Cat
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Posts posted by Cat
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Have you tried IPSEA? It sounds like you could do with some help before you get the statement review. I am a novice with statements but it's my understanding that all of a childs special needs need to be included so why is the autism not in the statement? IPSEA should be able to help you - it can often be a job and a half to get through to them but keep trying it will be worth it.
Here is a link to there site and there number.
Cat
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No violence not ever it's simply not acceptable and he has to understand that. Have you explored ways of his venting his aggression? He has to find something that works for him and there has to be a point where even if he does not know that that time has come you do - and you tell him. No magic wand I am afraid just a sheer determination that violence is unacceptable always.
This may shock but what about a beat -em - up game. It can get rid of the aggression as can loud music. I say beat-em-up because I wont allow shot em downs. Maybe not be a huge difference but it is to me.
Easier said than done I know but I think I would knock up some ground rules and display them and then stick to em like glue. You both need to identify the trigger points. I have snapped before and then felt dreadful but we are all only human and we are certainly not here to be used as a punch bag.
Cat
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I just can't stop crying - I don't know what's happened to me todayLife bit you in the bum and it hurts
<'> <'> <'> I would not stop working all together it's probably a life-line even if it does not feel like one right now. Respite sounds a good idea if you can get some. Tell them it's reaching crisis point. Rather a couple of nights respite than a residential - BUT - for some families residentials have been their saviour. With some respite you might remember that the other carer is also your husband
<'> <'> <'> Cat
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I would ring IPSEA or NAS and ask them about this. They are the experts and should be able to help you with this. I would not be happy at all - however I do have a friend who is going to tribunal and she has just found out that a Dr from within CAMHS, who has never even seen her son, has asked for a referal to an OT because the LA just found out that their is an independant OT report and have requested their own????????
http://www.nas.org.uk/helpline/
Cat
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The best thing to do is to have a 'no touch' rule and apply it to everyone including yourself. Children with ASD can have problems if you say well it's OK to do that with me but not anyone else - so the easiest way round that is to say that you do not touch anyones bum. This might sound radical but after I attended a workshop about this I realised that sometimes you have to be radical to keep your vunerable children safe. We were told stories of kids who liked to stroke hair. Now that might be cool when they are 6 and 7 but when a 17 year old stood and stroked the hair of a checkout girl he ended up in trouble.
I think that the teacher has to be made to understand that it's not funny. You could try and ignore it but if it's something he likes to do it may not go away. I do not know how old your son is - mine is 9 - and he loved kissing girls. I was not comfortable with this and so even before I went to the workshop I stopped him from doing this and I am really pleased that I have now. We had the talk about how certain parts of our body belonged to us and how we did not touch other people in those areas and although I had to keep telling him it worked and I feel better now that he has stopped.
When you think about it it's a mine field and our children are very much at risk.
Cat
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I would make two calls the first to IPSEA http://www.ipsea.org.uk to pursue the statement. You don't have to accept their decision not to statement especially as they are clearly discriminating against your son - and that would be my second phone call to the Disability Discrimination people http://www.sendist.gov.uk/. He is clearly being treat less favourably than his peer group as they are failing to recognise that is has a disability - excuse me while I explode
Actually for good measure I would make a third call to PP informing them of what I am going to do.
Cat
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The parents may well have a programme up and running however they have had to fight for every inch that they have gained. Nothing was handed to them on a plate - believe me - putting it in place was blooming hard work. And huge progress has been made with the child because of 'their own' hard work.
