Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Reciprocal Relationships with Others and Ourselves
sKePTiKal:
Understand completely Tupp! You do what you gotta do, best you can. (((((Tupp))))
I like your idea about teaching through a child's interests, like the Legos. Also, maybe turning that into a book of lesson plans to make a bit of income. That's actually an old way of doing things - at least, how I was taught things like addition & subtraction; how that scaled up to multiplication/division.
Language was always so easy for me, I didn't need much instruction. But I learned a lot from trying to teach my brother to read & spell.
People contemplating homeschooling are usually pretty anxious about whether they can perform up to the standards. A book of lesson plans like that might really encourage someone to try.
Hopalong:
Tupp, I'm really sorry.
You're coping with a lot of uncertainty and stress and I don't know how you do it so well.
I wish I knew about income strategies.
In my experience in publishing, it's usually not a reliable way to earn any income stream, and is tremendously complicated. Unless you self-publish on some portal like Amazon and there are thousands of self-published books languishing there. As to marketing, most new writers are left entirely on their own with enormous effort to do websites and promotions and often, I'm sorry to say, for nothing much.
[EDIT: Know what? Was thinking back on this following unsolicited advice, and realized point blank that the right way to offer ideas like this would be to say: Would you be interested in learning more about my PT companion care gig, in case it might be possible for you? And that's it. Too often I get all caught up in my own fantasy of "fixing" somebody else's situation, and it can for the "fixee" be a whole lot of tiring work to explain why NO, that idea won't work in my case. Just want you to know that I don't need an explanation, because my guess is, if some kind of gig work would be workable, you'd have researched it long ago. So consider the blah blah blah below as something that doesn't need to be rebutted. It's PRE-rebutted! Left it in anyway in case it helps, but don't expect it could.]
My guess would be that something local might be more viable than something that depends on the internet. Again, just because of my own experience....the most lucrative and easy-to-begin gig for me in recent years has been light eldercare. Nothing medical, just light companion care.
I don't know if the situation's the same where you are, but in my area there are a LOT of retirees who are still generally independent but need (and can afford) someone to, for example:
--sit with the frailer or perhaps home-bound one while the other goes to appointments
--drive to doctor appointments (in their vehicle)
--grocery shop with or for them
--sort a closet
--take them on errands
--do their laundry
--cook a simple meal
What I was daydreaming about was wondering whether there's a well-off family with a child on the spectrum, a child you could manage and who might enjoy Legos play with your son. I wonder if you could earn money babysitting for their child, with permission to bring along your son? Same question for elder companioning. I can visualize families who would like you so much they'd do all they could to adapt your hours with their elderly parent to your own schedule.
I earn a nice hourly fee, which isn't bad for part-time work done only for hours I want to do it. (In my case I told them from the beginning I was available weekday afternoons, with a two-hour minimum. For some I'd do three hours.) When I had 3 regulars, it was surprising how fast my emergency fund filled up.
If you're interested, there's a huge market for it. I have a lot of tips on how to set it up. I was surprised how quickly I was in business. Though I did happen to know my original client through church, it still just took a few short references (any nice person you've met through your volunteering could be asked to write a few lines about your good character, skill and kindness with people, and work ethic).
I hope you can work out what is happening with your son and college. I worry for you about the increased isolation of home schooling. But I also know you know better than anyone what is possible and most workable for you, and him.
Hugs
Hops
lighter:
I wonder if you could start a consulting company, Tupp.
Help people with special needs children navigate the system, put homeschool programs in place and tweak as they go, look at what's working and what's not, keep people's lives on track with special needs kids, instead of learning everything the hard way, like you had to. Food sensitivities are a factor, IME. Figuring out alternative food choices is a nightmare when you don't know where to start, and are already overwhelmed, and doctors are denying food impacts health.
The thought might give you the vapors. Ignore as needed.
Ummm.... what about a job working at a different kind of special needs school/program? Maybe where your ds enjoyed being, fit in, learned, and went for free, bc you're teaching there?
Lighter
Twoapenny:
Thank you all, for your thoughts and advice and suggestions, as always :)
For the time being, any work I do really needs to be homebased and flexible. Son's health is in a terrible state again now; college has been too much for him and it has really brought it home to me that the majority of people working with kids like my son don't have any kind of real understanding of how his disabilities affect him and how exhausted he gets. They also don't seem to be able to accept that he's tired when he isn't showing the 'neurotypical' signs of tiredness. With him, tiredness means his reaction times get slower. His sensitivities to noise, light, sudden changes and so on become heightened. His obsessive and repetitive behaviours increase, sometimes to the point of him being incapable of doing anything else. He forgets to eat and drink, loses the ability to do simple self care like tidy himself up after the toilet or wash his hair. And then all of that makes everything more stressful for him and me, which makes us both more tired, and then you're trapped in the cycle and it's only possible to get out (in my experience) by downing tools completely and doing nothing at all (which is what we're having to do at the moment). So anything that involves leaving the house has the potential to create all sorts of problems so for now home based is the only likely possibility. There are all sorts of things about; I'm going to look into as many things as possible and see how many we can realistically take on whilst bringing in a bit of cash. If absolutely nothing works out, then I'll have to start looking into outside of home opportunities. But home based would definitely be better for me to start off with.
There's also the issue of moving. We really can't/don't want to stay in this house any longer than we have to. I'm finding I'm feeling less inclined to stay in this area now that it's clear that going back to home ed is our only viable option. Whether that will change if I start earning I don't know, but for now I want to try to keep my options open and if I can find a way to pull in some money that isn't dependent on me being in one particular place it will help keep options open to us in the future.
So that's kind of where we're at now. I'm exhausted from everything that's happened over the last year or so. But I feel like we've got a wide open path in front of us now, so I'm just going to take my time, try things out, see what works and see where that takes us. A friend is coming to stay for the half term holiday, which I'm really looking forward to. Son is off college now, too unwell to go in. We'll try again after the half term; I've decided to keep him on roll there until the end of the course (next summer) but without any pressure on him to attend. It seems easier from a paperwork point of view to do that rather than formally withdrawing him. Onwards and upwards, I guess :) Thank you all for all of your help xx
Twoapenny:
By funny coincidence something just happened that kind of illustrates everything that drives me nuts. The lady who runs the group I help out with - who is lovely and I like very much - has just emailed me to tell me that she has changed her mind, again, about how she wants things done. It's not a minor tweak of a document or a re-wording of an email, it's a complete turn around from what we agreed, as a group, two weeks ago. I've put in another three hours work on the most recent item, all of which is now not going to be used. It's not because I've not done the work properly; I've not actually sent it to her yet, she's just changed her mind about what she wants to do.
This is kind of why I feel I need to just work from home, under my own steam, not answering to anybody, because I just find that most people seem to create work for me and most interactions just leave me feeling flat and deflated. I'm so tired already and then other people in the mix just seems to increase that. Sigh. Anyway, I've sent the document off so she can use bits of it if she wants to but I think I will probably just do what I've already agreed to do and then not offer to do any more. I think the time has come to focus on myself and son, first and foremost, and if anyone else wants to join in on our terms then great, but I think I'm kind of done with accommodating people endlessly. Anyway, just my little grumble, off in to town now :) xx
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