On the second day of school, Joey (10) comes to me after bedtime. He looks sad and distraught and starts off by saying, “I don’t know if I should tell you this or not because you might say something and I don’t want you to.”

I immediately think he’s having trouble with a kid at school. Turns out, he’s having trouble with his teacher. He’s feeling frustrated and overwhelmed by the differences between homeschooling and school.

Here I thought he’d be the one that would love it and be well adjusted, but it turns out he’s having a hard time with the rules. He says he feels like his teacher is getting on him about lots of things and that he doesn’t even know what the rules are.

Some things he’s been corrected on have been, sitting improperly in his desk chair. (He’s used to doing school work sprawled out on the floor) He’s interrupted once or twice at school and in the lunch room he was called over by the teacher because he kept getting up and down at the lunch table. He felt very embarrassed that she called him over.

Right about now I’m starting to feel guilty. Joey’s teacher is really sweet and during our pre-school conference she asked me what she wanted her to work on with Anthony. I mentioned he talks a lot and might need some help with interrupting. That we’re trying to teach him life isn’t always fair, but it’s how you deal with things that matters. We also mentioned he’s been going through a whinny stage. So I’m thinking maybe I brought this on my son!

He also mentioned being confused during a science lesson because his teacher said Molecules make up atoms and said the water atom was made up of a 2 hydrogen and 1 oxygen molecule. Joey said that I taught him that atoms make up molecules. To tell you the truth, atoms and molecules confuse me so I wasn’t sure which was correct.

Now I’ve learned that when I question something Joey usually is right. Once he hears something, he remembers it. But we went to my homeschool books and lo and behold, he was right. The hydrogen atom makes up the water molecule. But how does he go and tell his teacher she was wrong. BTW, she had confided in me that one of the teachers had challenged her to do more in science so I told Joey science wasn’t her best subject, but Joey can’t understand how a teacher doens’t know everything.

So he could really use your prayers right now. It’s only the second day of school, but he feels like an outsider. His closing words to me were, “school is not like I imagined it.” I could relate. Homeschool wasn’t what I imagined either.

I guess I didn’t prepare him enough for school. I just thought he’d love it. I told him how just because it hurts sometimes doesn’t mean it’s not God’s plan. (Hope I got that double negative thing right. I guess if I woke up Joey and asked him, he’d know!) I went on to explain a diamond is just a lump of coal until it goes in the furnace and comes out shining. (He questioned my diamond theory and made me think twice about it, but I stuck to my analogy.) I told him, maybe this was God’s way of making him shine. Then I held him, and let him cry in my arms. We ended with a prayer and I said, “I promise things will get better.”

He looked at me through tear filled eyes and smiled. “Mom, don’t promise things you can’t deliver.”

But somehow, I know things will get better!

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