The school’s number flashed up on my phone. I paused, took a breath, and answered.
‘Good afternoon, letting you know that your son has been defiant today and placed in isolation because he didn’t want to put his shoes on after soft play.
‘During this time, he soiled himself and smeared it everywhere. We wheeled him in a trolley to the showers and scrubbed him down. He was very upset and angry and had to be restrained by at least four members of staff.’
As the words trickled down the phone, I shook, sickened. My body knew before my mind caught up — my child had been violated, not supported.
My son – who was in the latter years of primary school – wasn’t ‘defiant’, he was overwhelmed. Dysregulated. Frightened.
He needed co-regulation, not confrontation. He needed someone to sit beside him, not pin him down.
This incident — avoidable and unnecessary — was just one in a string of failures. But it was the one that broke something in me.
My son was born with Down’s syndrome, then diagnosed autistic several years later. His speech was unique. Compulsive, with extreme sensory needs and avoidance of everyday tasks, he found the busy school environment with all the daily transitions extremely difficult.
In a class with 10 other children – all with profound multiple learning disabilities – he found ways of masking and said ‘yes’ to a lot of things he didn’t understand, so people would leave him alone.
On top of that, he would vomit daily on the school minibus, so I would be called to pick him up. This is regardless of me explaining it wasn’t a bug, but anxiety. The stress eventually caused him to lose all his hair.
He was soon labelled as naughty.
Children were regularly grabbed, held down, and isolated for behaviours that were actually cries for help
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We asked for support. Instead, we were blamed. We were told his behaviours were our fault — that we were too soft, too emotional, too much. I became ‘that Mum’.
We’d regularly be told, ‘He needs to learn’ and ‘Your standards are too high’, ‘Stop worrying!’ or ‘No one else has a problem with it’.
Then the incident happened when I was called about my son being restrained. On that occasion, isolation areas were lockable and padded sections separate to class, but children could hear others’ distress through the walls.
I had impressed on teachers many times how important it was never to leave him alone because of his anxiety, as it triggered his incontinence. He would have been naked, confused, and utterly terrified.
He wasn’t maliciously violent, he just hadn’t put his shoes on.
On other occasions, my boy would return home with unexplained hand-shaped bruises and scratches, but the school diary would simply state ‘he has had a good day, all fine’. When challenged, teachers would say ‘another child did it’.
I have since learnt that at that school, restraint was covertly routine. Children were regularly grabbed, held down, and isolated for behaviours that were actually cries for help.
International Coalition Against Restraint and Seclusion
ICARS supports children who have suffered restraint and seclusion abuse in schools. For more information, visit their website here.
The final straw came when I witnessed a child being carried kicking and shrieking up the corridor in the equivalent of a gigantic hold-all. The staff recoiled. I wasn’t meant to see that.
It was dehumanising. It was treated as normal. I raised concerns, but was silenced each time. I look back now with regret.
His fear of school was palpable, but over time I was made to doubt my own sanity.
The guilt of sending him to this unsafe place engulfed me. So we removed him and were left to fend for ourselves, effectively off-rolled under the guise of an ‘elective’ choice for home education.
Forced out. The school would not admit they couldn’t meet his needs.
It all had a nuclear impact. The whole experience destroyed his curiosity of learning new things. Only recently, through tears, he said: ‘School cruel’.
The fact it took years for him to say this speaks volumes and shows the depth of the trauma. A sensitive, funny, and deep-thinking young person, but his complexity was interpreted as being deliberately disobedient.
Viewing recent footage of a 12-year-old child being restrained at a special school brings back the sheer horror we faced. Five members of staff were involved while he was held face-down on the floor in a prone restraint.
Another child, another family. The truth is this is not an exception, it seems to be a regular practice and happens not only in schools both mainstream and specialist, but also care homes and hospitals.
Now, as a young disabled adult, my son struggles — being manhandled and misunderstood has left scars that are still trying to heal. He has PTSD.
We’re fighting to secure care support and nurturing education, while public services are stretched thinner than pizza dough. The future feels like a cliff edge.
A fundamental shift is needed in how we care for vulnerable, disabled, and neurodivergent people. Instead of convenience and compliance, the default must be connection. Trust, not threats. The goal is dignity and respect, not long-lasting damage.
Every one of us has a duty to speak up. To challenge abuse. To act when our gut tells us something is wrong. Because if we stay silent, we become complicit.
My son deserved safety. He deserved compassion. He deserved to be seen.
Every child does.
Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing James.Besanvalle@metro.co.uk.
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