Friday, July 6, 2012

Bohemian Mama: Baby Needles


Soon after her first birthday we’ll be giving Yarrow her first vaccination. I’m not against them, as a rule, but too many vaccinations disturb me and we decided early on to be cautious about the decisions we make for Yarrow. I’m not a doctor, and I don’t try to write a blog breaking down all my discomforts with the ingredients in vaccines, the timing of the shots. A lot of thought and prayer that went into our decision to refuse many, and delay the rest of the shots that most babies get. If you’re looking for solid information, the couple over at Cultural Heretics has a couple of good posts. In this blog, I’ll only say that I knew I’d be breastfeeding Petka as long as we both felt necessary and I knew that breastmilk builds a good defense against many illnesses. I knew we would not be putting her in daycare, where she’d have constant exposure to illness, and I knew that the amounts of mercury (whether negatively linked or not) gave me an overwhelming feeling of dread. I was also blessed to discover a pediatrician who truly respected my intelligence, and my choices (a pediatrician, in fact who had decided to forgo most vaccinations in his own child), as well as good friends, another doctor and his wife, whose advice was comforting, helpful, and well-reasoned.
Wait! That isn't Yarrow! Luba (who is vaccinated against rabies) has
taken over the Moses Basket.

We knew that, living on old pasture land, we would give Yarrow the Tetanus vaccine, because there is a high chance out here of her stumbling across some rusty metal. That vaccine seemed a risk worth taking. The others are all on the back burner for a while. There may be a point in her future that we’ll consider one or two of the others, but in the main they are unnecessary, risky, and rest uncomfortably in my mind. I’m grateful for the freedom to make these choices, and happy to see that, a year in, the worst Petka’s run across is a light cold.


1 comment:

  1. I think that's the cutest picture of Luba I've seen yet!

    Not to take anything away from Yarrow playing in the sand, of course.

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