All The Reasons Why...And Then Some

Looking back through my posts I realize that I've never posted about the reasons why we've chosen to homeschool our kids. Truthfully, Josh and I had always planned to homeschool. My parents had wanted to homeschool me and my brother but back then they couldn't afford it and private school was out of the question. Josh was homeschooled himself through high school and had also attended private Christian schools off and on through his schooling years. We did a lot of praying and discussing and we both felt the same, we felt the Lord leading us to homeschool. I apologize for the length of this, we went through a lot before we finally opened our eyes to the wisdom of homeschooling our kids.

Then the big whammy that life threw into the mix, Joey having down syndrome and Jaysen having autism. We honestly thought that we couldn't homeschool, that they had to go to public school. It really wasn't that bad at first. Through preschool and the first couple years of elementary school, Joey had excellent teachers who were truly the cream of the crop. The kind that adore their students and love their jobs. Things went downhill with the next teacher, one who did not care for the students and was not interested in truly educating a group of special education kids. Joey went from the star student to the class troublemaker. Joey was accused of being uncooperative, mean, aggressive with other students and even accused of inappropriately touching another student (it was determined later that it wasn't true). It didn't help, either, that the school cooks weren't as careful with his dietary restrictions as they were required to be and Joey was eating a lot of stuff that made him sick. The final straw came when Joey had a potty accident and the staff left him in the bathroom for more than 30 mins without checking on him and carried on with the rest of class. We brought Joey home and never looked back. We have spent many a day wondering if the problems Joey experienced with that teacher were due to Joey truly being a problem or if it was the teacher. Our instincts told us it was the teacher but we couldn't prove it. We've since talked with another mom who had a child in that class and she had the same experience with her daughter as we had with Joey. Lesson learned: trust your instincts.

Jaysen unfortunately had a less than positive experience at first thanks to a set of dreadful Head Start teachers who refused to give him the help he needed and fought us as we sought to find out the correct diagnosis for Jaysen's issues (at the time we thought it was ADHD only to find out it was very much more). When Jaysen was recommended to spend a third year in preschool, things began to get better thanks to a wonderful teacher and staff. That following summer Jaysen was diagnosed properly with autism and was then referred to an inclusive kindergarten program designed specifically for children with autism. His kindergarten teacher was AMAZING!!!! She fought hard to get Jaysen into the right class when he went to 1st grade and helped us get set up with a fantastic teacher that Jaysen would have for two years. But that 2nd grade year was not fun. Jaysen came home from school in tears many times, the friend he thought he had betrayed him and teamed up with another boy to tease and bully Jaysen, other kids were bullying Jaysen and by the end of that school year, Jaysen was so miserable that he begged us to never make him go back. I had wanted to pull Jaysen sooner but Josh felt Jaysen needed to stick it out. Even on Jaysen's worst day of homeschool, he still has no desire to go back to public school. I know in my heart that if Jaysen had continued in public school the bullying would've turned physical and I don't want to even think what may have happened.

One of the things I had always disliked about sending the boys to public school was feeling I had no control over their lives and I had no idea what was going on. Up until they started preschool, I had been so involved in all their therapies and appointments and such. I knew everything that was happening and what it took to deal with each individual issue. Once they were in school, I knew nothing. Nobody would really answer my questions with much detail and every summer I would ask for lists from the therapists of things to do with the boys over the summer to keep up their progress; nobody ever provided a single list. More and more I felt like I was losing my children and I could nothing about it. The nagging and tugging at my heart continued until I finally listened and realized what it was; the Lord. When Josh and I sat back and listened to Him, we finally heard what He had been saying all along. We could homeschool and we should homeschool and God would open all the doors we needed to make it happen.

One of our biggest worries was how would the boys continue to get the therapies they needed. We couldn't afford to pay out of pocket and the state insurance wouldn't cover much. We found out that in our state, public schools are required to provide any and all theraputic services that children need regardless of whether or not they are enrolled in public school. That was good, but Josh and I really did not want to have anything to do with the schools at all if we could help it. Then God opened another door when our daughter was 15 months old. Katie hadn't met her speech milestones and the doctor referred her to a pediatric speech therapy practice. We talked with the staff and to our suprise they accepted the insurance for all 3 kids, so therapy problem solved!! A simple referral from the doctor and we had that fixed. Joey had actually been graduated out of 1-on-1 physical therapy at school, his gross motor skills were right on target for his age and the school therapist felt he no longer needed help and could continue in a group P.E. with just a few adaptations. Of course, with homeschooling, we can easily accomodate all his adaptations and he also participates in a baseball league just for kids with mental/physical disabilities. His fine motor skills still need some work but that is easily worked on at home with some good books and tips from the internet plus the different techniques we learned over the years.

With the exception of a few things here and there, nearly all of Joey's behavior issues have disapeared. We still have a problem with the habit he learned with his last teacher of "playing stupid" when he doesn't want to learn but he's figuring out quickly that if he doesn't do his lessons then he's in big trouble. Both boys have improved so much with being homeschooled and we are really proud of how hard they work. Katie is our only one who will be homeschooled from the start and she's doing well, although she has some cognitive delays as well as her speech delay but the beauty of homeschool is we can work with her issues and help her more.

