Did anyone have measles as a child?

[Daffodil101]

With leg pain afterwards?

Been reading about measles tonight. I definitely contracted this as a child, we moved house a lot, so I can place it to about 1978 given the house we were living in.

I also remember an incident ( in the same house) where I had excruciating leg pains and my mother wouldn’t believe me. It was agony to weight bear. She forced me to walk to the shops on my hands and knees to ‘prove’ I was lying, which I wasn’t.

I’ve never connected the two until I read that measles can cause terrible leg pain. Talk about the penny dropping!

Anyone else remember experiencing this?

I caught measles as a baby in 82/3. Don't remember leg pain but possibly I was too young. No other lasting effects but I was pretty unwell with it and was blue lighted to hospital I think.

I’ve had measles and got leg pain that I was always told was growing pains - user to wake me up in the middle of the night...

Except my leg pain predated measles by at least 2 years...

I’ve also had whooping cough and mumps, I’ve never asked, but I’m pretty sure I was completely unvaccinated until I consented myself as a teenager.

I had measles aged 8 was intensely ill. 3 weeks bed ridden, hallucinating/very high temp and so itchy. 6 weeks off school. No leg pains though.

Regarding when the measles vaccine was first used in the UK,I was born in late 1963,and was given the measles vaccination in November 1964. I was one of the first children in the UK to receive it. My DM jumped at the chance of me having the vaccination as both my older brothers (8 and 5 years older than me) had had it at the same time 2 years before I was born and my DM said they had been really ill with it.
As a result of being one of the first to have the vaccine,my DM was asked if we would participate in a follow-up study,conducted by the PHSL. Until I was 18,my DM was sent the form,then from then on until I was 30,it was sent to me. It was the longest running follow up study on a vaccine ever done in the UK. And yes,they concluded that it was successful,which I would agree with,having been in close contact with someone who had measles (when I was 24) and I didn't catch it!

I had measles very badly when I was a child. It’s affected my eyesight. I had a squint corrected for cosmetic reasons, but don’t have much clarity of vision in one eye. I’ve been told I’ll eventually lose my sight in that eye. Unfortunately it’s already started deteriorating.

I had measles when I was around 4. I was vaccinated but was unlucky. I ended up with pneumonia as a result but don’t recall leg pain.

Most countries take measles very seriously. I live abroad and it’s certainly taken extremely seriously here.

I too find it interesting that the population closest in time to common and almost universal measles infection chose not to access the vaccine in large numbers, and the further we get from that time the more afraid we have become. This is in contrast to the polio vaccine, which I understand had a large uptake from the moment it was introduced.

I forgot to say I had measles as a 70s child - I remember being in bed with curtains closed, drinking hot lemonade (my DMs cure-all )

I was born 1979 and would have had any vaccinations recommend- mum was a nurse and big on that sort of thing. Have had measles twice though, once as an adult although that was a milder infection

I have had measles when I was aged 3 or 4, no leg pain beyond growing pains much later. Also caught mumps and rubella from my older brother.

My mum would definitely have had us vaccinated if it had been an option. I've at least two cousins a couple of years older who lost their hearing following one of those illnesses.

Dd had measles at 8 months, it was grim. She complains of leg pain, never occurred to me there may be a link, but she is a teenager so complains a lot... her eyesight is shocking, but no way of knowing if it would have been anyway. Got glasses at 18mo with +8 in both eyes.

I am rather unusual in my generation in not having had the measles. My brothers and my friends all did, don't know why I didn't.

If there had been a vaccine in the early 60s we would certainly have had it. I was vaccinated against German measles.

Low uptake of a vaccine may not actually mean it was offered to children as a routine measure but parents actively refused to take it up. It may not have been offered as part of the ordinary vaccine programme, parents may not have known it was available, stocks may have been low and information difficult to access. It is easy for those grown up with the internet to forget how much work there was in accessing stats or information that wasn't actively being pushed by authorities.

