How can I ease back-to-school anxiety? Parenting SOS with Saskia Joss

0:01Coming up on Happy Mum, Happy Baby, Parenting SOS. Yes. Children should feel safe enough to do the things that they love. And if they don't, there's obviously been a change of some kind. So children that used to love going to school and suddenly they don't, there's a change. My feeling about self-esteem and building self-esteem is what children need is for parents or other adults need them to identify a fact about them that seems positive and another person to affirm that that's true. Right. That's the building blocks for self-esteem. Anxiety is a coping mechanism that we have to use to keep us alive.

0:31Our body's primary objective is to stay alive.

0:40Hello and welcome to Happy Mum, Happy Baby Parenting SOS. I hope everyone is having a lovely summer. It's been so nice just to slow down or at least try to, definitely making the most of some family time before school starts and we all start rushing around again. But actually, it's not always that simple because if your child is feeling anxious about going to school, maybe to the point where they refuse to go, it can be really exhausting and stressful for both of you. So what can we do to ease this transition as we get ready for another school year? Well, here with all the answers is Saskia Joss.

1:15Saskia is a child therapist and an expert on anxiety in children. Hello, Saskia. Hiya, thank you for having me. How are you? I'm doing well. I'm very pleased to be here. I'm so pleased. We bumped into each other a couple of months ago And you basically, it was the launch of your new book. Yeah, it was the launch day. Yeah, Help My Child's Anxiety Has Given Me Anxiety. And you basically thrust it at me. Yes, I did. You were just trying to go to the theatre and watch your brother-in-law do an absolutely stonking performance. And I was just like, let's do it. I've just got to do this. I've got to take the moment and give it to you.

1:43But I'm so glad that you did. Oh, thank you. Because, and also like many parents, you know, all of us are going through different things. That's right. And I feel like your book landed with me at the right time. So how long have you been a child therapist? And I guess has the landscape changed a lot since you've been doing it? Yeah, so originally I was a primary school teacher specialising in early years. I was doing that for a long time, around 10 years. And then I decided that I wanted to requalify. And the main reason why was I could just see there was so much need. There were children in the class that with a 30th of attention just wouldn't get any better.

2:16They would struggle in school for the rest of the time they were at school. and however nice their teachers were or however good the phonics was taught, they would still be, they wouldn't be able to access it because of their emotional issues or their overwhelm from their mental health. And so I re-qualified. I was very lucky that my school were very supportive and they helped me to re-qualify. And then I managed to qualify literally just before COVID, just as it happened. Wow. And I was just about to get into my private practice and then nobody was doing anything. And then the most surprising thing happened, which was just after everyone came out of lockdown, all those things, I started to get honestly tens of calls a week of parents saying my child is so anxious they're so anxious they won't go to school they won't eat food they won't go to the supermarket with me they're so anxious they're so anxious what do I do and I thought I actually don't I actually don't know this isn't the main part of my training and so I began training and training and reading things and looking at things and neuroscience and reading lots of different kinds of books about how the body holds anxiety why we feel it I've done lots and lots of courses on regulation techniques different kinds of complementary therapies all different kinds of things and I tried to just skill myself up because it was the need was so obviously there post-covid for very good reason and so now I specialize specifically in working with children with anxiety and I see hundreds of children a year who are anxious and I try to get to a point where they're not living with anxiety they've recovered from it.

3:32Over a year ago I heard the the term EBSA so emotional based school avoidance yeah before that it was called school refusal which I think is completely it says something different. Well it sets a different tone for how parents and children and schools think about children's behaviour. Exactly. But when I heard, it's like everything fell into place in my mind about what was going on in my life at that time and, you know, within the family. And it completely made me rethink and reframe what was going on. Yeah. Knowing that it's not just happening in your house, but happening for so many children.

4:08Yeah. You know, there is something in that, you know, it's not just that your child is being difficult and doesn't want to go to school. There's so much more at play. So anxiety is a coping mechanism that we have to use to keep us alive. Our body's primary objective is to stay alive. That's the only thing that is important about what we do, really, is to be alive, to be there, to do the things we want to do and go to school and have fun or see friends or do the things we love. So when we see children feeling anxious, we can see what they're doing is that they're feeling under threat of some kind.

4:40Their body has identified there is some kind of threat. Their body has identified a closeness to death, which means they may be at risk. And when they feel that way, their body is sending them an army of chemicals, mostly cortisol, but lots of other things too, that makes them feel skeptical. It makes them feel scared. It makes them feel vigilant. It makes them want to become their own security guards so they don't end up in a situation that can kill them. And when we think about why going to school would make children anxious, it's very obvious because it brings in so many different kinds of anxiety that we know about.

5:12Separation anxiety. Separating from parents makes children anxious because they feel less safe without their safe parent. Social anxiety. Feeling like you might be ostracized from a group is incredibly scary and frightening because being alone is much more dangerous than being in packs. We know that from evolution. We know that from hunters and gatherers. you get a variation of resources and you get a larger amount of protection from being in a group. Knowing that you might be separated at school, left out, bullied, not in the group, not the cool kid, whatever it is, brings on a huge feeling of anxiety from social anxiety, but mostly to do with loneliness and the fear of loneliness.

5:46We've got academic anxiety, which obviously comes up for lots of children in school where they're asked to be academic. It's difficult to be academic and survive in schools because the pressure, if you're very good at work, to keep achieving is a high level of pressure. And if you're not achieving, knowing you're not achieving is a horrible thing to carry around with you the whole time. So we end up with a very big group of different anxieties that could be happening all at one time or a bigger group of anxieties that are triggered at different points in the school year. And then we also see a high level of anxiety and not obviously for all neurodivergent children, but very commonly neurodivergence comes coupled with anxiety.

