Primary school auties: summer and the new academic year - thread 7

[openupmyeagereyes]

New thread.

This is the continuation of the thread for parents / carers of autistic children / children with additional needs. Most of us are parents of children in year 1 / year 2.

Links to old threads

Thread 1 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/3080753-DS-with-ASD-starting-school-Sept-2018-I-am-feeling-overwhelmed

Thread 2 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/3451020-Reception-auties-2018-19-thread-2

Thread 3 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/3628263-Auties-transition-to-Year-1-thread-3

Thread 4 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/3748449-Primary-school-Auties-into-2020-thread-4

Thread 5 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/3953023-Primary-school-auties-summer-and-beyond-thread-5?pg=1

Thread 6 - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/special_needs/4166833-Primary-school-auties-spring-2021-and-beyond-thread-6?pg=1

Obviously I didn’t get him to repeat ‘fuckers’ 😂😂

But he might 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Wish DS would tell the Head he’s a fucker. Would save me a job 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Ds had headlice a few months ago. He was scratching and I looked in his hair several times and couldn’t see anything. A few days later, after his bath, I used the nitty gritty comb on him and sure enough he had them. Large buggers too. That’s the only time we’ve had them so far 🤞

Danni I don't think tough titties is that bad. we once got told off cause ds called someone stupid. They were very 'concerned' that he's heard that word at home! I'm pretty sure it was echolalia repeating from Big Hero Six. This was at the old school.

Well done getting ds in to school open. I think you're right not try and push him on to quickly. It's amazing you've built him up so much.

Magrat ds hasn't seen an EP since his EHCP assessment at 4.

So typical dimples! You would have thought they would expect term times to be busy and not to take annual leave then!

So glad that it's Friday.

Tough titties is definitely something that would be said in front of children in my family without a second thought. I was a bit alarmed the other day when DS told me that he knew the C-word. Turns out he meant crap!

This morning I asked DS to get a knife to butter the toast. He said, 'no, I might hurt you with it'. He then asked what would happen if he stabbed me in the neck. I have no idea what's put these thoughts in his head.

Open my line manager and head of department have both been useless. I think that I'm going to go to my union rep or HR as they're not taking my concerns seriously. The icing on the cake was when my line manager asked how DS was. When I mentioned that his aggression towards DD was my main problem, he said 'well of course as they're not siblings' I replied what in the same way as I'm not my Mum. I didn't think I had the scope to be more cross with him but he succeeded!

Great progress with DS Open. Well done you!

Oh how thoughtless dimples. I’m sorry, that must have stung. He’s talking rubbish anyway as plenty of kids are aggressive to siblings. Ignore.

Thanks guys, though I don’t think we’ve done anything rather than be (mostly) patient I suppose. Yesterday for instance, we got to school and out of the blue ds refused to go in. I ended up taking him home but wondered if I should have frog marched him in and let them sort it out. Anyway, an hour later he said he was ready to go to school so he went in happily for two hours which was preferable I think.

He’s in but there’s a way to go yet as he’s not spending much time in the classroom and he’s not doing much work. Still it’s great progress so I’m very pleased. Waiting to hear about the new school.

Ooh hello, I sort of disappeared for a while..

Decided to add to the madness and added a Dpuppy to my crazy life. On the plus side I toilet trained him in a week when DS isn't trained at 5!

DD has settled into year 2 surprisingly well, interesting when child who made her life miserable is no longer in her class...

Hope everyone is plodding along OK?

@danni0509 just been reading back. Interesting reading re medication not seeming helpful, DD's pead will not prescribe medication as they say they very rarely work for dual diagnosis children with ASC/ADHD and at best may calm the ADHD down but the anxiety/ASC becomes more pronounced

@carriebradshawwithlessshoes the plugged in thing describes my DD too.

I watched the don't exclude me programme yesterday and it struck home that despite being the same age there is no way at all DD could articulate like the 6 year old boy could.

Very thoughtless of him dimples! That's a bit worrying about the knife, but good that he knew not to stab you! When the kids were young and I was overtired/anxious I used to get intrusive thoughts a lot and it was very stressful.

Hopefully you'll hear about the school soon open.

So sweet mumofsend! Well done in the toilet training. I sometimes wonder whether getting another puppy was such a good idea but I think it has mainly been a good thing and the kids love him.

Regarding ds’ meds, he’s having better mornings in school, I would say by what I’m told / the emails they send, 3 out of 5 days he’s having a better time, he’s taking part in pe weekly with the class & joining play time with a small group of children every day, a new target in his ehcp is to swim weekly in the hydro pool but to do it safely and leave the pool when he’s told etc, they are starting with that next week.

He still does impulsive / dangerous things, yesterday morning when he arrived at school (fully medicated) he ran off from the staff on the school car park (he has to have 2-1 on the car park) and the taxi driver said the staff look terrified as they couldn’t catch ds. (I hate being told stuff like that) he went straight through a railing! And the staff couldn’t get through the railing / to reach him. I was trying to picture it in my mind but don’t know exactly what she means. I do know from taking him for those 2 weeks there is a main road very close!!!!

He is still being silly at home regularly but then I think it’s not just adhd he has it it? Plus nothing is going to happen overnight, from what I understand the medication makes the brain work in sync but ds still needs to learn how to behave, it’s not automatic. Oh here ds have this tablet and miraculously you’ll know exactly what you need to do! I think as with everything it will take time.

