Reactive Attachment Disorder LOVES Homeschool

If by "LOVES" you mean absolutely detests and would rather eat your own vomit.

While Mar is totally attaching, she is still clinging with all her might to the whole entitlement thing. That lingering diagnosis of Oppositional Defiant Disorder wants to stay for the party. She was busy doing outlandish behaviors and did not get to try out for the musical. Her sister is now in a three-week stint of performances. Sense of Entitlement says, "This is not acceptable. I should be in that musical and I should never, ever have to do anything to earn it."

Enter: more bad behaviors ... followed by more correction and/or consequences.

Mar does her schoolwork wrong on purpose when her feelings are big and suffocating her. Always has. Maybe, always will. She also did it while in public school, but because we educate at home, it worsens when some issues of entitlement has triggered her ("What? You think you can give me a consequence for spilling water on the table and leaving it? Um, no thank you. I do not do consequences. So, I'll just spell everything wrong today.").

Corey once posted on how well unschooling can compliment children with a history of trauma (and I could not find the specific post, Corey - sorry!). Children learn ... like, all the time. Many of you have asked about the challenges of educating a child who is doing everything they can to dishonor you and push you away. Here are my thoughts.

First - stop worrying about it! Really. You will not be able to gauge where a child is academically if they do not want you to. So, sneak in the back door.

Mar sits with us every day during school right now. She wants to draw attention to herself. She wants to upset me by doing things incorrectly. So, she sits and participates in everything we do. However, if it requires any grading or competition, she just writes her answers for herself. I do not take her papers. I do not look at her answers (occasionally I can sneak a peek without her noticing). If she knows I am going to look at her paper, she will screw the whole thing over. Instead, I blow it off and dig it out of the trash later.

Our kids will usually do some things right and choose which things to do wrong. Pay close attention. Mar will many times do everything right except for one section ... or just one row. However, she has already given me a great idea of what she has learned. Amazingly, she typically is well beyond grade level. For instance, she was once doing multiplication and ended up dividing several problems. Perfect division. She put thought into how she would do it wrong, and sure enough she said, "Oh I forgot and did the other thing." And the really amazing part? She had not yet ever been taught division.

Unschooling, my friends. Our kids are sponges.

Because of the many special needs in our home, my children thrive most with structure. So, we will always have organized schoolwork (and bedtimes and excursions, etc.). Looks like Mar is just sitting against the wall screwing through every thing, but she absorbs all of it. This week she corrected something I said. "Remember what you read last week, Mom?" Yeah ... she wasn't even in the ROOM for that.

When she is on restriction, I choose her books and activities for her. Yes, she will lie and tell me that, in fact, she DID read all five books in one day (I throw in one more difficult and longer book as a gauge). Yet, eventually, she makes her way through them. She will screw up finger knitting on purpose, but she will do a bit of it correctly first and THEN screw up.

I am not worried about her education. I am worried about her continued attachment and her ability to regulate when those still debilitating feelings alter her life. When she is in these modes, I have much more control over what she is exposed to. It's actually a beautiful thing.

When flow comes after the ebb, then she participates again and doesn't mind me seeing her effort. She will have amazing handwriting. She'll be actually playing the recorder, instead of squawking every three notes. Perhaps next week, once the musical is over? Or not. Either way, I just keep making sure she has plenty to absorb in the world around her, even when we have to keep it small.


(photo by ivan petrov)