FOX 32 reporter shares painful shingles journey to warn others at risk: 'Stopped me in my tracks'

CHICAGO - If you had chickenpox as a kid then you are at risk of getting shingles, a painful rash that appears on one side of the body. 

It’s often thought that only older people can get shingles, but it’s likely that you know someone in your circle that has suffered from it. 

Shingles diagnosis

My journey with shingles:

I was off work this summer for about six weeks because I contracted shingles. It was the end of May, and I was at work on the weekend with Mark Strehl. I had been having weird symptoms and finally he called it, "I think you have shingles!" I disagreed, not knowing what shingles was only that you have to be "older" to get it. 

I was wrong. At the age of 39, I was diagnosed with shingles, and it was on my face, surrounding my eye.

After an urgent care visit confirming the diagnosis, I was told to make an emergency appointment with an ophthalmologist. 

"Shingles, it's common, but it's rare to affect the eye, but if it affects the eye it can be severe and vision threatening," said Dr. Shantan Reddy an ophthalmologist with Duly Health and Care. 

Dr. Reddy said my early eye appointments were crucial.  

A shingles rash isn't just on the surface, its nerve-based and when it’s on your face it attacks the trigeminal nerve. In my case the pain and rash were on the left side of my scalp, forehead, and eyelid.

"It can affect the cornea, which is the windshield of the eye in front of the eye and that's when it becomes painful. And then if it affects that structure then it can start to get complications of blindness," said Dr. Reddy. 

He says he’s seeing more and more shingles in younger patients, and no one really knows why. Doctors do know a weakened immune system and stress are major factors. 

"We're all more stressed emotionally, physically you know long hours. This all kind of suppresses the immune system. So very healthy patients can get this," said Dr. Reddy. 

My symptoms started with a terrible headache, so sharp by my left temple it stopped me in my tracks. That was followed by flu-like symptoms the same day and the rash didn't appear until three days later. Then the nerve pain kicked in and the itch lasted for weeks. 

Dr. Aabha Beri is my primary care doctor with Duly Health and Care and she explains shingles and chicken pox are, well, related.

"Once you have chicken pox it never really goes away it just goes and hides into the dorsal root ganglion, and it’s basically inside your nerves and when you are not looking, stressed out, boom, it just kind of reactivates itself," said Dr. Beri. 

She said it's often thought of as an illness for people over 50 because the vaccine for shingles is only approved for those 50 and older or the immunocompromised. Though during her practice she's seen it the most in women of child-bearing age, who are usually post-partum or pregnant. Dr. Beri knows shingles, personally. She was diagnosed with shingles when she was 31 weeks pregnant. 

What is shingles?

What we know:

Shingles is an inflammation of the nerve caused by the reactivation of the varicella-zoster virus which causes chicken pox. Dr. Beri said a patient who suspects shingles needs to be seen within the first 3 days of symptoms to get the anti-viral medicine, which won’t cure the condition, but will help you get it out of your system faster. 

As for managing the pain, not much helped me. I tried Hydrocodone, Naproxen, Tylenol, Advil, and Gabapentin and not much helped. 

"That’s nerve pain for you and that’s why it is so terrible," said Dr. Beri.  

It can contagious, the fluid in the blisters is thought to carry the virus, so you have to stay away from anyone who hasn’t had or been vaccinated for chicken pox. 

I wanted to know more about why I was getting shingles at the age of 39. So, I called on shingles researcher and microbiologist Jennifer Moffat with SUNY Upstate Medical University.

She's been researching shingles for more than 30 years and has had shingles, twice! 

"It went from the tip of my nose to my chin and into my ear. So, it really covered that bottom third of my face. I was in agony. Like you. I also had swollen lymph nodes. They were like marbles under my chin," said Jennifer Moffat, PhD. with SUNY Upstate Medical University. 

That was in her 30s. She got it again in her 50s. 

"The same nerve, did it again. And this time it was worse, it was from my nose to my ear, but it also affected my eye, and it caused a big bleed inside my eye," said Moffat. "So, now I have a floater in there and it really damaged the nerves in my ear, and I had earaches for years after that."

Moffat says in the US alone there are more than one million cases every year and one third of them will end up with shingles on their face.

In her decades of research, Moffat has seen the rate of shingles increasing for all ages except for people under 30, thanks to the chicken pox vaccine which came out in the mid-90’s.

"That seems to be protecting them, but everybody else who got normal chickenpox as usual, is at risk now for shingles," she said. 

Why are we seeing an increase in shingles?

"There's something in the environment. It may be worldwide because we see this in other countries, but we don't know what it is. So we're not sure what is happening, but it's allowing this virus to wake up," said Moffat. "The rising temperatures could be affecting our immune system. It could be pollution. It could be, I don't know. We don't know. But it's happening everywhere."

The older you are, the worse the symptoms are, and your chances increase for lingering chronic nerve pain, called Postherpetic Neuralgia.

What you can do:

Get your shingles vaccine if you are 50 and older or if you are immunocompromised. 

Moffat says there’s also a newly discovered bonus for shingles vaccine recipients, a 20 percent reduction in dementia. 

"What we think is that the virus keeps trying to come out. And as you get older, it happens more and more. And it might be coming out in the nerves inside your brain and causing damage," said Moffat. 

Moffat suggests now that you know the symptoms of shingles, be a shingles spotter and be on the lookout for shingles in your friends, family and coworkers.