Using My Intuition to Protect Those I Love (and Prevent a Potential Disaster)

In my previous blog, I shared with you that listening to my inner voice, my intuition, had probably saved my life while driving a couple of weeks ago. (If you missed it, you can read it here.)

Perhaps one of my most life-altering intuitive moments came after I gave birth to my first child. Two days after she was born, a nurse came into my hospital room and told me that I needed to get the rubella (German measles) vaccine because I didn’t have immunity. She told me that if I wanted to have healthy babies in the future, then I needed to get the vaccine or risk major birth defects in future children.

At first I said no, but then something inside of me said I needed to do it. So I said yes. At the time I didn’t pay too much attention to my intuition, so it was unusual for me to listen.

Of course, the nurse didn’t give me the rubella vaccine. She misspoke. Getting a single vaccine for rubella isn’t an option in our pharmaceutical world. Instead, she gave me the MMR (measles/mumps/rubella) vaccine, the only possible vaccine available in the US for rubella.

It wasn’t until two months later when I started doing my homework about vaccines that I discovered that I had been injured by MMR. During those two months after my daughter was born, I thought the debilitating arthritis in my hands was due to some kind of crazy post-partum hormonal imbalance.

Nope.

Thanks to a courageous physician who told me to do my homework before starting the 2-month vaccines with our daughter, I found out that over 25% of females who get MMR end up with arthritis as an adverse effect, and for many of us, it never goes away.

I am so grateful that I listened to my intuition and got this shot, despite the chronic pain it has caused me -- not because of the immunity and/or protection it supposedly gave me but because my experiences with it opened up my eyes to the complicated world of vaccines and vaccine injury. Like so many mothers I have met over the years, I would gladly be injured myself so that my children would not have to endure those potential problems themselves.

You see, as a result of the antibiotics I was given in labor, both of my daughters developed severe dairy allergies even through my breastmilk, making their infant bodies and immature immune systems much more at risk for adverse and allergic reactions to all vaccines in those early months. God only knows what could have happened to them if I had ignored that inner voice and followed the Center for Disease Control’s recommended vaccine schedule.

(We were lucky – our pediatrician was extremely supportive of our desire to delay vaccinating the kids. Unlike many pediatricians today, he didn't kick us out of his practice.)

The way life unfolds to teach us the lessons we need to learn is so magical, isn’t it? 

And guess what -- Our intuition isn’t just for protecting ourselves and those we love! In my next blog, I’ll share with you how my love life went from being a Seinfeld episode to a fairy tale, simply by listening to my intuition.

In the meantime, I’d love it if you’d comment below to share an experience you had where listening to your intuition protected yourself or someone you love. You don’t need to hide those magical moments!