One thing I, and the rest of the team working on this project at HF Healthcare, wanted to accomplish with these poems, was a presentation of advice for young patients for every stage of their bleed and treatment. The last poem had to do with a fear of needles, which I saw as the beginning stage in a treatment regimen. So for this next poem, I wanted to examine the next stage in treating a bleed, which I thought would be the waiting a patient must do before they resume normal activities. This was one of the most difficult parts of a bleed for me, and it still is.
Particularly for a younger patient, it’s hard to understand why you need to wait before going out and engaging in normal activities. Sometimes, with more mild bleeds, it might feel like you’re ready to start putting weight on an ankle, or knee, before it’s actually ready. Having to wait when there may not be a lot of pain is a really hard thing to rationalize to a child, and it’s a really hard thing to cope with as a child. This got easier for me when I discovered that there was a lot to do when I had a bleed. I started playing video games, which kept me engaged and entertained. I would read, which is great for any kid to do, and that turned into a love for literature and a love for writing. I also learned how to play guitar, which was also something with which I fell in love. I ended up learning to love these activities so much that they became what I wanted to do even when I didn’t have a bleed, and that led to less bleeds, as I was spending my time doing things that weren’t as physically demanding.
While this poem doesn’t have all the answers for keeping a young hemophiliac engaged and entertained when they have a bleed, I hope it can act as a little reminder that there are plenty of things to do while they’re waiting for a bleed to heal. Some of the things they try while they’re off their feet may even turn into life-long passions. It’s never easy waiting for a bleed to end, but I hope that young patients know bleeds don’t have to be boring!
