fun shot

For many years, I strongly opposed getting an annual flu shot.  The first year our health unit strongly promoted them in our region, Mark and I went to the local high school to get our shot.  I felt that it was my civic duty.  Mark was driving a taxi and was exposed regularly to all kinds of gross germs, we lived with a little old guy (Mark's dad Joe) at the time.  It was the right thing to do.

That winter, I experienced what I can only describe as a creeping malaise.  I constantly felt like I was on the verge of being sick but never actually got good and sick to get beyond that.  It was a huge bummer, feeling tired and run down, all the time.  I had never experienced this before and blamed the flu shot.

In subsequent years I refused to get a shot. I hadn't had the flu since the year that the Brady Bunch movie came out (I remember this because the flu hit me like a tonne of bricks while I sat in the theatre) so I felt okay not getting it.  Fast forward a few years and I get hit with a bad dose of the flu.  Horrible, I thought I would die.  As I lay in bed dying (ha!), I thought that for sure, this was why old folks and little kids get flu shots.  Whatever I had would surely kill someone who was not as strong and otherwise healthy as I was.

Every year since, I get a flu shot.  Mark and I go to our local health unit for it.  There are several things I like about getting our shot at the KFL&A Health Unit - you can book an appointment online, they have great parking and, more importantly, the staff and volunteers are friendly and very professional.  It's a very easy way to protect yourself against the flu and, this year, they had fun band aids (I got a Snoopy one and Mark had a Taz band aid). 

It was quick and easy and painless.  Everyone should do it, to protect yourself and the folks you love.  Have you been shot yet?