Son & PRU

[DrainedNFedUp]

In desperate need of help and advice, I don’t really have anyone in real life I can speak to.

I am going to be as transparent as possible with this, there will be no drip feeding. So therefore it’s going to be quiet a long one.

I’m a single parent to my son who is age 13 years of age, I spilt with his father 9 years ago, because I wasn’t happy with his criminal activity, I am going to get into it now.

My sons father was jailed 2 years ago and he will not be coming home until my son is in his 20s.

He has been in prison a many times before, but charges have always been dismissed or he has gotten not guilty at trial, so his stays haven’t been long.

The majority of the time, I liaised with him and we both agreed to tell our son that he was “away” either working abroad or his native country. Which did work, because he would still provide the expensive clothes, gifts and money for days out and holidays etc from in prison.

The last two times, I refused to lie. I had had enough covering from him, and making out that he is a saint when he isn’t. DS finding out the truth did hurt him, but his father would always assure him that everything would be alright and that he would be home soon, and throw money at my son to make him feel better.

He promised my son that he would never go back to prison again, and my son believed him and that if he did, he would never speak to him and not want him to be his dad anymore.

So since he got convicted my sons behaviour has gone down hill. He has gone from that kind, humble (despite being spoilt rotten from his dad) caring and generous, to the complete opposite.

He has been permanently excluded from 3 schools, the first was his primary school. He was permanently excluded from his secondary school on the 6th week of him attending.

Fighting, bullying, being disrespectful to teachers, the last straw was him violently attacking a teacher. I managed to find him another school that would take him, three wouldn’t.

My son has always had the ability to make new friends and fit into friendship groups very easily, but I found out that at the second school, he was using money to buy friends. I was very disappointed in him, because I didn’t understand why he felt the need to do that. Before finding out from him that he just wanted to help them because their parents don’t have a lot of money.

Good few weeks, no complaints, I was beginning to think this was the start of him settling down.

Permanently excluded again, an attack on a student, teacher and damage to window.

He now attends a PRU, I am really not happy because the school is full of children with behavioural problems, so my child is not going to change.

There have been a few incidents just to name a few

1. He went on a school trip, my child decided that he wanted to come home, I receive a phone call saying he has run away and that they’re trying to find him. I am sat at home frantic, school doesn’t allow children to bring in mobile phones, so no way off contacting him. Luckily he found his way home. Resulted in a 3 day exclusion

1. My son was rude to and used foul language towards a younger teaching assistant, reason behind this he made an appropriate comments towards me and asked my son if I was single. Which is totally unacceptable, when I raised this with the head teacher I was told that there was no one around at the time (so basically my son is a liar) my son wouldn’t lie about something like that. Resulted in a 2 day exclusion

1. Teacher wouldn’t let my son out of the classroom to use the toilet; so he climbed out of the window and urinated behind some bins in the playground (classroom was on the ground floor? I don’t agree with him doing this; but I believe he should have allowed to go. Resulted in a 3 day exclusion which I think it ridiculous and a very farfetched

My son threatened to bring a knife to school and kill a teaching assistant (he has admitted) his reason behind it, said teacher is always singling him out and saying that he will not be going on the school trip, he has complained to me about this previously, I told him to ignore the teacher and that I’ll take him.

This incident happened on Tuesday was called to collect him, but due to the school strikes, I’m yet to hear back from school.

AIBU is to just withdraw him from the PRU and home school him, because his behaviour is just going from bad to worst.

Thanks for taking the time out to read this, much appreciated.

Me too.
don’t feed it, people.

Hi op
he sounds very unhappy and these of behaviours are his display.
he must have real feelings of abandonment by his dad. Promising to his child he wouldn’t go to prison again then disappearing for years must be devastating for him.
is there any charity that supports children of prisoners that you could access.
children do well when they can and at the moment he can’t xx

Oh come on it is funny tho

The new Charles Bronson taking shape before our eyes

@Scrambledchickens

Thanks, I appreciate your kindness.

Hopefully during therapy we will be able to get to the bottom of this.

@potniatheron

Can you please stop accusing me of lying/trolling. It’s taken a lot of me to open up and tell you things that people in real life aren’t aware of.

Name changed for this for obvious reasons. To those out there thinking that this post may be a troll, I’m sorry to say that I meet parents/students like this daily.
Unfortunately there is often very little we can do by way of support and assistance as they do not see certain behaviours as wrong and are unwilling to accept that their child needs boundaries and the parents themselves feel differently to the suggestions we make to improve things.

OP, the money coming from “uncles” is likely to be from “the firm”, money from the continued “business” whilst dad is inside or possibly ongoing “reward payments” because he didn’t grass, taking the time without implicating anyone else. In essence this is a form of “grooming” because the “uncles” are showing your son that the money is easy and can bring about a comfortable lifestyle… they will want to draw him in and he will aspire to this regardless of how much you say he doesn’t. In the circles he’s mixing in at the moment, there’s no embarrassment within students that a parent is inside, in fact unbelievably, there’s a lot of kudos depending on how long they’ve got and what it was for, this will be further exaggerated by the fact that he has regular money being given to him, and he can buy the best of everything.

