Is life always this crappy

[sincerestwonders]

Any one else feel like this but I dunno why my life has been just so hard lately for me and my 17 1/2 year old daughter. Last year I felt completely different, this year I feel burnt out and just bored and unmotivated. I have a guy who keeps coming in and out my life he works abroad so he isnt a stable presence but I feel stuck and dunno if any of you have similar life experience or advice as that would be so useful.
My daughter has not been to school since age 8. I chose not to keep her in school because of some of the things we encountered in her school such as staff pinning kids down in isolation rooms as a punishment and like harming "bad" kids by restraining them in the classroom, which I did not want my young daughter to see or felt was appropriate.
She has been home educated since then. At the minute she has 2 gcses, a 9 in Spanish and 8 in computing/ICT. Her maths and english skills are quite subpar to be honest. She is a good speller, yet struggles with reading long books and guessing the "intention" of authors which is what a lot of GCSE is about. Her maths is reasonable and probably key stage 3 level, not the best but GCSE math standards are so high these days. In the last year she has done a cookery course, several language courses, business administration basics and we were asked to do an art course which she bloody hates and has no artistic talent really but we are 3/5 of the way through that and she just cant think of ideas and hates it and obviously wishes she was doing something else. The obvious thing to do next is driving, but the theory test I dont quite know how to study for it seen as I havent driven since I was in my 20s cos we live in an urban area where we can bus walk everywhere. The other thing I struggle with is deciding on the gold DOFE program. She has done it for 18 months, did all sections and loved the volunteering element. Its done all bits except the Expedition, and honestly how is a weeks walking, eating garbage and carrying a 20kg bag up a mountain useful to the development of a young person? This isnt the 1940s. We originally did this with a dofe open award center. She attended 2 training days. On the first one she was assigned to a team of 5 other girls, all of whom were friends from that posh arse Hills Road college in Cambridge. They ignored and excluded my already friendless daughter and walked ahead. My daughter is 5ft 4 70kg and is not unfit, she does swimming and dance, but no way can she walk 20 miles a day like they suggested with a back breaking Army bergen. The idiots said the expedition was to take place in summer. Considering the heatwaves we have had its a recipe for sun stroke, burns and nausea. On the second day she asked whether she could have a parent see her at a particular point of the day or night as she is high anxiety and gets sick when away overnight from parents she can stay at nanas house without us but it seems being away at night without parents presence is traumatic for her. She went to mendip activity center last year and being away led to panic attacks and a drinking episode. They said no,okay, but I dont think they care about her needs. The food is another troubling element. They suggested eating those gross ration pack boil in a bag meals. My daughter wont eat them preferring fresh foods, and wouldnt eat any with meat in them due to concern of quality. She would have to handle bottle gas, flames, putting up a tent, no contact even a mobile phone with parents, possible injury, carrying own excrement, managing herself miles from anywhere at 17 YEARS OLD what is this SAS basic training? We had her walk 10ks every week, every time her feet would begin to blister and bleed she has size 3 feet for context with the bag on so I decided to leave that centre and look at these expensive private expeditions on canoes but she wont do that either. This has led to a lot of arguments with me and her dad who the dad says stop pushing and she has done enough already. The final issue is she obviously doesnt want to go to uni next year but she just cant think of what job/career to do and seems to have lost interest in anything. Sorry to rant but any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

So sad that this was a lifetime's opportunity to learn resilience and it was taken away from her.

I do understand @sincerestwonders , we want to protect our kids and putting them in the lion's den goes against every ounce of our being. But it is also so important that kids learn how to negotiate situations for themselves and not have a parent always swoop in and sort it .

The most loving thing you can do now is to get her into college or a 6th form.

'handling gas and flames' FFS. Really OP - this level of anxiety and lack of fluency with the real world has to have come from you.

True, walking 20 miles a day isn't for every young person, and she has done really well with the volunteering and other sections. Presumably the volunteering happened in a live and social environment?

But my Dc could safely lay , light and manage a campfire for cooking from 8 and used camping stoves from about 12 - Scouts and friends and family camping.

Your DD hasn’t had a comprehensive education at home. If she had, she’d have more than two GCSEs and she’d have functional English and Maths.

You have disabled her, by opting out of all the parts of life you and she find hard. You want her to have the Gold D of E, without doing the content that is required. If I remember correctly from your last thread, she hasn’t done the bronze and silver.

You are teaching her to cherry pick. Life doesn’t work like that. She needs to do all the things that you have allowed her to avoid.

How will she ever get a job if she doesn’t do any of the necessary things?

Clearly it wasn’t the best thing to do and the damage done is likely to be life long.

Dofe, teaches our kids resillience, which is vital for the ability to be a functioning adult. Putting our kids outwith their comfort zones is what us parents must do, it is our job, if they are to manage in the real world when we are no longer here to help them.
Good luck op

I have had a flick through this thread and I think someone is making up pork pies. Restraining kids, boil in the bag food is normal for DOE. What did you expect, they are out in the wildnerness. My son did Silver and their tent blew away...

