AIBU to let my Year 10 child miss school sometimes?

Were they 15 at the time? Think on for a minute about the logistics of that?

DD2 was 5'7" in Y7. A couple of times (on the advice of school) we did bodily (between us) force her into school. After she ran away from home and disappeared for an hour, and the other time did that from school, we thought her safety and wellbeing came above attendance. Plus it went against every fibre of my being to force her in, it felt like abuse.

I agree with this. If you project the idea that they are not strong enough and that they should avoid anxiety they will become anxious about anxiety itself.

OP, don't let anyone make you feel like a bad parent. Unless you've been through it, you can't possibly understand.

Just to add to my previous post, my DS attended a specialist college in Y11 which went well but all fell apart again when he went to mainstream college the year after. There is help out there.

If you let them pick and choose what days they go in now, you are sending the message that they can do what they want. Colleges do not tolerate absences in the same way schools do and your child could end up being kicked off their course.

I think you should work with the school. See if they can offer alternative ways of learning, eg watching videos not reading books, that might suit your DC better. And can your DC drop a couple of subjects and focus on the rest?
Skipping something they don't like is not a great approach to life and it's always harder to go back after time off.

Its a good point and I think sometimes people parrot “resilience” without engaging with what that actually means.

As a general rule instilling the idea that kids can’t opt out of school or anything else which is hard is important. Nine times out of ten a child just needs to be made to show up and get on with it.

But there are sometimes scenarios where school triggers a serious trauma response and a child can’t cope. The difference isn’t always clear. Which is where the therapist comes in.

As others have said I would lean heavily on the school for support.

My child had school anxiety for about 6 months. Crying, screaming, refusing to go. I ensured they attended every single day, they realised there was nothing to be fearful of eventually and they got beyond it. Happy, settled, academic high achiever now.

The very worst thing to teach a child is that avoiding something that they find hard is ok.

What support is in place for your child in school?

DD2's attendance at secondary school was <50%, she has AuADHD and we ended up withdrawing her and she completed her education at online school and took GCSEs as a private candidate at an exam centre.

She started her job in September and has not missed a single shift.

It seems that something else is going on, which is not "lack of resilience". Like secondary schools not being fit for purpose and creating mental health problems for perfectly healthy, resilient, well behaved children who want to learn. She had only the odd day off for illness throughout primary school and always had good reports. She would have full on panic attacks about going to secondary school and developed anxiety and depression. She would try so hard to attend for a time and then burn out. As soon as we withdrew her from school she started to become herself again, much more mentally and physically well and her usual sunny self.

'The drive from within' is a ridiculous statement for any y10 child, let alone one that is suffering additional struggles. Best to teach resilience now, yabu.

Have you actually spoken to the school about this?

While your child might not want to do A levels, college can be more strict regarding attendance, even if they end up doing a level 2 course. The colleges near me do not chase absences and if your child doesn't attend and is therefore not meeting the requirements they generally get kicked off the course. So it's not ideal to get your son into the habit of thinking attendance is not compulsory.

Depends on the child. I routinely missed a week of school every month from 10-18 due to such intense period pains I couldn’t walk, let alone go to school. I still did incredibly well. But I was motivated and happy (no mental health issues).

I can’t say what I would do in your situation, but my child’s motivation and ability to self study would be a huge factor in my decision.

If they are missing school in an important exam year, they may not get into college to do the course they want. My DD was ok with school but still wanted to go to college rather than A levels and uni, she wanted to be a hairdresser so did college and apprenticeship route. To get into any course she still needed to pass a certain number of exams. I think this is still the same now as her step son has just started college and had to get a certain grade to get in.

Have you had a meeting with the school SENDCo and/or the Head of Year about this? Ideally bringing your child along and asking them to articulate exactly what they are finding so difficult.

The school should work with you to find solutions and lighten the load, but they can't do that if they don't know what the problem is and parents aren't communicating with them.

I do think that giving your child the message that it's ok to opt out when things are difficult is wrong.

To add, is it the school environment itself, and might they find the more relaxed environment of college better?

Sorry OP but this is unreasonable. You have two options, push to get DC the support they need at school so they can attend and do their GCSEs, or home school them. They will be missing so much GCSE preperation which is setting them up to fail and likely have to do retakes, which will be even more stress. Not every kid works to the same timeline, I did my A levels later than my peers and went to uni later, but if this is what you are thinking for DC you need an actual plan. Apprenticeships need English and Maths GCSE, so they won't even be able to take ab alternative plan to academics if you go down this route.

OP sympathy: I have friends who are going through this. I think you may have had more empathy if you had framed your initial post differently.

What you seem to be describing is EBSA based on mental health issues which is a very different ballgame to just “lacking motivation”.

The responses you have had so far seem to assume lax parenting as opposed to dealing with an underlying emotional problem. “Resilience” is a very overused word at the moment and while I do think its important to push through sometimes many children are at the moment really struggling at school and its not always that simple.

In your situation you possibly do need to accept that your child cannot always face school. But the therapy will be your guiding light here.

Good luck. In both the cases I know the children did eventually get past it.

Bloody hell, I have a colleague like this and it has a massive impact on the the rest of us...she only turns up when it suits her or she's had a calm weekend (or whatever). The rest of us have to pickup the workload and/or drop everything to run a meeting for 80 people we haven't prepared for!

Like everyone else has said, school is not optional, as many things in life aren't. Work with the school to get a plan to ensure your child is at school every day, especially as GCSEs are imminent.

To add, when my son chooses not to go to school, I don’t put pressure on him to go but we have very clear boundaries re what he can do. Sleeping, reading, bake, walk, play the piano, school work. There are no phones or gaming, he doesn’t even ask for them he just recuperates, usually now chooses to catch up on school work, and then he’s recovered enough to go back the following day.

I absolutely think you are taking the right approach, said as the aunt of my dear dear niece who took her own life at 15 last year because the pressure of school was simply too much to cope with anymore. Not everyone is academic and school is not the only path for children today.
My own eldest is autistic. Sometimes he goes to school. Sometimes he doesn’t but he’s working very hard for his gcses. He is learning his own needs and we are helping him do that. I have no doubt he will go out into the world, a kind, hardworking human, and this is the path he needs to get him there.
I too struggled with school back when I was there and my psychologist mother allowed me days off and helped me through. I am now a lawyer and cope perfectly fine with life, I think because I was shown respect and compassion and taught to understand my own needs as well as respect what needs to be done and what’s optional.

You didn't mention anything about self harm in your post. Your "seeing a therapist" was following skipping school information.

It could be an educational psychologist you are seeing as MN commonly use therapist to cover everything from life coach to psychiatrist. If your child is self harming, it is a qualified psychologist or psychiatrist you need.

It feels like you’re being kind but you will do him a bigger favour by reminding him that school’s not optional at this stage and we all need to do things we don’t want to do.

I spent two years of secondary school not wanting to be there. I was from a small primary school and secondary school felt huge and scary. I was shy and afraid of getting detention, doing the wrong thing etc. Most mornings I’d tell my mum I had a stomach ache (not lying, I was nervous which gave me one!) and after checking it wasn’t something awful, she’d remind me that school is important, and off you go basically. I’m unbelievably glad now that she did. I got good qualifications and was the first person in my family to go to uni (nearly 40 years ago). More than that though, I learned that pushing on through mild anxiety builds resilience and that I’m capable of far more than I had thought. I really believe that learning how to build resilience in younger years makes for happier adulthoods.