to give jabs to dts against ex-p wishes?

[ladyfirenze]

Dts are six. For long and boring reasons which I'm happy to discuss, but aren't the issue in question, they are not vaccinated. Recently I've come under pressure to have them done, and I'm happy to go ahead, but ex p was against it when the boys were born (as was I). He rowed with his pro-jab family terribly over it.

We aren't able to discuss things unfortunately, as whatever I say seems to finish with him flying off the handle during a change over, so I stay indoors when he comes to collect the children. Sad, I know.

But what the fuck shall I do about these vaccinations?

LOL @ jabs causing a squint

Also, think past childhood when they may want to travel and stuff, many diseases which we have more or less wiped out due to extensive vaccinations remain rife in other parts of the world. So they may not necessarily be at risk now due to herd immunity, but could be later IYSWIM?

ah yes! see that now. d'oh too tired. Off to bed now but will have a think how to tackle ex and let you all know what happens.

Ignore the silly fucker, go ahead and do it - just don't tell him. You will not suffer any legal penalties for following what is standard medical advice and ignoring the wishes of a dickhead.

Right. You didn't get them vaccinated because your mum told you that vaccinations caused your older child to have a squint, and then need glasses?

Now that is bonkers. Almost the most bonkers vaccination story I have heard. But not quite.

I have a friend who is seriously convinced that her children will not get nits because they are so strong (due to no vaccinations) that their bodies will naturally resist head lice.

I think you have to just go ahead and get them done asap and deal with the fall out later, he can't unvaccinate them lets face it.

My dd2 is completely un vaxxed. If dh and I separated and he took her for jabs I would be beyond livid.

OP, what is your ex p's reasoning behind the non vax?

You have explained your previous thinking, but not his.

He is their parent too, and has equal right to have his views considered on this.

Silverfrog, what issue do you have with tetanus and polio ?

If I could get a single tetanus fir dd2, I would consider it. But it is not available for under 10s. I would still not have given it to her until at least age 4 anyway.

There is good reason to not vax dd2, which is why I asked what OP's ex's reasoning was. (agree that the squint issue probably not a decent reason to not jab)

Btw,OP - for a reasonable, balanced view of the current vax schedule, the alternatives, and the risks both fromthe diseases and the jabs, read Richard Halvorsen's book.

lololol

Checkit - more Halvorsen balance...

Warning - this contains long words, and some statistical concepts. This may cause the anti-vac/unicorns are protecting my children brigade's heads to explode.

Declaration of COI - do not believe in unicorns.

I think it is important to consider your husband's feelings in this. They are his children too. As someone else said, how would you feel if he took them away and had their ears pierced or had your son circumcised without your permission. It just doesn't seem right. I think you need to establish your own feelings about the diseases and if/why you want to vaccinate against them and then perhaps email/write a letter to your husband. He obviously has to respect your wishes too so hopefully you can come to some sort of agreement that will keep you both happy.

To help you make a decision about whether or not to vaccinate you should really read about the diseases themselves, their incidence, risks, side effects etc and come to an informed decision based on that. There is quite a lot of incorrect information on this thread about the various risks of the diseases because many people don't actually bother doing that. Look at the NHS websites for information and the HPA usually has figures for England and Wales. The WHO has figures for the other countries.

Just to mention a few things -

Mumps is not a killer disease ( I won't say it never kills because there have been a couple of fatal cases in adults several years ago), deafness is a very very rare complication which can also, incidentally, be caused by an ear infection but we don't all panic about that! There is NO evidence that mumps causes sterility in adults. It may cause orchitis (swelling) in one or both testicles in adults - this does not usually have any long term effects. Mumps is usually mild in child hood and in a large proportion of cases is completely asymptomatic.

There has not been a recorded case of polio in the UK since the early 80s so unless you are planning a trip to Africa or India I wouldn't worry about it. If your DCs are planning to travel when they are older, they can make the decision for themselves. In any case, polio is usually a mild disease. In 99% of cases it causes very few (flu-like)symptoms and many people do not even notice they have it at all. For those of you who do not believe me - see the NHS website information [http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Polio-and-post-polio-syndrome-/Pages/Symptoms.aspx here]] 1% of polio cases are paralytic polio but again, the paralysis is usually temporary and the majority of people will make a full recovery.

There are approximately 7-10 cases of tetanus a year in the UK. CASES not deaths. These are mainly in the elderly. The last case of tetanus in an under-15 was in 2000/2001 in a girl who had been fully vaccinated. She recovered. If your DS has a deep puncture wound that has come into contact with soil and does not bleed then you should probably take him to hospital for tetanus antibodies just in case. If you have cleaned the wound well, it bled and it isn't so deep so that air can get at it then it is probably fine. Tetanus bacteria are anaerobic which is why they thrive in deep puncture wounds. Rusty nails do not cause tetanus!

