Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi there
My daughter was diagnosed with aspergers with high anxiety earlier this year and she has been going downhill for over a year now. We have been paying for private counselling and they believe the best thing for her would be to homeschool her as she is struggling with the social side of school so much. The school have been quite good and introduced some things to help her but the main problem is friends and that can't be fixed. Most of her friends have withdrawn now and she is often alone. She has always been exceeding educationally so there aren't any concerns there but I don't know what to do now. She is horrendous at getting to bed - she has really long drawn out routines that have to be restarted if she makes a mistake or if she talks to one of us after and it has to be done with each of us, including the dog! We started taking her computer etc away two hours before bed and she is fine then but takes hours to get her settled. It also takes her ages to get out of bed and get dressed and often insists on help to get dressed. We are at the end of our tether and wonder if it would be trying to pull her out for a break or even for good if this is the trigger that's making her so unhappy? She never wants to go in and is clingy and tearful in the mornings. I have struggled to get her in a few times and so kept her off but her attendance has fallen below 90% so I've got the obligatory warning letter. Spoke to the doctor and she said sounds like I'm doing as much as I can and they should be understanding as to why she is off more than normal. Plus I do more with her at home than she probably gets at school!!
Anyone have any advice please??
Hi
I don't really have any advice, I am in a similar situation with my daughter she is 8 and has serious issues with sleep she only gets about 3-5 hours a night and not all at once! We have hysterical meltdowns in which she will make herself sick over bed time. She then refuses to get out of bed in the morning not because she's asleep but because she doesn't want to go to school I physically have to dress her. She screams and lashes out when I leave her in school BUT 5 mins after I leave she is behaving like the perfect student!
She is also starting to struggle socially she has 2 friends one of which she borders on obsessional with and providing this child will play with her everything is fine, but when that doesn't happen she has started having meltdowns. She bottles everything up during the day and blows her top when she gets home. We did contemplate removing her from school but decided that at the moment it would probably upset her to much. School have been supportive considering until recently she had shown next to no issues at school she was always just "random " or "quirky".
I know it's not much help but you are not alone, the reason we didn't take her out of school was our worry that she would become completely isolated
Hi ya
our daughters sound very similar and thanks for taking the time to write. We r worried about pulling her out for the isolation reason as well as whether she will get all the necessary education so at the moment we are on hold. After a bad weekend and a bad gymnastics session where she hid and refused to move, we have decided to give her a couple of weeks off school and will go back after the easter holidays. Yet to hear what the school has to say but we are doing 4 hours of working with her and after speaking to her teacher this morning who said they are just doing revision , think she’ll get more out of staying at home anyway!
Have you considered melatonin? My friend was prescribed it for her son but he isn’t that bad at the moment so hasn’t used it. My husband isn’t keen so not gone down that route yet. Just trial and error at the moment and trying to find some sort of calmness for the whole family!