I haven't been around much lately though I have been checking in to keep up with threads and posts.

My D14 has been refusing school since February 2012 after a prolonged period of bullying by a large female peer group with one main ringleader. I removed her from the toxic school and then found myself in a new battle trying to find a place in another school. I tried my best to get her a place in a school where she has three close friends in the same year group but was told this wasn't possible.

She started a large co-ed school in Sept 12 where she had no familiar friends, this made her anxiety about being amongst peers of her own age group again even stronger. She refused school for the whole of the first term and into the first week of the second term. Her case then became a children's services matter where it looked likely that if she continued to refuse school, D would be removed from my care.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place, her father and I (we separated 13 years ago) had a discussion about what to try next in order to avoid children's services acting further. D has had a lot of emotional issues with her dad over the past few years which resulted in them being fairly estranged, but we decided a move to his house for a while was our only option. D was told clearly where we all stood and that her going into foster care would not be helpful to anyone, that she would be moving to dad's and step mum's home for a while and he was going to be taking her into school every day so she could attend learning support and from there take small steps into some lessons.

It was really hard, I was way beyond burn out but knew I had no other options, I had to open myself up to trusting her dad to take over. I helped D move to her dad's and I have been keeping out of the picture as far as school is concerned, her dad does all the drop offs and liaisons with personnel. It was a rough start with tears, tantrums, mutism and D refusing to get out of the car but her dad stayed firm, sat with her for over 3 hours in the cold until she finally agreed to go inside the school building. I just know I would not have been able to do that.

One month on, she is attending learning support every day and going to some science and English classes. On one non-uniform day where there were no lessons and only form activities, she attended the whole day and is starting to make some friends. Recently she started walking home to her dad's after school.

She came home to me for half term, we even had a short break in London to see one of her favourite bands. On Friday she will return to her father's home ready for school restarting next Monday. We have agreed that she needs to be there until she is attending most classes again, the worry is that if she returns to my home too soon she may regress into old habits.

So things are much brighter for our two families at present. I have slept so much over the last month, it is hard to believe just how exhausted I was. I have also been able to give quality time to my other daughter who was getting really fed up with the stress her sister's school refusal had been putting on me and her.

I know there are a few single mum's here who have been struggling with their child's SR alone. I really believed D's dad didn't 'get it' at all and he would force her in all the wrong ways - I was wrong, he has handled it much better than I anticipated and his and D's relationship is slowly recovering too. She knows she has two parents supporting her now instead of just one.

I don't know how relevant my experiences will be to anyone else here but just wanted to share them anyway. My heart goes out to everyone coping with the many challenges SR brings and the lack of awareness about it in our education systems.

Clarity

Hi Clarity,

Thanks for the update. You have had so many thing to deal with but it is really great to hear how your daughter is now doing. Having read the Kearney book - and he mentioned sitting in the car for as many hours as it takes....I thought that was not possible - but obviously her dad tried it and it worked. I know that this kind of 'tough' love is needed -but we seem to be trying to do tough love and soft love all at the same time as our children seem to need someone to lean on. And yet by continually leaning...they are not learning to stand on their own two feet (which is what we are all trying to do for them). Its so hard, isn't it....especially when there are often no options in place.

I had a small break through this week where I stood my ground. My son emailed and begged to be picked up. He had done this the day before and I had convinced him to stay. The second day he sounded frantic. But I still told him to stay but I rang the welfare coordinator and asked her to see him and if she couldn't - then get the chaplain to see him. When I picked my son up at the end of the day - he came smiling - saying the Chaplain had just had a quick chat and introduced himself and he seemed really nice. I was relieved....I feel like maybe at last the school can start connecting with him. Last year they were always just waiting for him to go to them - but this doesn't quite work. If I know someone at the school might be looking out for my son - I think I can stand my ground much easier. It is all about the support. I guess my ex is a bit like yours - I don't think you and I have been blinded though....I think there is always a need for the good cop- bad cop in kids lives.
Take care -
Linda

It's nice to see some success. This has been a bad year for my boy. He is able to go to only 2 or 3 classes a day and misses one or two days per week with persistent low fevers.

I feel so sad for him. He is beautiful and I am broken hearted by all his suffering with depression and anxiety. Just when I think he is past all this he will have a set back that starts it all at the beginning again.

His medicine no longer works for him and his therapist says he can't help him any more because he isn't able to articulate how he thinks or feels.

