To be furious that DD was alone when I came home??

[ApocalypseCheese]

DD has asd and a statement which covers her from the moment she leaves home to the moment she gets home. IE she is never unsupervised for her own safety.

Got home from shopping earlier and the poor thing was sat on the sofa panicing, one phonecall to the school reveals there were hardly any kids on the transport bus so dd was home quite a lot earlier than usual.
The front door wasnt locked as i've lost my front door key, dp had left for work earlier and left it open for me/the builders.

Not good enough, these people are trusted to care for my child when i'm not there, heads will roll in the morning

thebossofme no I am usually one of those supervising the disco.

Ok put it another way then.

Most schools' policy is for children to be released only once their appropriate parent/guardian has been seen by the member of staff. Imagine therefore if one day the teacher opened the classroom door early, and you were not yet there to collect, however the teacher allowed your child to leave anyway, and as you came up the road you saw your child coming towards you. Would you think that appropriate? Because that amounts to the same as allowing the child to leave the bus and enter the house without having seen the appropriate caregiver waiting to take her.

Tbh I don't think that it's possible to really have an understanding of what it's like to have a child with sn unless you have a child with sn iyswim. I imagine many posters here know someone with an sn child, however you only get a snapshot into their lives and cannot possibly know what it's like 24/7. And added to that the feelings are different anyway when it's your own child as opposed to one you know/happen to work with..

Apocalypsecheese, having been the author of a 297 post thread where at least 276 of the posters had completely misread the op, latched on to minor details, got it wrong and generally abused me, you have my sympathy. I don't often post here any more! it's a total bunfight and if you started this thread tomorrow, the response would be totally different!

Really, really, really will go to bed soon, but just wanted to say that I think that's absolutely true that you can't know what its like until you are there - but some of us are trying our very best to understand as much as we posibly, and I apologise if asking for explanation and clarity causes offence. Its just that I am interested in the topic for lots of reasons, so tend to try and ask these questions in a possibly misguided attempt to learn more. Apologies if this has offended AC or anyone else, but I don't see any other way that I can learn more. As I said, I have lots of experience with SN adults, but none with SN children, and my experience is limited to specific settings and situations, so don't really have anything comparable to go on.

wannabe - my DD isn't at disco age yet, but looking forward to that stage very much

Gosh - am very tired - that should read "possibly can"

""walking off a bus into a house" and being left there is unsupervised. She was on her own."

Yes, I don´t think anyone thinks she should have been left.

I don´t think going from a bus to a house id´s unsupervised.

But, in this case it clearly is.

However, for me that was not clear from the OP.

Am still waiting to hear what the escort said about why they didn´t escort OPs daughter to the house & wait for OP.

Just to give a small insight into my world....

I havent slept fully in over 7 yrs, always have one eye open just in case my son decides to go for a wander or gets frustated and hurts his sister.

Every night I double check the doors are locked, remove the knobs from the gas hob, lock all windows down and hide the keys etc under my pillow in a small bag.

I always sleep with my door wide open and my bed is pulled as near to the door as possible, that's just a small part of my sons bedtime routine, I havent even started on my daughter and what we go through with her !

Ah the escort, she just kind of hung her head and muttered something about DD shouting 'mummy' and running into the house so she assumed I was in, we went through the formal procedures again, I wasnt narky or shouty but did point out the consequences if this were to happen again and how scared dd was.

She did seem genuinely concerned so hopefully a harsh lesson has been learned and this sort of mistake won't be repeated.

Have only ploughed through the first page of this thread but the OP says she stands on the step and then it's she greets her from the bus. Hmmm confused, I am.

By TheBossofMe Fri 25-Jun-10 15:28:12
And 2shoes - no need to shout, its very very rude. And very few people who have read the thread properly are saying AC was BU. The discussion is now largely about whether her OP was clear, or whether it was a bit of an AIBU by stealth, because she didn't explain the full arrangements in her OP, only later in the thread.

The fact that myself, diddl and several others feel that original post wasn't obvious as to what the problem was would seem to suggest that it perhaps could do with a bit more clarity. Which AC then gave later in the thread.

None of which warrants being shouted at.
yet loads of people are argueing over her wording.
sometimes shouting is the only wasy to be heard when people won't listen(in this case read)
if you think that is rude.....what about people and what they have written on this thread??

I shouted out of pure frustration.
the op posted a clear op

Well at least she was ashamed.

A child running into the house shouting "Mummy"-how does that mean that mummy is there?

It is quite odd if you are usually outside waiting(?)-surprised that they didn´t come in to check that you were OK.

Oh ffs, we don't all have front gardens, my front door goes directly onto the street, the bus pulls up outside my front door, hardly freaking rocket science.

omg AC, now I am shocked.....you mean to say you don't jump on the bus and grab you child in a bear hug........well I never
pmsl

The vast majority of the time I wait outside, occasionally the escort will knock on the door. (usually in bad weather, but even then I look out of the window for the bus and jump up when I see it coming)

Dd always shouts 'mummy' when she comes home, dosent mean anything.

Personally I think the rush to get home and watch a certain football match had a large part to play in it.

2shoes, I crawl on my eyelids towards the bus everyday I will have you know

well.......
I wait at the door. we(well ok it was another mum) kicked up a stink as the escort was making her go and collect from the bus, so the escort has to drive her through the door.

She stands on the step and greets her from the bus. I didnt find that confusing.

Whatever next, you said you take her book bag too.

Do you have extra long arms that reach from your doorstep to the bus?

or do you or your dd take a few steps forward before you can take said bookbag from your dd?

I would like to know, the length of your arms as this will help me make up my mind as to whether your dd who by law cannot be left unsupervised, should have been left unsupervised!

oh blimey - are we still going

My arms only reach my knees sadly.

Toccatan, as the youngest of 4 children I see it as my duty to stand my ground and shout at educate those who need it

Diddl, you said

"I don´t see walking off a bus into a house as unsupervised".

This means that you think that AC's dd was supervised at this point.

If you are not unsupervised, you are supervised.

Perhaps what you meant was that you felt a child should not need to be supervised to do this and you don't have enough knowledge of disabilities to realise that this might not be the case for some children.

sorry diddl, didn't realise there was a whole other page of the thread and this has in effect been answered.

YANBU, of course. There is probably some sort of official complaint channel. I'd be writing to our SW and the LEA Transport dept; the underlying issue is that the bus co either have unclear processes or they aren't training the Escorts properly. It should be absolutely 100% clear to her that a) she phones if they are early or late and b) supervised handover means what it says on the tin. And as it wasn't clear, somebody needs to sort that out - because who knows what might happen if there's a next time. [mad]

Fwiw, if I dropped a child off early (whether SN or NT) and the person who always met them at the door was missing but the door was open, my first thought would be: "have they been burgled?" and my next thought would be "omg are the burglars still there?" Not "I hope I make it home in time for kickoff".