Will school ever be better?

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My daughter is starting high school next week and I am thrilled that she got into the aspergers program and hopefully will get the help she needs to succeed. I was hoping that our school experience would be so much better now that she will be with teachers and educational assistants that are trained to deal with her, but I already find that I am not happy with her teacher for a few reasons.

First off, when I met her at registration in June she was pushing me to go to see my family doctor to get her medication, even though she had only just met her and would have no clue if she even needs meds. I had mentioned that she has quite a bit of anxiety and she then made me feel guilty for letting her go through this when I could get her meds and how Temple Grandin was so happy once they put her on antidepressents.

She told me that just before school started my daughter would be able to get her locker organized and get her time table, so I emailed her to ask her if we could do this at the end of the day this week, as I had to leave work, bus home to get my daughter and bus her to the school. She then asks me isn't my daughter going to their Orientation day for grade 9s? The orientation day is from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm this Thursday (before school starts next week) and is to get the grade 9s hanging out and doing activities together. - Did they really expect me to drop her off alone in a room full of strangers to do this voluntarily? She knows my daughter is super nervous about starting high school, how could she think she would find this fun?

I was actually glad that my daughter adamantly refused to go to this activity when school doesn't start until next week. With bussing her there and bussing back to work and then having to get her afterwards and bring her home - I would be lucky to work from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm.

I just get so frustrated being a single mom and working full time because it seems that I am a bad parent if I don't just ditch work at the drop of a hat and take my daughter to everything they think I should. She wanted my daughter to see her at 2:00 pm and I asked her if we could meet later and then she got kind of huffy saying she could do it at 3:00 pm and no later. I emailed her asking if she could just email me the time table and that my daughter doesn't feel she will need very long to put her stuff in her locker. (She had a locker in grade 7 and 8. I hope she does this because really do I need to miss 3.5 hours of work just to get a time table and put a few things in a locker?

I am so hoping it won't be another year of me having to rush to school to pick her up because of whatever behaviour - won't they be trained to deal with her? Isn't that their job? Last year I missed so often getting her diagnosed, seeing various doctors and social workers and no one ever seems to understand my life does not revolve around these appointments. I also was asked repeatedly to come get her for various behaviours until they allowed her to just go home if she was having such a bad school day. (This year she will be too far to walk home and I will have to come and get her) Am I supposed to quit work, go on welfare and sit around waiting for them to call me?

So nice to vent and get this off my chest. No one at works wants to hear anything about my struggles with my daughter and such.

I did not think teachers were supposed to bring up meds.

Not this is very reassuring, but you will have to see how it goes. You would think that the teacher would be experienced enough with various manifestations of AS to know that not all kids are going to jump at the chance of a voluntary orientation. Voluntary is most likely going to be interpreted in its literal sense --- as opposed to meaning we expect you to go, even though you technically don't have to.

I don't see an orientation like that being a good fit for a school full of AS kids unless they made the interaction structured so that the kids would have to interact with each other and not just stand there. This would create other issues for the probably numerous AS kids that would recoil at that.

I think you were right not to push it, given her rejection of the idea, as it might have predisposed your daughter to hating the place. If she went in immediately with a bad feeling it would likely persist. It is probably a good idea for some kids, but not all. If there is something voluntary like that, which we want to encourage we need time to sell it. I don't see springing it on your daughter after she knew you were fine with her bagging it.

Schools seem to always assume the mother can always make herself available. I guess that is the same even in AS schools. So frustrating.

The only thing I can say is that sometimes things are bumpy at first but end up OK, or at least

She is going to a regular high school with an aspergers class of only 10 kids, so there would not have been too many AS kids there at the orientation. (She was able to meet a few of them from her class when we registered and we left very quickly after about 10 minutes of trying to make small talk) She would not know many students and she is embarassed that they will all now know that she is an aspie.

You are right - voluntary was what she focused on. She was not going to miss almost a full day of summer fun playing video and board games to attend school when her twin sister's school is not doing anything like this. Definately pushing it would have made her hate school for sure.

I just was reading Yippy Skippy's post this morning about dreading school after the lovely school break and it really made me think how nice it was to be free of all this over the summer.

I am probably looking for problems because I know how rough it was for us in middle school - hopefully high school will be relevantly uneventful like it was for my son.

Too many people think the answer to every problem is to dope up on meds. Stick with non drug treatment methods as much as possible. All drugs have side effects, and sometimes they can be very unpleasant, or even harmful, so it's best to keep meds to a minimum. IF your daughter is having anxiety issues, help her to develop non drug coping methods. She needs things to do to keep her mind occupied to reduce the time spent on being anxious. Maybe read a book, take up knitting, or some other portable hobby, as long as it will keep her mind occupied.

