Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Should I remove DS (11) from school? (Bullying)

95 replies

ClaireD2212 · 06/02/2016 00:45

Hi, sorry if this is in the wrong place, I'm new to Mumsnet. If it is, I'll delete it and put it somewhere else :)

I just have no idea who to turn to anymore, no one is listening to me, or my poor DS. Here's the story:

DS started Secondary School, in September, he was getting on well (so I thought) but during the Christmas Break, he came to me and just broke down. He explained to me how he couldn't go back to school and he can no longer deal with it anymore... I asked him why, etc. he explained that there is a 'gang' of people - some are in his year and they age all the way up to Yr 11 and they have been picking on him. They have been calling him names (he is quite small for his age) and sometimes even physically hit him, I told him that things will be okay and I would sort it.

We went up to the school (I had an appointment with his Form Tutor, after Christmas) he said that he'll put in a 'Bullying Report' and that was it. DS went back to school and when he got home, I asked him how it went and he said that everything was much better. I thought it was fantastic how quickly the school resolved things.

However, 2 weeks later, I was borrowing my son's laptop and there was a lot of history linking to many Tumblr pages - some about anorexia/self-harm/suicide, etc. this worried me a lot and when DS came home, I spoke to him about it and he said he was just looking at all different Tumblr sites, but I wasn't happy with that and I said I would rather he now used his laptop in the living room. That was that, I thought I would see how things went. A few days later, I was sorting out some of his Christmas bits, in his draw I found a pencil sharpener blade (it was loose, not inside a sharpener) and then I got a call saying that DS hadn't turned up to school. My heart sunk and I drove up to the school and explained the things I had found (I was thinking the worst) but then I got a call from him and he was asking me to come and pick me up, so I went and got him and he broke down and told me that things weren't better at school, but he didn't want me to worry. We had an appointment with the Head and Pastoral. They were both really nice and said he could be with them at break/lunch, while they sorted through everyone involved and got him to speak to a lady from the YMCA charity. However, no child was excluded.

Self-harming became a very frequent thing (with my 11, ELEVEN year old son) and this is when he got a CAMHS referral - we are still waiting to be seen. DS went back to school and, what the KS3 Pastoral described, 'had a mental breakdown' saying that 'no one is helping him', 'no one has stopped them tearing him apart' and I was called to collect him and take him to the hospital, which I did, he was assessed by CAMHS there and then said he would be followed up in the commuinity, this was yesterday. I'm just so lost. I cannot watch my child suffer like this, but I don't know what to do - he is locked away in his bedroom and doesn't want to leave and when he does, he will just sit and hug me and that's all he is doing. Does anyone have any advise? Sorry that it's so long, but I didn't want to have to keep adding bits :(

OP posts:
silversparrow · 06/02/2016 14:45

Please help him move schools and don't send him back.

I was bullied for 5 years of high school. It was hell. By year11 my confidence was in tatters and I had severe anxiety and social phobia. It took 10years of therapy and meds to rebuild my confidence.

PosieReturningParker · 06/02/2016 14:45

Trust your gut.

ClaireD2212 · 06/02/2016 19:08

Thanks everyone, I have told him he won't be going back, I see a change in him already

OP posts:
starry0ne · 06/02/2016 19:31

Fantastic.. the next few days I am sure will reinforce your decision... However he still needs to recover...

AMouseLivedinaWindMill · 06/02/2016 19:55

Hoorarh!!

bless him! imagine the weight lifted from him knowing he does not have to run that gauntlet and face that misery every day.

adults cant cope with it i dont know why children are expected too.

good for you op....

Sadmum19 · 06/02/2016 20:36

It honestly brought a tear to my eye reading this thread. I despair that so many people have had these horrible experiences. What makes these kids think it's acceptable to destroy other kids like this?

Claire - I've no advice but offering a big virtual hug for you and your boy.

ClaireD2212 · 06/02/2016 20:38

Thanks a lot xx

OP posts:
londonrach · 06/02/2016 20:48

No advice op but you doing the right thing to remove him. Flowers to your son and yourself x

What2 · 06/02/2016 20:51

Good luck OP. I hope everything works out for your DS. He is so young Sad

longtimelurking · 06/02/2016 21:20

Larger schools simply can't guarantee safety and some are simply not interested in even attempting to do so. Bullying policies amount to lip service really and all the while his mental health is suffering badly.

I think parents are bullied into believing children simply must go to school regardless and end up sending kids in despite their best instincts. As an adult would you tolerate having to go to work every day knowing you had no control over your day and at any moment you would be physically and emotionally abused and nobody would help you??? But despite the fact they are less resilient we expect children to put up with exactly this situation for years on end because they must go to school.

I would pull him out ASAP and emphasize to him that you are doing this because the school isn't good enough to have him and this is not his fault.