Cat
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By September next year there will not be a Language Unit left in our Authority it's all integration, integration, integration. There may be a bigger picture going on behind the scenes here and if I were you I would start making enquiries now. This is how it started with us. It was then made to look as if it?s what the parents want. No matter how many government reports are rolled out saying that total inclusion is just not work the LA?s appear to have other ideas
Cat
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I told my youngest when he was only 4 that Santa did not really exist
The idea of a strange man with a big white beard and red coat coming into our house while we were all sleeping was just too much for him to cope with. I could have held on and waited to see if things improved the next year, but as I am not much of a Santa fan either (I know bah hum bug) I told him there and then. I have never quite understod why we spend so much time telling young children that they don't talk to strangers, let alone take sweets and even toys from them - and then find it acceptable to fill em full of rubbish about a man in a red coat? You can all boo and hiss now if you wish. I am not anti Christmas we do do Christmas but very much on terms that are right for us.My eldest two only really believed until they were about six and at the first question of 'does he really exist Mummy?' I said no
dreaful I know. My youngest has been very good and not told anyone who does believe, the real version of events 
However he is now becoming very perplexed that his 11 year old friend still believes. Now how do you get out of that one without the child thinking that you have been lying to em for years 
Cat
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Do you have an autism outreach team? They should have enough experience to be able to make the school understand that many children with ASD are well behaved in school but explode through the school gates. Our AOT now fill in these forms for some of our parents because the schools tend not to like to make an issue out of it
Cat
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I tend to get depressed around certain birthday. Usually what I consider to be landmark birthdays - like the 13th. I was also blue on his 16th then his 18th and it will probably hit me again when he hits 21. The other thing that really upset me was the school prom because my son was not going
But then I had to remember that he was not there because he did not want to be there - but it's still hard. I have so far not had these feelings with my youngest however he is 10 next year and for some reason that is starting to make me feel down to. Maybe because before that age they are still only tiddlers?
Many children with ASD do not look forward to or enjoy birthdays and I tend to think that it's down to change. You may not look any older but your age has changed and they find that very upsetting. My youngest wanted to stop his birthdays when he was 6 and it took me a year to make him understand that birthday or no birthday on 'that' day he would be 7. Maybe being a teenage is a big internal issue for you son even though he may not realise this himself. Maybe a day off to tomorrow would help him and you - you never know he may wake up with a runny nose
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I did see someone with my son about this and they said 'growing pains'
It's not. My son is 9 and has been having pains in his knees for as long as I can remember. It wakes him up and I am often heating up those microwave pads at 3am to wrap them around his knees He likes me to squeeze his knee really hard when the pain is there because he says that it helps But he often needs me to do this for hours I truly wish I knew what this was but I also have a friends whose son also suffers from these pains in his knee - so I am now thinking that it's not so uncommon. Of course that does not answer your questions.Cat
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Some parents actually want their children to remain in school no matter what. And trying to be fair to the school if they did ring you when your son is very upset to come and collect him, they may fear that you at some point may then decided that this is a form of illegal exclusion. I am not saying that 'you' personally ever would but it can and does happen. I am no fan of the school system but sometimes schools can be between a rock and a hard place. It is part of their duty of care to be able to cope with your son when he is very upset. If they are not doing this then they also have a duty to ask for input. Together you need to find ways round the problem.
However if you make it clear to the school that you are NOT one of the parents who wishes her son to remain in school no matter what (I am also one of these parents) then they are aware of your wishes.
What I tend to do if I have importants things which I need to address is to make a short report outin the same way that schools do when there is an annual review. All of the lead professionals will submit a repot about where they feel your child is and any areas of concern and how to address them. This is what I do
I do this not only for education but also when we have an appointment with any of the medical bods that my son sees.Doing it this way give you the chance to make your points and they are also down in writing so it's more difficult for them to be ignored
It actually makes me feel better and more on an equal footing with whomever is sitting round the table.What usually then happens at a meeting is that the reports will be discussed and this gives a chance to enter into a discussion about the issues you have raised. It will then depend on what stance the school decided to adopt. Hopefully they will be willing to meet you half way
Cat
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Many of us notice that our children and adults for that matter appear to have periods of regression it's not uncommon.
However I think the key to your sons behaviour could be in the line
He is coping well at school but at home his behaviors are becoming more autistic then we have ever noticed before.Quite often children do 'appear' to be coping at school but the cost can be quite high and this could well be what you are seeing. I am not an expert but I have seen and heard about this many times and I also have first hand experience of this times two.
When they put all of their energies into coping at school the stress has to come out somewhere. It sounds like he is on total overload for most of his out of school hours and it may be worth looking into this - even though school will probably tell you that there are no problems.
I am a firm believe in the fact that children with ASD often develop obsessions and phobias when they are under extreme stress it's yet another form of coping but the real porblem has to be unearthed before you can help with the overload.
I am more than happy to discuss this with you in more depth if you would like to just pm me and we can chat.
Cat
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If it can't be seen it will not be recognised sadly
And to be fair I have probably thought that a child was particularly badly behaved in my pre ASD days.I also think another issue is that there are so many badly behaved children these days. Our kids would not be having such a rough ride through the mainstream schools if they were all little angles would they?
This leads the more senior members of our society to think that it simply is a behavioural problem, which is sad because we work so hard to make sure that our children do learn manners and what is and is not acceptable behaviour it just takes a while to bed in that's all.
