To ask if you got your child back into school after EBSA?

[drspouse]

I know I'm going to touch a total nerve here, but those who know me will know I've got skin in this game. DS is ironically in a very unsuitable SEMH specialist school but we have no problems at all getting him there in the morning. He has, however, been in a primary PRU where he struggled to go in and the deputy head said "he's not anxious" when he was hiding inside my cardigan.

Bridget Phillipson says parents must not "let" their children stay at home.

www.facebook.com/bridgetphillipson/posts/pfbid04qzL7fcPQb1bifL62gWuZu3ykHApzSJUTZRb3fnQh68JmXNbF97PdmJDejZxCpHHl

There's a recent report (which I slightly question as I'm not sure who they asked - if they used a snowball method then once they got a few parents of neurodiverse children that's going to skew their sample) saying that over 90% of children persistently missing school have ASD or ADHD. If anyone has the link feel free to put it below.

I'd like to know what worked for you, or what didn't work.

I am not personally of the opinion that low demand, or socially isolating setups are good for children. I'm also aware that some alternative provision/EOTAS setups can involve a lot of interaction with other children/a variety of adults, so it's not necessarily more isolating than school. But I'm firmly in the camp of "if you avoid it you will be more anxious" and that's how we worked with DS when he was anxious - gentle introduction, sitting at the doors of the school playing a game with his excellent TA, and ignoring the deputy head when she said he wasn't anxious (luckily the TA ignored him too).

My Dd was an EBSA due to burnout. What worked for us best was time.

However she had done her GCSE’s. After 18 months out of school she’s starting an Access to Higher Education course at college.

5 months ago she refused to attend specialist provision. It was just time that caused the change.

What happens when children/teens stop being able to attend school, but the real problems lie at home?

What this thread is discussing is a mismatch between the school environment and a child's needs, frequently, but not not exclusively, associated with neurodiversity. Aspects of the school environment are leading to enduring anxiety and/or trauma that exceeds a child's tolerance. Psychologists supporting schools and families recognise that this isn't a situation in which child blaming or family blaming are appropriate.

Sorry, I was not child or parent blaming. In my family, my two neurodiverse sons stopped attending school at 13 and 14. The family situation was very difficult and although school was not a great environment for them, it was absolutely unhealthy for them to be at home with so little occupation, so much stress in the household and so little help from the LA (a tutor came for 2.5 hours twice a week for the youngest; my eldest was too unwell for tuition).

My question, although perhaps not well phrased, was trying to expand the discussion to include families in crisis. By the time my sons could not cope with school, our family was in crisis at multiple levels.

In my case, there was no way we could create a low arousal environment or even keep our very disturbed teenage boys safe without the structure of school.

Many families with neurodiverse children have been struggling for years before their children get to the point where they can no longer go to school

Sadly, often nothing or very little happens. Many are failed by education, health and social care.

What should happen is:
An EHCNA requested if the children don’t already have EHCPs or early review requested if they do.
Section 19 provision put in place - 5hrs twice a week is not full time. LAs know this but often don’t provide more unless forced. The provision doesn’t have to be traditional tutoring if that isn’t suitable.
The school and outside agencies looking at whether adjustments at school will enable DC to reintegrate - sometimes adjustments and additional support can do this, sometimes the school environment is inappropriate no matter what support is provided.
Social care assessments requested - Contact has model letters for this and is often another area where parents who know the system and can advocate get better support.
Health referrals.
Signposted/supported to apply for DLA and any other benefits eligible for if not already in receipt/applied, apply for a blue badge and any other things that may help ease the situation at home, such as a DFG, charity grants, charity support services, etc.

In an ideal world, most of this would already be in place if the family has been struggling for a while. All too often it isn't, though.

In case it is relevant now to anyone reading, you can request an expedited tribunal hearing for those out of school not receiving a full-time education. It doesn’t mean the tribunal will be immediate, but if SENDIST agree, it cuts the wait down.

Extremely anxious autistic child - sobbing, hiding under tables, self harming. Absolutely cured of EBSA by going to an autism specialist school. I disagree with the term EBSA, I think he had wildly inappropriate environment of his additional needs. I doubt he'll ever cope with being in a small and very loud room with 33 over people. He can learn though and likely will be able to work (maybe mostly remotely or outdoors). As adults we can make quite a lot of choices about the environments we put ourselves in.

Sorry to have leapt to that conclusion, @blalabla. It's been a bad week on MN for posts blaming SEND parents and kids. It sounds a tough situation. Are you in a better place now?

