just found this sub

*long post incoming*

hey all, first post here and all that. figured i could come here and tell my experience and how it’s effected me as an adult.

so im 25 now, born in 2000 and grew up in a small3 bedroom house with 6 siblings (4 younger, 2 older. oldest born in ‘96 and youngest born in 2011). we were Catholic when i was growing up, but stopped going to church in like 2012/2013 and now im agnostic. some of my siblings are still Christian but most of us are non theistic.

i went to a public magnet school for kindergarten, and then went to a private Catholic school for 1st and 2nd grade that was connected to our church. then before i went into 3rd grade, my parents decided to start homeschooling me and my siblings. i believe it was because they still wanted to teach us religious/Catholic things but couldn’t afford the private school anymore. at the time only 4 of us were school aged, my 2 other younger siblings were still in diapers. my dad was the sole income of the house, with my mom being a SAHM for most of my childhood. this meant the schooling and childcare both fell on my mom. my dad is a brick mason, and at the time also had an overnight job to support us. he was gone by the time the sun rose, and got home well after we were all in bed. they both put themselves through so much to provide for us.

3rd grade to 5th grade, i was homeschooled. we did computer programs and workbooks and tests, all kinds of things to try and emulate a school environment. we went to the public library a LOT, and had a homeschool group we went to with other kids in our age range once a week.

it was a lot for my mom to do, and us 3 older kids ended up kind of just teaching ourselves. another little thing about me, i had undiagnosed ADHD at this age and really struggled to pay attention and do my work. so for me, “teaching myself” was trying a bit and then when i got frustrated i would just look in the answer key for the answers.

the summer before 6th grade, my mom sat me down and asked me if i wanted to go to public school. i said yes, i wanted to go be with other kids my age and make friends and be outside and ride the bus and do the things kids in school did.

i stared school that fall, and came to the conclusion pretty quick i had NO idea how to socialize with kids. i didn’t know how to make friends, or how to fit in. kids in middle school are brutal, we all know this. so looking back, i kinda just got thrown into the most brutal time of school with absolutely no experience of how to actually BE in a public school. my limited school experience before that i can actually remember had been at a Catholic private school with different rules and expectations and a different demographic of kids.

i went to another magnet school for 7th and 8th grade, then went to public school until i graduated in 2019. i don’t think i really learned how to socialize “normally” until mid high school, and even now i still struggle to socialize.

now i’m not saying this is 100% the fault of being homeschooled, cause again i’m neurodivergent and didn’t know until a few years ago that i was. that itself is probably a huge impact on how i socialize with people, and in the past few years i’ve made decent friends with other neurodivergent people i can relate to.

but, i do think it had a bit to do with it. i missed a crucial period (in my opinion) of a kid learning how to socialize in the world around them. i was 8 when we started homeschooling, and 11 when we stopped. i feel those are the exact years that a kid is learning how to make friends, how to play with other kids and how to have conflicts with kids your age. and just being AROUND kids your age for an extended amount of time. we had a homeschool group, yeah, but that was once a week for a few hours vs being in school 5 days a week for 7 hours. a lot of my socializing was with my siblings and neighbors.

i’m 25 now, and i’m doing alright. i never did finish college, i started in spring semester of 2020 so i got about 3 months of college before the world shut down and everything went online. i needed that in person structure to actually learn anything, so i ended up unofficially dropping out. i’m a barista now, with my own apartment and a boyfriend and 2 cats who i love dearly.

overall just wanted to share my experience, maybe someone here can relate to mine. i know it’s not the “typical” homeschool of being homeschooled my entire life, but i think it has had an impact on my life. thanks to anyone who read the whole thing lol, i know it was a doozy