The Thompson brothers

The Briefing

Hello, my name is Emma. I am currently studying at university in hope to become a special needs teacher. To get some experience of looking after children I looked to start babysitting and nannying, advertising as someone who is trained to look after special needs children. With low supply of people who do this, jobs came thick and thin. One particular job is what I will be sharing today.

When I got a call from Mrs Thompson she informed me she had 2 boys. Her younger son Jack who was 9, had autism, and her other son Henry who was 15. She needed me to come and look after them both while she went out one night. She also mentioned how both of them are bedwetters and may need changing when looking after them, something I already had a good experience with so was happy to accept this job.

I arrived at six o'clock on a Friday evening. "Hi come in, you must be Emma." "Hi Mrs Thompson," I said. "Oh please just call me Claire,"she said as we proceed to make the normal small talk, about how my studying was going and about Jack's autism. "Normally I never go out and leave them because I worry so much about leaving a normal old sitter with Jack. He can be a handful sometimes," she said. "I'll be fine with him Mrs Thompson, I assure you. I'm sure he's a wonderful boy," I replied to her. "Go and have a fun night, you deserve it!" I was an expert in this so I had full confidence everything would go smoothly. "Oh of course," she said chuckling, "Why was I even worrying."
She began showing me round the house while explaining the bedtime and toilet situation for both of them. "So this is Jack's room," she said as we both entered. "He wears these pull ups," as she said pointing to a pile of drynites sized on top of his chest of drawers. "Change him into one of these an hour before bedtime so at 7:30. He may need a change before bedtime so just keep an eye out for that. Also he may need you to help him in the toilet if he needs a number 2" "Ok that's all good," I replied. It was clear that jack still had regular accidents during the day which was very common with children on the spectrum.

She then lead me into another room, this one bigger with a TV and game console next to the bed. "This is Henry's room. He'll probably spend most of his time up here playing on his playstation-you know what boys are like," she said. "He wears these pull ups." She opened a draw in his wardrobe with had about 10 or so adult pull ups, sized medium. Clearly he was on the larger side like his mother, so had out grown drynites."He's a bit sensitive about his bedwetting at his age which is why he prefers to keep his pull ups out of sight," she explained. "Bedtime for Henry is 10:30 ish but just get him changed at the same time as Jack." I was surprised she wanted me to change him as he was 15, but I didn't want to question her about anything. "Okie dokie Mrs Thompson that's all good," I said, as she lead me downstairs to meet them both.

We entered the kitchen where they were both sat having there dinner. "Boys, this is Emma, she will be looking after you for tonight while I'm out." "Hi Emma," they both said. Mrs Thompson went upstairs to get ready as I sat down at the table with both of them. "So how old are you both," I asked, making conversion with them. We proceed to talk about school for both of them and their interests. Mrs Thompson returned a few minutes later. "Goodbye kids, be good for Emma please," she said giving them both a kiss on the forehead, before leaving.