alt Hacker NewsHello! Another datapoint here, both I and a friend of mine got shingles in our early 30s. I had to go to two different doctors because the first just assumed that it was "bad acne" (my shingles followed the trigeminal nerve across my face). Second doctor immediately clocked it as shingles. It was perhaps the second most painful experience of my life, not so much because it was intensely painful but because the pain was constant and resistant to relief.
I'm told that stress can cause shingles to flare up, in that stress also suppresses the immune system, and both my friend and I were going through one of the most stressful phases of our lives at the time, so I always chalked it up to that. Not a very strong hypothesis, though.
I had shingles across my back in 7th grade. I remember at the time being told since I didn’t have chickenpox as a kid that led to my shingles. I was also told that once you have shingles you are immune. I have since learned both are not true. I also will get pain in the same location that my shingles started when under great stress.
I got the shingles vaccine last year.