At my wits end - ds (yr 12 nearly 18)

Apologies in advance for the long post but don't want to drip feed info.

DS is coming up 18 and has already failed yr 11 twice (once he changed electives and repeated, this time they're letting him through to yr12).

He started school aged 4 (England) and was withdrawn due to physical intimidation from another child within 6mths. He was then homeschooled till he was 7 when he returned to full time formal education. He's never been interested in school, hates being told what to do and is incredibly defiant when it comes to homework.

His dad was violent and he left the day after his 9th birthday and hasn't had any contact since he was 10. When he was 11 my girlfriend moved in and when he was almost 14 we moved to Australia.

Since he's been old enough we've had problems with him completing homework - his pattern is to not tell us he has any (lie to our faces when we ask) and then lie to his teachers about why it hasn't been completed.

His first attempt at yr11 he selected the wrong electives and hated every minute of the year. We encouraged him to try again and accept that he'd made a mistake in his choices and he was happy to redo the yr with new subjects.

His second attempt at yr11 he only completed 1 piece of coursework (which he got 97% for) and didn't achieve higher than 27% in any of his exams. It's not that he can't do the work, it's just that he's lazy and doesn't see why it's important.

He is full of ideas about his future (that last a couple of weeks) and then he's off on another idea, which is nothing to do with his current subjects.

I've just had an email from his bio teacher telling me he's failed to hand in an assignment (due 18th November that I knew nothing about) and he's in the same situation with chemistry. He told his bio teacher the work was done but power outages meant he couldn't send it in. We haven't had any problems with the power and so far as I know it hasn't been completed.

The atmosphere in the house is horrendous, the girls (15 and 13) dread him coming back from school as he lies so openly and doesn't think twice about yelling at me and telling me I never believe him. It's hard to when he always lies :(

Has anyone else been in a similar situation? If so how did you handle it?

maybe suggest tafe? its a differant learning structure and if he is the hands on type it might be what he needs? and at almost 18, the pressure from school to
"know" what you want to be is beyond a joke. have you talked about other ways to finish year 12? I'm not sure what state your in but i did VCAL in year 11/12 and it was highschool/tafe/work all the outside school stuff had to be done under my own steam.
now at almost 25 i'm studying distance in something i have a passon for. its hard as i was simmlar to your DS, if he has a passion help him find a way to grab it with both hands and run. you may not be "happy" with his choice; i know my mother was most displeased when i told her i was doing VCAL but i finished year 12, i could have done two more subjects AND attempted VCE but i didnt. wasnt my thing. maybe get him to see a careers counceller and see if they can help him map out what he wants to do and what needs to be achived to get there?

He sounds like my DS. This year we got him into a VCAL program, he has excelled! He did 1 day a week work experience, 1 day of TAFE and 3 days at school. It was like the penny finally dropped, I have not had one teacher call me. He has just been offered an apprenticeship by his employer, starting in January.

Perhaps you should focus on him getting a job over the holidays. No employer will put up with him yelling or lying so it might be a good learning curve for him. Then he can decide whether he would prefer to work or go back to school.

I have been through this all before.. Except I was in your DS position..I never cared enough about school or had the motivation to do homework and assignments.. although I never lied about it. I just simply said I didn't do it.. Which I think annoyed my parents/teachers more.. They used to say that I cared so little I couldn't even be bothered to lie.. Which is true.
I can't say for sure the reason why.. I guess because I had a very up and down mixed up childhood that structure never really worked for me.. I didn't like being told what to do.

I ended up leaving school, and I was immediately relieved.. I got a few casual jobs for about 6 months while I settled into life outside of school and then got my first full time job at a law firm and have been in law ever since.. I now manage team within the firm and get to boss other people around (much more to my liking).. I am dedicated, responsible and very successful I what I do..

School just really does not suit some children..
Let him struggle through his HSC and then make him go out and get a trade.. Carpentry, electrics etc..
I found that the work place suited me much better.. I was giving and getting something in return. I was praised for my hard work and rewarded in ways that aren't possible at school..
My DF sounds exactly like your son at the same age.. He is now a successful builder who runs his own company..

Just because he isn't good at school doesn't be he won't succeed in life :)

I know it would be hard for you to think from his perspective but just try to... He has obviously fallen behind, the work has become too hard. He feels like it is hopeless trying to catch up and doing assignments because he is probably going to fail anyway, then he goes to school and has teachers on his back and then he comes home and has you on his back and it just makes school this huge unenjoyable stress in his life that is just a constant source of anxiety, which will perpetuate that feeling of just giving up.. And which will make him lie to you and his teachers and come up with excuses because he wants some reprieve from the constant nagging.. I'm sure as far as he is concerned his HSC is a lost cause and no matter what he does now he will still fail.. you can battle with him to try and change this mindset.. Maybe get him a one on one tutor and try and talk to him about what will make his life easier I.e no chores of a night so long as he is studying.. If he can prove he is doing his homework you will give him and allowance..

