Rejection

I always wanted to be a home educating momma. When I had just the one child I desperately wanted more, yet they did not come. So the dad of the one child would always say he would let me homeschool but he wanted no part in it and would blame me if his son did not grow up and fit into the real world or was not smart. When this child was three years old, his dad said, "Don't you think you should be reading up on how to do this homeschool thing you are planning to do?" I set out to read every book my local library had on education, with a particular emphasis on homeshooling but I also read books on just the topic of education itself. Along with reading books, I also educated myself on the various methods of education and variety of curricula that abounded to choose from. I do not think i went into this lifestyle choice blindly nor was I just "flying by the seat of my pants."

I hate it when people assume that one method of education should produce genuises over another type, so no, this child was not a genius yet he was educated. He did learn his "three R's" (some skills 'stuck' sooner than others) and he enjoyed being home educated and even would comment when we drove by a school how he felt sorry for the kids trapped inside all day. Other than it seeming to take "forever" for reading to click for said child, he was all good until those 'dreaded' fractions came along (I hear from many a person they too liked math until fractions entered the picture). We had been using  Abeka for math when we first encountered fractions, so I did some more research and switched to Math Mammoth because it didn't require the use of fancy manipulative tinkery things, and when that still did not seem to 'click' for this child, we switched to A.C.E. for math because of the mastery based emphasis in hopes that much repetition would finally help him to understand and not dread fractions. It finally seemed that fractions were no big deal to him anymore and then came decimals and the junior high years and what I am told is "normal" pre-teen/teen 'laziness' (sigh).

It was during this journey of understanding fractions that this child's dad decided he rather liked the cheating on me that he had been doing throughout our entire supposed "union" and he wanted to be "free" of me to pursue his 'endeavors'. He however wanted to make perfectly clear that he was only leaving me and not his son thus entered two weekends a month father/son visits while I was trying to hold down a full-time job and still home educate said son. At first my son did only see his dad per the custody agreement but over time he started spending more and more time with his paternal family. The same people who tell him things like he will never have friends unless he goes to public school and that his mom is weird because she is a Believer yet follows Torah in order to live out John 14:15 “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments." (and when I went to get this verse from Biblegateway, this was the verse of the day - I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands.     Psalm 119:60 niv). Over the years my son has rejected doing things with me that he always did before he started spending so much time with his dad's side. My son no longer goes to Torah Community Events with me and even regular old secular calendar 'holidays' are spent more and more with the other side. I feel so rejected by my son and like maybe i should have been the parent who walked away, then would he be chasing me and trying to maintain our relationship, the relationship that saw him through the first 10 years of his life? My son's Bonus Dad used to tell me that perhaps I had my son to love because the L-RD knew his dad was not going to love me. (this statement really bothers me because I now have a son with this Bonus Dad....)

Three years into the new way of split life and my son finally got a little brother and I was able to be home again but I did have my hands full with a high needs baby and trying to home educate a seventh grader. Surely at that age one should be able to do their work, after all it was A.C.E. which is meant to be self-instructed and read alouds from AmbleSide list. My son would tell me he was doing his work but then when it was test day, he would break down and cry and beg me not to tell his dad that he was not doing his work or else his dad would take his playstation away (cry me a river, here's a quarter.... right???).  All three of my son's parents decided to put him in a private school for "eighth" grade and I had really prayed for two things: 1)  that my son would deepen in his relationship with Yeshua and embrace the Hebrew Roots of his faith
2) that he would realize what a privilege it is to be home educated and long to be so again

 He did come around to my second one during his second year at this school. During both years there was constant "mom. can I skip school today" battles and at the beginning of his second year there he started telling me he wanted to be homeschooled the following year and utilize an online learning platform and we researched and agreed on Monarch. His instructor at the Christian school also told me of moments he noticed my son growing closer to Jesus.

Everything was on track for starting up online homeschool this fall and my son also wanted to get a job and save to build his own computer and so he could pay for car insurance since he will be a licensed driver by then. Then summer started AKA non-stop time spent with his dad's side of the family and one kid younger than him who starts public high school this fall and some girl who was my son's "girlfriend" but dumped him for some other guy but yet has been hanging out with my son all summer...(i digress)....and suddenly on 6/30/17 i start receiving text messages from my son saying he wants to go to the public high school (groan and pain in my heart) ... he doesn't seem to care about all the most likely unnecessary vaccines (definitely no long term "are they safe?" results and many of which while his system is incubating these vile sickies he can spread them in our household - nothanks! ) nor that if lice or some other icky thing spreads at the school that I do not want it in my house!!!! When I press him for why he wants to go he replies because his friend will be a freshman and thinks it would be cool to have my son in the same school, that he can listen to music during class, and that he said his (paternal) papa will be more proud of him if he graduates from a real school.

What about me, does what I want (hope and dream) for you not matter to you?

(Guess it is 'ok' to break a mom's heart, after all they love you unconditionally and you don't have to "earn" their love)

Whelp, time to go see what needs to be done to let everyone else get their way .... (think i'm gonna be sick)

Don't mind me I'm just a kicked to the curb, rejected mom and I have always been told "can't complain, no one wants to hear it anyway"

(yes I have another son, he is too young to formally educate ... he so needs to work on speaking more and oh yeah, potty training :P) (also hoping that since my second son's dad and I are on the same page Faith wise and home education wise that he will have my back more and not work against me like the former one did just to get things his way)

PS - i have no idea why there is pink lettering, I did not tell it to do that and every time I select all text and default all to black ink, it does not mind...I should so be used to being ignored