Emotionally Based School Avoidance: You Are Not Alone
- Jessica Narowlansky
- 5 days ago
- 5 min read
Updated: 3 days ago
As we move to the mid-point of the school year, I have been thinking about the many parents who are finding mornings increasingly difficult. Some are facing tears, panic, or sudden immobility; others are navigating quieter forms of distress that make it impossible for a child or teenager to walk through the school gates. For parents of neurodivergent children in particular, these moments often carry layers that are not easily seen: the cumulative weight of masking, sensory overload, friendship ruptures, or the daily effort of trying to feel safe in an environment that does not always make safety easy.
This piece is not intended as a guide, nor as a list of steps to follow. It is simply an offering — a clear message to parents that they are not alone, and that the isolation of this experience is more common than it appears.
When a child begins to avoid school, the behaviour is often misread as oppositional. Yet what may appear rooted in defiance is rarely defiance at all. It is more often an expression of fear, overwhelm, or a sense that the demands of the day exceed the child’s current capacity. Emotionally Based School Avoidance (EBSA) is best understood as a message from the nervous system: something in the child’s world has become too difficult to manage, and they signal this in the only way available to them. Children express strain somatically or behaviourally long before they can articulate it in words. Morning panic, tears, stomach aches, or sudden immobility are often attempts to communicate distress rather than exert control.
For neurodivergent young people, the pressures of school are often intensified by the sheer cognitive and sensory effort required to get through the day. The noise, pace, and unpredictability of the school environment can accumulate quietly until the load becomes too much to carry. Many are also navigating subtler forms of strain: shifts in friendships, academic demands, or a gradual sense of not quite fitting in. For teenagers in particular, already balancing a rapidly changing internal world, these pressures can become overwhelming at remarkable speed.
A helpful starting point for parents is to step away from the fight for control and move towards a position of understanding, as difficult as that may be. Rather than asking, “How do I stop this?”, it can be more revealing to wonder, “What does my child believe this behaviour is protecting them from?”
What looks like refusal is often a child’s best attempt to manage something that feels unmanageable. For some, this may be a matter of perception; for others, it may reflect genuine difficulty in the wider school system, the peer group, or the relational environment they are trying to navigate. Whatever the cause, approaching the situation with curiosity rather than fear allows the child’s experience to come into view.
If parents can approach their child from a calmer place (easier said than done I know), the defensive system is more likely to soften. The child senses that they are not being pushed faster than they can cope, and that their experience is being taken seriously rather than dismissed. Validation does not mean endorsing a belief you do not share; it means showing your child that you understand the emotional logic of their point of view. This does not mean agreeing that school is optional, but it does mean making clear that their distress is intelligible, that you will help them decode it, and that they are not expected to shoulder it alone.
A sustainable return to school is rarely achieved through pressure. It is shaped through steadiness, collaboration, and a plan that acknowledges the child’s actual capacity. For some, this may involve shorter days, fewer transitions, or beginning with subjects or adults that feel safest. For others, it may require adjustments around sensory load or the creation of predictable routines. What matters is not speed, but the child’s sense that the adults around them are working with their nervous system rather than against it.
The partnership with the school is crucial. In most cases the school will take the lead, as they have the clearest understanding of what they can and cannot provide. Teachers and pastoral staff play a central role in creating an environment where the child can feel safe enough to attempt small steps of re-engagement. This requires the school to see refusal as communication rather than defiance, and to ensure that there is a strong relational connection between the young person and at least one trusted adult. Ideally, this recognition sits at a whole-school level, so the child is not held within a narrow behavioural narrative that leaves them feeling misunderstood or exposed.
Where difficulties arise in the wider social system — tensions in the peer group, friendship ruptures, or dynamics that place a young person on the edges of the community — it is essential that the child avoiding school does not become the sole point of focus. If the wider social ecology is contributing to their distress, those areas must also be addressed. Otherwise, the young person may be left with the impression that they are ‘the problem’, when their behaviour may in fact be a reasonable response to relational conditions that have not yet been fully understood.
Parents often feel as though they have failed when their child refuses school. It can be helpful to remember that EBSA arises from a complex interplay of factors — within the child, the family system, the school environment, and the broader developmental context. It is not a straightforward reflection of parental competence. Your role is not to carry your child across the threshold, but to remain a steady bridge, helping them trust that the world on the other side of the morning distress may not be as unsafe as it currently feels.
Progress is often far less obvious than one might expect, and it tends to reveal itself in quiet, nuanced ways. A shorter period of distress, a tentative willingness to return, or even the wish to reconnect with friends can all signal the beginnings of an internal shift.
These moments matter.
They are small signs that something is softening and reorganising beneath the surface. As with the healing of any wound, the surface may appear stronger before the deeper layers have had the time they need to repair. Care, time, and attention are what allow the healing to hold. Where other professionals are involved, their insights are often invaluable. But when the reasons for refusal remain unclear, an exploration with a mental health professional or educational psychologist can offer a broader understanding of what the child has been carrying and help ensure that whatever sits beneath the behaviour is being thought about with care.
Above all, EBSA is not something to be solved through force. It is a call to see a young person more clearly. With relational steadiness, thoughtful adjustments, and collaboration between home and school, many children begin to recover their capacity to attend. They learn, over time, that their voice is heard, that their needs are taken seriously, and that adults can help them find pathways through overwhelm rather than deny its existence.
School refusal is, at its heart, an expression of a search for safety. When adults respond with empathy, structure, and an openness to understanding, that sense of safety may begin to feel possible again.
Resources for parents and schools:
