Loony Smurf
Member
Here goes again time to dust off the old armor it appears.
School started here on August 20th. I started a new job (first time I've worked for about 6 years although I was in school 4 hours a day for over a year) on August 30th. difficult child 2 did ok during the summer, we had very few problems with him. Hedid however grow several inches taller. But his behavior wasn't really too bad. He used to be in complete Special Education classroom but last year they moved him to regular ed except for English; he has dysgraphia. He has a few minor supports for that and a dusty behavior plan that hasn't seen much use. Since I've moved I'm not exactly sure where it is and what's in it.
Apparently last thursday one of the teachers dumped his breakfast tray before he was done with it and put him in a bad mood. he was apparently on thirds (should have been my first clue, he hasn't eaten like that in months). Then the math teacher in his first class marked his entire worksheet wrong because he didn't show his work. He gets the right answers but doesn't show the work because his handwriting is so bad he doesn't have room. So he's failing. Then he was tossing a football around in PE after the teacher told him to put it away, so she sent him to ISS. for 2 days. By then he was agitated and couldn't sit still and be quiet...so they sent him home for the day. The next day, ISS...he couldn't sit still and be quiet again, so they sent him home again. This is after about 15 minutes each day in ISS with a teacher, 3 other kids, and 5 desks. That was episode 1.
Monday he was very hyper, bouncing in his seat, talking a mile a minute, singing under his breath, the teacher couldn't teach the class because he was being such a disruption. So, they suspended him ISS for the rest of that day and since he still can't just sit there, he got 2 more days OSS. I called an emergency IEP meeting at that point, they set it up for wednesday morning at 7:15. Apparently while he was in the dean's office, he hid the guy's candy jar under a chair. The dean and the school police officer showed up at my house right after he got home (knowing i was at work) and confronted him about it...Didn't tell me anything about it until the IEP meeting (difficult child 1 was at home for a different issue and answered the door and let them talk to him and told me about it when i got home)
So, IEP meeting. We added in that he can have scratch paper to do his math problems on instead of the worksheet, he can leave his science stuff in the classroom (teacher didn't like that one bit but he can't remember to take it with him to gym and he's late if he goes across the school to his loker and then back) but that support is only for a month. He can now leave his classroom when asked and go to the library and use a stressball for a few minutes then go back to class. I also made clear I had made an emergency appointment with his psychiatric for friday. His school social worker asked me if he had a diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), because he's seeing a LOT of it.
So psychiatric appointment, went through the symptoms with him: increased appetite, less sleep, touchy, rocking back and forth, bouncing his legs, tapping his fingers, making noises, singing, talking, losing things, messier writing, interrupting inappropriately, distractable, can't finish a sentence without getting distracted. On top of the worsening Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) symptoms that have always sort of been there but are bad enough to make others notice now. He was never diagnosed until The psychiatric heard more about them today due to what the school social worker said: picking at sores until they bleed...for months at a time. he has sores from july still. Hoarding, obsessive about touching things, taking pens, other cool little items, correcting people if they say anything innaccurate, doing things at exactly the right time, if he has something to say he can't let it go until he's said it despite any known or anticipated consequence. psychiatric raised his prozac for the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) symptoms to 30mg/day, raised his metadate to 60mg in the morning and a methylphenidate 10mg at 4pm, he's got to go in tomorrow morning and have a depakote level drawn so we can see if we can raise that too or if it's ok. I have to call monday about that.
So he gets back to school today and goes through the metal detector and sets it off. Turns out he had something belonging to the principal he'd taken and was going to give back, a railroad spike with 'talking stick' engraved on it. Since he hid the candy jar the other day, they wrote him a ticket (he has to go to court on october 24th at 3) and suspended him for 3 days for stealing.
Now I have no doubt he took it. He also knew it was wrong. I do question whether he could help it. I know he couldn't help the other times they've suspended him for. I feel at this point they have just plain taken a dislike to him and are going to do whatever they can to get rid of him. The Special Education coordinator and the school social worker like him but his other teachers and the dean don't.
So, what do I need to be doing? I could use some suggestions. I've been called at work probably 8 times in the short time i've been there and already had to leave several times. I'm afraid they're going to find a reason to expel him, not to mention going to cost me who knows what for the ticket they wrote, they don't do community service here for minors.