6:24And we see that children who are neurodivergent will find school very anxious making for those reasons, but also for other reasons like sensory reasons, overload, experience of trying to read the situation when you don't have the rule book all the time. And we end up seeing children that are so overwhelmed because they've had an incident where someone called them out because the lunchroom is always too loud because the children in their class are just not nice. And it builds up over time. You know, I know from experience and I'm sure everyone will as well, that thing where you've got a really great boss and you love your boss and you go to work and you absolutely love it and then your boss goes on maternity leave or your boss goes to a new place and suddenly you've got this boss that you don't like going to this place every day is like going to hell you go like you're drudged there you're exhausted and children have to go to school every day whether they like it or not or that's the you know wide wisdom and that's why things are changing now because we don't usually feel now that making forcing children do things that really hurt them is a good idea so we're in the in a sort of fluxy place where we think this doesn't fit for some children but what do we do now and I think that's what we're dealing with.

7:26Well and that's the thing so homeschooling is going up 21 % every year. Yeah and you can see you can see why. How does school anxiety present itself? So there are so many ways and but obviously the main one is children saying they don't want to go to school. Yeah. Very obvious one but you also will see panicky twitchy children children that seem worried when you look at them you think that they're worried what are they worried about like they've just watched a scary film they look worried there'll also be obviously somatic symptoms which is physical symptoms that manifest in the body from emotional feelings like stomach aches also sometimes worse stomach migraines that really hurt you might get lavatorial symptoms like frequent urination or needing to go to the loo a lot you might get children who are purposely holding going to the loo because they're trying to have control over something they feel scared about you might get headaches stomach aches all those things when children say i've got a stomach ache it's probably because they've got too much cortisol because they're very anxious and the cortisol is messing about with them inside and it makes them feel like they've got a stomachache they're not pretending the way their body is telling them there's a threat it it gives lots of ways to feel that way i feel sick and i don't want to leave the house and i don't want to leave you and i don't like loud noises and and then obviously all of that together can present with physical symptoms as well as emotional ones and we might also see children withdrawing from things they used to love and i always say if you ever see your children stop doing things they used to love it's time to ask for some help that could be from a friend could be from a family member could be from the school could be from a professional like a therapist or a counselor a parenting group something like that and the idea is that children should feel safe enough to do the things that they love and if they don't there's obviously been a change of some kind um so children that used to love going to school and suddenly they don't there's a change children that used to go to gymnastics now they won't and they loved it and you could see them flipping about and now they won't that's a change and there's obviously a good reason for that.

9:11And then we also can see children reacting with anxiety to things in their environment and that makes them want to stay at home rather than go to school. So sometimes children will look like they've got school anxiety and they go, I don't want to go to school. And you think, I wonder if it's that moody teacher. I wonder if it's that they've just taken all the toys out the playground and he's now got nothing to do. But it's actually that you've had a baby and they just want to stay home and check that you're OK. So sometimes we have to think, is it a school issue that's causing school anxiety or is it actually a home issue that's causing home school anxiety and making children want to stay with us at home because they want more information or more time with you or they want to work out what this change is going to be like in real time so sometimes that's when parents move house or divorce or a new baby and parents get a new job and children just want to work out like what will that mean they want to know quicker rather than waiting five weeks to work it out if they stay for the whole week at home they'd know what it was like and there's this thing where we wonder when we see children with school anxiety is this uh is it because there's something going wrong for them at school or is it because there's something going on at home that means they'd rather be there to to know what's going on well and the flip side as well of children being withdrawn is children acting out absolutely yeah and we will see children who will start doing uh the behaviors we just wish our children wouldn't do like hurting each other saying horrible words um you're breaking things because they're so full up of feelings and it starts bursting out in other ways and we will see absolutely both withdrawal and behaviors that feel uncontrollable from children.

10:37I just think for such little, any child no matter what age to be feeling such huge things but not be able to vocalize exactly what that is it's got to be such a scary. Yeah and there is a lack of choice in it and I think you can see that very quickly with adults which is that we after school we never have to do the exact same thing as our friends at the exact same time ever again. And that's because adults don't want to be put on a starting line up to see what happens every single morning at 8.30. And I think the other thing about school avoidance for parents is that immediately you cannot do what you were planning to do that day.

11:12Immediately. Even if you're very lucky and you've got a lovely grandma that can come over the next day, you're still worried the whole day. Your child is not at school. And the idea that things will carry on normally for their siblings, they won't. When they see that their sibling is too frightened to go into the building, that obviously will have an impact because we're meant to assess threat based on what other people are doing. So, for example, if I've just been electrocuted, you're meant to notice and move away because that could hurt you. So part of our experience of identifying threat is looking what other people are doing in relation to this threat.

11:43Because if my sibling thinks that school is the world's most dangerous place, they might be right, and I'm silly for staying in school and having a great time with my teacher, writing on a little whiteboard like nothing's going on. What if actually it's the end of the world and I've missed it? so you will see change in siblings and it will be silly if you didn't because we've got someone they know and love saying there's a threat and a problem it'd be really silly not to look and have a check yourself yeah so there is this change immediately for parents parents end up doing and saying things they wouldn't usually say that thing where you say it's illegal I have to take you to school which is in some ways true um and also you think if this if I can clear it up today by just saying that once I won't have to do this every single day this week but the truth is a child with anxiety will simply hear that and it will be like they've you know you know that's fine if the policeman comes that's right you know so i can't possibly go to school and for these children who i see that do have episode who are not going to school for emotionally anxious reasons they wish they could go to school mostly they mostly wish they could just go to school see their friends do the things they always did because standing out is awful they also feel fearful if they did have a week where they could go to school that their friends would say where have you been and they'd have to suddenly explain themselves and the answer is I just felt too scared to go to school and they don't know how to say that to other people they feel like they would be seen as a pariah because they were doing something different and they couldn't manage it and the kids I see who are school avoidant wish they could go to school.

