Did I overreact?

DanE2010

All these posts about are they not savvy with texting etc, the hospital would of had phones, payphones, or even a normal landline that they or someone like the nurse etc could of used to informed her that her son was in hospital with the grandparents.

Sorry but they could of rang her and SHOULD of rang her instead of left her worrying for four hours, no excuses, they dropped the ball and she had every right to have a go at them and be cautious about letting them have him in the future.

I suspect when things calm down she will let them see him again but she needs to cool down first and they need to accept responsibility and realise what they did and why it upset her, until then the rest of the family need to keep out of it instead of inflaming the situation.

milliemonster

esmerelda98 wrote: »

The medical professional has a duty to act in the best interests of the child. A young child hits his head on concrete and your priority is contacting whoever feels they have 'ownership' of the child, rather than excluding and if necessary treating any intra-cranial bleed or other serious injury? Of course attempts should be made to contact the parents, it is the compassionate thing to do and it avoids administrative and legal headaches, but that is not the priority and should not delay or detract from the investigations and treatment of the child.

With due respect, I know what I am talking about having worked as a neuro intensive care nurse.

Children often present to a and e with head injuries, they are incredibly common believe it or not in kids and yes you are absolutely right that medical attention is given in the best interest of the child, however, this only outweighs gaining consent from whoever has parental responsibility in an emergency situation, a child presenting with a recent head injury with no signs of deteriorating neurological function is not classed as an emergency.

Serious head injuries take some time to present themselves with symptoms and can occur 24 to 48 hours after the incident, usually vomiting, losing consciousness, blurred vision etc which is why medical advice is usually given to return if following a head injury you experience any of these signs, at this point, treatment overrides gaining consent, not before.

My priority as a medical professional is treatment in the best interest of the patient within the confines of the laws of our land, if you have a problem with that, then may I suggest you lobby your local mp.

FatVonD

I don't think you overreacted, OP, I would have been furious too.

Where I would go from here would depend on how and why other relatives are interfering, it would be a shame to stop your son going to your grandparents but if he continues to go then it needs to be on the basis that they (and the rest of your family) understand that what they did was wrong and will contact you immediately should anything like that ever happen again.

Georgiegirl256

I don't think you've overreacted at all OP. The fact that they were 4 hours late and didn't contact is in itself worrying enough. Yes, they may not have mobile phones, but hospitals have pay phones, and they should have contacted you to inform you of your sons accident. They said they didn't want to worry you, but surely they can understand that that's exactly what they did.

Where you go from here I would say depends on if they can admit that they've done wrong or not. It isn't as if you've banned them from seeing him altogether, but if they want to look after him again, they've got to realise they went about the whole situation totally wrong.

Saturnalia

Paulaviki wrote: »

To be honest if you have to ask if you might have overreacted, you know probably did and feel bad about it. Otherwise it wouldn't be bothering you.

On the other hand, "you over-reacted" is often used to try and silence a person who has a perfectly valid complaint (and I think OP certainly does). Especially when the accuser has already taken the other party's side, as OP says her family has.

Mrs_Soup

I don't think you overreacted as they were wrong not to make every effort to contact you especially once it went past the time they should have been home. My parents look after my children frequently and the boys would be fine with their grandparents taking them to hospital if they needed to go- however I am absolutely certain my parents would move heaven and earth to make sure I knew about it.
I would still let them look after your son as after all they have have done that well and not put him in any danger but I would make it clear that they must keep you informed if anything at all prevents them being where/when you expect them to be as you should not have to worry for 4 hours. I would be wanting them to acknowledge that they did not act in the best possible way in this instance and that they understand why you were upset.

Pollycat

Mrs_Soup wrote: »

I don't think you overreacted as they were wrong not to make every effort to contact you especially once it went past the time they should have been home.

I think the bit in bold is key.

The OP was expecting her son to be home at 5pm.
Her grandparents didn't bring him back until 9pm.
During that 4 hours the OP had ample time to imagine all sorts of things, especially as she went round to their house and they weren't in.

If it had been that the accident happened at say midday and they'd spent 4 hours at the hospital without calling the OP but brought him home at the expected time, that would still have been wrong but not as bad as leaving a Mum worrying for 4 long hours.

Mondler wrote: »

To cut a long story short I ended up telling my grandparents it would be for the best if they didnt have him anymore, that if they wanted to see him I would bring him to their house, I explained that I wasnt mad about the accident because accidents happen, its the fact that they didnt let me know what happened so I could be there, the fact that they couldnt make a quick two second phone call to at least let me know they were at the hospital, the fact that I waited around for hours not knowing where they were etc.

They took it the wrong way, and of course think they can never see him again, my family are giving me a hard time saying to give them a break as it wasnt their fault and that I am overreacting.

Just wanted to know if I am overreacting?

Why have they got the wrong end of the stick?
If the OP said they can see him but she will bring him to them (presumably she means she would stay with him) why have they taken that as they can never see him again?

It sounds to me like they know they were in the wrong and just want to get other family members on their side by misrepresenting what the OP actually said to them.

dippy3103

What an awful situation.

Yes hey were wrong in not contacting you. They probably panicked.

It's time to let it go into the past where it belongs and let them be grandparents.

They won't be here forever. Forgive & forget x

Yorkie1

So, the GPs have, for 2 years, successfully looked after their GC. No accidents.

I may have missed it on the thread but I don't remember seeing that the GC's accident was their fault as opposed to an accident.

The GPs ensured prompt care for the injury, as you would expect.

Yes, they were wrong not to let the OP know a) of the injury and b) of the lateness. I agree that I'd have been really worried about that and reacted with anger about the lack of a phone call. I don't disagree with others on this point.

However, the sanction of removal of unsupervised visits doesn't match this wrongdoing. It is either punitive, or implies a lack of trust that they can prevent accidents.

My niece had to be taken to A&E yesterday evening after a hot drink ended up on top of her. She was at my parents' house (i.e. the GPs) with her parents. The A&E consultant reassured them that very few children get through childhood without needing medical treatment for accidents, and that accidents happened. It was just that, an accident. Nobody to blame.

Given that the issue in OP's position is the failure to tell, in my view it is an over-reaction and not addressing the actual issue to permanently withhold unsupervised contact. That should be addressed differently. If the GPs refused, after discussion, to promise to contact OP if anything similar happened, of course that would be different. But the OP hasn't indicated willingness to have that discussion but to impose this decision.

duchy

I think the point is that the mother is considering stopping unsupervised visits because she has concerns that Grandparents apparently couldn't see why it was vital to inform his mother what had happened straight away - both from the point of view it's a rare child that doesn't want and need their Mum in hospital and also because of the worry and upset they caused leaving Mum not knowing where her child was for four hours.

The OP has made it clear it wasn't the accident itself that is the issue -but that she has concerns that if the same circumstances presented again the grandparents wouldn't inform her again.

I do think the fact they are grandparents to the OP may mean that they aren't treating her as they would any other unrelated adult - but see her still as a child they can make decisions for -instead of understanding that in these situations informing parents promptly is an absolute given.

In the OP's shoes the grandparents brushing it off as not wanting to worry her.....and then running complaining to other members of the family that she is being unfair to them doesn't to me show they have understood why what they did (or didn't do) was unacceptable to the child's parent.

I would have hoped that having slept on it the grandparents would be round with an apology and assurance that if the OP allowed them to continue to have her child that they would make sure she was fully informed as quickly as possible about any incident. This doesn't seem to have happened.