Recently, I was talking to someone about homeschooling, and I was telling her all the wonderful things about it. I mentioned the freedom our family has with scheduling, the joy my kids get from only doing school for a small portion of our day, the ability we have to pursue whatever actually interests our kids- I could go on and on. I could talk all day long about why we've chosen this way of life, but she hit me with a question I haven't gotten as often as you might expect. She said, "What about it do you really hate though?"
Hm.
I have often said that though we love homeschooling in our family, I would never say that it's something everyone should do. Some days I might even lock myself in my bathroom and cry and wonder if we should even be doing it...
Pssshhhht....No I don't....
On the reals, though, I totally do.
For the sake of fairness, I just thought I'd put together my list of reasons I hate homeschooling just so that if anyone is genuinely considering it, they can have a true account of the not-so-pinteresty side of it from someone who has actually done it.
1. My kids aren't anti-social, but I am. This is a harsh truth about me, but it may not be the case for everyone. I'm pretty anti-social even if you take kids out of my equation, in all fairness, though. You can ask all my tens of friends. I have been so careful to make sure our kids are involved in a church and a co-op and family and anything we can do to get them around people, especially kids, that I have not taken the time to foster relationships with other adults. This bums me out, and it leads me to my second point...
2. Homeschooling can be very lonely. Golly jeepers this is true for me, and from what I've read, seems to be true for most homeschool parents at one time or another. I spend my days surrounded by tiny humans, and that means I have little adult conversation throughout the day. This would probably bother me much less if I didn't tire so easily of the same three knock knock jokes and faulty logic in Disney Junior shows. There are days when I feel like I might as well be a million miles from any other human beings over the age of 6. There are lots of fixes for this that I just haven't pursued, I'm sure, but hooray for Facebook on those days! (And hooray for my mom retiring!)
3. It can be repetitive. It can be repetitive. One of my most favorite things about doing this with my kids is that we have the opportunity to explore and do things together. The problem, however, is that we don't always...or even nearly as often as I'd really like...okay, rarely ever. It's very easy to get into a rut, and when we do, it's tough to get the energy to pull ourselves out of it. Because why should I put on real people pants and head to the library when my husband's old sweat pants are so cozy? Oh look. Here's another worksheet.
4. It's easy to spend a lot of money. When you consider that I don't have an income, that already limits us financially. We are fine with that, and it was always our choice to have less stuff but more time with the kids. Homeschooling itself, however, can quickly get expensive if you let it. There are an endless number of things you can buy for it or places to go. Budgeting has become our rule of thumb, and I've found that we can't do everything I'd like to do. If I had my way, we would have a complete library...and I'd build an entire school building next to our house...and we would visit every single country we studied. Turns out, things cost money, even if it's for education.
5. Goodbye "me" time. Because I don't have any time during my day that I am without kids, I don't have any time during my day without kids. (how's that for swell logic?) But seriously. None. I am fortunate enough that my dad is retired and lives just a mile or so from me, so he often watches them so I can go grocery shopping or something, but my day in and day out is spent with my little cutie patooties. We have discovered that movie time while Eva naps tends to keep Mommy from throwing things, so that's nice.
6. I'm not as brilliant as I think I am. Oh my my my...this has never rung more true for me than when I try to remember what I learned in first grade but have to look at the teacher's manual to recall what a "fact family" is. I'm sure as my kids get older, this is going to become more and more apparent. Because my mom has a Masters in education, I have a great resource to fall back on, but I will for sure be looking into what options we have when we get to Algebra. Once math has letters, I'm out.
7. Oh my Gosh. I'm in charge of educating my kids. This is the biggest, scariest, heaviest truth to homeschooling for me. Let us take a moment of silence and meditate on this truth...are you as freaked out as I am?? It's on me. All of it. If my kids learn how to read, that's on me. If my kids can write an essay, that's on me. If my kids are 18 years old and have no idea how to write their name, well, that's on me. Thankfully, I have found that if I take it a day at a time and do as much reading as I can about what they should know when and use a great curriculum, this daunting task doesn't feel so overwhelming, but even right now, literally as I'm typing this, I'm finding it difficult to breathe because sweet Jesus that is a big, scary, heavy task.
So that's it. That's my gigantic list of the dark side of homeschooling. But even with all of that, I love love love doing this, and I pray on a very regular basis that God allows us to keep it up. I wouldn't trade anything in the world for having this precious time with my children, and watching them grow in every way and really being a huge part of that is sincerely the greatest blessing ever. There's for sure way more good than bad in our days, and trust me, if I can do this successfully, anyone can do it. It's work, but it's the most rewarding job I can even imagine having.
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