[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

 

 

Yeah, I do not think putting someone with some serious emotional health issues into the military and handing them a gun, possibly risking PTSD on top of other issues, and having them in a place where other's lives depend on them, is a particularly wise idea.

 

I think Job Corp or something similar would make a lot more sense.

 

Also, I'd let the dude eat the leftovers. He's under 18 and having to pay for his own food, and that doesn't seem quite right. I get that it's his choice not to eat meals with you, but if he has a legitimate diagnosis of attachment issues it's really NOT his fault. I do think that if everyone else has to help either cook or clean up, it's reasonable to assign him some other chore, since he missed clean up/cooking time. But I wouldn't withold food from a kid because they didn't help with clean up, which I am sure is how he sees it.

 

Also, you say that you give him a lump sum for school food/clothes/etc and he mismanages it. So why do that? Sounds like he needs scaffolding, and more time to mature. I'd stop and start giving him one week at a time. When he handles that well go up to a month. But stop setting him up to fail, you know? He says he can't manage the money better, BELEIVE him! He very likely has executive function deficits..it's a brain issue, not a character issue in that case. And if he's under stress to the point he doesn't feel able to eat in his own home that totally messes with your higher order thinking. Even a really great kid, when stressed, will make bad choices, and blow money just to make themselves feel better. adults do it too...that's what they call retail therapy. I really think you need to spend the next few months making some changes. Maybe it won't help, but you will have tried. Let him have free access to the food, help him with his money (that you give him) so he doesn't blow it all at once, etc. I know you are trying to force him to be more responsible but that just doesn't work with some kids. They need time, and if you throw them in the deep end to sink or swim they WILL sink.

So the food thing: he used to eat with us always, until he got a job and friends with cars. He chooses to be gone from home until his curfew every night. I will buy him food he asks for, he can cook food if he wants to, I have taught him to cook, it's not like the kitchen is under lock and key or something. He bus himself convenience foods if he wants to, but I will buy them for him if he asks for them (I don't typically buy them, we are feeding 7 other people here and I'd go broke trying to feed us like that).

 

With the money, I'm not disagreeing with you but I'm curious how you would go about it. His school has no daily limit on spending, it's a la carte so you just buy whatever you want. If you want to spend twenty bucks and buy everyone at your table food then you can. Also if you want to go into debt on your card you can. And with clothing, I took him shopping, we'd talk about what he needed. He wanted a hundred dollar pair of shoes. I told him no. He cried, you guys. Nothing like being in a store with a very angry, grown man sized teenager crying about shoes. He gets so, so angry if he doesn't have control. He knows how to bargain shop, we talked about what he might not be able to get if he bought them. He bought them. I mean I don't know what else I can really do you know?

 

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[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

Thanks so much you guys, I appreciate all the thoughts and ideas.

 

Having someone else talk to him about money is a good thought. He doesn't disagree with how we do things, he just "can't" do it that way so he deals with the consequences (bumming money and rides from friends, going hungry until he comes home at night and making a sandwich, etc.). But maybe someone else giving a fresh perspective is a good idea.

 

He was seriously considering joining the National Guard Reserve, the one where you serve one weekend a month and two weeks a year. I'm wondering if I should press that at all. I'm trying to step back and be more of a sounding board than anything, asking him questions to get him to think about things rather than making suggestions. It's hard to know how much to say. His main concerns there were that he wouldn't be able to play rugby this summer because of when boot camp starts (yeah....) and "What happens if I get arrested?" That question really took me aback, we haven't had any law enforcement dealings for over a year so it kind of came out of the blue.

 

Is it worth talking to him about it again? It would give him some money in his pocket, delay school a bit though not much (just 1 semester), and give him some experience. He sees the pros but those couple of things have him hung up a bit.

 

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[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

:iagree: :iagree: :iagree:

 

I was on my own at 17 and had I had parents who would/could have (partially) financially supported me I think I would have gotten over my anger and been much more appreciative a lot sooner. As it was I called my mom 5 times in the first week after I had sworn to myself I wouldn't speak to her until the end of the summer(we're on good terms and I think of her as a friend now). Distance can help. I would figure out how much I could afford and offer to pay 1/2 of it directly to the dorm first semester and if he has passing grades then I'd pay the other 1/2 for second semester. I'd tell him he has to call to check in (proof of life) X times per week but otherwise his life is his own, but we'd love to see/hear from him more often. Then I'd stick to it and wait him out.

Thanks for your experience, that is very helpful and encouraging :)

 

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[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

PS Also, he might be better off pursuing a trade for a while or even for life. The world is always going to need electricians, for instance, and good mechanics. Is he good with his hands? Maybe he should delay college and figure out some better goals.

