AIBU to not understand how "school refusers" are a thing?

[Idontunderstandmodernlife]

There seems to be a lot of parents that have children that they simply can't get to go to school no matter what they do - these children are often called "school refusers". Parents say they have done absolutely everything to get their child into school but nothing works.

I hate to be that "in my day" person but I simply don't get where these "school refusers" have come from because they simply didn't exist a decade or 15 years ago. Kids just went to school. I never knew of a child that simply didn't turn up most of the time when I was in school? now there seems to be one in every class

What has changed that parents are now finding it impossible to get their child to school? Have schools got that much worse? are parents more lenient? are children more forceful? has children's mental health declined? what is it?

Fucking crap.

My dd never went in Roblox. She was 17 when she self harmed. It wasn’t a thing then?

All her homework was set on an App on her phone. How was she supposed to access it? She’s never done social media. Just the odd game of Animal Crossing or Pokemon.

Hateful comment.

Well, no, that won't help a thing and is cruel. I've been very different with my children. Mine have never refused school because they never went from day one.

I suspect that “back in the day” the threat of some serious corporal punishment did the trick for a lot of families but parents don’t have that in their parenting arsenal now (rightly or wrongly) so are left with having to negotiate with their child and many children know they can’t be touched or even shouted at (my niece had a lesson at school where teachers were advising the class that being shouted at by their parents is a form of abuse and should be reported to school!)

Ditto my daughter. Severely depressed but everyone just says she needs to be in school. Which is the problem.

My DD missed all of y11, but did make it to college for a level1 course and worked up from there in parallel with recovery.

I feel the same about my daughter

I was bullied at school and would loved to have refused to go. Sadly there would have been no point in explaining this to my mother. It was the 90s and not going to school was just plain illegal. Fun times.

Still at least that meant I passed my exams which was quite useful in the long run.

Of course they existed 🤣 it’s really quite simple op, if a 15 year old refuses to go - what exactly can you do? You can’t force them. What would your recommendation be?

@Katemax82 and @MyballsareSandy2015

Yes exactly this. You have to make that decision and stop pushing don’t you. Unlike some on here who believe that you have a choice as to whether your child goes to school or not (we don’t do we) …. The only real decision is when to stop trying to force them to go. Though it’s a hard thing to accept, I felt a sense of relief when the pushing , coercing, the will they won’t they and employing every strategy, tone of voice possible to try and make them go was over. That’s when you know their MH is really the only priority isn’t it?

I see the “know it all” brigade have turned up. Try physically battling a child who is desperate not to go into a car to get to school. I still feel the trauma myself. It was terrible for our relationship. She was desperate and anxious and I was trying my best to be a good parent and get her in. Eventually the teachers could not manhandled her into the building. It was wrong.

All of this went on sporadically for some years and as a teen she attempted suicide because of the trauma. Then eventually CAHMS stepped in but were as much use as a chocolate teapot.

If you’ve not been through it you wouldn’t understand. I had also been through phases of it in my own childhood and felt ashamed of that. I always exaggerated illness so it sort of went under the radar. I went to hospital and had operations rather than go to school!

I value education, I still got all my qualifications and went to a high-performing uni and my school refuser child is now at uni too.

I have never ever understood one word of the argument that school is a lovely place of safety. Not for me and not for her. Home was the place we felt safe. School was a grim, scary institution, a completely hostile environment.

My DD was diagnosed eventually with ADHD. I suspect I have ASD traits but it didn’t really exist for girls in my youth. I am a loyal long-serving employee who very rarely goes sick - except for when I was in crisis over my own child’s school refusal and mental health.

That's nice for you 🙄
What would you do then if your child has barricaded themselves in their room and you can't get to them or they cut up all their clothes so they literally have nothing to wear or they grab a kitchen knife saying they are going to harm themselves rather than go to school.
Seriously what would you actually do in situations like that?
"tell them to go to school"
Yeah....so simple.

