Another outburst

At work yesterday afternoon, I’m in a meeting and I hear my cell phone ringing in my purse. Normally I turn the phone off when I get to work because a) I don’t get good reception in the office and b) People that would phone me know my work hours and would call me at the office.

Well, it was a good thing I had forgot to turn my phone off when I came back from my lunch meeting. When I listened to the message, it was the school’s Principal, calling to tell me that S was having some troubles and was refusing to get out of the school vehicle. The message went on to tell me that if I didn’t get back to him quickly, he was going to have no other option than to contact the police to get assistance through that route.

I quickly called the school back, and got the answering machine. I waited about 10 seconds, and then called back again. This time I was able to get through. The Principal came on the phone and started to tell me what was going on. He wasn’t fully aware of the situation, but the biggest problem was that it was obvious S was agitated, and neither the Principal nor the EA felt it wise to allow him to take the Van home in such a mood. (Given that this is a special ed van for behavioural-isssue children, I could sort of understand that.)

I asked if the Principal had a cordless phone that he could take out to S in the van so that I could talk to him and try and coax him out of the van. He said they would call back with a cordless. A few minutes later, the phone rings in my office, and it’s the Principal handing the phone over to S. S sounds like a storm cloud. I try to reason with him, and encourage him to just get out of the van so that the driver and the other child could leave. I explained that he wasn’t in trouble, and that I would be there very soon to pick him up, but he continued to refuse to get out.
After a few minutes, I told S that if he just got out of the van “right now, without arguing” he wouldn’t have to go to school for the rest of the school year. He hopped out without and further words needed.

In my head, I was wondering if that was the best promise to make to him, but with being more than 15 minutes away from the school, I just didn’t know what else to suggest. I also didn’t really know what had lead up to the explosion, so part of me was thinking “He may be getting suspended anyway…so who cares?” They only have another 5 days of school, and I know there won’t be much covered in the Grade 7 class in these days considering the Grade 8’s are away for the rest of this week, and then graduation is next week. This wouldn’t be a hard promise to keep.

I got to the school, and was actually quite surprised to see that the EA was still there. (I figured she would head for the hills as soon as S was off the bus.) We had a sit down with S to discuss the events of the afternoon. Turns out he was agitated about 20 minutes before school ended from a couple of boys in the class. The EA had kept him in a secluded area to try and calm down, and when the bell rang, S just took off and got in the van. EA didn’t feel it was safe to allow S to take the school vehicle home when he was still quite visibly distressed. Again, I can understand that.
I also told them that I felt 95% confident that S’s dark mood would have lifted the moment the van left the school property. However, the other child that takes the van has a way of annoying S with a simple word or look, and it wouldn’t have taken much to set S off again.

I totally understand the school’s position on this entire event. I was greatly annoyed that I had to leave the office early, and abruptly, but I was very glad that there didn’t have to be any police involvement. Apparently the Principal was on the phone with the police when I was finally able to get through.
I asked why he called my cell phone, not my work number, and he informed me that was the only number the secretary provided him with. I suggested he needed to take that particular issue up with the secretary – I could tell he wasn’t pleased to discover I have about 5 telephone numbers listed for emergencies and he had only been given one.

After S left the room, I made sure that both the principal and the EA were aware that with Aspergers S isn’t able to self-regulate the way they were telling him he needed to. (Just needed to make sure they really ‘got’ it.) They both did, but also told me that by repeating the same information over again, they hope to make it more rote in meaning for S, which will then become something he might start to do. Long process, this.

I told them that just on the weekend Hubby had commented that a big blow up at school would probably be happening soon, and the EA told me that they have been waiting for it for the past two weeks. Gee – do we all know this child?
This morning S informed me that he was not going to go to school. I told him that was fine, but he would have a few chores to complete throughout the course of the day. He decided to go to school. :o)