I have bitten my tongue or slapped my hands to avoid posting anything about this subject in the past but I just can't keep quiet a moment longer. I had mentioned in the past about the home school group I was involved with and how much I appreciated them. I refrained from telling you about the horrors that I went through with the group, with the exception of a couple of the mom's, this group turned out to be a nightmare. I found the group through an online search for home school groups in my area. I found one local group that apparently didn't have much activity to the web page and the mother that started her own group sent me a message to tell me about her group. I looked it up and joined the yahoo group she had told me about.
When I first met them back in 3/06 they of course put on their best home school mom faces. They appeared genuinely interested in us when we came to the first play group and also seemed interested in Jean and her family who came for the first time on the same day. Both Jean and I have children with disabilities and they seemed interested in the challenges that those disabilities brought to our lives. Unlike most of the mom's in the group I had not been a home school mom from the start of my children's school years. Little did I know that this made me a lessor home school mom in their eyes. I know that my choosing to home school my son when I did was for reasons that I felt were best for him at the time. I'm not of the belief that home schooling is the best choice for all children, all families or that the choice to home school can't change over time. I don't feel home schooled children are better than any other children nor do I believe the opposite is true. I do believe that children that are either in public school, private school or home school still need the guidance of their parents. A public school education can be fantastic or it can be lacking but in either case with a parents involvement any deficits can be made up and for those lucky enough to have great teachers still need their parents support.
What I found almost immediately was that these mothers seemed to speak badly of parents/moms of public schooled children (PS). Heck they spoke badly of each other when ever they had the chance to do so. The sad truth is women are notorious for back stabbing. Let me assure you this isn't what I'm attempting to do here as you will see by the end of the coming posts that this is about telling the facts as I know them.
The "inner circle" is composed of 3 moms in particular. *I've changed their names to protect their identities. Nicole*, (Catholic home school mom of 6 children, yeah Catholic, but not the "perfect" Catholic that she seems to portray). I won't go into the specifics cause that would be airing dirty laundry. Stacy*, married (to a man that at least one of the mom's says is a hottie) home school mom of 2 young boys (Catholic wanna be from what I understand). Mandy*, wife and home school mom of 3 girls (not sure of her religious orientation or if she has any). I'm not giving the religious info for any reason other than giving some background of each. We are all sinners, we all fall very far from the example that was set for us by our creator and I know this includes me. This isn't a Sunday school lesson so I'll stop there. Just the facts, here. This "inner circle" keeps each other informed of the goings on of its other members. Speaking as if they are of higher power. Better than the rest if you will. The truth is they are no better than any other person in the group or on this earth. We are all equal. I learned fairly early on that I shouldn't talk about anything more than myself and my home school trials and tribulations. It wasn't long that I'd hear things that I had confided in one mom being repeated to me by another mom.
One afternoon I hosted the group at my home. The moms settled in the house for coffee, cake and other goodies set aside for all to enjoy as well as the usual conversation. Now mind you the group is pretty large and I have a modest home only about 1,800 square feet and the moms and children I numbered above were only a small part of the group. At one point Stacy* sees Bob, my husband, arrive home and he greets everyone and runs upstairs to get cleaned up. *Stacy remarks how cute he is. I thank her and tell her I thought so too. This get together went fairly uneventfully except for the mess left outside from the water balloons and plastic cups and such and the mess in Brandon's room.
A few play dates later and Stacy* mentions to me that she can't understand how I could stay married to Bob. Apparently she had a short conversation with him outside at the previous meeting at my house and he spoke to her about his wish to get out of his current profession. In that 5 minute conversation she had decided he was impossible to live with. Of course the fact that Bob isn't a drunk, abusive in anyway or the fact that he is a wonderful loving husband and father unlike her own comments about her husband made him impossible to live with. I suppose we have different ideas about what a good husband and father should be. I sat there in complete shock and though I should have said something like, "oh yeah a husband that drinks till he's drunk every night is the GOLD standard. I'm not sorry I didn't aim that high!" Instead I had no reply. Again I bit my tongue cause everything that came to mind was going to be hurtful. Believe it or not I do try not to be hurtful. Not to say that I haven't opened mouth and inserted foot on more than one occasion....
To be continued......
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