What’s on your radar?
My friend Jessie shares her homeschooling journey with us this month. God directed her and her husband into unchartered waters. Be Encouraged and Enjoy!
As we cruise through our second year of homeschooling, it seems strange to me that this wasn’t always MY plan for my life. But it absolutely was not. For much of my life, being a mom was not even on my radar, BUT if I ever did become one, I would be one of those successful career mom types. Which definitely didn’t include homeschool.
To understand my call to homeschool, it’s important to understand my journey with the Lord. I grew up around the church, going many weekends as a child, but my faith was shallow and lukewarm for much of my life. I had my all-in moments, surrounding myself with believers in Jesus, going to youth groups and trying to learn the stories in the Bible. I said the “Salvation Prayer” many times, just to make sure I was “in”, but lacked assurance every time. While in college, I didn’t attend church often, but I still spent time around Christians and longed to know the God they did. I did this until the Christian life, I was leading, no longer meshed with the life I was choosing… at which point I was out. I actually had a conversation with God that went something like this, “I know you exist, but I don’t want to follow you anymore. So, you’ll be there, doing your thing, while I go about doing my thing. Thanks for everything.” That poor girl.
Fast forward many years and many crash and burn moments. I was a mom of a sweet toddler, a wife of 7 years, a regular church-goer and active in my communities. I was reading the Bible, participating in Bible studies, doing and saying all the right things. And I was CRAZY! I sat down with a friend to talk about Jesus and she asked me when I became a Christian. I broke down because I couldn’t answer. Even though I’d “accepted Christ” on multiple occasions, there was no lasting change, no clear distinction that I had a solid salvation. It felt so strange to not be able to answer this very simple question, the one that should be a foundation. So, that day, March 22, 2019, I prayed and reaffirmed my faith in Jesus and what He did for me and EVERYTHING changed.
Years prior to my reaffirmation, as a new wife, still undecided on children, I had a moment where I felt God give me specific direction. To homeschool. It seemed strange, but I shared it with my husband. I told him I think I want to do this, but not sure if I’m ready for kids yet. He was absolutely in for homeschooling and we left it at that.
A few years later, we became first time parents a bit earlier than expected in August of 2017. Amelia was born at 26 weeks weighing only 1 lb. At this point, being a mom to her long term was in question, so thinking about school was definitely not on my mind. As Amelia improved, slowly but surely, we began to think about what life would be like with a child who may have extreme medical needs. Remember, career mom was my plan prior to all of this, so another strange moment happened when I felt a tug to stay home with her. She’d been in the NICU 4 months and came home on oxygen with a very weakened immune system. Providers stressed childcare not being a good option for her, but I was paralyzed to make a decision. Soon, a friend called out the angst that was obvious in me. She said, “Just say it. You’re not going back. You’re staying home with Amelia.” As I said the words out loud to my husband, the weight I had apparently been carrying lifted and life changed quickly. The numbers didn’t pencil out, but over the next year and a half, I saw God remain faithful to us as we took this step of obedience. Even though we’d agreed to homeschool one day, the part of it that meant I’d be a stay at home mom didn’t fully sink in. And now that change was happening, much earlier than it would have.
During Amelia’s toddler years, I struggled deeply with her delays in development. I wrestled continuously with separating my identity from her achievements (or lack thereof). As a person who is prone to personal development and growth, I spent a lot of those years also working on myself, healing, processing and leaning into the Father. This was also when I reaffirmed my faith. I’d love to draw a graph of how this time looked in my life and have it be a lovely diagonal line going up… but that’s not true. If we graphed these years of my life, it’d look more like a rollercoaster. I had good days, weeks or months along with some bad. Between the time Amelia was 2 ½ and 6, we welcomed 3 little boys into our world. Amelia was a great big sister to each, but it was a wild time for everyone. In the midst of our growing family, I continued to lean into the Father and began choosing to be obedient when He called me. It wasn’t perfect, but there was lots of growth during this time, and I now see the foundation He was laying in my life and heart.
