since the start of the year my teenager has been getting into trouble at school.
nothing very serious - talking in class, distracting others, caught using his phone during his lunch break checking cricket scores when they are not allowed phones in school hours. This has led to him getting four demerits since Jan and a detention for the phone use. I got a message from the school to say if he gets any more sanctions he might be suspended.
Today he told me him and his friend were messing around tussling with each other and a teacher saw and he got into trouble again and has been told he’s got an after school detention next week. They will call me on Monday. This might lead to a suspension even though his friend has written a statement to say they were both messing around and it was nothing malicious.
I totally lost my shit with him because he is generally a good kid but doesn’t use his brain and gets himself into stupid situations. He voluntarily gave me his phone when he got home from school and has not asked for it back since then.
He went to the bathroom to have a shower after school and came out of the bathroom and said he had a nosebleed. I helped him as it was quite a bad nosebleed. I went into the bathroom to see the wall and mirror splattered with blood. It didn’t look right to me.
i had calmed down by then and cleaned up the blood and asked if he had hurt himself on purpose because that didn't look like a normal nosebleed and he convinced me it was and he sneezed and that’s why there was blood everywhere.
He’s just told me he was so disappointed with himself that he smacked himself and had caused the nosebleed.
I am so devastated that he’s hurt himself on purpose because of what’s happened and what I said to him.
His head of year will call me on Monday to discuss the matter. Should I tell them what happened today? Or shall I see this as a one off as self harm?
it is coming up to the one year anniversary that he saw his dad beating me up and police and social services were involved. I was hospitalised after the assault. School are aware of the situation but they don’t see it as a problem anymore because he refused to have counselling and didn’t want to talk about it with them at school. I am not making excuses for his behaviour but I’m just wondering if its something he’s been thinking about and it’s making him act out.
is there something that’s going on that’s making him act out of character. Is he going off the rails? Should I support the school with the punishment they give or defend my boy?