Update: AITA for not allowing my son to be punished after he refused to do his school presentation?

A Redditor provides an update on the situation with their son, George, who had refused to give a school presentation due to an embarrassing physical issue. After a meeting with the school, the Head of Year was understanding and agreed to cancel the punishment.

The Redditor also discusses their strained relationship with George’s mother, who insists George should face consequences for his actions, while the Redditor believes George should be allowed to make his own decisions about the matter.

The Redditor is unsure whether to support George’s desire to avoid going to his mother’s house or encourage him to spend the week there, as they feel torn about how to handle the situation. Read the full update below to find out how the situation unfolded.

‘ Update: AITA for not allowing my son to be punished after he refused to do his school presentation?’

I wanted to come on and give a little update about how I handled everything with his George and his school and clarify some things as well. I’m writing this on the Sunday, and it’s currently half-term for George so he has a week off school.

Firstly George was never able to give his presentation, which he was really upset about because he had worked so hard on it. But the presentations aren’t “graded.” I think this was a difference between the US and English education system.

We don’t generally have graded projects, at least I never did and neither does George (Also side note but we can’t repeat a year – or “grade” – here). At George’s school he gets his “effort grades” at the end of each term, and he does a mock-GCSE style exam at the end of each year which we get given the results.

But these don’t actually matter they’re just to give insight of how they’re doing and to give practice for his real GCSEs when he’s in Year 11. Onto another thing, many people commented that I should have shown him the old “lift and tuck”, I can tell you he already knows the trick.

His school requires that he wears formal suit-trousers and if anyone has worn those type of trousers before you know you can’t do the lift and tuck effectively and even if you could a large bulge would still be easily noticeable.

Okay, onto what happened with his school. So his Head of Year rang me after school on Tuesday and we arranged a meeting on Wednesday. I told George that he didn’t have to share the details of exactly why he didn’t want to do the presentation unless he felt comfortable sharing it.

I wasn’t going to force it out of him. The class teacher who gave him the after-school detention didn’t come to the meeting. So it was just me, George and his HoY. His HoY is a really decent guy and he has a great relationship with George.

His HoY started with saying he was so shocked when he learnt that George had been given a C3, since it was so unlike him and asked what happened. Like I said George has a great relationship with the HoY, so George started trying to explain.

He didn’t say ‘I had an erection’, he said something along the lines of “something embarrassing was happening with my body and I just couldn’t stand up when [teacher] called me.”

HoY looked slightly puzzled for a brief moment but then I think realised what George was trying to say and said something like “oh no need to explain further, I was a teen once too, I understand.”

I went on to say about how they’re aware he has a history of b**lying, and he struggles with friends and how I felt the teacher could have handled the situation differently. HoY agreed, said he would discuss it with the teacher and he would cancel the C3 for George.

I thanked him and he encouraged George to come to him with any problems in future instead of just getting upset and staying quiet. I thanked him. Now, onto George’s mother, I wish I could say things went as well with her as they did with the school.

I’m honestly not sure what’s up with her, but she isn’t usually like this. A lot of people were commenting that she sounds very unreasonable, in that moment I do agree with you but normally she is not like that and we have a great friendship even though we are not in a romantic relationship anymore.

She ended up ringing George to tell him that she wanted him to go to the C3 whether it had been cancelled or not, George rightfully said that was ridiculous and that he wasn’t going to do that, they both ended up having a huge argument.

She sent me a tirade of messages about how disrespectful I am (I’m not), how I was raising him to be entitled (not true), how he’ll end up in prison because he doesn’t understand consequences (he won’t and he does). I turned off the notifications for her messages and just left her to it.

I am meant to drop the boys off at her house tomorrow for her week with them, but George has said he doesn’t want to go. At this point I am of two minds on whether to support that decision or not.

On one hand I wouldn’t want her to ever encourage either of the boys to not spend their week with me, but on the other hand it should be his choice. I feel like I’m walking on thin ice here and I am honestly not sure how to navigate it.

I could stay out of it completely and just let him make the choice, but maybe encourage him to spend his week with her. Because I think that’s how I would like her to handle it.. I do feel really conflicted..

Let’s dive into the reactions from Reddit:

bowlofweetabix −  Im so glad that the school was reasonable! I would honestly keep George at yours the next week. It would be detrimental to his physical and mental health to send him to his mums right now. Maybe the two of you could meet with someone, a mediator, doctor, anyone to get her to act rationally

AffectionateAgent264 −  I’m so glad the school were reasonable, shame his mother isn’t! If he wants to skip her week and stay with you I think he is old enough to make that decision, but you have more of an idea as to whether that will cause more trouble or give her time to think.

isopodsoup_ −  Ask your ex: “If a girl got her period in class, bled a bit on the front of her pants and needed a little time to hide it. Would you be angry at her if she wanted to do her presentation after a few other children and want her punished?

Or would you be angry at the teacher for refusing to even grade her work because she asked to go a bit later?”. I have a feeling her answer will be VERY different than how she treated your son. Poor kid.

Maybe get your ex to a doctor or therapist she’ll actually give respect when they explain male puberty to her. Or just a crap ton of reputable articles explaining it. Because how many more times is she going to punish him for things he can’t control?

Samarkand457 −  You know, you might want to check if she’s gotten into the sort of online groups that encourage tough love or authoritarian parenting.

It sounds a bit like the sort of situation where someone was a “normal” conservative before suddenly starting to spout off about The Storm and how vaccines are mind control enabled by 5G cellphone signals. Something might have gotten into her mind to cause it to rot.

naranghim −  Listen to your son and don’t encourage or make him go to his mom’s. The reason why is that she is ***still*** hell bent on him being punished when he was dealing with something he truly had no control over. This just drives that point home and I’m bolding it for you:

**This isn’t about him declining to give his presentation anymore, that’s just an excuse. She still thinks his erection was caused by s**ual thoughts, and wants George punished for having those thoughts.

She** ***doesn’t*** **care that there is another explanation. She** ***will*** **find a way to punish him and if he gets a spontaneous erection around her, she** ***will*** **punish him for that as well.**

Equal-Brilliant2640 −  Man she is going to b**ly him all week. Dont do it

Even_Speech570 −  Mom sounds like she’s on a power trip. She doesn’t seem to care WHY George was uncomfortable, doesn’t care that he did nothing wrong, and doesn’t even care that the school AGREED with George in the end. Has she always been like this? Is something going on in her life and it’s spinning out of control?

JocastaH-B −  Could he go to a third party for half term e.g. grandparents, other relative or friend? Then perhaps she won’t think you’re keeping him away from her.

bishopredline −  I think OP really needs to find out what is really going on with his ex. I mean “he’ll end up in prison”. That is not rational. Is it a power play? Is George not listening and saying I’ll go to dad? Or is the woman just a n**case?

xanif −  Tell her you’ll punish him for the erection when she gives a work presentation with period blood stains visible through her clothes.

Do you think the Redditor made the right call in supporting their son’s decision, or should they have insisted on a different course of action? How would you handle this situation with both the school and the co-parenting conflict? Share your thoughts below!