For most of these pregnancies and newborn seasons, we were in a pandemic. Many around us were considering their options for school for their children. Homeschool started to seem more normal and there were also some hybrid school options popping up. I started to feel nervous because I was looking at possiblities that looked differently than my friends around me. Many were sending their 4 or 5 year olds to preschool. We felt strongly we shouldn’t, but the lies about our daughter being “behind” were loud. Thankfully, during this time, God started bringing homeschool moms and families into my life. One mom in particular had girls just a little bit ahead of my kids in age. I spent lots of time with her and began to learn from her as we mothered alongside each other. I asked questions and she shared her wisdom and insights. I appreciate now that she never asserted anything, nor spoke from a position of authority. Each answer she shared was personal to her and she always pointed back to being led to it, and discussions with her husband.
The time spent together was deeply impactful for our family’s journey and helped me stand more solid in being firm in my decision to obey my call to homeschool. During those transitional years from about 3.5 to 5.5 years old, I wavered daily in our decision. I couldn’t answer the questions I was being asked with a firmness the people asking expected. I felt unconfident and unsure. And all the questions and other people’s concern for my children’s education started to get to me. I’m thankful I had my husband to run to, along with God, during those years. He was confident in our stance when I didn’t have the same confidence. He reminded me of my call and my decision to obey when I wanted to abandon it all to do what I perceived to be the easier thing.
Over the years, homeschool moms whom I’ve grown to respect, have shared resources. I’ve read tons of books and blogs, listened to podcasts and attended workshops. But the things my husband and I have done most is pray and discuss together. The question you often get as a homeschool mom is “Why?” and as a family we’ve decided this is our foundation. When fear creeps in or we get distracted or overwhelmed, we are able to go back to our “Why” over and over.
--Does this line up with our reasoning for “Why” we are doing this in the first place? If yes, ok, let’s pray about it. No? Great, move on.
There are homeschool philosophies and curriculums galore. You could spend so much money and time exploring and shopping. Our “Why” helps us make decisions on resources and approaches. Part of our “Why” is keeping things between my husband and myself as it relates to making decisions for their activities and lessons. This helps me tremendously when I get overwhelmed with ideas from well-intentioned homeschool mom friends.
The best thing about homeschooling is there are so many options, approaches, resources, timelines, activities, etc. The hardest thing about homeschooling is all that I just listed. We want the best for our kids. We want to know we are doing the best and we have no magic ball to know if what we are doing is that. But we have the Spirit. And since I’ve stopped trying to control and do more, more, more, I am able to listen for guidance and nudges. I’m more firmly rooted in the “Why” we decided together, in prayer. And our “Why” doesn’t have to look like everyone else’s. Lately, I’ve felt much more secure when asked what we do and why. I don’t feel the need to apologize for making others uncomfortable with my answers. That’s not my job. My job is to be obedient in what we’ve been called to do and to be able to answer to God, my husband, and our kids.
As I mentioned, we’re two years into this homeschooling thing. I’m only working with one of my 4 children, formally. The boys show up for storytime, they love the “field trips”, but mostly they play during our short formal lesson time. There’s lots of time to change things, and lots of different personalities to dictate my approach for each child. I remain open and willing to deviate from what we have set up at this point. That’s huge growth for me. Taking things term by term, reevaluating and adjusting. It’s been so good for Amelia and myself. I’m prone to focusing on checking boxes and reaching the finish line. I could easily do this with homeschooling, but I fear I’d miss the whole point of being called to this, if I took that approach. So, I see Him, my Father, refining me here.
Honestly, I’ve seen more growth in myself since we’ve started homeschooling than any other time in my life. I can confidently say my Father, called me to homeschool as much for my sake and what He wants to do in me as much as what He wants to do through me and for my kids. I’ve had to lay down lifelong beliefs I didn’t realize I had. I’ve been humbled by my children daily. I’ve had to admit I was wrong, to myself, my kids, my husband, and friends – which is not something I have been willing to do much of in my life. Ultimately, homeschooling has brought me to my knees and to the feet of the Father more than any other experience in my life. I’ve learned so much about myself and about Him. On my hard days, I see that I’m doing the work. The days that go smooth are absolutely when I stop focusing on my list and allow Him to guide me.
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Jessi Huenink