My Daily Rind Journey of a Mom: Reflections on Health, Unschooling, and Love.

We attended the Fall Blue Skies Family Picnic (unschooling group) today. It was really great to gather with a huge group of families together to share food, conversation, toys, smiles. I enjoyed having my husband be there to feel the energy of the group with which I’ve aligned our family. He felt it. Jonathan struggled again with the social dynamics, but it’s good that he’s having these experiences in small doses instead of being forced to deal with intense social situations all day every day at school. This is so much better, and REAL life, not contrived situations starting and stopping with the ring of a bell, no time to process, transition, have closure, make amends. Bell rings, you stop what you’re doing and move on.

We came home and Jonathan got to experience the tail-end of our neighbor’s 5^th birthday party. He got to have some great play time, eat cake, and wish his friend, Carissa, happy birthday. We played outside for a while in the dark, warm night. Now he’s been in the bath for close to two hours, such a GREAT way for him to end his day. I can hear him playing, working through some of the themes he is processing and releasing pent-up energy.

I feel my husband and I shifting, deprogramming, de-schooling, and relaxing into the idea of allowing our son to just be. To let him follow his own flow, instead of deciding what he should be doing and telling him what to do. It’s definitely a process, but we are in agreement and allowing it to happen! Yay!

Ingredients in the green smoothie we brought to share:

really ripe bananas (brown spots = sweet goodness)

pineapple

pear

apple

dates

kale

spinach

water

What a fabulous balanced day of alone time, work at home, and fun family activity. We sort of slept in, which is rare, and then I took two of our dogs with me to sit outside at a cafe while I indulged in a cup of coffee.

Back at the ranch, life was a bustle with some of the final basement touches happening – carpet and countertops! Very exciting. Jonathan and his dad went on a neighborhood adventure walk. I came home and played Beyblades for a couple of hours on the front lawn, followed by a much needed family nap to prepare for our big night out to Boulder Dinner Theater.

We saw the world premiere of Slow Dance With a Hot Pickup. Fabulous show. We all loved it. We talked to the artistic director of the theater after the show, and he offered Jonathan a part in the next production, Phantom. Jonathan sort of panicked and said he wasn’t going to go on stage, then he added, “Well…maybe when I’m 7 or 8….or 20.” Dang! That was his big chance. Michael said when he’s ready to go on stage, to give him a call. Oh, I will!

Today was the day that my son would say goodbye to his school. It was a life-altering experience, really. This was very possibly the last time he would ever go to school. Possibly. I felt the buzzing of my emotions all day as I empathized with my son’s experience. He was excited to go there today; the excitement mixed with sadness and confusion. He wanted to carry in the muffins and present them to his class. When he walked in, all the children were in circle just finishing up a story, getting ready to go out for recess. He paused in front of them all as they turned to look at him, and he gave a little speech about how he is now being home-schooled and how he misses everybody there and he brought muffins to share with everyone. He was so articulate and shiny, standing there in front of his class. None of the nervousness or fear that I had expected. He was poised and saying things to provide comfort to everyone just in case they were feeling sad. He stood by the door and passed out a muffin to each friend as they exited to the playground. He wanted to stay for recess with them, which was fine. When recess was over, he gave another little speech to the line of children awaiting to re-enter their class. He told them that he promised he would come back to have recess with them again someday and not to worry. He promised he would write letters “all the time.” Their tiny voices punctuated the air with shouts of goodbyes and I miss you’s. He gave hugs and watched them march away into their class. He turned to me and the emotion carried us both away. We both cried as we held and comforted each other. I slipped into a parallel universe of holding space for my son while at the same time reliving the dozens of times that I had to leave all my friends at school to move on. I survived so many of these transitions, which is why I had the utmost faith that my son could handle it too. And it was perfect that I was the one there for him. We held hands and walked through the garden for one final time, checking on the carrots and picking one prematurely to bring home to our residential rabbit, Felix. Periodically, he stopped and buried his face in his hands and leaned heavily against me. I held him and breathed. We got in the car and he said he was so very sad and that he wanted to come visit another day but didn’t want to go to school, just visit.

Today we stayed close and just sort of hung out. We went out for a treat after the school experience, then played together with his new Beyblades for a couple of hours. Karate was excellent and then we went out for pizza slices at our favorite place. We even got dessert. By the time the evening was upon us, we were back to ourselves, Jonny struggling with allowing me space, me desperately needing it; both of us cranky. We had a snuggly bedtime story and promptly fell asleep together. I got up later to get that space that I crave and to write this.

Another busy busy day in the Morris household. Of course the days won’t always be like this. I imagine languid cozy winter days huddled together in pajamas reading and playing cards. But for now, it’s busy. I had my therapy appointment this morning, and dear Jonathan stood there naked holding his stuffed monkey, Steve, announcing he was ready to go with me. He said I told him that he’d be going with me everywhere. Well, I guess I did say that when explaining that he wouldn’t be going to school anymore. This was an exception. I’m sure there’ll be more.

