When Should I Allow My Child to Stay Home from School?

Maybe it's a dreaded question, or maybe you're used to it by now: "Can I stay home today?"

Some parents struggle to answer this question, especially if their child has a history of trying to avoid attending school. Other parents don't see staying home as a big deal. What's the harm in a day off every now and again?

Unfortunately, there can be a good deal of harm depending on the "why" behind your child's desire to stay home. If your child is staying home because of anxiety, each time they stay home, they learn that it is safer there, that they are right in thinking that whatever challenge awaits them at school is insurmountable.

We also know that avoiding school snowballs very quickly. It starts as one day here and there, and quickly becomes twice, even three times per week. I've seen some children stay out of school for months at a time. This was never their goal, but each day spent out of school makes it that much harder to return. Not only does the initial anxiety worsen, but it is accompanied by new anxieties like, "What am I going to tell people about why I've been out so much," "Are my teachers going to be mad at me," and "Oh my god, I'm so behind on work."

I want to keep you and your child out of that situation. So, let's start by helping you to streamline the decision-making process. Here are three reasons your child should stay home from school:

There's tangible evidence of illness.

We're talking fever, vomiting, diarrhea. Obvious signs that your child is ill. It's not uncommon for anxious kids to feel nauseous. It's less common for them to actually vomit. It's not impossible, though. If your child typically vomits when anxious, you'll want to look out for more frequent vomiting than usual or other changes in nausea or vomit patterns.

This may take some information gathering. If your kid is vomiting because they are anxious about school, we would expect that they would start to feel less nauseous as soon as they know they will be allowed to stay home. The good news is that, when they attend school, we also expect them to feel less nauseous as the school day progresses. If your kid has the stomach flu, there's nothing that will keep the vomit at bay.

They have positive test results.

The bad kind. If your child has tested positive for a communicable illness -- think COVID, strep throat, the flu -- please do not send them to school!

You have a pre-existing mental health day policy.

A mental health day policy should be developed at the start of the school year. Number of allowable days should be clearly outlined--you may want to write it down somewhere where everyone can see it. Certainly we want you to track these days, so everyone in the house can remember how many have been taken at any given point.

I suggest no more than 1-2 mental health days per semester. When developing your family's mental health day policy, don't forget to consider what will actually work for you, especially if your child is not old enough to stay home alone. For a younger child, you may need to specify which days of the week can be used as mental health days and how much notice you will need to be able to grant them one.

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, your child will end up staying home. Here's what we want those days to look like:

If your ill child is staying home:

• Determine if a doctor's appointment and prescription medication is necessary, or if they can rest at home with OTC meds.

• The majority of the day should be spent resting without entertainment.

• Rest should continue outside of school hours. If they are ill, they should not be hanging out with friends! We want them to be able to return to all of their typical activities ASAP.

If your anxious child is staying home:

• Your child should wake up on time for school and get dressed for the day. We want to simulate a typical day as much as possible.

• In the spirit of simulating a typical day...we want your child to complete school assignments. Remember: anxious children who fall behind on schoolwork often feel even more anxious about returning to school.

• No access to any entertainment throughout the day. This includes futzing around online, social media, and television.

• No access to you during school hours. Sometimes anxious children stay home because they want to be around their parent. There may be many reasons for this, and we want to address those; however, we don't want to send your child the message that they'll get to hang out with you all day if they stay home.

Thinking about enrolling your child in therapy?

I provide therapy for tweens, teens, and young adults who struggle with anxiety, intense emotions, and substance use. Learn more about my approach to treatment, and schedule a consult call to see if I am a good fit to work with your family.