Machita Denny will not forget easily the day when she was asked to collect her “disruptive” son from school. There had been another incident in the classroom in which Jack, then 10, had failed to cope.

When she got there she learnt that a senior teacher had told pupils they should tell their parents this boy was ruining their lessons. On the way home Jack was crying that no one would now want to go to his birthday party. “He was breaking his heart,” she said. “I think that was the point when we decided we’d had enough.”

Jack has Asperger’s syndrome, which was known to the school and confirmed in a statement of special educational needs. But, as Mrs Denny and her husband, Terry, discovered, getting a diagnosis of autism does not guarantee that children will get all the support, or understanding, that they need at school.

For years after Jack, now 14, had autism diagnosed, they felt that they were in an uphill battle for him. Mrs Denny, from Stone, Staffordshire, was asked to take him home from school so many times that she had to give up her job as a nurse. Mr Denny, then a policeman, switched to working for BT so that he would not have to do shifts. The financial implications were huge but they had no choice.

The Dennys know that getting the right educational support is crucial to the functioning of any family with an autistic child, which is why Mrs Denny is chairman of the Jigsaw Group in Staffordshire, a support network for people with Asperger’s syndrome or high-functioning autism, which in turn is supported by TreeHouse, the charity for autism education supported by The Times in this year’s appeal.

Linda Redford, the director of development at TreeHouse, said that the experience of the family is all too common. “TreeHouse receives hundreds of phone calls and e-mails every year from parents and carers of children with autism. Most of the time they are seeking our advice because they are desperately trying to secure the appropriate education for their children. Their children’s autism is often mistaken for disobedience at school, resulting in their exclusion, leaving the parent unable to work.”

Mrs Denny said that there was support for autistic children within mainstream schools but it was often the luck of the draw. “The schools decide how to spend their budgets. You just have to hope the school will take on the difficulty,” she said.

Jack, who has a twin, Tom, who is not autistic, started to manifest problems when he was 6, but they think that the pressure of Year 2 tipped him over the edge. Mrs Denny was constantly being told by teachers about his behaviour. When Asperger’s was diagnosed at age 7 she believes that the school had already judged him. He was a “naughty boy”.

Without the support of Celia Churchill and the Autism Spectrum Disorder team, she said that they would have been lost. The couple learnt that they might have to say something 200 times to Jack before getting a response.

The incident with the senior teacher was the turning point for the family. Jack’s self-esteem was at rock bottom so they set about getting him into a special school. This is not always easy. Parents must argue convincingly why the mainstream school cannot meet the needs of the child. But their work paid off and, despite occasional hiccups, Jack is flourishing and studying for his GCSEs. “We are very proud of Jack: he is so loving and has a great insight and understanding into himself and Asperger’s. But if I had known what I know now I would never have let Jack go through all that distress in mainstream school and I wouldn’t have messed about begging to teachers for help”, Mrs Denny said.

The reward for their hard work is that Jack is no longer unhappy. He told his grandmother recently: “I know I’m happy because it's a different feeling than I’ve ever had before.”

The Pears Foundation will match every donation to TreeHouse made by Times readers, pound for pound.