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Trying a new "I'm not available" tact with difficult child 1
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<blockquote data-quote="Marguerite" data-source="post: 392667" data-attributes="member: 1991"><p>From our experience, if anxiety is a factor, you won't succeed in forcing the issue through until the anxiety is dealt with.</p><p></p><p>What we did - we had a rule. School work during school hours. It doesn't matter where you are or how you feel, you WILL work on schoolwork, even in the nurse's office or even if you're home in your pyjamas. Even if you have a fever and are in between throwing up. School. Work. During. School. Hours.</p><p></p><p>WHat I often ended up having to do, if I had a day when I could not cancel out in order to go fetch difficult child 3 from school, I would keep him home so I could get my stuff done. I had to cancel too many of my own doctors appointments, just because I would be on the way there and the school would call asking me to come get him. Or I would leave him there (as you tried to do) and I'd find he had been in the sick room all day, with no schoolwork left with him. Even if he is not deliberately trying to call in sick just to get out of work, the conditioned response rapidly sets in and he associates schoolwork with increased stress, and claiming to feel sick with reduced stress=no schoolwork. A bad conditioned response. We were able to reverse the conditioned response with the schoolwork at home, always, when he was home during school hours. He learned that he felt better while at home, and could actually do his schoolwork more successfully and with less stress. This taught his body that schoolwork was not the problem.</p><p></p><p>difficult child 3 had been a correspondence student for three years when we travelled to NZ. But even though we thought he had a better understanding of his own stress levels, we discovered while there that he did not realise just how bad anxiety could make him feel. He was very anxious one day, convinced he was dying. When I said, "It's OK, it's anxiety, just take some deep breaths and keep telling yourself, 'I am safe," he could not believe that mere anxiety could make him feel this bad. It was as we left the place that was making him feel anxious, and experiencing his symptoms ease as we drove away, that helped him finally begin to realise how crippling anxiety can be, and that it is not a wimpy thing to say, "I am so anxious I can't cope."</p><p></p><p>Every time there is an anxiety experience that he survives, he learns he will get through. But it is taking time and a lot of understanding.</p><p></p><p>I would make it very clear to the school - he MUST always have work to do, even if he is in the nurse's room. It's not punishment, it just IS. The work has to be done and feeling sick is not a get out of jail free card. You throw up, then pick up the pen again. If your life is going to be a constant struggle with IBS, you have to find ways to meet your obligations in the teeth of it, and not simply wait for it to go away.</p><p></p><p>And over time, as you slog through, your body slowly learns that the work has to be done, and the stress actually reduces while they work and as they complete stuff. The build-up of work not completed only adds to the stress.</p><p></p><p>We tend to first think of sick kids in terms of putting them to bed and coddling them. Same with ourselves if we become acutely ill - we go to bed until we feel better. But with any chronic illness, life will pass you by if you don't find ways to soldier on. So we have to teach our children to do the best they can, while still dealing with the illness (whether physical or emotional). It's not cruel; it's life. But we do sometimes have to get inventive!</p><p></p><p>I think you did a wise thing, but you are also dependent on other people following through. You compromised well. I would praise him for making the effort and having the work to do.</p><p></p><p>Marg</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Marguerite, post: 392667, member: 1991"] From our experience, if anxiety is a factor, you won't succeed in forcing the issue through until the anxiety is dealt with. What we did - we had a rule. School work during school hours. It doesn't matter where you are or how you feel, you WILL work on schoolwork, even in the nurse's office or even if you're home in your pyjamas. Even if you have a fever and are in between throwing up. School. Work. During. School. Hours. WHat I often ended up having to do, if I had a day when I could not cancel out in order to go fetch difficult child 3 from school, I would keep him home so I could get my stuff done. I had to cancel too many of my own doctors appointments, just because I would be on the way there and the school would call asking me to come get him. Or I would leave him there (as you tried to do) and I'd find he had been in the sick room all day, with no schoolwork left with him. Even if he is not deliberately trying to call in sick just to get out of work, the conditioned response rapidly sets in and he associates schoolwork with increased stress, and claiming to feel sick with reduced stress=no schoolwork. A bad conditioned response. We were able to reverse the conditioned response with the schoolwork at home, always, when he was home during school hours. He learned that he felt better while at home, and could actually do his schoolwork more successfully and with less stress. This taught his body that schoolwork was not the problem. difficult child 3 had been a correspondence student for three years when we travelled to NZ. But even though we thought he had a better understanding of his own stress levels, we discovered while there that he did not realise just how bad anxiety could make him feel. He was very anxious one day, convinced he was dying. When I said, "It's OK, it's anxiety, just take some deep breaths and keep telling yourself, 'I am safe," he could not believe that mere anxiety could make him feel this bad. It was as we left the place that was making him feel anxious, and experiencing his symptoms ease as we drove away, that helped him finally begin to realise how crippling anxiety can be, and that it is not a wimpy thing to say, "I am so anxious I can't cope." Every time there is an anxiety experience that he survives, he learns he will get through. But it is taking time and a lot of understanding. I would make it very clear to the school - he MUST always have work to do, even if he is in the nurse's room. It's not punishment, it just IS. The work has to be done and feeling sick is not a get out of jail free card. You throw up, then pick up the pen again. If your life is going to be a constant struggle with IBS, you have to find ways to meet your obligations in the teeth of it, and not simply wait for it to go away. And over time, as you slog through, your body slowly learns that the work has to be done, and the stress actually reduces while they work and as they complete stuff. The build-up of work not completed only adds to the stress. We tend to first think of sick kids in terms of putting them to bed and coddling them. Same with ourselves if we become acutely ill - we go to bed until we feel better. But with any chronic illness, life will pass you by if you don't find ways to soldier on. So we have to teach our children to do the best they can, while still dealing with the illness (whether physical or emotional). It's not cruel; it's life. But we do sometimes have to get inventive! I think you did a wise thing, but you are also dependent on other people following through. You compromised well. I would praise him for making the effort and having the work to do. Marg [/QUOTE]
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