Homeschooling with a Chronic Illness Series

Homeschooling with a chronic illness is a series I have wanted to cover in detail for a long time. Charlotte, Lillie and I have even talked about doing a podcast together, chronicling our combined experiences over the past ten years. We have had a lot of ill health in our family, from cancer, anxiety and neurological disorders. Truly, it seems like we have been thrown a lot. Yet, somehow, each experience has been dealt with humour and love. Actually, love and humour is more accurate. And as a result, we all feel like we have grown, matured in ways we may not have, had it not been for the health struggles.

To get an idea of Charlotte’s health you can read an update I did five years ago. Obviously, this is just a small peek in time but it gives you an idea of all that was happening. I intend to create a page with all of my posts about Charlotte’s health, but that will take some time 😊

Our New Normal

These health struggles have become our new normal. I remember one of my friends saying that about her teens who were taking drugs. It has become their new normal. I didn’t fully understand what she meant at the time. I get it now, though. When something becomes a new normal, it means you don’t react to it a viscerally as you may have done at the start. I think in a way, it is how we protect ourselves. It is how we prevent the feelings of hopelessness from overwhelming us.

Vulnerability

I know writing a ‘homeschooling with chronic illness’ series is going to be hard and may at times require us to be more vulnerable than we would perhaps feel comfortable with. But someone needs to be talking about these types of struggles, especially in a positive way.

Mental health still retains a stigma, even today. And I think this stigma becomes even more prevalent in the homeschool community. Whether this is because the buck stops with us and so there is an element of blame, rightly or wrongly, which is placed firmly at the feet of the parents…or because homeschooling is an alternative life style and so can easily become the scapegoat for all ills, I don’t know. What I do know is that we need to start a conversation, one where blame has no part to play.

Post-Covid

Charlotte became ill after she had an infection. This infection floored our entire family. Lillie passed out multiple times and Gary found Thomas delirious in the hallway in the middle of the night, passed out from a high temperature. There were burst ear drums and it took all of us weeks to get over the infection as it returned multiple times.

I will preface this to say that in general our family has a fairly good immune system and we are not often floored by infections. Bizarrely, Charlotte had been the one least affected by it at the time. However, she seemed to never really get over it and within months her health took a huge nose dive.

Much of the same malaise is now being seen post-covid. Individuals who had it are taking longer to get over it. More and more people are being diagnosed with chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia.

Homeschooling with a Chronic Illness Series

All this to say, more of us are dealing with unusual symptoms post-virus. And with mental illness in teens reaching an all time high, we need to start a conversation. This conversation needs to be vulnerable and therefore supportive and judgement-free. The NHS in the UK is struggling to cope with the influx of so much ill health in teenagers, so we are left sometimes to try and figure it out ourselves.

I Need You

I am writing this post today to ask you to jot down any talking points, questions or thoughts you might like me to cover. My email is below. Please do use it to get in contact. I promise that anything you say will remain completely confidential. If this series is to be helpful to you and other homeschoolers, it would be wonderful to have your input. Please do contact me and ask anything. No question related to homeschooling with a chronic illness is too much or too private.

Also, if any of you would like to share your experiences of homeschooling with a chronic illness, I would love to do an interview with you. This can be confidential or not. It’s up to you. Oh, and it can be any chronic illness, mental or physical.

My email is: clairestewart@angelicscalliwags.com

Don’t be shy! Every and all emails will be read and somehow incorporated into the series. Thank you in advance. I will be sending this out to all my newsletter readers so apologies if you subscribe to both my blog and my newsletter as there will be a double up!