A trip to A&E

Z loves to run as much as possible.

This week Z took a tumble. He was doing his usual running up and down the living room making his happy sounds. He skips his way down the room before taking a leap onto the end of the L shaped sofa. It’s just one of his repetitive behaviours that he does and besides, he’s a kid, he’s having a great time!

But this time he tripped over himself and fell head first into the hard wooden base of the sofa. Normally Z is the kinda kid that just gets up and brushes it off, but this time he was hurt. His eye was bloody and swelling up. He wouldn’t let me near him to clean it up. He is quite sensitive to personal space and when we're allowed to touch him. I managed to get a smear of antiseptic cream on the cut but there was no way I’d get an ice pack on him. With his limited speech it’s so hard to know how hurt he is. Sure I could see his eye was a mess but how did he feel? Did he have a headache? Could he see ok? Did he feel dizzy? After a call to 111 we were advised to go get him checked out at A&E.

Normally we try to avoid as many busy places as possible, but this was an unavoidable one. After packing a bag of supplies - Snacks, juice, fidget toys and tab - we were off. We’re pretty lucky that we made it this long without having to do this! Our local A&E has a separate children’s unit so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. We were asked to go into a room to give Z’s information and this was when we struggled. He’d been playing nicely with a toy truck but of course now we had to go through a door and into a small room with two strangers. He freaked out and I could tell the nurses were thinking ‘oh, here we go’. The nurse helping Daddy Z deal with the meltdown however, spotted my sunflower lanyard with the ‘my child has autism’ badge, which is when they became much more understanding, he wasn’t just a naughty kid kicking off.

I’ve previously been in two minds about using this badge to advertise his autism. Before, part of me felt like it’s nobody else’s business, but then the other part realises that the majority of people probably just haven’t much knowledge about autism. There’s been loads of times I’ve been in a shop and seen kids kicking off, so Z would look no different than this. Lately quite a few people have mentioned it to me when they’ve seen it and said what a good idea it is, and that they wouldn't have known otherwise. I always at least have it on my bag when we go. When Z is having a meltdown the last thing I can deal with is people staring. So in this instance the badge came in handy because although I told one nurse about his ASD the other couldn’t hear over the meltdown.

It took quite a long time after we came out of the first room to get Z to calm down. We were offered a quiet side room for some privacy but Z was determined to bust out. He eventually calmed down and a packet of crisps really helped to improve the situation. So when we were called back to be seen by the doctor I was worried (as I think the same nurse from before was) but ta da! He was fine. Like nothing had ever happened. Happy as can be to go in the room. Why? What had changed? I can only thank the crisps because who knows! Clearly I have so much to learn.

Z was checked over using toys and lights to distract him. He was absolutely fine, just very swollen and after some aftercare advice we were told it was ok to head home. A few days later and the swelling is almost gone, his eye area is turning some very interesting and intense colours but he’s back to his usual self, running, spinning and jumping. It’s like nothing even happened.

Sarah x

Here is the autism badge we use.