I have seen some pretty horrifying things in my life, but there is nothing more horrifying than having your child try to kill himself in front of you other than that he was successful.  Mine has tried it twice.  Both times I was close enough to see it coming, but too far away to stop it.  The second time was not intended to go the way it did so I suppose it doesn’t really count, but the first time, though it had no chance at success, was every bit intentional.  I was on the phone arguing with the school to leave us alone while I worked to get him into a mental hospital. I was trying to get him admitted for a week long evaluation that was recommended by his counselor. They were insisting he had to be in school while we waited to hear if there was a bed ready.  They thought I could just pick him up when I got the word.  By that time discomfort at being in an environment as dirty as a school, surrounded by people he didn’t know had evolved into pure terror at the very idea.  While I was talking he heard me say something about someone from the school coming to pick him up and take him in.  He grabbed a belt that was nearby and wrapped it around his neck and tried to attach it to a plant hook.  The last thing I said to them was he’s trying to hang himself and I hung up and got him down.  Instead of a trip to school he got a trip to the hospital and an expedited entry to the mental hospital for evaluation.

    Our battle with the school started in October.  He started feeling sick and missed several days with what seemed like the flu.  Then he started telling me about the things he was afraid of.  We were seeing a counselor regularly.  He had trouble with his homework and they started keeping him after school.  The night before the crisis he had stayed from 2:30 when school got out until 6:30 when I went to pick him up.  The principal wanted to keep him another half hour to do something the class hadn’t even done yet.  A could take no more and I couldn’t blame him.  The school was just not equipped to handle someone with his problems and the state law was too rigid for us to operate safely for A.       

    We had already come to the conclusion from his behavior that one problem was OCD.  We had arrangements for a bed for him the day before he went, but the situation was such a shock for his father, who did not live with us, that he wanted to talk about it first because he didn’t see that it “was necessary.”  He’d never seen any odd behavior so therefore it didn’t exist.  The two hour delay lost A his room and we had to start over,  meaning he had to go to school.  Through the hospital evaluation, during which he was hospitalized for a week, we became acquainted with PTSD and the other members of the mental unhealth alphabet that inhabits my beautiful boy.

    He went back to school after winter break armed with the report from the hospital and a request for an Individual Education Plan (IEP).  During his hospital stay the school was supposed to be sending his homework to the hospital.  Instead they just let it pile up so he started out behind anyway and went back to the cycle of punishment instead of encouragement.  I kept asking for the IEP and finally in February the school told me they “didn’t have time” to work out an IEP for him, something that is required by the same laws they were using against us to charge us with truancy and contributing to truancy.  Finally one day the police liaison - fancy talk for truant officer - showed up at my door to give me a ticket for contributing.  I drove the 60 miles to the state capital that day to sign a form to home school and A hasn’t set foot in a school since then.  That was eighth grade.  He was 13 years old.

    I didn’t want to home school him.  I knew he wouldn’t do any work I gave him.  We tried online academies.  Same thing.  He never even logged on.  I basically let him study up on whatever tickled his brain and he gave himself a good education in history, social studies, English grammar, pretty much every subject except math.  He was ready to take his GED a year ahead of time, though the agoraphobia keeps him out of a classroom to prepare for the test.  In our state the class is required so he has to work up to it.  He has been talking about doing it though so there is hope.  He’s been going into places more, though only if they aren’t crowded.  I sincerely feel that if he is allowed to work at his own pace he will find his way to a more normal lifestyle.  I get a lot of people telling me to “quit babying him”, but I don’t feel it’s babying him to let him find his own way at his own pace.  Forcing him is what got him into the shape he’s in now and as long as he keeps testing his limits it’s progress.

    The doctors and counselors tried giving him medication, but he never took it long enough to make a difference and he was comfortable with his various “things.”  I managed to keep him going until he was 15, but he never talked.  The only answers he gave to any question was “I don’t know.”  When he was told that as of the age of 14 he could reuse treatment that was exactly what he did.  Another thing his dad can’t wrap his head around.  He keeps giving me choices and ultimatums to get A into treatment.  A has agreed to have another evaluation, but that is as far as he’s willing to go.  He’s comfortable with his life the way it is.  I’m not okay with it, but the state has taken it out of my hands.  I want my boy to be happy and live a prosperous life, but the prospect scares the hell out of him.