Boarding School is Looming

[Heidi]

This is going to sound odd, I think, but here goes....

My DS, age 11, is starting at a Boarding School in Sept for Y7. He sent off for prospectuses a couple of years ago and the first I knew of his interest was when they started landing on the doormat! We are not a family who would naturally have considered boarding but we have always sent the children to a fee paying school so were more surprised than 'anti' the idea, and were impressed when we looked around all the ones he had earmarked.

DS is v. bright, as well as musical, artistic and extremely sporty, and he won scholarships to more than one school of choice (this is the only way we could afford fees so was lucky - or unlucky for us). We eventually settled on a school about 3/4 hour from home, so we can easily get there and take him out for tea / watch fixtures etc. We have spent a lot of time as a family talking about this issue (we have a 9 year old DD who will stay at home obvs.), visiting the school and generally trying to prepare.

Recently, I have been cramming in those jobs like naming all his kit after work; also DD has expressed an interest in joining some more local clubs (which is possible now we won't have to 'share' the free time during the week) and I have been making these extra 'exciting' arrangments for her.

And suddenly it has hit home. In 5 weeks he will be gone.

DS is so excited to be going (he's away there for a week of sports camp now with a couple of friends who will also be attending in Sept), is looking forward to being able to do more after school and to being kept busy all of the time (it's a struggle with me working FT to fit in everything he and his sis want to do). But all I can feel is looming dread. I'm certainly not as ready as he thinks he is for this whole experience.

I know my DH and I have agreed to this and I want to be seen to support my DS as I don't want him to feel guilty or worried about his choice. Has anyone else been through this? I know in my heart that he will probably be fine, and we'll have to get used to the situation (unless he hates it, in which case we wouldn't expect him to stay), but I've found myself in tears more than once at the prospect of not having him around :-( My DH seems a lot more relaxed about it and thinks I'm being overprotective, but it won't seem as much of a change for him, as he works away some of the week.

Aaaagh!

I think you can be close to your family wherever you are, however there are aspects of family life that a boarding child will miss out on; in the same way they will be gaining other things/experiences.

When I was 12 my mum was very ill and hospitalised for quite a while and then nearly paralysed/unable to move for around a year maybe a little longer. I looked after the family, did the cooking, washing, ironing and helped looking after my mum and my younger sibling. When I was 16 my grandma, to whom I was extremely close, was very ill too and I was able to go and see her every day and hold her close to me. Incidentally she wanted to hold my hand in her last hours. There were lots of other similar situations, good and bad, which I would have missed out on if I boarded.

Although I didn't personally board, I have been living abroad since 19. Although I am incredibly close to my parents and extended family, there are a lot of things that I have had to miss because I was physically not there, and I do find it hard, even as an adult, to cope with that. My mum had an accident last year and I couldn't be there for her and although I was glued to the phone every day and eventually went to see her, the fact I could not be there was hard.

I think the family dynamics change once the children are not living daily at home, but that's not necessarily good or bad, but certainly it is different.

I think things are different from when your DH went to boarding school. DS2 starts at his new boarding school in a few weeks we deliberately tried to choose one that reflected on our values on life. We are a broad minded outspoken liberal very eccentric family and looked for similar views in our chosen school. The school has a reputation for not having parents who are social climbers and the boys are very much encouraged to hold their own opinions and voice them and eccentricity is common and positively embraced. I think in general todays parents spend longer looking and agonising over their choice of school whether it be state or independent than our own parents did.
I suspect that when your DH went to school his parents may not have thought about these things, parents then often sent their children to the same schools they went to or a school that is convenient for them. My mother in law is a knee jerk Tory and sent my husband to liberal London day school I doubt if she even visited the school before he went, she knew about by its academic reputation and she would never of thought about the schools ethos in a million years after all she did not send him there to be influenced by their liberal views. Its unbelievable academic results and convenience were the only factors in her choice.
As a final point both my sister in law and DH went to London day schools they fight like cat and dog with my mother in law and have very little (no) common ground Christmas is a nightmare!

My sister and I have nothing in common with our whole family and we went to the local school. I think if a boarding child turns out a certain way it is blamed on the boarding environment but if a day child turns out the same way it is down to their personalities!

How does your school sift out social climbers HappyGardening as they bent over backwards to have my son!

i'm not sure it "sifts out social climbers" but the general consensus from all those we've spoken to and everything we've read is that it's not considered a place groaning in social climbers! My feelings at the recent new parents lunch backed this up; the parents were not socially ambitious but academically very ambitious!

Although the prep head said we were not Eton parents and was desperate for us to accept X, I decided I was way too thick to be a X parent and did not want to deal with intellectual snobbery, which may or may have not happened of course. in saying that I may apply for a music scholarship for my other son as a smaller environment would be better for him.

Maybe X does not have to sift out social climbers maybe they sift themselves out! Our prep school was full of social climbers needless to say they did not choose X rather those other well know schools often quoted in the press. I think your right there is intellectual snobbery at X but it will make a refreshing change to what we had to put up with for the last 6 years. Maybe we will welcome the company of the social climbers in 5 years time!

Colleger good luck with your decision re: music school I saw your posting a difficult decision; I have little experience of parents of gifted musicians apart from a woman I worked with years ago I suspect they could be pretty grim. Maybe the social climbers aren't that bad in comparison.

Heidi - some 35 years ago I was your son and you were my mother.

I loved boarding school, it made me what I am today BUT my mother hated every single time I went away to school but could never say how she felt.

I used to to dread the few days before I went away to school as my mother was so angry and upset with me. She could not say or show why. I'm sure she cried many tears. Its only recently I have come to understand it.

Mothers and sons have a complex relationship - not the same as sons and Dads. I dont know what to say but that your son will love you just the same and you will be so proud of him. Try to be happy for him and not be angry with him.

My name is Raeann, I am visually impaired. I attended the Indiana School for the Blind, a day and residential school, for blind and visually impaired children, ages three to nineteen years old, in Indianapolis, Indiana.

When I was four years old, I began attending the school. The local public school, lacked the facilities for me to attend there school, they did not have the adaptive technology that I needed to succeed in the classroom, an aide or a vision teacher, so my parents enrolled me in the blind school. The school considered me a residential student, during the week I stayed at school. A bus would take me to school on Sunday and not bring me home until Friday. My dormitory had eight other girls. Weekends, Christmas, spring, and summer vacations, were the only times I went home. The school was like my home away from home, the people in my dorm were like my family. On the weekends I had a nice visit with my family. Summer vacation was like a breathe of fresh air, three whole months with my family at home. The only time I remember going home during the week is when I was seven years old. My dad was taking classes, he would pick me up after school, take me home over night, bring me back early the next morning. Being able to go home during the week to see my family was like a rainbow. It only lasted a few weeks before it had to end, I was so tired at school that I started falling a sleep in class.

My school was a five day boarding school, where the whole school closed on the weekends and everyone went home. My family lived an hour and a half from the school. My best friends Jessica and Lisa, lived at the other end of the state, had to ride the bus for five hours twice a week, just to attend school.