13:07Saskia when so we this is a subject that's very close to my heart and we had months and months of trying to get one of our kids into school and when he said to me one day and he could often not vocalize what this thing was when he said to us one day i want to but i can't yeah that just meant can't give you a squeeze but for us we're like we get it like this is yeah you know you've got to honor that that feeling and as an adult i'm so sorry i know it is on the podcast but i think um it's been obviously it's But if it was us. I think people don't understand how difficult EBSA is for the parents of children with EBSA and for the children who have EBSA.

13:48Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's absolutely awful because it feels like exactly like I said, you're constantly being lined up with other parents and they can see you're not doing the same as them. Children feel the same way and they want to go to school but they can't. You know, this isn't the same as children who just say, I don't want to go. No, it's not. It's not the same thing at all. They wish they could go. But it's like there's a lion waiting to eat them at the gate or a lion waiting to eat them in the classroom or a lion waiting in the playground and they just can't enter. And we don't get to decide where he's safe for them.

14:17That's right. And there were points when he was going to school and there was a designated safe space. But that's not his safe space. And it's really hard for the adults to kind of be going, but this is a designated area. For us, no. And I think there's a thing, which is schools often think they're doing a lot to support these children. I literally spoke to someone yesterday where they said, we're happy for them to have a reduced timetable, but they have to come in for English and maths. That's just not going to work. That's not going to work for any family where there's a child who has EBSA because it's too much of a restriction on something that already feels too dangerous.

14:51Yeah. And also that thing of just get them in. How? Yeah. How do you possibly get a child with EBSA in through the... And then keep them there? Exactly. So the idea is that when we have children who are presenting with a fear of going to school, we have to listen and we have to understand what it was that started this feeling for them in the building and and also be aware that it could be something going on at our house you know often I see children who are emotionally worried about school and want to stay at home because for example they're a young carer and they've got a parent that they know could be unwell without them at home and they know they're meant to care for their parent that's what they've been told they're a young carer they're getting a little bit of extra money to do it that sort of thing They occasionally get to go once a year to a young carer's meetup, in theory, that's meant to really support them.

15:41But they know if they're not at home, something really bad could happen to their parent. So of course they can't go to school and sit down calmly and just do some fractions because what if their mum falls out of bed? What if their dad can't have any food because they can't get to the kitchen? And they feel this incredible fear that their parent will die without them at home. And we know that, as I said, anxiety comes from a feeling of proximity to death. and that could be your own death. If I go to school, I will die. Whether I can tell you the reason why, which is the thing that will trigger my death, I can't tell you, but I'm sure that it will happen.

16:11So I cannot go. But when it's the death of your parent, the feeling that your parent could die if you're not there, that's even more scary because children know, and it's completely true, that if they didn't have us, they would die. And if you've been upset by something at school, and as we said before, there's often with children who are not neurodivergent children who are more regularly wired, the reason that they don't want to go to school is usually because of an incident and it might not be an incident that stands out so obviously like they didn't do well in a spelling test but that's made them feel like they're the worst in the class so it wasn't that someone shouted them or it could be or it wasn't that they were directly left out or hurt by someone at school it could be something very small but it's triggered this feeling of threat with children who are new and divergent we often see it's a build-up over time of having felt so physically uncomfortable and emotionally uncomfortable that they just can't take anymore.

17:01It's the whole kit poke can thing, isn't it? Poking it in us. Exactly. And that's the difference. So if you don't have a neurodivergent child, a neurotypical child at your house, I would be thinking, what's the difference between now and then? What happened? What is the reason that school suddenly feels dangerous when it hasn't before? And if you have a neurodivergent child, I'd be thinking, where's the buildup and how do we pull down that buildup? How do we make school, either at this school or a different school or at home, depending on what you can set up for yourselves, as long as you're setting up something that feels like a structure that helps children get what they need in that way?

17:34How do we help my child take those experiences out of their life so they don't feel weighed down, built up and suppressed by the experience of just doing something they're meant to do every day? Yeah. I ask you your three most asked questions. You've sent them in. Yeah. So your first one is, how can I improve my child's self-esteem around school? Yes. So self-esteem is one of the main issues that comes up around children in a school context. Because as we said, they're very academic. The feeling that they are only good enough if they do well is absolutely huge for children. So if you've got a child who's, you know, very, very capable and has been seen to and you're always telling how clever they are and they're always winning the, you know, the history prize.

18:14we're also trying to show them that there are other parts of them that we notice and that they're not getting our love because of their great achievement it's not it's not conditional on whether they've done well in the spelling test they're a great kid always and we're trying to teach what they now call growth mindset which is very simple which is no one is good at anything straight away you can't be the perfect and you can't be the very best at anything so you can really try your best and as a family what we value is hard work trying your best doing things we love and giving your best energy to those things and rewarding children for those things, the process of making things, but also the things that they love and helping children, academic or not academic, to find additional things out of school that make them feel good so that if they don't do well in the test or if they never do well in the test, they also know they're really flexible or they're really good at smacking a cricket bat or they're really kind around the house.

