Viewing 17 posts - 41 through 57 (of 57 total)
  • Parental Advice – Child Suicide
  • crikey
    Free Member

    Jesus.
    We’ve gone from jumpers for goalposts to this sadness in 2 generations?

    johndoh
    Free Member

    We’ve gone from jumpers for goalposts to this sadness in 2 generations?

    Yep – I just hope some children growing up now (and being the first ones to have a lifetime of experience growing up with smart phones, 24 hour communications and social media) learn how to manage and regulate this developing shitstorm when they become regular adults and potential leaders.

    twistedpencil
    Full Member

    Well I’ve just back from A&E to round off one of the most scary weeks of my life…  my lad has continued to talk and act out thoughts of suicide… tonight we realised we can’t carry on like this.

    Suspect that we’ve a long road to recovery ahead of us. We’re all home and we’ll see what daybreak brings…

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    concrete24
    Free Member

    @twistedpencil

    What a nightmare – can’t really add anything useful other than wishing you all the best and hoping you can get the right help.

    jjprestidge
    Free Member

    I think the whole state education system is structured poorly. The independent sector has pre-prep (little ones) prep (years 3-8) and senior (years 9-13). This stops the issue of throwing 11 year olds in with 16 year olds, which is never good.

    JP

    Sandwich
    Full Member

    even from a young age been desperate to “grow up” and become a teenager.

    Ms Sandwich, as she was then, was 30 from the age of 5, or so it seemed. We spent a long time emphasising that it’s not a race and enjoy today before tomorrow. We used router blocking to keep MySpace(!), FaceBook and the other social media under control, plus dumbphones only until they were late teens.

    She also attempted suicide in her sixth form years due to an abusive boyfriend and a school that despite it’s outstanding OFSTED report bullied her as well. Being in Suffolk our mental health team is crap and has been for tens of years. If you’re not in Suffolk I hope that your mental health support is much better than ours.

    On a positive note she is now married, the proper age (30) that she has been for the last 25 years and happy in her skin. You may need to buckle up for the long haul as it was mid-20’s before she felt secure in herself.

    db
    Full Member

    Son (ambulance tech) was called to a school yesterday for a 13 year old having taken an overdose of pills. I was shocked but talking it through with him and my eldest (pediatric nurse) it seems it’s a bit of thing just now. All I was worried about at 13 was riding my bike.

    No real advice just keeping talking to her.

    TroutWrestler
    Free Member

    This isn’t really a school thing, it is a symptom of modern society. There is some really good advice about phones and boundaries in this thread. I often say to parents, “How about we put an HD camera in your Daughter’s bedroom and connect it to the Internet?” Once their initial incredulity has died down and it has dawned on them that THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT A SMARTPHONE IS, hey start to get the point.

    This behaviour in society is not going to go away quickly. Too many parents are wilfully ignorant of what their kids are up to online – They’re safe, they’re in their room! – is a refrain I often hear.

    You need to talk to your daughter about this kind of shit, and help her identify, filter and process it. She is surrounded by it. Shielding her will do no good in the long term as sooner or later she will have to deal with it.

    Rules, advice, openness and honesty are the tool you need.

    The bullying is a school thing, and you should speak to them. They will help, but it is something you (and crucially, your daughter) need to stick at as it isn’t always easy to resolve. There are more dynamics than ever at play. I frequently deal with malicious fake Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook accounts, and the best you can realistically hope for is to flag it to the platform, and the account to be closed. You will not get an investigation into who is behind it.

    Moving school is not a tactic that will work long term. You’d need to move a long way to escape the Social Media bubble that will follow. A “fresh start” is rarely that.

    Good luck. Don’t give up. You want (and need) your daughter to have the skills and resilience to deal with this kind of stuff for the rest of her life. Unfortunately (and fortunately!) you learn a lot more at school than can be summed up in an exam results league table.

    shooterman
    Full Member

    Trailwagger we have been through something very similar. Both my son and daughter went to the same school but fell in with very different peer groups. My daughter fell in with what I can only describe as a “dark” sort of crowd. Eating disorders, suicide notes and threats to harm others posted on social media etc by her peer group.

    I would definitely have handled it very differently looking back but my wife was against any sort of drastic action. My advice is:

    1. Get her out of that school. What you are describing sounds systemic.
    2. If you can’t get her out of the school, get her involved in stuff outside school so she can meet people her own age with a different outlook. I always felt my daughter was totally immersed in negativity when she was at school.

    concrete24
    Free Member

    Hey @trailwagger, I was thinking about this thread earlier and wondered how you are getting on; whether things got any better for you?

