Deciding To Homeschool While Working From Home

When my 2-year-old daughter was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder in April, it came as no surprise to me. She had been showing signs since 18 months or so. I already had her in the state's early intervention program getting combination speech and play therapy and occupational therapy. The official diagnosis only helped to reassure me that I was correct in my assessment and I wasn't crazy.

We are a neurodiversity-friendly family. My husband is autistic. I love and accept him for who he is. Autism makes parts of his life more challenging but also gives him gifts of looking at and thinking about the world differently.

We feel the same way about our daughter. We love her unconditionally. We want to assist her with her challenges while also supporting and accepting her differences. For example, she is mostly nonverbal. We want to encourage her speech while also giving her the options to use gestures, sign language, picture cards, an iPad AAC app, or even learning to spell words as equally valid forms of communication.

My husband and I have been talking about homeschooling for years, since our daughter was a baby or perhaps even earlier. Both of us believe we would have been better educated for our careers if we could have stayed home and pursued our own interests. We are both highly educated professionals. My husband felt that school was mostly babysitting and often taught himself out of his own books in classes. I felt that school was a lot of busywork, especially subjects I had little interest in. I had to wait until university to take a class in my profession.

Schools are also full of bullying. My husband got the worst of it, but I didn't escape it either. Kids can be cruel and the teachers did little to nothing to stop it. Fitting in and peer pressure are difficult for neurotypical kids, and even more difficult for kids who are different than the norm.

Fitting in and being normal are not values I want to pass on to my children, not to my presumably neurotypical baby son and definitely not to my autistic daughter. The more I researched applied behavioral analysis (ABA), a common autism therapy, the more disturbed I was on its emphasis of discouraging odd behaviors and reinforcing "normal" behaviors.

None of my daughter's behaviors are bad (except for the typical troubles of most curious and energetic toddlers). My daughter is a gift to us and to the world. Why would I want to change her to be someone she isn't? Instead, I strive to love her fully and completely for who she is.

Last week we attended our first meeting with the school district. When my daughter turns 3 later this year, the state will transition her therapies to the school district. But the meeting with the school district did not go well. In a very short time, I could see how unhappy my daughter was with others trying to control her, discourage her adventurous behavior, interrupt her play, and ignore her wishes which were clearly communicated through sounds and body language. That was the first of five required meetings before I could even visit a special education preschool or talk with any school district therapist.

But I already knew what a preschool classroom might look like and I already knew what the therapists' intentions would be. Their primary intention would be to normalize her and get her “school ready.” To follow instructions and commands blindly because an authority said so. To ignore her body's desire to move and to sit still because that's what's most convenient for adults. To communicate verbally because that's most convenient for others. To play with peers even if she isn't interested in doing so. To tell her how she naturally exists is bad, and how they want to change her to be is good. And don't get me started on the ingrained sexism in most early education environments where girls are cute, pink, and delicate and boys are dirty, rough, and action-oriented.

This is not to say I think schooling is bad. School can be great for most kids. I intend to raise extraordinary kids who are self-motivated, critically-thinking leaders who are confident in their knowledge of who they are. My daughter is naturally this way.

And so, the decision to home educate (unschool or world school) fell into place. Already my child is learning the basics of early education without much help from anyone else.

She is fluent in the use of her iPad and watches shows or plays games involving shapes, colors, pattern matching, numbers through 100, letters, and spelling. She found a kids baking series and has discovered a love of baking. She loves animals and recently started hippotherapy (horse riding). She loves her daddy's fish and coral tanks and sometimes watches nature documentaries of her choosing. She is very athletic and enjoys running, climbing, bouncing, swinging, spinning, and swimming.

And most importantly, my daughter is happy. Her joy with life is apparent. Her curiosity is insatiable. I have no doubt that she will do great in life, perhaps even take over the world. It is my great pleasure as her mother to facilitate her learning in the best way for her: by following her lead.

How in the world can I homeschool my child, care for a baby, and run my small home business? Well, so far it hasn't been any different from what we've already been doing. I read to the kids every day. I get her books, toys, and iPad apps I think she will like. I recently took her to the library for the first time, and although she chose to run through the aisles in the sheer joy of being there rather than pick a book, in the future I hope she will choose her own reading material. She already chooses her own shows on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and YouTube. I take her to church, talk to her about God, and pray with her. I even read to her the highly technical articles and papers I read for my profession. As she gets older and her needs get more complex, I will rise to meet her needs. This may include signing her up for more classes or clubs, exposing her to new events and places, or finding more knowledgeable people to answer her questions. When she is a little older, I hope to join a homeschool co-op for projects and field trips.

I'm excited for this next adventure. We may homeschool for a short time or all the way through high school, it's up to her and her needs. We may homeschool my son and any future children as well. The great thing about homeschool is its flexibility. I feel very positive about this step in our lives.

