The EBSA support thread (emotionally based school avoidance/absence)

[BrambleyHedge]

Following this thread https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4996315-a-question-to-all-those-who-think-school-refusal-in-schools-is-increasing-due-to-lazy-enabling-parents?latest=1

I wondered if some people would welcome an EBSA support thread. I haven't seen another one so if there is already one I can delete this one. For those dealing with EBSA - I don't know about you but sometimes I just want to cry and scream with all the stress and I thought it might be healthier to write it down and share with others going through similar issues.

My son is 15 yr 11 and is currently upstairs refusing to go to his mock GCSE this morning. He is too anxious. He is only doing 5 GCSEs and has small group tutoring in his school rather than the normal classes. There are several in his year with EBSA so they have their own group. He is finally being assessed for ASD after 2.5 years in CAMHs list and also finally being assessed for EHCP after mediation due to council refusal to assess. He is what they used to call high functioning but unable to deal with education. I am practically in tears this morning trying to get him to go in. He usually doesn't go in until about 11 so this is early. He doesn't sleep.

So enough about me. If you too are having a crappy morning then please talk.

It would be good if this thread can be for those who are dealing with EBSA. Well meant advice or judgement from others may not always be welcome or helpful. I have tried literally everything over the last two years to get my son to school and am learning much of this is beyond my control. Sometimes there just isn't an answer.

I have put this in Chat for now so it gets seen. It could fit in education, SEN, or some other subjects.

@YorkshireTeaDrinker2 forgot to mention in DD's case the voices (alongside other symptoms) also led to a diagnosis of OCD, so you might want to discuss that with your health care provider.

, sympathy and solidarity. What do school hope to get out of a home visit?

@BrambleyHedge
Hand hold from me too.

I'm not sure and maybe they aren't either - maybe persuasion. They now say they will call him everyday and then discuss next steps.

@YorkshireTeaDrinker2 I read your post with much interest. I'm not sure if my son would ever have been a good fit for learning at home, but if I had my time over I would be more open to braving it before we got to the point that he is too broken to engage in it.

@BrambleyHedge I hope the visit is helpful somehow. Sometimes keeping home as a safe space away from school is valuable - this is why homework clubs get written into EHCPs. Ultimately I guess they can't force him to talk to them. You can protect him from that if you feel it's in his interests.

Too often it seems no one is really sure what to do for the best.

We had a couple of little chinks of light today.

@YorkshireTeaDrinker2 just found this thread and read your long post. My DD is year8, and hasn’t been into school since Oct, she is ND and the EHCP is in draft phase. The few 2 months out of school were very slow minimal learning just focused on recovery, basic life stuff and talking about how life can take different paths. We’ve tried out different ways of learning experimenting with live zoom, recorded lessons, in person tutor, time with me or DH, whether she likes course books(no!) and YouTube stuff (sometimes( to see how she learns best. Physical stimming is really helpful for her, voice to text software captures her thoughts which she then edits. Reading Dr Naomi Fishers book and social posts is really helpful. Finding out about all the different options for igcse she could take if /when she’s ready on a timeline that suits her. It’s not all easy and plain sailing but compared to where we were a few months ago she is so so much happier and now wanting to learn stuff. There’s loads of resources out there now for home ed some really low cost. We’ve lucky DH & I can share the load around working from home to facilitate her needs at the moment. But I can honestly say seeing the change in her I think we pulled her out just in time as she was spiralling so badly under school pressure despite a long list of adjustments they had already put in place including a 50% timetable. It’s just not the right environment for some (a lot!) kids. I just read some stats that 120k kids missing fromLA Education and at least 125k home ed but I suspect there are a lot more. The system just isn’t working for many! I hope you can find a way that works for your DD.

I would say this is unbelievable in this day and age. Shows that many people's understanding about MH problems is virtue signalling. How cruel.

Well dd has her ehcp all finalised and has the placement I want for 16+ in September.
I don't know if it will be enough but we can only but try.
This year is a total wipeout and I know GCSE wise she isn't going to do them.
But at least I have a little hope for sep, we have TAMH assessment (again) next week, then will have to wait years for any actual help like last time.

I’m still lurking not much to say here. DC still out of school. Thank goodness it’s Friday. I’m so sorry that we’re all in the same boat here but it really helps to have your company.

Hi all, another week of no school here. He is doing the schoolwork but SH and I had another row about it all yesterday, we just both feel so helpless. We are trying to access MH support but DS didn’t like the person we managed to get, so we are trying to find someone else. It is so hard - they are not even calling us back as they are all so busy.

