Most teens seem to develop their interests and strengths pre-programmed by some higher being than their parents. I think parents should take the comfort in knowing that whatever they do probably have very little impact on their kids outcomes anyway.
We felt lucky we didn’t think about a thing related to college during my kids elementary thru high school years. Ignorance was truly a blessing—it allowed us to spend many worry free vacations during their school years and let them pursue whatever their passions led them.
It was great for us NOT to know this website until my first child’s junior year. The best thing OP can do is simply staying away from CC, which OP seems to be doing.
While this often true for normal parents (wide definition of normal), for those who drew the unfortunate straw to get bad parents, I often wonder what their lives could have been. Very few parents (if any) on CC would be in my “bad parent” definition TBH, but I see them in my local high school and know they are out there everywhere. “Bad” and “poor” (financially) are not synonyms.
Then talk to them. About everything. Let them see (and hear) the way you process the world, other humans, and yourself. They will follow suit and become super compassionate and tolerant and self-aware. And, as they grow older, it’s the thing that will make you most proud.
When they express an interest in something, be their greatest cheerleader. Get just as excited about it. Find clubs, online forums, lectures, books, events to support that interest. But let them know you don’t expect them to pursue it as a career; you just enjoy learning about it for learning’s sake.
If they don’t fit in the box of traditional school, homeschool them or find a program that nurtures who they are - not who you or society wants them to be.
Do I have regrets? Nah. Sure, there are things I would have changed. Maybe handled a divorce differently. But I don’t look back with true regret.
Most of my kids are out of the house. They thank me constantly for always listening to who they are and being brave enough to let them carve their own path.
I’ve read all these responses and given some of my own.
Just listen first to your kid no matter how mad you may be before you react. Think first, act later.
The IDEA, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, applies to all Americans. Age 0-3 is generally handled by the county you live in while 3-21 is usually called Child Find and handled by the school districts.
My daughter qualified for services automatically because of low birth weight and received services from 0-6. Some services were great, others a waste of time. My second daughter received services starting at age 3 because of speech. She hated every minute of the services she received.
I wish/hope they allow a child to change who is giving the services if they don’t like who they have. My guy loved his providers. They made everything fun for him and connected well.
My child would have hated any therapist (the one at the middle school was very nice) because she didn’t like to do things she wasn’t good at. Yes, a problem in more than one area. She didn’t read well, so she didn’t read. She really disliked that there could be 2 words for the same thing. “what is jam?” It’s like jelly, I said. “Well, why don’t they just say jelly? I’m going to say jelly.” And she’d read and change jam to jelly throughout the story. Sofa and couch? Not for her.
The extremely nice therapist the older one had (OT/PT) let younger daughter do all the activities the older one had to do at the therapy sessions (my kids are 10 months apart and in the same grade). D#2 loved all the drawing and coloring and pushing marbles out of clay while older daughter hated doing all those small motor things. D#1 loved all the large motor stuff like swinging and throwing things.
I always said if I could combine them, I’d have had one perfect child.
But no, you don’t get to change the therapist if you don’t like her. Most are assigned to the school, not to just one student.
Whether you can change therapists or not might depend on the state and/or age and/or provider. I’m familiar with a pre-K agency that contracts with the county, and if a family is unhappy with the provider, they can call the agency for a different one. The agency doesn’t HAVE to change the provider, but absent unusual circumstances they will because the county chooses which agencies they use, and the agency will want to keep the parents happy so the parents don’t complain to the county.
I should further amend this to say that it’s my understanding that there is some learning time lost when a transition is made and agencies would prefer not to change providers mid-year.