Why doesn't he want to go to school?

Q: my son is a 2nd grader in regular education with a shared aid. he receives support from an itinerant teacher, and in general is having a good year. this week (mon) he developed a cold, and i kept him home from school. the next day (tues) he was well enough to go to school, but wanted to stay home because he said he felt like he was going to throw up. i kept him home again, and told him he had to go to school the next day. the next day i told him i would be available to get him if he needed me to get him. the teacher indicated that although he complained of feeling sick, he did his work. he went to the nurse, but she sent him back to the classroom. he still insists he should stay home from school. i am trying to talk to him and figure out what is the cause of feeling sick. (i.e. the school work, a bully, etc.) there doesn't appear to be anything going on. what can i do to help him get over this? how can i help him resolve the problem? i am very patient and calm with him as he can be a sensitive child. thank you for your help.
sincerely, virginia (mom to neil who is almost 9)

A: Well, before I answer as an Aspie, I feel like I ought to answer as a person with a heart condition that took years to diagnose. I spent four years as a kid who didn't want to go to school, and until I had an episode of ventricular tachycardia, I was diagnosed with "habit cough," a psychosomatic condition. I spent months with a psychologist trying to find "repressed emotions" that could be causing it, and meanwhile I couldn't get my doctors to care that I had a resting pulse of 125. So please keep in mind that there are a lot of actual illnesses out there that are very difficult to diagnose and can look a lot like a kid who just doesn't want to go to school. Particularly if he's complaining about his stomach, you might want to look into some of the food sensivities and intolerances common to those on the autism spectrum.

That being said, sometimes the problem is that the kid doesn't want to go to school. Even if there isn't anything in particular going wrong at school, school is an annoying place when you're on the spectrum. There are a lot of rules that don't make any sense (I used to get in trouble for reading on the playground,) they never spend enough time on the interesting subjects, and you're surrounded by neurotypical kids, who are quite frankly really weird. If there's anything you can do to make school more interesting for him, like convincing his teacher to let him work on a project about one of his special interests, or finding him some Aspie/HFA friends who weren't as confusing as the NT kids, it might go a long way towards reducing his reluctance about going to school.

Wiley