DC skipped their first day. AIBU about DP’s reaction

If anything your DD should be praised for her compassion in immediately sacrificing her own first day back, seeing her friends after the holidays etc to look after her distressed twin (although I note that she ended up disadvantaging herself in order to 'be kind', which maybe shouldn't be encouraged too keenly).

Although she should have called you, might she have been afraid that you'd be angry? Did she feel it would be disloyal to her twin as they are too old to 'tell'?

There is of course no way she could have have got him onto or off the bus herself if he decided he wasn't going, if he is now physically mature and so much bigger and stronger than her.

I always think with school refusers you make home so horrible and boring during the day they want to go to school to escape it!!

ie no tv music games socials. Lots of cleaning toilets putting washing’s on, batch cooking, practical skills. When questioned explanations that you need qualifications from school/college to get a job so if you don’t have that all you can do is likely domestic stuff like Homecare or cleaning. Or be a housewife/husband.

Dont know how that’s work with an asd kid. I just feel like once kids know they can refuse school without consequences the wheels are off the bogey and it’s game over…. In life we have to do stuff we don’t like. It’s just how it is.

DD has my sympathy while I think it was bad she ignored your calls, especially with DSs history of self harm. But I can appreciate the split loyalties, and she is not responsible for her brother

I think sometimes violence, needs physical dispersal. DP didnt hit him, didnt injure him just pushed him away after DS assaulted him. I dont think thats terrible. Tbh actions have consequences and autism isnt an excuse for violent behavior. DS needs to learn hes responsible for his behavoiur regardless of his feelings or mood

You sound like getting him to use the bus is sensible, so he’s not going to rely on you, but then you totally go the other way as soon as you mention your DPs involvement.

i actually suspect this is more about your relationship with your DP than anything to do with your DS and DD.

Given your “get the bus” strict and fair approach your “he needs the phone” totally confuses your fairly firm and strict approach.

it’s almost like when your DP dishes out the punishment you don’t align.

Honestly, you need to make school non negotiable, or rather going to school in the morning. I drove my dd for months at one point handing her over, by 11am some days they were calling me to fetch her (too complicated for here) but the key thing is that she wasn’t rewarded with staying at home, what she wanted. Eventually we found a compromise to lessons and she learned in the school office, fuelled by mugs of tea and biscuits (and got a*’s). Skipping school needs a heavy hand

Just reiterating what PP have said - the shove seems justified but it's not fair to blame your DD. However, it's much much worse to expect her to be solely responsible for him - this will cause long-term trauma and disruption to her education. Let her get the bus and you drive him - or get a bus with him. Leaving him at the bus stop and hoping he'd start a routine was optimistic and hasn't worked out, so you need to try something different and take the responsibility for him back to yourself, away from DD.

Even if you were working today, I'd expect you to have taken the week off to help your DS who already has challenges to settle into his new routine.
Loads of parents take their kids to school on the first day.
I don't understand why you are making excuses about working in the future. I can't get my head around you not travelling with him to school to be honest. Even if you felt driving him was the wrong thing to do, why didn't you take the bus with him?

Then DP turned on DD and shouted at her for not making sure DS went in and for covering for him. He told her she had let everyone down. She just stood there crying.

This is appalling behaviour from your partner and I would be having significant words with him about it. What did you do / are you doing to comfort your daughter? She could have handled the communication better, but she’s not responsible for getting her brother to school and I can completely get that - with no adults around - she didn’t want to leave him. Really you need to get them to travel separately; you can’t place this on a 14 year old.

Yes you did give her the responsibility by sending them off alone! You must have known if he (likely) refused to get on she wouldn't give him a cheery wave and leave him there.

The rest is just wet lettuce excuses.

But he has point blank refused anyway, as he didn’t go in and says he’s not going to go in. So while telling him to get the bus was a nice idea, it didn’t work. So time for plan B, which I’d suggest is taking him in. If you don’t have a job lined up it’ll take a little while to find/apply/interview/get a start date etc, so I’d take him until that point then cross the bridge of getting the bus when you get there.

I don’t think you've made the wrong decision trying to get him back into education but I do think you expected an awful lot of a child with additional needs to manage all of that today after being out of school for more than a year. Did you think he was just going to happily skip into school on his own, with no one there to encourage and support him?

I also feel uncomfortable with your DP’s reaction, especially considering he’s not the father. Yes, he should support you in how you discipline your children, but he should definitely not wade in there with a heavy handed approach which isn’t aligned to your own.

