Six year old completely burnt out from school.

[primaryproblems]

Dd6 is fine during the holidays and weekends but can't cope with the long school days, she comes home emotional and breaks down into tears saying it's all too much, she can't handle being in school all day and all week only having 2 days off and spends most evenings crying over anything and everything one thing after another.
She begs me not to send her to school because she's too tired and I feel completely helpless because I have to force her to go.
I completely understand how she feels but there's nothing I can do.
She asked if she can have one day off in the middle of the week to rest which sounds quite reasonable given how burn out she is but I'm not in a position to authorise that.
If an adult was completely overwhelmed and burn out like this they'd be signed off sick but talking to the school doesn't help, they just say she's fine once she's here, she'll get through it but they don't see her when she comes home and then there's homework and reading to get on with when she's passed out on the sofa too tired to even eat.
She's always in bed by 7 and sound asleep by 10 past that's if she hasn't fallen asleep before hand and been carried up and she is soo tired int the morning.
I feel so bad it seems like child cruelty to me but no matter how much she talks to me my hands are tied because the law says she should be in school because all the other children can cope.

The OP says she is asleep by 7.10pm.

The wee soul

Honestly op. It seems like you're hoping people will tell you take her out of school one day a week. No one is going to tell you that's a reasonable idea.
There is something extra going on with your daughter. She might be neuro divergent or deficient in something but either way your first step is a GP

You use words like 'strong willed' so I would be afraid that things will only get worse down the road if your ignore this .

GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP
GO TO THE GP

DD was like this. Turned out her hearing is rubbish and she was exhausted trying to fill in the gaps. She would literally sob the whole way home then fall asleep by 5.30.

Go to the GP.

Have you considered shes masking all day at school to be good/fit in etc and you are her safe space where she can release and let it all out, be herself? Could she have adhd/asd?

Such a weird response.

Because this is NOT typical for a 6 year old. And it suggests there is something else going on.

For the record, I would not consider most SEN as being "something wrong". It's just something different. And if there IS an underlying medical condition - eg low iron or whatever - then dealing with that is the right answer.

We use "norms" to better understand and identify when here might be a problem. It might well be that this is just the way she is, fine, but it's significantly outside of what's considered the standard so it seems very weird to me to not at least look at what might be happening.

If your DD was struggling to read the board at school would you just say, "we just need to listen to her needs -s he must sit closer to the board." Or would you say, "let's go get her some glasses if she needs them"?

It could be hearing or eyes it's why I suggested testing them earlier in thread.

DS had glue ear in early years of school - he had very poor working memory as well - but the hearing wasn't helping.

Honestly ruling out the physical is probably easiest place to start so going to GP and probably back and forth a few times is needed and then look at the many and possibly co-morbid SEN that she could have that are leaving her tired at end of school day- there is more than adhd/asd.

I have a happy healthy primary age child .
Loves learning . Loves their friends .
Goes to bed early eats really well .

When they started school they just wanted to be home . When they get home even now they just need time out.
As adults we are all different but with kids they must socialise, they must be adhd etc , they must be unwell if they don’t skip to school or go to 5 after school clubs a week .

Why can’t kids just be allowed to be kids and be different . Why can’t a 6 year old not prefer being home and be listened to when she says “mum it’s too much “

I listened to my child’s needs and adapted and now they are older school is less of an issue . Would still like a shortened week and gets frazzled but I listen and let them be .

I've not read the full thread, so others may have mentioned this....

Could she be autistic? I didn't think this from your first post, but tantrums at home followed by exhaustion, while being fine at school, especially in girls can be a flag for autism. They 'mask' at school to blend in and be 'normal' and it's just so exhausting they're mentally knackered from keeping everything in so when they get home it irrupts. Autism is often harder to detect in girls with the traditional things like needing order, and lining toys up, counting etc. Those are more boy austic traits.

Girls can (unfortunately) be great at masking. Keep an open mind that this may be behind things, and speak to her teachers to see if they've noticed anything else.

As well as listening to their needs you have to meet their needs. If this little girl is low in iron she may need supplements, if her eye sights poor she may need glasses, if she has a neurodiversity she may need reasonable adjustments, if she has anxiety she may need some play therapy. Just dealing with the symptoms and not finding the cause is really not good enough.

Why can’t kids just be allowed to be kids and be different . Why can’t a 6 year old not prefer being home and be listened to when she says “mum it’s too much “

I don't really know what else to say. I've already explained, pretty simply I thought: OP's DD is behaving in ways that are outside the boundaries of what most children her age behave. It MIGHT be fine, but it's unusual enough it's worth at least exploring what might be going on. Especially if there could be a medical issue.

