11 year old very upset about sports day

[Zombieof3]

My 11 year old suffers badly with anxiety. Sports day to her is a day of hell. She spend an hour last year crying in the school toilets as she couldn’t deal with everyone watching.

Tomorrow is sports day, she has already spent the evening sobbing. She hates the idea of everyone watching her and competing, she said she doesn’t feel good enough and it’s too much pressure for her.

She is currently being diagnosed for autism and I know this is very hard for her.

I honestly don’t know what to do, I can’t keep her home and I don’t feel like she should be made to do something that is going to make her unwell.

This isn’t really AIBU post but I was hoping for advice asap as I don’t know what to do. Shall I speak with the school in the morning to explain the situation and ask them not to make her partake and perhaps she can help in other ways?

No way would I send my DC in for this

Are you at work? If not just keep her home. My son has ASD - he is marginally last in all races. I keep him home.

keep her off (and I wouldn’t say that lightly)
when- in any other aspect of school- are you pitted against your peers for the whole of the school community to watch? its just not fair!
no way, if you had anxiety over reading, would you be asked to read in front of parents and other children who were better than you. Fuck that shit! (with them all cheering you and others on)
I don’t agree in sports day at all- so unfair to children who hate crowds/ noise/ competitive sports and who are crap at sports.
You’d never get it anywhere else in your life so it builds no “resilience “ to anything towards your future life.

Same here but thankfully my dd enjoys sports day. I still blush when l think how everyone laughed at me

Hypermobility is one of those things that is frequently noted but they don't look at the bigger picture.

Hypermobility can occur on its own but it is a feature of several connective tissue disorders including Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (and others), and is often comorbid with autism.

Might be worth a bit of reading in case you have an "aha" moment, either now or in the future (e.g. if other things start cropping up, like scoliosis).

Just keep her off, she's in Y6, what are they going to do?! Hopefully she won't ever need to worry about such an unreasonable set of expectations about sports day again.

We ask children to choose their races and SEN children can opt out altogether if they wish. I feel that this is a reasonable adjustment. I'm sure she can support her team in other ways.

Why are you talking about how a parent feels? I don’t think it's the parents she’s concerned about - it's the other children. Children are judgemental.

Sports day is pointless. I would just let her be ill for the day. Yes, we all have to do things we don’t enjoy - but there is no benefit to sports day. It is totally pointless.

No need for an 11 year old to be doing anything that causes them extreme anxiety. I'd explain to the school why she wasn't doing it. I'd leave her kit and trainers at home. Not doing sports day because you don't win and don't like coming last is one thing. Not wanting to do it because it terrifies you is another. There is no need for her to be this worried. I would tell the school she was unable to do it.

If sports day is just a bit of fun, then why on Earth would we subject a child who finds it humiliating and anxiety-inducing to it? Let those who find it fun crack on and let your DD stay home.

There is a lot of terrible advice on here from well meaning but utterly clueless about autism people.

Can you imagine sports day as an autistic person...

• the lack of understanding of the rules - that it's supposed to fun / don't take it seriously / someone has to come last. Someone may have said it reassuringly but with auditory processing issues and high anxiety, it doesn't process.
• the lack of social communication of how to be in these situations with winners / losers
• the severe sensory overload of bright sunlight / clapping / whistles / cheering and jostling of kids and adults shouting instructions.
• the physical pain from hyper mobility / dyspraxia / incoordination
• the debilitating anxiety from suffocating masking of trying to watch everyone else and do exactly like they do whilst going against every fibre of their being of how to act.

Autism ignorance is deeply unpleasant in mainstream schools.

Honestly I don't see what she stands to gain from enduring it.

I'd keep her off but keep it low key and not a drama.

It gives sporty but non-academic children a chance to feel proud of themselves. Some kids find classroom education really challenging every day, sports day is just one day. So there’s one reason it’s not just blanket pointless.

At 11 years old I’d keep her home and work on a plan for next year.

How lovely for those children Nancy. But why do they need ops Dd to take part if it makes her stressed and miserable? Those that enjoy it crack on but think dc who bloody hate the public humiliation of it should be given an opt out. After all it’s supposed to be “fun” - it’s not like deciding you don’t fancy maths.

Perhaps the "fun" requires that they very visibly trounce their less athletically inclined classmates 🙄.

Can you imagine the outrage if children who struggle with maths or reading were humiliated in front of the whole school in assembly?

Sports day is awful for non sporty kids. Why is it ok to humiliate kids who aren't good at sport? We don't do it with anything else. We don't make kids who can't sing enter music competitions or kids who can't draw hang pictures in art exhibitions.

I've always let my kids have sports day off.

"It gives sporty but non-academic children a chance to feel proud of themselves. Some kids find classroom education really challenging every day, sports day is just one day. So there’s one reason it’s not just blanket pointless"

Yes, but the sporty but non academic kids, aren't made to stand up in front of the whole school and recite their times tables, or do say their spellings out loud in front of a crowd.

It's not the same at all.

If schools are allowing children to feel humiliated in any way, they’re doing sports day wrong. Egg and spoon race or throwing beanbags hardly requires athletic prowess.

I let my boys have the day off on Sports Day. They have Ehlers Danlos syndrome and dyspraxia and the whole thing was bloody misery. I don’t think bloody misery is character building - it’s just wretched. We were firm about other matters, but some things are just not worth the angst and this is one of them. Bloody Sports Day. You have all my sympathy, OP.

Of course they do. Children often read aloud in class. Excruciating for some of them!

Anyway, my initial post was in response to whoever said sports day is totally pointless. Most children would disagree.

I should have added that they always had an educational day of some sort. We would go to a museum or the aquarium and out for lunch. They actually have positive memories and they absolutely wouldn't have done if we’d made them go.

There are a lot of people on this thread with zero idea of how autism works. You can’t just force an autistic person to suffer through something that’s causing them severe anxiety; our brains are structurally different and it can’t be trained out of us by kicking us out of the nest and seeing if we fly 🥴

There is actually research emerging about late diagnosed autistic people who have been forced to fit in (i.e. grin and bear it because ‘we all have to do things we’d rather not’) all their lives. Many of us are now struggling with a fried central nervous system due to a lifetime in fight-or-flight mode.

OP, ignore the school and keep her home. Said with kindness as someone with ASD, dyspraxia, hEDS and every other common autistic co-morbidity who survived sports day by the skin of my teeth.

Agree wholeheartedly. It’s easy to take a robust view if you have no idea of the price some kid is having to pay. Let her stay home, OP.