Your question is 'Is Life Always this Crappy?' but YOU have made these crappy choices and it's entirely your fault that your life feels shit.

I feel sorry for your DD. As everyone has said, you've failed her really badly and left her with very few options in life and a crappy looking future. She can't go to either college or uni at 18 with 2 GCSEs, neither of which are English and Maths. The best she can hope for is some kind of functional skills as an adult, but she's going to struggle greatly to get any kind of job with zero qualifications, skills or experience. No wonder she finds life stressful.

This has all been down to your decision making though. To answer your question, No - life isn't usually this crappy for most people. Because they don't act like you have done.

As someone with a high anxious kid, you have disabled her. Instead of trying new situations you have basically kept her prisoner. Why wait till 18 to do college?! Why not look into other options than keeping her home? She's most likely undiagnosed autistic from what you have said or it could be the fact youve not given her a normal upbringing and now shes stuck with barely any qualifications.

The obsession with DoE seems very odd.

She needs to do her maths gcse and her English gcse. These are foundations that most jobs require.

Obc she won’t get in uni anyway with 2 GCSE’s. Even with 4, she then needs A Levels or similar (btech etc) to qualify for uni.

She won’t be a candidate for an apprenticeship.

so.

part time job. Get out meet people. Study for her maths English GCSEs - is there a place near you she can do them?

Then see where she can go. Maybe a few weeks in Spain on a course.

She needs to get educated and get out in the world meet people achieve. Believe.

Ps. And her mum needs to stop being so small minded / judgemental. People go to a better school than you / dd did, that doesn’t mean they are ‘snobs’ 🙄

This. Forget meaningless awards, and try to get her a rounded education. Poor girl.

This thread doesn't really match the title and there are few paragraphs. What is crappy OP? That you decided to homeschool and now your child only has two GCSEs?

I think your daughter needs to try to get more GCSEs and then move onto A levels. I think you need to let her become a bit more 'uncomfortable' in terms of what she is willing to do. Without pushing herself out of her comfort zone I would worry that life will pass her by. She needs to be 'out there' making friends and having fun or not having fun, but learning about herself.

Maybe in your realm it's normal 🙄

She's not equipped in anyway to attend school. She's miles behind on many ways.

I believe Mumsnet AI overrides the header the OP chooses and rewrites it.

Errm, i'm quite sure she will be able to attend college to get all her basic gcses . Is that not the point of colleges?

She got bullied in primary school so you chose to remove her from school for the rest of her life?? Bonkers. It’s greatly reduced both her social, emotional and academic development. Your take on the DoE expedition is weird too.

Surely if everyone around you is saying this, you need to take it into consideration and reevaluate how you parent? Considering your DD’s age you don’t have much time left to give it some serious thought.

I would contact local colleges and talk to them about what they can offer. They will be able to enrol her for GCSE English and Maths alongside another level 2 course. Although you say she doesn’t have SEN, what you’re saying about her anxiety, plus the comments you’ve made about her difficulty with English (particularly where ‘guessing’ the author’s intentions) suggests she might have traits of ND - and there might be things they can offer by way of support (extra check-ins with a her personal tutor for example). Some colleges have a track record of working with previously home-educated youngsters: it might be worth asking on your local HE Facebook groups page for recommendations. Alternatively, you could look into distance learning/online providers of GCSE English and Maths courses that your daughter could aim to do from home, with the aim of doing an access to HE course when she turns 19. She clearly has strengths - the fact that she got such high grades when self-studying and that she did well with and enjoyed volunteering prove this. She just needs a bit of encouragement. On that note, you do sound a bit down, and that is probably affecting your ability to enthuse her. Is it worth trying to access some talking therapy via HealthyMinds to see whether it will help you out of your slump. (Ps you don’t have to wait until your daughter leaves to fulfil your wish to go to uni. You could start looking into access courses yourself. A lot of unis want evidence of recent study even if you have A levels).

Personally I could not imagine home educating my child. I do not have the skills, knowledge, patience, relevant experience or qualifications to do so. It has always mystified why and how people do this, I know that it would have been a negative experience for my child and apart from them not getting a rounded and comprehensive education they would not have made life long friendships.

Because I didnt want my 7 and 8 year old child exposed to violence and abuse in a primary school

Get her into college to get her basic qualifications. That's the best thing you can do for her (though I rather think that being stuck up a mountain with a bag of her own poo and a bit of dodgy meat wouldn't do too much harm). I had a shit time at school myself, but that was how I learned resilience and to be able to cope when things were less than ideal. You are doing her no favours by treating her like a piece of precious china. Everyone is saying the same thing - are you going to listen, or are you convinced that your way is the right way and we're all wrong?

That was a decade ago op. What have you done since?!