The end of the line....?

I have not posted here for too long, being busy with life, and Aric in particular. A bare bones update, at least, is in order....

* Aric finished out the 2006-2007 school year at St.Marys High, but under serious stress. The situation had deteriorated to the point that he was in poor health, mentally and physically, and a completely different person than the boy who had so the grade school, the one who walked through the high school doors with such hope. Aric had become tense, angry, bitter, and distrustful of nearly all the staff there at SMHS, and nothing could be done to restore the joy he had once had in school. The harassment, the lack of support, and all the rest had taken too much out of him. So we began homeschooling him last September. Keeping him home has done a great deal to restore his health and emotional balance, though not his trust. He is still very bitter and distrustful of the school, while missing very much his friends and the classes whose teachers he did like and trust. But he feels the price is too high, to try to return, and suffer through the misery again of before.

* the school had stated, many times, that they would 'help wean Aric from his pet' in every way that they could. They succeeded in completely destroying Aric's ability to use a service dog. He no longer is able to focus on the cues from his service dog, his concentration and attention is scattered, and without this, he is not able to handle an SD alone and benefit in the same way. The SD who had worked with him in school, Tagg, is now 11 years old, and too old to manage, so we had gone through a great hunt to find a suitable replacement, and were fortunate to find Diego, a young dog who seems to be as Tagg would have been at this age, with all the same talents and sensitivities. But even the best service dog is only a dog, a pet, if the owner is not able to work him. We have had to take the level of Aric's use of an SD down to that of a child, with his father and I handling Diego for him, sending Diego to him when he needs calming, etc. It is a situation of Aric functioning at a lower level than he had previously in many ways. The frightening part of it is that he is now without the assistance and protection of a service dog when he leaves the house. What we are hoping to do is rethink and retool his use of one, to still permit him to use one in his jaunts about town, without our help. But at this time, that is requiring that Diego be retrained, and to look to us for commands, and Aric as his charge, as an autism service dog for a lower functioning child does, and this has been hampered by my own health problems and disabilities. But, please God, it will be solved.

But he will never again attend public school. The illigetimi have won, yet again, and the ADA disobeyed. I feel I have failed my son, and failed every other child who will come after him, who attempts to use a service dog in our area. A dangerous precedent has been set....and who will be able to overcome it?