19:03My feeling about self-esteem and building self-esteem is what children need is for parents or other adults need them to identify a fact about them that seems positive and another person to affirm that that's true. Right. That's the building blocks for self-esteem. You're really good at drawing, and you put the things on the wall, and a friend comes around and they go, who made that picture? That's really nice. And your kid goes, I did. I'm an artist. And suddenly they've got this factual piece of information about them, which is I'm good at something and people notice it, and it's my special thing.

19:32Another question is, how do I get my child back to school after school refusal? So it's a really cracking question, and obviously it's different for every child, But there are a few different ways. So the first one is to work out whether your school is a good partner for that conversation. So if you say to your school, we're really struggling, we can't get back to school, and they're shaming to you, they're nasty to you, they say they won't bend, it's probably not the right school to get them back into in the first place. They've obviously sent something about the way that the school is run that makes it feel like it isn't the right place.

19:59So I think, have the school given me enough reason to look elsewhere? and if they haven't yet you can give them a very good chance to help your kid back in school because there obviously will have been times where that was their happy safe place yeah and where they've got good friends and I start by speaking to my child and I would say when I ask you about the week next week of school obviously I know the whole thing feels too big I couldn't possibly say let's do Monday Friday that's ridiculous and I wouldn't ask you to because I can hear what you're saying very clearly is there anything in the week even walking to school with your friend Sam on Tuesday, even after school club sewing with Jill on Friday.

20:33Is there anything that you could manage, even one thing? And is there anything you could manage even for five minutes of that one thing? Yeah. And once you've got your child back in the building, they can start restoring their faith and trust in the school, but they can't until they get there. So trying to make big changes without them even being back in the building is not going to work because they will obviously see that they don't find it to be safe. But if there's one thing that still feels safe, I would do that one thing. so let's say they're happy to go swimming with the class on Thursday and actually they don't want to go on the bus with everyone because that feels too much but you could meet them at the swimming centre and you've got time to do that and it is possible I would do that and then I'd say how about you go back on the bus with the friends and I'll meet you at school and pick you up and take you home so what we're trying to do is nudge we're nudging from a place that they feel safe to a wider safety and hoping that eventually we get back to a more full schedule and that thing of never try to trick them yes exactly Because it would just go.

21:25So I wouldn't, for example, say you'll pick them up from swimming and then let them go back on the coach and meet them at school. I would arrange it in advance. They're in a situation where... So they know the parameters. That's right. And I'd be really clear. And I'd get them a watch. And I'd say, I'm dropping you off at 10.06. And I'll be back at 10.26. Yep. And if you can stay five more minutes, you'll give me a five-minute sign. I'll wait outside. Yep. And if you can't, I'll be here at 10.26. And even if you can't at 10.17, they'll call me and I'll be outside anyway. I'm not planning to go.

21:51I'm just going to do my emails in the car. and the point is we're not hoping to do that forever. The idea isn't that for the next 10 years you'll be waiting outside the swimming lesson until turn 26. That's not the point. The point is to show your child that you're willing to build up their safety at a pace that feels respectful and safe and with the agreement of the school. If they know you're doing it and the school isn't doing it, that's obviously unsafe. I'd also say again, consider what's been going on in your own life. Stop for a minute and think, have we moved house? Did I have a scare?

22:24Was there a week where I was very worried? Has a family member died? Have we lost a pet? Have we had any big changes? I lost my job, this one, this one. What's come up in the last year? And I think could any of those things have got stuck in the wrong place? And they call it eating a sandwich with a wrapper on. If you were going to eat a sandwich with a wrapper on, it wouldn't digest. It would get stuck somewhere in your liver and you have to have it removed later. And that's what therapy often is. It's the removal of the misconceptions that children have swallowed in other places. so we're trying to think how has the last year impacted my kid and is it something that we're doing I'd also think has there been an incident at school has there been a sleepover that went weird has there been something else that's happened that wasn't exactly in school but is school related I would definitely if your child is avoiding school and consider professional help either from someone who specializes in getting kids back to school or a therapist a counselor in your local area.

23:18I would ask your school for a referral. I'd ask your GP for a referral. It does sometimes take time, which is a bit of a tricky one. And I would also earlier on look for places at other schools near you, which sometimes can be very easy. If you call your borough, they might say, actually, we've got three places. We've got one very small school around the corner. We've got one very big school. They're really sporty. And we've got one school. They might say, we've got no places and you'll have to come back in a few months time. So you're in a position where you may end up with a very good plan immediately just by calling your GP and your local council.

23:47And there are maybe situations where none of that seems to be doing anything, in which case it feels very powerless making for parents because it feels like you're really stuck. You've got a school that isn't listening. You've got a child that won't go to school. The GP hasn't been able to get you an appointment and you're stuck. So that's when I would say find someone in your local area a bit like me. So therapy is expensive, but I do lots of different things. So one of the things I do is parenting support phone calls, much cheaper than therapy. And often it means we can put a plan in place for your child without you having to spend money on weekly therapy.

24:14There are other people, lots of people who do similar sorts of things, lots of amazing people all over the country. that are trying to support families while they can't get things done. Which also just shows how big this is. A hundred percent. And also how much people need it and how little there is available. You know, if you've got a child with EBSA who can't get an appointment and you're waiting for months and months and you've got this child deteriorating at home because everything's becoming more scary because that is what happens with anxiety. When you haven't fought the original threat, more and more things kind of fall into that hole of threat.

