How much do I have to take from these 'professionals'?

[YakkaSkink]

DS (5, in Reception) has some problems that are taking a lot of effort to make sense of. I chose a school for him that's large, well-regarded and well-resourced as I knew that he would be a challenge and thought that they would probably be in the best position to meet his needs. I am clearly not the usual type of parent for the school (I don't do the whole yummy mummy look for starters), I also happen to be the only single parent of any child in DS's class.

DS is disruptive, sometimes violent and very demanding at the best of times. He has a visual impairment, maybe an ASD as his social skills are abysmal, I think some serious sensory processing problems and he's highly intelligent, but getting nowhere at the moment.

I met the SENCO recently and she started by calling me 'Mum' (which I don't mind if it's A&E, but I have a big issue if its someone with whom I will have an ongoing relationship) and then proceeded to make a heap of sweeping generalisations about what it must be like to be a single parent. She went on to suggest that she thinks he has oppositional defiant disorder - I think that's not really the assumption to start with. The next meeting she opened with 'Well, we've had nearly a year now to get to know and love [DS]!' - her voice heavy with sarcasm. She really seems to have a negative attitude towards DS and towards me.

In the same meeting the Ed Psych (who said that he hadn't read the notes at the outset) within five minutes of meeting me gave me a heavy-handed lecture on how I had to set boundaries for DS (on the assumption that I don't and also that I must be very stupid). He then questioned me, aggressively, about whether I have any routines in place. I sat there, saying through gritted teeth 'yes, I agree with you'. He went on to give me a lecture about how a child should do as they are told because they are a child and the person telling them is an adult (well, I don't agree exactly, but I didn't dare discuss). I did say that since meeting the parenting support adviser and listening to her advice I wasn't sure that she had a lot to suggest that I don't already do with DS. The SENCO finished off the meeting by warning me not to 'disengage' with the parenting support adviser or it would be much harder to get help for DS.

I feel that they're misjudging me and DS seriously and I'm assuming that the only way through this is to smile sweetly and do as I'm told until they finally believe me, but the whole thing is making me feel bullied and up against it.

sorry you are having a difficult time, could you get someone (parent/friend) to come to some of the meetings with senco etc, when I had a nightmare HV I found she toned the criticism down if I had moral support! do you have any sort of specialist advice re:visual impairment service as to support in school? is he already under paed, as you could ask paed about behaviour issues your concerns about ASD,and paed could refer on if necessary

Thanks, there are a couple of friends I could ask - I feel so silly doing so as I don't usually seem short on confidence and I could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times anyone's seriously tried to bully me before. The VI specialist support teacher has put in a very rough and slightly inaccurate report - the VI is insignificant from their POV and they don't know anything about DS's wider issues. Paed is referring on - but the wait is 12-18mo for assessment, meanwhile he needs a lot more support in school - today he bit his teacher whilst scaling a bookcase...

I've been too honest that I'm finding it difficult and that I can't understand what's going on with DS - I can't work as DS is such a handful that I can't leave him with anyone (and there are probably no jobs anyway atm) so we don't have enough money. Have just applied for DLA, so that might help if he gets it. I think me admitting that I'm finding it very hard (during CAF) is what they've based their assumptions on apart from the fact that my face doesn't fit.

I think DS is marginal for a dx of ASD as there are some things he just doesn't do - he's very flexible about changes in routine for example - and there are a lot of confusing issues in his case: a sensory impairment can be confusing with ASD, as can giftedness (he's testing three years+ ahead in terms of cognitive ability)

Poor you. I am afraid I don't have much advice, becasue your ds's situation is a bit different. But I do have lots of understanding to some parts of your post.
I have a very unsupportive school. And ds is being assessed at the moment. The thought it was ODD, then AS, not they are not entirely sure. he is very bright with poor social skills, or he is very lonely, at the least.
I too was told 12 mths to get into CAMHS for assessemnt, but I phoned and phoned and pushed and pushed, and i got one alot quicker.

I wish you the best. Ask anything, if I can be of any help at all.

Your son sounds like a complex little boy. 3 years ahead in some areas is impressive!

Okay, so I've been through a situation where one supportive figure in my CAF team and made me feel uneasy and wasn't helping. She didn't turn up for a meeting, so I mentioned it there and one great family support worker (miss her) said I absolutely have the right to have who I want involved, as someone I don't get along with won't be a support to me. So we dropped her.

Unluckily, you seem to have a team of them who don't understand you and are so presumptious (I would be angry too).
You have the right the change the worker your have for your senco.
We also had a Senco worker who came to some assumption I won't even repeat, I made sure he went straight out of the picture. And the health visitor told us we're within our rights to change our senco worker.

I think what you need is a support worker you really do get along with, who can speak up for you, and help you change the people involved in your CAFs.
CAF is there to support you, not make you feel like this.
People you can try talking to about this very uncomfortable situation are; health visitor, the school's family support worker. A childrens' centre support worker. You can take yourself to a childrens centre, say you'd like to join some groups, they often have parenting classes on. If you get talking to staff there, you can inquire about if there's anyone there who could be your family support worker. I had them come with scans and all sorts with me when I was pregnant, as I was alone, they were sooo helpful and so caring.
Even charities for children with disabilitie smay have support workers for you, do mencap do that? I'm unsure.
Look for support for yourself, talk things through with them, get them onside and to come and support you. You can invite anyone you feel is a supportive figure to YOUR CAF meeting. It's about you and your child, an you being supported, not lectured, that's disgraceful.

