DC skipped their first day. AIBU about DP’s reaction

[BlondeSpider]

I do not even know where to start because my head is all over the place. Today was supposed to be such a big day for us. DS is 14 and was due to start at a 14 plus college after being out of school for more than a year. He stopped going back just after Christmas in year 8. His mental health had been declining for a while before that and then I found out he had been self harming. His anxiety was through the roof and it got to the point where he just could not manage. CAMHS were no help at all. I felt like I was banging my head against a brick wall every time I tried to get support. Eventually I deregistered him from school and homeschooled. It has been very up and down but he is bright and when he is calm he is lovely. I paid privately in the end for an autism assessment because waiting for the NHS was going to take years. He now has a diagnosis which in some ways was a relief but also quite overwhelming.

This summer has been really hard. DS has been difficult to live with. He is angry a lot of the time and everything is an argument. His anxiety is still there and when he is stressed it turns into lashing out verbally and sometimes physically. We have had things thrown, doors slammed, endless shouting matches. It has been exhausting, I think it's mostly due to puberty as he's had a growth spurt recently and his voice has dropped

DD is his twin. She has generally managed better with school and life in general but she has been struggling too, especially with his behaviour. She loves him and worries about him and is quite protective over him. She was supposed to be starting year 10 today which is a big year with GCSEs coming up.

This morning they both set out together for the bus stop. DS was nervous but I felt cautiously hopeful. It felt like maybe this was a turning point. But they never went. They did not get on the bus and they were gone most of the day. They ignored my calls and texts and would not say where they were. When they finally came home later on it all kicked off.

DP was furious. He immediately took their phones off them which caused a huge row. DS completely lost it and hit DP on the arm. DP reacted by shoving him back. It was not hard enough to hurt but it was physical and I just feel really uncomfortable about that. Then DP turned on DD and shouted at her for not making sure DS went in and for covering for him. He told her she had let everyone down. She just stood there crying.

I honestly do not know what to think. I understand why DP was so angry because I was too. We have been through hell trying to get DS back into education and today felt like such an important chance. But at the same time I feel like DP handled it badly. DD should not have had all that responsibility put on her and I do not think shouting at her was fair at all. And even though DS hit him first I still do not like that he shoved him back. The atmosphere in the house is awful now and I feel like we are right back at square one.

AIBU to think DP was too heavy handed and made things worse. Or am I just being soft?

I do feel sorry for your DD. She was in a tricky position but she really should have called you so you knew they were safe but she didn't deserve to be yelled at.
I understand why you don't want to set a routine of driving DS to college. I can also understand why you sent him in the bus (ignore people saying it obviously wasn't going to work as it's easy to be wise in hindsight). I would get the bus with him and explain this won't happen every day, just for now. If you're there DS may go to college but if he doesn't at least DD can go to school.
I wouldn't really say anything about DP pushing DS. DS shouldn't have hit him, there's no excuse for that. My DD used to lash out when angry (she is autistic too). We got her out of that by enrolling her in kickboxing, your DS doesn't sound ready for anything like that but maybe something you could consider in the future if he gets angry.

If you are renting UC will cover it.

Agree with this entirely. OP is excusing every behaviour of her DCs, not actually parenting but people pleasing, propping and perpetuating their difficulties and demands (yes, demands, not needs - nobody needs a phone) without any real consequences. Their behaviour has been very poor, particularly her son's - and I don't care she thinks her DS would struggle if on occasion she couldn't take him to school, it's not her DD's job to mother him, but OP's. OP, sometimes he'll be expected to do something that he doesn't consider perfect and autistic or not, yes, at times he will have to learn to get on with it. You won't be here propping him for life and neither should your DD. You seem to let him get away with everything.m because of the very tough time he and you have had.
If a 14 yo still hits, he needs to understand he will receive a response that may also be physical, nobody should put up with this sort of behaviour. He clearly had no real boundary in his life and reading your posts, this doesn't surprise me.

As for DD, no excuse for her not going to school and disappearing for the day. She either used the situation as an excuse not to go in or she's being brought up with excessive sense of pressure and responsibility for her brother and she genuinely felt like she had to stay with him. Either way, this isn't parenting, OP. She is left to her own devices and struggles and then she's shouted at by DP - not good, but does he see you have no authority and is he desperate? Still not great, but I do have some understanding of where he might be coming from.

