatologist who mentioned a correlation.  The weird thing is my mom had the same exact experience (starting with mono), although she wasn't diagnosed for years. I don't know if they knew what fibromyalgia was in the late 70s. At one point her Dr. thought she had lupus.

Also,  when I was diagnosed with mono, my doctor said I  had had it once before.  It had something to do with the test (titor/titer scale or something).  I never knew I had it when I was younger.

[jtyangel]

Beg and chi same experience for me. Within a couple months of the mono time frame I started getting itchy and red right at the hairline in my neck. Full out psoriasis within a couple years and there is some other autoimmune issue I haven't taken the time to get figured out. My fam dr suspects lupus. If so I had that marker butterfly rash on my face ie a full blown flare up within 3 years of mono.

[jtyangel]

Right should be rash

[chitownchica]

Beg and chi same experience for me. Within a couple months of the mono time frame I started getting itchy and red right at the hairline in my neck. Full out psoriasis within a couple years and there is some other autoimmune issue I haven't taken the time to get figured out. My fam dr suspects lupus. If so I had that marker butterfly rash on my face ie a full blown flare up within 3 years of mono.

JTY,  sucks, doesn't it?  I had to look up the butterfly rash you mentioned.  I had a lot of itching, and if I remember correctly, had some type of rash (maybe on arms?). I do remember being really sensitive to touch.  I still have that problem sometimes, but nothing like before.