Homeschooling the kids is anything but easy. But I will take a bad day of homeschool over a day of either of the boys coming home from school in tears any day of the week.

Why can't he find a friend?

Joey is our precious little man. He is a joy to be around, he makes everyone around him smile and it's hard to stay in a bad mood when he goes through the house singing as loud as he can. He has had kids in his Royal Ranger class say that Joey is a cool kid and last week had everyone singing a rousing chorus of "Kumbaya".

And yet, Joey isn't totally accepted. He's still left out of a lot of things. I know it shouldn't be a suprise anymore, but it still hurts when he doesn't get invited to birthday parties or playdates or anything. This past Sunday, once again, one of the boys in his class at church had a birthday party and, once again, Joey wasn't invited. It stung just a little, but I'm trying to learn to expect it. What I didn't expect was to see in pictures that were posted on Facebook that nearly all the other boys in the class had been invited...except for Joey. That slammed into my heart like a spike.

I don't know what quite hurt more, that Joey hadn't been invited or that the parents didn't think I would notice the fact that the other boys were there. Despite the appearance at church that Joey is accepted and welcome, outside of church it's another story. Yes, Joey doesn't do very well in large and noisy crowds. But he is getting better and I'd like to see him be given the opportunity to try to attend things instead of automatically getting shut out.

It honestly would hurt less if people would approach us about it and say "we know Joey isn't comfortable in noisy crowds and we're afraid he wouldn't enjoy himself" and give us the opportunity to say "thank you for considering that". And it's true what Josh says, I don't want Joey to be invited because people think they have to. Pity invites are worse than just being cut out to begin with. I don't want Joey invited unless people really want him to be there.

Yet it still hurts. It hurts to the very core of me. While I do believe Joey feels it as he does ask sometimes why he doesn't have a friend, I think Joey has a skill to just go with the flow and move on. He has much more wisdom than his mommy does. Who wants to be somewhere if they aren't wanted? What fun is there in that?

But my heart still is broken that we have yet to find anyone who truly enjoys Joey and wants to be friends with him. My prayer is that one day he will find a friend. Someday.

Relaxing with a visit to the library

If there's one thing that makes us different from other homeschoolers it's that we don't visit the library as often as we probably should. We're so busy with work and church and just life in general, we don't schedule in library time as much as we should. I don't want to think how long it's been since our last visit, but I made a point of going today. I took Jay with me while Josh stayed home with the other two kiddos (Katie was napping and Joey wasn't interested in going). I don't always get an opportunity to do things with each of the kids so I snap up the opportunities.

Jay and I had a great time. I quickly got the books I was looking for so he would have more time to look for himself and not have to be bored waiting on mom. He had his heart set on finding a book he could read by himself and a book that would be "fun".  But, this trip to the library wasn't going too well, the poor kid was getting pretty frustrated and overwhelmed by the selection. He was already dissapointed that someone had already checked out all the Lego books and movies.

I suggested that we try to find something new we'd never heard of before. He wasn't too wild about that idea, he's pretty rigid about things (to be expected with a child with autism). I shared with him how I looked for new books when I was his age. That I would go through the rows, pick out a random book and try it out. I found many wonderful suprise favorites that way. So I did just that, grabbed up a random book and handed it to him. This particular book was one of a series of books, each about a different member of the Knights of the Round Table. Jay still wasn't too sure, especially that this particular one I picked up wasn't the first of the series. We found where the others were, the first one was checked out but the second one was on the shelf. I picked it up, handed it to Jay and suggested he sit down and look through it while I went to grab a book I needed that I forgot. He shrugged his shoulders and went to the reading area. My hope was that after he took a look at it he might get interested in it.

It worked! When I got back I asked him what he thought. He said "well, I like the pictures and it's not a really big book and I know some of the words". I asked him if he thought he'd like to try it and he said he would. I reminded him that if he didn't like it he simply had to bring it back and get something else. Then he said "I think I'll probably like it. I like knights and stuff." Good job kiddo!

I'm working on getting Jay to broaden his interests in books and not stick to the usual super heros and Lego themed choices. For one, there's not that many options in our library system for those and two, I really want him to see how large a world there is in books. Since he started working with the McGuffey readers, his reading has improved big time and he's becomming more confident and excited about reading. I want to cultivate that new found love of reading and open his eyes to just how fun and amazing reading can be, especially if you step away from the "safe zone" and explore something new. He made a first step today.

Away to camp he goes...what are we thinking!?!

Jaysen is gearing up to go to his first ever sleep away camp on Wednesday with his Royal Rangers outpost. He is so excited! Right now, he is making himself a chart to mark off the last few days before camp. He's almost ready, just have to finish washing some clothes and packing his gear.

Am I ready? Not so much. I am scared to death that this is the worst possible thing we can do. I know Jaysen is in good hands, his outpost commander is a great guy who cares about these kids a lot. I'm worried for Jaysen. I'm worried that he will have major behavioral issues. I'm worried that he won't make it through one day before he's begging to come home or we get a call from the grown-ups begging us to come get him.

I know I just have to pray and have faith that he will be fine and will have the time of his life. Like my mom says, he can't keep going through life getting disapointed and left out at every turn. He has to have a chance to try.

So here we go, God! I am putting him in your loving Hands and trusting You to help him be the brave and awesome kid I know he is.