Why am I not surprised
Last Thursday, one of the other moms on the MOMS Club board unknowingly came to the board meeting with shingles. Once she was diagnosed, she immediately emailed everyone she had been in contact with apologizing & offering to answer any questions people may have. Not too many other moms have to worry about it since they've either had the chickenpox or their kids have been vaccinated for it. Only a few people have newborns & I'm pretty sure they made out OK.

I emailed her back wishing her a speedy recovery (I've heard shingles is super crappy to deal with) & that I was the strange one of the group actually hoping Logan would get the chickenpox since he's not been vaccinated (& won't unless he never gets the disease by his teen years).

I've been keeping a close eye on Logan's rashes & eczema outbreaks, looking for any signs of chickenpox. Last night he had a very nasty breakout - a bright red rash on his stomach, hips, arms & the back of his knees & a few bumps on his face. I was sure that he would wake up covered in spots. He actually woke up looking good, but I still took him to the Doctor to get checked out just in case.

We were seen this morning & I was told to leave him in the car while I got him checked in at the front desk. After check-in, they had us come into an exam room by a side door to the building so no other children would be in contact with him if he did have the highly contagious infectious disease. The PA looked him over & checked out the spots on his lips, ears, hands, face & feet. Chickenpox was ruled out, but he was diagnosed with a different contagious infectious disease. Hand-Foot-Mouth disease. I was told that it is really common in kids his age, especially if they are thumb suckers (Logan is more of a whole hand chewer - still). He's been living in the sandbox ever since the weather has been nice, so it's no surprise that he has some virus from the combination.

There's no treatment plan or medication for him to take, we just wait it out for about 3-7 days. He doesn't have a fever & he doesn't have open blisters so he's not contagious & we don't have to be quarantined in the house for an extended period of time. The PA thinks that his rash from last night was a combination of seasonal allergies causing his eczema to flare up, along with the HFM symptoms. It's been suggested that Logan start taking a daily medication like Zyrtec. I might have him take it only during high-pollen days. We'll see.

So, HFM disease. Yuck. Although I was really hoping it was chickenpox.