Well, it wasn’t what I intended to do and I certainly am not doing it “for real,” but I also…am. Kinda-sorta.

Builder and his anxiety issues have necessitated removing him from school for the present. I am generally against medicating children’s behavioral issues, but – like many parents with firm principles without actual experience working them – I have come to think that it is the only way to get a handle on Builder’s anxiety responses.

So. He is on hospital homebound education. Which basically means he is under the care of physicians until he is able to properly return to school. Technically. In our case, it means that for the safety of himself and others (students and faculty) he is going to be educated at home until such time as we can find an appropriate medical/medicinal assist to smooth over his initial panic response to just about anything that freaks him out.

What provokes such a response? Changing “specials” on a school day. Being overlooked by another child when he wants to answer a question. Having to choose only from choices given and not his own (often outlandish) choice. Not getting to be line-leader. Not getting to choose apples at lunch when apples aren’t even on the menu. A substitute teacher. A change in therapy times. Spilling water from the drinking fountain. A pencil breaking.

All of these and a hundred other circumstances stimulate the amphibian brain, his psychologist says. The survival mechanism. The fight-or-flight adrenal flow.

Which on a child with a regularly processing brain, could be discussed, worked through, with proper behavioral rewards and consequences. But with my son and his autistic exceptionality, these discussions are largely fruitless.  It isn’t that he’s stupid or slow…rather it’s that he can’t see the advantages, really, of choosing to behave appropriately to a situation. He will NOT be manipulated by rewards or consequences.

And this can be, at bottom, a good thing.

However, he still needs to be able to function with a group of other people without wanting them to die every time he is annoyed.  And until he can see that he can behave that way and that this is a good and desirable way, he will continue to try to control situations through the use of his strength and temper.  Which is unacceptable.

So back to where I began this lengthy post…

My son hasn’t been in school since the day before the last day before Winter Break. He has been at home, with me, being educated.  Though I have asked for work from school for him, it hasn’t been forthcoming.  We have had to process paperwork to get the homebound education program rolling, and that’s taken weeks.  So I’ve been teaching him from home.

Actually, it has in many ways been much less stressful. If I could be assured of his proper assessment at the end of the year, I would consider just taking him out of school entirely for the rest of this year. However, he can’t really take the FCAT and I am not equipped to handle all the things on his IEP, so I am leaving him enrolled in school.  I’m just currently the one making his lessons.  While we wait for a teacher to come.

One was all set to come this past week…at last…but… She became ill and so was unable to come meet us and get started.  There’s no school this coming Monday or Tuesday, so I am hoping that Builder will finally get back on track later this week.

This will likely last until May, since we cannot get in to see a child psychiatrist/prescribing M.D. until mid-April and then we’ll have to see what kind of medical treatment we can find to help Builder work through his anger/anxiety issues.

And maybe…just maybe…  he’ll level out and we can try school again.

Tags: Autism, education, homeschooling