Theodore ate the fluff out of his teddies. By the time his mum realised there was a serious problem, help was 700km away

Renee knew “something was up” with her toddler son Theodore when he started pulling apart his teddy bears and eating the fluff from their insides.

He was obsessed with eating fluff, wool, cardboard – anything but food – and had explosive meltdowns when Renee tried to stop him.

“I had to take all these teddies away. I had to use certain blankets that didn’t have any wool or fluff that could be easily picked off,” Renee, who was living in Sydney at the time, tells 9honey.

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“He’d always had trouble sleeping and meltdowns and things like that, but I put it down to typical two-year-old behavior.”

Eventually she took him to a hospital in Sydney where a paediatrician diagnosed him with pica, a mental health condition wherein individuals compulsively swallow non-food items.

Pica is especially common in children and with certain conditions, including autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and intellectual disabilities, but the doctor assured Renee that Theodore would grow out of it.

Little did she know this was just the first sign something was “different” about her youngest son.

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By the time Renee realised there was more to Theodore’s situation a few years later, they’d moved more than 700km to the NSW outback town of Lightning Ridge, where help was much harder to find.

One in five Aussies are waiting more than three weeks to see a GP in regional areas according to recent research; it’s nothing compared to the wait times kids can face.

In 2023, children were made to wait up to five years to see a paediatrician in parts of NSW, per data from children’s health charity Royal Far West.

Meanwhile, the average wait time for paediatric services across all of Victoria has ballooned out to 12 months, according to one 2024 study.

Wait times are believed to be even worse in some remote and regional Australian communities, forcing families to either trek hours to the nearest metropolitan area or leave their children untreated until a local appointment becomes available.

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That’s the choice Renee faced when Theodore’s preschool raised the alarm a few years ago.

“He couldn’t sit still, couldn’t follow basic instructions, he was lacking in so many areas,” she says, “And he started getting very, very picky with his food.”

Theodore’s grandfather suggested getting him assessed for ASD but when Renee called the Sydney-based doctor who had diagnosed Theodore’s pica, she was told there was a two-year wait list.

With no paediatrician in Lightning Ridge, a town of about 2200, Renee’s only option was to wait.

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“Because Theodore wasn’t seen as urgent, he was put all the way down the bottom of the list,” she says.

“So we were waiting quite some time. I feel like I would still probably be waiting if it wasn’t for the Flying Start program, to be honest.”

The Variety Flying Start Paediatric Serviceflies experienced paediatricians out to regional communities in Western NSW to provide free paediatric assessments for children and young people.

Designed to bridge the gap in paediatric services for kids in regional NSW, the service was absolutely vital for Theodore and Renee.

A fly-in paediatrician was able to diagnose Theodore with ASD, oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), which was a huge relief for his mum, who was finally able to seek out the support Theodore needed.

She was able to get him regular therapy appointment and medication to manage his conditions, as well as ongoing paediatric services through the Flying Start program.

“It was so good to actually finally be heard,” she says.

Theodore is now eight and, with the help of medication and regular therapy, has shown significant improvements in the years since his diagnosis.

He also recently got approved for NDIS support, without which Renee would struggle to keep up with the costs of all his therapies, medications and extras.

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Looking back, Renee can’t imagine her son would be the happy, thriving boy he is today if not for that first paediatric visit through the Flying Start program.

Without it, Theodore would have had to wait years for proper diagnoses, then Renee would have had to spend a small fortune on petrol and accommodation to get him to regular appointments in Sydney.

It just would have put more financial strain on the family in the ongoing cost of living crisis.

Renee wants to see more programs like Variety’s Flying Start brought in around Australia to bridge the gap for families like hers, many of whom are waiting months or even years for critical paediatric services.

Kids like Theodore need regular, consistent support to thrive and it breaks his mum’s heart to think children in regional areas are still being left behind.

“It’s a bit of a nightmare, but hopefully we can start seeing some changes in regional areas and help current and future children.”

To find out more about the Variety Flying Start program or to donate, click here.