Confirmation

It’s that time of year again, the last week of school, where I feel the mental and physical exhaustion of an entire school year catch up to me.  As I crawl across the finish line, I wonder if I have the strength and stamina to do it again next year (or ever!)  In my mind I know that it’s mere weeks until I start perusing curriculum sites and getting excited for the new year to begin, but for now I’m thinking that sending them to school next year might be a welcome break.  In the midst of questioning yet again whether or not I’m actually ruining my children, I got the confirmation I really needed.

A year ago this week, we moved to Texas.  My sweet #3 was not so sweet any longer.  He had spent his one and only year in public school (we thought we needed special ed help….we don’t) and he had learned some new words, phrases and gestures that I know didn’t come from my house.  ( I have a potty mouth, but even I don’t say this kind of stuff.)  It was significant enough that I worried about him as I sent him out to play in his new neighborhood.  Reports came back to me of what he’d said or done, and I would cringe.  I spent a lot of time last June apologizing for him, and even more time lecturing discussing it with him.  I mourned the gentle soul we had lost in one year of traditional schooling.

It was yesterday, while talking to my neighbor, that I knew he had returned to me.

“He’s a different boy. Completely different” She told me.  “Last year he was so angry, and so crude……but the boy he is today would never think to say the things he did last summer.  It’s like the anger has come out of him.  It’s amazing.”

And it is.

Homeschooling detractors often criticize us for “brainwashing” our children.  I’ve never really been sure what they meant by that until now.  Now, I’d agree.  It took an entire year to wash the ugliness out of his head that his public school peers and that one nasty teacher put into it.  But here we are in June, the ugliness and anger are gone, and the boy we love has come back to us.

Every year I wonder if I’m ruining them by keeping them home.  Every once in a while, I get the reassurance I so badly need.  I’m not ruining them at all.  I’m preserving the people God created them to be.