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Took Little Man to the doctor. He has strep throat and ear infections again. He seems to get them once every 3 months or so. The doctor said that some kids are prone to them and do better once their tonsils are removed. They will document how often he gets strep then decide.
While at the doctor's office, I got into a "discussion" with her. She first questioned why I said Little Man is autistic and who made the diagnosis. According to her, he didn't look autistic to her. Really??? So, what does an autistic child look like? On one hand, I am thrilled that he is seeming to be more typical and stims far less. On the other hand though, I am not happy that she questioned that we would call him autistic & suggest that we came up with that all on our own. I told her who diagnosed him and their findings. She was accepting but unimpressed. (Note: she works for a competitor company of the university medical center that diagnosed him.)
The next bit of "intelligence" that came out of her mouth was over the issue of our not having vaccinated him or finished vaccinations for his older sister. She refused to hear our reasons, then told me it was "her job to educate the uneducated" people who come into her practice. Are you serious??? She actually believes that the uneducated people are the only ones who don't vaccinate their kids? Did I happen to mention that she is a young doctor? I don't want to insult any blond readers, but you do share a hair color with her. Unfortunately, she came off as the stereotype.
Her following bit of "brilliance" came when she remarked about a medical convention she had recently attended here in Oklahoma. According to her, there was an informal poll taken asking the doctors in attendance to raise their hand if they would REFUSE treatment to a child who did not have their inoculations. By her estimation, 95% of the doctors in attendance raised their hands. Only 5% were willing to treat a child who had not been vaccinated. She said, "That should tell you just how important doctors think vaccinations are." Oh really??? No, dear educated one, it tells me that 95% of the doctors are admitting to being prejudiced and willing to discriminate against anyone who does not vaccinate their children. Doesn't matter to them if it is a religious or other reason that the parents have chosen to not vaccinate. They are admitting to not being willing to treat a child for that reason alone......not having been vaccinated! Where is the parent's right in this to choose whether or not to vaccinate? I know that if you opt out of the vaccinating of your children while on WIC, you sign a waiver stating that you are opting out. It is not illegal to refuse vaccinations.
The discussion then turned to schooling. She noted to me that public schools would not allow our kids to attend without vaccinations. That is fine, I told her that we are homeschooling. She then argued that you can't homeschool a special needs child. I let her in on the fact that there is no law preventing it and that many special needs children are homeschooled successfully. She stated that a special needs child requires an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) for their schooling. Well, here again I educated her. Every homeschool parent chooses a curriculum to fit the needs of each of their children. In essence, every homeschool child has an IEP set up. No homeschooling parent treats their children's education as a cookie cutter situation.
"But what about therapies that a child gets at the public schools?", was her next argument. Well, last I knew, therapy was not a part of academic education and can very easily be done privately. You don't have to go to public school to get speech, occupational, and physical therapies. Parents can very easily hire therapists privately away from the school setting. It is called, going to the office for an appointment.
I came right out and asked, "If you knew ahead of time that my son was not vaccinated, would you have refused treatment?" She didn't reply. Well, her silence said it all. In her silence she admitted that she would have not treated him. If she would have treated him regardless of whether or not he was vaccinated, she would have said so. I asked if it was her hospital's company policy to not treat kids who are not vaccinated. She replied that she didn't think so. Good thing. Had she told me that it was their policy, I would be making that fact widely known to every autism support group I could find in our state.
Joe and I have not believed vaccinations to be the reason for our son's autism. We have our own reasons for not vaccinating. Experience with our daughter proved to us how dangerous the vaccination program can be. Our daughter became very sick with a 103*F fever for 3 days with vomiting & diarrhea for the entire 3 day period she had the fever. When I called and told them, I was told that was a "normal reaction" and acceptable. Really??? Well, it wasn't acceptable or normal in our eyes. She was 3 years old and they had no concern for dehydration or her health. They had given her 12 inoculations at one time in the form of 4 booster shots, 5 of the inoculations were for things she was up to date on and didn't need. When I complained, WIC told me that "beggars can't be choosers" and gave her the shots anyways. We never took her back for vaccinations again.
In our country, the FDA requires all foods and any products that are either ingested or put on the skin must contain labeling that discloses what it contains. An exception to this rule is vaccinations. How do you know that there is not an ingredient in those vaccinations that your child is allergic to? With the vaccination schedule that children are placed on, being given several vaccinations at one time, if they have a reaction to something in 1 vaccination, how do they know which one?
I explained this to the doctor and she, in her vast and infinite knowledge, told me that there has never been a case of a child having a bad reaction to a vaccination. Oh, give me a break! She really believes that in all the years of children being vaccinated, there has never been a bad reaction? Guess she never heard of the fact that if you have an egg allergy that you can't have certain flu shots, because of the flu shot containing egg in it! Even the medical experts agree that if a person is allergic to a component in the vaccination (such as the egg in flu shots) then they are at higher risk of having a severe allergic reaction to that component.
By not knowing what is in the vaccinations, how can we say we are making an informed choice? How can we protect our kids from the bad reactions to the vaccinations if we don't know what they are being given?
What it comes down to is that I will now be starting a search for a doctor among that 5% who does not discriminate against kids who are not vaccinated.
