I understand what you are going through with the whole "homeschool group" thing - the bummer for us is we DID fit in, really well, where we used to live in MI! I blogged about how we TOTALLY had it going on - a great homeschool group (that started to falter then got an infusion of new blood, so is all worked out) and we were all GREAT friends, plus I had great friends just 2 doors down and in town, we were close to several homeschool orgs that did fun stuff, the homeschool building that always had used curriculum plus sold all the new stuff, great girls scouts and boy scouts, and my son lived next door to his best friend! It was like dreamland! But all dreams must end, and so did this one. Almost 2 years, and two moves later, while I am closer to my family, not quite close enough to hang out regularly. Just as I joined a homeschool group, they had a schism and now I am trying to make friends and meet up with 2 separate groups! My son still has few friends and no one in our immediate neighborhood seems to be his age (hundreds older and younger (by 2+ years or more) but NONE his age - are you kidding me?) Plus, since we moved further north, while we are still at our charter, it is a 40 minute drive so we can't really do all the fun extra stuff they offer. I now have to find a new charter up here (none of which seem to offer all the great stuff our current charter does, of course). I feel like I have to rebuild, AGAIN, and work at trying to fit in AGAIN. It can be trying to say the least. I only have one tattoo, but some piercings - the belly peircing had to go when I started having kids.
Yeah, I hear ya. When we first started homeschooling one of my neighbors (Who was my son's friend)decided that she would homeschool too, so we got together a few times, plus we lived in campus housing so there were TONS of kids to play with. Now we only do 4H because the closest Homeschool Group near me is VERY Christian - they put on the homeschool convention in this area and they are the ones that have that statement of faith for curriculum vendors. Which by the way I have decided to not sign. I mean, I could go explain my position to them and see what they say (if I could in good conscious sign it, even though I have some issues with the whole literal interpretation of the age of the Earth stuff) and see if they think my stuff is appropriate - but it feels so much like a stinking JOB INTERVIEW, ya know? I mean it is a huge personal risk in my opinion, to go expose your faith to someone just to have them tell you, No sorry - not good enough. :Sigh: :| Movin on I guess....
You think you dont fit in on these boards..here is my thoughts on that..for me. I am a SINGLE secular mom, yes we believe in God and I try to practice and preach his word to my daughter but I am far from perfect on that. We attend church on wednesdays for my single mom's bible study and Madison can have a bible study/learning time at church also. I work 3 days a week, struggle every month with bills(like everyone does these days), use learning material/circul. from any place I can get, weather its a magazine, a book I grab at salvation army anything!. I love homeschooling, this is our 3rd year and I cant imagine it..Im not "on top of it" thou and despite my lax schedule at work I know she needs more time with me. Madison takes tap dance class and attends church, pretty much her socialization time is that..if Im off work, we dont generally leave the house cause of the cost of gas(which has come down but if no need to leave then why bother). I feel like I cant compare things with married couples at conventions or picnics etc..when they hear Im single the conversation always seems to change. I didnt plan on being a single mom but thats the life that God chose for me it seems. when I tell people I work, they are shocked that I homeschool...how do I find the time, umm you make the time. My daughter and I butt heads and all but life is good, in my lil world. Just wanted to add my 2cents I guess. Also wanted to add that I have 2 tatts, am a currently dating in hopes to find my "LTR" for my life..I smoke, occasionally drink..totally not perfect..but this is my life and I enjoy it also. My life did not stop when I had my daughter..it was even more blessed then before. Im grateful for my daughter..SO proud of her...she is my everything.
Oh and one more thing before this thread dies! WOW - you guys and your TATTS make me feel so GOOD! LOL. :lol: I have 4 myself and next summer I will turn 40 and I am getting the one I got for my 16th birthday redone...I can't wait - it is gonna be sooo cool! :wink: I don't know why - but I still feel 16...I know it is dumb to not grow up but I still like the music I listened to back then - I saw Ozzy 4 times, Metallica 5 times, KISS, Rush, Deep Purple, Anthrax, Slayer, Lita Ford (LOL at Slayer and Lita Ford huh!!) how funny. And now I listen to Bayside, Blood for Blood, Social D, Dirty Water, Ducky Boys, The Killers, Manic Street Preachers, Rise Against... Anyway...sorry for my little flashback but how ironic that ME - the biggest metal head in 1987 - grew up (sorta) to be a HUGE homeschool supporter! If my childhood friends could only see me now - they'd never recognize me! :shock:
Melissa - I am a single mom too! Yes it is a bit lonely for us - I've never met another single mom homeschooler in person myself.
