My son is 12 and I am having problems with him, he steals money, doesn't listen when spoken to, plays truent from school, he also has trouble sitting still and concentrating, he has been excluded from school once, and now they see him as a naughty child. My husband is at the point where he wants him gone, but I want to try to get him some help before it comes to that. I've tried the school they told me to see the doctor, the doctor told me it was the school I needed to see, now I don't know where to go, had the police involved because of the truancy, Please can anyone give me any ideas, I don't know what else to do

Hi,

FYI, I was a middle school teacher for 8 years, your year 7-9, before becoming a medic.

He's 12. He's going to try things, test you, test others. What is your husbands relationship with your son like? Do they get along? Do they spend time together? Your comment "wants him gone" concerns me about their relationship.

The school probably wanted him checked out for ADHD and it sounds like your doctor sees him as fine. Good.

A lot of people will try to find fault with your son, especially schools. It is very common over here for teachers to "recommend" that a student, usually male, be tested for ADHD. He could be bored or just not get along with his teachers. Unfortunately, once a student is labeled it tends to stick with them and the pattern is set.

I found that sometimes the student needs to be challenged. Most likely he is looking for attention. What are his friends like? Is he into sports or hobbies? What does he do when not at school? Will he talk about what is going on?

A visit to a psychologist may be in order. It can be uncomfortable as the entire family situation really needs to be looked at. Often acting out is just a symptom of another problem.

Let me know if I can offer more, good luck.

The doctor never checked him for ADHD said because he was sat behaving himself that as far as he was concerned he wasn't a naughty child.

As for my husbands and his relationship it is non existent at the minute and I'm stuck in the middle, they have got similar intrests but my husband won't do anything with him because of his behaviour, we have taken his computer, radio control cars, tried grounding him but nothing works, he doesn't behave long enough to get his things back.

He has truented from school Thursday of last week and got found out but he didn't return home till 8:30pm, then after a telling off he decided not to go to school of Friday and didn't retun home till 8:30pm again.

We came to an aragement that if he attended school and came straight home for 2 weeks he would get his stuff back and be allowed out, he seemed fine with this... but Sunday (which is today) he disappears with his bike, I can't go looking for him because I'm on my own, and now I am waiting for him to get home before his dad, so there are no arguments