Sarah's Love Letters Illustrated

I haven’t blogged (who knew “blogged” was a verb?) in days because... well, because I didn’t want my blog to depress you. Sometimes life gets to me and I feel overwhelmed by the responsibility of it all. That’s the state of affairs I am in right now, so if you don’t want to read about it, I understand.

Two weekends ago we attended family camp with some families from our church. During the first meal at camp, we spent some time getting to know another family. The mother asked Ju “What grade are you in?”

He said “first”.

She then asked “Where do you go to school?”

“West Elementary” he said, with surprisingly clear enunciation.

My heart broke. Neither of these statements is true. He’s in the second grade and has been since August 2004 and he’s been home schooled since October 2004.

Since October 16 of last year, Ju and I have spent countless hours studying, reading, writing, counting, listening to music, creating artistic masterpieces, going to therapy and gym class and field trips and a hundred other things involved in home schooling a second grader. I’ve all but given up my hobby and a fledgling business and I don’t remember the last time I read something non-school related. I’ve made worksheets at 1 in the morning, reviewed curriculum until I just can’t read about it anymore for fear my eyes are going to become cartoon swirls… and I’ve read Firefighters A-Z so many times I can recite it from memory.

And still, he thinks he’s in the first grade at West Elementary.

We’ve had countless discussions about home schooling and why we no longer attend West Elementary. He doesn’t understand. I get that. He may never fully understand that his teachers and the people who were supposed to be helping him had given up on him. He may never understand that I could not allow them to bus him to a school 65 miles from my home where there would be no peer modeling of proper behavior and normal learning skills for him because 100 percent of the children in the school were facing challenges and disabilities of their own. He may never understand that the people involved in his education at school didn’t care for him nearly as much as he cared for them. He may never understand that we decided to home school because we want the best for him and we no longer had a reason to believe that school was giving him the best opportunities to learn.

There are hundreds of parts of his story that he may never understand fully…but I thought he had the basics. I thought that after many conversations, he understood that he’s in the second grade and he is a home school student.

Apparently, I was mistaken.

I know in my head that this is not a rational hurt. He’s a little boy. He doesn’t understand his mother’s feelings. I am fully aware of his short-comings and one of them is the ability to attach facts to answer questions. Current truth has little relevance to Ju. It’s part of dealing with changes that throws him for a loop.

It’s just another in a long line of misunderstood facts that I have to correct him on every day. But it still hurt.

This decision to home school has impacted our entire family. It’s probably been the hardest thing I’ve ever attempted to do, even though Joal helps on a daily basis. Doing the same thing every day is something that drives me to the edge of insanity. I know in my heart it is the right choice for us but carrying it our everyday is a huge, sometimes daunting, challenge.

It hurt that after all this, he still won't, can't or just doesn’t acknowledge the changes we’ve faced and come thru.

It just hurt.
It still hurts.
Sometimes being the mommy hurts.