![\"Emma](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/X73NSPZXBVCXPGKE5FWP5NBW5M.png\")
Emma O\u2019Riordan <\/p>\n
The family sought help from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service<\/a> (Camhs), but O\u2019Riordan says his referrals from the GP were rejected three times. This was because it was \u201cjust panic\u201d and \u201cnot severe enough for the service\u201d. With help from a psychotherapist uncle, Eoghan slowly recovered to sit a reduced Junior Cert<\/a>, in which he passed three subjects. \u201cI told him to take the win . . . he had been through so much,\u201d says O\u2019Riordan. <\/p>\n Determined to help him find his way, the extended family have watched Eoghan recover. This has been facilitated by a flexible approach that has helped him navigate his way back. This year, he passed his motorcycle test and he now drives himself to Youthreach, a national education and training programme for 15- to 20-year-olds who have left mainstream education.<\/p>\n Eoghan\u2019s story is a hopeful one and an indication that with the right support and therapeutic response, a child\u2019s crisis can resolve. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen a person doesn\u2019t go to work, we don\u2019t call it work avoidance, work phobic disorder or work refusal,\u201d says Alan Oates, a psychotherapist from Marino Counselling in Dublin. He has developed an intervention model for children who are struggling with the school environment. \u201cWe pathologise it for children but we don\u2019t for adults,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd yet, children are like adults, just younger and smaller. Our brains can\u2019t differentiate between a principal shouting at us and a bear chasing us.\u201d<\/p>\n There are no figures for the number of Irish children who are unable to attend school because of anxiety. However, the latest attendance data from Tusla, the child and family agency, shows more than one in five primary and secondary school children missed more than 20 days of school in the 2023\/2024 year.<\/p>\n Oates says school refusal is \u201crarely defiance or attention seeking\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s telling us adults that there is something wrong in their life and we need to really listen and find a way to support them.\u201d<\/p>\n Every child in crisis needs the same basic things: to be believed, to be understood, to have someone actually assess what is happening rather than simply demanding attendance, says Oates. <\/p>\n Nessa Hill\u2019s daughter used to run for the climbing frame every morning until a change of rules removed that option. \u201cThere were even more rigid rules and sanctions imposed, to the point that my child just became incapable of being in the classroom\u201d says Hill, who is chief executive of Neurodiversity Ireland. <\/p>\n Hill rejects outright the term \u201cschool avoidance\u201d. \u201cIt\u2019s definitely better to talk about school distress or school breakdown, because school avoidance says it\u2019s the child avoiding the school.\u201d She argues the classroom has not been examined the way any other workplace would be. \u201cWe haven\u2019t stood back and critically analysed our education system to say, \u2018why are we asking 30 children to pile into one room and sit facing a board, on uncomfortable seats with harsh lighting and too much noise and total overload of the senses?\u2019.\u201d <\/p>\n When Hill sought help, she says the education welfare officer options amounted to: get her daughter back into school, arrange home tuition or find a place in an independent school 90 minutes away at a cost of \u20ac10,000 a year. Hill, who is neurodivergent, is passionate about education. \u201cI\u2019m a practising barrister. I believe in education. I am as highly educated as you can be. I want that for my children.\u201d<\/p>\n Michele Van Valey, a neurodivergent psychotherapist who teaches mindfulness in schools, explains why she believes the standard fix of daily exposure and building tolerance through repetition collapses for children like Hill\u2019s daughter. \u201cIf a child is having a traumatic experience in school, you want them to face that same trauma over and over to build resilience,\u201d she says. \u201cBut that often does not work.\u201d <\/p>\n She is blunt about what the goal actually is: \u201cWe\u2019re not trying to keep them happy, we\u2019re trying to keep them functional and out in the world with their peers.\u201d <\/p>\n Who should be doing the adapting, then? \u201cThe adults need to figure out a way to meet the kids where they are,\u201d says Van Valey.<\/p>\n O\u2019Riordan\u2019s younger son Cillian (10), who is autistic, was separated from his established friend group when his class was shuffled, she says. This created enormous stress and he was crying every day. O\u2019Riordan says an education welfare officer arrived after 20 days\u2019 absence and the use of the word \u201cschool\u201d sent him screaming from the room. \u201cI didn\u2019t need to explain what I was dealing with . . . I took my own approach again with him and stopped pushing. I told him every day to just do his best,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n A turnaround came when he was moved into a properly resourced autism class. \u201cIt\u2019s worth it,\u201d says O\u2019Riordan of the 27km round-trip. \u201cHe is happy but it\u2019s not an option for many parents. That is not right.\u201d<\/p>\n The Department of Education last month published its implementation plan for the review of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act. The Government has called it a \u201cclear roadmap\u201d towards inclusive education and aims to address areas including curriculum design, staff training, resource allocation, and the wellbeing and inclusion of students.<\/p>\n Some campaigners say it lacks statutory student-support plans and independent mediation, both of which have been deferred to separate legislation. <\/p>\n Cillian\u2019s anxiety dropped within days of finding a supported classroom, his mother says. <\/p>\n Parents and campaign groups such as Neurodiversity Ireland argue these children are not broken. Hill says: \u201cWe\u2019re looking at all these children in crisis; it\u2019s the system that is in crisis. That is what needs to change.\u201d<\/p>\n Catch up with Conversations with Parents on all podcast platforms <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There is a particular kind of exhaustion that belongs to the parents of children who cannot go to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658039,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,13,14,2215,6,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,2212,65,66,67],"class_list":["post-658038","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-for-you","tag-headlines","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-weekendreview","tag-world","tag-world-news","tag-worldnews"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117163705367537616","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658038\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Nessa](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/XLMVLAXU5NGEDKKNDSLEE2V3OQ.jpg\")
Nessa Hill, chief executive of Neurodiversity Ireland, rejects outright the term ‘school avoidance’ <\/p>\n