In the case of your child, perhaps everything is absolutely fine and with a few minor adjustments, at home, they are coping. Great. But this does actually make me a bit concerned: Would still like a shortened week and gets frazzled but I listen and let them be. Because most of us feel like this and it's fine, but they'll need coping tools if they can't adjust because the world, unfortunately, doesn't accommodate people who find it hard to behave in ways that are normal for everyone else.

@StrawberryShortbread2001 said it better! Exactly - it's not just about treating any symptoms but addressing the underlying issues.

Lol “really not good enough” who are you to say that?

The way this mum has posted tells she is a caring mum trying her best for her child . .

Maybe it would be worth talking to her GP but maybe just maybe the child also “needs” her parent to listen to her .

There is flexi school
home education
Education is important but health happiness first . I’m his girl is only 6 all the time in the world to be frazzled by life and all the time for learning in a school environment

they'll need coping tools if they can't adjust because the world, unfortunately, doesn't accommodate people who find it hard to behave in ways that are normal for everyone else.

This is what's wrong with society, right here!!!!

Sure, I don't entirely disagree. And I'm all for making efforts to change society.

BUT, in the real world, there are certain expectations and norms. And longer term, unless we're lucky enough to be completely financially independent, we have to work within those (up to a point).

My DS has ADHD. In discussion with his doctor, the doctor agrees that part of the problem is the way DS is being educated. It does not entirely work for his brain. Okay. But unfortunately, the educational options are the educational options and so we have to support him within that context. As he grows older and has more control, there may be ways for him to make choices that work better for him. We're already discussing what sort of careers are more likely to work (spoiler alert - sitting in an office, at a desk from 9-5, is off the table). But he's still going to have to accept responsibilities, work to deadlines or on a schedule etc. So my job as a parent is to help him learn hw to do at least the basics of these, even though it's hard for him.

@OhBling I disagree with you, you can't fit a square peg into a round hole and if you force it you end up damaging the peg.
Neurodiverse people didn't choose to live in a society they can't function in and shouldn't have to just because society was made by neurotypical people for neurotypical people which isn't neurodiverse peoples problem its society.

Many neurodiverse individuals don't have a problem with their disability, it's neurotypical people that have a problem with it, neurodivergent people are just who they were born to be.

Just to say that yes, it could be autism, but it could also be adhd - or a combination of both. There's a school of thought that adhd can't be 'masked' at school. It absolutely can be, particularly the inattentive kind of adhd. A bright adhd kid will develop short term coping strategies that just about get them through the school day, at longer term cost to their mental health.

@cosynightshome so what is your suggestion to a child that needs an education in order to get a job and support herself long time? How is a ND person in this situation going to manage if they can't work at a sufficient level to earn sufficient income?

Neurodiverse people didn't choose to live in a society they can't function in and shouldn't have to just because society was made by neurotypical people for neurotypical people which isn't neurodiverse peoples problem its society

This sort of statement is all well and good, and actually, I agree. But in the REAL world, society isn't exactly changing that fast. And until it does, my ADHD son is going to have to accommodate certain NT norms and standards if he wants to get an education and build a life for himself. The chances are, with inattentive ADHD as his issue, he's actually going to be just fine. Society has enough opportunities for people like him. But to get there, he's having to work that bit harder. And it's not exactly changing fast. I have a friend whose DD absolutely cannot function in mainstream school. You only have to speak with her for about 5 minutes to see that - her communication and social skills are very low, her concentration spam is difficult etc. it's all documented. And yet she STILL can't get her into a special school designed to support children who need to learn in a different environment. So there's a LONG way to go until children like DS are going to get access to the kind of education that fully works for them.

Bless her, this was me as a little girl. I was higj functioning autistic and thr burn out was caused by the exhaustion of long and hectic school days, feeling more mature than my peers ( more so because I was always very logical and rigid about rules being rules and questioned the purpose of everything and at that age ita a very childish environment where I felt patronised by it all ), lots of routine that didn't resonate with me. If it helps Op, it was quite temporary and I absolutely thrived in school the older I got. Secondary school was amazing for me especially in the later years as I felt I had more autonomy over my routine. I'm not saying your daughter is autistic but this really resonated with me. It was 30 odd years ago but I still remember crying to my mum for the same reasons. Please don't feel helpless, speak to the school and include her in it.

Who am I to say that? Someone who cares about DC. Who cares about their needs being met. Who cares about them reaching their full potential. Someone who is discussing the issue on a forum! And I don't believe it is good enough as a parent/ teacher/whoever to not meet their needs.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that OP is not doing it with her DC, she could be at the GP now for all we know.