Rubella is a mild disease which is quite often completely asymptomatic. It can be very dangerous if you are exposed to it in the early stages of pregnancy though. It would be worth checking your girls' immunity when they are teenagers and consider vaccinating them then if they are not immune (singles are available) TBH most people should check their immunity at this age anyway because with the MMR being given so early in childhood many people may not have the immunity that they think they do when they are older and considering getting pregnant.

HTH

Do it. Legal problems my hole, there isn't a court in the land who come down on his side if it ever came to it, which it wouldn't.

Oh FFS! Unless there is a known family history of certain allergies the case against vaccination is all a load of dangerous hippy bullshit. Yes there have been some cases of vaccinations causing harm but this is shit bad luck the same as if your beloved child gets leukaemia or is hit by a bus.
And I don't believe in respecting the wishes of the NRP when the NRP is being a knob. What if the NRP's wishes were for his DD to be circumcized? That would be a fuck-right-off and prohibited steps order, surely.

On a side note, I think it's very sad that so many people are just saying to go ahead with it and not take the dad's feelings into consideration. I wonder would so many people saying that if it wasn't vaccines we were talking about....

Maybe I should start a thread about getting my son tattooed(something else that can't be reversed - well not easily!) against his father's wishes and see what the response is....:)

A case in point SpringChicken - not ok to order circumcision but ok to order vaccination. Double standards! :)

Don't be ridiculous. Tattoos have no benefit and are illegal for children. Vaccinations are standard and normal and generally held by the medical profession and therefore the courts to be in the best interest of the child.

There is a bit of a difference between something that is purly cosmetic and soemthing that has significant health implications. Note I dont say what health implications. or which side i am on.

Ok - tattoos were a bad example - let's stick with circumcision shall we? If you lived in the US where it is very common then the court may rule in favour of it for 'health reasons' or whatever...

she said circumcision for a DD, actually, so no, not common in the US.

I'm not talking about female circumcision in this case BLB - I'm just talking about a hypothetical situation where one parent wanted their son circumcised and the other did not and how mumsnetters would be responding if one parent was suggesting taking the child to get circumcised behind the other parent's back. I think the fact that we are talking about vaccines is swaying people's opinions....

While I think circumcision is barbaric primitive bullshit for boys too, I deliberately used the example of an NRP wanting a girl circumcized as this is an extremely harmful, disgusting and indefensible procedure. Refusing vaccination is fuckwitted and moderately harmful as it's a risk assessment call (but only stupid people think the risk of vaccination is higher than the risk of non-vaccination).

ANd to save time, any anti-vaccination posters on here, yes I do think you are stupid. And selfish and self-righteous with it.

SGB - you're entitled to your own opinion. I would wager a guess that you fall into the camp I mentioned earlier about the people who don't actually read too much about diseases themselves. Did you get vaccinated against swine flu?

Ear piercing, tattoos, circumcision etc are completely self-contained issues, as is tetanus AFAIK.

Choosing not to vaccinate againt communicable diseases is a decision that affects other people, whether that is in terms of 'herd' immunity or the effects on people who are too young to be vaccinated (eg babies in the case of M/M/R) or too old to have been vaccinated.

I'm from the pre-MMR generation and had mumps as a tiny (DH never had it, despite his mother's best efforts, so it's wrong to assume that not vaccinating against mumps 'will not hurt anyone'. It might well harm adult men.) I was vaccinated against rubella as a teenager; in those days it was still a significant cause of infant disability.

I can't be much help to the OP as she is obviously in a difficult situation with her exH.

But in general I think people who choose not to vaccinate are BU. We have had several cases of measles in our school that have presumably arisen as a result of parents deciding they are willing to take that risk with their DCs because of perceived dangers from the vaccine, but who have apparently failed to take account of the fact that their decision might impact on others, such as small children, pregnant women and the immunosuppressed.

I'm interested in what people think about chickenpox, which I believe is routinely vaccinated against in the US. I had it in my 30s and it was horrible, though antivirals were a huge help. When my DD had it 6 months previously (we sent her to grandparents - I ironically caught it at random) my GP refused to believe I hadn't had it as a child, and insisted I must have 'forgotten'. My mun has never had it, and my sister got it from her DCs.

How would it harm adult men LW?

Also, many people who do not give the MMR choose to have their daughters checked for immunity to rubella when they are teenagers and have them vaccinated against that.

There is a long thread about the CP vaccine over on the vaccinations board if you are interested.