I didn’t think you can get measles twice. I thought once you have had it then you are immune

I had mild measles in the late 70s after the vaccination - back then it was a live virus and that wasn’t uncommon but it was still seen as better than risking a severe dose.

If there had been a vaccine in the early 60s we would certainly have had it
The vaccine came out in the UK in 1968, then there was a big catch up campaign. I queued up at school for it but wasnt allowed the vaccine because of abnormal febrile convulsions in my family. I went on to have measles a couple of years later and remember feeling totally exhausted and not being carried down stairs because i was too week to walk.
Also measles wipes out your immune system for about 3 years. In the following years i had really bad tonsilitis for weeks on end, I would have a week off school and back for a week and off again. They ended up taking them out when it wasnt fashionable to so any more.

and not being carried down stairs because i was too week to walk.
Correction
and being carried downstairs because i was too weak to walk

Conversely, two of my DSs regularly got leg pains at night around the ages of 4-8. Spent many evenings rubbing their legs and making hot water bottles for them. Neither have had measles. Doctors still put it down to growing pains

my children were born in the early 70s and we were not offered the vaccine.My neice was in the first offered the MMR a few years later
My daughter had it age 1 and it was horrific.
@StarUtopia
You really are quite mad or totally ill informed
@MrsAvocet

Lots of assumptions there. Not sure of your source but we definitely didnt have the options of MMR. I would have taken it. Seeing what I saw in my baby who luckily recovered anyone who declines it is mad

I had measles and chicken pox when I was too young to remember it. I had mumps when I was about 7 and that was horrible.

I was born in 69 and didn’t have the measles vaccine as there was a scare about its safety around that time although dais who was born 15 months later did have it as the scare was over by then. My uncle was a medic so she would have done whatever he said was the best thing to do at the time.

When I was about 7/8, mum suddenly decided I ought to have the measles vaccination as it was safe again and so ordered it from the gp (who didn’t keep it in stock - they got the right number in for the baby clinics but no spares) so the day came, end of the Easter holidays and she took me into have it. Got there and was coughing so doc said no worries, better to have it when you don’t have a big, come back next week/when you’re better. Next day was first day of term so went in, cough wasn’t that bad...

Unfortunately the next day I didn’t go into school as I had spots... measles. Turns out it starts with a cough... and as I’d gone into school, and as lots of dc in my year had also not been vaccinated due to the scare, lots of dc then came down with it... not good.
I remember being pretty ill, being in my parents bed with the curtains drawn because the light hurt my eyes. I also had chicken pox and mumps - cp was seen as the scary one as somebody locally had had it very badly including spots on their retinas which had scarred and made them lose most of their sight, and down their throat which led to all sorts of problems.

I had measles. We all did in the 60's, it was seen as a childhood illness that you just had to get over, like mumps, German measles, chicken pox etc.

I remember lying on the sofa feeling ill and my brother bouncing around and my mum saying 'you won't be feeling so bouncy in a week or so!'. I caught measles at school, he was pre-school age.

No complications for either of us thankfully, and I don't know any of my school friends had complications either. But we were post-war and well nourished children.
I had leg pains that were called 'growing pains' but could, to be honest, just have been muscle strains. I didn't have the experience to tell what they were.

I remember having the measles vaccination aged about 3 (worked out from talking to my mum - I don't personally remember it being for measles!) That would have been in about 1971.

So no, I never had measles.

I was born in 1966 so maybe I just missed out on being offered it, but if it was available I am also surprised that I wasn't immunised. My Mum was always very compliant with medical advice by my recollection. I certainly had everything that was offered when I was at school, so I am sure that had she been told that I should have it, I would have done.

They went into schools and did a catch up campaign there . As i said up above I remember queuing up for measles jab with my sister. We were not allowed to have it because my sister had what is now recognised as GEFS+( history in our family going back to at least 1912 by syndrome not recognised until probably mid 2000)
We both went on to get measles in the next couple years

I had it in the early 70s. I have a fleeting memory of sitting in a big armchair feeling very sorry for myself with the curtains closed because the light hurt my eyes.