Feeling a failure need

Hi Victoria,

I’m Kayleigh, one of the parent supporters at Netmums. From your post I hear that you are a caring mum and you’re really focused on your daughter’s wellbeing. You want her to get a good balance of education and social opportunities at home, but it sounds like this can be challenging at times. I’m sorry to hear this leaves you feeling like a failure, making the decision to home educate your daughter shows how committed you are to her and you are making the effort to arrange meet ups with her old friends too.

It may be helpful to connect with other home educators in your area, this could give you an opportunity to introduce your daughter to other home educated children nearby and they may be able to advise you of local home education sessions too. There is a directory with regional groups here: https://www.educationotherwise.org/community-portal/

We also have a home education board on Netmums that may be useful: https://www.netmums.com/coffeehouse/education-1071/home-education-873/

Wishing you all the best,

Kayleigh

I totally understand what you’re going through. My eldest wasn’t officially homeschooled but due to ME, wasn’t in school for almost the whole of year 11. The social side was so difficult as her friends were busy with school stuff which she wasn’t so she felt really left behind when she was well enough to see them.

from what I’ve read on our local borough FB pages, there are homeschooling support groups. Would it be worth checking them out to see if there are any local families who are in the same situation as you? From what I’ve gathered, in some places, there are a lot of homeschooled kids and they all organize get togethers.

you’re doing great - you’re not a failure. She will smile, honestly.

ps not sure if this is any help or something you believe in but my eldest had counseling around the same age and it didn’t work. She just got more traumatized. However she really got on well with holistic therapies and crystals. For her it really made a difference to her healing.

Hi my daughter is 12 homeschooled we use a company called live laugh learn lessons are £3 and kids internet via zoom if she ever was a email pal she’s welcome to chat to my daughter 🙂

Many thanks , I will take a look at the links 🤞🏻😊

Hello Vicky , yes that’s what I worry about , I have found some information through friends on fb she seems reluctant to go though , so I’m going to give it another try after Easter as we have a few HE meet ups close by, I know 1st time is hard but hoping it will be fine after that, will definitely look into holistic therapy thank you 😊

Hello Kayleigh, I actually found the site live laugh learn yesterday so going to sign her up to a couple things on there & I see they have a chat & pen pal section on there so will definitely take a look into that , thank you that’s really kind 😊

Best of luck. I’m sure her confidence will have been properly shook by the bullying so it will take time and baby steps to put herself out there again. She will get there x

We home educate my 12 year old. We were so busy last week with Home Ed groups and events. There's so many now, hope you find something in your area. We are in derbyshire

Have you tried your local scout group? Might be worth a try.

I am so sorry to hear your child was bullied at her previous school. If homeschooling isn’t working to increase her confidence, could you try enrolling her in another school next year as a fresh start (I assume year 8)? You say that you live in an isolated area and she doesn’t attend school, so I would guess she is missing out in freedom making her own friends independently.

Give her some chores. Get her to choose and cook dinner every day. Find her a job, she's old enough to walk dog, muck out horse, etc or get her to pick a new thing she wants to learn for herself like knitting or cycle mechanics or whatever

I think the issue is she doesn’t have a friendship group since being with drawn from school.