Following my appointment, I had to rush home and prepare for our big day out. First to his play therapy, then off to park day with the local unschooling group. He was pretty intensely emotional coming out of therapy, and this sensitivity continued on throughout the whole park day. He seemed small and fragile to me today. He was obviously struggling with finding his place in this large group of children who are mostly familiar with each other, having grown up meeting for unschooling adventures weekly. He was bossy, mean, tearful, laughing, playful, stingy…the whole gamut of interactive strategies. It can be painful as the mother to simply watch these dynamics, knowing that it likely won’t turn out in my son’s favor. He’s learning, though, and growing. He has a hard time making and keeping friends. He gets mad pretty easily and also gets his feelings hurt. The therapist says he is working through his attachment issues around nurturance and deprivation. This makes sense to me on several levels. Although I was always there for him and loved him so dearly, I was also detached, distant, struggling, angry, and depressed from the time he was born and many years after that. He got a lot of mixed messages around attachment and nurturance, which confused him, especially subconsciously. Now, he tends to gravitate to children who are quite aloof and indifferent toward him, vying for their attention and acceptance. He is drawn toward the bullying type of child, girl or boy. It’s painful to watch and difficult to hold space for his outbursts and anger toward me. But we are healing too, and this will help in the long run. For now, he struggles with relationships. He is only 5, so there is time.

I sit here in the wee hours of the night baking muffins for his farewell gathering at kindergarten tomorrow morning, reflecting on our day and the beautiful ray of sunshine that is my son. He is a very special child in so many ways. I am eager to hear how his evening was with his dad. I got to go out tonight to a gaming group nearby. It turned out I knew 4 people there! It was such a great time with lots of laughter, of which one can never get enough.

Jonathan and I slept on the living room floor last night on our leftover cozy camp-in spot from last Saturday night. As usual, the awakening was too early for me. My sweet hungry boy caressed my face and said that I could go ahead and sleep. He was going to make himself some breakfast. He decided on toast with avocado. He was letting me sleep, but constantly hollering out questions and comments to me, such as, “Don’t worry about me. I’m using a very sharp knife to cut the avocado.” I knew he had never cut an avocado before, but I wanted to trust him to do it. I hollered back if it was okay that I tell him how to do it. He said sure. I talked him through it and he did it. This is the sort of child I have. He is 5 years old and can be trusted to take a butcher knife to an avocado, safely follow my verbal instructions being shouted sleepily across 2 rooms, and still end up with 10 fingers. Funny, he needed me to get up to spread the avocado on the toast.

We met up with the local unschooling group for the weekly nature hike. For about 3 hours Jonathan played hard with about 7 other boys ranging from 5 to 11 years of age. There was a creek running along the trail, so the boys were having the time of their lives trying to control the flow of the water. I happily observed that this is the best kind of school. If anyone questions how a child gets “socialized” being home-schooled or how they learn to work with others, all they need to do is hang out with a group of boys at the water’s edge. For hours these kids planned, strategized, engineered, cooperated, delegated, and played at building a dam, moving enormous logs, throwing sticks at floating targets, and balancing on rocks to cross the flowing creek. I am not worried one bit about my son’s socialization.

He was utterly exhausted at the end of this adventure. We were driving home and he said that he’d like to make a visit to his school to say goodbye. I asked how he felt about it and he said, “I feel happy. I’m not sad at all, but I’d like to say goodbye.” So, we’ll bring some cupcakes and have a brief farewell. I think this is a good thing. He needs to have that closure.

We snuggled together on our floor camp for a couple hours watching a funny claymation show, while I snoozed. He played outside as the sun went down, and I made a nice salad for dinner. The three of us snuggled in bed and read four chapters in the exciting and adventurous Wonderful Wizard of Oz. It’s a nice feeling to end the day on such a happy and peaceful note. No rush or worry about getting to bed on time to catch the bus in the morning. Just a lot of love and gentle pace.

As of today, Jonathan is officially being unschooled. He’s only 5 so that means that the days will be spent exploring and playing. I have so much to learn about how to just be with him and follow his interests, but I’m really excited and ready for the journey. The process of getting to this decision has been tough, mainly because holding witness to the difficulties that Jonathan suffered in school is painful as his parent. He struggles with so many things, but it’s time that we change the environment for him so that instead of seeing him as struggling or “special needs”, we can focus on how truly gifted and special he is. It’s all about the context in which something is viewed. It’s time to allow this big Ray of Sunshine to truly shine.

