Deja Vu

After a rough week this last week, more of which compounded these feelings for my son on the weekend, today was meant to be a good day for him. Not only did we have a gym visit planned where he would be able to use his new flippers for the first time, but also he was going to a gaming meet up with his friend and to a laser tag arena too.

In my naivety and, perhaps stupidity, I asked my husband to take him to the laser tag arena, sign him in and then meet him at the end, whilst I spent time with our two girls, before us all meeting up at the gaming meet.

All was well- the usual pep talk before he goes anywhere without me went well, he was prepared for the games and went into the arena safely and well supervised. There was little point in anyone staying in the small waiting area once the children went into the arena, so, knowing the organiser had our numbers and could easily contact us if needed, I stayed close-by with my daughters and my husband came to meet us about half way through the laser sessions.

We heard nothing. At the end of the session my husband picked my son up, collected his gaming paraphernalia and we all met at the next event.

After a time, I heard that a complaint had been made about my son. Allegedly he had hit a girl, then this girl had hit him back and was now refusing to go to any more home education meet ups in the future and was distraught. Also, the mother had spoken to the laser arena who had confirmed to her that my son had hit her first and was in the wrong. Again!!

Having learnt from last time this happened, I decided to be more proactive this time. I messaged the mother and apologised if any upset had been caused, but that it had sounded like over-exuberance during the playing of the game.

After all, there were two games played, all by the same group of children, and at no point had anyone come out of the games upset or distressed in any way, other than a younger child in the second game and my son and his friend in the first game.
Oh- wait- my son and his friend were upset? They came out of the game to find a member of staff? Yes, that's what he says and what the staff member says too- that he came out to find the staff member because a girl had been following him around, not listening to the rules about no physical contact and had hit him and kicked him, so he had used his gun to push her arm out of the way when she next came at him. At this point he went to get the lady working in there, who he pointed out the girl to, before returning to the game. Nothing more happened for the rest of the game, apart from them continuing to all shoot eachother, as per the reason for the game.
At the break before the second game, the group organiser reminded everyone present of the rules of it being a non contact game, and they all went in to play game number two.

At the end of game number two everyone went home or to the gaming meet. That was the end of it- we thought.

Since then it has transpired that this mother telephoned the worker at the laser arena and wholly contradicted her own record of events to the extent that the worker was left feeling un-nerved and wrote a report for her manager to read of the whole incident. By the time I had a phonecall back from her this evening she had written this report, offered to read it to me, and it confirmed what my son had been saying- that he didn't hit the girl at all, not to start a fight or to defend himself, that my son and his friend had gone to the worker to let her know he had been hurt by this girl and that she hadn't been following the rules of the game.

My son's name is muddied already due to an adult who should know better, so it takes nothing for people to jump to conclusions when he is potentially involved or just in the general area where anything may have occured. I am beyond disappointed in this girl and mother who have followed mistruths, tried to coerce a worker to confirming their falsehoods and have accused my son of hitting her first, unprovoked and given me all kinds of personal information about the girl's past that I do not want or need to know about. I could equally respond with a sob story of my son's life to date, or tell her that I have spoken to the staff at the game and confirmed what actually happened with them, but what is the point?

Just as the last time this sort of nonsense happened, this parent wants to have a chat after gymnastics the next time we are there. Why? What is the point? They are in the wrong, they are loud and well known here, the girl has lied and hurt my son. If anything I should be the one kicking up a fuss and nonsense about this, but things happen between children and they have to work it out themselves- to a point obviously. If things had been really bad why hadn't the girl come out of the game? Spoken to a member of staff? Not gone into the second game? Been upset or distressed at the end of, or during the first game? None of it makes any sense at all. She is older and bigger than my son, had people there in the waiting room for her, is perfectly able to speak up, so why make up this tale?

To my mind, either she realised she had hurt him and saw him speak to the staff member, therefore knew she was potentially going to be in trouble, especially as the event organiser had spoken to the adult with her at the end of the games, so she may have assumed this was to tell them she had hurt someone in there (that is not what was said though), and to avoid getting into trouble herself, she invented this fallacy to redirect any anger and annoyance from her mother onto my son.....or.......she is a pathological liar and he mother has not realised this........or........they are total nutcases, as we seem to attract these, and need help themselves.

Whichever option it is, I don't care anymore. My son's emotional wellbeing is fragile enough from the last nutcase we encountered and her lies, without anything else adding to it.

As a protective measure for myself- I am barely keeping my own shit together with everything I am constantly dealing with here, without any added complications or attention seekers trying to butt in to my life or that of my children or family- I have unilaterally decided that we will no longer go to any home education meetings or events or activities where there is the possibility of an attention seeking, loud mother deciding that my child has hurt her or her child, when this has not happened. This will severely curtail my children's lives and friendships but is the only way I can see to protect them from these crazy people.

I am under no illusions about my son. I know he can be aggressive, is very competitive, likes to be in control and struggles hugely to take other people's points of view or feelings into consideration, but I also know that he would not attack or hurt someone without provocation and good reason. He has seen enough violence to know the difference. The times he has been violent have been as a result of provocation and him being backed into a corner. He is likely to say something hurtful and then walk away, laugh at people to get away or run away and tell an adult- as he did today- but if he ever did physically hurt someone I know he would tell me- I can always tell when he is lying anyway- he would know I have his back and that I would make him apologise and make things right if he did wrong, and that he can talk to me.

If this had happened the other way around and he had come home after two games, telling me he had been hurt by this older child, my first question would have been what happened before that? then did you tell anyone working there? Did you come out of the game? Why did you feel OK to continue with the second game? Are you sure it was on purpose? and it's done now, just stay away from them and move on. As a mother why would I telephone the place where the game was held to convince a staff member they were wrong in their own account of it? Why would I message the event organiser and not the parent? Why wouldn't I speak to the parent collecting the child at the end of the session? Why wouldn't I ask my child why they seemed happy coming out of the session? It makes no sense to me at all and I cannot deal with people like this. No more.