@YorkshireTeaDrinker2 , I am looking into online schooling for DS but he has said he wants to go back to his current school - I think k I would nearly feel better if we could go down the online route and at least take the constant pressure to go into school off the table.

A group hug to all of us in this situation! Thankfully Friday. Sad I just wish the days away.

I had to nudge DD to go in for the first hour today. She wanted to go for period 2 but as she is on a reduced timetable I had to coax her to not miss even that.
It was hard for me to do it.
In the end, I left her to it and went for my GP appointment.
I dared not check my phone on the walk home to see if she had gone in.
Wanted that 15 min walk in peace...
I know you lot will get what I mean...
Xx

I think he has depression. He just won't get up and was in tears last night. School have now said we need to call CAMHs again as it is beyond what they can support with (they are right). But CAMHs just don't do anything.

@BrambleyHedge
Sorry to hear.
Unfortunately camhs tend to get involved when there is an escalation to self harm and suicidal ideation.
I know from experience as DD was referred to camhs but we didn't see them until dd took an overdose.
Are you able to see a psychologist privately? Or even a psychiatrist?
Would DS agree to therapy?

Big hugs..its awful when they are depressed. You are doing the right thing being concerned.
It took us a long time to accept DD was depressed. We just thought she was being a miserable teenager.

Xx

@DarkChocHolic We are also looking at private as I do know from past experience that what you say about CAMHs is true. I have called them anyway and they said four weeks for a call back. Just before I called them I was trying to get DS to get dressed and come for a walk with me and he was resisting. He got annoyed with me and eventually told me to eff off. Five minutes later he stormed out the house which is out of character but I figured he'd gone for walk after all and I was on the phone. I can see his location on my phone so wasn't too worried. School have just called to say he has gone up there (we live quite close) and is safe and they will call me back later. So I've no idea what is going on. He obviously told them I didn't know where he was as they wouldn't have called otherwise.

@BrambleyHedge
Can school or GP refer to early help at all?
They are a service one tier below camhs...
They can offer counselling and support. Not sure what the timelines are.
Alternately does your GP service offer anything for mental health?
Some areas have safe havens which are a walk in service for anyone aged 16+ for mental health support
They are usually open until mid night.
We were told of this by DDs mental health team.
Hopefully something similar in your area...but the challenge is always getting the young person to go to these like I found with DD
When she was in crisis.. nothing or no one could make a difference.
We had to ride out the storm.

Hope your son has come home ok?
All I know about mental health is it lingers about and haunts you for life depending on how it is handled.
Even though the pressure is on right now for GCSEs they can be deferred if necessary.
If I was in your shoes right now I would let your son have some time off, like sick leave from work. And see how he goes. Even if school are supportive it sounds like you are at max point pressure.

Thanks @Luddite26 . The school SENCO walked him home and we had a chat. She agreed he was in a bad way. I think you are right. Need to focus on mental heath.

So glad to hear he is home.
I didn't mean to sound abrupt. I wrote a long post earlier but it disappeared before I could post it. No decisions have to be made about postponing or anything right now you need a few weeks of pressure off and breathing space. So sorry for what you are going through thanks for starting this thread.x

if you can focus on mental health I really would which I know is easy to say and really scary when they are in gcse years. We’ve seen such a change in our child since removing the demand of going into school. We still have big ups and downs but the recovery from the downs is quicker, and she’s learning to talk about the hard stuff more. This morning it took her an hour to get dressed with lots of dysregulated behaviour which I mostly ignored calmly. By lunchtime she said I’m sorry I was feeling really ugh this morning and we had chat about recognising that and acknowledging it. This is huge step forward for her, previously it would last hours and we were always the bad guys but helping her learn to communicate the crap feelings is helping her then deal with them better. We have a long way to go it’s slow progress but I fear if we’d left her in school any longer she would be in an awful burnt out shut down place mentally. We also did 4 different “subjects” today two formal learning and 2 life skills stuff, plus played a board game as it was my day off work. When she was at school by the end of the day she was so shut down she would have to hide all evening in recovery before awful behaviour at bedtime and in the morning because she was so scared in the school environment. Trust your gut.