And just know that this is not uncommon at all..

I really hope that everything works out. I'm almost positive it will. A little understanding goes along way :)

Thanks ladies xx

I should have said we're I'm NSW and he was working last year at Maccas but lost his job due to his attitude.

I'm going to talk to him later about training or TAFE to see if he'd rather do that. It's so difficult to know what to do for the best as he has no passion for anything in life and his school careers teacher has pretty much washed his hands of him :(

I love him dearly (don't want anyone to get the wrong impression) and just want him to have choices in life.

and those choices can come later in life too.
every one is sooo focused on yr 12, VCE/HSC all that jazz when reality is sometimes its not what the child needs. i was one of them. school plus me = kaboom.
i also found for me; as school was so book based i often couldnt wrap my head around it. yet at tafe (i did cookery) i loved it and the lowest i got was a pass; due to it being a bussiness subject which i held no intrest in; at all.

I'll come back to this.

Honestly, he sounds a little like my DH. My DH was fine at school (I didn't know him then, but his grades tell the story), but as soon as he moved onto Uni he seemed to stop caring. Didn't turn up to classes, didn't do his work. He failed so many topics which is ridiculous cause he's super smart.He spent 4 years there and, if he was lucky, completed enough topics for half a degree. He swapped degrees once or twice in there too. Basically, he just wasn't interested in what he was doing.

In the end he just had to get out in the real world and get a job. He's ended up in banking and loves it and has moved well up the ranks (even without a qualification). Amazingly he just came to me last week and said he wants to study externally next year and work towards a banking degree.

I guess my point to the story is that maybe you should just let him leave school if that's what he wants and decide what interests him. It could be some other study or it could be an apprenticeship or a job. As he is smart he will probably find that that gets him a reasonable distance into his career and then he can possibly refine his skills a bit more in the future.

I agree with the other posters. I know plenty of people who didn't complete year 12, yet have still been successful. My own brother didn't even finish year 10, then spent 3 years refusing to even work. But now he owns his own business & is in the process of buying his first home.

I suggest not letting him leave school without something else lined up. Find out what he's into & enrol him in a tafe course. Or send him out looking for an apprenticeship, or even just unpaid work experience, doing something he is interested in. He could do a 3 day tafe course & 2 days work experience. Maybe its mechanics, or panel beating? Graphics design? The things that interest him everyday are what he should try find something in. He may not make a career out of it, but it might keep him interested enough & get him at least in the door. Then if he decides to go further, he can get advise as to what to do next, as well as a reference from the employer.

My BIL will be 18 in January. He had all intentions of finishing year 12, but dropped out this year (11). He worked at Macca's for a few months last year, but he had no interest in that & hated every minute. He now has an apprenticeship at some metal work company I think. He's been there for a good few months & is very happy there :)

Where in nsw are you???

Unfortunately DS won't be accepted on an apprenticeship as his last few school reports are so poor :( he looked into it last year when he was wobbling during his first attempt at yr11 and he was turned down.

According to him there's nothing at TAFE that he wants to do, or at least nothing he wants to do for more than 48hrs.

He doesn't actually want to do anything, he wants to stay at home all day and surf the net and that's def not an option.

I honestly don't mind what he does, so long as he does something but he's currently running the huge risk of being kicked out of school with no options or ideas about what he's going to do.

You sound like you have tried everything supportive so maybe try something else. This may sound harsh but maybe stop supporting him. Disable the internet, don't pay for anything but school expenses and basics (i.e. Food etc). He doesn't need an allowance or new clothes. He is almost 18 (and I assume he has finished the year for school) so if he wants to survive, he can either work or get Centrelink. If he gets Centrelink benefits then he can contribute to household expenses.

TBH, I don't know what I would do personally as my boys are still young and I have no experience so please take my post as a suggestion only. I am not criticising, just giving another option.

Good luck and I hope everything works out for the best.

Firstly big hugs. My son has never had much success with school. Battling with an incorrect ADHD diagnosis for most of primary school and finally diagnosed Aspergers at age 12. He by and large manages pretty well. He has issues with writing and his spelling is shocking but he is a great reader.
My son is now 18 and repeating year 12. He is on a modified program and only needs to go 3 days a week. I consider it a good week if he goes 1-2. Making it to school all 3 days is unheard of.
He works 3-5 shifts a week at KFC and they love him. He's reliable and will always pick up extra shifts, do doubles etc.
But school, meh forget it. He talks about doing an electrician apprenticeship but when it's explained what is required to get there he nods and agrees but fails to follow through.
He's mentioned the army/army reserves but when we told him he needs yr12 he stopped mentioning it.
All in all. Not much help but just know you are not alone.

