All kids are quirky. Some are really weirdly quirkly. But most of them just grow up and become (vaguely) normal adults. So I don't think you were missing big glaring signs of impending problems. My guess is no one could have told it was going to be a problem. I know kids who were way weirder and quirkier and displaying concerning signs than my kids. They have gone on to become functioning adults (ok, some are a bit medicated, but still, they function.) But my kid has not. She thinks she's functioning, but the reality is that she's alienating anyone who ever tried to help her. Her favorite weapon is abusive emails. She's sent these to many professors from college. And she's been fired from a good job and probably will never be able to get a good reference from them. Which means she may never get a job ever again. And we're left having to explain to friends and coworkers that we aren't the cause of the abuse directed at them by our daughter. Maybe she'll grow up eventually. Maybe she'll get out of the toxic relationship she's in that may be the cause of this. Or maybe not. What I find interesting is that she didn't go down this path as long as we (her family) were still in contact with her. So we must have been doing the "right" things to keep her on track. As soon as she cut off contact with us, things got really bad. She was ripe for an abusive relationship that turned her abusive as well, but I'm refusing to feel guilty for that. That's on her. And the abuser. But she should have known better than to get involved with that. To be honest, I'm not sure I EVER felt guilty. I jumped right to anger. And I've never let that go. Anger's probably not the healthiest thing in the world to hang onto, but better than guilt in my book. I believe it's keeping me sane. If I were feeling any guilt, I'd be a mess.

And while I'm chiming in here -- the reason it's not believed vaccines cause autism is because of statistical studies. Bringing up the "well, how do we know that ONE kid's autism wasn't caused by a vaccine" is not a valid argument against a population survey. If you want to argue against the statistical studies, you need to bring up the power of the statistical tests and whether a valid control group was used. Which would involve delving more deeply into the data than just pointing to one kid who happened to develop autism at the time of a vaccine. A sample of one doesn't tell us anything. Nor does a sample that was chosen precisely because it gave the answer one was looking for (while discarding all other data points that argued against it).

I have asked if kids are vaccinated. It can be done. You just have to not be judgmental about it. Least, not that anyone can tell. Around us, at the time my kids were little, it seemed the vaccine that everyone was avoiding was tetanus. Some people had been told by various drs that that was ok because "no one gets tetanus anymore". I would doubt that dr's competence if that's the story they were giving people. But then, I'm constantly surprised by the lack of scientific understanding in many people I know. It just added an extra layer of surprise that someone who had been through a medical/science degree could come out with that statement.

They're not designed to be 100% effective. They're designed to do the best that can be done at this point. Sure a higher rate of effectiveness would be nice, but that hasn't been developed yet. However, what these vaccines CAN do is provide herd immunity if a threshold number of people are vaccinated. This can be a better protection than individual protection -- it protects not only those who can't be vaccinated, but also those whose vaccinations failed. Something to keep in mind is that anyone who's been vaccinated could fall into that latter group and not know it. So it is in everyone's best interest to have a fully vaccinated population. You never know if you're going to be the one who needs that herd immunity, even if you or your kids have had the vaccinations. But I wouldn't call it failure. These are just things we know about how vaccines work. Nor would I call it the way they were designed. That would imply that we wanted them to not be 100% effective. Obviously, that would be the goal, but not all immune systems react the same.

Were any of the employees getting on the flight to replace this guy wearing leggings?

They obviously weren't looking for volunteers if they claim he was only dragged off because he didn't volunteer.

And the leggings incident. I've heard that United Breaks Guitars is a video that's often shown in marketing classes as an example of why the customer is ALWAYS right. Now there's a new video to show.

For some kids, they think it's a good way to prove to their parents that they shouldn't be in college. Because they didn't want to be there in the first place, and they think their parents are forcing them. I've seen this happen a lot. Whether that's true or not is beside the point. It's probably more important for his professors to be encouraging him not to totally crash and burn. But if they're not getting through to him, it's even less likely his parents would. Whatever his reasons -- reasonable or silly -- college isn't working for him right now. Your or your son's involvement isn't going to change that. Don't make yourself crazy over it. It's not your fault now and it won't be your fault if you stay out of it.

I used to think we argued about money, until I realized I was actually upset about the amount of junk being brought into our small house. Keeping the money in check was just a way I could keep more large items from appearing. We still argue about acquiring more junk occasionally -- but it helps to know that what was really upsetting me wasn't the financial aspect of it.

It was horrible. And painful. Probably one of the many reasons we've homeschooled. And to add to the misery, one year we got pinched if we wore green but no orange. Because wearing green must mean we were Catholic. Good Protestants knew enough to wear orange. Tried to avoid that by wearing both green and orange. That didn't work either. But then, the logic of the whole situation was bizarre. Ironically, looking back, I'm guessing most of the pinchers had no Irish ancestry. And if they did, they didn't know it. It was just another excuse to bully. My husband does not understand my fear of St Patrick's Day.

We've now got compost pick up by the city (yay! -- our lot's too small for composting without annoying the neighbors anyway). The city prefers we put our recyclable paper into recycling, not composting. There's more monetary value in the paper as paper than as soil. If that influences your decision

Statistically speaking, it's less likely. A number of faiths see conversion of non-believers as part of their religion. This makes them more likely to go out and convert people. Although there may be individual atheists who would want to educate others in what they see as the truth, they don't have a whole religion behind them telling them they have to do it.

There are companies that hire people to do medical transcription while working from home. That might be a possibility. When I googled this idea, several companies came up in the search. (I don't know how reputable they are)

I do see kids getting jobs with just a biology degree. That she also has nursing experience/certification may also help. Are there any job fairs she can go to? That might give her some ideas as to what's out there. Is there any industry nearby? Because they are often looking for people with a stem degree of any sort. It may not say "biology" on the job description, but that doesn't mean she'd be out of luck. Food plants, sewage treatment plants (ie city jobs), etc -- that kind of thing might be worth looking for. Nurses can also sometimes be part of a research team. They may not be doing nursing, per se, but that experience can be useful. My neighbor (an ex-nurse) was working as a grant overseer for a medical research team for awhile. I've seen kids get into a low level industry job with a bio degree (kids who didn't manage to get into grad school) who have now risen to fairly responsible and well paid positions. It may take a few years. But it's not a worthless degree by any means. The kids who come out of the college where I work are just as likely to get a job with a bio degree as a math degree.

I was 30. However, I'm really nearsighted, so it was really just a matter of taking my glasses off to read. It was when the midrange started to go that I finally had to get progressive lenses. But even now I usually have to take them off to read for any length of time.