OK Boarding School - this will make me Mrs Unpopular

[MsTownmouse]

AIBU for having sent my DS to boarding school. I have thought it through & I do love him & think it is the right thing

Just interested as a lot of people think that Boarding School and loving your child are mutually exclusive

pip pip

We considered sending our DS (14) to boarding school as he was doing really badly (socially, mentally & with his school work) in private education.

DH was at boarding school from age 9. Far too young - his tales from that time are harrowing, I want to go back in time to give him a big hug and tell him it will be okay.

MIL is similarly screwed up about it, constantly trying to make amends by over-parenting her DCs still, in their thirties, and trying to be a mother to her GCs rather than a grandmother. She clearly feels incredible guilt about it and as if she missed out on their childhoods.

DH loved it later on, in his teenage years. Of course, boarding schools are very different now to in the 80s/90s.

How much does boarding cost in the Uk?
It's about $50k per year here (before uniforms, books, extra curricular activities etc) which would make me think twice about it even if DSs want to go.

I went to nine different schools and would have much preferred to go to boarding school. I can't settle anywhere now and feel like I don't belong anywhere.

There were quite a few boarders at my school (120ish) , some weekly, some few, only a handful ever seemed miserable and it's very hard to be happy and outgoing if you don't really feel it so i don't there could have been many that were hiding it. It was also on the military list as one of the ones they paid for.

There will always be children who will love it and those that hate it. I have a good friend whose son still cries every morning when he goes into (day) state school

few full

lequeen I have seen exactly the same behaviour in the day school that I worked in. Younger children love the attention of the older ones!

it's very hard to be happy and outgoing if you don't really feel it so i don't there could have been many that were hiding it

I'd disagree there. My boarding school made it clear that if you were of any sort of worth you would "thrive". Missing your parents was seen as meaning you were deficient, a lesser person.

Since the OP hasn't come back, I think y'all may be wasting your time here

I went because my parents worked abroad on a contract basis so they sent me so I wouldn't have to keep settling into new schools and also because you couldn't do GCSEs and A Levels in the schools where they were. However, they sent me at 9, I actually think I would have preferred to move school a few more times than be living thousands of miles away from my family. I was very shy and loved being at home and I actually think my parents naively thought boarding school would be good for me, it actually made me depressed and introverted and I still feel like I am recovering now.

I think that if you have children you owe it to them to prioritise them not your career. My dad could have stayed in England, he had a perfectly good job but they wanted some excitement and career progression in my opinion to the detriment of our family life. My gran used to say 'as least they are not divorced' about my parents but at the time i used to wish they were and at least I would have been at home with my mum!!

I may have got a good education but I was so emotionally damaged from it all that my only ambition was to get married and make a home. I couldn't think beyond having my own family to make up for what I missed out on.

Another military wife and daughter here. I have done the weekending for 4 years at a stretch when ds was younger, so that I could have a job and he could be in one place for prep school.

Dh then got posted abroad. We did two years of trying to weekend from Brussels to Cornwall. There were no flights, so it was Eurostar and train or driving. The journey took twelve hours door to door depending on traffic; it could take more. There was no help (gyh) from Brussels, so we picked up the travelling costs. Not cheap.

We tried to see each other every three weeks; it ended up being every six with me travelling out at half terms and dh getting home once in a blue moon for a weekend, and coming home at Christmas and in the summer. It didn't help our relationship, and ds didn't really know his Dad, as he had spent 50% of his (ds's) life weekending or in Brussels.

I threw in the towel and moved to Brussels. Ds goes to school here.

From September next year ds will board for sixth form. We are out here until late 2013, which is the first term of year 13. We have thought about this long and hard, and ds agrees that he needs to be in one place and that it will provide a half way house between home and uni. We don't know what the future holds jobwise for dh, so continuity for ds is important.

I do not want to spend another 17 months only seeing dh every six weeks, and as there are no teaching jobs in my subject area where I live as of yesterday, my options are limited.

As a military daughter, I know it put a strain on my parents when I went to comp and Mum stayed in one place, especially when O levels loomed.

It is all very well imagining what you do in the situation many military families find themselves in, but the reality is bloody tough and sometimes the choices are a bad choice or a worse one. Having now done the military wife thing for 25 years, and having been around the military for 45 years as a daughter and a sister, I do have some experience and have seen it from all sides. The families make the best choices they can for them at the time based on the limited information available to them at that moment.

I was sent to boarding school aged six. not a good for me but then I did not have a happy stable family at home, which is why I was sent to boarding school. would not do it to my kids

scaryteacher - I think boarding for 6th form is a very different thing. Having boarded myself it's hard to explain why, but the whole vibe is different.

Vixsatis
Your post at 11.45.15 regarding taking your son out for Sunday lunch once every three weeks fills me with sorrow and a sense of desolation. I am of the Lequeen school of thought; I need my children, to see them, touch them, talk to them, be close to them.

But that is just me and I don't criticise anyone else for choosing a different route.

I have worked in a boarding school for a number of years.

Honestly? Before 12 is too young. And then it should be the child's choice more than the parents'.

I went from 11 and totally loved it as did most of my year. However, there were a couple of people in my year running after their parents cars etc when they were dropped off, they left soon after.
I don't think it works for everyone but for many it does.

DD2 has asked to board when the weather is bad. She's really excited about it. [hsad]

It is not the choice that I would make for my children.

But I don't actually care what choice other people make, since it's not my kids and I'm not paying.

[heartless but honest]

so YANBU. Do what you like and what you feel is best for you. Like we all do.

YANBU to make whatever choices you think are right for your family.

I boarded from 16 at sixth form college and loved it. I would have sent him earlier but he wanted not to board until 16.

Well I decided to ask dd1 what she thought about it in a few years and at 5 she can't see herself wanting to do it and if that is the case then she won't go. Like others have said it has to be something they are up for doing, otherwise they would be really unhappy.

So for now we won't be doing it Not that I would consider it before 10/11 anyway regardless.

I think micro makes a valid point and tbh if they went and didn't like it after a term then I would take them out of the school/ try to get accommodation near the school so they could day board.

I think military schools are great for those students who do not have any major behavioral issues, but just require more structure in their lives. My mother sent my brother here (www.militaryschools411.com) and loves it. It has really made him a better person and made him more serious about studying. Military schools are boarding schools where the students live on campus. These schools require students to wear uniforms during the training day.