Back to Working at Home Postpartum... Partly

Baby #2 sleeping on my lap

Two months postpartum and I finally feel as though I can slowly nudge my way back into the working world. In some ways, I never stopped working. In other ways, I still have a few months before I can progress back to the projects I want to do.

Colleagues and followers were surprised when I was tweeting industry news just hours after my baby was born in January. But honestly, I was a little bored laying in bed resting, not able to sleep, with a phone in my hand. It doesn't take much to scroll through social media and type up short commentary. Social media is by far the easiest way for me to stay involved in my business. But it's not a money-maker and it's not very productive.

I surprised myself by giving several interviews with reporters over the past couple of months. The industry doesn't stop just because I am on maternity leave, and I've done a decent job of marketing myself as a subject matter expert. Reporter interviews are usually short and don't require much preparation, so they were fairly easy to accomplish. I would hold my baby, usually nursing him, and inform the reporter ahead of time that I was on maternity leave. Not a single person complained about the occasional baby noise. In fact, some people loved talking about their kids upon hearing mine.

Over the past couple of weeks, I've slowly allowed myself to continue with individual clients, first existing clients, then responding to potential new ones. This usually requires at least half an hour of quiet and the ability to type on my laptop with at least one hand while on the phone. So far I've had good success nursing my baby to sleep during these calls and making use of the mute button on my phone.

These are more challenging conversations that require focus. I would like to get to the point where I can leave my baby alone for short periods of time while on a call, but I still have few months ahead of me before then. It doesn't help that my toddler has become more advanced in getting into things she shouldn't and making messes, and therefore leaving her alone during these calls is risky as well.

Several projects on my to-do list require me to be able to type with both hands on my laptop. I rarely have free time with both hands available, so I am still unable to accomplish these tasks. (Even this blog post is being written mostly by voice dictation on my phone.) If I can do something quickly in 5 or 10 minutes, I can take advantage of a baby nap or ask my husband to hold him. But most of my projects are extensive and require a longer focused time commitment. I still have some months to go before I can call myself completely back from maternity leave.

Professional Appearances and Poopy Diapers

I’m thankful to have reached a point in my career when I’m sometimes asked by journalists and podcasters to give interviews. Occasionally they are in person, such as a studio interview I’m giving next week. But usually they are phone or video interviews from the comfort of my home.

I had a Skype interview with a reporter I know scheduled late this afternoon. With my 2-year-old toddler not always sleeping through the night and my 37-week-pregnant body interrupting my sleep, I've been feeling exhausted. I didn't know if a video interview was a good idea. But thankfully, my toddler slept through the night and we had a mother-daughter early afternoon nap, so I felt well rested and ready for the interview.

Twenty minutes before the interview, I refreshed my make-up. I had already done my face up after my nap, so freshening up only took a minute. I put on jewelry and a blazer. I looked every bit of a professional from the chest up. From the chest down, my baby bump bulged in my casual dress and red sparkles shone from my barefooted Christmas-themed painted toes.

I set up my laptop in my “home office”, a room I use more for storage than for work. I prefer to set up my laptop on the family room couch most of the time, but that doesn't look professional. So I set up a nice backdrop in the home office with work-related things on a desk behind me for video opportunities such as this one.

The moment I stepped into the room, I remembered the overhead light had recently burned out. No problem, I had time to replace the light bulb. I had just bought a new pack of bulbs and knew exactly where they were. But they weren't there! My husband must have moved them. But where did he move them to? I searched for a couple minutes, but time was too short. A strategically placed desk lamp would have to do as my only lighting for the video interview.

Five minutes to interview time, I peaked in on my toddler who was watching Sesame Street in the family room. Clearly through her pants I could see she needed a new diaper. I had just enough time. I grabbed a new diaper and started to change her right on the carpet. Until, to my horror, I realized my mistake: Poop! Diarrhea! I didn't have time for this, but I couldn't leave her like that, either.

I raced to the nursery to clean her up on the changing table. Poop gone, new diaper on, new pants on – done in record time! Not ideal, but I left the trash on the changing table to throw away after the interview. It wouldn't be long enough to smell up the room.

But what was that wetness I felt? Diarrhea – on my leg! So gross! I cleaned myself up with a wet wipe and raced back to the family room. Suspicion confirmed: there was diarrhea on the carpet where I had begun to change her. And I had leaned on it. I did a quick carpet clean-up with more wet wipes, vowing to do a better job later. With no time to wash my hands, I was glad I wasn't going to be shaking anyone’s hand over Skype.

Back to the home office and to my laptop, a minute late to the interview. The reporter was none the wiser. The lighting was good enough. The interview went well. No one watching the interview video will ever know that this working mom had a poopy diaper to deal with minutes before her professional appearance.