More Melts

DS has been having more melts. Poor kid hasn't been like this in ages. We had to do his homework from yesterday, and it was too much for him. I've drawn the line. No more homework through the weekend. There's a report he's supposed to continue working on, but it's not due until Wed. It can wait. He needs a break BADLY.

Every time I see that look in his eyes, that one he gets as he's withdrawing, I just want to scream at that school. Don't we have enough struggles? Do you have to pile on top of that, more and more and more? What do you achieve by doing this? It just makes everyone miserable. Can't you just back off, and let us get on as best we can? Can't you see we're trying? We're not out to make your life more difficult - why do you have work to make ours so rough?

And Back at the Hospital...

MIL does have a bladder infection. We expected that. She's dehydrated again. Not a big surprise since she couldn't keep anything down. But she also now has blood clots in her legs - odd, since she's been on meds to address the blood clot she had in her arm (months ago). The meds should have prevented more clots. Perhaps the meds couldn't work if she wasn't keeping them down? I don't know what else could explain it.

Now they are talking about doing tests on her heart. No one is completely certain what this is about. They also want to do a colonoscopy, but they are holding off on that because they don't feel they can do that cleansing thing. I'm thinking she's had so little solid food going through her system that a cleansing would be a moot point, but what do I know. I assume there must be a medical reason they can't do it right now.

Geez, I'm tired of hospitals. I can't even imagine how MIL must feel. And now she'll be there through Mothers Day. Bummer.

MIL is back in the hospital again. Looks like the bladder infection is back (or never left).

DS had a meltdown at school. Gee, bet they didn't even see that one coming.

Oh How Nice

I got a response to my letter to the teacher. She replied by sending home 24 PAGES of homework to be done, for missing 3 days of school. She also said this was MODIFIED, and the amount reduced. So it was going to be more.

She said that the students participating in the camping trip will have an activity schedule and classroom curriculum as their classwork. So this homework is assigned to students not participating in that camping trip.

24 pages. For three days.

Yeah, sounds modified to me. And this is for a kid that can't handle homework, and they know this. When they sent home batches of homework of this size in the past, it has led to weeks of meltdowns.

Nice.

When is this f-ing semester coming to an end?!?!?!?

No Response. Yet. And a Melt.

I didn't hear anything from the school regarding my note. Not yet, anyway.

DS had a meltdown today. :( They called me on his cell phone, and asked if I would try talking to him.

At first he was growling, unable to communicate. But then, slowly, I started getting mono-syllabic responses, which led to partial sentences. When I could get him to talk, I got him to go back into his classroom.

During the entire conversation, he was left alone in the hallway. Probably the best thing they could have done. They just let us be. However, I did find out during that call that his aide was not there AGAIN during this melt. He had no idea where she was. Apparently, she was at school, just not with him. She is often mysteriously absent during his melts. Either that, or she just didn't see what happened. :(

The swine flu has closed some schools in the surrounding area. But since there haven't been any diagnosed cases in our district, our schools remain open. I sure wish they'd close, just as a precautionary measure. (Not because I fear the pandemic the media has hyped up, but because I can't stand dealing with this school.) I'm counting the days until summer vacation. I'm needing it even more than DS, I think. I just can't stand their stress.

Double Punishment

Ds is not being permitted to attend the field trip this year. This trip is a sort of rite of passage. All kids his age attend. It's a three day camping trip. We had been told from day one that they could not accommodate his autism on the trip. I offered to go with, they refused. I asked that they make arrangements to have an aide of some kind attend with him. To my knowledge, they never made any attempts to do so. I was never informed of any attempts. Each kid had to raise money for the class to attend, or they have to pay their full way. Two days after DS participating in a fundraiser, and about a week before I was to decide whether or not he would go, we received a letter stating that he would not be permitted to attend. He had had too many meltdowns at school. They listed out the dates he had them, with all but one being unknown to us. And for that date, they counted TWICE. Which I feel is very unfair, counting the same meltdown twice, for two things he did during the same meltdown. But I didn't argue it, knowing full well that they would just come up with something else to prevent him from going. They had told us all along they did not want him to go on that trip.

