The Dark Side of Homeschooling

As a mother of 3 with 11 years of homeschooling under my belt, I can tell you, it’s not all fresh-baked sourdough and aesthetically pleasing Montessori toys.

Some days, the magic happens: After weeks, finally long division clicks in your child’s brain, or your 6-year-old says something wonderfully wise beyond her years. The epic, fulfilling feeling of accomplishment and joy is indescribable and worth every basket of dirty laundry that’s been taunting you for days (or weeks…)

Other days… well, let’s just say there’s a lot of crying. And only mostly by your kids. When those days happen, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed, under-appreciated, and in over your head. It’s easy to fight feelings of failure and frustration and question whether this is really the best thing for your kids and if you are really the best teacher.

Perhaps at some point you’ve envisioned a life where you get up in the morning, pack a sweet little lunch, and pat your kids on the head as they scurry off to school. You have hours to clean, cook, work, and run errands uninterrupted. When they return home, you are there to greet them at the door with a smile, a healthy after-school snack in hand. Obviously I have...

There’s something that feels so tidy about that picture in my mind, even though I know that reality would not be the wrapped-up-with-a-bow package of my imagination. I have even thought...

“Maybe I would be a better mother, a more patient mother, a fresher, cooler, less stressed-out mother if I sent my kids to school.”

The truth is when your kids are with you every day and you are involved in what they are learning, gleaning, and experiencing, they end up seeing the good and the bad.

The moments you celebrate their victories together, and the moments you lose your patience. The moments you laugh and the moments you break down and cry. The absolute chaos and the sweet contented silence.

They see you juggling the real-life demands of adulthood, they see the work that goes into running a household. They see (and hopefully are involved in) all the cleaning, cooking, and working that they would take for granted if it were all magically done while they were at school, surrounded exclusively by peers of the same age, all doing the same things.

“The dark side of homeschooling is that it is real.”

When I think about the honest relationships we are forging with our kids by inviting them into our real, authentic lives, the tidy little picture in my mind shifts. No longer am I romanticizing the idea of being in control, but embracing life as it is: a little messy, a little exhausting, but ultimately, wonderfully, beautifully real.

If you are on the fence about trying to homeschooling or if you are feeling a little burnt out, try and embrace the fact that you are preparing your kids for the realities of daily life.

Even though this means they may see you at your worst sometimes, they will also understand better the love and sacrifice you have made toward them and that reality will build a foundation for a strong, sincere relationship for the rest of your lives.

“By wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established; by knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches.” Proverbs 24:3-4

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