I grew a very thick skin and ignored those who have no idea.
Cat
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It sounds like something he is being compeled to do and maybe can not stop. My son had this problem along with constant hand washing he knew that he was doing this and that it was making his hands red raw but he simply could not stop. His was also related to his stress levels and was always worse when he was stressed. We discovered that massaging his hands did help, but as he hates certain smells and can also have a reaction to them we had to use a lotion with no smell. We could also only use it on the top of his hands because he hated his hands being sticky. We used a well know Norweigian Hand Cream but the one that has no smell and it did help.
Is he aware that he is doing this? Sometimes we can stop one stim only to find that the person replaces it with something else which can turn out to be worse
Cat
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I to have been on the end of a conversation with a professional who only enters into conversation with mature parents
Not only does the staff at this school have no understanding of the child they have no understanding of what you are living with and the stress that that creates in your life. We can't all bounce through the day with a bright and happy smile If the Head does not understand and is not going listen. Then the staff will have to keep up the approach that they are using now. It's such a pity that all school were not made to listen to Rita Jordan who really lays it on the line. She leaves no room for misunderstanding it will always be 'us' that has to give and 'us' who have to make adjustments because the child quite simply can't. I have held onto this for years now and because of this I will not back down. Although she would leave no one in any doubt she is still unable to make some people understand that the child is disabled and not just being a very naughty/boy-girl.
This school sounds like it has Naughty Boy Syndrome.Your son will learn to cope as he grows up but life should be about so much more than coping, and so much more than spending most of his young years in a place where they take part in professional bullying and are allowed to get away with it. Not only have they now bullied your son the Head bullied you this morning.
Cat
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How was the child going wrong? He may not have been acting appropriately or in the same manner of your average NT six year old but then he is not your average NT six year old. Surely what is needed is to make the child feel less stressed not preassurised into acting like an NT child. Will he really want to go through that again? Find ways to enable the child to cope and enjoy an outing. What he did is part of his ASD and he will develop these skills with the correct understanding. Today the school did not show this and rightly or wrongly I think it came down to the fact that he looked like he had been naughty and was treat just like those who had been. Why? Because try explaining to your average NT six year old that little Billy can't help what he does sometimes. They will not understand so it was easier for little Billy to carry the can. That's where inclusion is going wrong. The time and energy needed to invest in and teach the NT's that some people are different and you can't always see that difference, is simply not happening and I don't mean let's all point at little Billy. It should be built into their learning just like learning about different cultures is. My three year old knew all about festivals that went along with different religions - why not teach this about disabilities?
I think that it is wrong to let a six year old believe that they got it wrong we should be looking for shared meanings and understandings and not always looking to point a finger in their direction. I never have and my sons have still managed to aquire the understanding they needed to know what they are expected to do in a situation.
My kids don't 'go wrong' they don't always act like an NT because they are not NT and I have no desire to normalise them and that does not make them wrong - sorry but no way do I want my children to go through life feeling like they are forever getting it wrong.
Cat
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Your son has just been punished for having a disability and that is not an over reaction it's a fact. This teacher clearly has no understanding of the condition for which he is awaiting assessment. Does the teacher know what he is waiting to be assessed for? I would be furious and I would take this further. How long do the school think he will be happy to attend for if he is punished everytime he is stressed and anxious
Cat
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My son will walk right round our estate to avoid groups of lads hanging around. He will only walk to the bus stop if someone is going to meet him there. He would never get on a bus on his own
He likes to sit in silence on a bus and much prefers the car.Cat
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You and your husband know where the boundries should be and when to push and when not to. As for the other parent who would know what to do I wonder if they would be as keen to make bold statements about a child in a wheel chair or carrying a white stick?
Cat
I dont believe it
in Education
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When I was in this situation with my DS2 a home tutor sat and told him that she had not taught a child at home who she had not managed to get back into school and that he would be no different
He ran up stairs to get away from her tripped pver his bed and broke his arm - this is a true story.
He never did return to school - so that was one she lost
This tutor is bang slap out of order and has jepordised what you are trying to achieve and your DH is right to complain. I would put it in writing to. Unless she is a fully qualified ASD sepcalised tutor she is only there to teach and not to sabotage any progress which had been made.
As for PP she is also bang slap out of order and again I would complain in writing to the SEN Manager what does the PP know about medication it's not part of their remit.
Cat