Reply to DD12 missed a lot fo school this year due to stomach aches

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]She is playing you.[/quote]

As a parent of a kid with severe school based anxiety, it's not a matter of "playing" the adult.  Anxiety is an illness, and it can both cause physical symptoms (e.g. her head really does hurt) or amplify physical symptoms (e.g. what would normally be manageable discomfort becomes unmanageable).  When my son tells me that he feels too sick to go to school, he's telling the truth.  He does feel lousy, it's just that keeping him home isn't going to make it better in the long run.  So, I send him to school, but I do it with empathy, because I realize that the issue is an illness not manipulation.  I can say "I'm sorry, I know you feel bad, and I know you really don't want to go to school, but if you stay home tomorrow will be worse.  So, let's get going."  [/quote]

I posted above about my daughter who started refusing to go to school in 6th grade. I say exactly the same thing! The discomfort is real but she has to go to school. [/quote]

I'm 7:54 and I agree that this is an excellent description of the dynamic.

OP, you have taken her to several doctors. It looks to me like you are focused on finding out what "it" is rather than taking what feels to you like a more confrontational approach. But listen to so many of us who have seen this exact same dynamic with our kids. You have been reenforcing the behavior and you cannot stop it this way. Frankly if you go the way of accommodations, you will only send the signal to her that this is the way tog et out of things, and she will take this pattern through the rest of her life, to very destructive effect. You need to fix it now. I am not saying she's faking. As PP said, we can all find a physical ailment at any time and hyperfocusing on it will always make it feel worse. Thats a brain thing and you need to retrain her brain.

Sit her down and give her ground rules. Say that you are so sorry that she feels unwell so much of the time but she has to go to school anyway and just suck it in. Tell her that unless she has a fever she's going to school and staying there. And that means if she ends up in the nurses office. I went through that with calls from the nurses office and I just refused to pick DD up. Within an hour she was better. If you have to call the nurse ahead of time to get her on board with the ground rules, do so. And if your DD comes home and goes to bed, let her rest for a bit, tell her its OK, and then get her up after an hour or two to do homework.

The fact that when she stays home she feels better by afternoon should tell you something. You have indulged the problem and that will only set her up for problems in life. Stop with the doctors and dig in. You'll be surprised by how soon this stops when you stop indulging it.[/quote]

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