My latest post was about the energetic way my TBP wakes up on a Saturday morning and how that is very different from me.
He immediately wakes up with ideas, interests, questions, and is expecting the same from me at the same pace and enthusiasm.
I’m not saying that I don’t have ideas, interests and questions, Of Course I do. I just don’t start my morning with a lot of quick thinking. I need some time.
My son has always struggled to go to sleep at night and has woken up early because of all of his thoughts.
For the last year, this has been with good thoughts, good questions, good energy; however, it wasn’t that way before he was homeschooled.
From kindergarten to third grade, the thoughts, questions and energy that circled around bedtime and wake up time were engulfed by his stress, anxiety, boredom, hatred, dread, and hopelessness of school. From school. For school. Because of school.
For years, those nights and those mornings were challenging. Actually, challenging is an extreme understatement. They were torture.
From Friday afternoon to Saturday night, we had relief and he experienced necessary respite. The grief about school started back up on Sundays.
In the beginning, Sunday nights were tough but soon the worry drizzled down into Sunday afternoon and then, even into the morning hours.
Thinking back, I believe that Friday Family Movie Nights started as a way to celebrate getting through one more school week. A way to forget the tears, tantrums, and nasty emails. Vintage TV trays and French fries helped…temporarily.
All of this changed once we took him out of his third grade classroom. There were a few weeks of recovery but then the self-doubt subsided and slowly it was replaced with confidence and worth.
After a while, smiles and laughter returned and made frequent appearances, stuck around overtime.
I know there are people who doubt and question our choice to home school; however, unless you have lived through the days and nights that we did, you can’t know.
I’ll take hyper, joker, inquisitive and thinker at bedtime or early in the morning ANY time!
My Twice Baked Potato 
Oh goodness, I can only imagine! My son wakes up bouncing and full of energy and I assume it’s normal for kids to do that… but oh my, I need my coffee first!
I hear ya!
Thanks, you described this so well! My son also has a busy mind and wakes me in the morning with questions he’s already thinking about (though now he offers to make my coffee for me!) We recently left “regular school” for homeschool in the middle of 3rd grade, and right away he was more relaxed, not worried, not hating Sundays (or sometimes Saturdays, in anticipation), and waking up with a smile and energy and his usual joyful self. He sometimes doubts this choice (as do others) and we get occasional moodiness over missing friends and the social energy of recess, but he’s so much more relaxed now that he doesn’t spend 6 hours trying to sit still, keep quiet, and not ask questions, and get can to the business of learning for fun!
Yes! Very similar but mine doesn’t make my coffee (yet) and he doesn’t miss classmates or recess. Actually, recess was one of the hardest times for him-unstructured, unexpected, and chaotic.
I certainly understand moments of doubt-even when it’s better!
Funny. I’m reading Raising Your Spirited Child by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka. 🙂 I think you’d enjoy it! lol.
Oh yes…read that one😃 Definitely spirited!