To think boarding schools are an expensive version of neglect? MARK 2

[colditz]

LeQueen "Can someone please explain to me why living apart from your DH damages your marriage...but living apart from your children doesn't damage your relationship with them in anyway?

Please ...I genuinely don't understand."

Because your children can't have an affair, LeQueen

scaryteacher I am loving you but please tell me if you followed your husband to Brussels why do you therefore not speak fluent flemish along with your kids so you can be less of a burden on the tax payer

writer I think you are (deliberately?) missing the point. CEA is an abreviation for CONTINUITY of EDUCATION ALLOWANCE. It is NOT an allowance to provide childcare but to allow service children to do just that, have continuity in their education.

When sevice personnel is posted it's usually not a matter of moving within a county or even between English counties but the family could be sent anywhere, even around the globe. The allowance allows children to have a steady education.

I was a SAHM when my children were small. However, I would NEVER suggest that parents who used paid childcare are neglectful. I realise that that family has made their choice with their family's best interest at heart. However, I NEVER left my DCs with paid childcare for any length of time at such a vulnerable age as I wanted to sooth them and bond with them and share all the ups and downs that being a preschooler brings each day. This is my opinion.

I have teenagers. I have had younger children and preschoolers. I have mothered them all their lives. I am not SPECULATING about how I will feel at a given stage in their development. I know it. I HAVE done it.

I think some posters should have another think before sporting their judgypants.

Incidentally, I understand the avaiabilty of CEA for primary school is being reviewed so this discussion may well completely pointless.

So do all the caring non BS mums on here think that by damaging your childs education (and therefore the rest of their lives) you cannot strike a balance and send them to BS so they have a better future, as we all know that loving them but not giving them any education would be neglect. As also being a single parent and not seeing their father would also be neglect, dads are important parental role models and if you are not co located then spending time together would be hard

I've done two years of Flemish, but is a hard language (or at least I find it so). Ds is doing GCSE Flemish, and he is better than me.

If I worked full time in Brussels, it would be off no benefit to the UK taxpayer as (and I know you know this, but some obviously didn't do Geography at school), Brussels is in Belgium. Belgium is a country between France and the Netherlands, and separated from the UK by the English Channel.

As Belgium is not in the UK, any work and money earned here would originate in Belgium, and thus any tax would be paid to the Belgian govt, as Belgium is abroad and not in the UK.

Well said, mumof2.

The impression I have from a number of posters is that it isn't boarding school that is bothering them so much as jealousy of the fact that a family with one breadwinner is entitled to an education allowance.

I am not a forces wife but it doesn't take a great deal of imagination, surely, to understand that there is a great deal of unpaid work involved for a trailing spouse who is part of a unit (couple or family) which moves around the world frequently. She (if it is she) has to learn to function in new cultures. She might well not be able to work ouside due to language prolems or, frequently, visas restrictions.

She has to settle children, if there are any younger ones with her and not away at school, in new schools in new countries and deal with children's homesickness for the previous posting. She will have no extended family for support.

She will probably be the one who builds up a social network to support the family and help them be happy. She will be the support for her life partner whose job entails considerable risk.

Employers and governments fortunately acknowledge the key role these women play in enabling their spouses to work/serve effectively. These allowances are not perks but part of a salary package. Many of the big multi-nationals pay far larger allowances and include things like education allowances for trailing spouses of thousands of pounds, or allowances paid as one off sums annually to be used as the spouse wishes. This is because the key importance of the trailing spouse is recognised.

How can you begin to compare a forces family with a civilian family who do not have to change countries regularly with all the stress that entails?

If you think it is all such an easy lifestyle, why don't you try applying for it?

Whether it is in the interests if the child depends entirely on the sort of child you have. If you have sensitive children who hate changing schools and peer group you may think quite differently about the pros and cons of a peripatetic lifestyle for them.

If you choose to stay put (VOLSEP), then you have the expense of two households. This is not necessarily an affordable option.

The people who are best able to make the decisions about the best available option for their families are that parents. It is wrong to impose a one-size-fits-all solution.

slipshodsibyl, finally someone who gets it! Mind you, it's not always moves between countries these days so much as frequent shifts from one end of the British Isles to another at only a few weeks' notice where the only school places left (because it's halfway through the school year, of course!) are the ones that no one else wants.

Le Queen I think everyone acknowledges that it is separating the family either way, but that each family, depending on their circumstances, is doing it in the "least worst" way.

"But, in what way is the wife living apart from her husband seen as separating the family, and yet the wife living away from her children isn't seen as separating the family?"

No one is suggesting that putting children in boarding school isn't a form of separation - it's simply that when faced with one form of separation (boarding school) as opposed to another (serving spouse living away from the family) or with shifting the children from school to school in order to keep the family unit together some Forces family consider boarding school as the lesser of three evils.

