Cootie Patrol

An administrator at Regis emailed me to ask me for verification of my second MMR vaccination. I was all set to be irate with the Po’ People’s Clinic for leaving it off the immunization form, but looking back at my original records, I see that I never even received a second MMR shot.

Curse my lazy parents!

(Although, there isn’t even a space for it on the old card, so it might be a newer recommendation.)

No wonder I had parotitis a few years ago! The docs assumed it was bacterial, but it isn’t like it was cultured or anything. It cleared up in a few agonizing weeks later with antibiotics, but I guess a virus would pass on its own in the same amount of time.

I like the idea of mumps. It sounds cute, even. Much less gross than a Staph. aureus infection of the parotid gland, which my doc had warned could a release an “purulent discharge” into my mouth at anytime. Yummy! Of course, now that I know what Staph. smells like, it is even more nauseating than it was at the time.

So, of course, I call my sister, who will be starting nursing school in the Spring. For some reason I thought she might find this medically interesting. “Remember how I had parotitis a few years ago? Well it turns out it could have been mumps, because I didn’t get a second MMR shot. Isn’t that weird?”

“You didn’t have mumps!” Sister is incredulous. She says it like I told her I had smallpox.

She has a friend who works for Public Health. I should email her and ask if there were any cases of mumps reported in the Emerald City in 2002. I think it was 2002. Of course, then she’ll tell my sister that I am still obsessing about a virus I didn’t have 5 years ago, and I’ll never live it down.

I suppose I could have the Po’ People’s Clinic check my records. They would love that. Sometimes I think my medical records would be safer if I just held on to them myself. But that is another story…

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