Now I get a letter coming home that says they want to know if I will be sending him to school the three days that all the other kids his age will be gone. (I will not.) They want to send home the homework he will miss during those days!! HUH?? The rest of his class will not be there! Why would they send homework home??

This just sounds like double punishment to me. First he won't be allowed to attend, and then they give him work that none of the other kids have to do?

I had discussed all this with his teacher and the aide a few weeks ago. They told me then, that if he did not attend the field trip, I did not have to send him to school. Other parents in the same boat didn't send their kids in the past. I had been told from the beginning that if he didn't go on the trip, and he went to school, they would put him to work in the younger kids' classrooms. I expressed my concern that this would not be in his best interests. They assured me that it would be fine if I didn't send him. Just call him in absent during those days. No problem. They never mentioned that there would be additional work assigned!! It was never mentioned during the open house, either, when they discussed what would happen if your child was not allowed to go for punitive reasons. They talked about having them work in other classrooms, not doing homework assignments.

DS has a real issue with homework at ANY time, and this would just flip him out. I'm very upset about it.

I really believe that it wouldn't have mattered how good or bad he had been, they would find a reason not to allow him. They tried all year to talk me out of sending him. But they had made SUCH a big deal out of how "this will be the trip of a lifetime" that they made him really want to go.

I found it very interesting that they had not sent home any kind of reports during the school year indicating that he'd had the meltdowns. No disciplinary reports at all. One especially bad one I knew about. They did call me at work. But I was not informed about any others, and no report was sent home. Then all of a sudden he has too many. And they didn't tell me until after he participated in the fundraisers! Why did they insist that he participate in the fundraiser if they knew he was very close to not being allowed to go? (They were all activities requiring social skills - not exactly an easy thing for an autie to do.) I thought that was very low. They could have just told us that he was close to being banned from the trip, and let us decide if he should participate. But no. They waited until he had helped the other kids attend. THEN told us he wouldn't be allowed.

DS already feels that autism is "bad," and he is
"bad" because he has autism. They school has fed into this. He is constantly being told that his behavior is bad, even though they know it is out of his control. His meltdowns are a reaction, not an action. He spirals out of control when his needs are not being met, when he is not being supported properly. Meltdowns are rare at home, and no where near the intensity they are at school. But they refuse to listen when we tell them what works and what doesn't. They continue to restrain him, though we tell them that's the worst thing that they could do. They do not follow the IEP. (The IEP calls for them to empty the classroom if he becomes escalated, but they do not do this. The IEP states that restraint should only be used as a last resort, but they have used it for such stupid things as to drag him out from under a desk and remove him from the classroom - not exactly a last resort or when he or other children are in danger. Etc.) They do things they know will escalate him, and then get angry with him for escalating. They have a chart that is supposed to help de-escalate him, yet they never use it (that's in the IEP too). DS says they haven't used it since the beginning of the school year, though it's in his IEP to show it to him repeatedly through the day.

So lets ignore the things we're supposed to do to support his autism, then stand back and comment on what a bad kid he is when he escalates. Nice.

Now they plan to not only exclude him from a trip they have been promoting all fricking year, they also want to dump homework on him on top of that? WTF? And yes, they KNOW homework is a huge issue with him. They've known that all along. I've fought every year to have limits placed on his homework. Have they listened to that? Nooooo. That's not convenient for them.

And tell me, why wouldn't he feel that autism is bad, when they are constantly telling him what bad behavior he has. And why wouldn't he feel that he is being punished for being autistic? (I feel he is, too.) It all reeks of discrimination. And that he is being punished because that all makes it easier for them.

This has me very upset. I can't believe they would dump homework on him on top of the other punishment. I don't believe it's fair. And I don't believe he can deal with it. I think it's just inviting more meltdowns.

I've written a letter to the teacher. We'll see how that goes over.