Romy has just woken up. The 3-year-old little girl tiptoes towards her parents. “She always walks like that, it’s one of the things that alerted us,” says his mother, Johanna Brillaud, alongside her husband, in their house in Niort. She approaches her little sister, Ambre, almost 2 years old. Without warning, she hits him in the head with a cup. The adults present less than a meter away saw nothing coming. “There you go, you see what can happen,” says the mother, trying to console her sobbing youngest. Romy looks, surprised, at her sister's reaction. “She is not aware of what she is doing or the consequences,” sighs the mother. “Yesterday she tried to cut her arm with a knife. Before, she took the dehumidifier tray. I just had time to catch it; she was going to drink it…”
In the living room, the tapestry is in tatters, torn by the little girl with the face of an unfathomable angel. “She has not eaten since December 2023. We give her bottles on the advice of professionals. »
“She managed to open her window and jumped from upstairs”
This summer of 2024, the tragedy was narrowly avoided: “On August 30, she managed to open her bedroom window and jumped from upstairs. She has no awareness of the danger. She wanted to go play outside…” By a miracle, Romy emerged unscathed from his three-metre fall, sleeping in a closed medical bed ever since. During treatment, “They told us that they were going to make a report for a child in danger”. A shame for the mother in distress: “I've been calling for help and asking for support for a year and a half! »
Before the birth of Romy, the first child of this blended family, “I was employed on a permanent contract like my husband, like everyone else”. But, very quickly, small signs alerted us to particularities. “She was followed by the PMI who very quickly realized that there was something. She was hyperactive, walked on tiptoe, she had trouble looking in the eyes… I also saw that she had no interactions with the other children…”
For almost two years, his life has been entirely devoted to his daughter, wandering between diagnosis and care. The little girl took exams. “The MRI showed an absence of the olfactory bulb. She doesn't smell odors. But nothing else. We also did a genetic assessment, the results of which we do not have. » An appointment is planned with a geneticist in Poitiers in February 2025. “We hope that we will have answers to our questions”, says Johanna Brillaud in despair. “Our daughter has a disability, but we don’t really have a diagnosis and we don’t have any care! »
“I love my child, but it’s hell every day”
Exhausted, Johanna Brillaud contacted the media “in hopes that someone will hear our cry for help!” “. Now on parental leave, she can no longer take it: “Clearly, I’m lost. I am not a professional. I'm doing what I can, but I need help. » Worried about her daughter without appropriate care: “The priority is care. All the professionals agree that she needs follow-up, but there is nothing. » Also worried about her whole family, her little sister, her big brother from a previous union and for herself. “Everyone is suffering. I love my child, but it's hell every day. I get hit, bitten. Romy screams and screams constantly. And I'm afraid every moment, even just to go to the bathroom. The danger is permanent. »
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- Questioned about the case of this mother of a little girl in difficulty, the Niort hospital believes that the “child is followed by the Early Medico-Social Action Center (CAMSP) and the Coordination and Orientation Platform (PCO) of Niort. She benefited from consultations with a liberal child psychiatrist in La Rochelle, a pediatric neurologist in Bordeaux and a pediatrician in Poitiers.
- The hospital confirms that “in June 2024, the mother contacted the child psychiatry department at Niort hospital to request treatment in a day hospital. The department's child psychiatrist spoke with the liberal child psychiatrist, the neuropediatrician and the PCO doctor who met the child. It follows from these discussions that this type of disorder is not ordinarily treated by the child psychiatry day hospital.”
- “Based on this observation and ensuring that the child had been able to consult and was followed by competent specialists for the disorders she presents, the Niort hospital center was therefore unable to respond favorably to the request of the mother who wants her child to benefit from care in a child psychiatry day hospital. »
- The mother had contacted the establishment's user management: “On September 25, the user management, after obtaining information from the child psychiatry department of the hospital, called the mother back. She informed her of the specialists' response and referred her to a social worker from the departmental council to benefit from educational assistance. »
“Romy was refused in all structures”
“We first saw physiotherapists. Afterwards, at the Inkermann clinic, an orthopedic surgeon told us that there was nothing physical. » The mother is referred to the Pellegrin hospital in Bordeaux. “In the spring of 2023, we saw a pediatric orthopedic surgeon there who told us that there was nothing he could do, that we had to go see a pediatric neurologist. » An appointment is made in August 2023, still in Bordeaux. “We were told that there was indeed something neurological but without knowing what. Possibly Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). We were told we needed to see a child psychiatrist. »
In June 2024, a child psychiatrist from La Rochelle saw the child. “He also spoke of an ASD. He told us that his case involved a day hospital, that we needed a structure with everything on site. » More “Romy was refused access to all structures. The child psychiatry department of the Niort hospital, which never met Romy, responded that she did not need day care and the Early Medico-Social Action Center (CAMSP) which a care unit says the case is too severe for him.”
