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I knew moms who did not immunize their kids for anything after their first shots because they had severe local reactions to shots or because they heard of worse complications that were possible. I watched this, and later on when I had my own babies thought about it a lot. I'm a RN, was an 'older' mom, and my babies were precious to me and still are (not that other moms don't feel the same way....). I had mine immunized against everything, including Hep B. I now regret the Hep B but that's a whole 'nother story.

Here's my rationale for immunizing my kids. We don't hear stories about years ago except from old ladies who lost a baby or two or three or more to whooping cough or any of the other common diseases that can kill. People tend to forget things like big flu epidemics and some things are just not in history books. My grandma lost one, out of her 11 children. I know about it because my father remembers, he was a little guy at the time and sad because his mother told him his baby brother died during the night. They all had whooping cough and the baby died, he was three months old. This would have been around 80 years ago.

We live near a cemetery, there are lots of graves there that are 100 years old, and lots of little graves that are either unmarked or have a little lamb over them. My father tells about whole families who lost all their children or almost all of them from diseases back in those days.

The really sad thing is that all of these diseases now are preventable with a couple shots given as infants. I made the decision to give my kids the shots, even though there were slight risks of complications. I am convinced that the people in the 70's and 80's who didn't give their kids the immunizations rode along on the wave of good public health practice for a while, and now we are paying the price.

It's a tough decision to make, but all I kept thinking of was all those mothers who were afraid to get too attached to their babies because babies died so frequently.

I am convinced that the people in the 70's and 80's who didn't give their kids the immunizations rode along on the wave of good public health practice for a while, and now we are paying the price.

It's not a tough decision unless you have a family history of reactions to immunizations.

You take your kids places in the car. You take them on airplanes. Everything in life involves risk. With immunizations, the benefits far outweigh the risks.

Certainly you can ride the wave of immunity created by people who get the shots. That's like taking welfare. Sooner or later, the pool of immunized kids diminishes and you have epidemics.

Thanks for posting this reminder. I think that too many people forget how good we have it these days.

That's so true.

People had to deal with so much more death back then.

Breakthroughs that stopped diseases were thankfully embraced.

Now, too many people forget what it was like and play against the odds.