I vaccinated my kids (27, 25, 16 now), until in one month span in winter 2004/2005, my close family had several bad reactions that couldn’t be brushed aside.
My oldest had a serious reaction to prevnar that caused hives, fever, and some brain swelling. His short-term memory was impacted and that affects him to this day. He had had many less severe reactions throughout childhood.
My grandfather had severe reaction to prevnar (only vaccine he ever had). He immediately developed fever, cough, and lung congestion (diagnosed pneumonia which he’d never had before) and was hospitalized that evening. In hospital he contracted MRSA and C-Dif, which killed him.
I had reaction to adult DTaP. My arm swelled up with hard nodule at injection site, broke out with hives, and lost use of my arm for couple months. Then autoimmune symptoms kicked in (antiphospholipid syndrome is known side effect of tetanus shot): sudden onset high blood pressure, weight gain, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia symptoms, migraines, recurrent miscarriages (we lost 8).
My younger son was very advanced at his 8 month appointment (it was supposed to be 9 months, but pediatrician was to be on vacation). He was pulling up and standing, trying to walk, and had 8 clear words of language. He had a reaction that began in pediatrician’s office with swelling hard nodules at injection sites, all over hives, and (what I later learned) DTaP scream. Pediatrician refused to come back in to check him, I was refusing to leave, nurse bodily shoved us out of office and locked door (because his screaming was distressing other patients) after threatening me that children services would take my baby if I went to ER. He screamed for 10 hrs. It was the last sound we heard from him for years.
I called pediatrician once home because my son had developed a fever; she insisted this was all normal, to give him Tylenol. That didn’t help; swelling grew worse, screaming continued, fever climbed. Doctor said to alternate Tylenol and Advil; I kept putting ice packs on the injection sites to try to help. My RN best friend and employer (I was nanny for her kids) was shocked at how sick my son was. She came back to my house after dropping her kids off with their dad. My son developed horrible diarrhea, fever continued to climb (104), and swelling was worse (plus my friend noticed his head looked swollen.)
Later that night, he finally passed out in his swing; a few minutes later he was choking and turned blue. His breathing and heart stopped; my friend resuscitated him while I cried and screamed on phone with pediatrician. Pediatrician insisted this was normal and threatened my friend’s nursing license when my friend got on phone asking what the heck had happened.
Next day, all speech, eye contact, and muscle movement was gone; took him years to regain those skills. We couldn’t get a different pediatrician–no one wanted to take on an obviously injured child. We were stuck until we finally got referral for testing. Neurological and genetic testing showed mitochondrial defects and it was explained to us that was why our son nearly died from vaccine reaction. VICP and VAERS were explained to us, but we were too late to file for VICP, could never file VAERS report because pediatrician wouldn’t give vial/lot numbers to neurologist, and my son was declared disabled by all testing and government (husband earned $200/yr too much to qualify for help for our son though).
Neurologist talked to us about supplements to support brain function, organic diet, and that further vaccines could kill our son (but he wouldn’t risk his medical license to write medical exemption, he told us to use other exemptions available if we didn’t want to risk our son dying). Today most people don’t realize he has autism label, but he struggles to read more than 20 minutes (severe migraines due to optic nerve/brain connection damage from encephalopathy), his immune system is almost non-existent, his pancreas barely function and cannot seem to produce enzymes (ran out of enzyme supplement last year and ended up in hospital), ongoing stomach/bowel issues, and he is in constant, crippling pain.
I had no idea until recently (having gotten copies of some of my childhood records), that I had reactions every single time I was vaccinated (got the measles the evening following the 1st measles shot, developed life threatening egg allergy immediately following reaction to measles booster when I started school, severe allergies to many common foods and environmental substances (one example is artificial dyes touching or smelling them cause anaphylaxis), had severe reactions to flu shots, severe reaction to middle school boosters followed by asthma and worsening life threatening allergies–plus epinephrine and steroids stop my heart, and pharmaceutical grade antihistamines cause an additional equally severe allergic reaction on top of what I’m already experiencing). Pediatrician couldn’t figure out why I was constantly so sick and didn’t really expect me to live.
Our adoptive daughter had similar life threatening reaction to her 1 yr shots (my husband’s MD friend found it in her records). She had seizures for 24 hrs straight immediately following vaccines; she lost all speech, all muscle movement, and ability to chew/swallow. She now walks, runs, climbs, can eat regular foods, and is speaking fairly clearly. She shows same damage to optic nerve/brain connection like our middle son.
Vaccine injuries are not rare, but they are rarely reported (none of my family’s was ever able to be reported due to lacking the lot/vial numbers for needed data). As our MD friend and RN friends have told us, beyond the basics of importance of following the CDC schedule, and the blanket statement that injuries are mild and incredibly rare, they were taught nothing about vaccines in med school. To ignore the many injury accounts is to ignore scientific method, first steps of which are observing and collecting data. The blanket statement we so often hear of “science is settled” is not only gas lighting victims of injury and further endangering the lives of those presenting with injuries, but it is also one of the most unscientific statements you can make. Medicine is not one size fits all; the sooner that is acknowledged, the sooner we can have a better dialogue involving individual medical needs and care and true safety of medical procedures.
