Scott’s dad contacted The Wave for advice following a school exclusion and several police and community matters. Scott had been excluded from several schools in a short period and had not settled into online learning. School had reported a suspicion of teenage alcohol use.

During our assessment, Scott seemed pleased to be leaving the problems behind and to have a fresh start. Scott was sporty and interested in many of the program elements in our Primary Treatment. 

Scott had a difficult initial period in treatment. Disregard for social norms and rules had become a standard pattern of behaviour for Scott and living within a bright and challenging community was tricky. Scott was gently challenged by his peers, with many of them having been through similar difficulties with perceived authority. 

Scott joined the social skills group, led by Kaartick and Eslam and made really great progress within the smaller setting of this group. He began to hand in his independent work and found himself in less altercations. Scott found a desire to take part in short courses with a small number of university credits and took great pride in his work. 

Scott was also able to work with Dr Rasyid to look for medications that assisted with his impulsivity and that in turn helped with the rule breaking. He was found to meet the criteria for dyspraxia and ADHD, together with substance use disorder (SUD). By working through his early life story and bullying, we were able to look at the lifetime trauma and begin adolescent EMDR. 

Following his time at The Wave, Scott joined a Forest School with Adventure Program to complete his final years in formal education.