Well, I'm not a single mother, nor do I have tattoos, but I would hope that all of us have something to share. Sometimes we feel as if we don't fit in because we cut ourselves out of the action before we give others a chance to accept us. Someone once said that we shouldn't worry so much about what others think of us because we would be surprised to discover that they rarely think of us at all! People have their own issues and worries and are usually more concerned with those than with our warts. I admire you single homeschooling mothers. That must be very difficult. Forgive my rambling. I'm new to the forum and just surfing around getting the feel of it. Have a great day, everyone!
Well yes and no, I mean when you have to sign a contract that says you belileve everything this group believes, then I don't think it is me cutting myself out, ya know? I mean I will cut myself out, because I can't sign that contract and I can't guranantee that my views with 100% mesh with theirs when it comes to religion, but I would prefer that more people could be accepting of those of us who are more "middle of the road". And I'm not just talking about religious groups, the secular groups do the same thing - it's like - either you're an athiest or a "holy roller" (pardon the expression I don't mean it in a nasty way) and there is no middle ground in the "mainstream homeschool world" (Whatever that means, right?) Anyway - that's just how I feel. I'll get over it eventually. :wink:
yea Ive never met another one YET either.. The only problems I have are dealing with the ppl at work and a few neighbors that dont agree with my choices..but then again we all agree to disagree on this subjects. I homeschool because I want to be part of my childs life, and not just shove her off each am and then see her after work(I work 2nd shift). What kind of mom would I be then? someone would argue that Im unfit cause I wouldnt be around for her then. AND I didn't have a child to send her away everyday..although once in a while wouldnt kill me or her LOL:lol:
Well I was actually chased out of one graduate school when they found out I was going to homeschool again. The first year in that PhD program my kids went back to PS because I was so overwhelmed and was expected to work 50 or 60 hours a week in the lab. But they wanted to come home the next year when things settled down. I made the mistake of telling my PI (primary investigator) and the department pretty much ran me out of the program. I didn't like it anyway - but how dare they, ya know? Talk about discrimination...science DEFINATELY has a glass ceiling ladies...and the women are worse than the men because it was the woman department head that wanted to know "Who I thought I was - we all had to give up our kids for science and you are no different!" I swear that conversation took place. Then I had another boss who was like my best friend until she found out I homeschooled, then she became intolerable. Now I don't mention it to people at work, it isn't worth it and I work from home most of the time - so I hardly deal with them anyway.
I'm in agreement on the statements of faith.......It's not that I don't believe but rather I don't believe quite everything they do. All the moms that I know who homeschool do use all christian curriculum and are very active in the church and can be very harsh if you don't believe as they do. (I don't think that of everyone on here -- this is just describing people I have delt with personally). I chose to not join anything that I had to sign a statement of faith and even though I use a crs I did not include anything concerning religion in why I wanted to homeschool. They did not seem to have any problem with that so all was good. On the other side, just because I don't want to be part of a (very) christian based group, or use christian curriculum does not mean that I want to bash religion. Things that work for one person doesn't always work for another, thats life. I'm not going to argue another persons view on religion or tell them I think they are wrong. Anyways, I just wanted to say that I agree sometimes it is hard to find the right fit..... and I am definetly walking down the "middle of the road" with you.
Just wanted to chime in here. I don't post here as much as I used to anymore, mostly because I have been so worn out with growing this new baby that I was barely keeping my house going. But, another part was that I sometimes just don't feel I fit in here either. We are 100% secular. I was raised Christian, and the older I got and the more searching I did in my soul, the more I learned that I couldn't believe it all. Some makes sense but some just seems too far out there for me to feel comfortable truely believing in. I have deemed myself agnostic.. and have started leaning towards Buddhism... but it too is not a fit for me. My hubby is athiest, he said he would like to believe, but just can't find it in himself to pretend to believe in something and hope it sticks. I have a very large back tat, and if I hadn't become such a chicken as I get older, would probably have at least 5 more... one for each of my soon to be 4 kids, and one more for myself. The one I have represents the life I lived before my hubby came into my life.. and I need to show how I have grown from then. We do not, and will not belong to any group. There are none around here for one, and for another we like doing our own thing. My oldest is in boyscouts, and my DD will join Daisy girlscouts next year when she is old enough.. scouts is our thing that we do for socialization, and honestly we feel it is enough. We live in the country, have few other kids within a decent distance.. and still my kids do not play with them. It just doesn't fit our family. We are all unique, I just remind myself how boring the world would be if we were all alike.
amyb, I have yet to sign my contract... I have signed saying I will discipline my own kids and not worry about others kids, ( hardest thing for me!) but nothing about what I believe, I just join the co ops that I hear about and want to join, and wokr with the ladies on Feild trips, We dont do a lot of visitng except for my dd and her friend, they get together about once amonth? Thts more than she had been doing, and now that she is active in Church she has more friends but we dotn want to leave her hs friends behind, not sure what will happen next year, we like the friendship they have formed.
