Eventful, stressful, but also a reminder of how awesome true friends are....

This is the post I started to write yesterday...before things got even worse....

"Who said Tuesday would be better than Monday?


Today has been a day of up and down, mixed emotions. It's been the toughest day I've had for a long time and it's still on-going. However I have also been reminded of how amazing my friends and family are, and how fortunate I am to have them. A has been very difficult today. I've been reduced to tears several times and the stress is back to high levels. Fear, anger, sadness, frustration ... and that's just for starters. This is more than simple teenage bad behaviour and I will be contacting people in the hope of getting some help, tomorrow. In the meantime I can't seem to find the words right now... so I hope you'll understand that this has been a short blog."

Last night A was behaving weirdly and for a while I was seriously concerned. The out of hours doctor service were as much use a chocolate tea pot but thankfully I managed to calm him down. It was another late night for A, and after all that he had told me last night I decided to let him sleep. It's the first time I've ever happily let him have a day off when I've known that he's not ill. But under the circumstances I felt justified. It seems that a boy in his year has been beating him up/attacking him between lessons, to the point where A doesn't want to go to school - can't say I blame him.... He has been kicked, punched, kneed, 'chicken-legged' (where the back of the knee is kicked, hard, resulting in a dead leg and LOTS of pain), slapped, and throttled (arm around neck from behind - so so dangerous). The school have excluded the boy, am not sure how long for and A's dad and I were so close to calling the police. I get the impression from the school that they are deeply frustrated at how much their hands are tied. Seems that they have to make every effort to a) keep the child in school and b) make sure he doesn't miss out on an education...Well as far as I'm concerned I don't give a stuff about his education - what about A's? Fine, every child should have the right to an education but if they're violent then they shouldn't be in mainstream school. I feel for schools because they're told to ensure the rights of all kids but how can they do that when one child is so badly damaging another. Whose rights come first? I don't think I like the answer really....

It's really been a roller-coaster of emotion, and I'm almost numb now. I can't comprehend what A has gone through and if I think about it then I want to cry. The thought of him running and being chased by this little *&^(£$ and then being hurt again and again is heartbreaking. School should be safe, it should be where you learn, and where you find out what you like and dislike, make friends, grow up...it's not supposed to be fun all the time but then what would you complain about if it was....lol... It shouldn't be about running and hiding and being scared stiff of walking between lessons because you know that this *($£% has pushed you down the stairs before and you're scared he'll do it again and you may not be so lucky as to land safely next time...... It shouldn't be about the school trying to resolve it but having their hands tied by petty ridiculous bureaucrats who don't have the faintest idea what it's like to be bullied, and who were probably bullies themselves when they were at school. As you can tell I'm really quite angry about this. Not just because it's happened but because I don't know for sure that it's over yet. I can't be certain that his parents will do anything to stop him, I can't be certain that he'd listen to them anyway, and I can't be certain that he won't try and extract 'revenge' on A for the exclusion. I hope so much that this is done now but I have a bad feeling that it's not. All I can do is keep getting A to school and be ready to deal with whatever happens.

I'm just so grateful that we are surrounded by so many amazing people - friends and family - who have helped and supported us. I can't thank you all enough.....

On a lighter (?) note I managed to make a total muppeT of myself today, well it was my bike's fault....was just leaving the supermarket, had gone a couple of metres when the back brakes locked on and I fell off....nearly ended up on my bum on the pavement....at least I didn't fall the other way, into traffic... not fun, and am just hoping that it can be fixed tomorrow so that I can go on the planned bike ride with A this Saturday... I also managed to have two excellent meetings at Uni today about my MA dissertation and my PhD application..am too tired to think much about those now but the relief of being on track again is huge...

Right, long blog today so I'm going now.... smiley smiles and tight hugs (as a friend of mine says) x