But I take issue with you suggesting we only have to listen to their needs when we have to do so much more!

The OP is listening to her DD. This is why she's posted on here. She's identified a need and is try to figure out how to meet that need.

Yes, there are many options that may meet her needs and hopefully OP will be able to find the root cause so she can successfully meet her Dd's needs.

But one also needs to be realistic. Let me give you a different example - all DC need to learn to read. They have done much research now and the evidence is very strongly that phonetics, or phonics or blended phonetics etc seem to work best with the vast majority of children (some statistics seem to say something like 90%). If you therefore have a class of 30, the sensible way to teach them to read is to use one of the reading schemes that use what have been shown to work with the vast majority of children.
But my DS was one of the 10% (or whatever percentage it is). It was very obvious to me by the end of reception that he was not reading at all (although he was bright enough that the teacher hadn't even fully cottoned on yet the extent to which he wasn't reading, ie he was picking up clues from people, which he is and was very good at, rather than reading, but that can't work much beyond reception).
What to do? It is really unfair to the other 29 kids in his class to stop using the most effective reading methods we have (and reading is not intuitive, children need to be taught, otherwise they don't learn it) just because of my DS. It is not wrong for the teacher (ie society) to use the method of teaching that works best for 29 out of 30 kids, and focus on that.
On the other hand, it is not right (or good for society) that DS should never read. In DS's case, he had a mother who was determined he was going to read, and we experimented at home until we managed it - it tooks us several years of intensive effort at home to find techniques that worked for him - and he only really started reading properly in Year 3 - but by his Year 6 SATs he only lost one mark on the entire comprehension section (all his other loss of marks - 8 out of 20 was on spelling, that was the best we could do, we had to accept that the spelling was never really going to come right, though we did try everything for that too).
Now, society ought in my view to have helped DS to "cope" with reading, and not really left it up to his mother to find a way with him - so that the extra load was fully carried at home on top of a normal school day- but it is also not right to demand that the whole class be taken off the best way of teaching reading in order to accommodate DS and his particular peculiarities. That might have resulted in several children in the class not learning to read.
It would also not have been helpful to have said - oh well DS, your brain works differently so you don't have to learn to read, you will just do other things. Reading is such an essential tool for so much else, that he needed to learn to "cope" with reading (PS, DS is now at medical school - ie training to be a doctor, which he would certainly never have been able to do if he had never learnt to read)

Agree completely. Band aids are not solutions. If my child falls and cuts themselves, a band aid is fine. But if she is falling and cutting herself every day, I have to ask myself what is the reason she is falling and is there something I should be doing proactively to prevent the need for a bandaid.

I think any parent who just says, "this is who she is" without actually thinking about what might really be going on, is a bad parent. OP's child might just need more sleep - I certainly think an earlier bed time wouldn't hurt - but extreme tiredness can often be linked to actual physical problems, as well as to potential ND. It's irresponsible not to at least check that out.

The expectation to find coping tools to fit in with a society they can't function in comes from it being an invisible disability.
No blind person has ever been expected to work harder to see or deaf person expected to listen more carefully because it's accepted that they are deaf or blind.
The same for people in wheelchairs who are not expected to pretend they can walk because most people can.
People can't see the part of the brain that is wired differently causing the person to experience the world differently but they are expected to act as though they were seeing the world as neurotypical, the best you're asking these people to do is act and pretend to be something they are not as that's the only way acceptable by neurotypical people.

I realise this won't make sense in your neurotypical mind but that's because it's the experience of someone who experiences the world in a way you couldn't imagine or understand so you hope that people like me will find tools to make us act in a way you perceive as normal and acceptable.
And yes that's what's wrong with society the fact people have to conform to what neurotypical people think is acceptable even if that's not how they were born.
Society doesn't work for everyone, that's the reality.
It's no good saying yeah but in the real world because that is the real world.
Statistics show most people with ND are unemployed or struggle to hold a job down and that's because they are working in an environment that isn't sustainable for eg if you had to speak in a different accent all day you could only keep it up for so long and then you'd get tired and it would drop and you'd be sacked but if you could just be yourself in the first place you'd have more chance of success.

My workplace recently did a survey and found that 30% of employees were neurodivergent so they arranged training so that more peoples needs can be met during the working day. I'm not sure how many other companies one would have measured the stat and two cared enough to try to be inclusive. Since more members of staff that didn't count themselves as neurodivergent have been using tools put in place and seeing the benefits at home and at work. Whether they do fall under ND who knows but people who previously thought of themselves as NT have benefited from the education about ND and associated inclusivity.
I have mental health condition and also am finding the measures helpful so resources can go beyond ND and into other people who's brains work a little bit differently