DON'T BE RASH
As we all know, the Internet has had a profound affect on our
lives in more ways than one can discuss in a mere blog, some positive, some
very negative. What will surprise no one, and cause many to nod their heads
in agreement, is that the Internet has created a generation of sofa-surfing
pseudo doctors, or self prescribers shall we say. With a tap of one's fingers, a simple set of symptoms can turn a calm individual into a raving
hypochondriac convinced they have a brain tumour, rare African disease, or are in need of a triple by-pass, STAT. I’m guilty as charged of course, and often spend far too long checking symptoms
wondering if I’ve caught some rare affliction (or I'm just getting old) cause,
well, the internet told me so. Taking this a step further, if at all possible,
it has made parents out there more, ahem, involved in their child’s health and perhaps a tad kneejerk in
their reactions to some very standard run of the mill childhood conditions.
Take the good old rash. When I was little, as I was allergic
to poison oak (which is not found in the UK apparently and would’ve saved me a
childhood slathered with cortisone cream), I spent years on end bathed in calamine
lotion looking like a pink puffed up blow fish. How I made friends is beyond
me. Yes, we’d go off to the doctor when it would get really bad (as my eyes
would seal shut etc.), but for the most part, rashes were par for the course.
Nowadays, if you type the word child’s rash into Google, your eyes will bulge
and your head may explode at all the results that come back at you. It’s damn
near frightening and will have you packing a bag and moving into the A&E at
your local hospital. The problem is, whereas most rashes are harmless, some
obviously need tending to, and when you see the gamut of possibilities out
there, it’s hard not to appropriate the worst possible scenario to your child. "Omg, it's glandular fever with a side dose of the plague, ruuuuunnnnn!!!!"
Yes, I’m going somewhere with this. So this weekend, the
mighty King had a rash on his face. It was itchy and splotchy all over his cheeks and forehead,
but we figured (as calm, parents do) that it was just a rash, and we’d see
how it went as the weekend progressed. We of course headed out to a children’s book fair hoping that we would not infect the entire room of children with our son’s
condition. He faired pretty well for the most part, but in my mind was not his usual self
for much of the day. This is of course caused my husband and I to independently
- and furtively - do some Google searching on rashes coupled with the other
symptoms that seemed to be cropping up (or were they?).
The next morning he
woke up and the rash had spread to his legs, his face looked puffy and he was
coughing, and looking pretty worse for wear. So, what did we do? What do any Internet
savvy parents do in this day and age? Well, we rushed off to the hospital of
course at 6am on a Sunday. Okay, so we had taken a few steps away from ‘calm
mode.’ Of course by the time we got to the hospital – which for the first time
in our lives was empty – the King was starting to regain some of his usual pep.
By the time the doctor arrived and the King was on the bed waiting to be seen,
he was dancing, making jokes and using the bed as a trampoline. The doctor
looked at us like we were NHS bleeding, hypochondriac lunatics. We of course
smiled sheepishly and explained the rash had spread (and well, on the internet
rashes are baaaaad) and that Scarlet Fever was spreading across the King’s
school (whenever a medical professional is looking at you like you’re nuts, just
throw a disease out at them to show them that you’re in the know). Of course the
King had no fever and by this point was singing to the doctor at the top of his
lungs and trying to take his clothes off to show him the rest of the rash. Or let's be honest, the King just likes to take his clothes off.
Needless to say, we didn’t stay long and were sent home having been told that the King, wait for it…had a rash. And we should give him an
antihistamine and see how we went. Gosh, thanks for that. Of course my literal,
need answers at all times brain was not satisfied with that as I wanted to know
where the heck this rash came from? And more importantly, what type of rash
can I really worry about and hightail it to the hospital for on a Sunday morning? (The only answer to that is high fever and
the meningitis glass test, apparently). In the King's case, the root of the problem was not of a
concern to the doctor at 6am on this past Sunday morning, as he seemed more concerned with trying not to laugh at
us as my husband and I were trying to downshift from panic mode.
As we left the
hospital – both of us psychosomatically itching ourselves of course - in mild
embarrassment, my husband mentioned that he could only remember going to the
A&E twice as a child (contrary to the multiple times we have taken the King. In our defence many were legitimate visits).
Okay, okay…so maybe we’re a generation of paranoid hypochondriacs, and maybe a
rash is just a rash, but one thing is for sure…if I am going to get some rare
tropical disease, thanks to the Internet, I’ll see it coming a mile away.