No Folded Hands
Bronze Member
Hmmm. I had a thought while reading through the posts. Have you spoken with your son's teacher, specifically? I mean, just face to face with the teacher, without the principal or other school employees? It's possible that his teacher would be only too glad to have some ideas of how to abort a situation within 10 seconds of it starting, as you put it. At least, it might be helpful to try that if you haven't already. We used to call that kind of thing end-running the system when I was active duty, and it did work famously quite often. Also, I don't know how you feel when you approach the people you have talked with, either, but I found here when dealing with an authority saying no situation related to the PTSD it made some difference when I first made sure I believed it myself and then straightforwardly told the person that if there was a problem and he could educate me as to some of the details it would help me to work with him to find a mutually acceptable solution. I think the idea surprised him a little!
This IS a tough situation in a general sense, as others have mentioned, because it isn't really the teacher's responsibility to deal with special needs situations in already overcrowded classrooms. On the other hand, a great deal of trouble got handed to those with various disabilities in the days before legislation tried to change that, and it hasn't vanished. I am currently trying to get some kind of program in place at my university to educate professors (and others) about PTSD; having experienced some of the trouble students with the disability can face in trying to get through their degree programs and the difficulty in having trouble addressed. There must be some middle ground. Starting to address it in grade school sounds like a wonderful beginning. Good wishes and lots of luck for it! You're making my job easier by this, you know. :)
BTW...try not to feel this is your fault through not stopping the trauma your sons went through sooner. Somewhere in your heart, if not in your head yet, (or maybe the reverse) you might find a certain truth...you got them out of it, you stuck with them, you're doing your best to help them now, and you truly love them. Momhood doesn't mean being perfect superwoman. It just means all of the above, plus acknowledging your own mistakes and working to avoid repeating them while correcting them so far as you can. And it means knowing you're human, without using that as an excuse for the mistakes, sure...but a fallable and yet still amazing human person.
This IS a tough situation in a general sense, as others have mentioned, because it isn't really the teacher's responsibility to deal with special needs situations in already overcrowded classrooms. On the other hand, a great deal of trouble got handed to those with various disabilities in the days before legislation tried to change that, and it hasn't vanished. I am currently trying to get some kind of program in place at my university to educate professors (and others) about PTSD; having experienced some of the trouble students with the disability can face in trying to get through their degree programs and the difficulty in having trouble addressed. There must be some middle ground. Starting to address it in grade school sounds like a wonderful beginning. Good wishes and lots of luck for it! You're making my job easier by this, you know. :)
BTW...try not to feel this is your fault through not stopping the trauma your sons went through sooner. Somewhere in your heart, if not in your head yet, (or maybe the reverse) you might find a certain truth...you got them out of it, you stuck with them, you're doing your best to help them now, and you truly love them. Momhood doesn't mean being perfect superwoman. It just means all of the above, plus acknowledging your own mistakes and working to avoid repeating them while correcting them so far as you can. And it means knowing you're human, without using that as an excuse for the mistakes, sure...but a fallable and yet still amazing human person.