Not all Forces families choose boarding school - it isn't a universal thing. Some families live apart, some take the children with them. Quite simply, each family makes the decision that suits them best and that's it.

So you are happy leQ for the children to be away from their father by leaving them with their Mum?

There will be separation of the family at some point; however, we reserve the right to sort for ourselves the best way to manage that separation.

scary sorry my sarcasm didn't come across there, I know the hardships, I speak fluent German but could not get a job when my DH was posted to Germany.

Lequeen there is no point I don't think you will ever get it. But here goes, the children at boarding school see more of there father on exeat and holidays than they would if they were seperated from him with their mum. Most UK postings are in expensive areas to live so when you have the expense of running a 2nd home it is usually somehwere cheap to live so a long distance from DH. If DH works all week and comes home at a weekend he will arrive after kids are in bed on a Friday night and leave usually mid afternoon on a Sunday and this won't happen every week as with fuel prices the way they are and work commitments it is more likely to be once a month if that. So you all move kids go to BS when they come home DH is there (as he only works 5 mins away) and they see him, this happens every 3 weeks and then during holidays so therefore they see more of dad and mum is not a single mum coping with everything life throws at here and being ripped off by tradesmen who think woman = $$$ whenever anything in the house goes wrong and DH is not there to fix it (which is done by mod when you live in a quarter)

Le Queen I choked, and spat out, my cup of tea last night re your comment about drinkies on the verandah and officers' wives being at the beck and call of their dh's.

Please, what decade are you living in?

Lequeen by the way I am on here whilst taking a break from teaching my 4th child to ride a bike as once again DH is not here to see a milestone, that if we all stayed put would mean he would miss even more of these milestones at least he saw this DC walk for the first time not bad given she is the 4th

mumof2 I did get the sarcasm hence the bolding in my post, and the explanation of not paying UK tax.

I'm deeply opposed to sending kids to boarding school. Why have kids if you're just going to ship them off to be looked after by others?

However, dh went to one and he had a brilliant time. His relationship with his parents is close and, although we've had many an argument about the principle, I have to say I think it was the best decision for him.

Interestingly enough though, I don't think he would ever want to send our ds to boarding school as he would miss him too much.

sorry scary just re read and now get you (bit hectic round here right now, guess I am neglecting my 2 at home by being on here but having a break before the 2 elder ones descend with their dad for exeat weekend and the fun starts)

I have read this thread with interest,My ex husband ( a forces child,his father was very high ranking) was sent to boarding school at 6.It has had a lifelong impact on him.

He is bright, sucessful, sociable and easy to get along with,all products of his boarding school days.He still has friends from his school days,who are like family. However as he spent so much time away from home he learned to keep busy and put on a brave face,he did this for so long,he forgot how to process difficult emotions(anger,fear).So although extremly likeable he has the emotional depth of a turnip!(he would agree with this).

So although a great example on first glance of a boarding school child,I do feel that having to cope so early on in life,young children need to have space not to cope sometimes,made him somehow switch off emotionally.He went home only in the holidays.This has had an enduring impact on all his relationships( I am his second ex wife).

However I do feel that this was down to him being so young and his parents were spectacturly cold fishes and that and that this may not be the case for older children.

I think if he could articulate it, he wishes he had been asked what he thought and really given the option to leave,and to know that he didn't always have to put on a brave face.Because sadly for him, for me, for his first wife and most off all his six children he now can't take off that mask.

Lequeen come live my life for a couple of weeks, I live in an isolated area, have very few friends in the area I am in simply because of my DHs job, I miss my kids terribly, I don't live the high life, if you didn't notice the country is in dire financial state and a lot of the fond memories you have do not happen any more. You do realise the forces now are very different to the forces you were brought up in don't you. However as a caring mum I MUST educate my kids and so far the state system has failed them in this respect if we move them every 2 years and staying put fails them too. You don't want to understand, you are prejudiced by your parents decisions and are not willing to see the other side of it

That's the social life when your dh gets in from work at 2200 and leaves again at 0630 the next morning is it? Or the one where he is sent to sea for an unknown period of time with 12 hours notice over Christmas? Or is it the social life when you see your dh for less than 25% of the year because he is deployed/at sea/ being bounced around?

My ds doesn't board yet LeQ, but there have been times when doing the single parent bit because dh had been sent away yet again and without family support as they were all 3.5 hours away, and I was working f/t to please the taxpayer, I did think boarding school could be on the cards.

scary or the time when you are in a foreign country, your DH serving with a foreign army and therefore playing by their rules so ups and leaves you for 12months which is their tour time, with the family support a 20 hour 3 plane ride away!!!

Le Queen Very little personal cost to the Forces?

If someone is on mid-scale pay as a Lt Col their take home pay is about 4K. 2 children at Eton would mean their own monthly contribution would be about £2200, add on boat club, fencing and judo a lot more. Take off your married quarter charges, car insurance, food etc and you would be skint.