Community Chat

[Tissyanne]

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@Lucky Charm wrote:

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@Tissyanne wrote:

I am very happy for Amy, Steve, and Bree. Adorable host, and I wish her all the best. 

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@Tissyanne  That's really strange that you were replying to another thread, but it showed up on this old one!

Bizzare!!

ETA:  Obviously you were replying to the Amy Stran thread and that's shows as the title, but somehow it 'attached' itself to an old Polio thread.

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@Lucky Charm, I have no idea how that happened. I haven't been on that thread. 

[JustJazzmom]

I knew a woman who worked in the business office of the hospital I worked at. She was in a W/C because she had had polio as a child. She was unable to stand without someone helping her -- so she was confined to her W/C.

[gmkb]

I remember the school lining us up to receive the polio vaccine.  We were not permitted to swim in August.  For some reason August was the most dangerous month.

Today I know two people who are severely handicapped as a result of childhood polio.  It was a parent's worst nightmare.

[151949]

A little girl in my second grade class got polio - that would have been about 1955 - she ended up in an iron lung and died. I remember my Mom taking me to visit her and I was terrified. 

Since we went to Florida for all our school vacations and polio was very prominent in Fl, plus our family doctor was on staff at the hospital where Salk did his research, we got our polio shots early. 

[Noel7]

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@151949 wrote:

A little girl in my second grade class got polio - that would have been about 1955 - she ended up in an iron lung and died. I remember my Mom taking me to visit her and I was terrified. 

Since we went to Florida for all our school vacations and polio was very prominent in Fl, plus our family doctor was on staff at the hospital where Salk did his research, we got our polio shots early. 

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I've seen the photos of children lined up in iron lungs.  One of the saddest scenes I've ever seen.

I often wonder how it turned out for them.

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[BornToShop]

It was the summer I was entering the third grade.  My friends, sister and I all headed down to City Hall to take the polio vaccine via sugar cubes.  Later that day, we went to a birthday party & literally danced & did "The Twist" (Chubby Checker) for hours.  The next morning, I got up to go to the bathroom & fell to the floor.  I could not move anything from the waist down.  I crawled to my parent's bedroom & we were all horrified.  My mom chastised me thinking I injured myself for the excessive twisting.  When she then saw the paralysis, I was taken to Omaha immediately.  I spent the entire summer rehabilitating.  I was wheelchair bound, then crutches, finally to a cheerleader all 4 years in High School.  No question, I was extremely lucky.  I wonder what the outcome would have been if I hadn't taken that sugar cube.  

[Noel7]

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@BornToShop wrote:

It was the summer I was entering the third grade.  My friends, sister and I all headed down to City Hall to take the polio vaccine via sugar cubes.  Later that day, we went to a birthday party & literally danced & did "The Twist" (Chubby Checker) for hours.  The next morning, I got up to go to the bathroom & fell to the floor.  I could not move anything from the waist down.  I crawled to my parent's bedroom & we were all horrified.  My mom chastised me thinking I injured myself for the excessive twisting.  When she then saw the paralysis, I was taken to Omaha immediately.  I spent the entire summer rehabilitating.  I was wheelchair bound, then crutches, finally to a cheerleader all 4 years in High School.  No question, I was extremely lucky.  I wonder what the outcome would have been if I hadn't taken that sugar cube.  

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@BornToShop

My God, what a harrowing story!  Thank goodness it turned out alright for you, I'm so glad for that.

Thank you for sharing what happened to you to. By the way, you write very well.

[Carmie]

My father who was born in 1911 and was the oldest of eleven children got polio when he was six months old.  He was born to poor Italian immigrants and received no medical care.  I am amazed that he lived.  My grandmother must have been one heck of a woman as she kept him alive.

Both of his legs were stick skinny and both feet were deformed. His feet were shaped like boxes.  His shoe size was size 6 EE/EEEE. I used to go into the shoe store and order new shoes for him every couple of years.  He liked his old shoes because they were broken in and fit his feet like a glove.  Sometimes his shoes were tattered while he had new ones in the closet.

I never heard him complain.  He swam, danced and did everything like everyone, except run.  I used to tell him that God gave him polio to slow him down.  He was quite a handful and never sat still.

I remember seeing children wearing braces on their legs when I was a young child..  They used to be carried from place to place.  I was told that they had polio, but never connected the dots to realize that my father had the same illness, until I was much older.

My mother was convinced that polio was spread by eating the skin of peaches.  She would not allow us to eat peaches unless she peeled them first ( we had a peach tree in our yard) peaches ripened in Agust.

I remember going to the local high school and standing in a mile long line to drink from a small paper cup.' It was tasteless and looked like water.  My mother told me that it was polio vaccine.  We went to the school three times to drink three doses.  This was in the late 50's.

Polio is not dead in the USA.  My friend's DIL who is about 30 had polio when she was a child and she walks with a limp.  It is also more common in the Amish communities.

[JustJazzmom]

All of these diseases are common also to Orthodox Jewish communities too. In fact there is currently an ongoing outbreak of chicken pox in Wiliamsburg, Brooklyn, NY -- in an Orthodox Jewish Community.

[Noel7]

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@JustJazzmom wrote:

All of these diseases are common also to Orthodox Jewish communities too. In fact there is currently an ongoing outbreak of chicken pox in Wiliamsburg, Brooklyn, NY -- in an Orthodox Jewish Community.

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Oh no   That's terrible.

@JustJazzmom

Do they not believe in vaccinating?