Frosty Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 You lost the nettle eating contest when you agreed and didn't welch on the bet! I've never had either poison ivy or oak and it grew in S. Cal where I grew up, it just wasn't very common and I never ran across it. I've heard some horror stories about people trying to burn poison ivy. One a family story from when Dad was a teen, one of the hired hands didn't live through it. Poison ivy oil is persistent and has a long shelf life. IIRC GoJo does a good job of removing it. Be sure to wash contaminated clothes by themselves then run the empty machine a couple cycles with soap, a good grease cutting one me thinks. I'm thinking 2011 I was at a metal head gathering at a friends just north of Minneapolis Mn. and as part of the preparations I was mowing paths in the fields and later busting up a bunch of toilets, bowl and tanks. Don't ask I have zero idea why he had about 3 dumpsters worth after busting with a sledge. That was towards the end of the gathering, I needed a ride to the airport and was putting in some equity. On the ride to the airport I'm feeling a tingling on my forehead and my buddy asks if I'd gotten too close to the poison ivy. The WHAT?! All I can remember is 3 leaves. He says it's all over the place I probably got into a little, be sure to wash good when I got to the airport, lots of soap and don't touch myself until I've washed. I do as instructed and still felt little itchy twinges all the way home but figured they were psychosomatic, they weren't getting worse like I expect poison ivy does. The morning after getting home my forehead is really starting to sting / burn just plain hurt so we head for the doc in the box where I tell the doc about the poison ivy so he gives me some cream and a shot of steroids. That evening I'm trying to hide on the floor boards of the pickup to get out of what little draft is coming from the heater vents and literally crying between screams. A B-A-D case if poison ivy? Nope, Shingles. Dad wasn't effected by poison ivy so maybe I did get exposed smashing toilets or just hanging on the farm for a week and wasn't effected. Perhaps it triggered the shingles? I've never hurt like the shingles hurt me. If you haven't already, get the shingles shot. I don't care how much it costs it's cheap. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 Yeah Frosty, doesn't sound like poison ivy. Had the chicken pocks as a kid so iirc wont get shingles? Ugh. Cant remember which is which with that. Anyway, oil cutting soaps like dawn dish soap if done immediately after known exposure. Jewlweed is touted as fighting poison ivy. They grow in similar areas and pop up around the same time. I have rubbed jeweled on areas exposed to poison ivy and have not got it. I cant prove it works but I do it every time I can that I get into some, as well as dawn soap and water and a shower after. Poison ivy seems to get you differently depending on ?, but it is best to fight it fast and quick before it spreads. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 If you had Chicken pox you most certainly can get shingles. I don't understand how they differentiate the two, it's the same hepatitis virus. It goes dormant on your spine and may flare back up later. Get the vaccine. The rules have changed it used to be you had to be something like 55 or you couldn't even pay for your own and a vaccine ran in excess of $500. Cheap at twice the price. Had I known I would've looked for a black market shingles vaccine. The closest I can come to describing the pain is. A flaming, wire brush on a disk grinder breaking out through my skin, from the inside. It's been about 10 years and the left side of my face and head above the ear feels like a 1st degree sunburn. every day, all day some worse some better but it's always painful. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 It’s varicella zoster virus. Chickenpox is the initial infection; the virus remains in the body and can cause shingles later in life. Hepatitis is a disease of the liver; there are, I believe, three main variants of the virus: A, B, and C. Fun fact: when I was a lad in Philadelphia, we lived two doors from one Baruch Blumberg, who had identified the hepatitis B virus and developed the first effective vaccine for it. This work won him the Nobel Prize for medicine. His daughter almost called the fire department on me once when my backyard forge sent out such a cloud of smoke she thought one of the houses was on fire. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 Ah ok, so chicken pocks early and possibilty of shingles. So the other thing would be not getting chicken pocks early and dangers of getting it later in life. Something like that. Funny or so how they still understand so little of some viral and bacterial things. Limes disease for instance. I have a coworker who is still battling limes disease. Even the specialist he is seeing can only try different coctails of antibiotics trying to see what might work. So far after around a year and a half he has seen little improvement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 “Lyme disease”, named after Lyme, Connecticut where it was first observed. My mom got it some years back, and it still knocks her back pretty regularly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irondragon Forge ClayWorks Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 I tried to get the shingles vaccine but found out if you have had lymphoma, you can't get it. Even my doctor didn't know that but researched it and said I was right and didn't recommend it for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daswulf Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 Sorry, yes, "Lyme disease".. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 Sorry I mix up hetatitis and herpes related to Shingles, I meant "herpes virus" What I call my shingles skin is known as "Postherpetic neuralgia." Sometimes I get my tang all tongueled up. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Sells Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 11 hours ago, JHCC said: Hepatitis is a disease of the liver; there are, I believe, three main variants of the virus: A, B, and C. there is a fourth now, known as "Hepatitis D" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 I did not know that. Thanks, Steve. (This ^^ is something I say a lot.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 Grasping the nettle firmly: way back when I was in scouts our troop went on a 16 mile hike in Indiana. One of the scouts had received a real South American machete from his older brother who was working down there and he was proudly wearing it when we got to the starting place. He was roundly chewed out by the scoutmaster and in trouble for bringing it---until we found out that we were the first group to do that trail that spring and nettles were higher than our heads on most of it. Yup; we used that machete to clear the trail for most of the 16 miles...From zero to hero! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 That's a new one on me too. Thanks Steve. Thomas: A 16 mile hike makes me think Boy Scouts, yes? Being prepared is why Boy Scouts are never Zeros. That's a great story Thomas, I can imagine exactly the same thing happening in our troop. There was always a kid sneaking something he shouldn't on a hike or camping trip. Being in S. California fire making was strictly controlled and supervised. Nobody was allowed to carry matches, lighters, flint, etc. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SinDoc Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 O poison Ivy. I don't get it very badly anymore for some reason. Probably something to do with my constant exposure to it growing up. Poison oak will still get me though. I was also foolish enough to listen to my late grandfather about using bleach to get rid of it. Scratch it all open then pour bleach on it. Yeah, that was not smart at all. I have heard of horror stories about people burning yard waste and discovering there was poison ivy in there. Good way to kill someone in a very horrific manner. My wife hates me, as I don't get affected by poison ivy, I don't get sunburns and allergies don't attempt to end my life every year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 The reaction to poison ivy is an ALLERGIC reaction. In general the more you get exposed the worse it gets and the less that sets it off. Long periods with no exposure may give you a "freebie" the next time you get exposed and may not notice it; OR you may be heading to the ER for steroid shots. Allergies are funny that way. (I had Penicillin for strep throats semi regularly when I was a child and then one day BANG! Hives and a strong injunction to NOT EVER take penicillin again!) A folk remedy to decrease your sensitivity to poison ivy; is to drink goats milk from goats that have been eating it. Goats are also a good way to clear it out of a section of land---if you can fence it in good! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted June 7, 2021 Share Posted June 7, 2021 There are places that rent goats out to remove poison ivy, usually with temporary electric fencing to keep them confined to the appropriate trouble area. There's even a word for it now: goatscaping! 4 minutes ago, ThomasPowers said: a strong injunction to NOT EVER take penicillin again!) When I had my throat surgery some years back, Percocet made me vomit, and Vicodin made me break out in full-body hives. My chances of becoming accidentally addicted to prescription opioids have gone waaaaaaaay down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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