From Full Time to School Time: Trading in Six Figures for Homeschooling My Son with Autism

My 8-year-old son Joshua has level two autism spectrum disorder, suffers from anxiety and ADHD, and is a Gestalt language processor. All this means is that the level of support and accommodation he needs in a school setting may be more than most kids need. We successfully contributed to two other kids graduating from public schools, and one can now add graduating college to that accomplishment as well. Parenting a neurodivergent child in the public school system is not something you can be ready for until you need to be.

Both my husband and I were working from home full time, in jobs that were high stress and high touch. I was still able to be there for our son where school was concerned, but it was not easy. Adding to the difficulties was that a year prior we relocated from Ohio to North Carolina without any family here.

If we had remained in Ohio, I would have never considered homeschooling. For one, we had a great support system in place. Also, in my opinion, Ohio is much less homeschool-friendly than North Carolina. I believe North Carolina has one of the highest rates of homeschool families, and the laws are very relaxed.

The end of my son’s 2nd grade school year was plagued by his losing his one-on-one support person, and then the main teacher left as well. In our school district, Joshua was in a self-contained autism class. We had teacher assistants with our kids who lasted only 6 or 7 weeks of school. The principal did not reach out and explain a plan or even communicate an understanding that all of the changes taking place were not ideal, especially for kids who hold tight to predictable situations.

At the end-of-year party I attended, I came back home and told my husband we CANNOT send Joshua back the following school year. The class of 8 was down to 4 (including my son). Not only did staff leave. but so did students, unbeknownst to us. Two of the students literally had their tablets walking around the room watching their shows. Now you might say chill, it was a party day, right? Actually, my husband observed this previously when he went to visit our son’s class. We were getting daycare vibes; the kids were just being supervised but not actually taught.

Feeling discouraged and raising questions as to why our son was not working on reading and some other items, we thought he should be at least attempting. We were met with a busy book he likes to do (tracing and matching) and told the behaviors in the class make it difficult. IEP meetings were frustrating and exhausting, to say the least. These were all reasons we had to arrive at a tough decision.

Without consulting our financial planner but with much prayer, we decided I would leave my full-time job and begin homeschooling after summer break. “WHAT!!??” I am not a teacher, nor have I been trained in special education. Where would I start? How can I do this? What about our finances?

All I knew was that we know our son best. I knew that we would provide a safe environment where he could be himself. I would be able to monitor his diet and ensure we stick to the changes we committed to making with our Functional Medicine provider. If he didn’t sleep well the night before, I would adjust his school day. If he needed to stop and swing, I would allow it. These thoughts overcame the very real doubts I had (and at times still have).

During the summer I joined every homeschool and autism homeschool group I could find. I scoured posts about curriculum, socialization, schooling styles, you name it. This made me realize that I spend an awful amount of time surfing the web looking for so many topics related to this autism journey we are on. Article after article, blog after blog, and they were either from a dry medical perspective or a rose-colored parental lens.

In conjunction with teaching my son, I also decided to start Parenting Autism Compass. This would give me an outlet to share our wins and our losses as well as help other families who find themselves searching the internet for information to help their children.

Homeschooling is not the answer for all families with children on the autism spectrum. I’m not even sure if this will be our answer long-term. The growth and confidence Joshua now exhibits are pretty hard to miss with less than two months of homeschooling under our belt. We are still working out kinks and improving the amount of quality time he can attend, but it’s on his terms. Sensory breaks, field trips, learning in a spinning chair, however he needs it at that time.

I am thankful to not only be my son’s mommy, advocate, dietitian, and life skills coach, but now his teacher as well. Days can be long and hard, and obviously I am not getting the pay I was used to, but what is being stored up has no amount that a paycheck could express. My husband can work confidently knowing our son is well taken care of, which is priceless. We are now reading short books when he couldn’t read at all a few weeks ago. The sky is the limit!