I've written about vaccines before, but if you're struggling to find the balance between being a good steward of public health and keeping your kids safe, this might be an option.

Working in the news can be a curse sometimes, especially when you're a parent.  I read and consume every horrible thing that's out there to hurt your children.  I go home at night with my head filled with probable cause statements about child molestors, recalls of cribs that will strangle and studies about toys that will poison your child.   If you try to digest it all, you'll get sick.  So ignoring some of it, is the best policy.  But you have to figure out what the biggest risks are for your children....or at least in YOUR mind, what are the biggest risks?

I can not get away from the parents I've talked to over the years, who are convinced that Vaccines caused a severe problem with their children's health.  From Autism, to the rare case where a child died after getting the MMR Vaccine. 

When Jude was born and that vaccine scheduled was laid out for me again, I felt like I had to do something to calm the fears in my head.

I'm one of those people that can see both sides of it (I guess that's a good thing for a journalist)  When my pediatrician tells me how important the vaccines are for my kids and it could save their life, I nod my head and understand.  I DO understand...I know vaccines are considered one of the greatest medical breakthroughs in the last two centuries.  I don't want my child to come down with Hep A or Chicken Pox or Rubella, so YES, please protect them.

But then, there's Ruth Dunigan, who swears her son David developed Autism after getting his DTP vaccine.  I've heard from other parents with similar stories.  Being a parent, you can't just discount these mothers and their instincts.  I believe a mother knows, she knows if something changed her child.

It's a dilemma and a controversy that won't be solved anytime soon.  Here's the approach I decided to take.  Instead of letting the doctor's office give Jude 4 vaccinations at one time.  We spread them out.  Somehow the thought of her little body taking in 4 vaccines at once doesn't make much sense.  So we do one shot and then we wait 2 weeks to do the next one. 

Yes it takes a lot of time and yes we make a lot of trips to the doctor and YES, they seem kind of annoyed by it.  But you have to stay strong.  Take the steps you feel good about to make sure your child's health care is exactly what you think it should be.   

One more story to leave you with, a friend of mine took her daughter to her pediatrician here in Springfield.  Her 2-year old had a fever of almost 104.  The doctor examined her, said it might be Strep, but then sent the mother and child home without doing a swab to test for strep.  It makes no sense, I know.  This is a good doctor too, I know his reputation.  Maybe he was having an off day. 

My friend didn't feel right about it, but she left the doctor's office with her daughter because the doctor didn't do anything else.  When she got home and called HER mother, her Mother said "You go back to that doctor and demand a strep test"  So that's what she did.  And it was positive. 

Moral of the story:  Mother's have an instinct about their child's heath and you need to follow that instinct.  Doctors CAN be wrong. 

The other Moral of the Story: Grandmothers always know what to do :)