24:43So I can't possibly now do off-school activities. I can't go to Sunday school, I can't go to parties because everyone will ask me about why I wasn't at school. And suddenly you've got 12 places they won't go and it isn't just school. And that's because that's hypervigilance, that's what is meant to happen. When you think something is dangerous, it's much safer to make a bigger ring around it so you don't accidentally step out of the ring.

25:10I think when it first starts happening, you can feel like it's only you and that you're sort of failing as a mother, you're failing your child. There's so much guilt that lays on top of so much pressure. Because no one was expecting it and everyone's trying their blinking best every minute of the day. But you can feel like, I always feel like when the headmistress is around, I'm instantly like the kid at school. Yeah, of course. But that's also what it's meant to feel like in some ways because they are in charge and you feel like I'm not in charge here and how do I get them to do what I want? And you feel very powerless.

25:37Exactly. But if you can start having meetings with the school and realise that everyone is trying their best, it might be that the school have never experienced. they might get the wording wrong sometimes but if you can all kind of be on the same page where you're all trying to do the right thing for your child and know that sometimes things are going to get clunky and sometimes you need someone a bit like me who will call your school for you and it basically levels up I'm also a professional like they are I can say actually we won't be doing English and maths but they will be coming in for science and French how about that and they're like well we don't really do that and I say well that's the way that I think it works and they go okay well let's try that for a week but sometimes parents feel like they're they're being bossy or they're being difficult or they don't want to annoy the school or they've been annoying the school too much in the school of stop listening to them and sometimes you just need someone else to talk for you and that's where you'll find lots of people like me all over the country who have experience of setting up very good educational plans for children working out which parts are physical which parts are emotional which parts are sensory which parts are relational which parts have to do with a teacher or a classroom or a place in the school and like unpicking the knots that suddenly got too tight for families to see yeah and it's a third party look isn't it something that you've you're so deeply inside the middle of it and it feels so difficult someone else going wait a minute I wonder whether it's that time they went on the school trip you go we actually hadn't thought about that yeah you know and I wonder whether if they if they knew he knew there weren't any more school trips this year whether actually we could calm this down and obviously it's not often that simple there's lots of different pieces to organize but something so I'm yeah looking for someone else to help you have a look at the situation and possibly someone else to speak to your school for you with a sensible plan It will be much more likely the school will take them seriously if they're a qualified professional rather than even a very good friend of yours, even a very talented friend of yours.

27:17If they're a qualified professional, a doctor, a nurse, a therapist, an occupational therapist, an educational psychologist, the school is more likely to listen to them. And that shouldn't necessarily be fair, but it is the case. And that's because otherwise everyone could just call up and say, my child wants a green chair. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that wouldn't be fair either. So sometimes we have to sort of level up the case that we're making by asking someone else to help us. I see very regularly that children who are out of school without a good structure, so this is the opposite of children in homeschooling, the opposite.

27:45Children with no structure, where their parents are basically just leaving them in the house while they work because there's nothing else they can do. They need to make money. They're not bad parents. They're just humans. Children become depressed very quickly. And the reason why is exactly as we said at the beginning, they get this chemical diet from school. They get the oxytocin from France. They get the success criteria from doing work that they achieve in. They get the endorphins from regular exercise. They get the serotonin from living in a calm structure. without that there are very limited chemical interactions and children end up simulating depression depression literally means a depression of chemicals not enough chemicals and chemical depression for children in my experience tonight this isn't based on a study this is my experience of children is that it's not the same as depression for adults where they sort of end up in a hole where they can't see the top they just start like walking around like ghosts and as soon as you start filling them back up again with the right chemicals they sort of switch back on again and they start functioning much more normally but children who are out of school for long periods without good structure will become depressed not because they are depressed necessarily miserable although they might be because they're not at school and they wish they were but they'll be depressed because they won't have the right chemical inputs and that's the opposite of homeschooling where it's like a thousand chemical inputs a day great thoughtful careful right homeschooling can be a real structured amazing thing absolutely full of social interactions yeah and yeah lots of socialising with great friends who also homeschool with other kids in different activities lots of interactions creativity sport yeah you know it really can be fantastic for children allow children to thrive and to do things at their own pace yeah which is the very big issue particularly for neurodivergent children is to feel like they are constantly being rushed and put against rules that they don't understand or they can't meet even if they were really trying their best what i'm really saying is it's not the same homeschooling and not being at school is not the same and it's very clear to me from working with homeschool families and schooled families and you know more typical families and all different kinds of kids it's the children who are not at school but are not in a structure that suffer the most when they're um when they're when they're facing episode because they will be overwhelmed with cortisol and have nothing to replace the positive chemicals they would get at school yeah and that's very very hard and it looks like depression and parents are like i've got a depressed seven-year-old yeah i've got a highly anxious and extremely depressed seven-year-old now what do I do and the answer is firstly at home you can put in additional chemical supports and structures thinking about how do we get my kid moving every day even if they're anxious to it in the garden do it in the living room do it just on your road outside your house we're trying to basically hit those same same chemical structures oxytocin good relationships see their cousins see friends from outside school see people who they love and like try and get some physical contact and if your child likes that if they don't obviously find other ways to do physical contact like with animals and to get your oxytocin back into the structure while you're waiting for them to find their new school place.

30:29For example, endorphins, lots of exercise, lots of physical activity, go to the park in the hours where no one's there, great news, get your kid up and down that climbing frame. Try and find time to be calm with your family, board games where you don't sit there all looking worried and saying, you haven't been at school, you haven't been at school. How do we put that sort of calm feeling back into our home and dopamine by giving them tasks that are actually useful in your house while they're there? You're going to choose the meals on Tuesday, so you've got to cook and make all the meals for everyone on Tuesday.