This wasn't a CAF meeting - I closed the CAF before as the only people who turned up to more then one meeting out of three were me and DS's (long suffering) class teacher. I've asked to open a new one as it looks like it should work better if there's actually a lead professional and the (very nice) parenting support adviser has offered to do it. Unfortunately, this is the school SENCO so I don't get any choice about her and I'm also worried about the ed psych's ability to help DS if he's treating me like that.

I can't praise the childrens' centre enough, for their parenting classes, and all sorts of classes they hold. They're life savers. They don't think one size fits all either. They know about all the support that's out there for you aswell.
I just started another 12 week course on 'strenghening families' it's brilliant. Hearing all other parents go through aswell, it's like therapy.
They provide lunch and tea. Free childcare for the duration of the course (I have 2 kids under 5, so even the one afternoon with them in free childcare is great). I just can't say how great children's cntre has been for my, with my son having complex needs, and not acting like 'the usual' 4 yr old.
Maybe I've gone off track a bit, but yeah, childrens centre are so supportive.
Also my son's old school did a 7 week '7 steps to succesful parenting' course at the school too, which was great aswell. One week we had someone come in to teach us hand massage and give us some essential oils. They really understand the stress you go through with children who need more support and care than most.

If you had others involved who understand you more, they'll be able to speak up for you to the ed pysch and the senco at least?

Hiya yakka. Sometimes schools just assume behaviour issues are the mothers fault till proven otherwise. If you were a married teacher with four older kids they'd say your child's issues were because you put your husband and job first whilst simultaneously over-pampering your baby.

I've found health professionals far easier to deal with. I think it's because they aren't so accustomed to treating everyone like a child. Which means I'm far less tempted to behave like one! And once a health bod writes a letter saying you're taking all the correct measures, and further investigation is warrented the school should see you are right to be concerned. Often that's all they need to start working with you more constuctively.

School nurse might liase?

Single parents do get picked on - fact. I've been there despite being a trained teacher, Granny 1 being a retired SEN teacher & Granny 2 being a primary teacher.

"123 Magic" seems to be the gold standard parenting book - that if you are sent on a DECENT parenting course run by a professional rather than a Church volunteer will be recommended. Do what I did - skip the patronisation and buy the book, read it and when the techniques don't work start going higher. You will be taken more seriously by the ED pysch etc if you can say you have tried these techniques. My lad 's shrink report said I use consistent dscipline despite the derogatory comments from my son's last school ; ) Sitting on a course for 10 weeks feelng patronised when you can read the book at home one weekend seems daft to me.

Keep a diary of behavior at home - use antecedent (what happened before the behavior inc what the environment was like), BEHAVIOR, consequence (what was the reward to the chid of the grotty behavior). It took me a while but I identified my lad has a serious sound sensitvity this way.

Use your GP on a regular basis - it's an official record of the interventions you have tried etc if someone turns nasty and officially blames your parenting to social services. It also helps if the GP is in the picture when you ask for a referral to a developmental peadiatrician - do this now as a matter of urgency as it sounds as if it could be a while by the time the school get over themselves enough to suggest this to you.

Developmental pead will be the first step on the way to establishing if there really is a problems, eg adhd, asd apd etc. You can ask for this independent of school.

Keep posting - there's lots of us here who will bolster your spirits when they get to you!

just whatever you do don't lose your temper and call them names ... whoops that's what I did :)

The teacher isn't qualified to dx ODD for a start. link here - scroll doiwn to the bottom - basically says that ODD is just a name for a set of behaviours without a clear understanding of the cause.

Been there, done that. Having moral support in meetings is essential ime; just one more person sitting there looking as if "I am not sure I agree with you lot" can have a big effect. A friend or even better a medical professional.

Feeling better today, thanks so much for all the support :)

Thanks bochead for the 123 Magic tip - I'd far rather just read the book quickly as I think I'm doing the right things in general, but checking that I really am not missing something crucial and having the terminology to describe what I'm doing would be very useful. I think I'm going to ask the parenting support worker to 'check' my parenting somehow as I think she'd probably be the most useful person to have on my side. The faster they stop pointing the finger at me, the faster DS gets the people who can help him actually trying to understand him.

DS's class teacher agrees with me - she says she does all the usual things and they just don't work with DS. We had a short conversation today and she's starting to see DS in the same light I do and think along the same lines in terms of what he needs which is a great relief (although neither of us can actually see yet how he's going to be able to escape a classroom environment...)

Thanks very much for the link cornsilks - that was how I was feeling about the 'ODD' idea - it seemed to me like saying 'the kid has an attitude problem' but with some dubious air of legitimacy. The way NAS has phrased it says what I want to say to them with authority.