" scchool refusal" has started already ....and we are not even at the school gate yet...or in fact got to a school morning ! Any one got any good ideas ...(desperate help plea!)

[bizzey]

I have had a few loads of threads going about ds aged 9.

Since Friday after school he has said he is NOT going in on Monday.
As I said in other posts ..he is getting more anxious and defiiant in the last few weeks.

Has anybody got some good advice or tips for me ...please !!!!

Even my tummy is churring now at the thought of tomorrow morning !

School are trying to help him ...but he is putting up a brick wall and we can't get through to him or make him understand....he has to go ???

Thanks (and sorry it is me again going around in circles and not getting anywhere !) (OH and I can't change my spelling mistakes in the title !)

Is he able to tell you why he doesn't want to go in?
Is he amenable to rewards for being a big, brave boy?

I can't advise, I'm afraid, since with some kids, discussing their feelings helps, but I have one who just ramps up his anxiety to the point where we have to refuse to discuss it. DH ended up working from home, on Friday, because DS1 was threatening not to go in because he was worried about a specific event. The prospect of being driven home, instead of walking, helped him to face up to it.

Cant offer much advice sorry but we are in a similar situation with Dd3 who is 11.

She refused to go to school a couple of weeks ago because the teacher had threatened to keep the whole classs in at playtime.

Dd3 felt she hadnt done anything wrong and so refused to go. In the 6 years we have struggled with school anxiety I have never given in before but this time I couldnt motivate her at all.

Several emails to the Head teacher later and some support has been put into place to help to decrease her anxiety.

I am not looking forward to tomorrow because she has been saying since friday that she is not going, they are on a trip tomorrow.

It is exhausting isnt it.

Good luck

This has been / is a problem for both ds1 and ds2 on occasion.

ds1 has the odd day where he doesn't want to go in and has been known to lock himself in the bathroom for hours to avoid going in. We have had to call dh home from work (70 minutes away) to get him there on occasion! Bribery does usually work for him without having to go to the dh option as in general he gets some enjoyment from school.

ds2 hates school with a passion and often is very reluctant to go. On occasion when he has been forced he has then exploded at school so not a good outcome. He is difficult to bribe because he doesn't want anything. We have had some success where he is given some choices e.g. arriving a little late or I have arranged that he miss whatever lesson is causing the anxiety or even that I will pick him up if he tells the teacher he is struggling (did this a couple of times and he managed to go back after lunch). We feared with the latter he might end up not going in at all but this was not the case.

We have recently changed school for him and they are working really hard to help him feel safe and lower the anxiety so at the moment he is not going into the main classroom at all. Sunday / Monday mornings are still very troublesome though he has been going in a bit easier the rest of the week.

When I took Dd3 back after her recent refusal, I popped in at lunchtime each day and we had a secret code where she came to the door and gave me a thumbs up if she was ok and thumbs down if she wasnt.

The senco wasnt v. Happy when I said I would take her home if she gave me a thumbs down but I really didnt care. Dd3 needs to trust that I will help her if she needs me to.

Thank you for all you r kind comments.. will catch up tomorrow !!!

good luck for tomorrow , i am also anticipating problems . ds2 hasnt managed a full week yet since going back in september .

Awful morning...2 TAS had to prize my sobbing 9 year old off me....while I turned my back on him and walked out.

How crap do I feel now !

There is no getting through to him at the moment and HT coming to talk to me in the playground after school in front of him did not help !

He is going for counselling this week at school via external people and I will fill forms and chat to them tomorrow.

But I know my boy...I feel in order to get him back on track (if ever) I need to be his TA/ shadow for a while to get his confidence back....or I HE him , which is what he really wants. He came up with the idea !

Hope everyone else had a better day !!

Don't bring him in in the morning. Don't even think about it. But consider making him wear the uniform for a week or so on 'school days'.

Draw up a plan and talk to the class teacher about it. Basically: graded exposure so he spends almost no time in the situation and is heavily rewarded for doing that (McD after school, or whatever he likes best)

Bring him in 10 min before school finishes, have the TA make sure his desk is near the classroom door, and takes his stuff off him discreetly as he does in. Teacher then says, "That's it for today class", he gets straight up from his desk, puts on his coat, picks up his bag and is first one to walk out to the playground. To you, get in the car, reward.

After a week of this, try 20-30min in school. Later on, drop him at the end of lunchtime. Forget mornings till things have been good for quite a while. Any hiccups, go back a stage or two.

If they're getting funny about 'absent marks' you could later on concede saying hi at reception for 5 min so they can put a 'late' mark in for the 'morning', or maybe doing just the last few min of the pre-lunch lesson

PolterGoose Thank you ...Don't worry about not remembering my past posts....you have always given me good advice.

No to a statement or "formal dx" but he is on SA+,OT ,SALT, PHYSIO, 2 x peads and has had a quick ED Pysc assessment who has said in his report a few weeks ago that anxiety at school was causing him stress..(You don't say !!! I sure as well did not need a degree to work that out !!!) so "things are going on"!!

You are right ...this situation is not sustainable...for either of us...or in fact for us as a family with his 2 older brothers (1 at the same school as him)

Maria do not know what to do tomorrow...he is due for a cinema trip in the morning and I am due a meeting with the counciller but he said he will not go to cinema trip ? No bribary will work as he is quite fixated on his ideas and bribes and treats have never worked....in some ways he is an adult in a child's body !

HT said he over thinks things and should stop doing it

Which surely is like telling an OCD person/child to stop washing their hands as much (or something similar ).

Well, all boys asleep now and getting ready for ds2 birthday tomorrow so might have a little night cap !!!

If you withdraw permission for cinema trip, school will leave him in another class. Don't know if that's better or worse...

If need be, you'll just have to bring him when you see the counsellor. Is he full-on can't-talk-to-anyone hard work at the moment, or more likely to quietly sit nearby, maybe with a games console?

Maria... thank you ...for some reason I have just had a light bulb moment while reading your reply

He will go to the cinema
I will have my meeting
I will look at his work while he is at cinema as I can't/wont be able to take it all in during the 5/10 min slot at parent evening.

I wiil be there when he comes back ..because other wise he is going to struggle to trust me .

What do you think ??