I dont want my eldest anymore and I need help

[breakingpoint3222]

I have 2 children. The youngest is 4. My eldest is 6. My youngest is a boy. My eldest is a girl.

Im not going to drip feed. Im going to give as much information as possible.

My eldest I believe is on the spectrum. We have been to the gp. We are on a waiting list. We are on waiting lists for things that school offers. School have flagged she is about 9 months behind and she is going to struggle in year 3. She's currently in year 2 and goes 7 at the end of this month.
She is violent at home. She has beaten me many times. She throws things at me, hits me, bites me, pulls my hair. She does the same to her little brother who is absolutely petrified of her.
She has to be in charge. Its very much her way or no way.
She has no respect for any adult. She rolls her eyes, speaks to me like im stupid, screams at me and her brother.
She doesnt sleep. That is usually when the violence starts. She isnt sleeping until 1 or 2 am. Shes exhausted.
As she's screaming and hitting me my youngest is also not sleeping properly and as he's just started reception this is hard
I cant give him any one to one attention when she's here. She hates my attention being on anything but her. She will pull my hair and scream. She will hurt him

School is a massive issue. She hates school. School have flagged no issues except her learning is behind. She refuses to go. Screaming and crying. We are usually late which again impacts on my youngest.

I have no support. My ex husband left when the youngest was born and apart from maintenance is not involved. I have no family.
I dont want to do this anymore.

I know you need to vent and make sense of it all hence your regular updates. Is there anyway she can go to a relative for a day for the weekend of if you can all do something. Nice long nature walk feed the ducks etc sometimes letting them get worn out is also good. Be aware of the other Side though when they are actually exhausted and need chill out time or sleep - kids need regular routine regular times good bedtimes etc helps them settle more. https://raisingchildren.net.au/school-age/development/development-tracker/6-8-years

Try the Samaritans. You don't need to be suicidal. They will have contact details for agencies who may help. At the very least they will listen.

Hi OP, what was her behaviour like over half term?

What you're describing sounds like classic after school restraint collapse, probably amped up by it being the first week back and the lack of sleep.

My daughter really struggles with the first day or two back after a school holiday.

She wasnt much better over half term to be honest

This isn't that helpful for a potential SEN PDA child.

Safe foods can be massively important in stabilising a PDA

Bland, crunchy, tolerated foods can shorten a PDA

...if I refused my tea as a kiddo I would be sent to be hungry..send a PDA child to bed hungry and you have a WW3 at midnight on your hands

This is sensible and apologies I have not read the complete thread either I wholeheartedly agree with this response. Good luck with it all , it will get better

Same here for dc

My child is on a malfunction as we speak. I may be gone some time.

Honestly, neither adult social care nor NHS 24 will be able to do anything today.

No idea who is correct here, but I worked with a barrister specialising in SEND law when trying to get DS a school place, and he told me that the only way for parents to get the LA to act lawfully was to pitch up to their offices with the child, threaten to leave them there, and mean it.

Luckily it didn’t come to that with DS, but I have been exactly where the OP is. The resources that people assume SEND families are milking do not exist, at all, anywhere.

The OP's daughter isn't diagnosed with anything. She hasn't been referred to the children with disabilities service. If she had, and met the criteria, and they were refusing to provide respite, your barrister might have a point. But just refusing to collect your child and demanding social services take her to a foster family? That is not a legal right!

I don’t think anyone has suggested that it’s a legal right @RoseField1. The point the barrister was making is that there are scarcely enough resources even to help those who, like the OP, are at crisis point and beyond.

Interesting that you mention respite because that’s not available either. We and DS met the criteria at least 5 years ago, but since then it’s been crickets from the LA. Why would anyone look after violent autistic children for MW when you can get paid the same in Tesco, and not get biffed?

I don’t have any easy solutions.

The bar to getting help from Social Work is very high. It's a long and complex process to place a child in residential provision. It requires inter agency work from School/CAHMS/NHS/Police to build a plan. TV dramas make it look as if help is just a phone call away. It isn't. Social Work have a statutory requirement to provide out of hours telephone contact. There is no statutory requirement to act on the caller's wishes.

The idea of leaving your child somewhere until they 'do something' is just a fairy tale unfortunately. You cannot leave your child in someone's office. My son went into residential provision aged 16 - it's a long long road with many twists and turns. Social Work involvement for a 6 year old in the circumstances described is not going to happen.

the only way for parents to get the LA to act lawfully was to pitch up to their offices with the child, threaten to leave them there, and mean it. I assumed you were talking about legal rights under disability law?

She just punched her brother in the nose. I had to restrain her. Shes bitten me and pulled the curtains down..ive wrapped her in a blanket and held her. She fell asleep..shes exhausted. Im ringing the only parent I have in my phone and seeing if my little boy can stay for the night. He's so sad. This isnt fair

Did you look at the Capa First Response website? They were the most useful service I ever came across and I tried a LOT! They were recommended by the safeguarding lead at my school when I embarrassingly had to refer myself to them.

No ill have a look thank you

What some stupid comments recently.
OP has said nothing to indicate she’s a risk to her daughter. She would not got arrested for child neglect in the scenario of being at breaking point and not picking up from school. Social services can and do absolutely arrange emergency foster care places. If their parent was in hospital with no relatives, died, in this situation amongst others.

I agree not collecting and saying you can’t cope anymore would force action and support OP. However I firmly believe this little girl has trauma/ a complex after being abandoned by her father and I fear this may permanently break her. I think it’s partly thinking she’s bad as her dad didn’t want her, and also wanting to know there’s nothing she can do to loose her mum too. She doesn’t talk about her dad, which is an indication it’s really internalised. And it hurts. Talking about it is normal and healthy.
I do fully understand this is a realistic suggestion to get help, but I’d just like to throw my concerns out there. I understand it’s a really tough situation and it feels like there’s no winning for OP.

Chat gbt can be really good at coming up with social stories to help a child if you describe the situation and desired outcome realisation for child… if you wanted to try for some bedtime stories. Don’t go straight into the deep stuff though. I’d start by asking for a social story about a 7 year old girl who threw her meals off the table, but in the end learnt she was hungry and sorry for the mess her mum had to clear up and for scaring her brother. Read her a new one for story time before bed or before school. Maybe read to both. If you can print them off and have them available to her if she decides to pick them up and read again herself…. I still think lots of physical activity so she’s tired will help.

Nhs 111 option 2 is there as an option for you op, it's the MH crisis line, I'm not saying you are in MH crisis, but rock bottom burnout (clarifying there). They can link to other helpful organisations

I'm glad your DD is asleep for now and you reached out

OP, think about what happened from picking her up from school to the point where she threw the food and hurt her brother and see if there are things that could have gone differently. I am not saying you have done anything wrong, but there may have been opportunities to de escalate, to help her to calm down. I might separate the children completely for example - maybe your daughter would be happier eating on the sofa while you and your son are at the table.

We were taught to say "looks like you are not strong enough right now to...so i am going to" eg as this is situation specific and puts you in some sort of control, even if it is really only damage limitation.

Not sure what you mean by “disability law” tbh, but the Children and Families Act refers to disability in the alternative when defining SEND. I’d have to check the statute but the test is something like “greater difficulty in learning than children of the same age”. The LA has a duty to identify and support the above children AND those with a disability. Diagnosis is not a gateway to support (although in practice it helps a great deal). There is no “legal right” to force the LA to take a difficult child into care, though.

My barrister friend gave this advice after my 6 year old was on a reduced timetable (unlawful), being removed from a second mainstream school (possibly unlawful) which would mean that I would have had to give up a career I love. So in my case, it did relate to an enforceable legal right. His advice forced the LA to help DS, and me taking an extremely adversarial approach certainly helped too. I would not rule out any extreme action to get DS what he needs, so I can absolutely understand why people are suggesting that the OP forces their hand. Plainly, OP cannot carry on like this. You cannot possibly imagine how mendacious the LA can be towards SEND children and their parents unless you have experienced it, and it’s best to fight fire with fire.

Try connectivefamily.com

Its an organisation that's made a huge difference to me, there's nothing they haven't seen or supported before

If you email them they will get back to you

Keep building your SEN network @breakingpoint3222 both IRL and online

If you don't have FB make a profile just for finding out local events.

Depends where in gtr mcr you are but there's loads in south manc

Yes but none of the situation you were in applies to OP.

I didn’t say it did. I merely shared an observation made to me by a senior SEND barrister regarding the need to take extreme measures when it comes to getting crisis help from very stretched resources (as I think was entirely obvious to everyone else on the thread).