When schools ask disabled children to accept being hurt

I used to have a pretty good dialogue with my kids, before they experienced a lot of institutional harm. The conversations flow less freely now and less seldom, but back then, we chatted a lot and I often recorded the conversations, for proof, having experienced enough gaslighting from the district to know I wouldn’t be believed without evidence. Now occasionally, I go back to those transcripts. This piece is inspired from reviewing some chats.

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Robin sits beside me on the couch, seven years old, exhausted from another week navigating environments that position every defensive response as evidence of pathology requiring correction. We talk because the school called again, because Robin bit someone again, because the narrative arriving through official channels describes my child as dangerous, dysregulated, requiring intensive behavioural intervention to manage aggression that threatens peers.

I ask questions because I need to understand what happened before Robin’s teeth made contact with another child’s skin, what preceded the moment the school documented as unprovoked violence, what context the incident reports systematically erase.

• Mom: Yesterday you felt like everyone hated you. I’m sorry, that must be hard. Are there specific things that have happened with specific people that have made you feel that way?
• Robin: Yeah. (quiet, doesn’t elaborate)
• Mom: Let’s start with Liam. We talked about the one time where you were playing soccer and you fell down, or he bumped into you?
• Robin: No, that was Marcus.
• Mom: Oh, I see. But you’ve bitten Liam before, right? And it was a response to something that happened right before that?
• Robin: He was swinging one of those things where you attach it to your foot, close to me, and he was swinging it in my face. I was scared. I told him to stop and he didn’t. He was coming close with that and he told me just go away if I didn’t like him doing it, but there were actually people around. He was being unsafe.
• Mom: Yeah, I hear you. You know it’s not your responsibility to keep those other people safe—like you could leave and tell the teacher?
• Robin: (quiet)
• Mom: I know it can be overwhelming in the moment. Was there another time that you had a really big reaction with him?
• Robin: (quiet)
• Mom: Jean said he was telling other people that he didn’t do anything and you just went crazy, regarding the time he was swinging something around.
• Robin: (quiet)
• Mom: Did that hurt your feelings?
• Robin: I wanted people to know that he was doing something unsafe.
• Mom: Then with Marcus, that was the soccer ball and it landed in your stomach. I think you said you felt like that was intentional?
• Robin: No, no, it was just like—and he’s done this lately. I think he kicked the ball at me and it hit me now twice. So starting to feel like it’s on purpose.
• Mom: Okay. Then you said Morgan was bugging you. You’ve kind of had a tricky time with them since kindergarten. Are there specific things that they did recently that have been upsetting?
• Robin: No, not really.
• Mom: Okay. Do you feel like you’re more likely to be in the dysregulated when they’re around?
• Robin: We can be friends, but most of the time we’re not.
• Mom: What do you need at school during the day to feel less like you’re in the dysregulated?
• Robin: I don’t know.

Robin doesn’t know what would help because the problem exists beyond individual accommodation—the environment itself targets Robin through accumulated peer aggression the school systematically ignores while surveilling Robin’s responses with increasing intensity.

• Mom: What about if you had more options to do things separate from kids, like go outside somewhere else, or go in the resource room and read a book or do some math or play a game, or are there any kind of rewards that would help make your days feel more manageable?
• Robin: Well, Emma did say she might bring her Pokemon cards to school, but I just found out that her dad threw them away.

I offered segregation as solution—separate outdoor time, isolated activities, removal from peer environments—and Robin responded with the thing that actually matters: connection with Emma over Pokemon cards, the possibility of friendship unmediated by adult surveillance and behavioural management frameworks.

• Mom: So if Emma managed to find any kind of Pokemon cards and you guys could hang out and look through them, that would be really fun? And playing with Pokemon cards with friends would be fun?
• Robin: Yeah.
• Mom: What about the outdoor time? It seems like if you have become dysregulated, it’s usually when you’re outside. Do you want to try to figure out something else to do during that time?
• Robin: I love being outside. I love being outside.
• Mom: So is it more about having a teacher close by in case you run into some trouble there?
• Robin: There are teachers close by.
• Mom: Okay, so is there anything that can be done to make you or the other kids on the playground safer?
• Robin: It’s a hard question. I really don’t know.

Robin loves being outside but gets dysregulated outside because that’s where peers target Robin repeatedly—swinging jump ropes in Robin’s face, kicking soccer balls at Robin’s stomach, poking Robin with sticks, running into Robin deliberately, calling Robin names—and teachers stand close by watching Robin specifically, documenting Robin’s defensive responses, while the behaviours creating the unsafe environment continue uninterrupted.