    Same for @twistedpencil – hope all is OK.

    trailwagger
    Free Member

    HI @concrete24

    Daughter started a new school 1 week ago. She is a little down about it I think because she is missing her old friends. Her new school has two girls that she knows very well from her primary school and guides, so I don’t think she will be missing the old friends for too long. We are seeing a difference already. She is taking lunch to school and eating it again (she refused to eat at the old school) She says classes are boring, and the teachers are more strict at this school (I see that as a positive).
    Early days yet, but the signs are good so far.

    concrete24
    Free Member

    Hi @trailwagger,

    Thanks for the update. Glad the early indications are positive – looks like your instincts were right! Hope she finds her feet there and you get some head space back!

    My lad’s on an ‘up’ at the moment – he decided in the week before Christmas that he couldn’t take it anymore and wanted to tackle it head on. He got his teacher to get all the boys from the class together and basically hammer out what their problem with him is. We were worried this would backfire – but he was adamant. Looks like he is smarter than us. The main bully didn’t turn up to the session, (since seriously disciplined) the other lads basically apologised and admitted it had all got out of hand for no good reason. Since then he has still had good days and bad days but what’s noticeable is that he no longer seems to be excluded from the group and has a better support network. Our challenge is to not be too over-protective of him and remember he has a brother and sister that also need looking after!

    Everyday I give thanks that I am not 10 anymore!

    outofbreath
    Free Member

    He got his teacher to get all the boys from the class together and basically hammer out what their problem with him is. We were worried this would backfire – but he was adamant. Looks like he is smarter than us. The main bully didn’t turn up to the session, (since seriously disciplined) the other lads basically apologised and admitted it had all got out of hand for no good reason. Since then he has still had good days and bad days but what’s noticeable is that he no longer seems to be excluded from the group and has a better support network.

    Wish I’d had his wisdom and maturity as a kid. What a cracking lad.

    trailwagger
    Free Member

    he decided in the week before Christmas that he couldn’t take it anymore and wanted to tackle it head on. He got his teacher to get all the boys from the class together and basically hammer out what their problem with him is.

    What a great attitude, you must be very proud of the way he has handled that.

    concrete24
    Free Member

    Yep – we’re really proud of how mature he has been about it and how resilient he has been; the pressure on him has been immense. To be fair, the school have been very supportive, hard to fault them at all. I think these are the moments that will define him as an adult.
    I hope he can rediscover all the things that used to excite him now (and I can get him out on his bike regularly again)!
    P.S. he’s still very ‘10’ when it comes to homework\chores – the maturity can be switched off apparently! 🙂

    twistedpencil
    Full Member

    @concrete24 your boy sounds awesome, well done to him.  We’re talking it one day at a time. Since the implosion at the end of November he stepped away from school.  We got him in for an hour a day the week before Christmas and we gradually building up the number of hours a day he goes in for at the moment.

    He’s still very much depressed, though things calmed down over the Christmas break, so much so that we actually had a good Christmas day.

    I ended up being signed off work for most of December, my brain pretty much couldn’t focus on anything for more than a few minutes at a time. But I’m back full time again now.

    His school have been great with support. Local mental health services less so. We’re now awaiting autism testing, 7-8months before starting…   So we’re looking at private options, we’ve already been to meet a Psychiatrist, and are facing up to possible medications to help him.  Really not sure what’s best for him.  I keep meaning to start my own thread but get overwhelmed by it when typing it out…


    @trailwagger
    also glad to hear things are moving in the right direction.

    concrete24
    Free Member

    @twistedpencil

    Sorry to hear that things are still rough for you and your son. You’ve got more experience of this than me from your earlier posts – but I think you are doing the right thing looking at private options – 7-8 months is such a long time in a kid’s life whatever the outcome of the tests.

    Glad you were able to have a good Christmas day and are now back to work. The fact you want to post but are getting overwhelmed probably* means you definitely need to keep talking about it with someone\somewhere! Vent on this thread, start a new thread or talk to a counsellor about how it’s affecting you – whatever it takes to stay functional.
    *Not a psychologist or very good at following own advice.

    For what it’s worth I often think of your words of support and experiences from this thread when we are having a bad day, so thank you.

Viewing 17 posts - 41 through 57 (of 57 total)

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