What's bugging me

[Guest guest]

Hi,

Just needed to vent a bit about my son's school situation. We were very impressed with the school and the staff and last year was just unbelievably fantastic!

But...... even though we are thrilled with 's school, over the last month or two, he has become increasingly stressed about going, almost to the point where I would swear he was afraid. His self injurious behaviours have escalated unbelievably. He is now clawing at his gums to where the roots of the teeth are exposed, biting at a scar on his hand, and even though he has bitten his nails down to practically nothing, he is still managing to damage himself with them.

We just had a routine progress meeting with the school which included his new teacher, the psychiatrist for the school district (who we really like), the learning disability nurse and the pediatrician who is attached in the school. We discussed the increase in his distressing behaviours. The psychiatrist said that he might be developing OCD. He increased the Ritalin slightly and said we should meet again just after Christmas to see if there had been any improvement. If not, he said we might want to consider using Prozac. This scared me!!!! I don't have a problem with anti-depressants and understand that Prozac can be used in children with autism for OCD but is such a tiny little thing. I just wonder where we draw the line before he turns into one giant chemical cocktail. (The psych had also mentioned Risperdal as well.)

Anyhoo, don't ask me why because I just don't know (can't put my finger on it) but something about his teacher didn't sit well with me. I might be paranoid but I don't think she likes him very much. (I don't care if I'm being paranoid but just thought I'd mention it! LOL) I asked her if she knew of anyone in the school who would be interested in helping us with respite (for a few hours one Saturday a month). As it is a special needs school, the school quite commonly works with the local services to help with respite for their students. (And yes, they are paid for it. LOL) Anyway, she just looked at me very directly and said, "No." It was just in that one moment that I thought, there's something else going on here.

Last year, 's teacher was a woman named a and she was crying on the last day of school because she was going to miss having him in her class since he was moving up a level. I realize that you can't expect everyone to be so taken with your child, but it really was nice.

But this year.......well, the answer sort of presented itself to me the other night. Another thing that has gotten worse since started back to school is his sleeping. It takes him forever to get to sleep and he is stressed out going to sleep because he knows when he wakes up, he is heading straight for school. As he is lying there, he says, "No school tomorrow. School is closed tomorrow." Finally, he was so upset about school that I asked him the other night, if he liked Kate's class. The question really stressed him out and the answer was a screaming emphatic NO! I then asked him if he wanted to go to a's class (realizing that being a child, he might well have the same response). When I asked him about going into a's class, he got a huge smile on his face and said 'Yes!! Like a!!'

As I said, we, met with the school last week for the normal progress meeting but all the kids have been off school this week for what they call 'half-term' over here in the UK. It has helped that he hasn't been in school but obviously isn't a permanent solution to keep him out of school. I called the psych's office day before yesterday and we are meeting him on Monday morning at 11:30. I will also be calling the school to set up a meeting with the head teacher/principal as soon as they open Monday morning.

My husband and I have discussed this at great length and have decided that we want him out of Kate's class and just cannot send him back until it is sorted.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to read this, just needed to vent about what prompted me to join a support group in the first place!!

Hugs,

Steph