Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi All,
1st time on here and would love some advice.
I have 2 autistic sons 10 and 8. My 10 year old is really struggling socially and and recently started refusing to go to school. My wife has managed to get him in eventually each time thus far!
He is a massive "masker" to the outside person in class he appears as happy as one would expect, however recently he has ditched the group of kids he was hanging around with at break and lunchtime, as periodically they would have disagreements and kick one another out of the group for the day, and rather than fave the pressure of that my 10 year old has taken himself out of the situation - which I happen to think was quite smart on his part.
I'm getting to the main issue I promise!
Since he left this group, he won't go back to them "ever again" and yet he won't engage with anyone else either. There are some incredibly friendly kids also in his class that we have suggested he talk to but he refuses and will sit on the bench by himself watching the world go by or go to lunch club and do the same. I would have no issue with this If he was happy but he has cried every night for the past 2 weeks about how much he hates school.
The school themselves are trying, they are giving him activities to do which focus on his special interest (pokemon), and sitting him away from the disruptive kids etc
They have offered him tike out of class and breaks etc however he won't agree as he doesn't want to fall behind or everyone to think there's something wrong. He can't cope with anyone being told off as he feels it's aimed at him even when it quite plainly is not, and has decided that all the adults on school are bad and can't help him because individually they have told someone off at some point.
I'm really sorry for the long post I have read most of the resources on this website and we are / have tried what it suggests in one way or another with no luck thus far, I just wondered if anyone on here had some advice or could recommend different resources etc.
Thanks for your time.
I‘m sorry you’re experiencing all this. I don’t have children but I’ve seen some great communities of parents of autistic children on social media and they seem to give practical and realistic advice especially about school. One parent from TikTok, Lisa Lloyd has just brought out her book about parenting her autistic children and it’s really funny and real and might just lighten your heart a bit as you get proper advice and support from other parents, it’s called Raising the SENbetweeners and you can get it on Amazon.
Best Wishes, Blip
Amazing thanks very much I'll order it now!