Out of steam

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My teen has had issues with social skills / behaviour since a toddler. Constantly in trouble at school, often bullied, no friends. Kept of the playground while junior age, also sat on his own in lessons for much of it - None of which did much in addressing things. Secondary school was harder still, so reluctantly removed him a couple of years back.

He was referred for Autism assessment while at school, which has taken place now, and we are awaiting feedback. He thinks he'll be diagnosed autistic, I have an open mind. He's good at talking and very bad at puzzles (opposite of what's typical AS, I think).

Over the last year he has been participating in some groups, which he enjoyed, was given opportunities in, and where he believed he was getting along well with people. This was the most positive thing in a long time.
Unfortunately we have now been told they have concerns and things will have to change - I'm heartbroken.

We have a date for a meeting, but the last meeting we had was a nightmare - the person was condescending, unhelpful, and for some part, just plain wrong. So I managed to find my son an advocate to bring, which will hopefully mean they'll behave in a more civil way.

I am however still worried for two reasons...
(1) The organisation's safeguarding officer is coming, so I anticipate a possible social services referral (School did one previously when things were taken out of context. It was stressful. The social worker was taken aback when I asked about them being able to help - which school had implied).
(2) If son's participation is severely limited, as I fear it might be, we'll be back to square one - lack of positive peer experiences, lack of opportunities, and wasted money (which is scarce enough).

Prior to this revelation I had also recently lost much of my hair unexpectedly and suddenly. I am also undergoing treatment for a skin condition which takes one or two days a week. I am supposed to be looking for work, but am temporarily excused whilst undergoing the treatment.

I worry about what will happen over the next school year if I have to leave my son to his own devices. He can be trusted at home when there are no siblings to argue with, but struggles to organise / motivate himself to be productive, would have very little going on, and nobody at all to talk to.

I did apply for DLA a couple of months back, as I was advised to when moving to universal credit. But this could take forever to hear back from, and they'll probably say no anyway. From what I gather, that's my only ticket to being able to continue to home educate.

In the meantime I'm tired of meetings, tired of forms, tired of things going wrong. I felt faint and weak a few days ago, had to lie down in the park and close my eyes. I don't know if it was an anxiety attack, or if my brain had literally just had enough and needed a rest. I'm doing as little as possible at the moment while waiting for energy levels to stabilise.

I don't know if I'll be ready for the next battle, whatever that may be. I only wish I was a super mum who could sort things out efficiently and make life easier for us all.

I don't know what options you have in the UK. We homeschooled our children to avoid the problems one might expect with the industrial education complex.

We found instilling our children with an enthusiasm for learning allowed them to continue learning on their own without the detrimental impact that the school system can have.

If you aren't allowed to homeschool, maybe you could get permission for him to leave school completely and get a job. Often that sort of work environment can teach skills more useful than what would be taught in school.

I substitute taught for a couple years in Special Education classrooms. I saw where it was done very well (empowering), ok (survival) and unfortunately not well at all (harmful). So sad when as an ASD person I could so exactly how the staff was triggering meltdowns in a child and then blaming the child. So sad. All that said, I've had to manage my husband to modify his parenting so our children have a safe, respectful home and can weather school days. He's needed to discover compassion and my challenge is assert myself in a firm, kind, powerful way. Personally I don't have the energy for all that, so would switch schools in a heartbeat if needed. Thankfully we have very good options in our area. In the meantime we've found good programs and our son is in individual therapy. He's young yet but DBT is of interest to me for him to manage initial strong reactions. Wishing you strength and resources...

I was homeschooled since the 5th grade because of how bad the bullying (not only from other children) was getting and the school refusing to do anything about it except punish me for defending myself. I was already experimenting with self harm and regularly expressed how I wanted to die just so I wouldn't have to go to school anymore. I probably would have committed suicide by 7th grade if my parents didn't step in and homeschool me when they did.

Meerkat,ugh, sorry it was so awful so early. I wanted "out" by age 8, but didn't discover the dysfunctional but effective "coping" mechanism you mention until 17. Then it was an especially rocky couple decades. In my support groups for adult ADS women, over 90% relate to this pattern - some earlier like you, some a bit later like me. Bummer for the hardship and pain and kudos to us for finding a way... and hopefully there will be more and more gentler ways.

I had friends at 8. But then I was redshirted and in second grade at 8. Things didn't get bad for me until 3rd grade when I had a teacher who was either just a clueless idiot who should have gone into some other carrier field or some sort of sadistic narcissist. To all the other kids she was the "fun" teacher, but to me she was always mean and often gaslighted me. She didn't really know how to teach either. My mom didn't believe me until YEARS later about how truly mean she was. My 4th grade teacher wasn't as mean as my mother said she was. She was nice most of the time. She probably had undiagnosed bipolar disorder or needed to retire and not be around young children anymore. She grabbed my arm and left a HUGE bruise. She almost got fired for it too. Years later, my mom's having a homeschool and teacher garage sale where she's selling off the schoolbooks and supplies that I had outgrown to any homeschooling parent or school teacher in the area.

One of the parents who came to our sale said they used to send their autistic boy to the same school I went too but had to homeschool because of the same issues I had. The same teacher who grabbed my arm and left a bruise did it to their son as well. I don't know how it is in other countries, but in the US, it is nearly impossible to get a teacher fired even if they are abusive. I also lived in a rural area and teachers were rare and Mrs. Grabby Hands had to be brought out of retirement because they had no other options.

My German pen-pal is also autistic but he says, and I've heard this from other Germans as well, that over there if you want to be an elementary school teacher, it's just as tricky and challenging as becoming a doctor. I never really asked my South African pen-pal what it's like over there...but then he came from a well to do part of South Africa during Apartheid. From what he did tell me, he says he actually kinda enjoyed the school experience and the teachers encouraged his interests. He's a zoologist now and he said he knew he wanted to be one since the age of six. He too is autistic. But then his mother is an a teacher at a special needs school over there.

My friend from Finland says the majority of her problems with school and mean children (and adults) in general was mostly based in racism. She's originally from Russia but was adopted as a baby by a Finnish family. Finnish people do not have a good opinion of Russians because of some kind of civil war between those two countries during Cold War days. My friend was just a baby way after it had already happened but according to some people it was somehow her fault simply because she was born in the country they were fighting with. How is a child responsible for a war, regardless of where they were born?

I hate how it's like that. The teachers and school administrators all stand up for each other. All think they can do know wrong. The police stand up for the teachers too.

Police acting like I'm some sort of violent criminal just because I couldn't stand being in the class and literally had to get out and walk around the courtyard.

One of the police said, "I've got better things to do then deal with kids like you!" as though it was my idea to call him. s**t man, one of the school admins called you. If you've got a problem with getting called out today, you should take it on her. That's what I felt like saying. I didn't say it though. Trying to get through to a cop is pointless. They're denser than granite.

Another one with a red-veined face and a pornstar moustache said "How old are you! 10? Do you want to live to be 11?" Like s**t man. What kind of hardcore criminal activities do you think I'm up that will get me killed by 11? I didn't say that though. No point.

One of the cops even wanted me to call him "Sir". I know that in American you get called sir every time you get served in McDonald's but in Australia that word just doesn't exist except when referring to people who have been knighted.

Had a teacher threaten to call this particular cop “who is my personal friend… and he’s a constable!” He said “constable” like it’s meant to be some awe inspiringly high rank when constable is actually the basic rank (it is the lowest rank other than probationary constable). Also in any conflict, having the cop that deals with it being your “personal friend” seems like a massive conflict of interest.