Your constant enabling and excusing doesn't help anyone. I'd be at my wits end with your attitude and your DCs issues combined with their bad attitude if I was in your partner"s shoes.

Op do you consider that your DP is abusive to you and/or children? If so this really has to be the focus as fixing this will likely lower your DS anxiety and all round life will look better. Talk to your GP if this is the case as they can sign post you to things in your area, or google the options near you for support.

If you don’t consider it abusive and just unhappy then you need a serious conversation with DP and tell him to back off! He does sound like he is making things worse, not better from what you have posted. You should not have to ask permission to drive your children or to give phones back - that’s what troubles me and made me write the above paragraph. But if it’s lack of confidence (and you feel safe with DP) then do try assert yourself here. You can take the lead here - they are your children.

Be logical and less all is lost about your son. He may have black and white thinking here and so find it hard to change his thoughts but it is possible! You cannot get a day job if you homeschool and this seems to be important to you and necessary financially. Therefore focus on getting son to college. Drive him or get bus with him (I think getting bus is better as it’s teaching him the bus with a safe adult - your Dd is not ready for this!). Stop worrying that it will create a pattern he won’t break out of as that isn’t true - he was breaking out of pattern of home schooling but just got overwhelmed at bus stop. The first step is getting him there with low anxiety! Your DD should not be responsible for him. At 14 lots of children get taken to school but especially those with anxiety or ND. Wouldn’t it be better to spend 3 months getting bus with him to college and then work on a plan to get him going solo than just totally go back to home schooling?

So first step tomorrow is talk to DD and take weight off her shoulders and explain you know none of this was her fault. Call college and explain this week DS has got overwhelmed about bus and ask for some support. They may well do a home visit or have suggestions here. If they suggest driving him down and DS will do this then do it! You can’t worry about him always wanting you to drive him in the future. The first step is him going by any transport means! It will be perfectly possible to adjust the transport in the future. Let’s face it going from homeschooling to college is the biggest hurdle here!

Again, there is no question - not at all - about whether her boyfriend has abused her children. He has.

Him stealing her property and refusing to return it is also abusive.

That's all there is to it. Get your kids away from this man.

It sounds a really hard situation for you all but it was your responsibility to take him to school and make sure he got in the gates. It was certainly not your daughter’s.

Even accepting your premise that it would become a habit you cannot deviate from - that is your job to manage.

At worst it’s a time limited drop off not homeschooling all day and not wasting a day texting, worried but unable to contact him.

It’s a hard, hard age and especially difficult when your son grows and you physically can’t force them out of bed or into a car. And I know it’s easier said than done but you need to find a strategy beyond putting it on your daughter and crossing your fingers and hoping.

@Thursdayschild2025 the SON punched her partner and the partner responded by pushing the son away, that is not abuse.

The FOURTEEN YEAR OLD CHILD WITH AUTISM hit the bullying shouting adult boyfriend on the arm AFTER the bullying shouting boyfriend snatched his phone and only AFTER a huge row had broken out because of the reactive, abusive behaviour of the bullying shouting boyfriend.

The FOURTEEN YEAR OLD CHILD WITH AUTISM didn't react particularly well to the bullying shouting boyfriend and the time to deal with that by his mother was later.

The bullying shouting ADULT should have kept his fucking hands to his self and had he not snatched the OPs property after causing a screaming match the situation would not have escalated.

The bullying shouting adult boyfriend should never have stolen the phones they are NOT his to touch and belong to the OP. The bullying shouting boyfriend has continued to refuse to give back the property he has stolen.

The bullying shouting boyfriend has caused the entire situation to escalate horribly and because he is a bullying shouting MAN who should be able to control himself but refuses to do so and abuses the children instead, including SCREAMING at them, he has made things far worse.

It is almost certain that the abusive, shouting bullying boyfriend has caused many of the issues with the son.

Regardless, the OP needs to protect her children from the bullying shouting boyfriend and leave him.

True that. 👍

I didn’t work for over a year and got 24 grand into Debt but I drove my son every day to school and I will continue to do so for the next couple of years until he’s finished education because that’s my absolute priority
Sometimes everything else has to wait otherwise you pay the price for it later on

I agree with these 2 posters. Your excuses for DC are not making this situation any better and you sound like you’re just using DP as you can’t afford to be alone.

