eternalsummer
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Posts posted by eternalsummer
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Were you a practicing Catholic then, and how did that affect your decision-making, experience, etc.?
What was your family's reaction?
What was the best part (in your experience) of having your first child so young? (assuming there were good parts, of course)
I barely miss the cutoff for this thread; I had my first at 20 (in college), which I realize is a drastically different thing than 16. I get where you're coming from with the college credits thing, though - I thought it would be no big deal to keep up with school while relatives watched DD during class, hahahaha. I failed the first semester, every class but one where the professor felt sorry for me and gave me a pity D.
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When are you due? (I am not pregnant; I just have a fat tummy!)
This happens to me fairly often, and it makes me sad every time, even when I know that I shouldn't let it bother me... the first time I was 13 and fairly thin, so it was rather shocking to me.
The worst was when someone at church asked me this in front of a group of people, as I was holding my 2-month-old baby. I had to reply in front of everyone-- "I already had the baby! See?"
I have one similar, though I was mostly amused instead of offended; after I had my first, my dad (followed by assent from my husband) asked when I would stop looking pregnant. Humph!
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15 years ago, we had world history in 7th, early american history in 8th (up to the civil war), post-civil war american in 9th, world again in 10th, and then american (split in 2 again) in 11th/12th (although this time it included mexico and south america). History wasn't required in 11th/12th to graduate; you could take something called "American government" instead, which was just one semester.
So I guess it depends on the school district - you might be able to tell the last time there was a comprehensive american history year or partial year, to see if it was anytime recently for the PS kids. It's possible they haven't done american history since 6th grade, in which case I wouldn't worry about it.
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Black Ships Before Troy has a lexile of 1300; it's not a 4th grade book.
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"….but I think the answer you're looking for is I converted. "
hah, I bet that gets them :)
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completely optional, will not be a problem
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Also (tangent) I have to say that the difference between lunch in NZ schools and US schools (in my limited experience) was just insane.
In the US, everyone gets in a long line; the getting of your lunch and paying for it takes maybe 5-10 minutes. Then you sit at a table in the cafeteria (indoors) and have 10-15 minutes to eat and a few minutes to throw the trash away, use restroom, etc.
That is the only break time in the whole day.
In NZ, on every half-decent day (of which there are a lot more in NZ than the Midwest here, granted), all the kids eat lunch outside! And there are no long tables with seats where everyone sits in rows and shovels in the food - they have an entire hour for lunch, and they sort of eat and then run around and talk and play rugby or basketball or whatever. I just found it amazing, and such a better way of doing things.
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DH also works from home (we own our own business) and homeschool (of course). We ALWAYS get asked if we get tired of each other, or go crazy being all in the house all the time, etc. Then we hear about how that person could NEVER do it <insert reasoning>.
yes! Same experience.
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I agree that children learn even when they are not opening a text book, but that is the same for bricks and mortar schooled children. My boys have not stopped learning at weekends and in holidays just because they now go to school.
Yes - same here. I worked out that the UK education system adds an entire extra year of schooling compared to the US by age 18, due to the longer school year. For better or worse, that means that general education is out of the way before university and an English university course is usually three years of intense specialisation.
L
I did several months of teacher training in schools in NZ (Christchurch); I don't know if it's the same in the UK, but in NZ, high school at least is something like 9 am to 3/3:30 pm, with 25 minutes for "tea" in the late morning and an entire hour for lunch.
High school where I grew up in the US was 6:30am to 3pm, no tea, lunch was 25 minutes.
Not, honestly, that it makes any difference, because the schools waste so much time anyway. I think the US system could stand an overhaul, which might very well include allowing students with certain specializations to avoid gen ed requirements in University (which most advanced students do anyway, to a degree).
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Although I should also say: there is such a thing, I think, as addiction to the internet/computers, which is a different issue and should be handled differently. If you feel like it's really out of control in a serious way, maybe take a few weeks where *no one* uses the computers for anything non-essential (or anything at all, if possible), so the addiction/dependence can be broken.
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Perhaps they multitask. I can't function without multiple windows open. I get a thought, I write it down, I percolate. And by percolate, I'm on these boards, I'm checking Facebook or email, I'm reading an article... And then I go back and think some more or write some more. Even as a teen, I couldn't work in sheer quiet- I always needed background noise. Maybe it's no different in this situation.
Agreed. This may be a good opportunity to learn time management - perhaps you could give them a bit more responsibility, like an adult has. Say you gave them a checklist of what has to get done today, or in the next few days, or this week, and let them figure out how to get it done on time; that way they learn to manage (as we all do) our dawdling.
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I don't have experience with ASD, so I can't tell you anything from that point of view.
I can say that my non-autistic, non-ADD (should such a thing even really exist at the levels it is currently prescribed for), 5 year old kindergartner has a few of the same traits.
I was told the exact same thing about circle time (to the extent that he was not allowed to sit with the other kids at circle time), and his handwriting is pretty atrocious. He was (and is) both easily bored, completely non-internally-motivated to do things he finds boring, and ahead of the normal Ker in math/etc., which manifested as behavior issues in PS to the extent that they were making ADD noises (weighted blankets, etc.) That was the day we withdrew him from PS.
Here is the thing: he can focus just fine on things he either finds worth his focus for his own reasons or worth his focus because he's learned there's no other option (cleaning up a room, for instance).
He hasn't had an IQ test so I can't say anything there, and no vision problems like your DS.
Anyway, just a perspective of: at least some of these things are normal. Some may not be; use your best judgment, I guess.
