I would be grateful for any advice please
my daughter has started secondary school and things seem to be going downhill. She is struggling with maintaining friendship with peers and her anxiety is increased. She can’t get on the bus and at times refuses to go to school completely.
her meltdowns have increased as well as her expression of violence towards other (she has never hurt anyone) .
I am trying to support her but am struggling and would appreciate some guidance of how to help her
Hello NAS80767
I have no kids so I cannot claim to give any "advice" in that regard but I massively changed when I went to high school and not for the better.
There were other issues, but ultimately what I hated with a passion were the breaktimes, I hated the "chaos" and the noise, I was an "odd" kid so I used to be very low in the high school social cliques, my friends were mostly the other "outcasts" and we were the easy targets, compounded with other issues I eventually ended up going to a pupil referral unit due to extreme truancy and an absolute refusal, inability might be a better word, to go to school, but situations are much different.
The only thing I wish to ask, do you have an inkling as to anything that could be causing the triggers? If not you could maybe try asking her some "leading" questions?
To give a few examples and phrase it in a way you know would work better for your daughter, "Is it the classroom or the break times that cause you anxiety?", "Are their any particular subjects that are causing you anxiety?", "Do you find some of the behaviours of your friends confusing?".
Maybe give her a small notepad and pen and ask her to write down when she's getting anxious and what she knows is about to happen, depending on her communication style that may help, I don't now enough to give any other, I won't say advice, but thought process to that.
At the very least, you may spark the mindset of her sitting with her thoughts at brief periods during the day, recording them, I know because of what I was going through there used to be an extreme level of confusion when I got home, because it all "rolled" into one thing that I could no longer separate issues or concerns once I did get home.
Again, I don't really want to call this advice, I have no children myself, I don't know what you've already tried to do, I am not sure if I have autism or not, my mom does and she originally came onto this forum first. If there is something in there that seems like a good idea then feel free to try it is all I'm trying to say.
I hope you can find a solution that works for you either way NAS80767
Rambling opinion >>> I would also say that High School in general is just a garbage setup for some, it's very fast paced, you go to one lesson, then another on a completely different topic (Switching "order" of thinking), with breaks (complete "chaos") interspersed they have to recalibrate for each "environment".
While I get that they are having to prepare kids for adult work, even in an adult setting, you have one job, that requires a set amount of obligations to it, that usually make sense to the jobs role, in high school, it is structured more like work than primary school, but you are having to constantly swap completely what you are "focusing" on, with very little time to adjust to that.
I just honestly don't think high school cuts the mustard for a lot of kids in general, autistic or otherwise, I think it's too much of an awkward transition.
Ramble done.
edit: I left out the Knows originally
Paul M.
The one time in my life I’ve ever faked being ill was during my first two to three weeks of secondary school. It just overwhelmed me, and I had extreme anxiety almost instantly. My parents knew, and had to confront me over it. The guilt was horrific, and i wouldn’t have lied if i hadn’t been so overwhelmed- but I couldnt explain even ti myself why it was so bad as to feel insurmountable. By the time i was back in school, Id lost valuable time to build friendships etc. (not that if have been good at it) and was having to (mentally) run even harder to catch up that before. A miserable time of burnout that felt like depression, after having seldom had anything quite like it before. I remained a loner with just one or two friends picked up between then and sixth form. I think that the recent Monotropism video from Aucademy made a really good point about secondary school: the switching between each fifty minute subject, and the rapid travelling around the school in noisy groups to get to the next intensive readjustment and compromised sensory intake is something monotropic minds cope with less well, and that longer sessions in less piecemeal form would be the ideal attempted offset to that. Maybe in the future, it will change as more autistic people in each generation may make it an unignorable adjustment
I can sympathise too. School refusal is regular here too, sometimes we find out the reason and others put it down to anxiety or too much overload during the rest of the week at school. My son in year 9 is beginning to find his own ways of coping at times.
It is hard sometimes to feel you are not failing. The important thing is that you are there for her when she needs you. The hard thing with a teenager too is that they are trying to cope without parental help, but in the end can be grateful for support.
I presume school are aware of her difficulties. One thing that does help my son is an awareness by staff that he needs instructions broken down. Also I note that she has difficulty with friendships and wonder if lunchtimes are overwhelming and whether anything can be arranged in school that would help.
Thank you for your reply. Reassured me that I’m not alone.
I try to leave her to her own devices but it’s as soon as she sees me she goes into another meltdown. I know this is her way of expressing what she feels unable to do during the day and she is exhausted but it is wearing on me and my other daughter. I feel like I’m doing something wrong.
I do allow her to go straight on her pc for half hour when returning home and play her games as this seems to relax her but then the anxiety builds at bedtime for the next day.
no she is unaware of her triggers.
It seems to be a common thing for youngster to get worse as they start high school. It’s a big change. It’s a new place, bigger, noisier, and much harder to blend in, and there’s much more expect on finding friends and groups to be part of. It is truly overwhelming.
it sounds like your daughter needs to find some ways to make life easier at school. Speaking with the SEN department is a good place to start if you haven’t already.
When she gets in, it’s best to leave her to her own devices. She will probably want quiet time to recover and relax. Maybe she can dive into an interest of hers to help.
The violence is likely meltdown behaviour. This in itself is exhausting. Once she finds what helps, how much downtime she needs, and things like that, they may lessen. Anything can set them off, and she probably doesn’t know what her triggers are yet.
Secondary school has had a significantly negative impact on my daughter also, mostly with feeling lonely, the sensory overload and being exhausted by the end of the day/week. We are currently working to an agreed reduced timetable (pending getting further help) and this has helped her anxiety a bit (although makes working nearly impossible).
Does your daughter have an EHCP? If so, does the plan need reviewing?
If no EHCP - does she have a SEN support plan at school? Does she have any provision in place to make her day easier (e.g. an exit card to leave class when overwhelmed to go to a quiet place)?
Have you met with the school SENCO/SENCO Assistant to discuss your concerns?
Are you having TAF meetings with the school where your concerns can be raised?
Just a few ideas.
