I wasn’t gonna…

To get vaccinated or not get vaccinated…this is SUCH a hot button topic and I really kept my mouth shut about my opinions purposely, but as I have been more inclined to blog and share my truth, I’ve decided to talk a little bit about my journey to vax land.  Ready to go on a loopy roller coaster only for it to then come to an abrupt stop? 

GREAT! Welcome to my experience with vaccination.

I will preface all of this with the fact that I truly don’t think anyone knows enough about ANY of this-not just the vaccines, but the virus itself.  It’s something that truly knocked the world on its ass and oddly was turned into a political issue to further divide our country when really I think it had such a power to unite.  (Sigh remember that first week when people were playing music from rooftops in Europe, and we were all posting a beautiful poem on our instagrams about everyone becoming more kind?). You don’t know enough, that person you follow on instagram that is sharing “stories” doesn’t know enough, and doctors don’t know enough. None of us do: and that’s just a fact. 

So my journey to becoming vaccinated is one that has been lead by intuition, and my desire as a mother to protect my son.

When this whole “thing” started, both my husband and I thought everyone was overreacting.  I remember going to the market when the toilet paper was gone, I was like 37 weeks pregnant, and making fun of the fact that we were being “dangerous” by going to the store.  My OB assured me it wouldn’t be a big deal, even. And then, all of a sudden 7 days later my husband wasn’t allowed in my appointments and everything closed.  ALL OVER THE WORLD.  This virus has been the only culprit to any discord in my relationship with my husband over our 5 plus years together (and as I have discovered has caused a lot of tension between many partners) -as his family lives out of state and when the realities of the severity of the virus became more real and my mind changed from “everyone needs to relax” to “oh crap people are dying” there were issues with his mom wanting to fly in and meet Luke.   It’s still a very sore spot for me and hurts me very much.  Then a few months later, while there was an awareness of the severity, there was also an awareness of the misinformation being spread.  Then … see what I mean about the loopy roller coaster? 

I find that I have gone through waves with this virus-waves where I was scared and was okay with everyone staying away, and waves where I wanted to throw all caution to the wind and just have a friend or family member in my house without a mask holding my son. I know a HUGE part of this is the changing landscape of the virus-and the INFLUX of misinformation thanks to social media.  I don’t really know what life feels like to NOT be home, to NOT order everything, to NOT have to schedule trips to the store during Luke’s nap because it doesn’t feel okay to take him into places.  And so as my relationship and feelings about the virus have morphed over and over again: so have my feelings about the vaccination.

Initial response: Absolutely not.

Response as it became closer: Nope.

Response as it became available: No thank you.

Response as everyone around me started getting it: I’m all good, thanks.

And yet, here I am, a few days in from my first shot.

My initial instinct, as was Anthony’s, was to wait a year or few…see if you vaccinated folks got gills or a really terrible form of cancer.  I truly felt that the older population should get it since any long term effects in them wouldn’t be as detrimental, and us young healthy fit people could wait. My immune system is strong and everyone I know with strong immune systems that did end up catching it have been fine.  And yet my mind always wandered into the long term effects, and more specifically to how long term effects would harm my child if he somehow contracted Covid.

THEN I read about the antibodies of vaccinated mom’s being passed to their babies through their milk: and since Luke still breastfeeds around the clock I decided I was all in. ANYTHING for my baby.  I made an appointment for a Pfizer shot because I’ll NEVER trust Johnson&Johnson with ANYTHING: I honestly cannot believe people are like “Oh yes a company that has had class action law suits filed for causing cancer with their products created a vaccine to be injected into my body forever? I’m in!” And everyone I know that’s had Moderna has had pretty gnarly side effects after the second dose.  So, I got an appt and was ready.

Then…I freaked out. I got this horrible feeling in my gut that I was making a bad choice.  I started seeing a massive influx of MIS INFORMATION shared on social media about periods and miscarriages and while I instinctively knew it was a lot of bullshit, because I had just decided to cycle synch and prepare my body for a second pregnancy- I FLIPPED OUT. And as such, I cancelled my appointment.  It didn’t feel right. 

THEN, I did a LOT of digging.  A LOT of research.  ALL the claims people were posting about the vaccine “shedding,” or causing issues I dug deeper into. I find we all see a story/clip, and we just hit SHARE and spread it without taking the time to fact check. And when I say “taking the time” I don’t mean clicking the link of the story, but actually googling it, reading all the facts, and reaching out to multiple professionals about what you’re reading and asking their knowledge/experience/advice.  So that’s what I did.  I dug and dug: and the more I read and studied, the more I found that the numbers, if you looked at them closely showed these things that were happening to women…were not happening because of the vaccine.  And while I know for a fact we cannot 100% say this vaccine won’t cause us to grow gills in a year, I also trust science to a degree.  BUT that’s not why I got vaccinated, the research and evidence just helped to soften my concerns so I went from “I’m all good thanks,” back to my “I will at some point in time I’m sure…” 

Then, Luke got sick.  We go to ONE class a week for only ONE hour, and we came home from that class and by that evening he had a cough. By that night I was awake ALL NIGHT (and proceeded to be for the next 2 nights) making sure he didn’t stop breathing if he was able to sleep because he had croup.  He was in agony, as was I, hearing his chest rattle, his breath become difficult and strained, and his cough become a loud seal bark.  ANY virus can manifest as croup in a child because their airways are so small and my immediate thought was that this might recur for us if he gets any respiratory virus moving forward.  And what is Covid? It’s partially a respiratory virus: I can NOT bring COVID home somehow or have him contract it: I need to protect my baby. And how do I do that? I breastfeed him with my anti-body filled milk.  This record played over and over in my head so, I re-scheduled my appointment and 2 days later was sitting in pharmacy awaiting a shot.

My husband ended up deciding to get vaccinated as well, and so he made his appointment to go in the day after mine.  I’m secretly a little worried we both may get sick after the second shot-but seeing as though his arm was barely sore on day 2 and I couldn’t move mine-I have a feeling he’ll be JUST FINE. 

Do I know if what we are doing is totally safe? Nope. If they say little kids can get vaccinated soon, will we get Luke vaccinated? Absolutely not. BUT, I am so grateful I got to CHOOSE to get vaccinated. I am happy that I am a part of the herd of humans that wants things to open back up, that isn’t going to unknowingly (or knowingly) spread a virus that has taken the lives of a few of my friend’s parents, that every time Luke nurses he’s more and more protected, and that if I do get pregnant there’s a chance my baby will be protected as well!

Is Covid as BAD as the media has made it out to be? No, it isn’t.  The numbers are NOT accurately reported, the fear mongering and despair and the way this was handled was completely wrong. BUT, it’s a virus, and it has affected the whole world somehow. And we are currently watching India become decimated by it.  So, I wasn’t gonna…but I did.