I told him a couple of days ago that he wasn’t going to be going to school anymore. I gently wove it into several out-loud ponderings of mine. I tread lightly because he really loves school. He loves to learn, and he is at the top of his little kindergarten class, which he loves too (being first, that is). He heard my words, was still and quiet for a moment, and then said that it was a good idea. He has expressed the desire to go back and say goodbye to his classmates and teachers and that someday he’d like to go back to school. We’ll see. One step at a time.

Last week, in premonition fashion, I took him on an unschooling outing at a park that he loves. I explained that all the kids there (about 25) didn’t go to school. He said he felt sad for them. I explained to him that there are lots of ways to do things and that there isn’t one right way. Everybody is different and needs different things. He made some nice friends, whom he’ll see weekly.

So, today was the first day staying home for school on purpose. It was such a full and pleasant day. There were a couple of impatient moments on my part and a couple of snappy moments on his part, so all-in-all the moments evened themselves out.

He slept in this morning until about 8:30, which was glorious unto itself. He awoke at his own pace and made his way downstairs smiling and enthusiastic to start his day. He gobbled up some cereal and then headed to the basement to check on the workers doing the remodel. I didn’t hear from him for a while as I was preparing for the day, so I went to check on him. He was busy at work with the painters. He had the task of filling all the baseboard nail holes with putty. There was my 5-year-old working alongside 3 men, telling me in his I’m-very-proud-to-be-treated-like-an-adult very deep voice that he was working very hard and how tiring it was.

We went to my eye doctor, which was really challenging. I’m not used to having my son with me everywhere I go, and I strategically schedule all things to be done WITHOUT him. I was tempted to leave him with his dad, but I really want to shift my expectation that it’s so hard to go anywhere with him. I really want to have him with me, and I want him to KNOW that. BUT, it was indeed quite hard. His energy was spinning out of control in the doctor’s office. She said, “why don’t you send him to (blank) school. It’s for kids with autism and Asperger’s.” “Well, he doesn’t have autism or Asperger’s.” “He’s so intense like they are so it’d probably be good for him.” Hmmmm…yeah…well, she IS a good eye doctor. I talked with Jonathan about the importance of learning how to give mommy space when I’m having an appointment. It’s hard for him to share me. We went and had a fine time at the neighboring cafe, enjoying a drink and some gluten-free pumpkin bread. I felt happy to be able to flow with him, albeit still a little tense from the optometric debacle.

When we came home, there were some things I needed to tend to without interruption. Jonny played outside with his dogs for over an hour, which speaks to the fact that he was content today. I notice that when he feels like he’s getting good attention from me, even though he never wants it to end, he’ll actually play better on his own. He came in with a surprise for me. He gathered the long seed pods from the honey locust tree in the backyard and dug out the little brown seeds. He had them rolled up in the bottom of his shirt. He said he was going to plant them so we’d have more trees. We made a plan to go buy lots of bulbs to plant this week too.

Jonathan LOVES to be read to, and we’ve found out that even though he’s 5 and extremely active with an apparently non-existent attention span (which is totally not true, just the way it seems), he loves to listen to long, heady fiction written for young adults. He wanted to go to the library and get the entire book “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” by L. Frank Baum, not the kids’ version, but the real deal. So, we did, and it was really a great experience. We weren’t there for long because I’m aware of my own limits of tolerance that will definitely improve as we go on this journey together, but it was only Day 1, so I cut myself some slack! We played outside a spell until he fell backwards down a flight of flagstone stairs. Miraculously he was not hurt. Truly miraculous.

On our way home before karate, we had time to stop and indulge in some frozen yogurt. We sat together calmly for the duration of our treat, which was so nice and connecting. He was really proud to be together and kept thanking me and saying that he never wants to be apart. Then off to karate, where he earned 2 stripes on his belt. He loves karate and wants to go every day. They offer the Little Ninjas class 4 times a week, and he’s always there. They discourage being there every time because of the risk of burning out, but I truly don’t think that’s going to happen in our case. Jonathan literally craves the intensity, structure, discipline, and overall container that is provided by this class. It’s astounding to see his level of focus and respect to his instructors and classmates for that half hour. Often the transition away form there is really hard for him, resulting in significant behaviors, like today. It was a tough ride home, but we all survived. He chose to take a bath when we got home while I prepared dinner. After dinner, even though he was so tired, he went outside to play. He played with his dog until nearly 9:00, frequently bouncing in urging me to come out and see how the full moon changed in the sky and how the clouds were illuminated and moving. I was aware of my temptations to tell him that it’s bedtime (which is 7:00 on school nights), but I smiled and let it go. He played until he was too cold to play anymore.

We read the first 2 chapters in Oz. He wanted to keep reading, but I knew that it was time for our wonderfully full day to come to a close. This is our new life. There is time for discovery and exploration. As my husband and I shift and learn how to deprogram ourselves, there will be more space for acceptance, flowing, and shining. I am looking forward to tomorrow.