So, you’re taking the leap, brave ones. Despite what your friends may be doing, despite the cultural norms, despite what the media is trying to sell you. You are choosing to take responsibility for your child’s learning. Adopting them out 5 days a week to the schooling system would, in many ways, be so much easier. And hey, who knows? One day your child might ask to go in that direction. And that will be their choice. But right now, you are stepping up.
Scared? Yeah. All the great change-makers were. But, being a parent, you’ve probably heard someone say by now, that bravery isn’t the absence of fear, but feeling your fear and moving forward anyway. It’s often at this point that, to assuage our fear and prove to everyone, ourselves included, that we are capable of this seemingly mammoth task, that we dive into setting up some control structures. OK, what do my kids need to learn and when do they need to learn it by? Schedules, spreadsheets, curriculum, stationery, a study space, enrol for extracurricular activities. Can you already feel the anxiety building? I can, just writing this. And you’re planning to keep all this up for how long? But it’s OK, because you’re doing this for your family, and for them, you have to make sacrifices, right?
What about you, though? You’re the one holding this grand plan together. What if you keep giving and giving and then, one day, you have nothing left? Don’t you deserve a life too? Dreams? Friends? Time for self-nurture?
These are the secret questions that often lie buried for the homelearning mama. You can already hear the neigh-sayers responding with, “Yeah, well, it was your crazy choice so suck it up lady.” Right? So you just tuck it away. Push it down. Choosing to be different and vulnerable at the same time can seem like too much pain to handle. Just thinking about it makes me cry. Why does choosing to do things differently from others have to hurt so much? You can get really good at bravado, putting on a confident front and “schooling” yourself with quick responses to those questioning you.
Being different. And being vulnerable.
So I ask again, what about you? Being that single person in a role that was once shared by a village. Back when the world was smaller, more kind and more connected. How do you have your needs met?
The answer: BE VULNERABLE.
YOU DO NOT HAVE TO DO IT ALL ON YOUR OWN, despite the story you may have told yourself.