Being an electrician is what he's going to college for. No, not interested in finding a job where he can learn as an apprentice, or anything like that, has to be college so he can move out. We've had many, many conversations about it, but this is how he wants to do it and his mind won't be changed. This will be a very hands on type of college, we went and visited it a few months ago and I think if he must go somewhere then this is as good of a place as any for him.

 

He has thought of doing the military in one way or another but I think at this point he's leaning towards not doing that.

 

I'm pretty sure he wouldn't go out to eat with me. He did go to the grocery store with me the other night though so that's something! He normally eats one meal a week with us, usually lunch on Sunday but sometimes not even that.

 

He does have chores he does around the house and he has been responsible for his own money for a long time (for example, we give him a set amount of money each year for clothes, he can spend it how he sees fit and if he wants more clothes than that will buy he has to come up with the difference, we give him x amount of money for food per school day in one lump sum at the beginning of the semester, he spends it how he sees fit which usually means it's gone within a few weeks of school starting and then he has to figure out how to eat at school the rest of the semester; he has to pay for all the stuff he does with his friends and eating out with them etc.). Also we've done budgeting with him, when he was young we forced him to save 10% of his earnings and helped him open a savings account (we stopped that when he turned 15, we had hoped the habit would stick but it did not), he's taken personal finance in school. He has a lot of knowledge but no ability/desire to say "no" to himself or to anyone else and that is something we can not fix. Hours upon hours spent answering his questions about things and explaining why we do what we do (which is a very different way from his family of origin), helping him at his request only to have him say "I just can't do that". I think some of it has stuck. Hopefully. Maybe.

 

We haven't ever given him an amount of money that we would do, all we've said is that we will help him but we won't be able to pay for his entire college so he'll definitely be responsible for part of it.

[Exercise Thread: April]

I haven't been in these threads but I am getting back into working out! I took the baby in the stroller to the lake today and ran almost 4 miles. It's hard work pushing a stroller and running, I'm glad I don't have to do that very often. :) I ran a few other times this week and did one body weight workout video on YouTube which left me sore for 3 days. :)

 

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[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

I would let him go but not provide the extra financial support. I understand and it is hard. We have a 15 year old foster son who does not want to be adopted but wants to live with us until he is 18 and then move out in his own.

I could understand with an older child especially. Our son has been living with us since just after his 11th birthday. It's just hard to know what is best always.

 

Off topic but I just started reading about how a bunch of adoptees are angry that their adopted parents gave them new last names (not new first names, just the family last name). One more thing to keep me up at night worrying if we messed up. Even people who were adopted as infants are angry about it. It never would have crossed my mind as something to get upset about.

[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

Is this true? I think emancipation requires proving financial independence and is difficult in most states. Don't ask me how I know . . .

In our state it is quite difficult to get emancipated. According to a few different friends in the system it basically never happens.

 

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[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

Are you the OP? There are two different user names, which is confusing.

Yes I'm sorry. I do not know why this happens when I'm on my phone. But it is the same person.

[Supporting a child in college - WWYD or WHYD]

I haven't been able to find any scholarships that he qualifies for, many of them have to do with length of time in foster care and age of being in foster care (ie, in foster care at the age of 16 or higher).

 

As far as adoption stuff, we asked the state about a guardianship and they said because of his age they wouldn't consider it (this was when he was 13, before the adoption). We have also adopted his 3 younger siblings, so that was part of the equation also. It was somewhat out of our hands, other than saying no he can't live with us, you know what I mean?

 

I totally agree he is not ready for college. His therapist is the one who suggested he should try to live on campus, but then he realized that he could graduate early, and those two things combined to create the situation we are in now.

 

He qualifies for the full fafsa grant (it's something like 5k $ per year, I can't remember exactly), and also direct loans. We will not be cosigning on any loans for him (or any of our children most likely).

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

We are doing the London Pass which says it has a fast track for the London Tower and the London Bridge. I added up the cost of everything and i think will save some money that way. So hopefully not too much waiting in lines there.

 

Our hotel is close to Westminster/Buckingham Palace so it's not much travel time to get to those places from there. I'll look at my map again to double check. If rearranging will save us time then that will work out wonderfully.

 

Edited to add, my DH is not the best for spending hours upon hours at a museum either. I think 2 hours is a good amount of time, I know we won't get through it all. I will check out that podcast, that will be very helpful thank you!

[Stuff kids do]

This just in: DS6 said "Look, I found daddy's phone in the bathroom!"

 

5 minutes later DH picks up his phone. "Why won't this turn on?"