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I think it's one of the great things about the Laura Ingalls Wilder books - they're told, for the most part, from the point of view of a pioneer girl in the late 1800s, and that is explicit within the books. It makes it easy to talk about how the pioneers (and especially their children) might have seen and how they felt about Native Americans.
You don't have to present it (and the books don't present it, really) as if Laura's POV is objective, and it's really valuable as an example of a subjective POV.
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When I was a kid I played flute from 5th grade through 12th (PS), and got pretty decently good at it (22nd best in my state! which seemed like a big deal at the time). My parents never required or even encouraged regular practice. They paid for lessons (not muhc $ back then, maybe $40 a month) for 7 years. I went through stages of practicing feverishly, 2 hours a day, and stages of not picking it up for weeks (except during the school day for band). I never wanted to quit, and I haven't played (with a couple of very minor exceptions) since high school.
Band was a large motivator for me, and competition. Do your children like to play at all? Is there a certain standard they must reach to gain something they want? (a higher chair in a local band/orchestra, or even just acceptance into that band?)
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You could medicate yourself to medicated happiness, or numbness at least, through any variety of drugs (pharmaceuticals, alcohol, whatever.)
I don't think you can force yourself to be happy in a situation that is desperately sad/depressing/difficult. Have you ever read Joseph the Provider by Thomas Mann? There's a good bit there when he (Joseph) has been thrown down the well, and his life sucks, and he's miserable. He wants to hope but he can't feel it, and Mann says basically that you can't borrow happiness or hope or satisfaction from a future time; sometimes you have to live in the moment, and sometimes the moment is not a good one.
I think that there are things one can do to make one's life happier, even in bad situations, but it might just mitigate, not solve the problem. If there is no solution to the problem there is no solution.
I know you said the incurable disease reference was an analogy only, but have you thought of finding some forums or support groups for people facing that kind of thing, and seeing what they do to cope?
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my grandmother has been on pain meds for 7 years and will likely be on them for at least 5 or 10 more.
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Hah, I was just thinking - is anyone reading that British Views on the American Revolution thread?
In my (really very very limited experience), Jewish concern about Jesus is tantamount to British concern about the American Revolution.
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When I was 20 or so, our family dog (I was living with my parents at the time), a 15 or so year old dachshund, became quite ill with some intestinal thing. It was pretty clear that he was in some pain and that he was likely not going to make it through. He was not in the best of health anyway ( he was 15!) and it had come on quickly and he was defecating blood, etc.
So my dad and I went to the vet and I went in the room with my dog (my dad couldn't bear it) and they euthanized him while I stroked him.
I have still not been able to fully let go of the guilt I feel, though it wasn't my decision and he was after all going to die soon and was in pain.
The decision is yours to make, and only you can know if it's the right thing or not. Just letting you know that you're not alone about feeling guilt.
I think generally that the argument that a pet is in pain or will be in pain, so might as well euthanize as it's the best thing for the pet, is a poor one. My dad got sick a couple of years ago and was sent home from the hospital on hospice; we didn't just say, oh well, it's better off for him if we just kill him now. We don't euthanize pets for their sake; if we were doing it for that reason we'd euthanize old people too. We euthanize them for our own convenience - and that may be legitimate in some cases! But I think it's important to recognize going in, otherwise you trick yourself into thinking you're doing something you're not. Acting with clear vision is generally a lot better in the long run.
Eta: that was inaccurate, sometimes we do euthanize both pets and ourselves if we can, when the pain is truly unbearable and unrelievable with painkillers, etc. But I think generally we're much much much more willing to euthanize pets "for their own good" than we are humans, which means it's not for their own good at all.
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Or rather, the distinction between the two realms of instructions: those which separate good and bad, and those which separate pure and impure (holy vs profane, maybe?)
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hmm, that is interesting, the distinction between good and holy
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This might sound a little heretical, but I don't think anyone needs a religion to figure out how to behave ethically..
I agree completely, obviously (I am not religious, and I see religion as a vehicle for morality rather than the source, but it is sure a good vehicle for a lot of people) :)
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Here is an example: so you've got kosher laws, right? And one of them is to not eat the blood of an animal, so there are lots of customs and traditions and rules and regulations to avoid doing so, so that you've obeyed god.
Is that just a technical consideration in Orthodox Judaism (which seems more concerned with obeying the laws in the torah/talmud than say Reform Judaism) - you are just doing the things that are necessary (and a lot more, to be extra sure) to obey the specific law as given?
Or is there consideration within the religion for why that law might exist (perhaps to reduce the suffering of the animal? I don't know); in which case you'd have to do a lot more than worry about how the animal was slaughtered, as modern farm animals (even kosher ones) are often raised in really inhumane ways, which the writers of the torah/god could never have considered when the torah was written, right?
Or do you just say, heck, we don't know why that's in the torah, but we know we have to do as god says so that's why we're doing this?
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Do you see most (or all?) of the - what is the word, mitzvot? (the following of the various rules in the torah) as moral instructions or just technical instructions? Is there an effort to understand the moral behind the technical instruction, or is it assumed that there are some laws that are mysteries (that is, have no basis in morality that anyone can see but are god's word and therefore must be followed)?
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Is there a split (not maybe a religious or even overt split, but a community-identity thing) between Orthodox Jews in the US and Orthodox Jews in Israel? I read Chosen by Chaim Potok when I was 12, but that is about all the sense I have of it.
Ask a former teen mom
in The Chat Board
Posted
Was your pregnancy planned? I assumed not, but maybe so since you had already been married for a bit? Why did you get married so young? (Dh and I got together at 18 and 15 (me) and we knew then that we'd be married, but we held off on the formality for a while so as not to freak out family)