Bright sparkles - we're in the Hunter Valley.

Things got worse today - his bio teacher (lovely lady, desperate to help DS achieve his potential but pretty much ready to throttle him for his apathy) told me that the assignment he handed in was actually someone else's work :(

When I asked him about it tonight (was very calm) he lied to me 7 times that it was his work and he didn't know what the teacher was on about. 7 TIMES!! I had been perfectly calm up until then, but after that I cried bucketloads :(

It took me begging him to tell the truth before he admitted he hadn't done the assignment at all, and he'd submitted work another student in the class had done as his own.

I'm so worried - this was a piece of coursework for his HSC and if the teacher follows procedure he'll now be suspended and faces exclusion from his HSC course. He's already dropped a subject this year so if he drops another he won't be eligible for his HSC.

THANK YOU SO MUCH for all your replies, I really do appreciate them all. In some ways I think it's be easier if he was a tearaway teen but he's not. He's polite, always attends school, doesn't muck up in lessons or anything - he just doesn't do any work.

I'm going in to see his year advisor on Thursday to try and work out where we go from here - I also want to find out why it's gotten this far before the school got me involved. The first I knew last year that he was falling behind and subsequently failing was when his mid year report came out.

My DS18 was exactly the same, three years ago I wrote a very similar post to this. He repeated Yr 9 twice, didn't want to do Yr10 but I basically forced him because I wanted him to at least have a Yr10 pass, which he didn't get. He went on to do Tafe and thoroughly enjoyed it and also excelled, made us so proud. We told him before leaving school that he needs to be either working or doing some sort of course. If he doesn't pass Yr12 this year and doesn't want to repeat please don't push him, maybe he could try some different courses to find an employment path he enjoys. You are certainly not alone, wishing you all the best.

Regards,
Dianne

I dont understand how he can be knocked back on an apprenticeship due to grades? Was that just one place. When i started mine, grades where never an issue, unless they where the tafe cert. Related to my trade... Id look more into it because that sounds wrong some how

I understand your pain and frustration. I think that the school has some responsibility here too. They should have alerted you a lot earlier than the mid year report! At our school if my DD didn't hand in work on the due date, I would get a sms stating what was due and stating that it wasn't handed in. It gave me the opportunity to get on her to make sure that it was, she managed to get everything in. Our school would tell us if they were in danger of failing and give us options of other things to improve the grades. I know that here in Vic, a lot of the kids aren't actually doing the VCE exams but they still get their certificates.

I think there has to be something that you can do....something that he is interested in. My DD can be extremely lazy too, but I pushed her into doing her work before anything else, she didn't get computer time or anything else unless the work was done first. She has just finished her VCE, who knows what the marks will be like?

Tafe can be an option, but only if he wants to do it, they will not push him to do the work, its pretty much the students responsibility!

Good Luck!!

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I dont understand how he can be knocked back on an apprenticeship due to grades? Was that just one place. When i started mine, grades where never an issue, unless they where the tafe cert. Related to my trade... Id look more into it because that sounds wrong some how

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It's not his grades that got him knocked back, but the comments and effort. It's all over his report that he's lazy, disorganised and doesn't put in any effort. With competition so high in the area for apprenticeships he's at the bottom of a very long list and isn't being considered.

I'm furious with the school and their lack of communication - they've really dropped the ball on this one and I'm worried it's too late now to encourage him to keep trying.

It must be so hard to see someone you love so much and believe in not make the choice to live up to their potential.

It's like he doesn't quite get that in life you have responsibilities. Right now his main responsibility is to do his school work. If he doesn't do that then there are very real consequences, like failing school or getting suspended for plagiarism. Like someone said before, perhaps it's time for some tough love. If he doesn't fulfil his responsibilities, he loses privileges. Anything other than food, water, sanitation, clothing and a roof over your head is a privilege. If he doesn't learn this now, he will eventually discover that as an adult even those things aren't guaranteed, and are actually unlikely if you refuse to do your work.

Totally not trying to criticise your parenting here. Just trying t bring a fresh perspective as it can be hard to see things objectively when you're so caught up in it all.

You're obviously a very caring and loving mum. He's lucky to have you on his side xo

My stepdaughter was like this. Would lie to our faces about schoolwork and school attendance. The school wouldn't let her do Year 12 and the Year Coordinator told us that she wouldn't cope with TAFE where you still need to put in the effort and turn up. They basically told us that she was lazy, a drama queen (always wanted to see the school counsellor about something to get out of class) and she needed to seriously grow up. All of which, after a couple of years of pep talks, encouraging conversations, I agreed with.

Despite the fact that she was failing all her subjects, she would tell us she wanted to be a lawyer. Complete lack of reality.

