TARA Hills was against vaccinations — until her seven children caught whooping cough at once. It was the wake-up call she needed.

The Canadian mother decided to write a post for Scientific Parent called “Learning the hard way: My Journey from #Antivaxx to Science”.

In the raw and painfully honest piece published last week, she wrote: “The irony isn’t lost on me that I’m writing this from quarantine. For six years we were frozen in fear from vaccines, and now we are frozen because of the disease.”

The post went viral, with reactions running the full spectrum from applauding Tara for telling her story, to crowing over her distressing situation.

In a follow-up post yesterday, Tara faced her detractors head-on, saying that shaming anti-vaxxers and making them feel like bad parents was not the way to win the argument.

“People that are provaccine can vent their anger and fear by taking a mocking, angry, sometimes bullying stance with parents that have questions about vaccines,” she wrote.

“It feels like they’re talking down to us or questioning our fitness as parents. This approach only made me more defensive and less inclined to even consider re-examining my position.”

She said the person who convinced her to re-evaluate her views talked to her as “an intellectual equal”, respecting her position and acknowledging that she wanted the best for her kids.

“If more people talked to parents with questions about vaccines like that, instead of making them feel stupid or ashamed, I think more minds would be changed,” she added.

Tara Hills basically acknowledges that her own lack of critical thinking abilities led her to the anti-vax camp — Charles Johnston (@TO_Chuck) April 9, 2015

No gloating here. Thank you to Tara Hills for writing so honestly about your journey away from antivaccination. http://t.co/2Effi9iK5k — Robin Marwick (@electricland) April 9, 2015

Her words come as anger over the vaccination issue has ramped up across the world. The Australian government has said that parents who refuse to immunise their children on religious or philosophical grounds could be refused welfare payments and childcare subsidies.

The Australian Medical Association supports the policy but its president Brian Owler expressed concerns that some children could end up being punished for their parents’ decisions.

Emotions run high over the topic. Jo Briskey, executive director of The Parenthood, warned this month that “we need to put an end to this myth of ‘conscientious objectors’ because you cannot be conscientious when you’re putting a child’s life at risk.”

Last month, news.com.au columnist Jo Thornely slammed Daily Mail Australia for giving a “bizarre amount of oxygen” to the “increasingly ignored” Australian Vaccination-Skeptics Network.

In addition, a recent video entitled How anti-vaxxers sound to normal peoplecomparedrejecting vaccination with not using sunscreen (because it’s poison for your skin), letting a house burn down (every home needs to learn how to burn) and refusing to wear condoms (one per cent of the population has a latex allergy).

Tara learned the hard way, spending more than a week in quarantine at her Ottawa home watching her children coughing so hard they would vomit, and knowing her mistake had led them to contract an illness that can be fatal.

The mother of seven does not want others to go through the same, and has spoken out despite being attacked by both anti-vaxxers and pro-vaxxers — who say her story is propaganda and likely to have been paid for by big pharma.

“An issue like this invokes fear, distrust, anger, and upset, and it was never our intent to create those feelings,” she said. “We can only say that we are truly sorry for the unintentional but real impacts to everyone involved. We hope that sharing our personal story will be some token of reconciliation.

“We took the personal risk of going public because we knew that others like us might be willing to re-evaluate the topic sooner than we did if more people used a better approach. We know that the more we communicate constructively, the more we can work together to help people make sound decisions for their family and community.”

