AuDHD child gone from hating school to only wanting to be there.

[Quokkafeet]

I'm just having the worst weekend with my AuDHD 9 year old DS. We have a long history of extreme meltdowns and hating school. He started taking medication (medikinet) in the holidays. It seems to be going well, though we are still having huge meltdowns in evenings and weekends.

His new teacher reports he's "fine". He's sitting on the carpet, he's doing his learning. He is having some social issues at break time (though teacher didn't know about this). Tbh I left the meeting with his teacher feeling totally confused as years of difficulties have apparently magically disappeared. I felt his teacher thought I was a bit mad when discussing the issues at home and asking things like "how do you deal with that? What strategies do you use to calm him down?" And I had to say some days nothing calms him down, we just have to ride it out.

At weekends and after school, we can get him to do nothing. He spent all yesterday in his pajamas. He just wants to be on the computer, which we limit. This morning, I have turned it off and he's gone absolutely mad (yes I use countdown timer, it makes no difference, if there's time left on the timer he's fine until it runs out and then he explodes)

He has been screaming, crying, throwing himself down the stairs saying he wants to be at school. He just wants to be at school. I am at a complete loss. He cannot explain why he wants to be at school, he's just "fine" there.

For years we spent weekends with him dreading school. Now we apparently have a child that is genuinely fine for everyone but us. I can't even explain it as masking because he himself would rather be at school. Just wtf! I am absolutely shattered. We have poured so much of ourselves into supporting DS it just feels neverending.

Has anyone heard of this reaction to medication before? Or had an autistic child that wants to only be at school?

It sounds like he enjoys the ridgid expectations he has in school where he knows what he is meant to be doing at all times and the day is clearly planned out.

Have you tried setting out a full day schedule in the morning on the weekends so he knows what will happen and when. E.g computer until 11am and then we will do [activity] until 12:30 then lunch etc.

If he is just being told "turn it off in 10 mins" but then he's left to find something to do afterwards he might be frustrated that he is stopping with no reason or replacement so struggles with it.

Is he taking the meds at weekends too? The meltdowns will always happen at home as the meds wear off and there's the exhaustion of making all day (although it doesn't feel like masking as such whilst on the meds). Plus when the meds wear off it's really hard to transition from being able to do stuff to being unable. Plus some meds (in my case medicine but can vary person to person) caused a come down akin to what people have from illegal drugs. He might need to try a different type of medication. At the moment it sounds like the calm and ability he feels with the meds in his system he is associating with school so of course he wants to be there as that's where he feels more capable.

This does make total sense. What I think is confusing is he has always railed against being scheduled in any way at the weekend and refuses to go out and see people. We had made plans for this afternoon and it was collecting conkers at a local park so nothing major or demanding. He wants to drill holes in them and play conkers. So we made that plan and said we'd go after lunch. Now that's closer he says he "doesn't know" if he wants to go. This is the hard thing, he never refuses, he says he doesn't know. This means he isn't calmed by saying "that's fine, we can stay here" that's the most draining part, the going/ not going can last hours.

We are currently taking them every day as we're in titration but thank you, that is an effect that makes sense. Some days he does refuse the meds so it isn't totally consistent which I know isn't ideal.

I was going. to suggest a timetable for home too. It will hopefully get easier as he gets older and can tell you more but right now he probably doesn't know himself why he is so upset. And a timetable can in itself be a demand which adds it's own pressure so maybe put the order of events but no timings, for example.

I can only suggest lots of downtime, little routines eg go out to buy the same cake for lunch every Saturday, learn about his interest so you can talk about them endlessly, which you probably do anyway.

This too shall pass. It's always a phase even at 9. For today, you just have to get through today.

It could well be the structure at school that he enjoys.

They pretty much know exactly what they'll be doing and when.

There's little autonomy so they don't feel overwhelmed with decision making.

It sounds like it's transitions that he struggles with the most - I'm similar. I don't want to leave the house, but once I'm out I don't want to come home.

Predictability is the best thing to help with it, so routine really does help. "We will start getting ready at 12:45 and set off at 1pm to go find conkers" is better than "later this afternoon" as you can get stuck in "limbo" between tasks and it's really hard to break out of it.

Another big tip is "the illusion of choice". Don't ask "do you want to go or not", ask "do you want to wear the red shoes or the green shoes". He will feel some level of control over his surroundings while still having clear expectations and knowledge of what's happening.

Thank you. It's really interesting you identify with the feeling, thanks for sharing that.

I know it will pass. I just feel with DS we solve one thing and then he changes. It never really passes, just gets replaced with a new really challenging phase.

