My Brain Hurts!

In the normal course of childhood in the US, a child receives vaccines against certain common diseases. In my childhood these included: mumps, rubella, diphtheria, polio, smallpox, tetanus, and measles. An overwhelming number of children have minor reactions to these shots. Some have more significant reactions. Very few have extreme reactions.

When I was 10 years old I recall receiving my tetanus shot. For most, kids’ normal reaction is to have a sore arm and perhaps some flu like symptoms. For me, however, I was one of those very few who had an extreme reaction to the shot. For the first 3 days following the vaccination, my body went into survival mode and attempted to rid itself of the foreign matter. I had sweats with high fever, followed by chills and a low temperature. Frequently, every nerve ending in my body would sense extreme pain, such as when one feels when a sharp needle is poked into ones skin; every nerve ending from head to toe would sense this! I continually vomited even though there was nothing in my stomach to get rid of. I would drink water so that my body had something to vomit. All this happened several times per hour for three continual days. After the third day, the symptoms finally started to subside, but the journey was still far from over. My recovery took another 11 days, as the symptoms lessened each day.

When I turned 20 my doctor recommended that I have another tetanus shot. I tried to sway him against this by explaining my reactions from the shot I had at 10, but he persisted. He explained that people often outgrow allergies and that he anticipated this would be my case. I was working as a construction laborer at the time and living with my parents during these, my college years. Anticipating that my reaction to the shot would be similar to the one I received at 10, I explained to my foreman that I would likely be out of work for the next 2 weeks. He huffed in disbelief, and muttered something in distaste.

Knowing what had happened when I was 10, I asked my mother to take me to the doctor. Once there, the doctor gave me the vaccination, my body immediately started to reject it. My body reacted exactly as it had when I was 10, and I was out of work for 2 weeks.

Another 10 years passed and I had moved from the area. I found another physician whom I trusted. When he recommended that I receive a tetanus shot when I turned 30, I explained that I had an allergic reaction, he said, “Well, ok. Maybe you shouldn’t have one.” Knowing the extreme reaction that my body gave, I wasn’t satisfied that he understood what happened to me. I went home and looked up my symptoms on the internet. Finally, I had a name for what had happened.

During my next doctor’s visit, I showed my physician the term that described my symptoms: encephalopathy. When the doctor read the word, his eyes opened wide and he said, “Oh! You can’t ever have another tetanus shot! Do you know what this term means?” “No,” I replied. “This is encephalitis. It is swelling of the brain!” For those of you who might not know about encephalitis, it is a condition that places a person very close to death.

My body recognized that something was wrong; a foreign body had invaded it. It went to all extreme measures to rid itself of this and correct the problem. My body reacted in an overwhelming manner in which it attacked its own nervous system trying to remove the injected substance.

The spiritual components of our bodies act in a similar fashion. They recognize when something foreign enters in. Sometimes our spirit acts in such an extreme way as my body did to the tetanus shot. But often times, the attack on our spirit is much more subtle.

The object of a vaccination is to introduce an innocuous version of a substance so that our bodies can recognize it, train antibodies or the like to respond to it, and eradicate the substance.

Our spiritual life is similar. We need to introduce God’s Holy Word into our spirits so that it is prepared to recognize those foreign ideas that are presented to it, train our minds to recognize them, and then dismiss them. This is premise of Romans 12:2, where Paul states: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”