To Flu Shot Or Not To Flu Shot – THAT is the Question

I go through this. Every. Single. Year.

To the point that my friends start hiding from me and won’t return my phone calls from October to January. This year, advertisements for the flu shots started popping up in August. I recognized my friend’s weary glances right away.

But you, dear readers, have never been exposed to my paranoia around this time of year. You are a fresh new audience.

Welcome.

First, let’s say I am cautious about vaccines. I get them. I have my children get them. But we spread them out. Way out. During my children’s first years of life, we were in the doctor’s office about every other month just getting vaccines. I appreciate the value of a vaccines but I don’t want to overwhelm a body’s delicate system.

There are some vaccines I skip. When the chicken pox vaccine first came out I let my daughter get those delightful, itchy spots the good old-fashioned way. But my boys? Too many people were getting the vaccine by then. I was risking that without the vaccine they may contract chicken pox in adulthood when it is far more dangerous. So they received the chicken pox vaccine.

Then comes H1N1. Oh. My. God. I had no friends during that time. Not during flu season, anyway. I bored them ad nauseum with facts. I deliberated. I asked strangers on the street what they thought.

Last year, my kids each got the first dose of the vaccine and then #1son had a horrible reaction. Or, so we thought. (Later, the CDC – or whatever lab they sent the results to – deemed that it was a coincidental reaction to something unknown) The kids never received the subsequent doses and we were fine last season.

Except for last year, we never get the vaccine. We’re a typical, healthy family who enjoy the typical amount of colds each season. I’d venture to say a little less than the typical amount.

But every single year I worry that I’ve made the wrong decision.

My husband, who practices Chinese Medicine, is absolutely no help at all. Chinese Medicine believes in letting the body build its own immunities. When we first had kids, he was adamantly against any vaccine. I was adamantly for. We battled. It came to such a head that I planned on sneaking the kids to the doctor and never telling him. Luckily, we came to an agreement we both could live with after a wonderful talk with our amazing Western Medicine pediatrician who values my husband’s expertise.

But during flu season? He’s no help. He laughs at me whenever I ask a question, reminding me of what he thinks of the flu shot industry. Every time we pass a sign advertising flu shots (at a drug store, grocery store, the library, in the airport – God, they’re everywhere!) he gives me a sideways glance, just waiting for my barrage of questions.

In an advertisement for flu shots on the radio this morning they reminded all of us fearful listeners out there that the CDC has recommended that everyone should receive the flu shot this season.

Everyone.

Is this advertising? Is this a twist of a study just to create fear and make money for the store/pharmaceutical companies? Or should every typically healthy person out there get the flu shot?

I hate this time of year.

Hate it.

And I know what I’ll do. I’ll choose to skip the vaccine for all of us. And then sit on pins and needles until spring, worrying that I made the wrong decision.

Sigh.

So I’ll just take this opportunity to say goodbye to all my dear friends here in the real world. See you next spring.

Blog friends?

Anyone?

Will you keep me company until then?

Sid Gets The Flu Shot

When my daughter reached a certain level in gymnastics we decided to homeschool her. It made sense. The gym was an hour from our home and practice was 4 hours a day. And many of her gym friends were homeschooled for the very same reasons.

My boys were toddlers at the time and they would watch Sesame Street. I was suddenly very aware how many “skits” were centered around organized school and how the school classroom was the best place to learn. It was a little too preachy for my tastes. And certainly, a little too preachy for a children’s television program.

Now granted, Sesame Street receives finding from the U.S. Department of Education. Homeschooling is certainly not mainstream but it sure would be nice if when they’re showing all the different ways to go to school (walk, ride bus, ride bikes, etc.) that they would acknowledge different ways to be schooled.

My daughter laughed at the skit about how to get to school because they showed how you had to get up early, remember all your things to bring, pack your lunch, pack your backpack, etc. She said, “With homeschool I just have to roll out of bed and walk a few steps to the dining room table! I can even stay in my pj’s!”

Now, I wrote about our decision to vaccinate for H1N1. It was a decision I agonized over. We don’t typically do the regular flu vaccine and we feel we have very good reasons for opting out. From what my husband (practices Traditional Chinese Medicine)  knows of a healthy immune system and the need adapt, fight and strengthen we don’t feel it’s best to immunize our otherwise healthy children for the flu. That doesn’t mean we feel everyone should feel as we do or that everyone should not be vaccinated.

But I very strongly feel that my children should not be preached to by puppets on a public television show about this controversial topic.

So, when I received a link to this little tidbit from a friend I was appalled.

But take a gander and let me know what you think.