I didn't.
DD started to school avoid in year 8 ( pre covid) I didn't know why it was happening, she barracaded herself in her room, had panic attacks, self harmed, stopped washing, it was like a bomb going off.
Looked for logical reasons, bullying, not liking a particular teacher or lesson, issues on school bus etc. Could find no logical reason, academically she was doing well.
Worked with school, as a grammar school they had 3 part time TAs for 1000 pupils.
So staff kind but no real availability for intervention or support.
Nonetheless working with school we tried lots interventions including exposure therapy but nothing worked and attendance got worse and worse and by start of year 10 after discussion with clinical psychologist we decided to stop trying to send her into school which frankly was a relief.
Just before her 15th birthday she was diagnosed with autism ( private assessment as 2- 3year wait for NHS diagnosis - she was on NHS waiting list)
With diagnosis we were able to get her an EHCP and appealed to tribunal for EOTAS after LA issued an EHCP with no named school as current school couldn't meet need and we couldn't find any specialust school that had a place and could meet need either. At this point she didn't leave her bedroom at all, apart to use the loo, let alone the house.
The crash of her mental health was terrifying and CAMHS were awful no support, fought to get her accepted by CAMHS then she was on a very long waiting list then a when she reached the top of waiting list they told us they couldn't help us as she was too ill to engage with therapy!!!! Desperate we paid for private psychiatrist who prescribed medication. (our local CAMHS refused to refer her to a child and adolescent psychiatrist, I later found out they didn't have one and were struggling to recruit)
LA put no alternative education in place for her when she couldnt attend school - which I later found out later legally it should have done.
So she was failed by LA education services and CAMHS.
It's been hell, but she is slowly getting better, doing well with her EOTAS package which includes therapies but had to go to tribunal twice as LA reduced provision just a few months after it was awarded by first tribunal so we had to go back to tribunal- a process which takes a year - to get it reinstated. It's a never ending battle. Because of all the education missed she now cant slot back into appropriate year group in a school, she's 17 and doing Gcses.
However thankfully things are looking up and she is doing much better but it's been a bloody awful few years and I would not wish it in my worse enemy.
All those who say if it was my child I'd make then go to school have no idea what it's really like to have a child whose in mental health crisis.

Oh dear, @Dutchhouse14 that sounds awful. I'm so sorry that happened. I used to teach in a girls' grammar and as you describe, we had pretty much no provision for anyone out of the "norm". We actually didn't have a single TA and our SENCO was also librarian and head of careers...

I know i will flamed to high heaven saying this but the issue starts much earlier than school. Some children have learned from an early age that if they put on a big display of distress at being made to do things they don't want to do, they can avoid them because their parents are reluctant to put up with the tantrums etc.

It is easier to learn at 2 or 3 than it is to undo a lifetime of this behaviour at 7 or 8.

Modern society is part of the problem, overstimulating, not enough time outdoors, not enough exercise, poor diets, affluenza. But modern parenting is not helping, children need firmer, clearer boundaries and consequences earlier on.

DD hasn't been back for the start of Year 11. If she doesn't scrape together some gcse's she'll miss her chance to go to the nice, supportive, 6th form college and will end up at the local tech college which would be hell on earth for her.
She has an app on her phone to try and control her self harm, it was unused all summer and I can see she's spent a few minutes on it this week.

Nothing at all to do with the toxic environment of school today 🙄

What a blinkered statement.

Boils my blood when people (especially senior/professionals) say don't "let" them stay at home.

I literally had to peel my secondary school child off the banisters, the doorframe and then drag him out of the footwell of the car to get to school (for YEARS) and the situation never got better. It just got worse and worse with the school continually sending him home about 1 hour after arriving until he became extremely mentally ill.

If I had just listened to my instincts then perhaps that wouldn't have happened.

He has gone back to school after a very long time but only on a very limited timetable. (ASD diagnosis)

What an earth are you talking about? My son was an absolute dream. Had usual temper tantrums as a toddler which were delt with (not by giving in to his "demands").

He started refusing school in year one when the sensory environment became too much for him to handle.
School were unsupportive and had a view much like yours. In actual fact he had undiagnosed autism and adhd. School would not offer any support even after diagnosis.
He was taken to school by me every morning after hours of battling. We would get to school and they would tell me there was no staff to support/due an ofsted visit/couldn't be fucked to educate him.
They started calling me to pick him up beacuse he was crying/hiding under a table.
My son was and still is traumatised by his school experience, I have never got him back and he is 15 now. He is certainly told no/has consequences. He goes outdoors every day. He has hobbies that aren't screen based and he eats a better more balanced diet than most adults I know.

Nah. Some are far too conscientious for their own good and continued to comply until they were utterly broken and couldn't do it any more.

Result: they stopped going to school in their GCSE years. It would have been SO much better if we'd listened to them more earlier on. Then we'd have had a chance at finding something that they could manage in KS4 and they could have some semblance of mental health, and hopefully some GCSEs.

The idea that the rot set in because we were too permissive when they were a preschooler is bizarre and laughable.

A child can't learn when they are so flooded with rules and demands that they have no brain left over to use in their learning. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. You can compel a child into a classroom but it's the wrong battle if it leaves them with their head is all over the place so they can't even process what the teacher is saying.

The psychology of posters like you is fascinating. You've joined a thread asking for experiences of a situation you appear personally unfamiliar with, and have decided to tell a group of parents describing harrowing and challenging situations with their disabled children and children in mental crisis, that it's their fault for their permissiveness and poor parenting.

