I think preparing my child for the journey is letting him learn about how things work in the real world and not putting him in school with a group of age mates who are nothing like him, where he would be teased because he is a twice exceptional, musical theater, spelling bee, trivia loving kind of kid instead of a sports kid. My son says sports kids rule the school and it is true.
I used to worry that my son saw too much of the "real world" as a homeschooler. I thought I should fight to get him into our public school at least part time to get away from a part of our life that I thought was too scary and ugly and emotionally draining for a nine year old to have to deal with.
I know it is sometimes hard for him to remember the way his grandmother was five years ago, before the surgery that left her with brain damage and memory loss to the point that she couldn't remember him. She was also left with short term memory loss and this made her favorite activity in life--reading--an impossibility. Like my son, she was very smart and loved trivia and was very good at spelling and crossword puzzles. Because she read a lot she was very good at answering Jeopardy questions. My son had just bought his first Trivial Pursuit game before she went into the hospital and I thought this would be something they could enjoy doing together.
But after her surgery, she was very different because of the brain damage. His grandmother who loved him so much couldn't even remember him. He seemed to understand when we explained why she was like this now. He understood that she would probably never even be able to watch a video of his musical theater performances or listen to him play piano even though she was very interested in these things before she became ill. Before he turned five, he understood her new sensory issues, especially the sensitivity to sound, because he also has some sensory issues, and he volunteered to sit with her while the adults walked around the yard to look at the flowers my mother once loved.
But I now realize that my nine year old understands things that so many adults in our family don't, because they have not reached that level of maturity in their entire lives. My son is able to look past the ugliness and difficulties of life and see the good in it that I sometimes have trouble seeing. He could look past the fact that my mother has pulled out most of her hair now because of the anxiety that doctors can't control because she is already maxed out on the anxiety medication. He understands that she sometimes says things that she would never have said before she became ill. He told a friend a few years ago that she was very smart but it was "ephemeral" intelligence because it only lasted a very short time. He could see that her eyes lit up when he talked about the things he was learning and the books he was reading and the spelling bee that he participated in. He notices that she sometimes comes out of this "Twilight Zone" world that she lives in when he asks her if she knows how to spell a difficult word and she can. He discovered that she still remembers her multiplication tables and can still answer some trivia questions and this makes her happy. He felt good about figuring out how to bring her out of this awful world she lives in even thought it is just for a few minutes. He sometimes makes her laugh and this is like the ultimate reward for him. When he overheard me tell my husband that I would rather die than be like my mother because I worried about what it would do to my family, my son told me that he would rather have me here even if like his grandmother, it was just for a few minutes out of the day. He could still hug me.
My parents live next door to us, so when my father had to go into the hospital unexpectedly for surgery, my son helped me take care of my mother and patiently answered her questions about where my father was over and over. She couldn't remember for more than about 30 seconds and she was afraid. My son helped keep me calm with his amazing sense of humor that comes out even under the most difficult circumstances. I think he even understood why some adults in our family didn't come to help us. Because of some difficult real life circumstances he has developed an inner strength that some people never develop. He knows what really matters in life. I think it has shaped who he is in a positive way.
He has had to live with me and my anxiety issues which became much worse after my mother suddenly became ill about the same time we found out that our state education system does not require an appropriate education for twice exceptional kids and that support systems we thought were there were not there for us. He told me a few years ago that I needed to deal with "what is" and not worry about "what should be." He says he just wants me to stop worrying about everything. He learned to deal with the real world through his humor and intelligence.
When we read and discuss books it is obvious from his comments and questions that he understands what it is like being a "minority." I think he understands some things at a deeper level than a lot of adults. I think he read his sister's psychology book in a quest to figure out why people behave the way they do. He understands that children and adults who behave like bullies could have issues that affect their behavior.
Recently, we went to a history museum and noticed a group of private school students in their nice uniforms and once again, I started wondering if my son was missing something by not being in school with a group of kids. They seemed to be having a good time with each other. After we finished our lunch upstairs, we looked down to see the private school kids with their sack lunches sitting on the floor. My son pointed to one boy, sitting by himself, quietly eating his lunch. The boy seemed to be lost in his thoughts. My son told me that would be him if I put him in school. He said it somehow reminded him of "Camazotz" from "A Wrinkle in Time" and that boy was the different one. He said if I put him in school he would still be like that boy.
He also said he knew some people would worry about this boy's social skills because he was sitting by himself, but he thought the boy was happy sitting by himself. My son wants to know who these people are that think they can decide for other people how they should be and that anyone who is different in some way has a problem. He once told me that he thinks different is sometimes better and that he is not going to let other people decide for him how he should be. He tells me that I need to stop worrying about what other people think.
We talk in depth about real life family situations. He sees his older sister struggling to work and go to school and he can see that it might be a good idea for him to take some college classes earlier than most kids. We have talked about this lately and he doesn't think his childhood would be cut short by doing this. He can see that his life might be a little easier later on. He thinks more about his future than his sister did at this age. He seems so much more mature.
We talked about the promotion that his dad recently got after just two months on a the new job he started after retiring from his old one. All of the people who interviewed for the supervisor's job had a college degree, but it was his dad's people skills and sense of humor and his leadership ability and his ability to write well on the required test that earned him the promotion. These are the skills that my son will have because I did not make him go the the "everybody must color in the lines and everybody must learn the same way" school.
