My first son, born in 1982, got an initial infection of Herpes I from his Grandmother. Unfortunately, when he broke out in blisters, I had a bleeding split cutilcle....I had never had Herpes, including Chicken Pox . He was 5 months old and the blisters caused extensive drooling which got into my cuticle. After some time ( dont remember because thiwas 30 years ago) my thumb cuticle became infected. I had extreme swelling, fever of 104 to 106, red streaking up the arm, inflamed lymph nodes....Of course, my PCP thought blood infection...lanced the thumb which spread it to my lymph nodes....Now when I break out ,my lymph nodes swell and I get blisters where my tonsils used to be. Most recently, due to stress, PTSD, and more stress, I developed an ear infection that would not respond to antibiotics. Not too long later, my thumb (original infection area) began to develop blisters. I had had vertigo from the virus, antibiotics did not help. FINALLY I requested acyclovir and ears, throat and thumb and lymph nodes began to go down....The ear thing was new...is there a possiblilty of it spreading to my brain??? This is a very serious concern to me and no one in my very rural area has any answers...