I really loved this thread and I'll probably be one of the last to post so no one will read it...sigh:roll: not fitting in again. I am 48, mom to an 11 year old son on the autism spectrum (could start a whole other thread on not fitting in here), I have no tattoos, go to church, don't condemn those that don't go to church, have homeschooled for 3 years and that in itself makes you not "fit in" because 90% of society doesn't do it. SO...what I've figured out in my nearly 3 years of homeschooling is it does stink to not feel like you fit in and I do have my moments where I wish I was that ps mom who heads up the bake sale committe, gets along with all the other moms and their kids get along and like my kid, etc. BUT...I tried that and I hated it -it is not how I am made. I hated the ps moms who were snobby, cliquish, and competitive about their kids accomplishments and I hated their kids who were mean to mine. :evil: My son will never be popular, I never was but I managed to get married and have a child, have some good jobs, a good family and more blessings than I can count. I look for opportunities for social contact for me and my son and, so far, have been lucky to find just enough to suit our needs. I ALWAYS feel different around other hs moms -that's my baggage, my personality, though- not anyone else's fault. Pretense, bragging and one-upsmanship is not in my DNA- at least in my experience, it is in a lot of hs (and ps) parents DNA and I just can't stomach it so probably avoid many situations that I should attempt but don't because of that. I hope we are all lucky enough to find a small niche in life. If you want to fit in somewhere it takes compromise and work- sometimes it's worth it, sometimes it's just not. Jane
Jane, I have special needs kids, too. One time at a convention, while other moms were enthusiastically asking questions about Latin for their advanced students, my friend and I were looking at beginning readers for her (approximately) 11-yr old son who has cerebral palsy. Doctors had said he would not ever be able to read or walk or function on his own. (I'll call him Tim.) So, while others were tackling Latin, (and I was thrilled for them) my friend grabbed me by the arm and fairly shouted, "Prairie! Come here! I've got to show you what I'm buying! Tim is actually catching on to letters and words! I'm buying him a beginning reader!!!" Amidst a throng of parents hoping to raise super-achievers, we could have felt like we didn't fit in. Everyone was rightfully, diligently pursuing what they hoped would be best for their children. But as far as I could see, we were the only ones actually weeping with joy for the mile-stones our children were accomplishing. Welcome to the Spot, Jane. I think you'll find plenty here to talk about!
I'm another one who will never join a group. It would probably just annoy me anyway. And we dont' have time for it. Both my girls are in dance classes and one of them is training to be a professional dancer so we are at the studio 5 days a week and she dances about 13 hours a week. All of their friends are either from church or dance. Frankly if they had any more friends I think I would go nuts trying to fit it all in. We are happy living in our own little world.
I am sooo with you on this! We belong to a group, as you know, but we have been to maybe ONE park day out of this "School year"... our dance card is full! hahaha!
We've been nuts trying to fit everybody and everything in also, Jennifer and Tiffany, while at the same time--ironically--feeling very isolated with our overwhelming challenges. Yep, I think just being homeschoolers makes us all misfits. I do need to say, however, that our family also does include some children who are "super-achievers," did Latin, etc., so you may find me joining in with others on that type of brag post, also. I just wanted to identify with you in the type of loneliness you may experience in walking with a child who has a very different "calling" on their life than most. In thinking about this thread, at first I thought, "Well, it looks like everybody has found others to identify with." And then I thought--"All except that BLUE HAIR of Crystal's!!!" For one half of one second I thought maybe she was alone in that category. Now laugh out loud, everyone: Our son sported GREEN HAIR for a while! So, sorry, Cystal, my friend! You can't totally claim that territory by yourself either! We're searching high and low here: Are there really NO true outcasts among us who don't fit in with anybody here???
I don't mean to imply that you should never brag about your kids but when you do it constantly and don't care about others kids accomplishments then, to me, it's obnoxious. OK since I'm new here -has there been a "brag thread" started lately?
