note to principal | ADHD Information

Make an appointment for you, your husband your therepist, DS's teachers, guidance counselors, principal, & anyone else in the school who you feel should be there.  Do not make this appointment as an interrogation of the school, but rather as a way "we can all work together so that we are all on the ame page with regards to DS".  Then, if your therepist is as good as mine, he/she will make this all so much better but asking them questions & pointing out a better way to handle it.  Try your best to just sit at the meeting, you are the mom & this is your baby so you have WAY more emotions involved in this then your therepist. 

After the meeting follow up with an email cc'ing everyone at the meeting , thank them for their time, let them know you are looking forward to WORKING TOGETHER to help DS ~ this is the nice way of letting them know you will not let this issue just go away.   Also say you will be setting up another meeting at the beginning of next school year so everyone is on the same page.

Trust me, I have been through this & you cannot be nice you are your childest BEST advocate.  Do not let the school turn things around on you.  Keep asking htem what are THEY going to do to make school a SAFE plac efor your child.  Alsom read your school's mission statement ~ yurn their words on them.  My son is out of Middle School FINALLY, & it wasn't easy. 

I am considering sending this email to my son's principal. It will be like a
nuclear bomb, I'm sure; he will see it as an accusation rather than an
update on my son. I've always been very open with information about my
son, because I get feedback and insight that gets us all to the bottom of
problems faster.

Anyway, what do you think? Should I send this or just keep my mouth
shut?

***
DS has started therapy. His therapist said his biggest problem is that he
is being bullied at school and feels he has no adult support there. I was
shocked when I was told this. DS has been complaining to me about
certain kids, but I had no idea it was so bad.

The first part of his therapy will be clarifying symptoms of bullying. Then
he'll be able to distinguish between friendly teasing and bullying. At this
point he has a hair trigger, and reacts as if he's under attack at almost
anything, including being pushed academically by his teachers.

The next step will be labeling. I will make sure his teacher knows what
the labels are so she isn't caught off guard by them.

Once he's had practice labeling he will start verbally confronting "bullies"
rather than just trying to stuff his feelings. For example, he'll say
something like "That feels like bullying to me, is that what you meant to
happen?"

Hopefully between learning to distinguish actual bullying and learning to
verbally stick up for himself, it will stop his outbursts and threats. It will
take him a while to break the threat habit, because it is so effective - if
he makes a threat, he is immediately removed from the person who is
bullying him.

Notice there is nothing in his plan about him getting adults to intervene.
His therapist doesn't think there is enough time this school year for him
to rebuild trust because no one believes he is under attack - including
me, I completely disregarded his stories; I thought there's no way all that
could be happening with a teacher and an ed tech right there, despite the
number of incidences he's had this year when his ed tech was MIA - and
when he has an outburst that's what the teacher sees so he is punished,
but the kid who bullied him isn't.

I don't know what to say about that, other than I hope his teachers
support him in this process, especially the labeling period. I can see how
that might be disruptive.

The thing to remember with DS is that there is always a trigger, even if
you don't see what happened. He's very thoughtful and he does what he
does on purpose. Traditional discipline does absolutely nothing - on the
contrary, it reinforces his behavior issues because it gets him what he
wants, it gets him physically away from his stressor.

I will keep you updated as he progresses in his therapy.I think this letter needs to be direct. Your role is advocate of your son. Everything else is secondary, including how you are perceived by the staff.

I would state flat out that bullying is occurring and needs to be addressed and should not be tolerated. You don't need to justify whether it is or is not occurring. Ask the principal to call you to discuss a plan of action to address the chronic bullying. Name names. Quote Describe details. Don't talk about the therapist. This is not your son's "issue" -- this is entirely on the school staff.

These people are not thinking about your son's behavior or his reaction to the environment at the same level of detail. Only you are, and therefore you are the expert. Don't bother trying to make them get it; this is irrelevant. The only goal is to get your son what he needs. Insist that they resolve the situation as described by you.

I would pummell the principal with daily descriptive details of who said what. Your letter simply details your plan of action. They don't need to know your plan of action. You need to pressure them HARD to act on the bullying that IS occurring. Discussion over. It's not a tea party. You are not going to convince them of anything. You just need to make them feel the heat. That is how you get what you want in this environment. And no, they are not going to like you but who cares? When a school wants a parent to act, they pressure; there is no discussion.

Stop being so nice. And stop trying to get them to understand. Just get your kid what he needs. Jessica N40293.8997222222

corrina, please post us what ends up happening with the school.

this stuff really pisses me off!

I have been through it as well.

I can understand your not wanting to step on toes. It is so difficult to be assertive when you are up against an entire staff of people at the school and you are just one parent with one child.

I had to get my friend's daughter involved as a peer advocate for my son. He just would not relate what was happening to him when asked by the VP. Is your son not telling anyone about the bullying? Or is it that they don't believe him? My son has a little bit of both going on. He either doesn't tell, or he relates some strange story about invisibility or cat instincts and nobody knows what he's talking about.

The school does need to do something about this, but remember that bullies can be sneaky and wait until an adult-free moment presents itself. It might seem odd to have another kid be the playground advocate, but between the heightened awareness of the adult on duty and the keen eyes of a caring friend my son's problems on the playground are much better.

I'm with Bethann here. Please let us know how things are going. You have been so supportive of the rest of us, it's our turn to be in your corner.I sent the letter, and here's what I got back:

This is good information. How would you like me to communicate it to
staff that works with DS? I believe it would be important that the
information is shared so we can support DS and his therapist. I believe
you know that Miss Grant and I take safety seriously at WPS. You may
want to let the therapist know that students bullying is sometimes
addressed without notification of the victim. I have heard DS say to me
that nothing was done about an incident involving him when I knew for
certain that it had been addressed. I know we are working here at WPS at
addressing negative behavior and are seeing results. Once again, I
appreciate you sharing this important information. Let me know how you
would like me to proceed.   

***
I was surprised by this, because he didn't get defensive.
But also - he knows about the bullying?
But also - he knows my son feels like nothing is being done about it?

My head is spinning. My gut says to pull him from school for the rest of
the year, but that is so over the top.

Seriously, his therapist thinks he's been so victimized that he thinks
everything is bullying behavior. It explains so much - once this year
there was a girl who was watching him, and he flipped out that she was
staring at him. We couldn't figure out why. Well, if he assumed she was
getting ready to pick on him, that explains why he "struck first."

I'm out of my league. How do you tell a school they need to stop kids
from giving dirty looks? Is that even possible to do? I've told them over
and over they have to separate my son from the ringleader (with whom he
shares an ed tech). It's pointless.

I've got to go to war. I'm thinking about having a meeting with my son's
teachers and bring his therapist with me. I'm just out of energy. I'm
disgusted with myself that I didn't step in earlier. I've been hearing about
the "bully" for months, but my son didn't seem overly sad or angry, so I
thought he was telling stories. Until he said he didn't want to live
anymore, and then he went straight back to the therapist, and finally
someone listened to him, thank God. I'm numb. I'm worn out. I've just
gone too long without a break.

Oh, and it appears that he also has a sensory integration disorder. I have
absolutely completely ignored it. There's no other way to describe it. It's
a whole new thing to research, and there aren't going to be simple
answers, and I just can't find the reserves to do it.

Okay, that's enough bellyaching.      I need to get over myself and go
take a spa day or something. And figure out what to say to my son's
principal. What a PITA his is to throw it back into my lap - he's supposed
to know how to deal with bullying, not ask the parents what they want
him to do about it! Beh!