How I Survived 18 Years With No School

First off: my heart goes out to all the parents who have been forced to homeschool during COVID-19. Maybe you’re scared for your kid to go back, or maybe their school has gone virtual for the rest of the year. Whether you’re juggling a career in the background, trying to get your kids to pay attention to virtual classes, or stressing about their lack of social interaction, this is a difficult and uncertain time for every parent and child.

While I don’t yet have children of my own, I distinctly remember my own struggles with an unconventional childhood. I was homeschooled and mostly isolated from society until I was eighteen. This was mostly due to the dogma of my parents’ former cult-like church, who preached that the end of the world was coming and that children needed to be isolated from worldly influence to remain “pure.”

The beacon of hope I want to offer parents is: after eighteen years of living through that type of environment, I was still able to go to college. Eventually, I got a PhD in engineering. I learned social skills through college and was still able to develop long-term friendships and relationships. It was not by any means easy or perfect, but through my experiences I gained a certain amount of “grit” that helped me pull through.

I’m not here to sugar coat the reality that homeschooling and social isolation are difficult and are not ideal situations to grow up in. As much as I paint a rosy picture of coming out “alright”, I also had many fights with my parents, painful social blunders and severe bouts of loneliness. However, I do want to share some important takeaways from my own childhood. I believe these key points helped to keep me and my family sane, despite our church putting external pressure on us and trying to force us apart.

Start the day with a meditative activity, together.

When I was young, my mom, sister and I had our morning rituals. First we’d pray. Then we’d read a chapter of the Bible. And then, my mom would read aloud to us from classic adventure books, such as The Twenty-One Balloons by William Pene Du Bois or King Solomon’s Mines by H. Rider Haggard. While she read, my sister and I would listen quietly and work on our Lego City. This was probably the most structured part of our entire day, and looking back, I realize that it also taught us some valuable lessons. The ritual of reading adventure books to us inspired our creativity, while the ritual of praying and reading the Bible taught us discipline.

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There are different ways a morning ritual could look for your family – maybe walking the dog together in the park, audiobooks, yoga, or even family chats during breakfast. Regardless of what it looks like, it needs to feel grounding, for both the kids and yourself.

Trust your kid to discover and pursue hobbies that interest them.

What if your kid hates virtual school, but is keen on other hobbies such as playing online games or doodling? How will they make it into college or find a useful career?

My teenage years as a homeschooler were particularly rough. I spent summers on a church farm commune with other kids my age (that was a whole other can of worms) but for the most part I remained isolated at home. Even when I was on the church farm, we were forbidden from reading novels, watching movies or doing anything remotely fun. Our job was to work on the farm and “serve God.” Our only education was related to reading the Bible, listening to sermons by the church leaders, and basic skills like writing and mathematics.

During these times, my hobbies were the only thing that kept me going. Whether on the farm commune or isolated at home, I learned to value my time alone because it was sacred for pursuing passions like:

Sneaking onto Neopets.com — both to play game and learn CSS/HTML by coding customized webpages.
Coding up an explorable world, writing decide-your-own quests based on if/else logic, and inventing a whole storyline for an online role-playing game.
Writing a fantasy novel. As part of my self education I borrowed a LOT of books on literary craft from the library, including The Portable MFA.
Listening to pop songs and transcribing them for piano by ear.

Yes, I wasn’t learning much in terms of “traditional” school subjects. Instead, I was building skills in coding, logic, creative writing and arts. And by the time I realized that I did want to go to college and that I’d have to learn traditional disciplines such as Calculus, Physics and History, I knew how to pursue them myself as I’d already learned how to look things up on the internet or borrow books from the library on subjects that were new to me.

Give your kids the support to deal with tough times, with examples and values from your own life.

There are increasing worries about the impacts of COVID-19 on children, and whether it might be causing any trauma. It’s important to let your kids process what’s going on in a healthy way, and motivate them to continue dealing with the temporary inconveniences that COVID causes, in the hopes of a better future.

I personally had to overcome the trauma caused by my church while applying to college — not an easy task. I was struggling to teach myself math for the SATs, and was freaking out about how to write my college applications when I didn’t have formal grades and wasn’t part of any clubs or community institutions. Most days I’d shriek at my parents, blaming them for not sending me to school at a young age. At that point of my life, I was still too scared to go to public high school as I thought they wouldn’t accept me due to my experiences at the church. I only thought formal education was “worth it” if I could make it into a four-year college, so my parents weren’t left with many other options other than to get me ready for that path.

First my parents would calm me down, reminding me that the situation we found ourselves in with the church was something that had affected the whole family, not just me. They’d then motivate me first by telling me about the Stanford marshmallow experiment, and how the concept of “holding out for better things” helped them through their own childhoods. For example, my immigrant father endured living with his abusive aunt in Singapore during high school, knowing that it was the only way he could apply to college abroad in the United States.

My parents would also remind me that I had several choices: I could give up immediately and go back to the church farm commune for the rest of my life, essentially “eating the first marshmallow.” Or, I could keep struggling and working towards getting into college, essentially holding out for a “second marshmallow” which would be better than the first.

For some reason, those examples stuck with me. I figured out how to study for the SATs, and found ways to contribute towards my community despite not attending public school. These days, whenever I call my sister, we reflect on our lives and agree that our parents’ telling us about the “marshmallow” example had been crucial for motivating us to keep sight of larger goals.

Let your kids know that you’re all in this together, as a family.

My parents were always transparent about any “adult” problems they were having. Whether that was dealing with lawsuits against unlicensed plumbers, deciding whether to move for a new job opportunity or prying our family away from the influence of our church, they always kept my sister and I updated on what was going on. We never felt like we were kept in the dark, and were more empathetic towards what our parents were going through. No matter what happened, we were a family. We were a team.

These days, you might be experiencing fights and meltdowns from your kids about being bored, wanting to see their friends, being scared, or a combination of all those things. Let them know you feel that way too. Let them know that it’s OK to be frustrated, but that in order to survive and see the light at the end of the tunnel, the whole family has to get through these times together, both physically and mentally.

If this pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that family is precious, and that you only have one. Don’t forget to take care of yourself as well as your kids, and treasure the time you have with them. I hope this article has given some ideas or at least inspiration for how to deal with homeschooling during difficult or uncertain situations. Please comment or reach out to me if you have any other questions. Thanks for reading, and stay safe!

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Previously published on medium

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