That is why I haven't tried meds - was really worried about the side effects making her worse after reading about them. She doesn't really like reading which is my fave hobby - her main thing is to play video games when she is overwhelmed.

Going into an ASD class probably gives your daughter the best chance available for school to be better. My son is only in 3rd grade, but getting him into a class of 10 AS kids (actually the whole school is only 10 kids) has been a lifesaver. Once he adjusted to the class (which took about 3 months) his stress level went down dramatically and life was so much better at home.

Even when school are aware that some mothers work, they are not used to thinking about those who use bus transportation and can't just hop in a car and be there quickly. Or those who don't have the kind of flexibility where it's ok to take a couple hours off to go see a doctor without asking for permission from your boss. You definitely have my sympathy.

zette - I hope she does calm down after a few months being in the program, but she will still be attending regular classes in the high school and only has homeroom, lunch and one class in the aspergers classroom. I know it is the best place for her and we are really fortunate she got a spot, but I still know school is such a difficult time for her and am already worried about how it will wreak havoc with our lives.

Give her some empathy for me-- those orientations aren't fun for Asperger's 36-year-old moms who got to leave the little ones with Grandma for once, either. I get through my kids' orientations by smoking a cigarette RIGHT before crossing onto school property, making sarcastic comments to myself about the resemblance of secondary school assemblies to scenes from dystopian novels, and promising myself some serious book time for this once the little angels are in bed.

Classrooms stuffed to twice capacity, really loud loud speakers, and hallways shoulder-to-shoulder with chaotic, LOUD kids. Heh. Joy.

It's time for the education in "voluntary does not always mean voluntary." "Life will be easier if you do the 'voluntary, but you're going to pay if you don't do it' activities."

Will school ever get better?? Well, we can wait and see if CLASS will go better this year.

Their attitude and behavior?? No, it will never get better. Medication is their first, last, and only resort to "solve" problems because the problem they're looking to solve (the only one they're likely to acknowledge) is THEIR problem. Which are behaviors that don't mesh with their standardized administration. It "solves" the problem at minimal issue for THEM.

You will have to either medicate, stand your ground, or figure out how to pull off resorting to online schooling.

I got through it like this: Focus on WHAT I NEED TO DO. I kept my eyes on the toes of my sneakers, kept my arms across my midsection, kept my shoulders pulled in tight, and kept a song playing in my head. I shut out as much as I could and GOT THROUGH.

And then I GOT OUT.

How much of that was made possible by the really crappy attitude I had as a secondary schooler, I don't know.

Just wondering, has this mainstream school just recently introduced their AS program into the school? Also, what portion of classes are with the mainstream group and how many are the AS classes. I'm wondering also when your daughter is in the AS class, what mainstream classes she is missing out on? Since now the NT children are aware that there are AS children attending the school, I assume the NT children are receiving education in equal opportunity and non-discrimination of people with different brain orientation. Like others here, I would be extremely cautious about the school administering meds to your daughter. I would also be interested in what training and qualifications the teachers have in dealing with children with AS.

It doesn't sound like the orientation was designed for the ASD students at all. I think you were wise to skip it.

I still remember my college orientation. They did lots of "ice breakers" in which people crawled through each others' legs and shared embarrassing stories. I found it traumatic and embarrassing.

Buyer Beware - Yes I will definately stand my ground, couldn't do it any other way. And I love your comparison of high schools to dystopian novels. I had a really difficult time in high school, so I am hoping my daughters will have a better experience.

Yippy Skippy - No it definately was for the mainstream kids, not for the aspies. I was just really surprised that her AS teacher assumed she would want to go. She saw how nervous my daughter was at registration and just meeting a few students from the aspergers classroom, why would she think she would want to spend the day with all of the grade 9s?

Progaspie - The AS classroom has only 10 children from grades 9 to 12. They attend one AS class every day and the the other three classes are mainstream. To make up for the one mainstream course she will be missing, she will be doing an extra year of high school.

ASD Mommy - Well she is sending me the time table tomorrow by email- so I am hoping she will be this flexible from now on. I guess I will have to wait and see and not jump to conclusions.

Do the mainstream kids only have 4 classes a day? When I was in high school (25 years ago now!) there were 6 classes a day.

What will the kids be doing in the AS class? Is there a plan for what they are to learn (such as social skills and life skills), or is it basically a supervised study hall where they can get extra help doing the work for their other classes? Have they given you any information about the teacher's background and training?

I have seen many posters here mention that high school wasn't as bad as middle school in terms of bullying, etc., so if nothing else maybe just the rest of the NT classmates being a bit more mature may be helpful. Plus the reduced academic load can't hurt. Did most of the other kids feed from the same middle school, or is everybody basically starting new?

Keeping my fingers crossed for you. Very curious to hear how it goes.