@BrambleyHedge
Glad DS is home. Hope the weekend is calm and uneventful.
You take care of yourself too.
Xx

My eldest DD in y9 (2003) had a period of refusal. She had worked so hard August birthday in every aspect of school since she started age 4. She had nearly half of y9 off and at the time I thought she was ill so treated it that way and somehow she returned in y10 and got through GCSEs without another refusal period.
Looking back with what we know now it was probably burn out.
I ended up home educating ds in 2007 because of his behaviour and constant skiving and my constantly being threatened with court. That was my first experience with home ed and it was pretty positive just managing him until he was old enough to work no more school phone calls!
Then dd2 always pretty anxious from play group onwards. But was pretty ok through primary with periods of absence with illness but a family trauma occurred when she was in y7 and by y8 she was refusing to go.
After the usual noises of support she was transferred to the hospital school. Went to cahms nothing of relevance and was discharged.
Settled at the hospital school but by February they said she was ok to go back to school no choice for anything else came home after 2 days and everything was back to square one. So withdrew to home ed. So she had the rest of y8, y9 and y10 home ed then we found an early college transfer and she did that in y11 not perfect but she went and passed her GCSEs.
Then she had a couple of years working and went back did an access course then a degree. Home ed really prepped her for independent learning.
Fast forward to GS1 always good attendance but not great experiences with school. Got to y8 always in some form of trouble and the hoy turned and said everyone is sick of GS1 well he was in a state it was like he could just not do anything right ever. I thought I was going to find that he'd took his own life when I got to his house but thankfully he hadn't he was a broken mess and we said enough is enough. I feel like some of these academies are run like prisons. So we withdrew him to home ed. Managing his behaviour and keeping away from gangs etc is our priority along with MH.
Then GS 2 started reception in September. He had been to nursery since 5 months old - except in 2020 with COVID. - no problems whatsoever.
Anyway he reported that he'd been hit by a couple of peers most days and we tried the usual tell the teacher hit them back. He's a very big boy so people would expect he could do this . On top we have suspected and HV was pushing for a diagnosis of high functioning autism. School was pretty much exhausting and all consuming for him even though he was doing well and loving the school community this boy was bullying him in all aspects saying his writing was scruffy calling him fat blah blah. One day he came home and said he had been beaten up by this kid and his cousin to the point of being knocked out red marks all over his body. I emailed school and the next day went in and they said they'd sort it out it happened again.
Christmas came and he started back Monday and Tuesday fine got to Wednesday said he wasn't going. He said he had been hit every day by this kid since he started and wasn't going any more. So he didn't go Wednesday, Thursday he wouldn't speak the whole morning refusing to go. His mum got him in Friday and he was ok but still got punched by the child.
Monday came refusing to go. We kept giving him the option for a couple of weeks to go and to see what school would help with. Admitted child was a problem hitting kids all the time but couldn't do anything. Anyway we set him up with home ed and withdrew his. If we kept it going I think it would have been so debilitating for him.
We are so angry that this has happened to a 5 year old and feel sad that was his experience when he had so looked forward to school. But onwards and upwards he's doing really well learning to read and having more time to do his writing etc being left handed. He's really thriving and isn't as exhausted as he was every school day. We are just taking each day as it comes he's still upset and actually angry himself about the bullying boy but GS2s MH is priority and his education and so many times schools show they are not showing that every child matters.
And even though I know you are always trying to do the best thing for your child you face so much judgement from those who really don't matter.
Home ed is a great buzz these days though so much support and resources.
Solidarity to all going through this you know your child best and be kind to yourselves.

Thank you for posting all that @Luddite26 . It really does help to hear from people who've trodden this path and don't have the trepidation of it that we do.

Thanks @Piony it's so sad how so many children are feeling so isolated through the school system.
I was a school governor at 2 schools in the 00s and I think that added to my disillusionment of the system.
I don't want to sound like some anti school campaigning Home Ed looney Che Guevara but looking back on some children's mental health and the roles schools played in it makes me really angry.
And speaking about it openly people switch off and think you are a non conforming extremist. But it's a child's mental health that is so important because that is the long term and the damage that school can do to some children is life long.
And some children can become school refusers and magically re-enter as though nothing had happened months or years later.
Support for kids and parents - and I might say mostly mums cos this can cause trouble between parents and dad's aren't always on board which makes it so much harder - is what gets you through.

Don't feel alone and don't feel rubbish always remember you didn't have your child for them to feel so rubbish in life and MH is like a physical illness. Sometimes kids just need to know it's ok to feel like they do and it's not their fault for feeling like that. School cancelled feel like such a hostile environment.

A lovely education welfare officer came out to us a couple of weeks ago and said remember with home ed you can go out for walks and bake and cook and do things you enjoy. Learning is everywhere.

@Luddite26

Great post. Thankyou

Wishing everyone who has children at home with EBSA well this week. Mondays are difficult.