They didn’t tell me at the first appointment, ‘This is going to be a long journey’ because probably that would have been-, I was already so sort of traumatised by it happening, if they’d have said, ‘Well, we’ll still be seeing you in three years’ time’ that would have been an awful thing, I think, to know at the time. So, they probably did the right thing in that, like you said, they were sort of drip feeding a little bit the information.

I think because he was only two months’ old as well, when you’ve got a baby that’s that young, you’re not really thinking long term future, you’re just like ‘Let’s get through each of these days.’ So, I can’t say, I think once I saw, once I went to [city] and I found out it was going to be a longer process, I felt very sad. But I can’t, I wasn’t, at that point, thinking sort of future.

I think because he was a baby and when you have a baby, especially that young, and who had these health, we didn’t, we knew he wasn’t right but it was literally getting through every day, because he was screaming all day, every day because he was obviously in so much pain from his stomach, it was less “Let’s think about the future” and more like survival mode almost. So, yeah, I guess at the time I didn’t really think about “Oh what’s this going to be like in two years’ time.” I just, I think as time went on and I saw that it was going to be quite a thick scar – and I guess that would’ve been about six months to a year after – that’s when I started thinking a little bit more about the future and, you know “What’s it going to be like when he takes his clothes off and goes to the beach or …”.

I am concerned about when we have to have the conversation with him about what happened. That’s something that I can’t say I sort of look forward to doing. I mean, even the psychologist said to me, and a number of people have said to me ‘Oh, boys love a scar’ but that’s … that’s not necessarily the case and you don’t know how MY boy, how MY [son] going to react to it. Which, I guess, is a bit, I don’t know, it’s a little bit … I know everyone’s trying to be nice saying that but it’s a bit stereotypical and it doesn’t reflect necessarily the society we’re living in nowadays where you say ‘Oh, yeah, you should see the other guy’ sort of thing and, you know, ‘I got it in a fight’ or whatever and, you know, the story behind it. Um, I know people are trying to be nice but yes, most people have said that to me including members of the NHS, um, in a jokey way perhaps but it does make me think ‘Yeah, how will he deal with it?’ It might be that he literally couldn’t care less, or it might be that actually he is very looks-orientated and very sort of self-conscious of its. So, it will be interesting, but it’s also something that I think about, of how he’ll cope with it. Because I know there’s always going to be things that you’re … that anyone who has something that they’re self-conscious of, so it’s whether that is his thing or whether he just thinks ‘Oh well.’ It remains to be seen, doesn’t it?

But my little boy had lots of, had some health issues when he was a baby as well, so we didn’t realise that he had a cow’s milk protein allergy, so he wasn’t, he’d hardly feed at all. So, they were quite concerned. They were saying it was taking a bit longer to heal than it normally would heal, and it turned out that that was linked to the fact that basically he wasn’t getting enough nutrition essentially, because I could only try and get an ounce of milk down him at a time. So, that took longer, I guess, that process to heal. And then, at four months we were finally referred to a paediatrician for his eating, who said “Right, it’s cow’s milk protein. Put him on this milk. You stop having any dairy” because I was express breastfeeding him. And also, he had to go on food, like, he had to start food early, and as soon as we did that his burn just suddenly started healing. But we’d had two months of it basically taking ages to heal. So, it was great, after that it really did start to heal.

Yeah, so, when I went back to work, as soon as I went back in I had to say to them “Look, I’m really sorry but I am going to have days where I’m going to have to take days off” and when I first went back to work I think I had a couple of days, because we were still going every three months I think then. Yeah, so I would have had a couple of days off and, yeah, it was just something that I basically said the first day I got back into work “Just so you’re aware, this has happened, and I will have to have time off.” But my work was really, really understanding about it, so that was fine.

They didn’t quiz me loads about it, which was great. It was just totally, it wasn’t “Well tell me more” you know, I didn’t have to go into loads of detail about it, which was great, because I wouldn’t have really wanted to. It’s hard enough to have to say it in the first place. And just realising that this isn’t, you know, you’re not going to a burns appointment to go on a jolly, you’re going because it is so important for your child. So, and if the person who is working for you is a good worker and not taking time off here, there and everywhere and it’s literally to take their child to this appointment, I think if you can be totally unquestioning about it and say, “That is fine, that is such an important priority,” that would be really fantastic I think for everyone involved.

I think sometimes with work, they can ask you to be really specific. You know “I want to know exactly why? Where are you going? Why are you going there? Who’s-?” and I really appreciated that they just didn’t over question it.