faking sick?

It is a common thing for anyone to occasionally need a day off from school or work. We used to pretend to be sick and nowadays most people refer to it as taking a “mental health day”. I have done it. My spouse has done it. My kids have done it.

While it is good to let your kids take a mental health day from school or activities on occasion without really questioning it, some kids will over use these days. They will fake injuries or sicknesses up until the school wonders why you are not taking them to the doctor for these long lasting poor health conditions. Trust me, my kids go to the doctor all the time. They are not being neglected. They are perfectly healthy physically.

The sheer volume of school avoidance has forced me to become a detective. Depending on which kid it is, I can now quickly narrow down the possible reasons for trying to get out of going to school.

My oldest avoids school when she has created drama with her peers. Or when she has embarrassed herself. This used to be a daily occurrence! The stories we heard from her teachers were just incredible. My favorite is when she went to the hair salon and got an undercut. She was so excited to show it off and decided it needed to be a big crazy reveal. Against our advice, she went to school with her hoodie pulled tight to her head so you could not see her face. In class, they are not supposed to have their face covered, so the teacher asked her to put her hood back. She flings it back and the whole room can now see her new haircut. They are all staring and she screams, “Don’t look at me!” She then sulks under her sweatshirt the rest of the time she was in class. She stayed in the counselor’s room most of the day and reported to us that all the kids made fun of her. The teacher reported he only heard people complimenting her new hairdo.

My youngest is really stressed out when there are events going on around her where she feels inadequate. In elementary school, I was called numerous times to pick her up because she would not leave the sick room. After a few occurrences, I saw that she was calling out every time the kindergarten classes were having “Parent Day”. Parents were coming to spend the day with their kids during school. Those were hard days because those were the first few months she lived with us and our status as parents was not solidified yet.

A lot of people think kids are pretending to be sick to get out of school because of a test or assignment they did not do. Most teachers these days are so lax about due dates and give ridiculous amounts of retakes on tests that I do not think that is what any of these kids are trying to do. I think a lot of it probably comes from some type of social anxiety or feelings of inadequacy.

Nothing hurts my kids more than feeling they are different from everyone else.