How far would you go to save your child’s life?

Neil Hutchison was devastated and desperate when doctors said there was nothing more they could do to help his 7 year old son, Sam.  Sam has a rare and deadly form of nerve cancer and doctors had exhausted their treatment options.  So Mr. Hutchison, a defense-contract recruiter who majored in chemical engineering in college, decided that they had nothing to lose and began to research own recipe of cancer cocktails to give his son.  And so far, it might be working–for now.

While many–including physicians–criticize Mr. Hutchison for experimenting on his son, don’t most parents understand the urge to save their child using any means possible?  To look at it another way, if, like Mr. Hutchison, you believed that there might be something within your power to help, but you decided not to try…how would you live with yourself?

“When your kids have run out of options, you have to think outside the box,” Mr. Hutchison says. “It’s terrifying, but it’s our only hope.”

We are a wasteful lot

I’ll fess up to having done a couple of these (though I’m not saying which ones). In What You Can Learn From a Dumpster Diver, CC Christiansen offers insight on what we are throwing away.

Yahoo! Power Mailer

As proof that I’m spending too much time online, Yahoo! has dubbed me one of its Power Users.

Power Users are the heaviest and most frequent users of Yahoo! Mail and were selected by Yahoo! to participate in this pilot program. These users spend an incredible amount of time using Yahoo! Mail, so the Power User program is our way of thanking them.

Not so sure this is a good thing…..

Honey–it worked!

EhiPassika posted yesterday about a study indicating that a spoonful of honey is more effective than over the counter medications for soothing coughs in children. Since the boy has been suffering with a nighttime cough for the past few days, I decided last night to give the folk remedy a try.

The boy was pleased with the taste of the elixir, and I’m happy to report that our very limited unscientific trial of one night was a success. The honey was just as effective as the children’s cough medicine that he’d been given on previous nights. In both cases, he received a “dose” of honey/medicine at bedtime and it suppressed the coughing for about 5 hours. Another dose when he woke up with a coughing fit at 1 am quieted the cough for the remainder of the night.

I’m not prepared to throw away the cough medicine just yet, but I’ll definitely offer honey first from now on.