Have a word with yourself and calm down, goodness me. You're projecting a fabricated account onto this situation through all your posts here which isn't borne out by the evidence in the OP's messages.

It sounds like you've had some bad life experiences yourself and I'm very sorry if that's the case, but this level of emotional outburst is not productive or useful here when the OP is clearly refusing to actually take ownership of the situation.

I feel bad for DP. He’s funding you and your two DC, one of which is autistic and sounds difficult to live with and lashes out. I assume he’s paying all the bills if you’re not working? That’s a dangerous position for you to be in. If I were him, I’d be gone.

I mean this kindly but yesterday didn’t work either!

o think both kids were set up to fail yesterday

I would leave too if I was DP.

Stop blaming the kids.

Day one was badly handled by you. So make better plans for day two.

Your DP is completely overstepping and you need to either get him to back off or get him out of their lives.

Give the phones back.

You need to support both your children more. They had insufficient support on day one and that's why it went wrong.

You need to take your son to school, it's your job to support him to go.

Not read all your other posts but it sounds like you need to leave OP, or ask him to go. UC will cover the rent and the landlord won’t even be aware. Why stay with this abusive partner when there are options? Your DC will be much happier.

You need to drive your son tomorrow, or Monday, whenever he will be persuaded to go. I have a DD who is not diagnosed but very likely autistic and i’d definitely have to drive her or she wouldn’t go. You are just going to have to hope he makes some friends and will be happy to get the bus, because right now you have zero chance of him going. If you will need to stay home and home educate for a few years then leave this abusive guy and live in a much calmer household.

If a child has autism, has self-harmed, experiences suicidal thoughts and is receiving insufficient support from CAMHS, nothing will be improved by an angry phone confiscation after a hostile interaction.

The whole family needs to calm down and review.

How many practice runs did you do over the summer holidays though, he should have been having travel training to get him used to the routine, the bus stop, the seats, the driver, getting off, the walk up to the school. You or your partner could have done that several times over the summer,a lthough this is unhelpful now as you cant turn the clock back

Partner or yourself should have taken both kids to school, but I think you might have to reconsider home ed option for your son,so many kids with autism do better learning at home than in a busy forced school environment.

Sorry but you have a huge DP problem here and your DS needed a lot more support on day 1 of school. There is a lot to unpack here.

Your partner who isn't their dad shoved your child?

How long have you been with this man and why did he have anything to do with this situation? Why didn't you intervene?

How much of this sort of behaviours have they seen? Did he stop going to school around the time he started dealing with your new partner? My husband is my kids dad and if he shoved him I'd shove HIM right out the door.

Leave anyway. He's the problem.

The more I look at it, the more I wonder if you might be ND too, OP, the way you present your son's situation and excusing him, as well as catastrophising he will never do X if Y happened is a very binary and anxious vision projecting your own fears and it nearly sounds like deply, these are your preferences which is stopping you from parenting him. He can't stay as is just because some things are hard for him, you need to do what you need to do to help him move forward which also means challenging his difficulties and not accepting bad behaviour for his own good.
You can't live like you do forever either, you need a job to do something for yourself and bring an income. I remain unconvinced your DP is a bad guy in all this, but either way, you have the same binary and catastrophising approach to your own life and work and weak authority in respect of making your own decisions. Just a thought, in my view you could make the situation better for your DCs and yourself if you changed your approach but you seem stuck in it.

Yeah I've read every update and OP is absolutely just excusing her son's behaviour. As many, many prev posters have said if you're considering going back to homeschooling anyway, why wouldn't you take him to school? He is building no resilience being at home.

You keep saying you can't take him because he'll always expect to be taken then and you want to go back to work, yet you're thinking of home schooling again which gives no possibility to go back to work.

The bottom line is you don't want to take him in for whatever reason. You're doing your son a disservice with this. It will only get harder for him to re-enter society the longer he's out. It's not really even about education and long term prospects.

You keep saying he's so rigid and if you take him on the bus once he'll expect you to always take him, but what about keeping him home: won't he always expect to be kept home? Just take him in - it's easier to work towards him taking himself if he's attending (as, again, many many others including those with asd children themselves are saying).

You need to do better by your son, OP. Your partner is pretty much irrelevant here.