# @juleswaller_ on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/DcpXR6PE0r_
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/69794029-juleswaller-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/8b9a05178a.jpg
- **Posted:** 2026-08-30T01:46:01.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** Julie Waller (Jules) | School Refusal Support (@juleswaller_) — https://gondola.cc/juleswaller_

## Caption

There was a year my daughter missed over 100 days of school.

Not 100 days of “she didn’t feel like it.” 
100 days of a nervous system so overwhelmed it couldn’t get her through the front door - even on the mornings she wanted to go.

And the hardest part wasn’t the missed days themselves. 
It was the pattern I couldn’t make sense of at the time: a good morning, a calm stretch, even a whole good day - and then by evening, she’d fall apart. 

Worse than before.

I used to think that meant we were losing ground.
It took me a long time - and a lot of learning, both professionally and as her mum - to understand what was actually happening. 

Calm wasn’t the goal her nervous system trusted yet. 
It was still safer, to her body, to expect the alarm. 
So it kept pulling her back to what it knew.

That’s not failure. 
That’s a nervous system that hasn’t learned yet that calm is somewhere safe to stay.

It learns slowly. 
Through repetition, not intensity. 
Hundreds of small, quiet moments - not one big breakthrough.

I won’t pretend I knew that in the moment. 
I didn’t. 
I just kept showing up, one day at a time, even the days that didn’t go anywhere (& there were so many).

She’s not that little girl on the school run anymore. 
She’s doing the degree she chose, and she’s thriving.

If you’re in the middle of it right now - the good day, the 6pm crash, the wondering if you’re going backwards - I need you to hear this: you’re not. 

This is what the road through it actually looks like. 
And there is a way through.

Comment TOOLKIT and I’ll send you the full picture.
We got through.  And you can too.

With hope,

Jules ❤️

#schoolrefusal #schoolanxiety #schoolstress #kidsmentalhealth #teenmentalhealth

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## Tags

schoolrefusal, schoolanxiety, schoolstress, teenmentalhealth, kidsmentalhealth

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