 

DS6: "Well it fell in the toilet when I grabbed it."

 

Me: "Did you wash your hands?"

 

DS6: "yes, I did. And I washed Daddy's phone off too."

 

Yeah, the phone is toast. 😬

 

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[Stuff kids do]

A friend's DS was peeing into the corner of his room while sleepwalking. There was a floor air vent. It reeked forever.

My oldest son was in the kitchen while the pee was being dumped onto the floor out of the trashcan. He was utterly disgusted and declared he was never having kids.

 

He then proceeded to tell me that when he was younger (living with his bio mom) he used to pee in the floor vents! His mom never found out. [emoji15]

 

You guys are making me laugh so hard. I'm so glad I'm not the only one.

[Stuff kids do]

My 3 year old is potty trained but has a little potty in his room so maybe he just thought "Wow, this little potty in sister's room is just the right height for me to pee standing up in without having to go down the hall." So convenient for him. [emoji14]

 

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[Stuff kids do]

My daughter's (age 5) bedroom has been smelling really bad for the past week. At first I thought she must just have some stinky laundry, so we washed everything. Nope, still there. So I reminded her to do a good job when she takes a bath and make sure not to miss any parts, I mean is it possible she could have such horrible body odor at the age of 5? After no improvement we stripped her bedding yesterday and washed everything.

 

Yesterday afternoon was "chore day" and she asked if she could empty her trash can. Well of course you can dear, don't let me stop you!

 

She emptied it into the big trash can in the kitchen.

 

Wet stuff spilled everywhere. On the floor, all down the trash can, everywhere.

 

It was pee. In her trashcan in her room. Sitting for at least a week.

 

Whhhyyyyyyyyyy?

 

She swears she didn't do it. The three year old may have done it. I just do not understand.

 

I'll spare you the rest of the details of the ridiculousness of my day yesterday. It's horrible but also hilarious. But also horrible.

 

What crazy things have your kids been up to lately?

[In African-American Communities, Growing Interest in Homeschooling (NPR)]

Four of our children are black. We know zero other black people. I am seeking them out but in our area there just aren't many.

 

Possibly a bit of a tangent but here goes. When my son was in public school for kindergarten there was one other black child in his grade (but none in his class). We homeschool partly because I do want to make sure that they know about all of the awesome black people in history, not just Martin Luther King Jr. It really irritated me when his class did nothing for MLK day, no stories read, just nothing at all and I thought hmmm, I wonder if they would have acknowledged it if there were more black kids in the school? I wonder if black parents would have thrown a fit about the lack of celebrating the day? It's just one man but he's almost the only black man I remember learning about in school, if they aren't going to teach about him then who will they teach about? One of many reasons we chose to homeschool.

 

Anyway I'm always super excited to read about black families who homeschool, thank you for sharing.

 

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[Mark Gregston's views on homeschooling]

I read the quotes from students about how they felt the first week of being in public school. 75% of those were me...every single day of my entirely public schooled life. I wanted to be home schooled so badly but my parents felt that I needed to be forced to interact with people at public school.

 

At the age of 33 I'm still a socially awkward introverted shy dork. Public schooling did not change that for me, but some painful things happened to me in school. I wouldn't go back for a million dollars.

 

Perhaps if I had been home schooled I would blame my personality on the way that I was raised; I'm sure others would as well.

 

So, in short, I do not agree with this man. Being a teenager is hard no matter your background.

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

Flying home ... as in the US? There are international flights from the US into Dublin, Cork, or Shannon. Cork or Shannon would be closer to Dingle than Dublin. Cork would probably be the most expensive; but Shannon's prices (I think) can be competitive with Dublin's prices.

 

Also - in Ireland, you might check into using the bus system instead of the train ... but that's just another option; I don't know which is preferable.

 

And credit cards - Chase Sapphire, Southwest's credit card, and Marriott's card don't have foreign transaction fees.

Thank you! Your post made me think - why not reverse our Ireland trip, fly in to some place close to Dingle, then make our way over to Dublin and finish up with a few days there and fly home from there. That would make much more sense I think, as long as we can still get everywhere we need to go. That would hopefully save us a few hours on a train or bus or whatever.

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

Yes I hope so! If she thinks we need to rent a car we will but I'm hoping we'd only need to for the one day.

[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

Ok so I do think the England portion of the trip is pretty rushed. My sister who lives there will be driving us around for the driving bits so she's accustomed to driving times etc. I think Ireland will be ok, the tours of Dingle and Ring of Kerry return to Killarney by 5 p.m. leaving (I hope) a bit of time in the evenings for relaxing or exploring the city or whatever. Also since someone else will be driving for much of our traveling I'm hoping to spend that time snoozing, gazing out the window, or journaling what we have done. All of which sound pretty relaxing to me, as compared to my daily grind currently with my kids. I hope that doesn't sound awful, I love my kids buuuut it's hard.