Sorry to be harsh, but you are just deflecting onto your DP and making excuses for your son.

Regardless of your future work plans and adult should have gone with your son today, it was a big occasion if he has been out of school for so long, not left for you daughter to deal with the situation.

I would go with him tomorrow make sure he has the support required, you will never no if it's the right decision or not if he never goes.

Why does your DS have to go on the bus 'from day 1'?

Many parents bring their kids to school - either commute together or drive them. Its your role to make things as comfortable as possible for your son. Its not your daughter's responsibility.

I also think your DS deserved that shove back to be honest. He's fourteen, not four.

I feel so sorry for your DD.. she should NEVER have been given that amount of responsibility, especially on her first day back too!!

She should however have called one of you and I can understand how it has all kicked off if they basically disappeared for the day without being in contact, there's no excuse for that really.

You sound incredibly soft and that may be causing the dynamic where your partner is having to assume the roll of bad cop, to your good cop, if you don't want that to happen then you need to step up and parent more effectively yourself.

Saying he has made things worse, while you sat there and did nothing is ridiculous, the decision to let your DD get your DS to college for the first time in a year is ridiculous, if you are not working and have the time you need to be more pro-active and stop shifting the blame.

Your partner taking their phones? Why is that ok?

I despair at the shit women put up with just to have a man in their lives.

I have two boys with ASD and if my husband and I split no other man gets a say in how they are brought up.

one of my children really struggled with school. He was home educated for a while. He would have all the plans to go to school but then on the day his anxiety would take over and it was horrendous. Sometimes we shouted, lost our temper. Not great but it was so emotionally draining. His MH got really bad and he tried to take his own life several times. I could not have put the responsibility on his siblings to get him to school, they wouldn’t have been able to leave him if he couldn’t go in.
I think you need to prepare that this might not work. Educational establishments just don’t work for some young people. Do you have a plan B?

I feel sorry for your poor DD as I imagine she really didn’t want to miss her first day back. It’s a situation she should never have been in.

Is your daughter generally good at going to school? If so, she probably thought she was doing the right thing by staying with her brother. It’s really unfair on her to miss her first day and then get yelled at after.

I see your point about wanting to start a routine of them getting the bus, but in hindsight an adult probably should have went to the stop with them to ensure they both got on the bus. If son refuses, at least then daughter still can.

Tbh, it was a big day for both of them. Huge for DS given he’s not been to school for a long time. I’d have arranged mornings off from work and taken them both in today. Yes, they’re 14. But today was really loaded. DS is autistic and recovering/managing MH issues. This was your and DH’s fault.

As parents it was totally foreseeable that DS would baulk at the enormity of it after so long and that this could put DD in a difficult position. It was your and your DH’s job to parent them - and today, that meant supporting them in getting to school.

I hope that you’ll both step up tomorrow and avoid a repeat of today.

1 you take him on the bus being clear that it a 1 off
2 get him an MP3 player for music
3 your son hit your partner he pushed him back (your words) he didn't hit him back
4 your enabling your sons behaviour
5 your son is entirely to blame for today's outcome including disrupting your dds education.
From an asd mum of an asd child

It wasn't your DP's place to shout or discipline, it should have been you taking charge of the response to their behaviour. He was absolutely in the wrong to shove DS and his shouting at DD was just appalling. I agree with other posters it was utterly unfair of the adults to put her in that position. A 14 year old can't be responsible for getting a school refuser into school - I have one, and I'd never have dreamt of asking her sibling to do that. If you didn't want to get into the habit of driving him in, you absolutely should have taken him on the bus yourself.

Why on earth didn’t you take him? He sounds able enough to understand that you take him to start with and he’ll get used to going alone.

My son started specialist secondary last year. I drove him and collected day 1. He knew the bus was the next step and had done several practice runs.

i followed the bus for two days in the car both ways. Day 4 he was travelling independently and had been ever since without incident.

Additionally why is your partner who isn’t even your child’s father getting so involved? How is this his business?

You take ds in the first week, even if you walk him all the way there. If all is good he walks from the car park week 2. Week 3 you stop outside the car park.

Meanwhile dd gets dropped at school/the bus stop as she prefers. She is not her brother's carer. You need to step up. You're not currently working. It's hard I know but work with the provision he's in. And cut dd some slack.

Frankly, if you aren’t working, I’d like to understand what you were doing which meant you couldn’t take your son to school.