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What to do on a refusal morning

By the time a child is on the floor by the front door, the useful decisions have already been made or missed.

Nothing on a bad morning is going to fix the pattern, and trying to make it do so usually costs an hour and ends the same way. The aim on the day is narrow: get the smallest true version of the step done, keep the relationship intact, and write down what happened.

On the morning

• Name the smallest version out loud and offer it. Not the whole day. The car, the parking lot, the front office, one class.
• Keep the offer concrete and time-bound. "Ten minutes in the office, then we decide" is easier to accept than "just try".
• Do not argue about whether the fear is reasonable. That argument has never once been won before 8am.
• Avoid stacking consequences on top of a panic. They do not register, and they get remembered afterwards.
• If the day ends at home, keep home boring. Not as punishment; because a good day at home is a strong argument for the next one.

Afterwards, the same day

Write down what was attempted, what your child actually managed, and what the rating was at the worst point. Two lines is enough. This record is the thing a clinician or a school will ask for and the thing nobody has when they arrive.

Before the next one

If the same step failed twice, it is too big. Split it. The version that works is often embarrassingly small compared to the version you started with, and that is fine, because the size of the first step has nothing to do with where the ladder ends.