30:56They've got to choose the things on the shopping or go to the supermarket and pick them. You're going to give them the money. They're going to work out how much budget they have. All of those things are the same kind of skills that children will need to manage a maths lesson. They're very practical and they feel good because when they finish that activity, they'll have something in their hands. Another question is, how can I help my child's social anxiety? So social anxiety is really interesting. We talked about how really the reason why people feel socially anxious is because being alone is much scarier than being in a group.

31:21And lots of children won't even think about that. And others will have this incredible awareness of being in a group is like the most important thing. Often I see it with girls between sort of 12 and 15, that it feels like the only important thing in their life is that they just want to be in the middle of that group. And so with children who are younger, we're trying to teach social skills. We're trying to help them to manage the difficult parts. Like, what if nobody wants to play with me? Okay, well, let's lock people in early. I find like sometimes some kids are better on the spot. They're like really good at sort of impromptu play and other children really struggle with it.

31:52So get your kid ready before they're on the way to school. who do you think you might want to play with go and ask them when you get to school if they don't want to play with you who else could you ask if you want to play on the swings and they want to play in the sandpit ask them and like do a negotiation like we'll practice i i don't want to play on the sample okay talk it through get them ready get them like basically like ready to go to school and like secure their friend for the day for kids who struggle with it for older children we're trying to think where are other ways they could make friends so we're thinking about out of school clubs um youth organizations like scouting and things like that and also So religious organisations often offer things for children who are religious.

32:25This opportunity to feel like a person and an important person in other places is really key for older children. And also thinking, is there a way that I could help structure their socialising? So, for example, if you happen to be good friends with your friend's kids' parents, you might say on the weeks where they don't have a party to go to, one of us will take them to the cinema. Right. So it's already in the diary. Yeah. Claire's doing it on Tuesday. Janine's doing it on Wednesday. and I'm doing it in three weeks' time when they haven't got a party. So the kids know what's happening, you know what's happening, and your child is already locked in as part of the unit.

32:58You might think like, oh, you know, the new series of Britain's Got Talent's coming up. We'll just all watch it together. And I'd say that to the mums. And even if your kids are slightly on the outs, you'd say, we'll host it at our house. In which case, your kid becomes an important part of the social structures available to their friends. Ahead of going back to school, because I always think the summer holidays are such a long period of time away. You know, so ahead of going back to school, what can parents do with their children to help make that transition a little bit easier? I would just do a lot of positive PR for your school, particularly if this is for children who are generally going to school and finding it relatively simple.

33:34Because lots of children will just be going to school a few weeks before. If you've got a car or you go on the bus, I go on the bus past your school and be like, there's your school. Oh, my God, we can't wait to come back. That's my school. If you happen to drive past a lot just over the summer, just point at it loudly and scream, that's my school. We'll see you in September. and I would try and remember the good things about it and I'd say to them like, I'm so excited for you to have that new teacher everyone says she's the very best or he's the most creative or you know look they're building a new building in the playground over the summer, I wonder what it's going to be.

34:01So we're trying to keep this relationship with school going, do positive PR, remind our children about all the great things they did and if you can, have play dates with friends from school like the week or so before school so they remember that they're still friends with them and they can hang out more. Do you remember that person? Yeah, Steve, he's great, he's your Actual best friend. Yeah, so we're trying to just keep this positive association with school for kids who generally have a positive association. And also for children who are struggling academically or things, we know that children generally go back a third of a grade over the summer.

34:30Right. So I'm not suggesting that everyone should be drilling their children over the summer and everyone should be basically setting up a school at their house if they don't have one already. But what I am saying is if you've got a child who's behind, they're going to end up a third back again. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It could be an opportunity to focus a little bit over the summer on some additional support, really working on handwriting, really working on reading, doing some kind of family competition about who reads the most books. My niece and nephew, I'd both try and read enough books they can make a stack that's taller than them.

34:58Right. And they're quite tall. They're good readers. I'm not going to boast about them. They are amazing. I will boast. They're amazing. So there's a way to make it fun. I don't know if you've seen it in Steve Biddell's book. It's called Fart, Family Alone Reading Time. No. So the idea is that everyone sits together with their own book and everyone sits quietly. Right. And it's family alone, reading time or reading together. And you say, like, come on, guys, let's fart. Let's just fart over the summer. We'll just have a fart every few days in the summer. And just even the name alone is enough to get most kids to, like, get involved.

35:26And you just think, how am I going to push them calmly, happily back to that start line with everybody else? If you've worked out over the summer and the last few months your child is neurodivergent, I think, what changes do I want to make for school for next year? Will I think about sensory processing? Will I do a bit of social skills over the summer? or we do more play dates or less play dates on purpose to make sure that we are giving them time to reset. So I think we're really just trying to work out how do we make it better and also trying to just maintain a positive relationship with your school.

35:54Lots of schools are open over the summer. If you are struggling, if you are unhappy, if your children are not doing well, if you're struggling for food, things like that, most schools will have days of the summer where their office is open and they can provide different support. The school that I work at is open all summer, for example, to help people. And they also run their own summer camps to make sure kids have places to go. So I would ask around in your local area, ask other friends whose kids go to different schools if there are other programmes or things your kids can do over the summer.

36:16And I just try and keep a positive relationship and talk a little bit about school, but not all the time. Give children a break and think, how do we actually have time to just switch off and be together in the summer as well? We asked the Happy Mum Happy Baby community for some questions. And someone said, my child is finding the boy banter at school really hard. He's only eight, he's crying all the time and says he hates his life. That's not even a question. Poor fellow, honestly. That's just an example of what someone's going through. Sometimes schools get into a funny groove where children are just allowed to speak in a way that they shouldn't.

36:47This sort of negging or like rinsing or roasting. Right. And it's meant to be funny, but no one finds it funny. I think it's the point where I would go to the head and I'd say the school needs like an anti-roasting policy. Like it needs to be like very clear and it needs to be clear to the children who are doing it that they will be, you know, that there will be some sort of consequence to doing that sort of thing because it has to be a safe place for everyone. and if for her son it isn't to the point where he's actually saying such terribly sad things, the school needs to take it very seriously.

37:17And, you know, you can also have people come in and talk to children about positive language. You can get, I'm sure different charities know you, will have these, like, positive, empowering people that they usually will recommend who talk to children about the way they speak. If it's girls, you can always have, if you're finding in your girls' friendship group that they're sort of catty and tricky, you can do a girls' retreat at your house where you'll just talk about why it's important for women to support each other because it's true. Just like this is the same sort of lovely thing. I would sort of empower that feeling through your school and also in your home life by trying to put those things in.

37:49I think those chats are so important. I can remember PC Ryan, obviously a policeman, coming into school and teaching us about action and consequences and that has stuck with me for 30 years. Exactly. There are some people that can be incredible. We had this amazing lady that was talking to children about conversation and she said like the key to conversation is just bounce the ball back such an easy thing to say yeah someone says something to you how are you bounce the ball back and how are you and it's such an easy one and these children can be completely changed by these adults and you can be that kind of adult as well i really feel for your son i'm really sorry he's having a tough time it is tough but they do need an adult they need sometimes an adult just has to get in and i would say this is the time for you to get your sharp elbows out and just say to school like this has really gone gone on too long and i don't like it and um if you need additional support you can also um ask ask for additional support for your son in school maybe they've got a counsellor or someone kind to speak to who can help him to sort of feel empowered despite the fact they're not they're not being kind to him at school absolutely another one is i'm a head of year at a secondary school how can parents have honest and productive conversations with school pastoral leaders about how to help as a head of year i have endless training on the law regarding absence but very little about mental health and how to genuinely support and talk with families?

39:00I think we're just we're all working on that I think you know there's very limited information for schools about neurodivergence there's very limited information about about school refusal there's all of these things are relatively new like terms. It's popping up in different councils. Yeah and suddenly over time we're going to get better teacher training about it which means everyone coming up will have more information you know when I was training to be a teacher before as a therapist I don't think we had a single session about mental health. Right. Right. You know, and that's not quite a long time ago.

39:27But even so, there wasn't a single session about that. There certainly wasn't one about neurodivergence. There wasn't one about dyslexia. There wasn't, you know. So I was going into classrooms with all of those things without any support on it. I think I'd say to your head teachers, I've heard there's a great course in the borough. Could we do it? I've heard about a lecturer that will come to the school. Can we have them? And trying to sort of skill up your community. and then also if you've heard something that works like for example as I said to you if we can find a way to find even one thing in the schedule that the kid is that your child feels happy to come in and do work from there outwards if you've got that strategy in your pocket when the school say to you like how are we going to manage this child that's not coming in you'd say well actually I heard on happy mom happy baby that one way to do it is to just start really small with the things they can manage yeah that's already a very good start to change the way that your school sees EBSA and children that aren't coming in and starts with a kinder and more specific approach to that child and that's the starting point for all of it I always think if you were going through something difficult how would you want people to behave to you it won't be the same for that child but start where you what you with what you would like and it definitely won't be the worst idea you know our child literally so we got to the point where we were trying to to help him to pick the things that he likes doing yeah and it was before Christmas so there's so many different things I think we always think of Christmas as a really fun time but there's so much overwhelming there's so much going on the schedule is different it really just was too much threw his children off big time but he knew that he loved this Christmas lunch but he made Tom sit on the sofa in reception knowing that it was 40 minutes made Tom sit on the sofa and took Tom's car keys so he knew that he could not go but that's exactly what we're saying you have to make a fair deal these interventions these big deal moments where Tom because he's a lovely person and he's trying his bloody best sits on the sofa without his car keys whatever He wouldn't have minded.

41:12Exactly. But where Tom does that, it's not meant to happen every single day. And because he did that, it doesn't have to happen as many other times as it would have if he hadn't done it. If he said, well, I'm not staying, that's ridiculous. You wouldn't have got him to the Christmas lunch. He wouldn't have had Christmas lunch with his friends. In being supportive and kind and slow, we're more likely to move our children in the direction they want to go. And we want them to go as well. Yeah, absolutely. Someone else has said, I don't know how to say this word. my child has emetophobia. Yes, my child has that.

41:43If a child has been sick, she will refuse to go to that area, be it the hallway or the classroom. That's incredibly sensible. Emetophobia is one of the most sensible fears children can have because obviously sickness is very close to being ill and being close to death is a very quick link for children. So emetophobia, I would firstly start by saying to your child, what a sensible thing to be nervous of. And then I would say something even more sensible. I'd qualify it with fact, which is there are very few illnesses where like vomiting is like the end of the end. Often it's the end of the beginning of that getting better.

42:15And if you've got a family friend who's a doctor or a nurse, I would get them to come over and sort of explain that in better terms. I'm not a doctor. I'm not going to give you a list of all the great illnesses that are, you know what I'm about. But it's true that generally being sick is an indication you're probably going to get better rather than you're getting worse. And so we're trying to restore first an indication that like actually, even if you stood next to that person, you would be fine. Even if you were sick, you'd also be fine. It would be horrible while it was happening. It's minging.

