[Anonymouse]

Maybe parents should start doing what the Americans do - have parties for kids who've caught, e.g., chickenpox, so they can spread it around. The theory's quite sound; it's generally agreed that the earlier you catch the routine childhood diseases and thus acquire immunity to them, the better.

I should know - I waited until I was 21 to catch chickenpox from who knows where...except that for an adult it's shingles, a.k.a. hell on earth. I still have the scars. I didn't even know I had them at first until my mum asked, as I was putting on a shirt, "What are those spots on your chest?"
"What spots?" says I, and I look down and freak out merrily. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!"

You might think I was a tad distressed. on seeing red spots that made me look like something out of Tom & Jerry You'd be right.

I got one in my throat. Talk about having an itch you can't scratch (and you can't scratch 'em anyway, because that makes 'em worse. But you want to. Dear God, you want to...).
For three weeks I couldn't wear anything heavier than a dressing gown, as the damn things chafed somethin' awful. But the baffling thing is that I'm sure chickenpox did the rounds at my primary school; I don't know how I didn't get it then. I wish I had. The horror...the horror...

I did get measles, though.