I felt a tap on the shoulder at school pick up

'Can I have a word Mrs McGill?'

My heart sank.

In these situations you know it can only be bad news and you immediately start to doubt your parenting abilities and blame yourself for whatever your child has got up to.

My son Nico's teacher told me he had been rude and spoken back to her when he was being reprimanded for 'bullying' a boy in his class.

I was mortified and really upset with Nico.

On the way home he refused to talk to me about it.

He was sullen and bolshy.

He pushed past me when we got to the front door.

He then refused to do his homework and picked on his siblings.

My patience was really being tried by this point until I remembered my mantra

‘Look behind the misbehaviour’

At bedtime I lay beside him on his bed whilst we stared into the darkness.

I breathed slowly and said simply

“It sounds like you feel blamed for something you didn’t mean to do…”

He started off with a rant...