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The story
An article in which a psychiatrist explains that children who can’t wake up in the morning and end up refusing school aren’t simply “skipping” out of laziness or attitude problems went viral on 5ch. In the thread, harsh opinions like “you should wake them up even if it takes a smack” collided head-on with responses citing medical conditions such as orthostatic dysregulation. Many replies also voiced anxiety about the road to higher education and employment that awaits kids who stop attending school, splitting the thread between optimists who point to the spread of correspondence high schools and remote work as expanding options, and pessimists who argue these kids will struggle once they enter society.
What people said
Simply unable to get up, no matter what. Their body won't move when it's time to leave for school. Watching their own child like this, plenty of parents end up thinking, "Are they just being lazy?" or "Is this just an attitude problem?"
We spoke with Dr. Etsuko Ando — director of Hibiki Kokoro Clinic in Ashiya City, Hyogo Prefecture, a psychiatrist certified by the Japanese Board of Medical Specialties, and a certified children's mental health specialist through the Children's Mental Health Specialist Organization — about how to approach a child's school refusal.
Maybe have a kid of your own first.
I actually agree with this take, but these days there are more correspondence high schools and universities, so even kids who missed elementary or middle school can move on to further education more easily. It's starting to make me wonder — is there a future where you can go all the way to landing a job without ever leaving your room?
With remote work on the rise, maybe that's possible if you're an IT vocational-school graduate.
People with that kind of background trip up in job hunting. Even if they get lucky and land a job, they usually can't hold a proper conversation and it falls apart.
When a person stands up, gravity pulls blood down into the lower body, reducing the amount that returns to the heart through the veins and causing blood pressure to drop. To counter this, the sympathetic nervous system — part of the autonomic nervous system — normally kicks in, constricting blood vessels in the lower body to push more blood back to the heart and keep blood pressure stable. But when the autonomic nervous system isn't functioning properly, this mechanism fails, blood pressure drops, blood flow to the brain decreases, and a wide range of symptoms appear as a result.
You can dress it up with plausible-sounding explanations, but their autonomic nervous system is out of whack because they're not living on a regular schedule. They're just not sleeping at night because of their phone and the internet.
Does it make you feel kind of drained? Apparently it can also happen from a lack of salt. Way back, Tamori once said, "Men gotta have high blood pressure, lol" (Tamori, the veteran TV host).
My kid's classmate stopped coming to school because of this. Such a waste — no bullying, no problems with grades or club activities, and yet. Not being able to get up in the morning really does narrow your options for higher education and employment down the line — it has serious consequences.
Still not cured, but remote work has been a lifesaver.
Retirement's coming into view, but as a safety net, I made 300 million yen in stocks.
I had the same symptoms as you, but I got fired before remote work became a thing, my savings ran out, and now I'm completely done for.
Orthostatic Dysregulation
https://www.taisho-kenko.com/disease/611/
An acquaintance's kid also stopped going to school because of orthostatic dysregulation. Luckily my acquaintance isn't the type to buy into the kind of extreme takes you see in this thread, but it does seem frustrating for the kid, not being able to do what they used to.
Is this bait? Kids raised that way only end up on the unemployed-shut-in track. Don't cherry-pick the 0.5% exception who made it and use them to justify mass-producing the 9.5% who end up unemployed shut-ins.
Individuality only means anything within a group — what you're describing is what's called 'a big fish in a puddle thinking it rules the ocean.'
Even if a kid who refused school passes the old high-school equivalency exam, they can't keep up with seminar attendance in college. Even if they somehow scrape by and graduate, job hunting is brutal. Even if they somehow land an offer and get hired, they crash and burn almost immediately.
Then it's either becoming an unemployed shut-in or ending up as a temp worker — and bottom-tier temp work especially is no joke. Several former school-refusal kids have come through my workplace, and honestly, even the way they stand is different, and the way they talk is completely different.
They might end up depressed at work someday. Or maybe they'll turn into a depression-manufacturing machine themselves.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Orthostatic dysregulation (OD) is a condition in which the autonomic nervous system malfunctions, causing dizziness and heart palpitations upon standing, and it’s commonly seen around puberty. As the thread notes, a certain proportion of children who refuse school reportedly have this diagnosis — but because it’s hard to spot from appearance alone, and because kids can stop attending even without an obvious cause like bullying or poor grades, it’s easily mistaken for laziness. The clash in the thread was between those who frame it as a matter of discipline and willpower and those who emphasize the medical circumstances, though both sides shared a common concern for the children’s futures. That said, the anecdotes about what becomes of correspondence-school graduates or former school-refusal kids are based on individual observation, not backed by any statistical data.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (News Speed+) thread “It’s Not That They’re ‘Skipping School’? — Children Who Can’t Wake Up in the Morning, and the Start of School Refusal.”
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