• Mom: When you are at school lately, do you feel like you’re in the dysregulated a lot?
• Robin: When people are annoying me, yeah.
• Mom: What do you qualify as annoying?
• Robin: Basic rules and stuff.
• Mom: Like when teachers ask you to follow rules?
• Robin: No.
• Mom: Give me one example of something that was really annoying recently.
• Robin: Amalie poked me with a stick.
• Mom: When was that? Did you tell me about that?
• Robin: It was out of school care, after school.
• Mom: Oh, I’m sorry. Was that the day you came home swearing about Amalie?
• Robin: Yeah.
• Mom: Has Amalie ever done anything at the school?
• Robin: Yeah. Once she purposely ran into me.
• Mom: What made you think it was on purpose?
• Robin: Because she looked at me and then ran right into me. Then she said “Sorry, sorry, sorry” and walked away.
• Mom: Just that one time or other times?
• Robin: I remember she gave me a bloody nose another time.
• Mom: Oh, poor bug. Did she ever say things with her words that hurt your feelings?
• Robin: There was one time she called me gay.
• Mom: Oh. What did that make you feel like?
• Robin: (quiet)
• Mom: How did that make you feel? What do you think she meant?
• Robin: Bad. She thought it was funny.

Amalie poked Robin with a stick, ran into Robin deliberately after making eye contact, gave Robin a bloody nose, called Robin a name while laughing. These incidents span months, involve physical violence and verbal harassment, create the accumulated environment where Robin exists in chronic hypervigilance waiting for the next assault—and when Robin finally responds defensively, Robin gets documented as the aggressor requiring behavioural intervention.

• Mom: Who are your closest friends?
• Robin: Owen, Casey, Jean, Maya, Sam, Lucas.
• Mom: If you think through the times that you’ve been pushed or called a name or knocked into, were there kids that saw that happen to you?
• Robin: Yeah, but I forget. (quiet)
• Mom: Then what about this stuff with Ethan, like when you were at out of school care yesterday and Ethan pushed you—were there any other kids that saw that?
• Robin: I can’t remember all the stuff.
• Mom: I know, honey. I’m asking you a lot of questions.
• Robin: I forget.

Robin cannot track every incident because the incidents accumulate faster than memory consolidates them, because living under siege produces the cognitive overwhelm where individual assaults blur into ambient threat, because seven-year-olds processing constant peer aggression lose capacity to document the evidence adults demand as proof that defensive violence emerged from legitimate fear rather than pathological aggression. And back then, I didn’t realise that every question is a demand.

• Mom: You know the school takes bullying seriously, right? And if there’s things that are leading you to be reactive, they need to know about it, because they need you to be self-regulated so that you’re not having big reactions. So do you feel like you’re being bullied at school, or more like you need help regulating and figuring out how to handle some of the things that are happening?
• Robin: Second one.

I offered Robin two framings: either you experience bullying (positioning Robin as victim requiring protection) or you need help regulating (positioning Robin as problem requiring management). Robin chose the second option because that’s the narrative the school taught Robin to internalise—Robin’s defensive responses constitute the problem requiring correction while the peer behaviours creating the necessity for defence remain invisible, unaddressed, continuing unchanged.

The school takes bullying seriously, I told Robin, except the school documents Robin’s biting as unprovoked aggression while treating repeated physical assaults against Robin as normal peer conflict requiring Robin to develop better coping strategies.

• Mom: Would it help you if you had less time at school?
• Robin: No, I love school.
• Mom: Is there anything your teachers or the people on the playground can do to help you that they aren’t doing now?
• Robin: Well, they’re like watching me and stuff.
• Mom: Is that good or bad?
• Robin: Good. That’s good.
• Mom: Like just in case there’s something unexpected going on, that they can go and clear kids away from you?
• Robin: Yeah.

Robin loves school despite experiencing chronic peer aggression there, interprets adult surveillance as protection rather than recognising it as the mechanism through which defensive responses get documented while precipitating violence remains invisible, believes teachers watch Robin to intervene when peers approach threateningly rather than understanding they watch Robin to document dysregulation.

• Mom: It seems like fewer things happen at out of school care. Do you think that’s because there’s different kids there or fewer people or teachers act differently?
• Robin: Yes, fewer people and more nice kids.
• Mom: And at the school there’s not very many people to watch all the kids? Do things get more hectic on the playground at school than they do at out of school care because kids don’t feel like they’re being watched quite as much?
• Robin: Yep. Also there’s like way more space.
• Mom: Right, so everybody could be spread out more and teachers aren’t as close by. Is there anything else you can think of that could help around all this stuff? Like we set it up so that you’re going to start seeing Michelle again. I’m thinking about trying to set up some time with someone like Alex.
• Robin: She was fine. She played games and stuff.
• Mom: Do you regret biting those people, or do you feel like they deserved it?
• Robin: I mean, they do deserve it. But I regret it, yeah.
• Mom: If you had a choice, would you prefer not to have these big reactions?
• Robin: Yeah, then I wouldn’t feel so bad.

They deserved it, but Robin regrets it. Robin holds both truths simultaneously: the biting represented justified defence against immediate physical threat, and the biting produced shame, social consequences, adult disappointment, the accumulating evidence that Robin constitutes the problem everyone must manage.