42:40Nobody wants to be sick. I don't want to be sick. But actually, as soon as it's finished, you might feel a lot better. Or as soon as a few days have passed, you might really feel fine. But it isn't an indication that there's anything actually wrong with you. And if there was, I would know because I'm your parent and I will take you to the doctor. And then I would put in other things in place. So I think we've got a factual information that helps us understand that we're not under threat. But then how do we make that work practically? So we're thinking, is there a place in the school that she could go to if someone is sick?

43:07is there a loo that's like a teacher's loo that she could always use instead because then she'd know that their kids weren't being sick in it yeah for example and we're trying to think about these structures again not for the rest of their life yeah just for the next few months well this is the biggest problem i think one of the most interesting things about parenting is the thing that is a problem for our children moves on so quickly you know i was uh i heard with sean wellby was saying she was talking about how like she was thinking about changing the teat and then she was thinking about changing the nappy it's exactly the same thing the whole way through you You spend weeks agonising.

43:36The nappies, the nappies. Then it's the nursery, the nursery. Then it's the which school, which school. And then our children, you know, they watch something scary. Then you spend weeks wondering, what about those creatures? We move on. We move on. You know, even if it's been a tricky road to get there, we move on. But while it's going on, we can support our children with the kindest possible support. Are there certain times throughout the year that might be more anxiety building for children than others? I think it really depends on the child again. which is obviously transitions are often difficult for naturally anxious children.

44:09And, for example, there's a lot more talk these days about highly sensitive children. And we know that one in 10 children is born more sensitive than others, not because you did anything wrong, not because you didn't breastfeed, you did breastfeed, you lived in the country, so you lived in the city. There's no reason. There's no reason. It's not anything you did. They are naturally more sensitive than other children, which means there'll be times in the year that are really hard for those children and you can't work out why. And there's an amazing book, The Orchid and the Dandelion, which is about highly sensitive children.

44:35And how the idea that like some children are just dandelions, they will just grow anywhere. They don't have to have like the best light. They don't have to have the best food. They will grow anywhere. And some children are orchids. They just need a different kind of care. They need a parent sweeping the path in front of them everywhere they go. And that's what you'll work out for your own child. Is my child an orchid? Are they a dandelion? Are they a mix of the two? Are they sometimes an orchid, sometimes a dandelion? And sometimes it's because of neurodivergence or disability that they obviously will be more like an orchid because they just need more support.

45:02but if we can imagine it exactly the same way like it would be great to have a beautiful kid that grows anywhere and it would be great to have a beautiful kid who with the right support grows into something incredibly special and that's what we're trying to do Absolutely Saskia we end the podcast with you completing three sentences the first one is if I could tell you one thing it would be if I could tell you one thing it's that parents are so capable and they don't realise it they don't realise how many incredible things they do every single day like they're running a multinational corporation at their homes and they never see it and they don't give themselves a reward or a prize and they don't shout out about how great they are and if for example and i want parents to firstly think even just by listening to a podcast like this you're trying your very very best you're trying to do it the best way you're trying to beat the history you're trying to beat the stigma you're trying to forget the things you learned or taught and you're trying to do it the best possible way and that in itself is an achievement but i also want to say if you feel like you're not doing well if you feel like you're having a terrible day and it's rough for you it's okay not to be okay but you don't have to stay that way you don't have to sit in being not okay it's not I don't want I'm not the opposite of shame I want you to feel like you deserve to be okay and you deserve to see your good bits and then to make changes to make your life happier as well as we're talking about making our children's life happy and wonderful you also deserve to have a wonderful life where you feel happy and proud of yourself and and you know you wash yourself and you give yourself a nice cup of coffee and a treat you also so deserve it.

46:30And if you're not doing that, or you feel on a regular basis that you're not doing a good job in the things you wish you were, ask for help, ask a friend, ask a doctor, find a local therapist, find a local mum's group, find a local support services and get the help you need to be the person that you want to. You don't have to stay not okay. Being a mum means? Being a mum means never doing the thing you want to do when you want to do it at the exact time you want to do it, even if the option you have is better even if the thing your child's suggesting is better it's still not the thing you wanted to do at that exact second and my kids have the best ideas in the whole world and sometimes it's still not the thing I wanted to do at that exact second and being a parent means that you're always going to have to put your needs in a different order yeah and that's kind of the point it's harder but it also makes it more rewarding in the end and to see these little people for every time you didn't sit down or you did sit down you know become the people they're meant to be that's the reward and you get it and you get it every day when you look at them I think.

47:27And finally I'm happy when? I'm happy when I see the impact of my work I also run a private practice and I absolutely love supporting therapists to do great work I run a private practice with my husband it's called the Mill Hill Therapy Hub and we run a hub in Mill Hill in Hendon and now we open one in Kingston with the amazing therapy shed I was our a different therapy shed she's we're running a practice with her and she's amazing and I love making environments that are amazingly therapeutically supportive for both therapists and clients so that you can make sure that they've got a safe place to work.

47:58And that's like when I see these therapists and their clients and the families that work with them come out looking better than they did when they came in. And part of that is because I've set the room up nicely for them. It's clean when they got there. Like I try and wipe the mental load for these therapists before they start their job by having a clean room, meaning they don't have to worry about setting up the paint. It's already there, things like that. When I see these families make progress in the rooms and the cocoons that I'm trying to make for these therapists so they can work. That's amazing.

48:23And then I'm also the happiest when I'm singing and offering them my family. Saskia, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you.