IguanaTail · 06/02/2016 21:34

Larger schools simply can't guarantee safety

No school can guarantee safety. You can't guarantee human behaviour.

longtimelurking · 06/02/2016 21:39

Well thank you captain obvious, you wrote the exact same sentence on the previous page as well but I'm sure reading it a second time in bold will make it all the more interesting and relevant.

I will concede I could have phrased my post better but I think the point I was making is quite clear and certainly it is my experience that the larger schools struggle more.

IguanaTail · 06/02/2016 21:42

Well it clearly wasn't obvious enough for you. The size of the school doesn't matter - it's the procedures and systems in place. Dunblane was tiny.

How many schools have you worked in as a member of staff?

longtimelurking · 06/02/2016 22:04

Fuck my life... are you seriously comparing the duty to manage behavior and bullying with a preventing acts of terrorism ? I would suggest there isn't much that can be done about a nutter with a gun running riot but there are plenty of options to deal with bullies.

I've stated my opinion on the issue and I'm not getting involved any further as you have picked out one badly phrased line and decided to take issue with it rather than the overall message conveyed in my post.

I'm glad to see OP has decided not to send him back and I wish more parents were brave enough to make such a decision. It really isn't easy as we are conditioned to think school is mandatory and the sky will fall in if we don't comply, when in reality there are other options which suit some children much better.

IguanaTail · 06/02/2016 22:10

I'm referring to safeguarding generally. You seem not to be following. I'm not clear what experience you have of safety within schools but you seem to be getting very aggressive so let's leave it. A lot of parents feel that schools should be able to vouch totally for their child's safety - it comes up regularly. Lots can be put in place, certainly. Schools learn through incidents such as Dunblane, how to improve their safeguarding. Currently schools are being advised on considering how to "lock-down" in situations like this. Safeguarding has many forms, bullying is one angle definitely and there are many more.

ClaireD2212 · 06/02/2016 23:56

The school did fail my son, though. He picked out a boy 'as they asked him to' and one of there answers was "no way, I think there's a boy similar to him , but not him, he's lovely"

OP posts:
katemiddletonsothermum · 07/02/2016 00:26

My DD was being bullied in Year 8. I spoke to the head of year who said "What? XXXXX? I can't believe that, she's a model pupil."

My DS is getting some persistent low-level bullying. I spoke to his teacher who said that she'd already had to deal with this boy in an incident with another boy. His PE teacher asked me if my DS was OK so I mentioned the bullying. He said "That's good isn't it? If that boy's been bullying other people then you don't have to take it personally."

Some teachers can be complete fuckwits sometimes.

fuzzpig · 07/02/2016 01:05

Oh OP. I haven't RTFT but I see you have told him he's not going back so that's brilliant. Give yourself time to just chill and watch your boy relax and become himself again.

I took my DCs out of school last year and never looked back. There is nothing more important than their mental health and it's turned around since they were taken away from the environment that terrified them (bullying was a big part of the issue for DD especially - school did fuck all despite our repeated efforts, and I've found out that the bully is just ). It's had a lasting impact - a little while ago DD was watching some film with a scene involving bullying, and she was distraught that night, saying how it brought all those feelings back. Seeing her relive it just made me all the more relieved that we'd got her out of there.

One of DCs' friends was taken out of school when they were found attempting suicide due to bullying. They were 8 years old. It happens. A lot, it seems. :(

Some people told us that by removing DD we were just 'letting the bully win'. You know what though, I do not even vaguely care about that. DD is happier, she's safer, she's got heaps of friends who value her for who she is and who would never hurt her. She's not seeing bullying and violence being tolerated or ignored by the adults who are supposed to look after her. And because of all that, she's able to learn and enjoy education again too. If it's got to be a competition, I reckon DD's come out as the winner. Wink She's not really lost anything by leaving that school, but all in all she's gained a whole lot of happiness :)

fuzzpig · 07/02/2016 01:08

Forgot to finish my sentence in the second paragraph... I've since found out that the bully has just moved on... and on... and on through different victims. My DD's old school friends are still in the same class - DD has been out nearly a year, and apparently they STILL haven't done anything.

PomBearWithAnOFRS · 07/02/2016 03:28

Go Claire
That's how I felt with my DS. It was like I got my son back, from the moment I said he would never have to go back there again. We agreed that no matter what happened, even with a "worst case scenario" of no qualifications and living at home with me for the rest of his life Grin that was better than the alternative (which I still try not to think of, but just know deep down he was contemplating :( ) he was safe...
As it turned out, the more we looked into it, at leisure, in safety, there were LOTS of alternatives to mainstream education and, even with an extremely small budget and not a great deal of support/assistance, we managed and he is now in full time work, with qualifications, and can work towards more whenever he chooses.
There are always options and you and your DS can and will get through this. DS will always remember that you did what he needed at this time too Grin
Good luck, and if I can be of any help (up to and including a virtual ear for ranting or coming to take you out to get sloshed and hurl abuse at people Grin just let me know!)

New posts on this thread. Refresh page
Swipe left for the next trending thread