At that point I would sit them down and try to find out what exactly is going on at school that makes it so hard for them. I would try to find a way forward but if it wasn't something easily addressed, I would pull them out and home school them from that week. Then work on healing the trauma from what had gone before.

Same. I tell them to go to school, they bloody well go to school. This is not a democracy, school is mandatory and I do not negotiate

Mine locked herself in her room and self harmed. How do you negotiate with that?

Most school refusers just do the work at home?

What about science practicals?

If only it were that simple

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow utter bollocks. I used to be so cross with mine in the early days that I would unplug the router and put it in the boot of the car before I went to work. No 5G or unlimited wifi in those days … made no difference to her attendance.

@beasmithwentworth i still remember so clearly waking up with that awful sinking feeling of “here we go again” every morning and the cajoling, pleading, bribing, anger .. it was a decade ago but still so clear.

I found an email recently from her teacher replying to a heartfelt desperate email from me … she had thought she was forwarding to HoY and simply said “mum making excuses for her again” … swiftly followed by a panicked grovelling message apologising!😡

How's your daughter doing now?

I don't even have any science GCSE's because I couldn't even manage to get to school to do the exams.

Wow! My child was a school refuser in the very early 2000s, about 25 years ago - not the 10 to 15 years ago that you claim above @Idontunderstandmodernlife.
Her school psychiatrist said that it (school refusal) was not even a new phenomenon at that time.

It was in her second year at secondary school that my DD eventually had to give up trying anymore. I am almost positive that had anyone managed to convince her to try again, she would no longer be with us. She had hated nursery, and most of her time at infant and junior school, but she still struggled on until she was in her second year at secondary school. I was so proud of her, for how long and hard she had tried to fit in with our societies norms, and I am still extremely proud of her now.

My DD has gone through so much heartache since leaving school, and has missed out on so much of what many of us take for granted, yet she still perseveres, even though her life and living conditions are so restricted. She has tried all sorts of therapies and interventions, but she can't be 'cured' as she hasn't got an illness. Her brain is just wired differently.

None of the psychiatrists, psychologists, mental health nurses, or counsellors, who have met my DD have ever been able to come up with any other lable for her than 'Social Phobia'. 'Social Phobia' appears to be such a simple descriptive phrase, one that suggests a person has an irrational fear of socialising, and of actually living amongst Society. I, however, don't think that there is anything irrational about fearing what such a large proportion of the World's population has become. So, imo, there is absolutely nothing irrational about my daughter's fears.

For those of us who have witnessed, or experienced SP in our loved ones, or even in ourselves OP, it is terribly demoralising, and downright sickening, to read posts like your opening one yesterday.

When I started writing this reply to you OP, I was the first person responding to you, now it looks like you have had a lot more replies, so I will post this now, and then read all of the responses to your OP, OP, and your replies to them.

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow apologies that wasn’t meant to be aimed at you

Do you have any GCSEs?

Luckily my dd goes in happily as she’s social and enjoys being around other people, but when it’s bad it is VERY bad. I had professional cause to pop into her school last week and was genuinely taken aback by the volume, the chaos, the behaviour. The teaching staff I met were all great but there was no way on earth they would be able to contain that behaviour, they were totally outnumbered.
I have friends with autism who struggle with noise/crowds and I cannot fathom how they would cope in that environment even as adults

It was. I tried my younger ones at school. My youngest was really struggling and I sat down and talked to her. She couldn't quite articulate it so I asked her if she could write it down. She did. I withdrew her from school the next day and she never, ever went back. Later diagnosed ASD. Best thing for her.

@WedgieTime doing brilkiantly thank you, mid 20s, great job, happy. Hope this gives people hope who are in the thick of this.

For a week?! Good luck getting them back after that. School refusers can’t often put their finger on the exact problem. You’ve obviously never had any experience of it. My child was doing all sorts of things to put herself in danger to get out of it.

Edit: I didn’t read your comment right. So you would homeschool for good? I thought you meant take them out for a week. Homeschooling is also very hard.