"I felt bad enough already"

I’m very sorry to hear that your visit to Holly Court as part of your autism assessment was such a difficult experience yesterday. As the clinician who you were due to see I spoke with a member of the reception/ admin staff who let me know what had happened. Unfortunately it can, at times, be very difficult to find a visitors parking space and when feeling anxious the search for a space is probably the last thing you want to do when preparing yourself for a potentially difficult meeting. I understand that you arrived with plenty of time before the appointment too. I was told by the member of the admin team that you had felt the staff were laughing at you. I was reassured from the discussion that I had with them that they were not aware that this could have happened and it was certainly not their intention to upset you. I apologise again that this meant that we were unable to meet but please rest assured that I will offer you another appointment as soon as possible and will contact you next week to arrange this. Perhaps we can discuss a plan for the pre-meet part of the visit to see if we can make the arrival any easier for you next time.

Dr Max Buchanan, Clinical Psychologist and Team Manager, Somerset Autism Spectrum Service