I know you’re trying not to make it worse.
You write the careful email. You show up composed. You give everyone the benefit of the doubt. You try to keep the tone warm, even when your stomach turns. You’re doing everything you can to stay in the conversation—because you believe that if you’re reasonable, they will be too. You want to be the parent they listen to. The one they thank. The one whose child gets included, because you didn’t make a fuss. You want to believe your deference will protect your child.
But I need to tell you something—gently, and urgently.
They will hurt your child anyway
Not because you weren’t polite enough. Not because you didn’t explain things well. Not because you weren’t kind, or patient, or flexible. They will hurt your child if the system sees them as inconvenient. They will punish regulation struggles, treat access needs as defiance, and withhold support because it’s scarce—or simply because they can. And they will do it even while smiling in the meeting, even while thanking you for your understanding. You can’t prevent this harm with good manners. You can’t out-nice a structure that punishes difference.
Appeasement is not protection
It’s understandable—this instinct to stay safe by staying small. Many of us learned it young. Don’t escalate. Don’t overreact. Don’t give them a reason to say no. As parents, we internalise the choreography: step back. Speak softly. Say thank you for what little is given. Make yourself palatable. Make them comfortable. Make it easy to include you. And underneath it all: hope. Hope that if we’re good enough, maybe our child will be the one they make room for. But institutions don’t run on empathy. They run on scarcity, bias, and routine. And when push comes to shove, your deference will not shield your child from exclusion, neglect, or punishment.
They will not make your child the exception
I used to believe that if I worked hard enough to build relationships—if I kept things positive, collaborative, constructive—maybe we’d be the family they accommodated. Maybe our child would be the one they quietly made an exception for. But they don’t build inclusion one family at a time. They manage risk. And if your child is seen as a risk, they will choose the system over your family. They don’t make exceptions because you’re nice. They make exceptions when they’re afraid you’ll speak up.
And if your child is “normally included”—you’re an exception
Maybe your child has a teacher who gets it. Maybe their EA is kind, their principal responsive, their team willing to listen. Maybe you’ve seen what it looks like when things go well, and you believe—genuinely—that your child is being treated with care. I want that for every child. But I also need to say: if your child is thriving in a system that routinely excludes others like them, that doesn’t mean the system is fine. It means they’ve been made an exception. And exceptions don’t scale. They vanish with a staffing change, a shift in behaviour, a new diagnosis, a harder year. They vanish the moment you ask for more than what’s quietly tolerated. Inclusion that relies on luck, personality, or silence is not inclusion. It’s access on sufferance. So if things are going well right now, celebrate it—but don’t assume the system is working. Ask why your child is included. Ask what could make that change. And ask what part of the system still needs to be rebuilt, so no child’s access depends on being the exception.
Not everyone has your child’s best interest at heart
This one took me the longest. I wanted to believe that most people in the room were there to help. That even if they didn’t fully understand, they were trying. That harm happened by accident—and that a clear explanation could prevent it. But the truth is: some staff are overworked. Some are indifferent. Some are protecting their own reputations. Some are managing the budget. And some genuinely believe your child doesn’t belong. That doesn’t mean everyone is cruel. But it does mean not everyone is safe. And once you accept that, you can stop trying to earn empathy that was never coming—and start advocating without apology.
These things are cumulative. Don’t underestimate the impact.
Maybe no single moment feels serious enough to challenge. Just a skipped strategy. Just a missed recess. Just another day with no support. Just a sticker chart. Just a hallway. Just a removal. Just a small thing, again. But it adds up. It changes how your child sees school—and how they see themselves. And it chips away at you, too—until the next email sends you spiralling, until you start wondering if maybe you are too sensitive, too intense, too much. You’re not. And it doesn’t have to be catastrophic to be real. If it’s eroding your child’s well-being—or your own—it counts.
You can’t make it worse by advocating
There comes a moment when you realise: it’s already bad. The thing you were afraid of triggering—exclusion, retribution, refusal—is already happening, quietly. And once you see that clearly, the calculus changes. You can stop contorting yourself into reasonableness, hoping to avoid conflict. You can stop writing from a place of fear. You can stop worrying that asking for what your child needs will make them dislike you. Because they already might. And that is no longer your problem. You can’t make it worse by advocating. You can only make it visible.
You’re not imagining it
If you feel like your child is being sidelined—it’s probably because they are. If you feel like your calm is being used against you—it probably is. If you feel like you’ve been gaslit into questioning whether any of this is really happening—then that’s because it is. This is how exclusion works. It makes you doubt your own perception. But you are not wrong. You are not alone. And you are not the one who needs to be more reasonable.
