Differing Opinions

I know vaccinations are a hot topic. I personally think you are putting your kids and the general public at risk by not vaccinating at all, as opposed to delayed vaccinations. I question your friend's reasoning because if she thinks that the chicken pox virus will stay alive and active for days while going through the United States Postal Service, she doesn't sound very well informed.
As to intentionally exposing your kids to chicken pox, what's what my parents tried with my sister and me. We went to all of our friends houses each time they came down with it. It never worked. I didn't get them until I was 18 (luckily it was a mild case). My sister didn't get them until she was in her mid-20s. If we didn't get them while being directly exposed repeated times, I don't think a stale lollipop will do the trick.

I'm sure your friend is a very nice person and she seems like she means well. But seriously why would you go through all that trouble to have your kids get sick when they are younger. Both my kids are up to date on their vaccines. My son has been hospitalized twice in his short 2 1/2 year life here on earth. First time was for a staph infection. The second time was for severe dehydration from rotavirus. Neither one of which I could control nor did I know much about. Parents not vaccinating their kids gets me very angry, because why would you put others at risk for an outbreak of something because of your selfishness towards your kids. Parents like this seem to forget the big picture that we are all here on this earth together, we can not walk around and put ourselves or our children in a bubble. To me it's a simple comparison; if you've had a heart attack and the dr. puts you on medication to help prevent from happening again, and you know there are definite side affects, are you going to risk another heart attack because of side affects. Tons and tons of kids get vaccinated and don't have any problems with the vaccines. I just think this is a very selfish move and to send a sucker through the mail to have one kid suck on then send it back, well I'm not an expert by any means but hello contamination of something that someone else might be sending through the mail, thus how an outbreak starts. That idea just sounds absolutely insane to me.
Again I'm not trying to down your friend at all or hurt yours or her feelings. I personally would stand up to her and tell her what your thoughts are. If she is your friend then she will value what you have to say.
I hope I didn't offend anyone by this, I just get so frustrated when it comes to children and their well being.

Unless her kids are under the age of one, I would not say anything. Most people have CP at a younger age. You don't want to reach adulthood w/o having CP because it can cause sterility in adults. Other than that, CP may cause scarring. Still, we all have the right to make the best decisions for our own children in our own opinions. I'm sure she probably thinks you are putting your children at risk with vaccines. Just let it go.

Honestly I believe this is okay to do. I remember having it when I was little and when my daughter was 4 she got it because she was around other kids that had it. We didn't do it on purpose but there was no vaccine for it at the time. The hope was that they got when they were younger because it is safer to get when your young than older also you hope it's a bad case because if you have only a mild case you can get it again. Chicken pox is really not that bad, it's just more of a bother than anything. The fever isn't that high if they get one and they get a bad rash and itch.
But if an adult gets it it can be bad. I had a friend that got it and he suffered a lot with it and they can have permanant organ damage from it.
Now I do have a problem with people not getting there kids vaccinated but that's another issue.
Lonie

Chicken pox is something that if you are going to get you want to get it when you are younger. The older you are the more dangerous it is. Here is a little info, although, I would recommend asking your doctor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenpox. Chicken pox is something that most of us had as kids without incident and generally we were too young to remember. The chicken pox vaccine is a fairly recent thing. I would be less worried about the exposure to chicken pox and more worried about exposure to other more harmful viruses.

I've heard of pox parties but not recently. My dd is 13 and she got the cp shot when it came out. She also had a mild case of cp at 10.
I would keep my children. Away from her sickly children.
good luck

There probably isn't anything you can do. I may even stay away from her if her kid is that sick all the time & not vaccinated.

I would hate to see her change her mind because her son is in the hospital deathly ill because he got the measles or something worse.

There's probably not much you can say to change your friends mind. I personally think that it's better to get the vaccine than risk my child contracting one of the horrible diseases they vaccinate against. There's a reason they have the vaccines. I do know that having chicken pox as an adult is mush worse than a child. However, I wouldn't purposefully expose my child to it in hopes that they would get sick. If you feel like your kids are going to be exposed, then I would tell your friend that while her chiildren are sick, then your kids can't play with hers, and when they aren't contagious, then they can play again. I would also be surprised if the virus were to even stay active through the mail. There's also always a chance of having the chicken pox more than once, if the first case was mild. This is probably going to be one of those "agree to disagree" situations.