Help looking for some advice - school avoidance

Part of it is trying to find out what aspect of school is causing the high anxiety and then you can come up with a plan specifically.

For PDA language regarding going to school it depends on the child. If it starts with getting out of bed you can try giving a choice for breakfast and not even mention getting up so "would you like toast or cereal". If she chooses then you likely don't need to tell her to get out of bed. If choices are difficult for her then you can try "your uniform is on the end of the bed, I'll be downstairs sorting breakfast". Leads her to the things she needs to do once out of bed but without telling her to do anything.

You can then continue this through the stages of going to school "are you putting your coat on now or in the car" or "your coat is on the end of the stairs, I'll be waiting in the car". Obviously you would change these to however your routine works.

If her autism needs are greater and less like PDA, you may want to go down the route of morning schedule (for a teenager it doesn't have to be a big deal with pictures etc if she'd hate that, just a list that works for her).

I don't know what adjustments she has in place at school but it may be that it's overwhelming to walk through the yard full of people first and could do with going straight into school. Or she'd benefit from doing the same thing every time she gets to school so the day is a little more predictable. Could be a certain staff member it'd help her to go to each morning. There's many small things that can lead up to these massive feelings.

Good luck. Hope it improves for you both.

I've just seen a reply you made to another person. If she doesn't know what is causing the anxiety it could help to break down the day and rate it on an anxiety scale. So looking at everything from the journey to school, arriving, going to form, going to lesson 1, moving between lessons, break, lunch etc. It could be 1-10 or if she struggles with number scales (I do) it could just be not at all anxious to very anxious. This way she might be able to pin point parts of the day that are causing the anxiety.

I've just seen a reply you made to another person. If she doesn't know what is causing the anxiety it could help to break down the day and rate it on an anxiety scale. So looking at everything from the journey to school, arriving, going to form, going to lesson 1, moving between lessons, break, lunch etc. It could be 1-10 or if she struggles with number scales (I do) it could just be not at all anxious to very anxious. This way she might be able to pin point parts of the day that are causing the anxiety.

Sometimes if I'm really anxious about something, my brain almost shuts off to it. I think it's my brains way of trying to protect me. It might be like that for her. Could also be that she finds it very difficult to talk about or thinks that if she talks about it, you'll make her go.

thanks. I’ve tried asking her to rate her anxiety but she just tells me to go away or closes up and doesn’t want to talk. It’s like she doesn’t want to address it which is really hard to deal with.