Welcome, Alex! Our first guest blogger at Attached Kids! Peer support is an incredibly important part of life. Kids need to interact with other kids who have had similar experiences, just like adults need to connect with other adults. Caregivers need to hear from other caregivers, teachers from other teachers. So, we are very excited to launch a series of guest bloggers! Some are parents, teachers, and other professionals who will offer support and guidance as you continue to promote the mental health and emotional development of the children in your life.
Alex is a mother, wife, and Ontario Certified Educator who is currently homeschooling her son. We asked her a few questions to introduce herself to all of you wonderful readers before posting her first official article next Monday! Meet Alex:
Q1. Hi Alex! Can you tell us a little bit about your family?
Alex- I stay at home in Simcoe County, raising our four year old son. My husband commutes to his office in Mississauga most days, but is able to work from his home office too. We decided to homeschool our son this year. We have begun an alternative nature program founded in unstructured playtime in nature. Our son has all his traditional reading, writing, and arithmetic lessons with me – usually in the classroom we created out of a dining room space.
We created a learning environment which supports natural science, STEM skills, reading and writing, arts, languages, cultures, nutrition, emotions, music and more. His environment is set up for self directed learning. He often leaves the breakfast table (unfinished) and gets his painting materials or workbooks out and begins his activity while I pour coffee and yawn.
Socially, he thrives. He likes his baseball team, his karate classes and learning how to swim and skate. Being at home with him not only gives me the peace of mind that he is getting a high quality of life but also allows me to work from home. I am entrepreneurial in spirit and am currently learning how to organize my time best between homeschool, housework and running a small business.
Q2. What is your favourite thing about being a parent?
Alex- My favourite thing about being a parent is revisiting childhood values. Spending time with my son has made me keenly aware of cool rocks, shells, spiderwebs, the degree to which a rain puddle has frozen, cement trucks, turtles, recycling materials for repurposing, cool feathers and the list goes on. Seeing life through his perspective has repatterned my perspective for more happiness, nature and wonderment.
My son’s childish confidence is infectious. He doesn’t care what anyone thinks when he is painting a picture or building a garbage truck out of my couch cushions (his self directed activity keeping him busy as I write this). His personal motivation is to learn, experience and grow. Other people’s opinions are just less valuable to him from this perspective. This has inspired confidence in me to try my hand at activities I otherwise have no business in. (Such as furniture repurposing, photography, muay thai or blog writing). The idea is to learn in a fun way without failure or social rejection being a concern. My son has inspired me to return to that value system.
Q3. What do you think is the hardest thing about being a parent?
Alex- The hands-down hardest part of parenting for me is practicing self control when I am feeling irritable. I grew up in an abusive household. I am accustomed to abusive language, anger and depression dominating the family vibe. I can easily slip into the unhealthy thought patterns that I learned from my childhood environment. I experience anger and depression and it requires a lot of self discipline, mental techniques and assistance from my husband and network to ensure that my son isn’t a recipient of my anger or grief. For me, this is my biggest challenge and it is also the driving force of my own mental/emotional healing. I want to be better for me, but my desire to be a healthy mom is truly what forces me to get through this process.
Q4. What is your favourite self-care activity?
Alex- When I need to escape, baths and The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Muay Thai when I need an outlet for anger. (I am going to install a bag in the basement because of how effective this is). Music when I need to tune out happy kid noises or cartoons.
Q5. What does your family like to do together?
Alex- We do everything together! Our top three favourites from my perspective are traveling, being in nature and going to restaurants together. This takes a level of maturity from our son as well as a level of patience from my husband and I. I asked my son what his favourite thing to do together is and his answer was “ cuddling in bed and on the couch.”
So, with a full heart, I am going to end this right there…
Alex
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