We have another review in a fortnight with CAMHS so they might increase it as he’s on a low dose, he is fine on the medication though, no side affects at all, he’s eating as he normally would / his sleep is the same as before. I’ve read that some kids lose loads of weight not eating and are kept awake all night.

So it’s not all bad.

His teacher said the medications goal is to enable ds to learn & retain strategies they teach him.

He’s only been on them 3 weeks today so I’m going to not make any decisions for a few months yet.

😞😞 sorry, a quick vent… in same vein as previous discussions about silly behaviour and why cannot some of our kids just keep their bodies STILL?? Quick drink out today, DS throwing himself from side to side in the cafe and flaying his arms about, knocked everything off table which smashed. Then I walked out onto the street with him and DD, he was laughing, walking backwards, he does this thing of flinging his legs out when he’s walking, obv I have to hold his hand… he completely tripped me up, I went flat on my face and landed on top of him on the pavement. Grazed all my leg.

How hard can it be to just walk down a street, forwards, normally??? I see 2 year olds doing it, not even handholding!

Sorry I’ll shut up now …

It’s how ds is Carrie. Knocks things off everywhere, crashes into everything, ds walks on the tips of his toes, he doesn’t / never has walked flat since he learnt to walk, so explains a lot with him because his balance is so poor because of it and he never walks, he just runs on his toes. I’ve always said taking ds for a walk is like taking a Rottweiler out on a lead 🤣

Talking of falling on top of kids when we went to turkey (he’d ran off near the deep pool, I grabbed him, he slipped and fell and he took me down too) I fell on top of his head on concrete, all my body weight straight onto his head he smashed his face in, massive swollen egg on his head was bruised for 3 weeks, couple of years ago I fell on him on a car park same sort of scenario except he was having a proper tantrum he took me down again, I crushed his foot! A week or so after he had to have an X-ray because his nail was injured and the dr thought he had a broken toe, felt such a cunt telling the dr I had basically done it. Then he dragged me down the stairs last year and AGAIN I nearly snapped his ankle off falling down with him on top of his ankle.

Ds is sat next to me trying to play fifa on the PlayStation 🤣 he looks so grown up, he just said mummy I’m not going to bed tonight 😂😫

Dimples, sorry you’re having a hard time at work. Ds has told me before he was going to cut me in to pieces with a knife and eat me up so I hid them well away. He would probably do it aswell as he doesn’t understand consequences.

Open sounds sensible not pushing ds to do any more hours if you’re managing to get him in every day. Hope this week is as successful.

Mum of send, pleased dd is more settled this school year, hope it continues. Is she staying there for now?

@danni0509 she is for the time being, the specialist options were all pretty grim so it was the least bad option despite her head telling me and the LA he hasn't got a single member of staff willing to work with her

She is also a bull in a China shop who leaves a trail of destruction just by 'walking'

That sounds like an exhausting outing Carrie.

What a lovely puppy MumofSend

Danni ouch those accidents sound painful.

All knives are secured here. I wonder if he was thinking about accidentally hurting me. He has previously walked towards me with sharp scissors holding them so that they pointed at me and as he frequently trips I pointed out that he was not being safe and what could happen. Scissors are hidden too!

Bless you @carriebradshawwithlessshoes sounds tiring!! With DS, it really depends on his mood, a lot of the time he's fine as he loves a good coffee shop, but he can be so impulsive if the mood takes him. I don't know how you guys with more than one DC do it! I have come down from bedtime at 10.30 as DS still not asleep!! He's trying at least to sleep but slept so much last night after q funny dream the night before that its knocked him out of routine and he just couldn't settle to sleep. He said I could go at half 10 bless him as long as he was allowed to put his light up magic wand on! So I'm watching a sneaky bit of the strictly results show! Absolutely knackered though, had flu jab yesterday too, and got work tomorrow. Still, we all had a lovely weekend, and maybe the clocks going back soon might help some of us with the late bedtimes!

Dimples, forgot to say hope things are improving with work a bit - what a strange thing for your manager to say! Working in a large organization too I have found going to HR about things more helpful. There's a bit more distance and less assumptions. Of course DD is DS's sister - they share a mum (you) and a house and a life. Silly man.

Thanks Carrie - I think the fact that they're not biologically related to each other makes no difference to DS's behaviour. He proudly boasts that she's his little sister. He loves her but he is also horrible to her - I'm sure that he would be exactly the same with a bio sibling. Tbf my line manager hasn't really sunk lower in my opinion as he has previously made jokes about a colleague who he has diagnosed with autism. I called him out on that, I don't think that really registered with him as he still thinks that we've got a good relationship.

Unfortunately we were at the drive through test centre today as all 3 of us are coughing.

Oh no dimples, I hope you get results quickly.

Magrat I hope you got some sleep in the end.

For those with hyper dc, I guess it’s a combination of proprioception issues (knowing where your body is in space) and a need for movement to regulate, like a restless leg type thing. Super frustrating but probably something they don’t have much control over. A number of times, more so when he was younger than now, ds has cracked me in the face with his head because he’s less aware of where he is in relation to me.

We’ve had a good day. Managed to get ds to the dentist (second attempt!) and then into school for a short while. Lovely play date in the park with friends later on.