 

Is London skippable? Because honestly York and Chatsworth sound so much more up my alley. London sounds scary, I'm not going to lie.

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

I wonder if I have two log ins somehow? I am confused also! I did get your pm. I wonder if it has to do with this whole Tapatalk thing. But I'm the same person!

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

 

 

As for the itinerary, my first thought is that you are spending a lot of time moving from one place to the next, and skipping over really cool stuff to do it.

 

I'd pick one island or the other for the entire 10 days. There is plenty to do in either place.

 

I also think it's a shame to go to Dingle and not stay the night so you can hear the music. The whole point of Dingle is the pub music! (We picked our Dingle rental house based on it being walking distance from the pubs. I might be a tad bit obsessed.)

 

The good news is, you'll have a great trip! I just think you'll have a better one if you reduce the geographic area you are trying to cover.

I'm not sure when we'll be able to do this again, so it feels like we need to do both while we have the chance!

 

As for Dingle, we did want to stay the night there but just didn't seem like getting from Dingle to Dublin to catch a flight home was very feasible. I mean it's like 7 or more hours right? And I think Dublin is the only place we can fly home from from Ireland. I think the tour company can drop us at our hotel in Dingle but it's just a matter of getting back to Dublin.

 

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[Traveling abroad - paying for stuff and planning]

 

 

Just a couple of things I noticed - I don't think it is possible to travel from Lakenheath and see York, Durham Castle and Chatsworth in one day. It is over 3 hours each way to get to York and then would be a further hour and a half, I think, to get to Durham. The roads in the UK are busier and narrower and it takes a lot longer to travel 100 miles there than it does in the USA. I haven't been to Durham Castle, but can definitely vouch for York and Chatsworth being worth a days visit each. I love Chatsworth, lived just down the road from it for many years, and loved York when I visited.

 

The places you listed in London are all very interesting to visit. I definitely recommend taking one of the hop on hop off bus tours, especially if you only have 1 day in London. The guides on the bus are knowledgeable and you can see and learn a lot this way. I would maybe pick a couple of places to stop off for a longer look. Also, Windsor is outside of London and it would take you a while to get there and back. Greenwich is a little ways from the center as well and would take a little while to get to, but you could do a boat trip along the Thames as part of your day, and get on somewhere like Tower Bridge or Westminster and go to Greenwich and back that way.

I think you are right about Durham Castle. I'll cross it off my list. Thank you! :) Good idea about the boat trip, that sounds fun!

 

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[Poll! What is your disposition type?]

One more thought. With very loud, very opinionated people I will quite simply take on the role of smiling and nodding because I can't get a word in edge wise or, if I do manage to eek out a sentence without being interrupted, my thoughts are simply discarded as incorrect and therfore not valid and not even worth discussion. Verbally run over is how I feel after this kind of engagement. This kind of social encounter is demoralizing and exhausting for me, but perhaps the person on the other end just finds me boring.

 

And to clarify, I'm both very shy and very much an introvert. This combination is practically a social death sentence. This post really got under my skin and I agree with many of the posts above, I hope you will take the time to get to know the person you are judging. You might just find a jewel beneath that rough exterior.

 

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[Poll! What is your disposition type?]

I think I'm a stick in the mud! I am quiet and calm (on the surface anyway). I don't get worked up about things, I'm pretty private overall. On the introvert-extrovert scale I'm way on the introvert side. Zero extrovert genes over here.

 

I've been thinking a lot lately about how people perceive me and it's really frustrating to be painted into a box because of how I (unintentionally) act in a group setting where I feel overwhelmed (homeschool group, church, etc.) I'm super nice, have a good sense of humor, I have lots of hobbies I love, I care for people deeply, but I just have a hard time socializing in groups. Especially groups where I'm trying to keep track of 5 kids while simultaneously holding a conversation with an adult who probably thinks I'm not paying attention to her. It sucks that that's an automatic black mark against me.

[Bee-keeping, anyone?]

I found that our city actually has a bee club, I stumbled upon it on Facebook which led me to their web page. I contacted the president of the club, and told him I was interested in learning more about keeping bees. He is going to find a beekeeper in the area who I can "assist" this season, so I can learn without investing much other than time. Maybe in your area there is someone who would be willing to do the same? He said next year if I'm interested the club can help me find a place to keep bees (our property is too small according to county rules). I think this is just about the perfect set up, maybe you can find something like that in your area as well.

 

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