Scratch Where it Itches...

Anyone familiar with the University of Iowa football team's history has heard this phrase before.  Our former coach Hayden Fry was famous for this quote, among others...."Welcome to the Salvation Army.  I've never been associated with an offense so nice about giving the ball away," and "You just witnessed an old fashioned rump kicking!"  Hayden is an endless supply of hilarious quotes...but back to the subject at hand.

I've been doing a lot of scratching lately, thanks to a mystery rash on my neck and legs.  I'm not going to get all gross and in-depth here because no one wants that, including me!  And luckily it hasn't really been that gross.  Just annoying.  What really freaked me out was when my eyes started getting swollen & red.  I look like I've been pulling all-nighters for the last week, when really I'm in bed by 10pm. 

So when I realized this was not going away on it's own, my first instinct was to go online and figure out a diagnosis.  (Now come on, who ever thought sites like Web MD were a good idea?)  All they do is provide a forum for people with all kinds of weird symptoms to try and diagnose each other.  ("Yeah, my cousin's sister's boyfriend had the same thing.  It was caused by eating too much devil spice beef jerky and drinking Mountain Dew while sitting in the hot tub all day.  He put some baby butt cream on it and it cleared right up.")  I have to say I found some really far out stuff on these sites.  After doing some research, I finally narrowed it down to the following:

1) Allergic reaction to who knows what

2) Excema

3) Pregnancy

4) Menopause

5) Foreign Accent Syndrome (Not really, but I did find that online.  It's the sudden change in speech patterns & intonation.  Caused by head trauma.  That could be on the horizon for me next.  Might be kind of fun!)

Knowing that pregnancy and menopause are both out of the question, I finally went to my family doctor.  She narrowed it down a little more.  She thought it was one of 3 things, prescribed me some steroid cream, and referred me to a dermatologist.  (Who can't see me for 3 more weeks!)  I'm really hoping the tiny tube of steroid cream will last that long.  Picture a tube of lip gloss.  That's what I've got to hold me over for the next 3 weeks.  Ugh! 

Until then, I'll just keep on taking Hayden's advice.