What are the odds? I need a nerd . . .

[Aunt Spiker]

Seriously. What are the odds that:

2 children will be born six years apart on the same exact day.
Later in life, those same two children will suffer from similar ailments and injuries exactly one year apart.

Last year: Son B fell at school and cut his head open, had to get stitched up.
This year: Son B fell at school and cut his head open, had to be taken to the hospital via ambulance, had to get stitched up - 362 days after the first head injury.

Last year: Son O contracted croup and had to be taken to the hospital via ambulance and stayed in the PICU for a day.
This year: Son O contracted croup and had to be taken to the hospital. - 370 days after the previous ailment?

. . . and how many baby seals do I need to club to keep this from happening AGAIN!

Two years of severe head trauma and near fatal croup is ENOUGH!

The doctors were humored by the Son B being prone to injury. Jokingly told me to keep him home from school next September.

The doctors are a bit stumped over the croup, though. How does a kid contract the SAME illness, an extreme case of it, three years in a row when it's rare for older children (age 6/7) to suffer from extreme symptoms (such as striders) at all?

 

[lizzie]

Sounds to me like you need an astrologer, rather than a nerd. :lol:

 

[Aunt Spiker]

LOL - I need a shrink, and a dream catcher.

Well - Son O is doing fine. He spent a day in the hospital this time, and not in the PICU - so it wasn't as severe. He's home with me, today, and playing video games. He's still running a low fever, is on steroids and an inhaler for a few days.

Son B is fine - his stitches healed well. Looking at him, you wouldn't imagine how horrid it looked. The doctor describe it as 'garish' - He almost scalped himself.

 

[Luke Skywalker]

Seriously. What are the odds that:

2 children will be born six years apart on the same exact day.
Later in life, those same two children will suffer from similar ailments and injuries exactly one year apart.

Last year: Son B fell at school and cut his head open, had to get stitched up.
This year: Son B fell at school and cut his head open, had to be taken to the hospital via ambulance, had to get stitched up - 362 days after the first head injury.

Last year: Son O contracted croup and had to be taken to the hospital via ambulance and stayed in the PICU for a day.
This year: Son O contracted croup and had to be taken to the hospital. - 370 days after the previous ailment?

. . . and how many baby seals do I need to club to keep this from happening AGAIN!

Two years of severe head trauma and near fatal croup is ENOUGH!

The doctors were humored by the Son B being prone to injury. Jokingly told me to keep him home from school next September.

The doctors are a bit stumped over the croup, though. How does a kid contract the SAME illness, an extreme case of it, three years in a row when it's rare for older children (age 6/7) to suffer from extreme symptoms (such as striders) at all?

A woman has about 1 menstrual cycle per month, or 12 a year (the number would probably be closer to 13.036 per year, being that each average menstrual cycle is 28 days, but we'll say 1 a month for the sake of this discussion)....

Now, for the record, your chances of becoming pregnant any given menstrual cycle is about 1 in 5, given that each partner is in good health and what not = 20 percent.

What are your chances of becoming pregnant once in 10 menstrual cycles? (By the way, this is kind of like flipping a coin - the odds of it being heads is 1/2, or 50 percent. The odds of heads occurring twice in a row would be - and mind you, I don't have my math books handy and am doing this off the top of my head, so please correct me if I'm wrong - 1/2 * 1/2 = 25%....) That would be 1/5 + 1/5 = 0.4 or 40%. In other words, you have roughly a 50% chance of getting pregnant in any given year. Your chances of having 2 kids (and I'm assuming that you didn't want to get pregnant in the years in between)? 1/2 * 1/2 or 25%. So, right off the bat, you have about a 1 in 4 chance of having 2 kids in two different years.... The odds of both of them being boys? 1/4 * 1/2 = 12.5%.....

Now, the crude birth rate for the years your kids were born (according to the rough age range you've provided) happens to be 20.3 kids per 1000 people (in the years 2005 to 2010). Furthermore, the number of people in the world when your kids were born was approximately 6.75 billion. I simply take 6.75 billion and divide it by 1000, then multiply the answer by 20.3 That would be 137,025,000 babies born per year, in the years your kids were born (approximately, that is). Given that 1 year = 365.25 days, one could compute that there are 31,556,925.98 seconds in a year. Take the number of babies born per year and divide it by that number = 4.342 babies per second or 260.52 babies per minute or 15,631.200 babies per hour or 375,148.800 babies per day..... The chances of your baby being one of those babies born on any given day is 1/375,148.800 or 2.7 e-6 or 0.0000027. The chances of having 2 boys born on the same day in two different years? Remember my former # (your chances of having 2 boys) was 12.5%....

So, 0.125 = 1/8. 1/8 * 0.0000027 = approximately 3.33e-7 or 0.000000333. 3.33 ten millionths chances of having 2 boys born on same day in different years....

As far as the rest, all you have to do is google the rate of croup cases per year and rate of head cuts per year and plug in some more numbers (would be the same idea).... (I'm far too tired to do the rest of that right now, lol...)

 

[Aunt Spiker]

Awesome! For the two kids who were born on the same day it's a 1 in 3.33 ten millionth's chance. So - I have 4 kids: 2 were born on the same day six years apart (which you ever so awesomely calculated out), the other 2 were born 6 years and one day apart.

Son T, was born first. Daughter M was born 6 years and 1 day later.

I assume that having two children born 6 years and 1 day apart is close to the same odds . . . 1/3.33*10m

Thankfully - they don't have identical traumas. LOL . . . and hopefully it all ends there.

 

[rhinefire]

You should give them names so other kids won't harass them in school.