Loony (truly today) Smurf
School started here on August 20th. I started a new job (first time I've worked for about 6 years although I was in school 4 hours a day for over a year) on August 30th. difficult child 2 did ok during the summer, we had very few problems with him. Hedid however grow several inches taller. But his behavior wasn't really too bad. He used to be in complete Special Education classroom but last year they moved him to regular ed except for English; he has dysgraphia. He has a few minor supports for that and a dusty behavior plan that hasn't seen much use. Since I've moved I'm not exactly sure where it is and what's in it.
Apparently last thursday one of the teachers dumped his breakfast tray before he was done with it and put him in a bad mood. he was apparently on thirds (should have been my first clue, he hasn't eaten like that in months). Then the math teacher in his first class marked his entire worksheet wrong because he didn't show his work. He gets the right answers but doesn't show the work because his handwriting is so bad he doesn't have room. So he's failing. Then he was tossing a football around in PE after the teacher told him to put it away, so she sent him to ISS. for 2 days. By then he was agitated and couldn't sit still and be quiet...so they sent him home for the day. The next day, ISS...he couldn't sit still and be quiet again, so they sent him home again. This is after about 15 minutes each day in ISS with a teacher, 3 other kids, and 5 desks. That was episode 1.
Monday he was very hyper, bouncing in his seat, talking a mile a minute, singing under his breath, the teacher couldn't teach the class because he was being such a disruption. So, they suspended him ISS for the rest of that day and since he still can't just sit there, he got 2 more days OSS. I called an emergency IEP meeting at that point, they set it up for wednesday morning at 7:15. Apparently while he was in the dean's office, he hid the guy's candy jar under a chair. The dean and the school police officer showed up at my house right after he got home (knowing i was at work) and confronted him about it...Didn't tell me anything about it until the IEP meeting (difficult child 1 was at home for a different issue and answered the door and let them talk to him and told me about it when i got home)
So, IEP meeting. We added in that he can have scratch paper to do his math problems on instead of the worksheet, he can leave his science stuff in the classroom (teacher didn't like that one bit but he can't remember to take it with him to gym and he's late if he goes across the school to his loker and then back) but that support is only for a month. He can now leave his classroom when asked and go to the library and use a stressball for a few minutes then go back to class. I also made clear I had made an emergency appointment with his psychiatric for friday. His school social worker asked me if he had a diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), because he's seeing a LOT of it.
So psychiatric appointment, went through the symptoms with him: increased appetite, less sleep, touchy, rocking back and forth, bouncing his legs, tapping his fingers, making noises, singing, talking, losing things, messier writing, interrupting inappropriately, distractable, can't finish a sentence without getting distracted. On top of the worsening Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) symptoms that have always sort of been there but are bad enough to make others notice now. He was never diagnosed until The psychiatric heard more about them today due to what the school social worker said: picking at sores until they bleed...for months at a time. he has sores from july still. Hoarding, obsessive about touching things, taking pens, other cool little items, correcting people if they say anything innaccurate, doing things at exactly the right time, if he has something to say he can't let it go until he's said it despite any known or anticipated consequence. psychiatric raised his prozac for the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) symptoms to 30mg/day, raised his metadate to 60mg in the morning and a methylphenidate 10mg at 4pm, he's got to go in tomorrow morning and have a depakote level drawn so we can see if we can raise that too or if it's ok. I have to call monday about that.
So he gets back to school today and goes through the metal detector and sets it off. Turns out he had something belonging to the principal he'd taken and was going to give back, a railroad spike with 'talking stick' engraved on it. Since he hid the candy jar the other day, they wrote him a ticket (he has to go to court on october 24th at 3) and suspended him for 3 days for stealing.
Now I have no doubt he took it. He also knew it was wrong. I do question whether he could help it. I know he couldn't help the other times they've suspended him for. I feel at this point they have just plain taken a dislike to him and are going to do whatever they can to get rid of him. The Special Education coordinator and the school social worker like him but his other teachers and the dean don't.
So, what do I need to be doing? I could use some suggestions. I've been called at work probably 8 times in the short time i've been there and already had to leave several times. I'm afraid they're going to find a reason to expel him, not to mention going to cost me who knows what for the ticket they wrote, they don't do community service here for minors.
Loony (truly today) Smurf