Having blood taken and immunisations

The wait time in that environment certainly makes a difference. I am a living nightmare for my special care dentist. My instinct to bolt kicks in the minute I am through the door. She needs to get on with it fast because I NEED to get out.

A couple of times she's asked me to wait while she changes a bit of kit or finds a thing in the cupboard. NO, NO, NO! Do that before I'm in the room otherwise I feel the curtain coming down and I bolt off somewhere where my husband can't find me for hours while I can't talk to anyone and probably harming myself. And hitherto haven't exactly been able to explain why.

This gets worse for me with age...bravely in my 20s I did try to give blood a couple of times. Once I passed out, the second time they could only get a 1/4 pint. They told me not to bother again.

My veins clamp down as soon as I see the needle. They've threatened canuals before now, which is a sure fire recipe for a melt down and total failure to get anything. The only way I can have them now is at home. 

that is interesting.  A lower of stress does help clearly.

If only I had a magic answer...they wanted some for me in hospital last week. Full blown melt down and total failure to get the bloods followed.

One thing that might make a difference is a home phlebotomist, if you haven't tried that already. I have some one come out to the house. She only charges £10. She's ex NHS and she then runs the bloods down to the hospital. And she is the only one who can get bloods from me.

I suspect she succeeds because I'm not in a clinical environment with all the associated sights, smells and sounds and because I haven't had to wait in a queue for hours in said environment, with the stress and the fear growing all that time. She's just in, grabbed them and gone before the melt down monster takes over.

Interestingly, she did once tell me she visits quite a lot of autistic kids, who seem to find it easier if they haven't been dragged out to sit in a bright, noisy clinic for eons to then be manhandled by someone they don't know. 

I'm scared of blood tests - I ask the person doing it not to say "sharp scratch" when they start as it makes my veins disappear - well, it feels that way anyway!  Maybe you could find out if little changes such as that would help - I'm assuming he's had it done by now though.

Honestly people drive me insane! I start to suffer when I'm around them too much. I really rely on my weekends to recharge and get my tolerance back for the Monday.

All of what you said above is why i hate people     I admire your strength in dealing with them.

I find the paediatric needles to be the best - if the nurse is skilled, he won't even feel it.

Also my mum held my hand and talked to me whilst the nurse was doing the blood test so I was distracted. You could try this, or maybe he could listen to something like a podcast or music or maybe watch a video on his phone

Im 16 and have the same issue and recently had a blood test. What I found helped was closing my eyes whilst it happened and not looking at all at the blood or needle so it didn't stress me out. I also had numbing cream on my arm which the doctor prescribed so it didn't hurt at all. It was a lot easier than I thought. Also I had a really nice nurse that I trusted which helped a lot because previously I had a nurse that I didn't like and it made me anxious. If he fails the first time dont be discouraged, just keep being positive and try again. Hope it goes well :) 

I take blood for a living, often I'll exclude the parents of an older child from the blood draw as they can cause more problems than they'll solve.

Mums in particular like to say stupid things like "oh that's a lot of tubes", "is that really the needle you need to use", "oh his brother/dad/dog hates getting this done [list awful effects]. My worse was a mum who fainted though close second was a dad who picked up a needle, unsheathed it and was like oh there's something sharp under that rubber thing. Yes sir that's a needle, thanks for giving me boatloads of paperwork to do you complete idiot. I would have stopped him but I had a needle in the arm of his adolescent child so I wasn't going anywhere.

You can ask the doctor for EMLA cream/patches to apply before the blood draw, they have local anaesthetic in them and mean he won't feel the scratch of the needle (but he will feel some movement, like the dentist). 

Ask the person drawing blood if they can use a paediatric butterfly needle as these are smaller (thinner) but still do the job in adults. 

The blood drawer will likely chat away to keep him distracted and follow it up with something nice.

I used to faint when I saw blood, literally.  And having a blood test gave me such great anxiety.  I think they used a bigger needle in my younger days and I found it quite painful.

It seems much less painful these days, in fact I hardly feel it at all., but I cannot look at it, even after it has been taken.  Explain to the person taking the blood how your son feels and get him not to look, using some diversionary tactic to stop him looking, or get him to close his eyes or use a blindfold.  Of course, you have to get him to the phlebotomist first. I don't like having even a spot test, to me this is even worse than having a syringe of blood taken.

I get very stressed by blood tests so I explain I'm autistic and if I do strange things, don't be alarmed.    Make sure they let you in to the room with him - as his carer, they can't stop you but due to covid, they might try to exclude you - you are allowed access by law.

Two things help me - I ask them to tell me when they're ready to stick me and I 'stim' (either my left leg jiggles uncontrollably or I rub the top of my head hard and fast) while they take the blood.     The other thing is to talk to me very fast about a favourite subject to make my brain redirect from what's going on - if he's into planes, ask him about which museum he wants to go to - which plane does he want to see there and why that one in particular.   Make sure you don't run out of difficult questions that make his brain function.      It's all normally over in less than a minute.