"What made you start homeschooling?" and "What do you mean by gluten free/How or why did you go gluten free?"
Those are the questions I get most often. Writing our story is going to be an ongoing process since I will be coming back to it here and there, but the simple answer to everything is medical. The true, more compelling answer is convoluted and complicated!
In 2001, after multiple miscarriages, my darling Pom was born. I had always considered home school. I had bad experiences in public school and couldn't see me dropping my baby off for a complete stranger to care for if I didn't have to. In 2003, Diva was born with no complications, much to my delight.
As Pom grew, we realized something was wrong. She wouldn't potty train and began getting horrible bladder infections. The odd thing to me was that she was never in any pain with the infections. At 3, she was referred to a pediatric urologist who said "overactive bladder". It didn't get better and we had to switch insurances. In the meantime, her father and I separated and I had to go back to work, full time, as a single mom and full time college student.
Her infections became more frequent and she stopped pooping in the toilet. We were referred to a useless urologist (not pediatric) who continuously put her on more medications while she proceeded to have 37 infections in one year. Finally, I broke down. She was referred back to the first urologist and the insurance agreed to cover it. She had to have scar tissue removed from her bladder at 5 years old.
The pediatric urologist instantly ordered a barrage of tests that confirmed his suspicions. Within 5 months, she was having surgery to repair a tethered spinal cord. Unfortunately, the spinal cord had caused (probably permanent) nerve damage in her bladder.
She was in school at this point and her teacher was not a very communicative person. While she was nice, and Pom liked her fine, I was increasingly frustrated as was her urologist as Pom continued to get infections from urine just sitting in her bladder. Finally he said that if the school couldn't force her to try using the restroom every hour then she just couldn't go to school.
