Needing support can be embarrassing

Q: Our son was legitimately sick and missed several weeks of school. Now he is well but doesn’t want to return. He is in Grade 10 and was a good student. We are worried he will lose his semester. Any suggestions?

A: Assuming your child is now medically well, he may be overwhelmed thinking about catching up.

Also, depending on the nature of the illness, he may have concerns about how he will be received or what he may be asked upon his return.

Just like adults who are on vacation from work for a few weeks, he may dread the return to school with the workload that has piled up. Similarly, he may not want to share the details of his illness.

On his return, it may be necessary for you to go with him to meet with a guidance counsellor to review the work he missed and make a plan for reintegration. It may also be helpful to concoct a story for him to use to cover his illness.

Quite frankly, it doesn’t have to be the gory details or even the truth, simply a story he feels he can tell that addresses his absence.

There is a likelihood that your son will resist, and this is where you stay strong, insist and even go yourself if you cannot get him to come along, at least initially, to meet with the guidance counsellor.

Demystifying the amount of work he must catch up on, developing a homework plan and concocting a story to cover the absence can allay his fears of catching up and fitting back in.