Do you have insight as to what motivates you to behave like this? You anticipate being flamed; is it that you crave attention? Or perhaps telling others what they are doing wrong makes you feel better about your life?

DS is currently on his first day in yesr 7 - no idea how it is going to go!

he first burnt out in yesr 5 and was off for half a term, a 6 week timetable did get him back but in June 2023 he went again. It was awful and his mental health reached rocked bottom. We did get some therapy

what worked was time although they were very resistant to it, phone calls and arguments about how he needed to get back in full time even though a gradual child led approach was working

a thick skin on my part to push back every time they wanted to move at their rather than his pace - I got attendance involved as was frankly sick of it being dangled over me as a threat for not coming in line with their timetable

tje whole thing was exhausting and having a child led bespoke approach set out would have helped from the start. We both had the same end goal - I wanted him back, he wanted to be back and they wanted him back.
Singing of the same page would have been so helpful - and the truth I found often inconsistencies in what I was told

better training I think would help

I'd agree with this. We did try a gradual approach to getting back into school but it only worked when the school was right and it was child led in terms of increasing hours.

We found schools and our LA were very keen on goals and targets and increasing them quite rapidly, like recovery would be a linear set thing. It was nothing like how my dh was treated when he crashed out of work for mental health issues where he led the pace.

This has to be one of the most outdated and ignorant posts I've read in a long time.

We are talking about children with clinically diagnosed neurological conditions here. It's got nothing to do with "affluenza" or anything that's happened prior to them starting school.

@Frowningprovidence yes the goals and targets and the belief that if he gets in he is fine (how many times was I told he is fine when he is in) because he didn’t act out or show any disruptive behaviour

then rather than going well done (his actual class teacher was amazing and did) you made it in for an hour it was let’s do 2 tomorrow

i get there are limited resources but letting us follow his lead just needed time and no pressures nothing else

distress…tantrums

Demonstrating how little understanding you have of distressed dysregulated DC with additional needs having a meltdown.

My year 7 has to all appearances completed two days at secondary school with great success.

On both Monday and Tuesday evening she said she wanted to die and said she'd use a kitchen knife.

(She's OK and has gone in for day 3).

It's very stressful!

She has an EHCP and a diagnosis of autism. My mother thinks "labels are unhelpful."

@Arrivapercy Because my dd didn't kick off school felt that she was "fine" and should be in school. When she was so unwell she couldn't get out of bed they thought she was fine and she should be in school. When she was declared unfit for school by a consultant they thought she was fine and were ordering me to attend meetings to discuss her return contrary to medical advice. It's all very well being smug in your ivory tower because yours were able to attend and FWIW my older ones attended absolutely fine with no issues. Your ignorance and arrogance have no place on this thread. Seven years later and dd now an adult we are still dealing with school trauma and LA are still funding a very expensive EOTAS package as a result.

DS is autistic, started refusing to go to school a couple of years of ago. A lot of work was put in to encourage him to attend, lots of involvement from various people. But he couldn't cope with seeing or being seen by any of the children in his school, and the resulting meltdowns were horrendous and violent towards myself and DH.

Short of physically forcing him, which would have been traumatic for all of us and counter-productive, I don't know what we could have done.

In the end he was offered a place in a small base in a different school, it took a lot of work but in the end we got his attendance up to about 75% - sometimes higher but he would have gone in late and missed registration, which was amazing.

He's now gone up to secondary, to a specialist autism base - he actually went in on the first day and we had no meltdowns in the last week of the holidays - some dysregulation but he managed it well. It still feels like we have a long way to go, but two years ago we wouldn't have believed we would be at this point now and I am so proud of him and grateful to the amazing staff at both primary schools who put so much work in to get him assessed and to get him into a suitable educational environment.

Not back to school but back to education which I felt was more important.

Exposure worked when anxiety was fear of the unknown. So when ds2 started a new placement (ARP, special school, home tutors) it helped especially when the provider was prepared to move at his speed rather than a preconceived timetable. So with the home tutors it took a whole year before he really began to trust them and for him to fully access what they could teach him.

Exposure did not help when the anxiety developed after a period of attending the placement especially if the provider expected any adjustment to come from him rather than them. So he attended mainstream successfully for five years but when it broke down in year 4 he never overcame his anxiety even though we persevered for eighteen months. Likewise with special school although he initially settled down once his anxiety levels were ramped up by a change of management he again never settled down (I think we persevered for six months this time). In both of these cases the schools never really were able to recognise when he was getting anxious and take premptive steps rather than letting it get to explosion levels.

Strangely, he copes with university despite having huge numbers in his lectures. I have puzzled over why but I think it is a combination of low contact hours giving him the opportunity to destress, knowing he is able to walk out / not go to the lecture if he is having a bad day, being taught a subject that interests him and at a level that stimulates him and a lack of disruptive behaviour from the other students.