Hi Terskac,

Sorry to hear how things have been. My heart goes out to you - I know how it effects us to see our kids like this.
Remind me how old your son is again? It might be a maturity thing waiting to kick in? The psychiatrist told me that I might have to go through another two years of school being upside down and then he might start to realise that he also has to put the effort in and things will start to move forward. She has said also that there is no point her talking one on one with him when he just lets it wash over him and sees no point in carrying out the ideas/steps etc.
So frustrating from a parents point of view. My son is 13 - turns 14 this year - so maybe by the time he reaches the end of Year 9 I might start to see some change. I was also reading in the book by Kearney (in the Resource section) and he says there is chronic School Refusal and accute school refusal. Our boys would have the chronic it seems as they are kind of getting to school (accute is when they can't get there at all). It seems that in fact the chronic is harder to work with in the long run as it can go on for so much longer before being attended to and it is harder to 'reintroduce' the child to school as they are already part there. I personally think they are both terribly hard to figure out and move forward with as they both bring their own issues - but it is interesting to see them indicate there are two types as I kept wondering why my son was partly going each week but couldn't stay for a whole week or often a whole day. And my son also ends up staying off school for long periods after illness as he just can't get back to school - so the two cross over at some points.

However- we have to look at the positives. Your son is still managing some school. Have the school offered any help at their end? My son is also only doing a few lessons a day and seems to be missing other days. I am trying hard though not to respond to his pleas to come home as I also now feel that he has to experience feeling uncomfortable (as long as their is support at the school for him) and realise he isn't going to break down. But after convincing him to stay (via email) two days in a row..the next day he went to the school nurse and said he was sick (he might be...I can't quite tell...there is a cold going round...) and she rang me and I took him home. Next week is a new week - I can only hope that he manages more than he has so far but I have to accept if he doesn't - but also try and stop myself from picking him up when he contacts me.

As for the medication. If I was you I'd go back to whoever prescribed it in the first place - or go to the doctor and tell them it isn't working. Sometimes it does take several types of medication before one starts to work. I am not sure if my son's medication is working because on the one hand he is obviously not staying full time in school but on the other - he actually seems happier within himself. But if I find his school attendance doesn't improve I will go back to the psychiatrist and talk about alternatives to this particular medication. See what you can find out.
Our kids can't articulate well because anxiety is not something you can just put your finger on - it is an overwhelming feeling and the therapist must know this. But perhaps he is just not wanting to take on board her suggestions, like my son - in which case - we will just have to try again later.

hang in there - you are not alone - we will battle on : )
Take care. Wish you could send some of your cold weather down here ....we are sweltering in a heat wave.
Linda xx

HI Linda

My son is 14. He has been struggling with this off and on for about three years. We were just at his psychiatrist about ten days ago and he said give it more time. On the way home my son had a melt down that sank him into a deep depression for the next week. He seemed a little better yesterday. I called the doctor and have not had a call back yet. I know his meds aren't working well because he had an anxiety attack last night over an upset stomach. He was afraid he was going to vomit and it set off a wave of panic.

Hi Linda and Terskac

Sorry it has taken me so long to respond to your posts.

Terskac I am so sorry to hear how low your son has been, I just responded to your thread about the intensive therapy sessions and I hope he is able to benefit in some way from them.

Linda, it's good to know your son's school are taking these steps to connect with him. It has been a similar experience for me, it is almost as if we have to guide educators in how to interact with an SR child. My d's school also expected her to approach one of her support team if she needed them - of course she was not going to do that, they have learned over time that they need to make time to reach out and offer understanding and support instead of piling on expectations and force. Have things improved further for your son?

You are so right when you say it is all about the support. The only reason I was able to step back when I did was because both her dad and the school had slowly come to realise that a solely authoritarian style approach was not going to work and they adapted their strategies to be more supportive and child centred. WE know this and that I guess is why it is so hard to step away when we know there isn't adequate support around our children.

Shortly before D moved to her dad's, the school counsellor said to me during a phone conversation, 'we aren't perfect, you are not perfect, we aren't always going to get things right, but you are exhausted and you need to step away and trust that d's dad and the support team can care for her and learn from/deal with set backs and mistakes as we go along'. It had taken four months to receive that kind of reassurance and I realised at that point I had to trust more and let go for a while BUT it was only possible to do because I could see the other parties involved had gained more insight into how best to support d. I hope in the future parent's of SR children will not have to go through what we have because awareness and understanding will be so much better.

My d is making steady progress, attending learning support daily and a few lessons if she feels up to it, today she is making cakes with two girls her age which will be sold at a school charity event. This activity was arranged by her school support team and is to help her build friendships. I am going to see her after school today