My 12 year old daughter is struggling with going to school, she has missed so much time already.
I'm basically begging school foe help but not getting much. I don't know what to do, I can't drag her there kicked and screaming as that will not help her at all. She struggles with social side and friends. I don't know what to do? Where to go for help? She is a very unhappy 12 year old
I'm in exactly the same situation as you - 13 year old autistic daughter has been home on and off since feb - mostly off over the last term. Massive anxiety, panic attacks, struggling socially, with sensory issues. She's very recently diagnosed - as a direct result of what's happening with her right now. It's really tough. I'm not sure I have any answers, but share your pain on this. It's really difficult to navigate.
However, there is tonnes of potential help out there. I haven't found it possible to access any help at all via the official routes - nhs, cahms and so on. I've heard that even actively suicidal kids have been offered nothing more than leaflets by camhs as they are so overwhelmed, that is all they have to give.
But I've had success contacting the parenting team at my local council - they run courses for parents with difficult kids and this ended up being a brilliant way to meet other parents with autistic kids struggling in the same way. The course facilitators were great and very well networked, so a good gateway to other services.
I've also had a lot of useful advice from a local autistic parents facebook group - ours is called parents supporting parents with autism. Again, I've been amazed from this group at how much is going on out there in terms of support. You may be able to find a range of social groups for autistic children and a variety of therapeutic organisations offering mentoring in a range of creative ways.
There are schools set up for autistic children and some are better for girls than others - again, it's worth digging around on facebook groups or through other networks to hear local recommendations. However access is another hurdle. I haven't tried this route, but have heard it can make an amazing difference if you're one of the lucky ones to gain access. And if you can find a school where the other kids are a good fit for your daughter.
If home schooling could be possible for you, there are online schools with tutors for every subject and a form tutor type staff member who helps you coordinate everything - so very much school from home and you pick and choose which subjects you want to take and can often adjust the pace to suit your family. Wolsey Hall Oxford or Kings Interhigh are a couple I've looked at. Both of these run on a pay per subject basis. There are also lots of free resources through Oak Academy, for example, for learning secondary school subjects from home - can be useful for keeping up with subjects from home during temporary breaks from school.
I cannot recommend enough the podcast Tilt Parenting. This has become a major lifeline for me in learning how to support my daughter and keep myself propped up too!
The reality of it for us has been that my daughter won't accept any help and won't go along with any changes at school. She desperately doesn't want to go to school, but desperately doesn't want to officially leave and go for home schooling instead - she feels like this is breaking the rules and giving in and she finds that extremely hard to do. We're really stuck. The school system is massively failing our kids.
Someone told me this analogy the other day and it's stuck with me - imagine asking a neurotypical family to place their neurotypical child into a 'special school' full of autistic kids, so they're the only one who thinks and functions as they do. You just wouldn't do it. And then imagine they're expected to behave as though they're autistic, even though they're not at all and if they can't do a good enough job of this, they get bullied or ostracised by the other kids; they get treated as though they're odd or willfully badly behaved by their teachers. They'd end up with a really distorted view of themselves, their confidence would crash - you just wouldn't do this, it would be really cruel. This is what school is asking of our kids every day. Sorry, that doesn't help, but I feel more and more strongly that we need to listen to how upset our kids are by the school system and we need to fight their corners. They're being hugely let down and expected to carry such a burden.
I'm in exactly the same situation as you - 13 year old autistic daughter has been home on and off since feb - mostly off over the last term. Massive anxiety, panic attacks, struggling socially, with sensory issues. She's very recently diagnosed - as a direct result of what's happening with her right now. It's really tough. I'm not sure I have any answers, but share your pain on this. It's really difficult to navigate.
However, there is tonnes of potential help out there. I haven't found it possible to access any help at all via the official routes - nhs, cahms and so on. I've heard that even actively suicidal kids have been offered nothing more than leaflets by camhs as they are so overwhelmed, that is all they have to give.
But I've had success contacting the parenting team at my local council - they run courses for parents with difficult kids and this ended up being a brilliant way to meet other parents with autistic kids struggling in the same way. The course facilitators were great and very well networked, so a good gateway to other services.
I've also had a lot of useful advice from a local autistic parents facebook group - ours is called parents supporting parents with autism. Again, I've been amazed from this group at how much is going on out there in terms of support. You may be able to find a range of social groups for autistic children and a variety of therapeutic organisations offering mentoring in a range of creative ways.
There are schools set up for autistic children and some are better for girls than others - again, it's worth digging around on facebook groups or through other networks to hear local recommendations. However access is another hurdle. I haven't tried this route, but have heard it can make an amazing difference if you're one of the lucky ones to gain access. And if you can find a school where the other kids are a good fit for your daughter.
If home schooling could be possible for you, there are online schools with tutors for every subject and a form tutor type staff member who helps you coordinate everything - so very much school from home and you pick and choose which subjects you want to take and can often adjust the pace to suit your family. Wolsey Hall Oxford or Kings Interhigh are a couple I've looked at. Both of these run on a pay per subject basis. There are also lots of free resources through Oak Academy, for example, for learning secondary school subjects from home - can be useful for keeping up with subjects from home during temporary breaks from school.
I cannot recommend enough the podcast Tilt Parenting. This has become a major lifeline for me in learning how to support my daughter and keep myself propped up too!
The reality of it for us has been that my daughter won't accept any help and won't go along with any changes at school. She desperately doesn't want to go to school, but desperately doesn't want to officially leave and go for home schooling instead - she feels like this is breaking the rules and giving in and she finds that extremely hard to do. We're really stuck. The school system is massively failing our kids.
Someone told me this analogy the other day and it's stuck with me - imagine asking a neurotypical family to place their neurotypical child into a 'special school' full of autistic kids, so they're the only one who thinks and functions as they do. You just wouldn't do it. And then imagine they're expected to behave as though they're autistic, even though they're not at all and if they can't do a good enough job of this, they get bullied or ostracised by the other kids; they get treated as though they're odd or willfully badly behaved by their teachers. They'd end up with a really distorted view of themselves, their confidence would crash - you just wouldn't do this, it would be really cruel. This is what school is asking of our kids every day. Sorry, that doesn't help, but I feel more and more strongly that we need to listen to how upset our kids are by the school system and we need to fight their corners. They're being hugely let down and expected to carry such a burden.
My daughter is still waiting to be diagnosed but we have exactly the same problem. She kicks and slaps me, screams and refuses to get dressed for school in the mornings. It's exhausting! Budburst, your reply is fantastic! And such an eye opening analogy. Thank you x
