I ran across this blog post today and appreciated the two questions she poses to homeschoolers at the end. I decided I wanted to answer them too.

As a former homeschooler, I am noticeably capable and mature because:
I grew up with a lot of responsibility that by necessity taught me many practical skills. I read copious amounts of books. I quickly learned to read another’s emotional state and intuitively guess what they need as a necessary survival skill. My performance level is high in most sorts of pressured or crisis circumstances. My communication skills, mostly verbal, were sharpened by constant high -pressure communication through my growing up years.

What I wish people really knew about me was:
I can find almost no motivation to do anything without a crisis. My health and current emotional weakness (Panic attacks, PTSD symptoms) are proof of the many years that I was strong in extreme circumstances. In spite of how it may look on the outside, I am unsure and insecure in all my social interactions. My ability to read and respond to someone else’s emotional state is almost to the level of compulsion; sometimes, I don’t know if I’m doing it out of care for the person, or to protect myself, or only out of habit. The only relationships I feel I have a good grasp on are ones with authorities or subordinates. I don’t understand people who don’t have a strong survival instinct, or don’t seem to think about survival one way or the other. If I dropped you as a friend, it isn’t because I didn’t like you; it’s because I literally do not understand how people are supposed to make, keep, or interact with friends.This is one of my greatest regrets and it constantly haunts me.

In my memories, I can rarely place exactly where Mom was. In spite of being a stay at home mom, she was never around. When I try to place her, there are a few things that come to mind. She was often in her room, on the phone, crying for hours. We were not allowed to interrupt her when she was in her room on the phone.

When I was little I would go to get my schoolwork checked, but it usually didn’t get checked because Mom was on the phone. If I did manage to interrupt her, she would curtly tell me to leave her alone, not to interrupt, and she would “deal with it later.” I quickly learned not to try.

I also remember her being out of the house a lot with one or more of us with her, running errands.

She also took a lot of long naps. Now I realize that she was probably struggling with untreated, undiagnosed depression, for my entire life.We were not allowed to wake her up unless someone was “dying or bleeding,” or she would give us a time when we were supposed to wake her up.

I don’t know why she never set an alarm. If we forgot or didn’t keep close watch on the time, she would berate us for not getting her up in time to do what she needed to. If we accidentally woke her up by being loud, she would also berate us. We all hated to wake her up even when she told us to, because she always woke with a strong startle response. She would jump out of her skin, and it would make us jump out of our skin too. Now I can't help but connect this to her own trauma and PTSD.