Anyhow, long story short, she went back to the US to live with her mum. Went from bad to worse and it was only when she got put in jail for drink driving that she finally woke up to herself. Her mum got her a place in a school for troubled kids (and really, compared to what some of those kids have had to deal with, her life was fairly simple in comparison). She is nearly about to graduate high school at the age of 21.

Sorry I can't be more encouraging but I guess what I'm trying to say is that sometimes there's only so much you can do with kids and they have to learn the hard way that you only get somewhere in life with hard work.

I would tell him that he can leave school if he lines up a job/something. If he gets sacked, go back to bare basics and take away all internet etc. so there's no incentive to sitting at home.

I would possibly try sending him to a counsellor incase there's something deeper going on.

My stepdaughter was like this. Would lie to our faces about schoolwork and school attendance. The school wouldn't let her do Year 12 and the Year Coordinator told us that she wouldn't cope with TAFE where you still need to put in the effort and turn up. They basically told us that she was lazy, a drama queen (always wanted to see the school counsellor about something to get out of class) and she needed to seriously grow up. All of which, after a couple of years of pep talks, encouraging conversations, I agreed with.

Despite the fact that she was failing all her subjects, she would tell us she wanted to be a lawyer. Complete lack of reality.

Anyhow, long story short, she went back to the US to live with her mum. Went from bad to worse and it was only when she got put in jail for drink driving that she finally woke up to herself. Her mum got her a place in a school for troubled kids (and really, compared to what some of those kids have had to deal with, her life was fairly simple in comparison). She is nearly about to graduate high school at the age of 21.

Sorry I can't be more encouraging but I guess what I'm trying to say is that sometimes there's only so much you can do with kids and they have to learn the hard way that you only get somewhere in life with hard work.

I would tell him that he can leave school if he lines up a job/something. If he gets sacked, go back to bare basics and take away all internet etc. so there's no incentive to sitting at home.

I would possibly try sending him to a counsellor incase there's something deeper going on.

Again, thanks ladies for all your thoughts and comments - it's so good to know we're not alone in this.

I spoke to the yr advisor yesterday and she she's agreed to put a system in place where I'll be notified every week, via email, of his cooperation in class and the status of any homework and assignments. Last night DS sat down and completed his maths homework without any complaining (and got everything correct!).

Then today he emailed his chemistry report to his teacher (and copied me in on the email) which is a huge improvement.

I told him last night that his birthday present isn't dependant on his school work - I've already banned him from the xbox and kill the internet at night but I wanted to reassure him that his birthdays still 'safe'.

Hasn't year 11 finished yet in NSW?

I'm not a parent to a teenager, nor do I have much advice, or stories to sympathise with you . But I have read your thread and wonder if maybe your DS could do with some counselling? Not just for school work, but for possible personal issues he might need to talk about. Maybe there's more to it all than you can see.

I really feel for you. No parent wants to see their child struggling with school and life choices at this crucial times.

Would he be interested in doing a gap year? Could this be motivation to put some effort into work or school? If he works hard or saves a certain amount of money that you can match he could go on a gap year overseas to work. There are lots of resorts (ski, sports, etc) that look for students who are 18 to come and work over there and it might be the atmosphere that he will enjoy before he decides what he wants to do in life. In order to go on the Gap year though, he needs to show that he understands the value of money and save a certain amount towards it and prove that he can put effort in.

Surfing the internet and staying home is not an option. He needs to know that is crystal clear. Cut the internet off and cut his phone off from internet if he thinks you are bluffing.


Sorry I cant be more help. :hug:

I agree with getting him out into the real world, slaving away in a minimum wage job (and paying board to live at home) should teach him that an education is a good idea :)

Mrs_Fi, how is your son going?

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Mrs_Fi, how is your son going?

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Thanks for asking - he's still not at all bothered by anything. He's been self diagnosing on Google and has decided he has PTSD (from his dad leaving), Severe Depression, OCD, and BPD.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry these days.

DP and I have decided we've done all we can - it's up to him now. I've given him all the tools he could possibly need for getting through yr 12 - if he fails at least I can say I tried.

Wow, interesting diagnoses. Would a trip to a counsellor or psychologist help? Just so he can talk to someone independent.

I agree with you. It is time he took responsibility for himself. I hope it is not to stressful a time for you.

Gotta love Dr Google :doh:. Since he's made his diagnosis let him know that now he needs to seek profession help.

Regards,
Dianne

To be honest I'm too scared to let him see a specialist - he'll show just enough 'symptoms' to get a diagnosis then he'll end up with an 'excuse' not to do anything.

It sounds awful but I know what I mean. There's nothing wrong with him, apart from extreme laziness and thinking the whole world owes him something. Sadly, he's very like his dad in that respect :(