Monday 26th April 2021
This is not unchartered territory for us. We went through 2 years of forcing Samantha to school. We followed the advice of the ‘professionals’. We ignored the meltdowns, after all they were just tantrums. We took her to school with no shoes on. We threatened to take her in her pajamas. We punished. We didn’t listen to her. We did damage. We broke her. It took a long time to not only repair the damage we did to her and her mental health but also to our relationship with her. She could no longer trust the people she is really meant to be able to. It has taken years to get our happy girl back and because we now listen and validate her feelings, thoughts and opinions, she is finally able to trust us again.
We are now facing the same situation with Riley who has recently started school refusing. The difference this time is we are listening to his concerns and treating him with the respect of a small human, rather than treating him like an insignificant child with no rights, which from our experience is how most professionals in the educational field believe our children to be.
Most mornings are starting with Riley refusing to come out from under his duvet and we are spending around 30 minutes convincing him to get out of bed and get dressed.
With Samantha in the past we would have just pulled back the covers and threatened to remove a privilege if she didn’t get up and get dressed. We have now learnt how damaging this was and are therefore taking the time to listen and talk to Riley. I sit next to his bed, ask him what his concerns are and talk them through with him. I tell him how many weeks/days are left in this term, what we have to look forward to this weekend and ask if there is anything else we can do to make his day a little easier. This usually helps and he is then able to face the day. On a really bad day between each task, getting dressed, meds, breakfast etc, he curls into my lap for a cuddle. Yes it takes much longer to get ready, yes we are late to school most days but he goes off much happier and much calmer. Now I know there will be those of you out there judging us, thinking we are being way too soft, allowing Riley to ‘run the show’ however when we took the other route, Samantha constantly spoke about taking her own life, she had plans and we won’t make those same mistakes again. As parents we owe it to our children to learn from our mistakes and not make them again.
I have a meeting with a member of the pastoral staff at school this week to try and help Riley in school, so he may be more willing to go and hate it a little less. Following on from this together we are going to arrange a meeting with senco to see what help can be provided within the classroom environment, as right now he has no extra support (regardless of the meetings I have had, the professionals I have had involved and the reports of the help he needs thatI have been provided from said professionals).
A reason at this point we are giving serious thought to home educating.
