A Mom's Separation Anxiety

When people ask me why we homeschool, I can easily came up with many reasons. The one reason I usually don't mention is the one that made me start thinking of homeschooling in the first place seven years ago even though I had never known anyone who homeschooled and it seemed like a strange, crazy thing to me. I was reminded of that reason today as I sat in my van outside the library  The first time I thought about homeschooling was when Colin was 3 years old. His friends started preschool and I just couldn't stand the thought of being away from him and having him with strangers. I thought it would be easier if we waited until he was 5 and ready for kindergarten. As 5 got closer, he still looked so little and I realized that 5 year olds are still babies. Once we decided to homeschool, I assumed it would only be for a few years until he was old enough to take care of himself a little better. Ha Ha! How could I not have seen then that he will always seem like a little boy to me?

So what made me think about all of this? Colin went to a science camp today. It was the first time he's ever went to a class where I dropped him off. Once I was back in the van with the girls, I sat there for about 5 minutes feeling a little sick about leaving him and wondering if I should just go back in. I had considered staying there when I first signed him up, but then I realized that as much as we love the library, 3 hours there is a long time for the girls. Finally, I made myself leave to do the errands I had planned and only checked my phone for the time and to make sure he didn't call once a couple times a few times okay it was a lot of times.

I don't think Molly liked it any more than I did. She kept asking me what time it was. After a while, she finally said that she just wanted to go back and get Colin. The funny thing is this morning she kept talking about Colin being gone like she was looking forward to it.

So we all made it through this milestone. He did great and had fun. Now we get to do it all over again tomorrow. It will be easier the second time, right?