Down, down, down the rabbit hole she fell.

Day three. It sure has been a doozy.

Day two seemed to flow quite easily, although we didn't get to all the lessons as we had an early afternoon meeting with his teacher. We did establish that the office upstairs (with the great, big whiteboard) would be where we conduct his spelling lessons. He has a little table and chair set that is set up in front of the white board. When we do any reading, we sit on a love seat which had been moved in front of a sunny window (shaded with sheer curtains to aid in the distraction factor) just for this reason. We do all workbook pages at the kitchen table and of course, any computer work is done on his new desk set up located in a quiet corner. Everything we need is handy in each area so we're not scrambling around looking for materials. If I had a checkbox next to "Organized", it would be checked.

Please note that the invisible checkbox next to "Student's Attention/behavior" is not checked. Slowly but surely, Malachy's behavior has started on a huge spiral downwards and has been quickly picking up speed. He's always been very headstrong, but mostly we've been able to work with him and get him to understand certain rules. Lately, not so much.

Taking him to meet with his teacher yesterday was an embarrassment to me. I listed my expectations of him before we got there. He said he understood. He would sit quietly. Be polite. Speak loudly enough for her to hear. You know, the typical mom spew......We get to the meeting place, Mrs. Moore is sitting down at a little table already and I introduce us. I sit down and motion for him to sit down on the chair left for him. He told me several times that "he prefers to sit on this little wall behind me". Uh, right! I warned him (several times) that he would not use his Wii if he didn't sit down. He sits down. He proceeds to kick my chair. Leans back. Sighs in boredom. Stands (Yes, I said STANDS!) up on the chair (we are outside a restaurant here...). I was thoroughly embarrassed at his shockingly rude behavior.

Lately, if he doesn't get his way, he yells and screams like a male, silverback gorilla beating his chest trying to intimidate me or his dad. Of course it doesn't work, we just get louder than him and it proceeds to sound like a jungle at home complete with all the animal hoots and hollering and he typically just ends up in his room, punished. As you can imagine, this is not working well.

Day three of homeschooling starts. He got up a half hour early because I told him that since it was supposed to be really hot out, if we started early we could swim later in the afternoon. I initially thought "okay, we're off to a good start". When the time came for him to start working, he argued with me about which chair he would sit on (he doesn't get the computer chair because he's been sitting on it backward, tipping it, or constantly spinning it in circles). He didn't want to do his math, but do some games instead. Today's math lesson with him made a root canal feel like vacation time in comparison. It just seemed to get worse as the morning went on so I took a break and told him that I needed to throw in a load of laundry. He shuts off the computer while I'm in the garage. You could say I was pretty upset when I saw that he did that and warned him that everything that we did today could be lost and we'd have to start all over. And then I tried to get onto the internet and there was no connection. Maybe I have been a little tightly wound myself but I completely lost it at that point. It was my turn to be the gorilla!

I yelled (technically, I roared) and told him that I can no longer do this! I shouted that I'm giving up EVERYTHING to sit with a boy who has been showing very little interest in learning and zero respect for me. I threatened to call the principal and get him registered at the neighborhood elementary school immediately. I told him it would be easier for me to get a job outside of the home, put him in after-school daycare and have him deal with that. I was doing this for him and his education but it seems all in vain. Blah, blah, blah...yell...yell...yell.....finally, it hit him. (Not me, the reality hit him!) I told him to go to his room until I could figure out what to do.

He cried and begged me to reconsider and went up to his room.

He didn't know that I sat at that computer and cried and again wondered if this was a bad decision. I really want this to be a success however, I don't want him to think that just because he is at home with me, he's not going to do any school work or worse, dictate to me how it's going to be or what we will be doing. Of course, that's just not going to happen and he has to have that clear now.

Still, all was now very quiet in the house.

I rebooted the router and it kicked back up. We were online once again, with no loss of the morning's work. I figured he needed some time alone in his room (no computer games/tv) to really consider what I threatened him with, and then I took a shower. I needed some calming down myself and to also consider my threats to him and how far I was ready to take them.

About a half hour later, I called him downstairs and we sat side by side on the love seat and had a clear discussion about my expectations of him and how I don't see him taking this homeschooling business or me seriously. He apologized, swore he will try, and seemed quite contrite. And then I hugged him and he hugged me back.

The energy in the house felt so much better.

The rest of the lessons today went well, with him giving all his attention to what we were working on with sincerity. I'm signing off now as I promised him a dip in the pool this afternoon. I'm also going to recharge my batteries with an intense yoga workout later on.

Although, I have heard, liquor is quicker! KIDDING!