The thing with medication and behaviour change
( or other strategies or natural supplements) is that it can be so difficult to pinpoint how much is the medication/ strategy and how much is natural progress or outside influences.

In Primary you can have good years and horrendous years. Much can depend on the staff and their teaching style and strategies.
Whilst there should be consistency across school individual personalities will have an impact.
Is the teacher new? There should have been a good transition and maybe a one page profile.
Early days yet in his new class but maybe he is now masking in school and then letting out his frustrations etc at home. This is so common.

I’d see how things are at half term and arrange a meeting with the SENCO and teacher.
Does he have an EHCP?

As PPs have said it’s far more structured in school. Sounds like he can get anxious about going somewhere or doing something and faces overwhelm. In school, whilst he may suppress the anxiety, there’s an expectation it’s break, lunch, PE, assembly and everyone goes at a set time.

At home you could introduce more rigidity with elements of choice to give him some control. For e.g. we are going out at 1 do you want to collect conkers or go to the park or do you want to collect conkers before or after lunch?

Fo you have an area he can go to to calm? Look at The incredible 5 point scale resources.

I agree with @DoAWheelie - the population I work with have learning disabilities in addition, but it is incredibly common for them to spiral during unstructured time because they don't know what to do or for how long, and when the next demand (or "demand" - to someone else going to the toilet or getting dressed or having a drink/ meal might not be a demand) will hit.

A timetable for the day might help.

What we find is that makes it worse for a couple of weeks as the timetable is new and change is hard, but then its unimaginablably better.

We use visual timetables, but it's absolutely fine to use a written one if your child would have no issues accessing written information and feel less babied/ patronised with a written schedule.

If he can tell the time, include times.
We use photos of the actual wall clock for some people and just a sequence for others (but supported by timers or us adapting tasks or whatever to work around fixed timings like going home).

A timetable would include broad steps - get up (time)
shower
get dressed
breakfast
read one chapter of school book or similar
drink
computer time (45 minutes or whatever specified)
Snack (choices specified) and drink
walk the dig with dad
set the table/ help parent make lunch
lunch
choice of (insert analogue freetime activity he likes - lego/ jigsaw/playing music - with timer or if that's too freeform a jigsaw start to finish, a model following instructions start to finish, if he'll tolerate these being deconstructed later in the week)

and so on.

This is rigid and limiting as one parent has to follow the plan with him, but what we find is you can reintroduce planned spontaneity (as in let him know a few days before that this Saturday will be different and prepare him for the alternative plan - visit grandparents, specified day out or whatever) and it will eventually be possible.

For us it takes about a year for everything to get onto an even keel where a young person has been really spiralling, but our young people have additional issues so hopefully your son won't take as long.

Good luck

Unfortunately that's the reality of any ND person. As a child you are the one to manage it all, as an adult this will be his his life. It's hard, exhausting and unrelenting. But as a ND mother bringing up two ND daughters, there ARE some periods of calm and things DO get easier. I've had a child who I've been to hell and back with and now at nearly 18 she is so independent and focussed. I've just managed to get my other child back in school after 18 months. I'm enjoying this period of calm whilst I can and I urge you to do the same when you can also xx

Thanks so much for these really informative posts.

To answer questions. Yes it's a new teacher. He should have had a handover but I have a feeling he took DS at face value and didn't realise how complex he is until I went in to see him this week. Tbh I feel like I've gone back to before he was diagnosed, trying to convince the school there is actually a bigger issue than they are seeing.

He doesn't have an EHCP. His previous teacher suggested we apply this term. She doesn't know if he would meet the criteria but felt it would be worth applying as she said he was reliant on the support and interventions she puts in place, and that there was no protection for these interventions as no EHCP. By interventions, what she meant was movement/ sensory breaks, emotion check-ins, access to inside during break time if he needed to come away from others, ELSA. His new teacher reports he doesn't need movement breaks as he is sitting and focussing absolutely fine. DS is now in agreement. His teacher told me ok Friday that DS has told him that things he found difficult last year, he doesn't find difficult anymore.

Obviously this could all be the medication, but what I wasn't expecting was that the medication would make him so "fine" on the surface that other support would be taken away - but maybe that's ok, because the meds are doing the job instead?

I would absolutely have said he was masking and releasing at home , like he did all through reception to year 3, were it not for the fact he now wants to go in, isn't resisting in the mornings, and is saying he genuinely FEELS fine in school.

I'm not neurodivergent so I can't really relate. I just always assumed masking would feel costly, or uncomfortable, while he was masking.

@Wechsel , the weekend timetable is a really good suggestion and I will start doing that. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm so glad your daughter is doing so well, that's wonderful. X