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Homeschooling experience of audience

What is burnout?

Symptoms of burnout:

• Inability to cope
• Feeling overwhelmed
• Depression
• Lack of patience
• Lack of enthusiasm
• Lack of motivation
• Fatigue - physical and mental
• Zoning out
• "I don't care" attitude
• Hopelessness
• Under or overeating
• No sense of priorities
• Crying easily
• Grumpiness
• Inability to manage time well
• Wanting everyone to go away and leave you alone - "go in your shell"

Causes of burnout:

• Pregnancy or new baby
• Illness
• Moving
• New job
• Fear of failure
• Unrealistic expectations
• Comparing yourself to others
• Too many outside activities
• Prayerlessness
• Failure to maintain parental authority (kids take advantage of you)
• None of the above - it just happens

Ways to prevent and/or deal with burnout:

• Prayer (sermon on prayer - from DaneBoyles.com)
• Scheduling (realistically - don't set yourself up for failure)
• Organizing
• Join a support group
• Learn to say no: don't commit to too many outside activities, even if they're good ones
• Find a "kids eat free" special at a local restaurant and give yourself a cooking-free night each week
• Plan a mom's night out with other homeschooling moms to discuss burnout and how to deal with it: you're not alone
• Take a trip alone to a book store, library, etc. for quiet planning or mommy time
• Break the routine and go on a field trip
• Join a homeschool co-op or find an outside class or tutor for subjects that you find difficult to teach
• Simplify/remove distractions
• Put things you need in the right areas so you don't have to go find them
• Snatch scripture
• Show grace (remember your children are your mission - reward them when they don't deserve it - throw your kids for a loop and demonstrate Christ)
• Ask for your husband's help and/or share your feelings with him - you need moral support
• Sign up your husband for the Familyman Ministries newsletter by Todd Wilson
• Required reading: Lies Homeschooling Moms Believe - Todd Wilson
• For your husband: Help! I'm Married to a Homeschooling Mom - Todd Wilson
• Focusing on the cross: http://aholyexperience.com/
• Sally Clarkson's Educating the WholeHearted Child

Ways to organize:

• Declutter (thoughts, space, supplies, etc)
• Daily lunch schedule (meal planning)
• Create a spreadsheet with subject and curriculum for each child
• School baskets with each child's books (color code)
• Lesson plans broken down by year, semester, quarter, week
• Paperwork: attendance reports (where required)
• Routine (set times, chores, delegation, etc - new habits)
• Create a control journal/school planning binder
• The Organized Home Schooler - Vicki Caruana
• http://www.homeschoolhowtos.com/
• http://flylady.net

LIES Homeschooling Moms Believe - Todd Wilson

• "Everyone else's kids are better than yours."
• "Everyone's house is cleaner than yours."
• "Everyone fixes better meals than you."
• "Everyone is more disciplined than you and more spiritual."
• "Everyone's marriage is better than yours."
• "Everyone else can do it all."
• "Every other mom loves homeschooling her kids."
• "Everyone else is more capable than you."
• "You are the only one who is falling apart and feels the way you feel."

"There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it." - 1 Corinthians 10:13

Posts about burnout:

• 4-Alarm Fire Burn-Out
• A Homeschool Mom Devotional: "Being Broken"
• Supermom Syndrome
• Avoiding Homeschool Burnout
• Christian ways to reduce stress
• The importance of limiting distractions
• http://www.waldsfe.org/Articles/burnout.htm
• http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/TRINITYPREPSCHOOL/326541/

Posts about organizing and/or scheduling:

• Redeeming My Time
• School Daze
• "What works for us" or "Yet another post about the schedule..."
• One of those Martha-Stewart-Betty-Crocker Homeschool Days
• Late elementary sample schedule
• Planning for unit studies (KONOS)
• Resolutions for a Homeschool Mom
• Order and the Organized Homeschool
• Homeschool Planner Set-Up
• Rainbow Schedule System

(Notes to our other conference talk, Blogging for Dummies)