Robin would prefer not to have big reactions, not because the reactions lack justification but because the reactions make Robin feel bad—absorbing the emotional cost of defending against violence while peers who created the necessity for defence experience no equivalent shame, no documented consequences, no requirement that they modify their behaviour to make Robin safer.

What Jean saw

I asked Jean separately about these incidents.

• Mom: Ryan listed Liam, Marcus, and Amalie as people he’s struggling with. I’m also interested in knowing who has seen these situations where Ryan is struggling with kids.
• Jean: I have seen lots of things.
• Mom: So if the school wanted to ask you some questions, would you be OK to talk to them?
• Jean: Yeah. Like this one time after school, only one time, Amalie was going around calling everybody gay. Like “You’re gay, you’re gay, you’re gay.”
• Mom: But that happened a long time ago?
• Jean: That was a long time ago. But that’s all I know. And then every time that happens I try and help. Remember on the first day, like some kids were bullying him on the park in kindergarten?
• Mom: Yeah.
• Jean: And then like Owen helped us. I was surprised. Like I’m like, wait really? He’s our friend now. That was nice. Yeah, I’m really happy to be his friend.
• Mom: What about when Liam and Ryan had an incident?
• Jean: He was swinging that jump rope thing that goes on one leg around, and then Ryan had felt it was unsafe.
• Mom: Was he hit by it or something?
• Jean: No, he wasn’t. He just was getting like uncomfortable. He was there first too. Liam just comes up swinging into his space.
• Mom: Right. Okay. Less than two meters?
• Jean: Yeah.
• Mom: Ryan needs the space, like his own bubble. Would you say people are coming in Ryan’s bubble, or is Ryan getting too close to people?
• Jean: They’re coming way too close! Like he’s just minding his business and they come over.
• Mom: Like to initiate play or to bug Ryan?
• Jean: I don’t know.

Jean confirmed Robin’s account precisely: Robin occupied space first, Liam entered that space swinging equipment within two meters of Robin’s face, Robin communicated discomfort, the situation escalated. Peers come into Robin’s space repeatedly while Robin minds his business, and Jean witnesses this pattern across multiple incidents spanning years, intervening when possible, recruiting other children like Owen to help protect Robin from the bullying that began in kindergarten and continued unchanged.

The violence of self-regulation frameworks

The school’s incident reports never mentioned that Liam swung equipment in Robin’s face after Robin asked him to stop, never mentioned that Marcus kicked soccer balls at Robin’s stomach twice in succession, never mentioned that Amalie poked Robin with sticks and gave Robin a bloody nose and called Robin gay. The reports documented only Robin’s biting, framed as unprovoked aggression emerging from poor self-regulation skills requiring intensive behavioural intervention.

All this happened when he apparently had ‘bell-to-bell’ supervision. So, something doesn’t add up and either supervision staff think bullying is OK, think Robin deserves it, or aren’t supervising.

Self-regulation frameworks position disabled children’s defensive responses as the problem requiring correction while treating peer aggression as normal developmental behaviour disabled children must learn to tolerate without reaction. Schools teach disabled children that experiencing violence constitutes an expected feature of school environments, that defending against violence produces consequences while perpetrating violence does not, that survival requires accepting harm without resistance because resistance reveals pathology.

Robin internalised this lesson completely—when I asked whether the biting reflected regret or justified defence, Robin answered both, carrying the impossible cognitive load of simultaneously knowing peers deserved defensive response while believing Robin’s responses made Robin bad, made everyone hate Robin, made Robin the problem requiring management.

The political stakes of whose behaviour requires management

Schools frame peer aggression against disabled children as opportunities for disabled children to develop better coping strategies while framing disabled children’s defensive responses as evidence of dangerous pathology requiring intensive intervention. This asymmetry serves institutional efficiency by placing the burden of behavioural modification on the disabled child rather than addressing the environmental conditions creating the necessity for defence.

If schools addressed peer behaviours targeting Robin—if they taught Liam that swinging equipment in someone’s face after being asked to stop constitutes harassment, if they responded to Amalie’s pattern of physical violence and verbal abuse, if they recognised that kicking soccer balls at the same child’s stomach repeatedly represents intentional harm rather than accidental contact—they would need to acknowledge that Robin’s defensive responses emerged from legitimate threat rather than pathological aggression.

This acknowledgment would require environmental modification, peer education, adult supervision focused on preventing violence rather than documenting disabled children’s responses to violence, the sustained institutional labor schools avoid by positioning disabled children as the problem requiring removal.

Robin loves school, loves being outside, lists six close friends, wants to play Pokemon cards with Emma, prefers not to have big reactions that make Robin feel bad—and simultaneously believes everyone hates Robin because the school engineered that belief through collective punishment, peer alienation, and the constant message that Robin’s presence and Robin’s needs and Robin’s defensive responses cost other children their playground access, their sense of safety, their freedom from disruption.