The Importance of Being.......Vaccinated

I can’t even begin to do this story justice, but this is my attempt.

My 90-year-old aunt wishes that everyone could understand how important vaccines are. She certainly knows.

As we spent the afternoon together, she began to reminisce. Her oldest son, Bill, my second-favorite cousin, was stricken with polio when he was 12 years old. She began the story:

“It was August, and there was a bad summer flu going around. I took him to the doctor, and they gave me some medicine to give him. They said that he probably wouldn’t eat, but to make sure that he drank plenty of fluids. The next morning, I gave him his medicine… and it came back out – his nose! I called the doctor right away, and they told me to bring him over immediately. The doctor took one look at him, and said, ‘I hate to tell you this, but he has polio. Can you get to Ann Arbor right away?’ We went home, and the ambulance came to get him.”

My uncle interjects at this point: “I borrowed a car from my aunt and uncle; all I had was an old car. I had no idea where the hospital was in Ann Arbor, so I stayed right on the tail of the ambulance until we got there.”

My aunt continues the story: “There were no beds available for him when we got there, so he was put in a porch-like area until a bed became available. Once there was a bed available, he was placed in the respirator unit. He was in a bed that rocked; some patients were on respirators, some in iron lungs… it just depended on where the polio affected them. The room was large, with beds all the way around, so that the nurses could see all the beds. There were curtains that could be pulled around the beds.

It was the most awful thing – to see all those people with polio. They didn’t think Bill would be able to walk. When the doctor took braces in to put on his legs, he told them he was not going to wear those. He told me that he had walked around the bed, and he was going to walk. He never did wear the braces.

After a little more than a month, we took him home. They taught me how to do his exercises and take care of him. If he started to choke, I would suction his throat.

Every day we would spend time doing his exercises, usually with both of us in tears before we were done.”

As she told the story, both of us were in tears. Bill is a big marshmallow of a man. He is probably 6’8” – one of the tallest men I know. I wasn’t born yet when he suffered from polio, so I only remember him healthy and well.

But, like many polio sufferers, he recovered, but today suffers from post-polio syndrome. He never has a day that is pain-free or easy. Bill’s stubbornness allowed him to overcome the effects of polio as a child. He has lived a full, busy life – he has never been “disabled” in any way.

My aunt’s frustration is that there are so many people today who are not vaccinating their children. Medical science came out with a vaccine less than a year after Bill contracted polio. She is thrilled that no one today should ever have to suffer as they did.

But, the vaccine won’t work if it’s not given; and, this is an epidemic we don't ever want to see again.