OP I can’t really give you any advice further to previous posts. Apart from the idea that £10 is not enough money to buy drugs and that he’s only 13 and doesn’t know anything about them.
I don’t know whether your boy is involved with this, maybe not, but it won’t take long. I’m assuming you’ve heard of a “10bag”…. It’s exactly what it’s name describes a bag of weed for £10. The youngest child I have had to deal with in my place of work, smoking weed is 11 years of age, so yours will not be immune to this or the possible pressure from his peers.
Can I suggest to you that you allow him a pre-paid cash debit card. You can credit it with money and he can use it to buy lunch, drinks etc. You will then be able to monitor his spending and he will not be able to give CASH away, he will still be able to buy snacks for friends though, just won’t be able to give cash amounts away.

Please do try to rein you boy in before it’s too late, previous posters have said, he’ll likely end up next door to his dad…. I’m sorry to say, that if a concerted effort is not made by you to effectively parent and create strong boundaries, this outcome becomes, in my (15yrs) working experience, highly likely. He is very lucky at this point that no-one has pressed charges regarding the physical assaults.

Good luck with the therapy I sincerely hope you get to the bottom of some of the issues.
Also, please take on board advice and support from the PRU and other agencies involved.
All the best.

@ImeetparentslikethisDAILY

Thank you, I really appreciate you commenting. It’s very upsetting that people here think I’m lying. I don’t have anyone to speak to in real life, because as you can imagine it’s very embarrassing at my end.

I am using this site as a safe haven, here I can let out everything.

People think (and hope) you’re lying because people are horrified by such an ineffective, passive and damaging parent being real

Why haven't MNHQ posted on this thread, I wonder?

For the benefit of anyone actually concerned about children having too much cash.

www.nspcc.org.uk/what-is-child-abuse/types-of-abuse/gangs-criminal-exploitation/

@Dinopawus

My child is never going to be exploited/recruited by anyone. He is NOT a silly boy.

There are no problems at home, as you can see I love him very much.

We do not live in gang territory neither, my son doesn’t know anyone around here, except for neighbours.

My child doesn’t want for nothing, everything has always been handed to him on a plate and I will continue to do so, until he gets a job and earns his own money, and still then I will give him a top up.

Information may come in handy for other people here.

I find it very ridiculous how people here have assumed my son is into gangs, smoking weed and climbing out of his three-storey bedroom window at night, to go and “meet people”

Denial isn't just a river in Egypt.

It's like a Greek tragedy unfolding, with the seemingly oblivious lead character (Mum) making a catalogue of errors that the audience (PPs) can clearly see with lead to a tragic outcome (avoidable, were it not for lead character's monomaniacal fallibility and myopia.
@DrainedNFedUp what about grandparents and/or extended family? Does your son have NO positive role models in his life???

Jesus wept...

I think we might as well give up, fellow Mumsnetters, as @DrainedNFedUp is clearly a fantasist...

My child is never going to be exploited/recruited by anyone. He is NOT a silly boy.

Unless you're checking his devices, you don't know that. It's nothing to do with being a silly boy. A very savvy student of mine was groomed online last year. The repercussions of that have been huge.

There are no problems at home, as you can see I love him very much.

Love isn't always enough. Kids need boundaries and to be challenged about their behaviour too.

My child doesn’t want for nothing, everything has always been handed to him on a plate and I will continue to do so, until he gets a job and earns his own money, and still then I will give him a top up

See above. We know you love him. But you also have to protect him, including from his own poor choices. Too much can be as bad as not enough.

@Ontheperiphery79

No he doesn’t, I do not have much family.

The only closest role money he has in life is my partner but he and my son are not close like that, if you get what I mean?

Every post makes it more obvious this isn’t real. But just in case…

People that groom children are skilled. Children that get groomed aren’t ‘silly’. There are four types of parenting. Authoritative, authoritarian, permissive and neglectful. You are permissive- the only good one is authoritative. So actually that makes your son an easy target.

“There are no problems at home”- see above. One parent is ineffective in their parenting approach, the other is in prison. The child has several ACE’s.

Gangs are everywhere. How do you think county lines work?

Everything has been handed to your child, you say this proudly. Maybe consider how that has contributed towards his behaviour, sense of entitlement and lack of respect and aspirations.

But yes, you continue to reward him and spoil him. Maybe he’ll repay the favour when he’s rolling in his own illegally earned money.

Unless you can track his every movement, tap all his devices, monitor all his friends etc, then you cannot be certain ?

You shouldn't be victim blaming op.

I wouldn't be so sure and smug if I was you. Your son is only 13. And he's already in a PRU. You've a long road of parenting ahead yet.

@Hawkins003

I do not need to tap his device or monitor his friends, I have already told you my son doesn’t spend his time in front of a screen, the only time he uses his mobile phone is when we are in the car to pass time, only time he uses the internet is to watch YouTube, or to look at something he is interested in buying.

What exactly do you think he is looking at?

How to buy drugs? 😂😂😂
How to escape from home? 😂😂😂
How to murder someone? 😂😂😂

Just stop it please!

How do you know when he's upstairs all evening on his own?

@gencritdd

I am not victim blaming or being smug, I know my child.

You are victim blaming the victims of county lines.

That's deplorable.

When did I say he is upstairs all evening alone?

Yesterday and this evening he was upstairs alone

Yesterday he was annoyed with me, he wanted time alone

Today he wanted to complete his Lego set, any other given day/afternoon he will spend time downstairs until it’s time to go to sleep

What are you going to tell me now? He is lying about sleeping early?

My child is not a liar, I’ve been completely honest on this post, I have never told you he lies.

He does not need the internet for that, all that information can be gained from other people he associate's with. You may think the sun shines and maybe it does, but based on your op information he seems hardly a saint, otherwise why write the op ?